Availability of reference material in Indian languages to help researchers

NEW DELHI: Many Indian researchers, who have been pursuing research in their native languages, often face the language challenge while pursuing higher research as most reference material is available in English, which is the language of publication of research papers. To address this challenge, Indian authorities are giving a major push to provide all the literature bilingually.
“The power to grasp complex scientific concepts and analyse problems comes best to researchers when they are pursuing Science in their own language. But at the same time, researchers ought to know English, which is the international language of Science. Thus, our goal is to have all kinds of literature and reference material — from school to research — available bilingually so that researchers who work in native languages can benefit from them,” K Vijay Raghavan, principal scientific adviser to the Government of India, told Education Times on the sidelines of the Annual India Symposium on Science and Society.

He added that literature translation to provide necessary material to the researchers is a major part of the mission to boost research and is being spearheaded by the Ministry of Information Technology and MHRD and will be undertaken in partnership with the state governments.

“The aim is to push the translation programme and have machine as well as human translations accessible bilingually, in both English and the native language. This will aid in better communication between researchers across geographies. The task is much more feasible now with better technologies,” said VijayRaghavan.

EARLY SCIENTIFIC TEMPER

VijayRaghavan stressed on the need for promoting logical thinking and analysis as a key part of the school education to promote scientific temper in students at an early age.

“The way we treat Science needs to change and that will come by promoting critical analysis and encouraging students to be curious and ask questions. The intensity of our teaching is geared towards job and rightly so, but as technology changes rapidly there comes a disconnect between what is being taught and what is of use in the public domain. This is not a new challenge and needs to be continuously addressed through upgradation in our schools, though the basic concepts never get outdated,” he said.