Avoidable purchases

Sir, - With reference to the report ``World's highest observatory commissioned'' (The Hindu, Sept. 29), I beg to state that it has hardly gladdened my heart to learn that a small telescope of two- metre size had to be purchased and imported from the U.S. by the Astrophysics Department. It appears even the instrumentation to go with it is also either totally or partially imported.

A 2-m telescope is hardly worth a mention these days when the Americans, the Europeans and the Japanese have already put up telescopes of 8 metres and above.

If I remember correctly, as early as 1984 or 1985 an indigenous 2-metre telescope was built in Pune and set up by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics in Tamil Nadu. I saw the programme on Doordarshan when the late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi inaugurated it. It made us feel proud as Indians.

Fifteen years later we seem to have moved retrograde and are freely using our precious foreign exchange for entirely avoidable purchases. Do I have to believe that our scientists and engineers have lost their competence, something which they had demonstrated decades earlier? It is a sad comment on the state of affairs if we have to still import a small telescope and still have to depend upon foreign technologies.

In our great hurry to move towards globalisation, we are perhaps disallowing the development of our own engineering skills and destroying the morale of our own engineers.

There is too much hype about IT and related matters while basic sciences and engineering seem to be coming increasingly under neglect. The Prime Minister's clarion call ``Jai Vigyan'' does sound a bit hollow, when his own government is supporting such ventures.

T. Raghavachari,

Bangalore

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