Research should be application oriented

MADURAI: Research projects should be made application oriented, rather than being publication oriented, said G Thiruvasagam, Vice-Chancellor of University of Madras, here on Friday.Inaugurating the research centre in economics at The Madura College here, the  V-C said that collaborative ventures with foreign universities should be initiated, technology should be shared among universities and government policies should be altered to strengthen and enhance the quality of research on par with those of foreign institutions. “Our researches are assessed based on publications, while foreign universities transform our publications into products.” “We should apply the findings of the publications in such a way that common man benefits and we use only six per cent of indigenous technology and import 94 per cent of foreign technology. This should be changed”, Thiruvasagam opined.He further insisted that faculties interested in undertaking research projects should be exempted from teaching and should be given full freedom in taking up research projects.Delivering the inaugural address, M S Meenakshi Sundaram, the Secretary of Madura College Board, insisted that the quality of teachers in Indian universities should be enhanced, in addition to providing good infrastructural facilities. The Vice-Chancellor of University of Madras also pointed out the wide range of opportunities that  the students have in the field of economics. “Whether it is engineering or any other profession, economics is the primary aspect of all. Students of economics will have a major role in taking forward the economy of the nation in future”, he said.The Department of Economics at the Madura College was established in the  year 1946 and upgraded with post graduation course in 1988. The department will administer PhD and MPhil from this academic year.