Brain drain no cause of alarm,
claim defence researchers

The Defence Research and Development Organisation has said that the rate at which scientists and engineers are leaving the premier laboratory is no ''cause for alarm''. However, it agreed that the brain drain needs to be stemmed to the extent possible.

The DRDO officials were reacting to the government's admission in Parliament recently that about 3 per cent of DRDO scientists and engineers leave the organisation every year.

DRDO sources maintain that the shortfall is more than compensated for by quick recruitment drives through advertisements, campus interviews and swift induction of meritorious candidates and research fellows.

The sources said that the DRDO is aware that a certain percentage of those who left the organisation, joined multinational companies offering attractive salaries and perks. Even the intellectual challenge at DRDO could not help retain some scientists, away from the corporate world.

Number of scientists who left DRDO in the last three years:
1994 1995 1996	148 177 162

It is learnt that the DRDO is now planning a considerable improvement in service conditions and better remuneration packages to halt even the 3 per cent brain drain it is suffering.

DRDO sources are emphatic that the continuous loss of talent every year has in no way affected defence research.

Scientist are inducted into the DRDO through a national selection process. Over the last five years, the average annual rate of induction has been around 300 scientists and engineers.

A number of fellowship courses are run for scientists recruited. In addition, there is a fellowship scheme under which bright young scientists and engineers work for stipulated periods in DRDO laboratories.

The sources claimed that the reasons for the scientists quitting DRDO range from purely personal to employment abroad and the size of the pay packet.

A point to note is that a majority of those who quit the organisation are either electronics or computer specialists.

The DRDO's major projects and programme activities are undertaken in a 'consortium' mode in which work packages are executed at a number of centres.

Asked to identify the means the DRDO is adopting to counter the loss of talent, the sources said the lure of better compensation schemes offered by companies in India and abroad is, generally, compensated in the DRDO by the provision of an exciting development environment linked to meet the challenges in advanced technologies and opportunities to use excellent facilities.

''We continue to be adequately successful in recruiting and retaining the available talent in the country with forward-looking policies and tools like the continuing education programme,'' the sources said.

The sources believed that the personnel policies and research and development projects in DRDO provided adequate incentives and rewards to the young scientists and engineers.

''We must, however, continue to attract the best talent for our science and technology programmes,'' the sources said.

In this context, the sources quoted one of the convocation addresses of Dr A P J Abdul Kalam to say that top priority should be to recognise the country's scientific and technical manpower as a "national resource".

Dr Kalam had said: ''One of the core competence areas of India is scientific and technical manpower. It has to be converted into resource cadre within the country.

''The present thrust in many countries abroad is in attempting to use this core-competence, in India itself, as cheap technical manpower, for their software/hardware products, which, with value addition, generates wealth for them, at our cost.

''It is time, we in India, recognise our scientific and technical manpower as a national resource, providing befitting financial attractions, to derive benefits directly, instead of seeking technologies from outside which are, in most cases, acquired with the help of our country's core-competence in science and technology,'' Dr Kalam had said.

DRDO has, at present, a strength of about 30,000 heads, of which about 6,000 are scientists and engineers.

The DRDO's mission-driven projects are implemented through a network of 52 laboratories. They cover a multitude of disciplines spanning most areas of science and engineering.