Pitroda panel for an ''avant garde'' body on knowledge

New Delhi, Jan 16 (UNI) The National Knowledge Commission wants India to become the first nation to set up an ''avant garde'' organisation ---a National Science and Social Science Foundation (NSSSF).

Such an organisation was needed in view of the disappearing boundaries between various disciplines of knowledge, the Commission said in its first annual report submitted to the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

The NSSSF would look at all knowledge as a seamless entity, in the backdrop of the country's 5000-year-old tradition of broadbased knowledge.

Persons who are to man and head such a foundation should have courage of conviction, and ability to listen to other people's views and modify one's own, if reason demands that, said the Commission.

They should be of high professional and personal integrity and honesty.

The governing board of the Foundation should have a chairman, a vice-chairman and eight to 10 members.

The objective of the proposed foundation should be to suggest policy initiatives to make the country a leader in the creation and use of new knowledge in all areas of natural, physical, agricultural, health and social sciences, with emphasis on those areas which cut across traditional disciplines.

Among the major task of the foundation would be to identify unsolved problems in various areas of science and social sciences and also to set up studies on relationships of science with other areas of human concern such as economics, sociology, politics, art and literature, and social, moral and ethical implications of advances in science and technology.

The Commission, headed by Sam Pitroda, also wants the foundation to identify and set up bodies on futuristic interdisciplinary areas, and help the government set up systems that would remove bureaucratic hurdles, increase professional, social and financial accountability and recognise that creativity in science and social sciences like in all creative endeavours was non-hierchical.

It also requires the foundation to formulate ethical guidelines for science and social science and a system of punishment, where such guidelines are violated.

The Commission has recommended a budget of Rs 1,250 Crore a year for the foundation.

UNI