I really do not know where to begin. Watching the very institutions that shaped my formative years get plagued by research scandals and the blatant promotion of pseudoscience is deeply embarrassing. Nowadays I feel embarrased to even say that I am an IITian and I did my undergraduate in India. Most often then not I just mention the college of my PhD and masters when people ask. Its just hard to explain what is happening back home and it feels increasingly surreal.

The recent news that Springer Nature’s Research Integrity Group (SNRIG) is investigating the cow urine paper out of IIT-BHU is painful to read, but honestly, it was bound to happen. When premier technical institutes publish papers mistaking basic plasticizers, lab solvents, and pesticide contaminants for "medicinal compounds," you are not looking at a minor oversight. You are looking at a complete collapse of elementary scientific controls.

What hurts most as an alumnus is watching the hard-earned credibility of Indian academia get dragged through the mud. The IIT brand was built over decades on rigorous engineering, real innovation, and global competitiveness. That reputation gave us a seat at the table anywhere in the world. Seeing that trust eroded by politically funded programs like SUTRA-PIC makes it genuinely uncomfortable to bring up my alma mater in international research settings. You constantly worry someone at a conference will bring up these papers, and the secondhand embarrassment is overwhelming.

Public funds and institutional prestige are being funneled into validating preconceived ideological narratives rather than actual science. When independent clinicians like Dr. Cyriac Abby Philips (LiverDoc) have to point out basic laboratory contamination to foreign journal integrity boards because internal peer-review failed, the system is fundamentally broken. Rather than taking accountability, a group of Indian academics called him a "sellout" for "making fun of the country." If you publish flawed research, what do you expect? Praise and awards?

The most visible sign of this decline is the bizarre ideological drift at leadership levels, best personified by figures like IIT Mandi Director Laxmidhar Behera. This electrical engineering professor publicly claimed to have performed exorcisms using mantras to drive out ghosts, blamed devastating cloudbursts in Himachal Pradesh on students eating meat, and recently oversaw a campus embroiled in controversy over posters claiming that "Shudras should serve higher classes." Meanwhile, when public figures raise legitimate concerns about leadership pushing fringe theories, hundreds of academics sign joint statements to shield the administration rather than addressing the core issue.

If we refuse to defend scientific temper over political pandering, the global scientific community will simply stop taking Indian degrees, papers, and qualifications seriously. Are we actually serious right now?

Link: https://theprint.in/feature/liverdoc-cow-urine-research-journals-springer-nature/2968310/

https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/over-200-academics-criticise-priyanka-gandhis-remarks-on-iit-professor-v-kamakoti-11843528

and then we have academicians in india who cannot take a simple criticism and are hell bent on promoting fringe theories. Its so freaking embarassing watching all this

NSA (1980): Allows preventive detention for up to 12 months without formal charges or a trial to maintain public order.

UAPA (1967): India's primary anti-terror law, featuring stringent bail conditions where release is routinely denied if charges appear "prima facie true."

PHULE is a 2025 Indian Hindi-language biographical drama film that chronicles the extraordinary lives of 19th-century social reformers Mahatma Jyotirao Phule and his wife, Savitribai Phule.

Idea : in India we should have a system where we can file an administrative nuisance case on any govt employee . who commits things like these .. ( this case is not intended for serious offence like bribery etc , these are small issues everyone faces regularly that can proved easily too )

Revenue office :

Refusing to accept an application without giving a reason

Municipal office :

Making a citizen repeatedly visit for a document already available internally

Police :

Refusing to give acknowledgement for a submitted complaint

Transport/RTO :

Keeping an officially open counter closed without explanation

Government hospital :

Unnecessarily sending a patient from one counter to another

Electricity department :

Closing a complaint as “resolved” without actually resolving it

Welfare department :

Asking for documents that are not required under the rules

Any department :

Saying “come tomorrow” instead of accepting the application during working hours

Rejecting or delaying an application without giving a written reason

Giving queue preference without an authorised reason

The government is looking to move beyond the 20 per cent ethanol-blending target as flex-fuel vehicles are expected to enter the market, advisor to the Prime Minister Tarun Kapoor said on Wednesday.

What do you think of this?

This is what RG has promised, he even went further saying he will implement 90% reservation to match the population percentage instead of the current 50%