My 'Improve the Practice of Software Development ...' paper is referenced in 2015 Management PhD Thesis on MCA students career planning, and in a 2012 Software Engineering literature survey paper

My paper mentioned in the title of the post is: "Improve the Practice of Software Development in India by having a Software Development Career Track in Indian CS & IT Academia" (by Ravi S. Iyer), December 2012.
Abstract: https://arxiv.org/abs/1202.1715 , PDF: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1202.1715 .

"MANAGEMENT PERSPECTIVE (ACADEMIC AND ADMINISTRATIVE ASPECT) IN CAREER PLANNING OF STUDENTS DURING 2007-2013 WITH REFERENCE TO SELECTED MCA INSTITUTES IN PUNE REGION” is a thesis submitted To Tilak Maharashtra Vidyapeeth, Pune (Maharashtra, India) for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D) In Management by Mr. Ashutosh Madhukar Kulkarni under the Guidance of Dr. Shriniwas S. Kulkarni in April 2015
Ref: https://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/86727/1/01_title.pdf.

The thesis contents can be viewed from here: http://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in:8080/jspui/handle/10603/86727.

In Section "1.7 Research Questions" of "Chapter 1: Introduction " on page 6, http://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in:8080/jspui/bitstream/10603/86727/6/06_chapter%201.pdf, it states: "A large number of IT graduates are available every year from different universities, but NASSCOM claims that very few IT graduates are employable, in addition, Ministry of Human Resource and Development (MHRD), New Delhi released a report which supports this view expressed by NASSCOM."

In the same section, it states that the researcher has identified a set of research questions. Among those research questions are:

"c) What are the industry needs/expectations from aspiring MCA candidates?
d) Are these needs/expectations known to the management of institute?
e) Is there any gap between industry and academia?
f) If the gap exists, how to bridge the gap?"

In section "2.2 Literature Review" of "Chapter 2: Review of Literature" on page 13, http://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in:8080/jspui/bitstream/10603/86727/7/07_chapter%202.pdf, it states:
"Ravi S. Iyer proposes that if the practice oriented software development career track, is introduced in UGC & AICTE regulations for appointment and promotion of Indian CS & IT academics then, a healthy mix of both research oriented as well as software development oriented Indian Computer Science & Information Technology academics will solve the problem.[30]"

https://shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/86727/14/14_references.pdf gives the references. It has the following reference for my pre-print (not yet published in peer-reviewed publication) paper: '[30] Ravi S. Iyer, “Improve the Practice of Software Development in India by having a Software Development Career Track in Indian CS & IT Academia”, December 2012'.

My above mentioned paper has also been referenced in a paper: "A literature review and classification of selected software engineering researches" by Ahmed Saleem Abbas, W. Jeberson, V.V. Klinsega of SHIATS, University, Department of Computer Science & Information Technology, India, published in International Journal of Engineering and Technology Volume 2 No. 7, July, 2012,  https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Wilson_Jeberson/publication/265886949_A_Literature_Review_and_Classification_of_Selected_Software_Engineering_Researches/links/560f943e08ae48337517e1a8/A-Literature-Review-and-Classification-of-Selected-Software-Engineering-Researches.pdf.

My paper appears in the list of references as '[239] Ravi S. Iyer, "Improve the Practice of Software Development by Having a Software Development Career Track in CS & IT Academia", Software Consultant, Puttaparthi, Andhra Pradesh, India, 2012.'

Internet search on: how to improve software development skills in Indian CS IT academia, gives my Dec. 2012 paper within top three results even now in Jan 2020

Last updated on 1st Feb. 2020

This post follows upon my recent post: Quite amazed that Internet search on: improve teaching of software development in Indian CS & IT academia, gives my Dec. 2012 paper as 1st or 2nd result even now in Jan 2020, https://eklavyasai.blogspot.com/2020/01/quite-amazed-that-internet-search-on.html.

The Dec. 2012 paper referenced above is:
Improve the Practice of Software Development in India by having a Software Development Career Track in Indian CS & IT Academia by Ravi S. Iyer.
Abstract: https://arxiv.org/abs/1202.1715 , PDF: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1202.1715 .

The word skills has become an important keyword in the context of discourse on employability of graduates in India. So I felt it is important to see where my paper stands in search results having the term skills in the search string.

The screenshots below (from incognito Chrome window to avoid bias towards my stuff) show that search on Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo search engines for term:

how to improve software development skills in Indian CS IT academia

gives my Dec. 2012 paper (pre-print and not published in peer reviewed academic publication) among the top three results!

• Google search ranking: 3rd result (two screenshots are used to show the ranking)
• Bing search ranking: 2nd result (with 1st result being another post of my Indian CS & IT academic reform blog)
• DuckDuckGo search ranking: 2nd result (with 1st result being another post of my Indian CS & IT academic reform blog)

[To open pic in larger resolution, right-click on pic followed by open link (NOT image) in new tab/window. In new tab/window you may have to click on pic to zoom in.]

Like in the case of the high search ranking in previous post mentioned above, I am quite surprised and disappointed with these results too, as now in Jan. 2020, it is over 7 years since that paper was authored & updated, and put up publicly on arxiv.org.

I should also mention that in my paper I have chosen to use the term academia to refer to educational institutions in India that impart under graduate and post graduate education. The other term used for such institutions is "higher education".

Search for the term:

how to improve software development skills in Indian CS IT higher education

in Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo  ***does not*** give my paper or any post from my Indian CS & IT academic reform blog in the top ten results when I checked today (31st Jan. 2020).

Quite amazed that Internet search on: improve teaching of software development in Indian CS & IT academia, gives my Dec. 2012 paper as 1st or 2nd result even now in Jan 2020

Last updated 1st Feb. 2020

The screenshots below (from incognito Chrome window to avoid bias towards my stuff) show that search on Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo search engines for term:

improve teaching of software development in Indian CS & IT academia

gives my Dec. 2012 paper (pre-print and not published in peer reviewed academic publication) as the 1st or 2nd result!

The Dec. 2012 paper referenced above is:
Improve the Practice of Software Development in India by having a Software Development Career Track in Indian CS & IT Academia by Ravi S. Iyer.
Abstract: https://arxiv.org/abs/1202.1715 , PDF: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1202.1715 .

I am quite amazed as now in Jan. 2020, it is over 7 years since that paper was authored & updated, and put up publicly on arxiv.org. Yes, I would not have been surprised if the paper showed up after the first ten results or so. But this result is somewhat disappointing as it shows that others are either not contributing to ***publicly available*** literature (on Internet) on improving the poor quality of teaching of software development in Indian academia, or their contributions on it are not being highlighted by top Internet search engines.

[To open pic in larger resolution, right-click on pic followed by open link (NOT image) in new tab/window. In new tab/window you may have to click on pic to zoom in.]

The next set of screenshots show results for the term:

improve teaching of software development in Indian academia

Bing and DuckDuckGo continue to highlight my paper. Google does not show it directly but refers to my associated blog table of contents and my paper title entry in that, as the seventh or so result.

Bing and DuckDuckGo highlight this paper even for the following term:

improve teaching of software development in India

But for the above term, Google does not show any of my stuff (paper or any blog post) in the first twenty or thirty results that I checked.

As I said, I am disappointed as it indicates that perhaps very few people are making ***publicly available*** literature contributions giving their ideas and suggestions to solve, what I presume continues to be, this serious problem of poor teaching of software development in Indian academia in general. There surely would be a few academic institutions in India where it is taught well. But, in general, in UGC & AICTE regulated Indian academia (vast majority of CS & IT higher education institutions in India), I presume that it continues to be taught poorly. The Google search results given below indicate that my presumption is, very unfortunately, right!

The screenshot below gives the top two Google search results for:

poor software development skills in Indian CS graduates

The top result link is: 95% engineers in India unfit for software development jobs: study, https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/info-tech/95-engineers-in-india-unfit-for-software-development-jobs-study/article9652211.ece, published on 20th April 2017 (and updated on 27th Jan. 2018).

It states: "According to a study by employability assessment company Aspiring Minds, only 4.77 per cent candidates can write the correct logic for a programme — a minimum requirement for any programming job.

Over 36,000 engineering students from IT related branches of over 500 colleges took Automata — a Machine Learning based assessment of software development skills — and over 2/3 could not even write code that compiles."

The second result link is: The reason India does not have enough awesome developers, https://www.hackerearth.com/blog/talent-assessment/indian-software-developers, 21st Jan. 2019.

It states: "Of the 6,000 hours devoted to studying, only around 500 hours are actually spent on hands-on lab work. If a student is given so many books to read but not enough time to indulge in practical experience, what can he learn?"
...
"Research says, around 1.5 million engineers graduate every year in India, with 80% not even employable. Then some become teachers. Thus continues the vicious cycle!"

Decided on A4 size for paperback book and ebook having this blog's (Indian CS & IT Academic Reform) main contents

Initially, I had not paid much thought to the page size selection for the "Indian Computer Science (CS) & Information Technology (IT) Academic Reform (Past) Activism Blog Book" which will have important posts from this blog (https://eklavyasai.blogspot.com/). As A5 was the size I had first used for both of my earlier self-published books (with 6in. x 9in. being used additionally later on for alternate paperback self-publishing & printing platform company), I had thought of using A5 for this book too.

As I added the first article into my book manuscript/document, which is my paper (pre-print and not published in any peer reviewed publication) on how to improve practice of software development in Indian CS & IT academia, it became apparent that A5 is a totally inappropriate size choice for this book which is essentially a technical education related book. After thinking about other possibilities, I checked out A4 page size. Here are two versions of the in-progress document PDF: A5 size: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Oezq4Fvsx0uXYv8TERmFjWEmeBfKOV7Q and A4 size: https://drive.google.com/open?id=15FDEf_ddrLYqvke8rmwW80UcHMBaYMw0. A4 PDF looks suitable and so I settled on A4 page size for the book.

I considered using A4 size for the following reasons:
1) Pothi.com which is the first self-publishing (& printing) platform I will use to self-publish the book, supports A4 page size paperback books - https://publish.pothi.com/tools/price-royalty-calculator/ shows the various page sizes supported by Pothi.com for paperback books.

2) Techie readers who would like to read a paper (hardcopy) version could just laser-print the (free download) ebook version if the ebook page size is A4. A4 paper is standard size for laser printers. [While in the software industry (1984 to 2002), I have printed umpteen A4 size documents for reading while being based in various locations in India, USA and Western Europe. Some of these documents ran into 50 to 100 pages or even more. For such documents, a bigger stapler or paper clip was needed to hold the printed document papers together - but that was available. So I presume that even today in 2020, any techie who wants to print the ebook on a laser printer, may be able to very conveniently do it, and thereby easily have a paper (hardcopy) of the book!]

Note that only the cover page (yet to be designed) will be colour - the interior will be black & white. Submitting the ebook to a black and white laser printer will print the colour cover page in greyscale (black & white) with rest of the book being black & white anyway.

3) Two columns in A4 size document would make for easier reading but I am not going to invest time in making the book two columns. Besides, I have authored so many internal documents in A4 size without multiple columns, during my industry career, and I have read countless such single column A4 documents as well. So I think single column A4 page is acceptable for this book. BTW the first book like document (other than specification docs like functional spec & design spec) that I authored was in A4 size single column, if I recall correctly. It was a GUI (Graphical User Interface) design guide for business applications done for Mastek in SEEPZ, Mumbai sometime in the mid 1990s. I used Microsoft Word at that time too to produce this book like document. 

What size of Times New Roman font - 12, 11 or 10 - should I use for main text for paperback book and ebook having this blog's (Indian CS & IT Academic Reform) main contents?

Last updated on 25th Jan. 2020

This post follows up on an earlier Facebook post, https://www.facebook.com/ravi.s.iyer.7/posts/2685157395034154 dated 11th Dec. 2019. Its contents are given below.

Should I use Times New Roman 12 or Times New Roman 11 font for main text in my next book - "Indian Computer Science (CS) & Information Technology (IT) Academic Reform (Past) Activism Blog Book"?

I have started working on my next book which essentially will include important posts from my https://eklavyasai.blogspot.com/ blog and which (book) I have tentatively titled as "Indian Computer Science (CS) & Information Technology (IT) Academic Reform (Past) Activism Blog Book". I will have both ebook and paperback print versions. But I expect to print only a very, very few (2 or 3) print copies. The ebook will be the important one which I will put up on self.gutenberg.org and archive.org and which hopefully will get incorporated into global ebook libraries like worldebooklibrary.org. That should ensure some longevity for the ebook even if very few read it.

It is a very niche interest book and so very few people will want to read it. But it may be very useful to some of that very few who are into activism of the kind the book/blog covers.

The question is what font size should I use for the main text in the book (font will be Times New Roman).

https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Basic_Book_Design/Font#Font_Size says, "Times Roman, look best in 11 or 12 points". Note that there are subtle differences between Times Roman and Times New Roman fonts but I think for the discussion on this post, they do not matter.

BTW https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Times_New_Roman says, "Although no longer used by The Times, Times New Roman is still very common in book and general printing.[3] It has become one of the most popular and influential typefaces in history and a standard typeface on desktop computers.[4][5]"
[Wiki Refs:
3: Dreyfus, John (1973). "The Evolution of Times New Roman". The Penrose Annual. 66: 165–174.
4: Farey, Dave (2014). "A Life and Times, Part 1". Ultrabold (16): 16–25.
5: Farey, Dave (2014). "A Life and Times, Part 2". Ultrabold (15): 3–13.]

For most of my documents work in software industry, right from around 1985, I have used Times New Roman as my standard font, and I think I typically used 12 as the font size.

For my previous books, I wanted to err on the side of large font for the main text and so used Times New Roman 12.

One of the issues with Times New Roman 12 is that the print version becomes more expensive as it runs into more pages. The ebook version will also run into more pages but no additional expense comes into play as it will be free download. But the higher number of pages may make it more intimidating for readers.

This book is a technical one. So I think Times New Roman 11 will be acceptable. That will reduce the number of pages in the book (both ebook and paperback).

So I am seriously considering using Times New Roman 11 instead of Times New Roman 12 for the main text in this book. I wanted to check with readers whether they have any suggestions on this, and so this post. Thanks.
--------

A correspondent wrote over email (and was OK with sharing):
Dear Ravi - Good to know you are working on your next book!
Regarding the font size, there is hardly any size difference between Times New Roman 11 and 12. However, the 12 appears little bolder (not fully bold) than 11. So, book purpose I think 11 would be better, especially for the print book. For the ebook, it shouldn't make much difference because these days pretty much all reading tools have zoom feature built into it. So a reader can zoom in, if he/she finds the font size 11 to be harder to read.
This is my 2 cents!
Good luck with your new book project!
----
I responded (slightly edited):
Thanks a ton --name-snipped-- for your valuable view on the font size and your encouragement for the book.
-----
=== end Facebook post contents ==============

23rd Jan. 2020:

Another suggestion I received which I have not mentioned above, was to consider size 10 font also. Further suggestion was to print test page(s) with same contents in different candidate fonts and then see what is appropriate for my needs.

Later I read that some technical papers are done in size 10 font.  http://marathon.csee.usf.edu/~sarkar/IEEEformat.html says that the standard IEEE CS-Press format specifies: "Normal text is to be single-spaced in 10-point Times or Times Roman (or similar font), with 12-point interline spacing, in the two-column format."

I had decided on Times New Roman as my font as I wanted to play safe and go with a tried-and-tested font for this book. So the candidate fonts were sizes 12, 11 and 10 Times New Roman.

I had got caught up in some other matters since the first half of December when the above Facebook post was put up, and so was able to get around to do the test printing only yesterday.

I prepared three versions of a two A5 page Word document with same content (excluding font size message), with the above mentioned three font sizes (Times New Roman 12, 11 and 10). I then used Print To PDF to print these two A5 pages of each document on an A4 sheet. I took care to ensure that there was no zoom up or down selection in the printing dialog and so I presume that the actual size of the text with the selected font got printed in the 3 PDF files of 1 A4 size page.

Yesterday I printed these three PDF files using a Puttaparthi laser printer shop's services.

Given below are pics I took of these pages using my low cost LYF phone. The first two pics below show part-page comparison of size 12 with size 11, and of size 11 with size 10. The third and fourth pic shows part-page comparison of size 12, 11 and 10 fonts in the same pic with 6 cms height of each part and 9 cms height of each part.

[To open pic in larger resolution, right-click on pic followed by open link (NOT image) in new tab/window. In new tab/window you may have to click on pic to zoom in.]

Pics below show the full 2 A5 sized pages on single A4 page for font size 12, 11 and 10. The pages look whiter than in the pics above but the pages are the same. The whiter look is due to the pics below being taken in rather bright sunlight whereas the above pics were taken indoors (under tubelights).

Looking at the pages directly (not above pics) shows that Times New Roman Font size 10 is also quite comfortably readable. I think readers from technical field of Computer Science and Information Technology will find it comfortably readable.

However, I intend to send the printed (paperback) book copy to the (Indian) Union Minister of Human Resource Development (who is overall incharge of UGC and AICTE, the main higher education regulatory authorities for Computer Science and Information Technology fields in India), (Indian) Union Minister for Information Technology and perhaps the (Indian) Prime Minister too. I think I may also send it to few state chief ministers (Andhra Pradesh, my current state, and Maharashtra, my former state). I don't know whether the ministers or his/her key support staff will give it a look or not. But they may! In the covering letter, I will point out a few important articles which can be understood by non-technical readers too, and request him/her/them to read it. For such non-technical readers, I think font size 10 would seem to be unusually small, as the letters and requests they get from citizens may be in larger font size. Note that I will use font size 12 for my covering letter, which is the standard font size I use for such letters. So I think font size 11 is a good compromise choice. It should be OK for such non-technical readers and since it is one size smaller than 12, it will slightly reduce the number of pages in the book.
=============================================

25th Jan. 2020

Line Spacing

I use Microsoft Word as my document creator/editor. The line spacing that I use in it is controlled by "Line spacing:" field in Paragraph->Indents & Spacing tab. The value it shows in my document is: Multiple At 1.15. https://medium.com/@mattsamberg/line-spacing-explained-9aecda41f48d explains "In Word, Times New Roman actually has about 2 points of extra white space built in. So, single spacing for a 12-point font is actually 14 points per line, and double spacing is 28 points per line."

The document also states, "When you go into the Paragraph formatting panel in Word, there are six settings: Single, 1.5 lines, Double, At least, Exactly, and Multiple. Single, 1.5 lines, Double, and Multiple are all straightforward: the line spacing is 14 points, 21 points, 28 points, or 14x points per line."

The Multiple At 1.15 spacing option that my document has currently for the basic text style (Normal) makes the line spacing for Times New Roman 12 font, as per my understanding of above document, 14 * 1.15 = 16.1 points!

So that perhaps means it is Times New Roman 12 point on 16 point interline spacing.

This Multiple At 1.15 spacing selection is the default line spacing for Microsoft Word installation on my PC. [I use an old copy of Microsoft Word 2007 which I am comfortable with and has served my basic needs well.]

I have decided to use Times New Roman 11 as my Normal style (main text font) for the book with the default Multiple At 1.15 line spacing of Word. I presume that Times New Roman 11 would also be having some points extra line space built-in (in the font) say 1.8 points extra space. Multiple line spacing at 1.15 is: 11 * 1.15 = 12.65. So it would be 11 point Times New Roman with interline spacing of around 14.5 points.

Even if we remove the built-in space, we get interline spacing of 12.65. I have given below a screenshot of Word showing the 1.15 line spacing selection.

To conclude, 11 on 12.65 Times New Roman font (without counting any built-in line spacing in the font) is what I will be using in the book for the main text in the book (both paperback and ebook versions).

Referrals: John Chambers named for Padma Bhushan award of India; John Chambers and his association with Wang Laboratories

Readers may want to visit the following posts on another blog of mine:

1) John Chambers of USA, ex Cisco chairman, formerly with Wang Labs., ex US India Business council chairman, is named for Padma Bhushan, third-highest civilian award of India, https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2019/01/john-chambers-of-usa-ex-cisco-chairman.html, 28th Jan. 2019

2) Some info. on John Chambers and his association with Wang Laboratories, based on Web articles, https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2019/01/some-info-on-john-chambers-and-his.html, 30th Jan. 2019

Referral: SSSIHL/SSSU (Sathya Sai University) ID cards with face blurred (Ravi S. Iyer)

Readers may want to see my recent post on another blog: SSSIHL/SSSU (Sathya Sai University) ID cards with face blurred (Ravi S. Iyer), https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2018/12/sssihlsssu-sathya-sai-university-id.html, 30th Dec. 2018

Referral: Documenting my part auto bio with pics - school and college education certificates and marksheets

Readers may want to see my recent post on another blog: Documenting my part auto bio with pics - school and college education certificates and marksheets, https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2018/12/documenting-my-part-auto-bio-with-pics_28.html, 28th Dec. 2018

Referral: Documenting my part auto bio with pics - computer software industry appreciation and experience letters

Readers may want to see my recent post on another blog: Documenting my part auto bio with pics - computer software industry appreciation and experience letters,  https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2018/12/documenting-my-part-auto-bio-with-pics_27.html, 27th Dec. 2018

Will Cambridge University do a thorough investigation of its academic Aleksandr Kogan's role in massive abuse of around 50 million American Facebook users' data for PSYOPS in USA elections? OR will it do a cover-up to protect its image?

Note that this post is copy-pasted from https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2018/03/will-cambridge-university-do-thorough.html.

Last updated on 24th March 2018

The Guardian article: Facebook gave data about 57bn friendships to academic, https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/22/facebook-gave-data-about-57bn-friendships-to-academic-aleksandr-kogan, 22nd March 2018, states:

On Friday 16 March, in anticipation of the Observer’s reporting that Kogan had improperly harvested and shared the data of more than 50 million Americans, Facebook suspended Kogan from the platform, issued a statement saying that he “lied” to the company, and characterised his activities as “a scam – and a fraud”.

--- end small extract from Guardian article ---

This is the referenced Facebook company statement: https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/03/suspending-cambridge-analytica/, dated 16th March 2018 and updated on 17th March 2018. Some extracts from it are given below:

In 2015, we learned that a psychology professor at the University of Cambridge named Dr. Aleksandr Kogan lied to us and violated our Platform Policies by passing data from an app that was using Facebook Login to SCL/Cambridge Analytica, a firm that does political, government and military work around the globe. He also passed that data to Christopher Wylie of Eunoia Technologies, Inc.

Like all app developers, Kogan requested and gained access to information from people after they chose to download his app. His app, “thisisyourdigitallife,” offered a personality prediction, and billed itself on Facebook as “a research app used by psychologists.” Approximately 270,000 people downloaded the app. In so doing, they gave their consent for Kogan to access information such as the city they set on their profile, or content they had liked, as well as more limited information about friends who had their privacy settings set to allow it.

Although Kogan gained access to this information in a legitimate way and through the proper channels that governed all developers on Facebook at that time, he did not subsequently abide by our rules. By passing information on to a third party, including SCL/Cambridge Analytica and Christopher Wylie of Eunoia Technologies, he violated our platform policies. When we learned of this violation in 2015, we removed his app from Facebook and demanded certifications from Kogan and all parties he had given data to that the information had been destroyed. Cambridge Analytica, Kogan and Wylie all certified to us that they destroyed the data.

Breaking the Rules Leads to Suspension

Several days ago, we received reports that, contrary to the certifications we were given, not all data was deleted. We are moving aggressively to determine the accuracy of these claims. If true, this is another unacceptable violation of trust and the commitments they made. We are suspending SCL/Cambridge Analytica, Wylie and Kogan from Facebook, pending further information.

--- end extract from Facebook statement ---

Ravi: So Facebook is clearly stating that Aleksandr Kogan of Cambridge University (an Assistant Professor there and not a full Professor) passed "information" (Facebook users' data) to a third party including Cambridge Analytica by which act Kogan "violated" Facebook's "platform policies".

The above Guardian article mentions that Kogan formed a company called Global Science Research (GSR) in May 2014 along with another Cambridge University researcher. The article mentions an email from Kogan to Cambridge (University) colleagues where Kogan said that he created the Facebook App for academic purposes in 2013. After GSR was founded (in May 2014) he transferred the App to GSR (commercial company) changing its logo and stating that it was being used for commercial purposes. Kogan seems to put the blame on Facebook for not raising issues then, and claims that Facebook is (unfairly) blaming him (Kogan) for this massive abuse of Facebook users' data.

I would love to see a full and thorough investigation by Cambridge University along with any required assistance from UK government authorities into the role of Aleksandr Kogan, Asst. Prof (Lecturer) of Cambridge University in this matter of abuse of 50 million American Facebook users' data. Did Kogan make inappropriate use of his Cambridge University academic status to do bad things and get away with it? That seems like a real possibility to me.

The unfortunate truth of life today is that there are many unethical academics, especially those that run or are associated with commercial enterprises (with permission from their academic authorities like it seems to be in the case of Kogan). My experience in Indian academia showed me that many academics get jealous (sorry I am being brutally frank) of the money made by people in industry, including their own former students, while they (academics) remain stuck, typically, on some govt. scale fixed salaries. So some Indian academics jump at opportunities to make better money through a business venture than they make from their academic salary alone.

But academics are usually not well versed with commercial law, commercial aspects of agreements, legal ramifications if the agreements are not adhered to etc. They are treated with kid gloves by the world in general which is deferential to them because of their once-noble calling of teaching, and they think that companies will also treat them that way.

However, once they form their own company, and are into making money there, they no longer have any basis to request the world to handle them with kid-gloves, since they are not academics only now but academic-cum-business persons.

The age when academics could be trusted to lead a higher and nobler life, are over, especially in Indian academia. There are some very good guys in Indian academia and then there are some very unethical fellows who will stoop to all kinds of nasty corruption and nasty poisonous politics to improve their career and to harm their peers' or juniors' career, with some such peers and juniors being viewed as opponents of theirs. And there are many academics in between.

In Aleksandr Kogan's case I would like a Cambridge University investigation to aggressively see if Kogan behaved ethically and if not, to record his unethical behaviour, share it with the university community and the public, and come up with steps to prevent recurrence of such behaviour from Cambridge University academics. That's the way to keep ethical standards high in such cases.

But will Cambridge University and the UK authorities whose assistance it may seek, have the time and inclination to do such an investigation which will be expensive in time and money? My experience in Indian academia, and later as a blogger on Indian Computer Science and Information Technology academic reform activism, https://eklavyasai.blogspot.com/, is that the first response of the top people like vice-chancellor and trustees/board of management of the university is to try to cover things up, and dismiss the matter as a minor mistake. The government prefers not to get involved in such university matters unless it is a big scandal and the media forces them to interfere. Many times, the Indian academic or academic administrator gets away with grossly unethical behaviour, sometimes criminal behaviour, due to this cover-up approach. That then leaves the concerned Indian academic institution in an ethically tainted state which people come to know about from informal sources even if no formal acknowledgement is made of the grossly unethical or sometimes even criminal behaviour of the concerned academic(s) and/or academic administrator(s). Recovering from that ethically tainted culture then becomes a difficult and long effort for the concerned academic institution and its academic and non-teaching staff.

Indian society finds it very difficult to handle unpleasant truths about teachers as the culture over millennia is to revere the teacher. That age-old reverence of Indian society towards teachers is unfortunately exploited in terrible ways by quite a few Indian teachers and academics, many times due to greed for money or sometimes, nowadays, sexual desire towards their students.

I do hope and pray that Cambridge University will keep its high reputation intact by doing a proper and fair investigation into Aleksandr Kogan's role in this massive abuse of Facebook user data of over 50 million Americans which was used to influence the 2016 USA elections. If Kogan is found to have been ethical then Cambridge University should say so publicly thereby clearing his name from the cloud it has come under now. But on the other hand, if Kogan did behave in an unethical manner, that should also be shared with the public and Kogan should be penalized in a suitable and proportionate manner.
=====================================================================

Given below is part of my response (slightly edited) to a mail correspondent who responded to above post contents sent to him over mail (his response is private and so not shared here):
It is teaching institutions including top research institutions that also teach students (like Cambridge University), that have to keep ethical standards high. If they fail then society at large gets threatened of being infested with the rot of poor ethical standards, which can degrade society at the least, and at worst, can destroy society.
-------

Some relevant articles provided by a couple of correspondents:

1) Cambridge Analytica academic's work upset university colleagues; Emails reveal rows over Aleksandr Kogan’s ‘get rich quick scheme’ with Facebook data, https://www.theguardian.com/education/2018/mar/24/cambridge-analytica-academics-work-upset-university-colleagues, 24th March 2018

2) Cambridge University asks Facebook for evidence about role of academic, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/mar/20/cambridge-university-asks-facebook-for-evidence-about-role-of-academic-alex-kogan, 20th March 2018
----

A couple of relevant audios/videos:

3) Aleksandr Kogan - Interview BBC Radio 4 - March 21, 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvtCNPnQtnY, around 18 mins.

4) Scientist: Didn't know data used to target voters, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APqU_EJ5d3U, 2 min. 23 secs., by CNN published on 20th March 2018.

I went through both the articles and the two audios/videos above.

Some points that emerge are (I may have made slight errors in some points below as I am writing them down from my memory of having viewed/heard the audios/videos only once; Don't have time right now to view/hear them again to confirm whether my points below are accurate):

a) Some other academics, including senior academics, of his psychology dept. at Cambridge University were unhappy with the manner in which Kogan was negotiating with SCL, parent company of Cambridge Analytica, about payment to be made to him (Kogan) and two other colleagues. Kogan was accused of taking a 'get rich quick' approach, which accusation Kogan refuted in strong terms.

b) Kogan created a commercial company with another colleague - Global Science Research (GSR). But claims that he was guided on legalities by others (SCL or Cambridge Analytica, if I recall correctly) and so was not able to answer authoritatively on whether he had breached his agreement with Facebook! Kogan tried to say he is just an (psychology) academic, implying that he cannot be expected to be knowledgeable on legalities and all that!

c) Kogan's company, GSR, was paid around 800,000 dollars by Cambridge Analytica but Kogan says that most of the money went towards paying those who participated in surveys (and things like that). Kogan says that he did not make money out of the Cambridge Analytica association with his company, GSR!

d) Cambridge University has not yet made a clear statement on this matter. It has sought information from Facebook.

e) Kogan claims that he had no idea that his App would be used to try to influence people in the 2016 USA elections. Kogan tries to give the impression that he is a researcher who is trying to do good for the world and that he is not in favour of his work being used to influence any election campaign in the manner in which Cambridge Analytica is alleged to have done in the 2016 USA elections.
--------

[I thank theguardian.com and fb.com, and have presumed that they will not have any objections to me sharing the above extracts from their websites (short extract from theguardian.com) on this post which is freely viewable by all, and does not have any financial profit motive whatsoever.]

Top Indian scientist reportedly dismissed after his research institute upheld charges of sexual harassment against him by junior colleague; Scientist to go to court to challenge it

Note: This post is copy-pasted from https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2018/02/top-indian-scientist-reportedly.html.

Today's (11th Feb. 2018) The Hindu newspaper carried this article on its front page: Scientist dismissed for sexual harassment of colleague, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/scientist-dismissed-for-sexual-harassment-of-colleague/article22716197.ece, 10th Feb. 2018.

It says that a junior woman staffer alleged sexual harassment by this 59 years old top scientist who seems to have held a powerful administrative position (head of a scientific lab). The allegations included an incident of alleged sexual molestation in March 2015 in a hotel room. That was in the context of an academic conference they were attending.

The charges were investigated by a committee constituted by the research institute. The article quotes the executive director of the institute as saying (slightly edited), "The governing board has ratified the decision to terminate --Name-snipped--’s services".."It is his decision whether he wants to further pursue the matter in court. From our side, the process has been completed." [I decided not to name the top Indian scientist in this post as I do not want to contribute to Google search results on his name showing up the matter via this post.]

The top scientist (who was dismissed) told The Hindu that he would "contest the decision in court".

Hmm. How good will scientists be as investigators and judges of a charge of sexual harassment! I have a very poor opinion of the Sathya Dharma (truth and ethics) standards of Indian scientists and academics. I have personally experienced Asathya-Adharma (untruthful and unethical) crook Indian academic administrators some of whom are Professors of science and so are scientists.

Through my own experience and through following mainstream media reports about Indian academia for some years, I have found that most Indian academics and scientists are very poor in knowledge about current day professional techniques and standards in managing staff and administering staff. They are trained mainly in academic research and teaching due to which most of them are UTTER NOVICES in management and administration. Many of them indulge in favouritism, nasty revenge, and sometimes poisonous behaviour towards juniors and sometimes even peers that they don't like including those that refuse to become obedient sycophants (yes-men) to them. Many Indian academic and scientific administrators are known to have indulged in even record-tampering, malicious defamation and identity-theft which are criminal offences under the Indian Penal Code. It is a crazy environment with significant amount of nasty abuse of power and sometimes money corruption and sexual favour related ethical corruption. Of course, there are good people too but somehow Indian academic administration posts seem to be such that even good people become ethically corrupt once they occupy administrative power posts.

I have zero faith in the ability of Indian academic or scientific committees to fairly judge a very serious, career-threatening and reputation-threatening matter like a sexual harassment charge. They may very well use the opportunity to ***fix*** a colleague of whom they have become jealous or have some other issue with, and unfairly judge him guilty which leads to a career-threatening and reputation-threatening outcome for the colleague. And similarly they may unfairly judge a colleague whom they support for some reasons like fear of that colleague's power to hurt them and monetary corruption reasons, as innocent of such sexual harassment charges even if the charges have strong evidence to back them!

I think it should be the court of law in India or suitable bodies appointed by the court which have people trained in Indian jurisprudence (lawyers and judges) who investigate and examine such sexual harassment charges in Indian academic and scientific institutions. If it is a court of law then judicial process would be followed and so any injustice concerns would be similar to how it is for any other court case.

But the court process in India may take years to arrive at a judgement. The concerned academic or scientific institution would want a quicker interim decision. The court could appoint suitable bodies as mentioned above staffed with persons trained in Indian jurisprudence. That body should produce a document on the lines of a judgement document though not as exhaustive as a regular court's judgement document, which explains the evidence and eyewitness testimony that is examined and how the conclusion of prima facie (at first view) guilt of sexual harassment or no such prima facie guilt, is arrived at. Based on this document's view which would have the stamp of people trained in Indian jurisprudence backing it, action or no action could be taken against the accused academic or scientist by the academic/scientific institution.

Of course, both the accuser and the accused would have the liberty of challenging the prima facie guilt/innocence decision, in a regular court of law. Note that some cases of sexual harassment like physical sexual molestation seems to be a criminal offence in India meaning that if the accused (top Indian scientist in this case) is proved guilty, he, in all probability, would have to serve a jail sentence. I mean, he would become a convicted criminal!

While I have not followed such cases in detail in the past, it seems to me that if the top scientist in this case who has been dismissed from employment by the Indian scientific institute, goes to an Indian court of law, seeking suspension of dismissal pending a proper court of law deciding his guilt/innocence in this matter, the Indian court of law may suspend the dismissal and the Indian scientific institute will have to put him back on the rolls! However, if the top scientist really did indulge in sexual harassment then he would fear going to court as the court would in all probability order the sexual harassment case to be heard in a trial criminal court. This court's wheels of justice may grind slowly but steadily and may eventually deliver a guilty verdict if the hearing produces strong evidence and/or strong eyewitness testimony supporting the sexual harassment/molestation charge. That would mean the top Indian scientist may go to jail as a convicted criminal!

Hmm. What a terrible dilemma to be in! Recently I informed an Indian Professor of Computer Science (male) about such matters becoming a great issue in India nowadays and advised him to ensure that he is never alone in a room/cabin with a female colleague or female student. Even a false complaint made by a female colleague or female student who is angry with him for some academic grade/examination result related matter could be enough to land the Indian Professor into unnecessary trouble! Further, the female colleague or female student can simply threaten to make the complaint if they had been together in some room without anybody else, to ensure that the Professor does their bidding (say, passes a female student in her Ph.D. examination).

I am not letting my imagination run riot. Indian academic system is rotten now with so many reports of police cases being filed against Indian academic administrators. This is the reality of Indian academic system today. There are lots of bad people in Indian academic administration and so the good people in Indian academia have to be very careful not to get trapped by these bad people using false charges or false statements.

Two recent money corruption and sexual harassment (ethical corruption) police cases against senior Indian academics of South India show how rotten Indian academia has become

Note: This post is copy-pasted from my blog post here: https://ravisiyermisc.blogspot.com/2018/02/two-recent-money-corruption-and-sexual.html.

Here is an article that appeared in 4th Feb. 2018 newspapers: Coimbatore: Bharathiar University VC arrested for taking Rs 30 lakh bribe, https://www.deccanchronicle.com/nation/current-affairs/040218/bharathiar-university-vc-takes-rs-30-lakh-bribe-arrested.html.

The article states that the vice-chancellor of this university in the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu demanded Rs. 30 Lakh (Rs. 3 million or about USD 46,773 at current exchange rate of Rs. 64.14 for 1 U.S. Dollar) from an Assistant Professor who was on probation, to get confirmed in his job as Assistant Professor. The Asst. Professor approached the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption people (police department) who laid a trap and caught the vice-chancellor red-handed with currency notes marked with invisible ink (according to this report: http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/tamil-nadu/bharathiar-university-v-c-arrested-on-graft-charge/article22642800.ece).

When the top academic administrator of a university (which is the vice-chancellor) indulges in such money corruption, one can well imagine how lower ranked academics and administrators of the university would behave. I am quite sure at least some of the lower ranked academics and administrators of this university would be corrupt as well. This kind of behaviour poisons academic institutions from the top. When the top is rotten the whole academic institution becomes vulnerable to becoming rotten like the top academic administrator.

A few days back there were reports of a Computer Science/Information Technology professor in JNTU Kakinada (Andhra Pradesh) sexually harassing female students who he called individually for a viva voce test that he was conducting as an external examiner.

Here are the related articles:
a) Andhra police arrest JNTU Kakinada professor for alleged sexual harassment, https://www.thenewsminute.com/article/andhra-police-arrest-jntu-kakinada-professor-alleged-sexual-harassment-75754, 2nd Feb. 2018

b) Sexual harassment: Prof. removed as Director, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/andhra-pradesh/sexual-harassment-professor-removed-from-post-of-director/article22581072.ece, 30th Jan. 2018

The students' agitation saw to it that the matter could not be suppressed. A member of the State women's commission also spoke to the alleged victims. I read in some other article about the state education minister also calling up the vice-chancellor about this matter. I think all this pressure resulted in an investigation by the university following which a police complaint was recorded against the Computer Science/Information Technology professor who also was a Director of some department/institute, and the professor was arrested by the police.

We have not heard the professor's side of the story in the media. Perhaps he has some defense. But multiple girls complaining about sexual harassment would be treated seriously by an Indian court of law, unless their complaints are shown to be false. As the letter complaint to the Registrar was made by 20 girl students, I find the complaints to be credible. I mean, I find it hard to believe that 20 girl students in Andhra Pradesh would conspire to make a false complaint of sexual harassment against the professor.

Still, the accused professor has to be proved guilty of these charges in a court of law. Till then, I will view it as an accusation only. Unfortunately, there is no CCTV kind of evidence to prove the case.

But can an Indian Computer Science/Information Technology professor sink to such depths of sexual harassment of his students? Well, my own experience of Indian academia in South India is that it is rotten. There are some good people. But many people in academic positions of power abuse their power in horrible ways. I personally experienced Shakuni poison kind of academic administrators including a vice-chancellor, registrar, director of campus and Head of Maths & Computer Science department in a deemed university in Andhra Pradesh. By default, I am deeply suspicious from ethics point of view of any Indian senior academic and any Indian academic administrator. I think the Indian academic system has become so rotten now that it poisons the ethics of any person who gets associated with it for long in positions of power.

Of course, there are academic institutions of high academic calibre (different from ethical standards) which may not be so poisonous in terms of their ethics, and there are good ethical senior academics even in lesser known Indian academic institutions. But, overall, the system has become rotten. Perhaps the reason is the lack of accountability that Indian academic system has. The perception is that nobody can question them. Therefore they get away with poisonous behaviour that in other walks of life in India (like private companies) would have put them behind bars (in jail) or at least be dismissed from employment.

When Indian academic administrators and senior academics have become so rotten in money corruption and ethical corruption including sexual harassment, what can we expect from the students they teach and mentor? It is very depressing to know about such things.

I think Indian academics should be subject to accountability like people from other walks of life. That will put some fear in them and stop them from money corruption and ethical corruption like sexual harassment and mental harassment of juniors, or at least reduce the number of such incidents.

Business Insider.com article: PhD students have double the risk of developing a psychiatric disorder than the rest of the 'highly educated' population

PhD students have double the risk of developing a psychiatric disorder than the rest of the 'highly educated' population, http://www.businessinsider.com/phd-students-could-face-significant-mental-health-problems-2017-8, 5th Aug. 2017.

My comments on the above article:

My experience as a free service Honorary Staff, Honorary Faculty and Visiting Faculty for nine years in an Indian deemed university, fits with the article's broad view. I think the PhD program in some parts of Indian academia puts inhuman mental pressure on the PhD candidates if they have a PhD guide who does not give proper guidance. There is a complete lack of accountability from the PhD guide. The student, who would typically be in the mid-twenties, has to be mortally afraid of his PhD guide as his PhD can be easily messed up by his guide. And, very unfortunately, there are some brutal and inhuman professors in Indian academia, who can extract brutal revenge from a PhD student who dares to go against them or complain about them or simply does not follow his orders.

For me to watch mid-twenties young men who could have had a good paying job in the software industry if they had chosen to go for industry, having to become grad-slaves of some unethical or sometimes plainly incompetent PhD guide professors, was particularly upsetting.

I think there should be some human rights group in India that ensures accountability from Indian (academic) professors who exploit and mentally harass their PhD students, and even punishes such professors by naming-and-shaming them and by having a negative record entry in their academic record. Really! It gets that bad, at times, in Indian academia.
-----

Requested a correspondent to never refer to me as Prof. even jokingly

This post is copy-pasted from https://ravisiyer.blogspot.com/2017/08/requested-correspondent-to-never-refer.html on 19-Aug-2017.

I had sent the contents of my recent post, A quick intro of Puttaparthi to non Sai devotee ex software industry colleague who is now based in USA,
https://www.facebook.com/ravi.s.iyer.7/posts/1955750351308199, over mail to a correspondent who is an elderly Indian academic.

He responded by thanking me for the mail and referring to me as Prof. Iyer! Now, even in the past I had requested him to NOT refer to me as Prof. as I am NOT an academic. But I think he was using the word in a nice way to express his appreciation for my post.

But my problem is that .... I think what I wrote him next expresses my views quite well. I wrote:

Sairam sir!

Thanks.

But please, please do not refer to me as Prof., even jokingly. I have a very, very poor opinion of Indian academia and certainly do not consider Prof. to be a compliment (I actually consider it to be an insult).

Please do not be offended, sir. I think while you are an Indian academic, you are a nice person. I am afraid I cannot say that of many Indian academics and academic administrators today. I think it is the ***rotten*** Indian academic system that is to blame for this state of affairs and one hopes that HRD minister Javadekar's efforts to reform Indian academic system will bear fruit so that academics, including professors, do not neglect their teaching duties, and do not indulge in promoting fake research, giving fake PhDs and producing graduates with paper degrees but without appropriate knowledge thereby severely handicapping these young graduates in their quest to get a good job and lead a full life.
--- end my response---

Ravi: I was concerned about the elderly Indian academic getting upset by my having shared my frank and truthful views. Fortunately, his subsequent short response indicated that he did not get upset.

I responded by thanking him for his understanding and his Sai blessings.

I decided to put up this post as a way of letting other readers know that I become very, very uncomfortable if somebody refers to me, even jokingly, as (Indian UGC/AICTE academic) Professor. I earnestly request readers to please not refer to me, even jokingly, as Professor. I am NOT an (Indian) academic. I am a retired international software consultant who is now a social media writer on spirituality and religion.

Indian Computer Science Academic job can be a DANGEROUS CAREER-WRECK for 'only' graduate Comp.Sc. engineers

Last updated on 18-Aug-2017
Minor update on 23-Apr-2020

I think a serious warning should be given to all Indian B.E./B.Tech. (Comp. Sc.) graduates to NEVER EVER take up a job in an Indian academic Computer Science / Information Technology department UNLESS a) they plan to finish an M.Tech./M.Phil./Ph.D. degree in the near future OR b) they are doing the job as a way to pass their time or as spiritual Seva (voluntary service).

The mail exchange given below shows how Indian Computer Science academia (engineering colleges, in this case) SADISTICALLY EXPLOITS 'only' graduate Computer Science engineers by using them as Lab. Assistants and also using them as teachers for some lab. courses and even theory courses at times, WITHOUT ANY CAREER GROWTH PROSPECTS WHATSOEVER! This is because the minimum qualification for a proper faculty designation in UGC/AICTE regulated Indian computer science academia is an M.Tech. (or M.Phil). Ph.D., of course, opens up the faculty designations and career growth possibilities in a big way. With 'only' a graduate Computer Science degree, there is NO CHANCE at all for anybody to be appointed as regular faculty.

Further, the even scarier thing is that as such a person ages, he/she may be pushed out of even that Lab. Asst. position by a youngster! College managements would want youngsters to do Lab. Assistant work and so push out oldies who are stuck at Lab. Asst. post for some years. Net effect would be that such a person loses such 'Lab Assistant' position in one college and so has to look for the same position in other colleges who are willing to take an older person to do that job! And sometimes one may be jobless.

The mail exchange below shows a sad case of such a first class B.E. in Computer Science & Engineering graduate.

A few days ago I received an email from a person (he was OK with sharing contents of his mails anonymously) who I am referring to as P in the shared mail exchange below.

P wrote (slightly edited):
My humble pranams [Ravi: salutations] at lotus feet of Bhagawan. I was working in --college-name-snip--,--location-snip-- as lab assistant. At present I have left the job. I have come across your blogspot.
...

[P forwarded his bio-data. It mentions B.E. (CSE - Computer Science and Engineering) Bangalore university with first class as his academic qualification.

The skill set claimed include C, C++ and Java languages and various Windows and Linux operating systems.

The experience details are three stints of "Lab. Assistant" in three different colleges in Andhra Pradesh (a state in South India) for 4 years, 4 years and 2 years. That comes to a total of 10 years "Lab. Assistant" experience.

The job function part states:
Installation, configuration and operation of various Windows and Linux operating systems (including server installations).
Computer Assembling, fault finding, Computer maintenance.
Helping students and acting as informal tutor.
Ordering supplies for the dept.
Doing other duties as assigned.]

[From a later mail, it seems that after P finished his BE (CSE) he worked for some computer services company. Later he seems to have moved to "Lab Assistant" position in an Indian engineering college in 2007. In the first college that he worked in, he seems to have been given an (informal perhaps) designation of "Assistant Professor" where he also taught courses for B.Tech. 3rd year students like computer organization, computer architecture, human computer interaction, and also ran multimedia lab. having experiments in Adobe Flash.

In the next college he joined he taught "IT lab" and subjects: computer graphics and unix internals.

He was with the third college till sometime this year - 2017. Now he is looking out for a job.]
----

I (Ravi S. Iyer) responded (slightly edited):

Sairam brother --name-snipped--,

I am not in a position to help you directly get a job. However, I looked at your bio-data and have given some thoughts for you to ponder about.

Your bio-data shows B.E. (Computer Science & Engineering - CSE) 1st class from Bangalore University, followed by 3 stints of Lab. Assistant in CSE dept. of 4 years, 4 years and 2 years. If they are not parallel then that comes to Lab. Assistant experience of 10 years!

Very unfortunately, Lab. work is treated as unimportant and so career prospects for Lab. Assistants and Lab. course teachers is very, very poor in Indian academic setup. Without clearing NET exam (don't know if you tried) or without having a Ph.D., I am afraid the career prospects for a person like you in Indian Computer Science / Information Technology academia is very poor.

[Update: A later mail from me notes that he needs an M.Tech. irrespective of NET exam to qualify for regular faculty position in UGC/AICTE academia.]
So either clear NET or I think you should try for a job in Indian software industry. For that you will have to find out the in-demand software skills in it today and learn them either by yourself or by attending suitable training courses. Then you will have to try hard to get a job in Indian software industry by proving that you have software development skills in the area they are interested. That can be done by doing experimental projects whose design and code can be shown to prospective employers as proof of your skills.

Don't take my advice as the final view. It could be inappropriate for you. Ultimately it is your future and your decision.

All the best!
----

He responded (slightly edited):
Sairam
Thanks for reply. If you know of any job sites please let me know.
----

I (Ravi) responded:
Sairam!

I don't keep track of job sites. So I cannot help you there.
----

I (Ravi) later wrote:
Sairam,

Oh! I later recalled that minimum qualification for Asst. Professor position in UGC/AICTE norms is M.Tech. with 55% marks.

So with a B.E. you are not eligible for Asst. Prof. position even if you pass NET/SLET (if they allow you to appear).

If I have understood that correctly then I think you must seriously consider whether trying for a job in software lab in Indian academia is worth it for you.

Why don't you learn mobile app programming - Android/iOS - as that seems to be in demand, and then try for a programming job?
----

In a later response P wrote (partial edited extract):
When I lost (an earlier college Lab. Assistant/(informal Asst. Professor)) job I thought I don't have M.Tech. (degree). I will never get a job. But you are totally wrong. Persons like you who should give good advice usually say unfit for any job. That is why --name-snip-- commited suicide because of frustration. [--snip--]

Only thing comes to you is that swamy has to give job or bless you. Without swamy blessing nothing will happen.
[P later got his second 'Lab Assistant'/(informal Asst. Professor) job in another engineering college in Andhra Pradesh.]
----

I (Ravi) responded (slightly edited):
Sairam brother,

First, I think you have misunderstood me. You wrote, "when I lost job i thought i dont have m tech. i will never get a job. but you are totally wrong. persons like you who should give good advice usually say unfit for any job.that is why --name-snip-- commited suicide because of frustration."

Did I say, "unfit for any job"??? NO. I wrote, "So with a B.E. you are not eligible (for) Asst. Prof. (position) even if you pass NET/SLET (if they allow you to appear)." I think that is the truth as per UGC/AICTE norms today which is what most colleges and universities in Andhra Pradesh (and India, I guess) follow. We have to face the truth in such situations FOR OUR OWN GOOD.

I had WARNED YOU that without M.Tech. your career prospects in Indian Computer Science and Information Technology academic setup is poor. Actually I think without M.Tech. /PhD your career prospects in Indian academic setup is very poor. I am just telling you the truth because I have studied IN DETAIL the UGC/AICTE regulations for appointment of Asst. Professor, Assoc. Professor and Professor, and am also aware of how so many engineering colleges in Andhra Pradesh have had to close over the past few years. I have seen how 'only' B.E./B.Tech. engineering graduates are EXPLOITED by Indian academic administrators like HODs and principal/director/Registrar/Vice-chancellors, giving them poor salary without scope for career growth. I even view some of such behaviour as sadistic. They destroy the life of young engineering graduates like you who has a FIRST CLASS Bachelor's degree in Computer Science & Engineering from Bangalore University!!!

As I have spent nearly two decades in Indian software development/IT industry where I have played roles of main technical interviewer (included interviewing of fresh B.Tech./B.E. and M.Tech/M.E. Computer Science graduates/post-graduates), trainer, mentor, software manager, technical consultant etc., I know that Indian IT industry is a far, far better place for people who are sadistically referred to by Indian academics as 'only' B.E./B.Tech. engineering graduates. BTW I was referred to as 'only' B.Sc. Physics by an ignorant fool in software development HOD of an Indian academic Mathematics and Computer Science dept. even though I then had 18 years international software development experience FOLLOWED by around eight years teaching and Masters project technical consultant FREE SERVICE in that department! Perhaps that ignorant fool in software development of an HOD will view Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg as 'not even B.Sc'!!! This is the tragic and horrific reality of some, if not many, Indian Computer Science academic departments where people who are ignorant fools in software development but who have some Ph.D. qualification (many times in field of Mathematics, Electrical Engg., Electronics etc.) and who are sometimes brutally exploitative of staff (and students as free research assistants to further their (academic's) research credentials), hold important administrative and decision-making positions.

Therefore I advised you to pick up software development skills that are in demand and try for an IT job in industry. Now I will expand that to even looking at system administration cum management positions in Indian IT industry. You could do some industry certified system administration courses and then try for such jobs. Based on my direct experience of Indian IT industry, I can tell you that expertise and performance are rewarded. I am sure if you had spent ten years in even a small Indian IT company instead of Indian Computer Science academia, and even if you had focused on systems administration rather than software development, and had done your job with reasonable performance level, today your salary would be at least Rs. 50,000 a month if not higher. Further, you would have been in the management grade by now and so had a senior and respected designation instead of 'Lab. Assistant', [Ravi: I guess that a 'Lab Assistant' job in an Indian private engineering college in Andhra Pradesh, for even a 10 year experienced Lab. Assistant, will not typically pay beyond Rs. 15,000 a month. In fact, I think the salary would typically be in the range of Rs. 5,000 to Rs. 10,000 a month.]

Those academic administrators/consultants who appointed you in Indian academia (college) and may have promised you a good career even though you had stopped your studies at B.E. (CSE), seem to have given you BAD ADVICE and, in my considered opinion, seem to have done you grave injustice. These Ph.D. fellows who are Indian academic administrators and consultants ****WOULD HAVE KNOWN IN 2007 and later**** that without an M.Tech. or Ph.D., appointment to regular scale (Lecturer/Assistant Professor) would not be possible from UGC/AICTE norms point of view. [Some college giving you an 'Assistant Professor' designation but not paying you UGC/AICTE scale salary is not REAL 'Assistant Professor' but more of something to make you feel good but which will not be viewed as REAL 'Assistant Professor' designation by proper UGC/AICTE academic setups.]

Honestly, I don't think it is too late for you to try to get into Indian IT industry even now. You have a First Class CSE bachelor's degree. You may not have the software development or systems administration skills that industry wants right now but you can pick it up. Don't mind joining in with people ten years your junior - the start salary will match if not better your Lab. Assistant salary.

To make you feel good if I tell you that pray to Swami (Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai Baba) and that even without an M.Tech. degree/Ph.D. you will get a good job in Indian Computer Science academia, I think I will be doing A GRAVE INJUSTICE to you and I will be giving you BAD & HARMFUL ADVICE. Instead I will say that you should pray to Swami for blessings and then EITHER do M.Tech. and then try for a good job in Indian academia OR do some additional training and try for a job in Indian IT industry. Bhagavan would say, "Manishi prayatnamu kuda kavali" or words to that effect, meaning that human effort is also needed, for success in such affairs and that we should not depend only on Bhagavan/God.

Thank you for the information you have provided about your work experience. May I share it on my blog ANONYMOUSLY, removing all names of people and college institutions so that there are no sensitivity issues? I think your information will help others to avoid the Indian Computer Science academia trap that you fell into.

I pray to Bhagavan to guide you and help you get a proper profession and not just a job. I repeat my advice - EITHER get an M.Tech. and then try for academic profession (and not just job) OR get additional training (even using Internet based courses) in in-demand areas either in systems administration or software development, and then try for Indian IT industry profession (not just job).

Jai Sairam!
----

A USA based correspondent wrote (slightly edited):
Dear Ravi - Another advise you may give him is to try and do some self training on Cloud stuff. Best I can think of is AWS (Amazon Web Services) at https://aws.amazon.com. It allows one to create what is called a Free Tier account and is good for one full year! The free account would allow one to launch server instances, databases, apps etc. He can get familiar with various terminology used in the Cloud world these days!

There is tons of documentation also on its site. Hope this helps him. Good Luck to him!
---

I (Ravi) responded (slightly edited):
Thanks --name-snipped--. Will share it with him and also put it on my blog/FB pages.

Dr. Pushkar's articles on research req. for Indian college teachers producing fake research and reducing teaching quality; historical background of Indian academic research system

Last updated on 5th Aug. 2017

I came across an interesting article that appreciated HRD minister Javadekar's recent announcement of near-future change in UGC/AICTE API (Academic Performance Indicators) to remove mandatory research requirement for college teachers (under-graduate teachers) - Kudos to Javadekar for Letting College Teachers Teach by Pushkar, https://thewire.in/163562/javadekar-ugc-research-college-teachers/, 1st Aug. 2017. The sub-title for the article is: "The research requirement in the API for college teachers was a travesty. All that it achieved was a proliferation of fake journals for college teachers to publish in."

About Dr. Pushkar who is Director of The International Centre Goa (India), from http://www.internationalcentregoa.com/web/about-icg/whos-who/: "Dr Pushkar (PhD Political Science, McGill University) previously taught at BITS Pilani-Goa, McGill University, Concordia University and Goa University." .. "He also writes regularly on India’s higher education and his op-eds and essays have appeared in Asian Scientist, Indian Express, Hindustan Times, The Wire, Braingainmag.com and elsewhere."

[For background on HRD minister Javadekar's announcement, readers may visit my recent blog post: HRD minister Javadekar tells truth about UGC AICTE academia problems; removes mandatory research for college faculty (but not university faculty); assures UGC AICTE reform, https://eklavyasai.blogspot.com/2017/08/hrd-minister-javadekar-tells-truth.html, dated 2nd Aug. 2017.]

Pushkar's above article refers to two earlier articles of his:
a) Let College Teachers Teach by Pushkar, https://thewire.in/3617/let-college-teachers-teach/, dated 10th June 2015
b) Strides Ahead in Sizing Up Academic Performance Skip Faculty Performance by Pushkar, https://thewire.in/36677/strides-ahead-in-sizing-up-academic-performance-skip-faculty-performance/, 18th May 2016

I feel that the three articles above give a good picture of UGC/AICTE Indian academia's struggle with mandatory research resulting in negative impact on teaching quality.

In the latest Aug. 2017 article, Pushkar himself summarizes his arguments for exempting (Indian UGC/AICTE regulated) college teachers (under-graduate faculty) from research, from his June 2015 and May 2016 articles mentioned above, as follows:

1. Large numbers of college teachers, even those with PhDs, lack basic training for research;
2. Most teachers are already overburdened with teaching, administrative and other responsibilities; and
3. A majority of college teachers work at institutions with woeful infrastructure and where the overall academic environment is inimical to substantive research.

Ravi: While I have not conducted a proper survey myself of Indian UGC/AICTE regulated under-graduate colleges, my views based on informal discussions on these matters over the past few years with Indian UGC/AICTE regulated college and university academics working mainly in South India, AGREE ENTIRELY with points 2 and 3 above.

As I am interested primarily in good teaching of Computer Science and Information Technology (CS & IT), especially the practice of software development, in UGC/AICTE administered Indian under-graduate AS WELL AS post-graduate academia, and have only some limited exposure to doing CS & IT academic research, I don't think it is appropriate for me to comment on point 1. Note that I have great respect and appreciation for GENUINE Computer Science and Information Technology academic (and industry) research and innovation, and as a software technologist I have applied/used the products/output of such research and innovation, to develop software and to teach software development in Indian industry and academia. But I am NOT INTERESTED in doing such research myself.

The Aug. 2017 article of Pushkar gives a very interesting extract from what it refers to as a widely-cited study (from the USA): The Relation Between Research Productivity and Teaching Effectiveness, by Herbert W. Marsh and John Hattie in "The Journal of Higher Education Vol. 73, No. 5 (September/October 2002)", http://faculty.washington.edu/mpw/ITE05/research&%20teaching%20correl.pdf. The extract is as follows:

It is important not to perpetuate the myth that there is a positive and reciprocal relation between teaching and research. There is no doubt that many would like such a positive relation to be true, and there is a strong conviction that research and teaching are closely linked….Furthermore, a near-zero correlation between teaching and research is consistent with the observation that some academics are gifted teachers and researchers, but that others are substantially better at one than the other, and some are weak as both teachers and researchers.

Ravi: I think the above effectively rebuts criticism that teachers who don't do research will be like drones who cannot apply knowledge well, and so will produce graduates and post-graduates who are like drones who cannot apply knowledge well. Mind you, like Pushkar says further in this Aug. 2017 article, teachers who are not trained to do research or are not inclined to do so, can keep up to date on research (in their field) and bring the new research input into their teaching if appropriate. I think this is like when I was an international software consultant in the Indian software export industry, I used to keep up to date on information about the latest technologies being offered by leading software vendors in the world, in my areas of software expertise, by reading leading industry/trade magazines on it regularly. And many times, I had to learn about some of these new software technologies so that I could provide consultancy advice about it, and sometimes even teach it to software developers. I did not have to do research into these new software technologies myself. Others did that and provided the new technologies. I consumed/used those new technologies to develop or help develop better software solutions for end users.

Pushkar writes, "It is not necessary, in terms of content, to be doing research in order to be or become a better teacher." I completely agree with this statement of Pushkar, based on my experience as an instructor/mentor/consultant in Indian software export industry for over a decade (different from my individual software developer and project lead experience), as well as a teacher of software lab. courses (mainly at M.Sc and at M.Tech post-graduate levels) and technical consultant for post-graduate (M.Tech./M.Sc.) software design & development projects in Indian academia for 9 years (with designations of Honorary Faculty, Visiting Faculty and Honorary Staff). [I also taught one software lab. course, once, to U.G. students (B.Sc. Mathematics).]

Note that my academic teaching/tech. consultant experience of mainly post-graduate students was in a somewhat odd situation. The M.Sc. students I taught software lab. courses were Mathematics students (and Physics students a couple of times) and NOT Computer Science students. So while they were post-graduate students, they could not be viewed as post-graduate students from a Computer Science perspective. And most of these M.Sc. students later became students of the M.Tech. (Computer Science) lab. courses and projects that I taught/gave consultancy advice on. The important thing to note was that almost none of the M.Tech. (Comp.Sc.) students that I taught had a prior academic degree in Computer Science or Information Technology! Further, I believe that it is similar in many parts of Indian CS & IT academia. The M.Tech. (CS) or M.Tech. (IT) student usually has a NON Computer Science/Information Technology graduate (and sometimes post-graduate) degree! So he/she has to be taught some under-graduate level Computer Science/Information Technology subjects, including some under-graduate level software lab. courses, at M.Tech. (post-graduate) level!

The June 2015 article of Pushkar gives some interesting historical background of Indian (UGC/AICTE) academia. It says that in the "old system" there was a clear separation of teaching and research. Colleges and universities teaching at under-graduate level (offering graduate degrees to passed out students) are, Pushkar writes, "the backbone of India’s HE system" (HE stands for Higher Education) with UG students comprising 80% of the total no. of Higher Education students. College faculty (and university faculty mainly teaching UG courses) focused on teaching. In the old system, a few college faculty did research and such people typically got promoted to/hired at PG institutions. But college faculty were not expected to do research with many not obtaining PhD degree or even seeking one.

In the old system, research was done by faculty in PG departments "across state universities, central universities and other central-government funded institutions". The PG department faculty had duties of teaching and supervising PG students (teaching-cum-research).

The article states that in 2010, the UGC introduced the API (Academic Performance Indicators) which made research mandatory for career advancement at central govt. funded institutions. This was also adopted by many state universities and colleges. The API was scrapped for a short time in 2013 but reintroduced (in 2013 itself).

This seems to have been an attempt to increase quality research output from (UGC/AICTE) higher education. Pushkar argues that it should have targeted only PG faculty and not UG faculty. By targeting all, it resulted in proliferation of fake research done only to secure API credit and reduction of teaching quality of UG faculty.

Now that the HRD minister is proposing to remove the mandatory research requirement for UG faculty/college teachers, Pushkar argues that it will allow UG faculty/college teachers to focus on teaching (Ravi: like it was before 2010).

[I thank thewire.in, Dr. Pushkar and washington.edu, and have presumed that they will not have any objections to me sharing the above short extracts from, and many references to their website/articles, on this post which is freely viewable by all, and does not have any financial profit motive whatsoever.]