Whither patriotism?

In the year 1986-87 , strategic technology renewal cycle every 5 years, after the first import of technology along with technology transfer, I had proposed in my capacity as Jt Director Research and taking care of the Secretariat of the Central Board of Railway Research. What I proposed was that the second generation of technology advance should occur in India, and we export the product. This can be done only if softskills and industry backbone get closely integrated with the technology import- where universities also get nominated for particulalr sectors. China followed this policy.

But the favourite pastime of India is to buy off the shelf every time new generation of equipment is produced again from abroad.

Even in case of technology transfer clause, it is observed more in letter but not really in spirit. The soft-skills needed are not nurtured and the basic industry backbone coupled with academic support from centers of excellence in Universities never get developed. So we continue to keep importing from one country or the other : of course the tendering, manipulations of specifications etc are carefully managed, so that CVC or CBI cannot fault.

In all cases where technology was not denied by the international bodies, we remained pure importers.

Only in case of nuclear and space technologies, where technology was denied, persons who never went abroad developed the space launchers and designed from scratch the entire Sriharikota facility. The man who did happened to be my classmate, unrecognised, unsung, retired quietly. But we proved to be in noway inferior to
any advanced country in the matter advanced technologies, so long as our import lobby cannot operate.

Way forward? Frankly old fashioned patriotism is what is missing today at top echelons.

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