Science in India: Progress towards becoming Vishwa-Guru & the Indian Council of Agricultural Research

Science in India: Progress towards becoming Vishwa-Guru & the Indian Council of Agricultural Research

India spends 0.65% of its GDP (~2.6 trillion) on research and development (R&D) continuously after 2014. However, it was 0.81% of GDP in 2005-06. State and Central Government share has shrunk from 35% (in 2010) to 24% (in 2018) and steadily going down. Of the total R&D expenditure, ~37% goes to the health and defense sector and only 2% towards education (https://dst.gov.in/sites/default/files/Research%20and%20Deveopment%20Statistics%202019-20_0.pdf).

 India in comparison to other major economies: As per statistics of 2018 (Tab. 1), USA (2.83% of >20 trillion GDP), China (2.14% of >13 trillion GDP), Japan (3.28% of ~5 trillion GDP), Germany (3.13% of >4 trillion GDP), UK (1.7% of >2.8 trillion GDP), France (2.19% of ~2.8 trillion GDP), Italy (1.39% of >2 trillion GDP), South Korea (4.53 of >1.6 trillion GDP), Canada (1.54% of >1.6 trillion GDP), Russia (0.98%  of >1.5 trillion GDP) and Australia (1.8% of >1.3 trillion GDP), Israel (4.94% of >0.4 trillion GDP). Though India is the 6^th biggest economy in the world it is at 13^th place in total expenditure on R&D. If we consider per-capita expenditure on R&D, India stands at 19^th place with an expenditure of about Rs. 900 per person per year much behind Switzerland spending Rs. 2.16 lakhs per person on R&D in the country.

Major areas of R&D Expenditure in India: As per statistics for 2017-18, of the 17 billion US$ R&D budget of India, major shares go to DRDO (~32%), space research (~19%), ICAR (~11%), atomic energy (~10%), CSIR (~10%), DST (~7.5%). Of the research funding, 24% goes for basic and 37% for applied research. (https://dst.gov.in/sites/default/files/Research%20and%20Deveopment%20Statistics%202019-20_0.pdf).

According to scientific manpower and infrastructure ICAR is one of the biggest organizations funded publicly. National Agricultural Research System (NARS) under DARE/ICAR consists of 103 Agricultural Research Institutes, 75 Agricultural Universities, 82 All India Coordinated Research Projects/Network Projects, and 11 Agriculture Technology Application Research Institutes ably supported by a network of 721 Krishi Vigyan Kendras. For about Rs. 14065 crores allocated to Agriculture R&D, ICAR received about 7846 crores in 2020 and about 500 crores went to other DARE activities. There are about 5000 scientists out of a total of 17000 employees in the ICAR system.

    From Table 2 it is evident that by spending one rupee on purchasing consumables for research ICAR spends about 10 rupees on administration. My experience says that this expense on administration is largely to safeguard the one rupee from misuse spent on the purchase of the consumables. A great organization with great management by great managers. From the facts, it may be inferred that either scientists in the organization are wasteful or dishonest, and saving that one rupee (the Golden coin) spent by scientists on the purchase of consumables is more valuable than anything else in the organization.

    

    Some more revelations from the annual account audited report of ICAR for 2019-20 are also interesting (https://icar.org.in/sites/default/files/Eng-ICAR-Annual-Account-Audit-report-2019-20.pdf):

1. ICAR earned Rs. 1.9 Crores in form of royalty from research and publications in 2019-20

2. ICAR spent Rs. 4.1 Crores as legal expenses in the same year.

Inference: For earning 48 paise of royalty from research and publications India's one of the Greatest and largest research organizations (ICAR) spends 100 paise on advocates and lawyers as legal expenses probably to safeguard 48 paise. One of the RTIs revealed that ICAR does even not know exactly how many legal litigations are pending and ongoing with ICAR.

    If we further descend to see Institutional performance in budget utilization in the leading institute (as per the statement of the Director on 13-01-2022), the ICAR-Indian Veterinary Research Institute as an example, holding 202 scientists on the roll, of the 340 crores allocated annual budget for 2020-21, >75% went for salary, 13% for administrative expenses and less than one percent (0.935%) i.e., 3.2 crores was spent on research related consumables. In short, for making a research material purchase of one rupee we spend 14 Rs. on administration. The institute awards each year's research degree (Masters and Ph.D.) to 180  students on average, i.e., the total number of researchers in the Institute is 202+180= 382 i.e., less than 84 thousand are available for purchasing research consumables. The quality can be imagined but can't be measured, only 105 research papers are published in 2021 in journals considered worthwhile by the ICAR itself by the Institute holding 166 young scientists and 180 research scholars. 

    Though I am not an expert on administration, it is interesting to note that administrative expenses in ICAR are almost 1.5 times more than operational expenses on research. There are 5000 scientists in ICAR, per scientist expenses on consumables are well below 1.5 lakh per annum while a scientist gets more salary per month than the money available to him for doing research per annum.

            Is there not a need to minimize the administrative charges to increase real expense in research in form of the ability of a scientist to purchase more chemicals and other consumables to do better research?

Is there a need to reduce the number of scientists to reduce expenses on salary in ICAR? The ICAR is an amazing system where scientists are recruited in the same manner of recruitment of soldiers. At the time of recruitment, neither the recruiter nor scientists know what works, for what project, and with what objectives the recruitment and recruits need to justify. In lack of clarity, a lot of scientific manpower goes to waste for years together, I have my example, after my recruitment as principal scientist I was not given a workplace for years unless I asked the Director-General of the ICAR (What for I have been paid the hefty salary per month?).

One very interesting phenomenon or fact with ICAR is that it prepared a hefty draft to double farmers’ income in just three years without increasing its own agriculture income from lakhs of hectares of land with NAARS even by 10% per year despite having 5000 scientists and 17000 employees.

I understand the situation may not be much different in other research organizations in India. I understand that there is a need for large-scale restructuring of the research system in India but it is not possible with political will.

This situation needs a change regarding funding and research management if we have to give the pace to Indian Research in the Public Sector.

Besides research funding, one more move of the Indian Govt is pertinent to be mentioned. There will now be fewer awards to Scientists of India for doing Research, wiping off about 100 award categories for research.

COVID-19 Pandemic in Data

 Sometimes I think, what may be the utility of garbage data accumulated globally, in the future, it will misguide our generations and people will laugh at us if we analyze it today. An example is here:

Dear friends, whenever there is an epidemic or pandemic population of the affected region goes down, but COVID-19 is an exception in its era world population kept increasing as usual by 1.1% annually, it was 7.71 billion in 2019, 7.79 billion in 2020 & 7.91 billion in 2021, continuously. The annual death rate (7.6 per thousand) for all 3 years ( 2019 to 2021) remained largely unaffected, so where is the impact of COVID-19?

From 1918-20, Spanish flu led to a 2.1% decrease in the global population in two years but in the Covid-19 era global population increased by 2.2% in two years. The great and historical pandemic of COVID-19 is getting stronger, so be careful.

Is COVID-19 a hoax? Certainly not, but is a pandemic to create panic in favor of greedy pharmaceuticals, tyrant politicians, and much more.

See how #Covid_19 is used to create panic. In comparison to 2019, in 2020 total excess deaths were 873633 (probably in proportion to the increase in population & the 0.76% usual death rate). Let us consider that the same number of deaths as in 2019 also occurred in 2020 and 2021, and also consider that all excess deaths were due to COVID-19, still, the number of deaths attributed 1941762 to COVID-19 is about 1.1 Million in excess over the real death figures. That is people who were to die otherwise for different reasons were also added to the account of #COVID19 & this addition was 1.5 M in 2021, let us see in 2022??? The statistics indicated that many of those who used to die from several other diseases died from COVID-19 in 2020 and 2021. Is it a reality, I'd yes then great covid-19 is reducing the burden of other diseases.

It means #Covid_19 is a plandemic to create panic with the help of some ill-educated medicos, politicians, and media houses.

Dear friends, I have seen people suffering and dying due to Covid-19, and not deny the tragedy we saw in the 2nd wave. But you see the data, none is produced by me, just put together to understand.

It is a mockery of our data system and epidemic management system which works with motives decided by tyrants, it rarely works for general people, who are always on the wrong end.

Data sources used: 1. https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/#table-historical

2. https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/WLD/world/death-rate

3. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2866376/

4. https://www.worldometers.i

Herd immunity is not possible with any of the available COVID-19 vaccines in any of the countries. The goodness of the experimental vaccines claimed by WHO and many other Public health agencies proved that it was not true. Israel, the highly boostered nation, and many more heavily vaccinated nations as 99% vaccinated UAE and 95% vaccinated Portugal not only faltered against COVID-19 but performed even worse after the vaccines and vaccination than any of the COVID waves before vaccination. All agencies bluffed us saying that 70% vaccination will create herd immunity but even the 99% could not. This is the tyranny of our system.

किसान आंदोलन की विजय के अर्थ

लगभग 13 महीने तक दिल्ली की सीमाओं पर चले किसान आंदोलन में किसान कितना जीता यह तो कहना मुश्किल है क्योंकि उस जमात के लगभग 700 सिपाही इस रण में खेत रहे परंतु अंततः वह तीन कानून जो तथाकथित लोकतांत्रिक तरीके से लाए गए बताए गए थे उन्हें वापस अलोकतांत्रिक तरीके से लेना पड़ा वैसे दिखावा उसमें भी लोकतांत्रिक था. किसानों की इस जीत ने दिखा दिया के गैरजनतांत्रिक तरीके से लाए गए वो कानून जो बहुमत वाली सरकार लाई थी और पूरी तरह गलत भी नहीं थे परंतु उन्हें पूरी तरह वापस लेना पड़ा, अगर उन्हीं कानूनों को संसद में पूरी बहस करवा कर जनतंत्र की भावनाओं को सम्मान देकर लागू किया जाता जो पूरी तरह संभव था क्योंकि बहुमत सरकार के पास था और बहस के बाद भी विजय निश्चित थी परंतु ऐसा नहीं हुआ क्योंकि लोकतांत्रिक सरकार अलोकतांत्रिक होकर दम्भी / अहंकारी सरकार बन गई थी. इस संघर्ष में हार हुई है तो उस दंभ की जो लोकतांत्रिक तरीके से प्राप्त बहुमत से प्राप्त हुआ और एक शाह अपने मन की बात करते-करते अपने आप को भगवान समझकर सभी के लिए अपने निर्णय थोपने लगा उसका अपना मन कहने लगा कि वह जो भी सोचता है वही सत्य है, वही शुभ है, उसी में सबका भला है परंतु वह भूल गया कि लोकतंत्र में जनतंत्र की भावनाएं तिरोहित करके कितना बड़ा भी बहुमत हो वह छोटा साबित होता है. अगर संसद में संवाद करके यह बिल जनतांत्रिक तरीके से पास कराया जाता तो विपक्ष कभी भी एक होकर उस तरह किसानों का समर्थन ना करता जैसा उसने किया, कोई माने या ना माने कमजोर विपक्ष का किसानों के संघर्ष को पूर्ण समर्थन घमंडी सरकार के मन में वोट का भय उत्पन्न करने में सक्षम रहा और उसी भय ने एक सर्वशक्तिमान नेता का घमंड चकनाचूर कर दिया परंतु टूटते घमंड में भी उसने अपना वर्चस्व कायम रखते हुए दिखा दिया कि वह चाहे तो कुछ भी कर सकता है उसका कोई विरोधी उसके दल में कोई स्थान नहीं रखता. #इस संघर्ष ने यह भी सिद्ध किया कि भाग्य कब किसे जननायक बना दे, किसे खलनायक बना दे यह नायकों को भी पता नहीं होता, #किसान संघर्ष ने यह भी दिखा दिया कि निरंतरता ही जीत का रास्ता है. किसानों के इस आंदोलन में वह इंसान जननायक बनकर निकला जिसे समझा जा रहा था कि वह सरकार का भेजा हुआ किसान संघर्ष को कमजोर करने के लिए एक खलनायक है शायद उस जननायक को भी यह एहसास नहीं था कि वह एक दिन इस मुकाम पर पहुंच पाएगा . #कुल मिला कर इस संघर्ष में अहम/अहंकार की हार हुई है, लोकतंत्र से जन्मे अलोकतांत्रिक तरीके की पराजय हुई. लोकतांत्रिक तरीके से भारी बहुमत से जन्मे बहुत से हिटलर पहले भी पैदा हुए हैं और उनका अंत भी दुखद हुआ है आज फिर हिटलरशाही को बहुत गहरा धक्का लगा है. किसान संघर्ष एक ऐसे मुकाम तक पहुंचा जो हर संघर्ष को नसीब नहीं होता. एक किसान ऐसे मुकाम तक पहुंचा जो हर किसान को नसीब नहीं होता. एक नेता जननायक बना जो हर नेता का नसीब नहीं होता. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/bhojraj-singh-762784228_asxatu-aslatbatuataate-aslatdato-activity-6877870468792147968-DmSn

Impact of COVID-19 Vaccination on reduction of COVID-19 Cases and deaths during 14-27 September 2021

 

Global impact (expressed as correlation) of COVID-19 Vaccination

14-27 September 2021

For recent updates, you may view (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/357028670_Impact_of_COVID-19_Vaccination_on_COVID-19_Deaths)

Analysis of data available online for COVID-19 cases & deaths (Source: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/weekly-trends/#weekly_table), & % vaccination (Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deployment_of_COVID-19_vaccines) for countries having more than 10 million people indicated a highly significant positive correlation i.e., more vaccination was associated with more disease & more deaths. Analyzing matching data available for all 193 countries also indicated a very strong positive correlation with the number of COVID-19 cases. There is no positive indication that COVID-19 vaccines are protecting the vaccinated populations of different countries in the world.

Impact (expressed as correlation) of COVID-19 Vaccination in India

Cases and deaths due to COVID-19 in the last 14 days (14-27 September 2021)

Analysis of data available online for COVID-19 cases & deaths, & % vaccination (Source: Source: http://data.covid19india.org) for 28 states and 8 Union territories of India using a variable number of dosages of three different vaccines of COVID-19 revealed that:

1.     More vaccination was linked with more deaths.

2.         1. The first dose of vaccine was associated with a significantly higher number of Adverse Events Following Immunization (AEFI), after 2^nd dose, adverse events were less.

3.    2.  Adverse events were more often associated with CoviShield and less often with Covaxin and Sputnik V.

4.    3.  COVID cases and deaths were more in regions using more CoviShield (positive correlation) than those using Covaxin and Sputnik V (negative correlation).

What to Do:

1. The immediate stoppage of the use of leaky, largely ineffective, and reactive COVID-19 Vaccines.

2. Promoting the development & use of whole virus vaccines either inactivated (like Sinopharm and Covaxin) or attenuated live (yet to be developed).

3. Promoting the judicious use of COVID-19 vaccines (https://azad-azadindia.blogspot.com/2021/03/how-judicious-is-covid-19-vaccination.html).

Herd-Immunity: A false notion for airborne and aerosol infections, not work well with the population moving and mixing with different groups frequently (Human population). After all, we are not herds of cattle or flocks of sheep to get advantages of herd immunity. It is a spoof floated by pharmacopoliticians to earn the money and bluff the people through creating panic and fear.

Updated as of 13th December 2021 

Impact of COVID-19 Vaccination on COVID-19 Cases and Deaths

 

Impact of COVID-19 Vaccination on COVID-19 Cases and Deaths

In the present analysis of data available for 208 countries with reference to a number of COVID-19 cases, deaths, population, etc. (https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus) and vaccination (https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covid-vaccine-tracker-global-distribution/) was used to calculate the impact of vaccination using correlation and multiple regression techniques. The analysis of correlation was also narrowed down for the 28 countries all having populations of  ≥50 million (Tab. 1). Though there may be several variables and confounders directly or indirectly affecting occurrence, spread, morbidity, and mortality of COVID-19^1-3 a successful vaccine and vaccination program is one which is little affected by regional or local, ethnic, and nonethnic, host and agent variables^4-6. Successful eradication and control of several diseases including Polio, Smallpox, Rinderpest, and to some extent FMD and Brucellosis⁷. However, varying stands of National and International Health Agencies and Organizations indicated the mysteriousness⁸ of COVID-19 and maniac attitude of the system towards the diseases which also affect powerful and mighty people and nations⁹. Further, the Pharmacopolitical motives might have restricted scientists in understanding the therapeutics, pathology, and control of the disease to a great extent. The genetically modified vaccines developed through ill-tested and never before approved technologies with the human genome, the potential of inducing several life-threatening complications and probable mutations in germ cells with unknown dangers have been used for mass vaccination of global population¹⁰. Nobody knows or is not educated about the spread of disease and many false assumptions¹¹ have been circulated, most probably intended to benefit a few big pharmaceuticals. Till 2019 the world health agencies were skeptical in permitting GM food production and consumption but suddenly the whole world has been inoculated with leaky GM vaccines with unknown efficacy and questionable safety converting vaccinated people to become super-spreaders (https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/national/mass-vaccinations-may-turn-super-spreaders-warn-kerala-docs/article35695823.ece) of the disease, the reasons might be known to the world health leaders.

The vaccines for protecting from the COVID-19 in the world are leaky, i.e., they neither protect from getting infection nor they provide enough immunity to halt virus multiplication in the host body is associated with several vaccination-associated disorders making people not only sick but also inducing life-threatening complications (https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/expect/after.html; https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-detail/coronavirus-disease-(covid-19)-vaccines-safety; https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/myocarditis.html; https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(21)00467-9/fulltext)

The analysis of online available data (1St September 2021) on vaccination in different countries and prevalence and incidence of COVID-19 revealed that instead of reducing the incidence of COVID-19 and mortality the vaccines in most of the countries are increasing the disease occurrence and deaths due to it. The increasing rate of the vaccinated population is having a positive impact on the increase in an absolute number of COVID cases and deaths in statistically highly significant (p, ≤0.02) figures. The level of association between vaccination percentage and increased number of COVID cases per million and deaths per million is very strong (Tab. 2) in most of the countries irrespective of the effect of population. However, a dilemma is the low incidence and low mortality of the disease in China, one of the highly vaccinated nations. In China, the vaccine used is a whole virus-killed vaccine (Sinopharm). Are killed vaccines more effective than the vaccines developed using modern biotechnology tools? The limited data on the simultaneous use of different vaccines along with breakout cases and deaths in each group is highly variable and not available in retrievable format in the public domain. In India, three vaccines (Oxford AstraZeneca CoviShield, Covaxin, and Sputnik-V) have been used at different levels of vaccination in different states and Union territories (https://data.covid19india.org/). The data analysis (Tab. 3) revealed that more use of Covaxin (a killed vaccine similar to that of Sinopharm used in China) was associated with decreased incidence of cases and deaths while the use of CoviShield was associated with an increased incidence of cases and deaths in the respective state.

The analysis suggested that except for the killed vaccines, the use of COVID-19 vaccines is not only associated with adverse vaccine reactions but also with a significant increase in COVID-19 incidence and deaths due to COVID-19 in August 2021. The analysis may be criticized because of not excluding so many other confounders affecting the outcome of vaccination, but the vaccines, efficacy of which is affected with confounders, are almost useless and go to the dust with time or remain as useful as Flu-Shots, only with limited and local use. Thus, there is an urgent need for research in therapeutics and also towards the development of more effective vaccines. Though personally, I am skeptical of the vaccine efficacy due to inherent short-lived immunity after vaccination as well as after natural infection.

The analysis further shattered the hopes from much-expected Herd-Immunity (>70% vaccination), as even after achieving the magic figure and much more, emerging mutants (as Delta and Mu; either under the effect of partial vaccination or global presence of the disease have evaded all kinds of immunity faultily measured by antibody response.

Indian Data: Is #COVID-19 Vaccination (16th September 2021) increasing the risk of faster spread of COVID-19? Data analysis from different Indian states indicated that more Covid-19 vaccination is associated with an increased number of cases and an increased number of deaths per million people by Covid-19. Though CFR in the most (>20%) fully vaccinated states in India in August-September 2021 is less than in the least (<8% fully) vaccinated states, total Covid-19 cases & deaths were 2.9 & 1.8 times higher in more vaccinated states than in less vaccinated states, i.e., Covid-19 vaccination is increasing the risk of spread of COVID-19. How is it possible? Probably vaccinated people are getting careless and the leaky vaccine making them infected without symptoms and they are acting as super-spreaders of diseases or Covid-19 vaccine is assisting the SARSCOV-2 virus in an undefined way to cause more disease.

References

1.      Bhoj R. Singh et al. Epidemiological Determinants of Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 Disease Pandemic and The Role of the Bacille-Calmette-Guerin Vaccine in Reducing Morbidity and Mortality. Journal of Pure and Applied Microbiology 2020(14):6224. DOI: 10.22207/JPAM.14.SPL1.39.

2.      Bhoj R. Singh et al. Are BCG Vaccination, Population Density, Median Age and Poverty Important Determinants of COVID-19 Pandemic Spread, Morbidity and Mortality? DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.21116.49282.

3.      Bhoj R. Singh. Changing Relations of COVID-19 Morbidity, Mortality, and CFR with the World. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.17870.89925/2.

4.      Bhoj R. Singh., et al. Pros and Cons of Covid-19 vaccines and vaccination DOI:10.12032/IDR2021B0207001

5.      Bhoj R. Singh., et al. COVID-19 Vaccines and Community Immunity. Infectious Diseases: Research and Treatment 2(1):5. DOI: 10.12032/IDR2021B0207001

6.      Bhoj R. Singh. Epidemiology of COVID-19 Pandemic and its Control strategies. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.22268.28808/1

7.      Bhoj R. Singh., et al. “Science Behind Non-spreading of COVID-19 During and After Political Rallies". Acta Scientific Pharmacology 2.6 (2021):10-16.

8.      Bhoj R. Singh. The COVID-19: A Mystery Disease. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.19214.89921

9.      Bhoj R. Singh. “COVID Mania and Truth of Life". Acta Scientific Pharmacology 1.9 (2020): 41-42.

10.   Bhoj R. Singh. Why sceptical of recommending the use of COVID-19 vaccines in the reproductive age? DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.24405.14565/1.

11.   Bhoj R. Singh. The Unwinding of the Second COVID-19 Wave in India. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.28062.25920

India: The World’s most Corporate (Pharma) Friendly Nation Part 2: Pharmacoplitics: Medical Oxygen and Covid-19 Vaccines are not Tested for Quality

 India again proved that it is the World’s most Pharma-Corporate Friendly Nation

Medical Oxygen and Covid-19 Vaccines are not Tested for Quality

Government by the Corporates, for the Corporates through Pharmacopolitics to bleed the people!!!

An RTI CDSCO/R/E/21/00235

 

Reply from The Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO), the organization responsible to Ensure and Guarantee Quality drugs, vaccines and other medical supplies  to Indians revealed that: 

Except for samples of 14 batches of COVID-19 vaccines collected in the Hyderabad region of CDSCO, not a single batch of 18 of #SputnikV, 117 of #COVAXIN & 153 of #COVISHIELD released in India from January to 30 June 2021 was sampled by CDSCO for #Quality_testing or #Quality_Tested.

Samples are claimed to be tested at CRI Kasauli for all 288 batches released till June 2021 for use in India, if not collected by CDSCO might have been sent from the producers or suppliers for getting clearance. Anyone can understand the validity of such sampling, no producer or supplier send substandard samples for testing. If sampling is not done at users end by CDSCO, directly under Central Government Control in the Department of Health and Family Welfare,  it indicates the facilitation of Pharmaceuticals producing and supplying Covid-19 vaccines and there is no difficulty in understanding what may be the purpose for the facilitation may be.

None of the batches of millions of tones of #Medical_Oxygen supply released in India from January to 30 June 2021 was sampled by CDSCO for #Quality_testing or #Quality_Tested.

This clearly revealed that Indian organizations work for corporate houses not for people. It is a false notion that India has a "Government is of people, by the people, for the people". It is only for the big corporate houses funding some selected. Government by the Corporates, for the Corporates through Pharmacopolitics to bleed the people!!!