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| We organized a discussion meeting at UC-San Francisco on June 11 to advertise and provide a clear picture of the available and emerging opportunities for academic careers in life sciences in India. The idea was set in motion by Dr K.Vijayraghavan to get the word out on the whole slew of Institutes starting or expanding in India. Considering that the success of these ventures depends largely on the talent pool recruited to take charge, Dr. K. Vijayraghavan put together a high profile delegation to reach out to potential recruits in the Bay Area. Dr MK Bhan, the head of the Department of Biotechnology, Governement of India, led the delegation and presented the vision of the Indian Government describing with historical perspective how the investment in science is changing over the years and how this investment will be distributed over the Universities and research institutes. A large drive is now being made to put research back in the Universities and places of education and to build synergistic clusters of institutions. He also detailed the different funding and fellowship plans at the individual level that will help to attract talented individuals. The big message in his presentation was that for Life Sciences in India, funding was no big object but finding talented individuals is. The focus of the meet then shifted to a large multi-institution cluster on the outskirts of Delhi with presentations by Drs Dinakar Salunke, Sudanshu Vrati, Martha Gray and Satyajit Rath followed by another cluster in Bangalore with talks by Drs K. Vijayaraghavan and Satyajit Mayor. Dr Ron Vale of UCSF then spoke briefly about the second annual young investigators meet in India that he is organizing to inspire the Indian scientific diaspora to return to India. The meeting concluded with an hour-long panel discussion. Bay Area Scientists Drs. James Spudich, John Kuriyan, Shuba Tole and Ishwar Hariharan joined the earlier mentioned presenters in responding to questions that ranged from the practical details of applying for positions in India to concerns about access to reagents. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| The most tangible fallout of this meeting could turn out to be the contacts and perhaps even friendships that have developed from bringing together present and would be young investigators into a small cauldron of primordial soup. This was one of those elements of the meeting that no organizer could have controlled and the results could have been demoralizing on the whole community if the mood had been different. But what I came away with was the overwhelming sense of possibilities. Not the absence of problems but the belief that they are solvable and a determination to solve them.
There were lively panel discussions on a variety of topics of relevance to young investigators from building and managing a lab, to applying for grants and educating a new generation of biologists. There was a sense of discovery in realizing that young investigators from across the country and from very different institutional set ups faced such remarkably similar problems. The senior Indian scientists stressed on the unlikeliness of having these problems solved from the top down; instead they advised that the only feasible option for the young scientists is to work from the bottom, from within their individual institutes. The message was that change is possible but will not be easy. An extraordinary group of mentors, Indian and international, played a catalyzing role in discussions within the conference rooms and outside under the palm trees and at the bar by the water. They talked about their insecurities and the confounding circumstances they faced when starting as independent investigators. Ron Vale described this breaking out into independence as not unlike our teenage years; even though we wouldn’t want to repeat the experience we are nevertheless the wiser, and better equipped to deal with the world, to have gone through it. On the final evening the post-docs and some senior scientists got together under the stars to analyze and discuss problems unique to those who are considering returning to India. The lack of easily accessible information on employment possibilities and application deadlines were brought up. There were frustrated voices on the intractability and sometimes incomprehensibility of application procedures. We talked about a lack of communication between Indian recruiters and post-docs and between post-docs themselves working abroad. A kind of ‘gateway to India’ website or a Facebook group was proposed to address issues of networking, information dispersal and contacts with the Indian system. The discussions ended with a unanimous support for continuing the idea of Young Investigators’ meetings in the coming years. As the meeting draws to an end I am filled with an excitement and curiosity about returning to India not unlike the one I feel when I set out to the lab in the morning eager to know the results of yesterday’s experiments. |
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Meet on Career Opportunities in Life Sciences in India Byers Auditorium, Genentech Hall, UCSF, June 11 View Schedule |
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