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My column 10-09-2025

My column 10-09-2025

Shashank Purandare

I woke up to a sad news yesterday. I found out that Tata Institute Of Fundamental Research, where I spent 37 years of my life, has been slipping as one of the premier research institute that it was some time back. It ranks 17th in the country, down from 12 last year. I find it difficult to reconcile with this. A brain child of Dr. Homi Bhabha, which harboured emminent scientists like late Prof. Jayant Narlikar is in a pathetic condition, barring a few scientists who are trying to produce something worth while. There are many reasons for this and I do not want to get into it, but sad indeed!

PM Modi has been talking about the semiconductor initiative for some time now. He promissed a made in India semiconductor chip by the end of the year. Here is a reality check.

Semiconductor chips are made up of silicon, available in common sand. A chip needs a silicon wafer. You need a processing plant to prooduce a silicon wafer. India does not have a single plant which can do this. These silicon wafers about 250-500 micron thick come in sizes from 1 inch to 12 inch dia circles. Apart from many processing equippments, again controlled by these silicon chips, which have to be imported, as India does not make them, Si foundry needs extremly clean water which is in short supply in our country. In fact, many of our people do not have enough drinking water. Our research institutes currently use 2-3 inch dia wafers, again imported, whereas the world produces chips using 12 inch wafers. Even if we import these wafers, we still need to import processing equippments to produce semiconductor chips.

We also need trained man-power to operate these machines, which we simply do not have. Our education system, IIts are no exceptions, are way behind the world to produce trained engineers.

Recently, the government approached many scientists for help, money not a problem. But nobody was forthcoming. Scientists are used to making may be one or two working devises, if at all. To convert from a prototype, as it is called in technical terms, to mass production, is not easy. We simply do not have people and facilities to do this.

If President Trump decides to send all the Indians employed in the semiconductor industry back, then we will have enough man-power to do this. But this will cripple the american industry, so not likely to happen.

The government is also trying to rope in private industries to setup facilities in India and this will work in the long run. But we simply do not have time. The world currently uses technologies involving few nanometers. We can at best use a 28 nm technology. The chip delivered by ISRO recently is based on 180 nm technology. This 32-bit microprocessor chip was made by Semiconductor Complex, Mohali SCL. Incidently SCL was conceived by TIFR. Our department was supposed to run SCL, but then politics happened.

To give an idea of sizes involved in a semiconductor chip, 1 micron is 0.000001 meter or 10e-6m. Our hair is about 100 micron thick. 180 nm is 0.0000000180 meter and 4 nm is 0.00000004 meter. 1nm is 10e-9m. The size in a chip refers to width of a line. One needs an electron microscope to see minute details in a chip. These lines are written on to the silicon wafers by electron beam writing machies. By the looks of it, the present government has all the intention of pushing for atmnirbhar semiconductor industry in India. It is a tough ask. But all the best. Lage raho!

Speaking of USA and the tarrifs, it is clear as to what is going on. USA is really going downhill. It has become totally dependent on immigrant population mainly from China and India. The native americans just want to enjoy life and not do any work. USA's debt is piling up. Dollar is losing its shine. It is not backed by any physical entity like gold. USA prints dollars as they wish. On top of this except for weapons, america imports everything. Now they have started feeling the pinch. Trump thought that by using import tariffs as a weapon, he can bring everybody to their knees. But the move boomranged. India refused to budge and formed an undeclared aliance with Russia and China. This has left USA fuming. India has a huge oil refining capacity. It is now buying crude from Russia and selling it to europe and other countries with a profit. Americans have acccused India of fuelling Russia and Ukrain war. The irony is Ukrain also buys from India. For the last three years USA sold weapons to Ukrain. They did nothing to stop the war. And now they are accusing India. Fact of the matter is that USA made trillions of dollars by selliing arms to Ukrain in the last three years. Now who is making blood money?

USA is now pumping money in Pakistan, a virtual perpetrator of 9/11.

USA needs oil from gulf countries. Two Iraq wars were due to that. But India's refined oil sell has skewed the pitch. No wonder Trump is rattled.There in lies the catch.

Elsewhere, a new social dawn has arrived in Maharashtra. Marathas, once a powerful clan has now equated itself with Kunabis, who were their servants once upon a time. Looking at the amount of money spent during the five day Maratha agitation, who would believe that they are poor and need reservation???

Shashank Purandare 10/09/2025