Publish or perish? Or No!

I recently went to Trivandrum as a member of the interview panel to select faculty. Two other experts were there with me from different places. Two of my former students appeared for the interview and that is one of the reasons I accepted to travel all the way. The other reason was to have a darshan of Ananthapadmanabhaswamy. They put me up in nice hotel called “Keys”. True to its name, my electronic key failed to work on the second day! And my students too failed to get selected because they had only 3 or 4 publications, as they have just completed their Ph.D. and are still in the process of writing and submitting ‘key’ papers. The very same students were not even called for interview at places like IITM, Pune. The person who got selected was 37 years old, and had 14 publications, never mind their quality! This is how it appears to work these days! Incidentally the committee consisted of 10 members, seven of them local. The three experts did not agree on this selection and the chairman went by majority! Prof. S. P. Pandya, former Director of PRL, used to say, ‘democracy does not work in science’. Here is a case where he has been clearly disproved!
I have been advising my students to write papers and not to devote all their time in generating data. Their English is far from satisfactory, presentation and writing skills leave much to be desired. May be we should start a course from this year on scientific writing/presentation at PRL.
Kerala is as beautiful as ever. Visit to the temple was fun. I could not spot the Shivalingam below the deity’s right hand. Has it been removed? The atmosphere was serene; I had a long walk and several rounds of it in the prahaaram reciting Sahasranamam.
Like Rajnikant, the superstar of Tamil films, among the Hindu Gods too, there is a superstar, one who collects large crowds. I asked several of my friends here and they could not guess: It is ironical that the land of communists is flourishing with income from religious tourism; Ayyappa Bhaktas dirty all the temples on their wake, including the famous Srirangam temple in my hometown, much to my chagrin.
Because of the recent Govt. of India rule we must travel only by Indian airlines/Air India, I took the available connecting flight via Chennai with a few hours there. Could visit Dr. Venkatesan, and more importantly Grand Sweets and replenish my stock of pulikkachal, coffee powder etc. They are selling new powder called karumeedhupodi, used for garnishing vegetables while cooking. I bought it but am yet to try it.
Johan Burman came with his family. I took them out along with Ray, Ranga and his daughter last Saturday. Everyone enjoyed the food. We were also treated with an exclusive magic show. We could not figure out many of the apparently simple tricks. While there I got the good news that my former student Satya Prakash (from Darbangha, Bihar) got a permanent job at INCOIS Hyderabad (he has only2 or 3 papers) on the same day his wife delivered a baby girl (the girl survived probably because of the good luck she has brought) Ghar mein Lakshmiji aayeen hai!