HLF 2026 Q&A Session Challenges Fundamental Assumptions About Research Investment in Developing Nations
The “Science and Society” session had already tackled pandemic modelling serving political masters and nuclear liability laws shielding corporations. But the sharpest exchange came during Q&A, when Ram Kanneganti posed a question that scientists rarely confront in public: Why should India invest in fundamental science when that money could help the nation become wealthy first?
The Asian Tiger Challenge
Kanneganti’s argument was provocative and clear. The Asian Tigers—South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan—didn’t start with particle accelerators. Their formula: “Borrow the science, apply it, and become rich, and then invest in science.”
“In a country like India, would you want to do research in neutrinos or figure out basic foundational things, become rich, and then all these things are richness toys, like quantum physics, quantum science?” he asked. His conclusion: “Let them develop it. Why do we want to develop the fundamental part? First, you figure out the money and become rich, and then you can play with your toys.”
The moderator noted that Devesh Kapur and Arvind Subramanian’s new book characterizes India as a “cautious democracy” that does things “ahead of what you think would have been the quote-unquote right time”—implementing universal suffrage before industrialization, building premier research institutions while millions lack basic amenities.
Kanneganti began with a telling admission: “I’m worried about speaking against scientists.” But he pressed forward, questioning the core assumption that “fundamental science actually leads to progress.” Japan didn’t win Nobel Prizes and then become rich—it became rich first. China is only now emerging in fundamental research after decades of applied technology and manufacturing dominance.
The Response: Justice for One-Sixth of Humanity
The panellists’ response reframed the debate entirely. Yes, Japan and China followed that path, “but it didn’t start out by investing in that. I think there was always some level of investment.”
More crucially: “The level of investment in fundamental research in India is very small in terms of a country. So it’s not something that’s taking away from many, many other benefits.”
Then came the moral argument that shifted the ground completely: “Given that we are such a large country, we are one-sixth of humanity, I think it would really be an injustice if we were to say that there are basic questions about the world and we can’t explore.”
This wasn’t an economic defence but an ethical one. To deny India’s scientists—and by extension, one-sixth of humanity—the right to pursue fundamental questions about the universe would be fundamentally unfair. “If you were just to deprive one-sixth of humanity of the ability for those who wanted to explore those questions, I think that would be very unfair.”
The panelist acknowledged the economic argument: “They clearly do lead to progress in the long run.” But the deeper point was about human dignity and intellectual sovereignty. Should a nation of 1.4 billion people—with all its diversity of talent, curiosity, and capability—be relegated to perpetually borrowing others’ discoveries?
The Tension Remains
What made this exchange powerful was its refusal of easy resolution. Kanneganti’s economic critique has force: opportunity costs are real, budgets finite, and India’s infrastructure deficits massive. The counter-argument—that fundamental research represents a tiny fraction of national spending and that denying one-sixth of humanity the chance to explore basic questions would be unjust—also carries weight.
The moderator’s acknowledgment that “we can have a longer discussion about this” but were “running out of time” was apt. This isn’t a debate that resolves in minutes. It’s a tension at the heart of development: between immediate needs and long-term capabilities, between borrowed knowledge and indigenous discovery, between economic pragmatism and intellectual sovereignty.
As the session concluded, the audience was left with competing truths: that India has urgent priorities demanding resources, and that a nation of 1.4 billion people has both the right and the obligation to contribute to humanity’s understanding of the universe—not someday when it’s wealthy enough, but now.
- Ennen
