A postdoctoral student in USA (call him X) applies to the Ramanujam Fellowship and does not get even an acknowledgment. After a few months, he gets an offer for an assistant professor in IISc, joins a department in IISc and starts setting up his lab. On 2 Jan, a colleague calls him and says, "Happy new year to you. As a Ramanujam fellowship recipient, can you help me with my proposal?" X is surprised and denies being a recipient of the award. His colleagues points him to the DST website, which shows his name as being recommended ! He calls DST and finds that they have sent the money to IISc but had not informed X. IISc, of course, has taken the money but also had not informed X. Luckily for him, they did not ask him for a yearly report (yet!).
In another case, IISc is insisting that they pay me Rs. 25000 for JC Bose fellowship even though I am not a recipient of the same. When they paid me the fellowship in September, I informed them that I am not a recipient. So, they did not pay me the fellowship in October. In fact, to resolve the problem, they did not pay the fellowship of all the 39 recipients in IISc in October. Then, in November, after verification (!), they paid me the fellowship with arrears for both October and November!
In yet another case, IISc paid the fellowship of the DBT wellcome grant to a faculty, who had not got the fellowship. Apparently, DBT Wellcome grants are of two types: a project grant and a fellowship. Some get only the project grant while some get both. Apparently, this faculty had not got the fellowship but only the grant. He was paid the fellowship for one year before IISc and/or the faculty noticed. I will leave it to your imagination on how the case was resolved.Clue: The obvious solution is not the correct solution!
On this happy note of IISc paying fellowships to everyone ineligible, let me wish you a very happy Makara Sankaranthi and pongal.
14 comments:
Prof. Giridhar,
Thanks for sharing your concerns about the state of affairs regarding fellowships at IISc. It is a pity that such things are prevalent in an established institution.
It would be nice if you can share what steps you took (as a member of the institution) to rectify such administrative defects, not just in your case but overall.
How do you think such problems could be solved? Will conducting a 2-day training course for administrative staffs on EFFECTIVE MANAGEMENT/ BOOK KEEPING help? Someone has to bell the cat, why not us!
Wish you and all your blog readers a happy Pongal/Magara Sankaranthi.
Chris
I hope they didn't recover DBT fellowship from the Prof's salary.
We have faced problems with DST at student level. It takes them anywhere between 6-8 months to settle the expenses related to conference expenditure that we students incur. In the meanwhile, all e-mails sent to DST go unanswered and the student can only wait till he receives any news from DST. The suspense is some times killing especially for those who are close to completing their PhD and submitting their thesis.
Chris, The case worker in this case is a very nice and efficient person. However, she was away for three months on child care leave (all women are eligible for 2 years of fully paid leave). When she came back, she fixed all the problems.
As a person used to the system, I am happy that the person who worked in her absence at least did not mess up the regular cases !
Training courses will help people who sleep not people who pretend to sleep. It also will not help people who do not turn up for work.
Vinay, One of my students is facing the same problem. He is submitting his thesis next month. Hopefully, DST will settle it before he defends the thesis in six months or so.
Giridhar
Prof. Giridhar,
Thanks for your reply. I can imagine the situation of ineffective training courses!
Thanks,
Chris
Prof. Madras,
I don't know if you remember those days, but there used to be a time when getting a draft made at SBI used to take all day. Now, you can go online and file a request. SBI, as we both know, is a government bank, with an excellent online portal, designed by a well known "private" Indian software company.
Here are a few suggestions I have:
1) IISc may be short on competent people, but there is a lot of scope for computerization of records. For instance, you could merge IAMS and Schemes records and make a nice portal to access it. Outsource this to a good firm like TCS/Infosys and pay them well, like apparently SBI did.
2) Right now, every piece of paperwork that leaves me, has to get approved by the Chair/Divisional Chair/AD. Why don't we make this whole process electronic? If you need a paper trail, you could outsource the printing process of hard copies. If you want security, make the approval access biometric ID based. Our approval process is archaic and needs to be chucked out.
3) As someone else suggested, hire a few people to interface with the outside world. These people could be recent MBAs with a drive (aka, young people). Give them a budget and staff and a lofty name such as "Director of External Liaison". You will get good people and professors will not spend half their time chasing funding agencies.
4) Make every interaction with the institute administration ticket based, through the unified computerized portal. If I want to complain about faulty wiring in my lab, I should be able to go online, select "electrical problem" from a drop down menu, and file a request. An SMS ticket can be generated by the system and sent to an external contractor (outsourced), who will fix the problem. He will get paid on a "per-job" basis.
5) I also think that we should do something about pompous faculty in IISc. There are many, who don't do a thing and just sit there and fart from their mouths. If they cannot be engaged in any constructive activity, I suggest that we install some treadmills hooked to dynamos in the faculty club, and use these faculty members to generate free electricity.
In my opinion, Profs. Balram and Balakrishnan are doing an awesome job, which is what has still kept IISc's position as the best place for students in India to come for research and faculty to take up employment. But, we all need to pitch in and help them, and make some badly needed changes to the way administration is currently run.
iisc prof
iisc prof,
Thanks for your comment. #1 and #2 are being done. Should be finished by August is what the comm members tell me.
The admin, as far as I know, is skeptical about #3.
Regarding #4, this was discussed a few days back but I do not know what happened after that.
Regarding #5, am I one of them?
Giridhar
Regarding #5, am I one of them?
Actually, I wanted to take your name in the same line as Balram and Balki for being someone who is trying to do something to bring about a positive change in the system. But lately, I get the feeling that you don't want to be mentioned in the same line with any member of the administration ;-)
So, I will heap my praises on you separately. Kudos to you my friend!
iisc prof
"I get the feeling that you don't want to be mentioned in the same line with any member of the administration ;-)"
Actually, one has to be careful in India regarding tags.
good administrator (poor researcher)
hard worker (not smart)
bright (does not work hard)
interesting alternate viewpoints (does not have a clue)
maybe helpful (does not care)
very helpful (maybe cares)
Whatever I have done is because Balaram and Balki have always supported me.
Best
Giridhar
Prof. Giridhar,
Nice to read your list of 'oxymorons'!
Just on a lighter side, Indian academia (incl. funding agencies) is a 'fine mess' and their staffs are 'uniquely skilled' :-)
Chris
Dear Prof. Giridhar,
many congratulations on your new role of a professor, which was eagerly awaited for long.
The website mgmt.iisc.ernet.in is normally dead.
regards
db
db,
I have no idea what you mean...
Giridhar
> many congratulations on your new role of a
> professor, which was eagerly awaited for long.
DB, you appear to have reached the wrong blog. You were probably looking for Giri the horticulturist. Sorry to disappoint you, but this Giri's application for a Professorship was repeatedly turned down and the last I heard, he decided to leave to cultivate a greener pasture away from IISc. An absolute scandal I must say.
Don't post sarcastic comments :-) !!
Your comments will be misinterpreted and people will try to correlate h-index with promotions.
You have been warned :-)
ANY CLUE ON RAMANUJAN FELLOWSHIP MEETING
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