Comment by XorNot
5 months ago
This is one of the reasons India has a civilian spaceflight program.
The obvious overlap with military technology aside, it's a way to retain and increase the institutional knowledge within India across a lot of areas.
5 months ago
This is one of the reasons India has a civilian spaceflight program.
The obvious overlap with military technology aside, it's a way to retain and increase the institutional knowledge within India across a lot of areas.
Indian spaceflight program done by ISRO have very few people from IITs or any of the so called elite colleges. Unlike china Indian colleges are really backward due to lack of research funding and a coaching industry which have gamified the entrance exams.
> Indian spaceflight program done by ISRO have very few people from IITs or any of the so called elite colleges
The bulk of recruitment at ISRO has always been happening at the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology (IIST) and the Indian Institute of Sciences (IISc) - not IITs.
Even getting into an IIST or IISc is almost as difficult as getting into an old IIT based on the JEE cutoffs.
Both India and China have specialized institutions dedicated to subfields that end up getting the bulk of R&D funding in said subfields, for example, Petroleum Engineering and the China University of Petroleum and the Indian Institute of Petroleum Engineering, or in mining enigneeing, the China University of Mining and Technology and the Indian School of Mines (now IIT Dhanbad).
> Unlike china Indian colleges are really backward due to lack of research funding and a coaching industry which have gamified the entrance exams
China also bases acceptance on entrance exams - the Gaokao is equally as competitive as the JEE Advanced. The exact same gamification of entrance exams and coaching centers is sadly the norm in China as well, despite the Xi admin's initial attempts to crack down on it.
Additonally, Chinese R&D funding is also stratified the same way Indian R&D funding is.
The equivalent of a government engineering college in both China and India would be receiving relatively limited funding or autonomy, but a Double First Class University in China or an INI in India well get the first pick of research grants and subsidizes.
If there is a promising professor at a mid-tier program, they are likely affiliated and getting their funding via affiliation to a national academy like the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Most of the program directors and other technical staff comes from lower ranked colleges like CET Trivandrum rather than from IISc and IIST. They are not based on IIT Jee rankings.
https://www.youngpostclub.com/yp/discover/news/asia/article/...
China banned the private tuition for Gaokao. Even before, it was not open to gamification like rote learning a few physics, chemistry, mathematics questions are(in the case of JEE). There are rounds to the exam which deals with latent intelligence rather than rote learning of problems for patterns. JEE has multiple choice questions and other pattern matching questions while Gaokao emphasise on subjective understanding.
Chinese professors are well paid and there are various perks to being a professor in China. Its a lucrative job and was one of the most well sought job before the private sector gained over it. IIRC the cafetaria for professors were said to be one of the biggest perks over working in private sector(jokingly mentioned by a chinese friend). I am not sure how true that is now.
This is why all regional powers have a civilian space flight program - the same thing you mentioned but also it allows you to sidestep some international treaties around testing.