Indian Defence Review

The first popular use of the phrase in Hindi, Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyaan was announced during India’s war against COVID 19’ Research, development and manufacture of COVID 19 vaccinations, as symbolized through a 5ml vial of Covaxin is being justifiably touted a major flagship product of Atmanirbhar Bharat. Its celluloid visualisation by Vivek Agnihohtri through the medical docudrama ‘Vaccine War’ is a landmark lamppost in Indian cinema this year. Unlike his earlier film ‘Kashmir Files’, which spawned Islamophobia, the Vaccine War (2023) is a testament to the exceptional sincerity of our scientists to realize Swadesi (indigenous)production of vaccines during COVID-19.

The Vaccine War, on the other hand, is a based on a factual account of the wonderful synergy between scientists of ICMR (Indian Council of Medical Research) and NIV (National Institute of Virology), in collaboration with Bharat Bio Tech, against heaviest odds and strident criticism by certain political entities, section of the media in consort with foreign companies, which had a vested interest in decrying a creditable indigenous substitute, is what makes Vaccine War a fascinating and gripping experience.

Based on a book by the erstwhile ICMR Director General Mr. Balram Bhargava’s book ‘Going Viral’, the protagonist played by Nana Patekar, who compares a scientist to a soldier, the support cast of bioengineers led by Priya Abraham, Director, NIV are emblematic of Shakti which women can only manifest. The film is reminiscent of Manthan made by ShyamBenegal in 1976 to capture the milk revolution in India in 70s fathered by Dr Verghese Kurian.

 Sadly, this film didn’t have the requisite resonance in the box-office despite a realistic storyline and wonderful performance by all the stakeholders While some critics believe that the film is blend of science and fiction, others believe that the film is being used as a government mouthpiece with an overdose of propaganda.

Some critics also believe that the journalists who questioned our capability to make an indigenous vaccine has been correct in her assessment. In this battle of speed and efficacy, commitment and foreboding of failure, World Health Organization’s (WHO)’s ambivalence to certify COVAXIN is rather unfortunate. The protagonist at the press conference rightly mentions that while several Multinational Drug Companies (MDCs) have taken a head start in developing a vaccine in our war against an unknown virus, India has been equal to their task by developing a vaccine with 77.8 percent deficiency against symptomatic COVID-19.

The very fact that 2.2 billion doses of indigenously developed vaccine could be successfully administered goes to demonstrate unequivocally the deep scientific strength that our research community have and the exceptional commitment of the women scientist shown despite overwhelming domestic compulsions. It is a triumph of Shakti over scepticism and indigenous knowledge over the over-rated western knowledge.

The Atmanirbhar Bharat campaign brings to mind the great contribution made by Dr. Abdul Kalam, by not only making India a missile power but by demonstrating how defence technology can have civilian usage at low cost, compared to the imported counterpart . A case in point is the development of lightweight prosthetics from material used for space related programs to enable disabled children to walk easily.

From the heavy wooden ‘Jaipur foot’, one noticed how children without legs were running around in light weight prosthetics during the Republic DayParade. Kalam wrote: “When I see children run around and cycle with artificial limbs we designed, it is sheer bliss”. To paraphrase Wordsworth: ‘Bliss it was that dawn to be alive. But to have artificial limbs was very Heaven’.

In 1994, Dr.Kalam tried to develop an indigenous stent in collaboration with a Hyderabad-based firm which was successful to develop a coronary stent at almost one-fifth of the imported cost. When Kalam-Raju coronary stent became successful, the paper mockingly called it a ‘Kalam Stunt’. It is a tribute to the great visionary that not only this indigenous stent is available at low cost for people with modest income, the exporting firms have also reduced their cost by 50 percent. This is the power of realizing full potential of our indigenous knowledge and capability.

Dr. Kalam was hurt, but like Ulysses, was undaunted in his spirits. In 2005, as President of India, he advised the DRDO labs to develop Cochlear Implants, which was only available through imports and supplied by three companies of USA at a price of Rs. 5 – 7 lakhs, Because of his pioneering efforts in collaboration with PGI Chandigarh and a few hospitals, today Cochlear Implants are available indigenously at a price of $1500 as against imported cost of $30,800. The story of light weight artificial limbs, Coronary Stent and Cochlear Implants is the saga of scientists who work under visionary leaders like Kurien, Kalam and Bhargava.

It is indeed a sad commentary that these stories of ‘Make in India’ do not get adequate headline and resonance and often derided as propagandist. Very few of us know how India has a defence PSU called ‘MIDHANI’ at Hyderabad which has made India completely self-reliant in titanium, super-alloys and special steel. The spacecraft which reached the moon uses all super-alloys of MIDHANI.

The Prithvi missile which creates trepidation in our adversary uses all material required from MIDHANI. They are no longer arm twisted by foreign suppliers by foisting the Denial card! This was due to the vision of Dr. Brahma Prakash, the internationally renowned metallurgist who founded MIDHANI and had envisioned that India should be self-sufficient in Titanium. When his proposal was scuttled by the Finance Ministry on the basis of cost benefit analysis, he had famously observed that ‘the benefit of self-sufficiency in critical material cannot be checkmated by consideration of cost’. This was supported by the visionary PM Nehru.

The Vaccine War is logical culmination of visionaries like Bhabha who made India a pre-eminent player in the field of atomic energy. Sarabhai carried his legacy to help Indian spacecraft to land on the moon. Brahma Prakash’s unique contribution to self-sufficiency in super alloys, Swami Nathan’s wonder seed to usher self-sufficiency in food production and Kalam’s unique footprint to make India in to a missile power make this quintet the leading lights of Swadeshi, the ideological spark of which was lit by Mahatma Gandhi to come out of the economic imperialism of the British. Dr Bhargava of ICMR is unsung hero in our war against high cost imported vaccine and perverted mind-set that ‘India cannot do it ‘by propitiating, and lobbying for foreign products.

Despite the heroic deeds of all protagonists, the Vaccine War does not bring out the real underbelly of our existing S&T infrastructure and budgetary allocation. As a country, we spend only 0.8% of our GDP on R& D against 3-5% by most developed and EMDEs (Emerging Markets and Developing Economies) like China. Our design capability in critical subsystems like propulsion, weapons, sensors leave a lot to be desired.

As head of a Self-Reliance Index Committee, it had assessed India’s SRI (Self Reliance Index) in defence technology was as low as 30% in 1993. It had drawn up a vision document, encompassing facility creation, Joint Ventures with OEMs and collaboration with design houses, so that our self-sufficiency improves to 70% by 2005. This has remained a pipedream and needs to followed up. In our pursuit of self-reliance and self-respect amongst the comity of nations, scepticism must not give way to reality and genuine appreciation of our indigenous mascots of excellence in India’s gloomiest period must never be forsaken.

Both Manthan, the cinematic tribute to white revolution and The Vaccine War, the film by Vivek Agnihotri carry the incandescent music of late Banraj Bhatia. The tunes carry the iconic theme of Rig Vedas, whose chants were played in Shyam Benegal’s eponymous tele serial Bharat ki Ek Khoj, based on Nehru’s Discovery of India. The New India that Gandhi envisioned through Swadeshi movement to emancipate it from economic imperialism and racial supreme attitude by the British has been effectively carried forward by its redoubtable scientists like Bhaba, Sarabhai, Kurien, Swaminathan and Kalam.

There are many unsung piped pipers in India’s journey to achieve its full potential of a knowledge economy; as second to none. In our Tryst with Destiny, the foresight, support and dynamism of our political leadership to support the march of science is indeed creditworthy.