He attributes this to a still-evolving culture of popular science communication, and the paucity of Indian scientists writing good fiction.
“Though most science fiction writers have a basic science degree, it’s rare getting experts to write,” says Purushothaman. “Therefore, you don’t see a lot of cutting-edge science fiction being discussed in these stories.”
Then there are people such as Nellai Muthu, who writes science fiction in Tamil, and has a day job as a space scientist with the Indian Space Research Organisation. Muthu says he regularly found time to write science fiction stories “up until the last few weeks when Chandrayaan (India’s recent probe carrier to the Moon) occupied too much time”. Not surprisingly, space and alien civilizations are his pet themes.
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His novel, Maakol Maindaragal (The Inhabitants of Planet Maakol), which won a state award, talks of the everyday affairs of a civilization whose inhabitants are made up of silicon, unlike earthlings who are essentially carbon.
Geetha B., an assistant professor at the Birla Institute of Technology and Science in Pilani, who also teaches science fiction as part of an English communication course, says Indian science fiction still doesn’t have great appeal for domestic, adult audiences.
“Much of our discussion, especially during these meetings, is about how to use science fiction to communicate science, and it invariably ends up as being a tool to get children interested in science,” she says.
Dishnuprasad Chaturvedi, a septuagenarian, retired school principal, who would easily count as one of the most prolific science fiction writers with 20 anthologies and translations of his works in Kannada and English, says science fiction writing does have a higher, often educational purpose.
He talks of his Yaadish ki chori, (The Theft of Memory) as an example. “I wove it around a crime scenario, and a detective catching a thief who swapped his brain. This way science is communicated in a readable way,” he recalls.
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Other Indian writers in this genre, for instance, are either part of non-profit organizations or use their writing skills to push pet perils.
G.S. Unnikrishnan, an officer with the Kerala agricultural department is set to make his novelist debut with Chimera, a science fiction work in Malayalam that talks about the possible damaging consequences of genetically-modified organisms. “I’ve been writing science fiction for over two decades, but a bulk of my work has been published in the regional newspapers such as the Malayala Manorama, Matrubhoomi and the local edition of The Hindu. The impact of GM (genetically modified) crops is a touchy subject with me and I believe this popular science novel will greatly popularize this issue,” he says.
Unnikrishnan’s sci-fi stories are usually about human beings subject to freak gene-modulating experiments.