Vestin Verghese

Have you heard of 'clocky'? Clocky is an alarm clock invented by Gauri Nanda of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Clocky sounds the alarm and then runs away and hides. Clocky's strategic retreat compels the sleeper to wake up and start a search for it. For the invention of clocky and thereby potentially saving thousands of man hours, Gauri Nanda was awarded the Ig Nobel Prize for Economics in 2005.

The Ig Nobel prize celebrates whacky inventions and strange research. It is a parody of the Nobel Prize and is awarded by Nobel Prize laureates at a not so glittering function. The winners don't get richer nor do they get grants for further research.

Interestingly this advance guard of silly scientific reasearch did not set out with the intention of bagging the Ig Nobel. They conducted their research with gravity not levity. They trod the path of patience. John Mainstone and Thomas Parnell started their experiment in 1927 and won the Ig Nobel Prize for Physics in 2005. They patiently watched a glob of congealed coal tar drip through a funnel, at the rate of one drop every nine years! In the rarefied heights of research, common sense, that rarest of senses, is conspicuous by its absence. A famous scientist once asked for two different doors to be installed for his dog and his cat as they were of different sizes!

Anyone who has conducted research knows just how difficult and challenging it can be. Therefore it is obvious that the title of the research programme has to be selected with care. An attempt should be made to gear the research programme towards the general good of science. However in India the majority of research programmes are conducted with the aim of producing 'papers'. The researcher is judged according to the number of papers he has published in recognised scientific journals. The quality of the papers is of no concern. In interviews for scientific and teaching posts, the researcher is awarded marks for papers published in national and international journals. Needless to say, the vast majority of Indian researchers have failed to make a mark by getting acceptance letters from international journals. Marks are also awarded for books written by the candidate. So a common ploy is to write a small book and bear the cost for publishing it. Thus a book that serves the author's purpose is born; a book none reads.

One has the sneaking suspicion that some of the awardees of the Ig Nobel Prize may have conducted their research without the best interest of science in mind. After all researchers too are human. A bizarre situation that prevails in Indian scientific institutions and colleges is the departmental rivalry and the infighting within departments. Far too often these rivalries drag the institution into a cesspool of petty politics, instead of catapulting it to soaring heights of scientific research.

The sign 'leave your egos outside' should be displayed outside the portals of scientific institutions and colleges. There is a crying need for a leadership that fosters true research in our scientific institutions. Science without religion should be stamped out at any cost.

The Ig Nobel Prize is awarded by Annals of Improbable Research. The Ig Nobel prizes for 2011 will be awarded in Harvard next week. Prizes will be given for all subjects for which Nobel Prizes are awarded, including literature.

I hope that this article will be considered for the Ig Nobel Prize (Literature).