This is an interpretative narrative of the six decade long experience of a People’s Science Movement and the creation of a cumulative scientific culture in the southern Indian state of Kerala. Major milestones of that scientific culture are presented with a plausible correlation with status of the state in SDG goals and HDI illustrating the creation of scientific culture value chain…
Historically the first SciComm initiative in India started in 1947 with the formation of Bangla Vigyan Parishat by the celebrated physicist S.N. Bose of Bose Einstein condensate fame. Ten years, later similar efforts were made in the southern state of India, Kerala with the Science Literature Council. Five years later this Council was reorganized with 40-odd science writers in 1962 which evolved and metamorphed into a massive People’s Science Movement (PSM) presently with 60,000 grassroot Scicommers in 1300 networked units with one SciCommer per 650 of population active in the field. The strategic manifesto is ‘Science for Social Revolution’ and exclusively used the native language, Malayalam, to create and sustain scientific culture with measurable societal impact. Mission driven, it weaponized the people with the tools of science and technology to reverse the process of monopolizing the benefits of science and technology by a privileged minority.
Science and Culture
Bertrand Russell while receiving the Kalinga Prize for the Popularization of Science lamented the divorce of science and culture describing the separation of science from culture as a modern phenomenon (1). He underlined the importance of science communicators, who act effectively as liaison officers between scientists and the public as performing a work which is necessary not only for human welfare but also for bare survival of the human race. Charles Snow hypothesized that science and the humanities which signified the western intellectual life had fissioned into “two cultures” and that this was a major handicap to both in solving the world’s problems (2). This concept had a long term damaging effect of fence building and the two cultures were not only on not speaking terms but also revelled in making faces at each other. Culture studies scholars posit two quite distinct cultures within science , one more inclusive, that promotes transparency of reporting and open science, and another, less inclusive, that promotes reproducibility as a remedy to the current practice of science.(3)
Russian Revolution
The early evolutionary history of the PSM had a distinctive critical phase in Bombay where a team of nuclear scientists planned, organized and executed a science capital development project and validated the proof of concept. A nuclear engineer MP Parameswaran, affectionately referred to as MP nationally in PSM, returned from Moscow absorbing the best practices of the Russian science popularization revolution and set off a chain reaction with a team of 100 Malayalam speaking scientists and engineers of the Atomic Energy Establishment, then Bombay. Inventing technical glossary, production of science articles, discussion meets, translation work, type writer keyboard development and building a cadre of writers and speakers from the scientist community were the high points of this phase. Later MP moved to his home state for full time engagement in PSM.
Trained in the Russellian thoughts and dissatisfied with the dichotomy of two cultures and influenced by Marxian thoughts, MP envisioned a scientific revolution in dialectical terms foreshadowing Stephen Gould. Science and technology in the Soviet Union served as an important part of national politics, practices, and identity. From the time of Lenin, science and technology were intimately linked to the ideology and practical functioning of the Soviet state, and were vigorously pursued. Max Weber differentiated between science as profession and science as an intensely inspired inner calling for the truth. Soviet state made it a strategy to establish a harmonious link between profession and vocation through a cultural-ideological ‘dispositif’ with a set of Soviet specifics of science communication (4) .
Nuclear Nexus
MP was witness to the Soviet SciComm revolution. He had returned from Moscow after training and was fluent in Russian language. In 1966, under the project planning ‘Let 100 flowers bloom’, he galvanized a group of Malayalee nuclear scientists and engineers in Bombay to actively consider the possibilities of producing science literature in Malayalam. The continual contacts between the Bombay group and the organizers of the Kerala Sastra Sahithya Parishad led to the formation of the Sastra Sahithya Parishad (Malayalam), Bombay in January 1966. Similar organizations were formed for other regional languages and they were sought to be coordinated through a ‘‘Federation of Indian Languages Science Associations’’ (FILSA). SSP (M), Bombay was the most active among these groups, with regular monthly discussion meetings on various science subjects in Malayalam.
The proof of concept was developed in Bombay where a high quality, high density science capital in inter-, multi-, and trans disciplinary knowledge areas was fortuitously available with knowledge of Malayalam. Transformation as well as transmutation of this science capital into Scicomm asset was the strategy. Tactically, an association SSP(M) was registered and preselected activities were programmed and operationalized. Every subject matter expert was persuaded to create two SciComm articles in Malayalam and present it in a meeting and finalize the text. One article will be technical with the principles and concepts explained and the second article will be complementary describing some practical applications. Gas Chromatography, Nuclear Fuel Reprocessing, Reverse Osmosis, Food Irradiation, Mass spectrometry, Radiocarbon Dating and similar topics came out in Malayalam. Planned production of science articles and books was the tactical priority. Vocabulary enrichment was the first critical step taken. Around 3000 SciComm words were coined and placed in public domain for comments by linguists and teachers contributing to the development of a scientific glossary.
Six Decades
A helicopter view of the scientific cultural landscape can be had by following the arrow of time in the evolutionary history of the PSM history over six decades. The first decade coincided with the golden age of capitalism. The state was experiencing a renaissance cultural revolution shaking the core of its body- social destroying the fabric of the old order. One of the intellectual streams was a library movement and its architect was a school science teacher, PT Bhaskara Panicker who galvanized a network of concerned citizens, mainly school science teachers. In 1962 April 8, a Science writers Association was formed in Kozhikode and the 32 founding members were all technical experts. For a decade, concentration was on science popularization and creating science awareness among the public and membership rose to 4000. Constitution was made in in1967 and emblem created in 1971. The sixties witnessed the ascent of science spectacularly by the conquest of space and the human footprint on lunar surface. The zeitgeist of those times was unbounded optimism in science culture. Sociologically it was also the golden decade of capitalism.
The second decade signified the oil crisis and the rising oil price created structural changes. The middle east became the Eldorado of wealth creation and epicentre of employment with the resultant working class migration to the gulf . PSM attention was shifted from the platform of protest of misuse and abuse of science and technology to the slogan of science for social revolution and reconstruction. The philosophical underpinning was that the Indian society as one; divided into two groups: a minority, which is continually getting richer and a majority which is continuously getting impoverished or is facing the threat of degradation. The analysis was that science and technology serve as efficient tools in the hands of the minority, the haves, in exploiting the majority, the have-nots. PSM took, on every issue, a stand partisan to this majority consequently against the minority and strove to arm the majority with the weapon of science and technology in their fight against impoverishment, against the exploiters. Educating people was enhancing their power to understand and analyze social issues in a scientific way and help them to play a more active role in transforming the society. If science and technology become a tool in the hands of this majority, it will bring about a radical change in the society. Hence the KSSP slogan Science for Social Revolution. Concurrently it paved the way for building a broad based massive movement opening up membership to all who are interested in science. Those who do not Reply to letters, do not Keep proper accounts, do not Accept responsibilities, do not Fulfil accepted responsibilities, do not Understand the value of others’ time, do not have Faith in human beings and Those who always complain about others are not admitted into the fold.
The third decade witnessed the end of cold war as also the fall of the Soviet Union and the Socialist Block. PSM evolved into a movement studying social problems, analyzing them and critiquing them and developing alternatives and transferring the campaigns to the public. Membership became more diverse and reached 42,000 including women. During this decade the Oil crisis displayed a new social phenomenon and saw a migration of people to the middle east with changes in the economy. The fourth decade of the PSM experienced pervasive Neoliberalism including in scientific research. The ascent as well as the descent of the influence of financial capital formation was the characteristic feature of the fifth decade. Also was luminous consequences of environmental degradation and climate change. All these changes impacted the course of science and technology (5).
Recent advances in Information Technology, Biotechnology and Nanotechnology have deeply impacted body social and countries have on place Science ,Technology and Innovation policies. Quark theory of matter, Lasers that transformed communication and treatment modalities, Rapid growth of Internet, Discovery of microwave background radiation validating Big Bang theory, Human Genome Project, Gene Editing Technology, Discovery of Gravitational Waves , Exoplanets, Search for Extra-terrestrial life and diagnostic MRI scanning made a long inventory of the impact of science. Such advancements in science generated rational optimism and great expectations among the literate masses. Several problems that remained insoluble were dissolved creating trust in science culture (6).
The interaction between the traditional existing local culture and the scientific culture has not been an easy straightforward acceptance of the scientific culture introduced in deficit mode. Deficiency and insufficiency were evident but were not responsive to the presentation of facts and reasoned arguments alone. One successful case study is that of kitchen fireplaces. Most households used firewood and burning firewood in the confines of the kitchen was bothersome. A new improved fire place was designed with higher heat transfer efficiency and was installed in selected houses. The story spread like wildfire. The demand skyrocketed and the science activists had access to the kitchen and the woman head of the family leading to a relationship management and trust building 500,000 fire places were installed and the acceptability of PSM as a public service provider gathered momentum.(7)
Over these decades , PSM expanded its fields of interests and activities to almost all fields of human endeavour. In essence it remained educative, combative and constructive informating the masses. The macro vertical domains it operationalized are environment, health, education, energy, literacy, micro planning and development in general deeply embedded in the culture of science. However, a cultural aberration a toxic concoction of tragic capitalism and antiscience attitude is emerging in COVID19 pandemic time challenging the scientific culture. The Universal Immunization program and the principle for vaccine for all are being jettisoned by commercial considerations and distinctly discriminatory vaccination program have highlighted the fact that scientific culture needs eternal vigilance.
SDG and HDI
The six decade long development of Sciculture is reflected in sociological parameters and the report card of measured indices are available validating process and strategies. The Index for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) evaluates progress on various parameters including health, education, gender, economic growth, institutions, climate change and environment. First launched in December 2018, the index has become the primary tool for monitoring progress on the SDGs in India. The state has retained the top rank in Niti Aayog’s SDG India Index 2020-21 for the third consecutive year, a recognition of its social, economic and environmental progress. The state bagged 75 points, an improvement from 70 and 69 in the previous years. Since its launch in December 2018, Kerala has been topping the index, which has become the primary tool for monitoring progress on the SDGs in the country. Kerala scored in segments such as ‘zero hunger’, ‘quality education’, and ‘affordable and clean energy’. Kerala’s rating of HDI is 0.790 is the highest in India, resulting mainly from the vast improvements the state has made in the fields of sanitation, health, education and poverty-reduction. A cumulative scientific culture can be created and sustained by intensive strategic science communication.
P.Jayaraman, S. Sivadas and MPS Ramani
