National Science Day is celebrated annually on February 28. The basic objective of National Science Day is to spread the message of the importance of science and its application among people. Every year, National Science Day is celebrated as one of the main science festivals in India in order to achieve a number of goals.
The objectives include spreading a message about the significance of scientific applications in the daily life of people, displaying all the activities, efforts, and achievements in the field of science for the welfare of human beings, discussing all the issues and implementing new technologies for the development of science, and encouraging people as well as popularizing science and technology, among others.
National Science Day is also celebrated to commemorate the discovery of the ‘Raman Effect’. Sir CV Raman, an Indian physicist, announced the discovery of the ‘Raman Effect’ on February 28, 1928. He was awarded the 1930 Nobel Prize in Physics “for his work on the scattering of light and for the discovery of the effect named after him,” the Nobel Prize organization said on its website.
In contrast, National Science Day is not celebrated with fervor in Nagaland. Its observance is limited to organizing some school events. In a place like Mokokchung, rarely do we hear about National Science Day. This proves that we lag behind other progressive societies by a long distance when it comes to scientific temperament. Rumor mongering, superstition, and unfounded beliefs are all results of lack of scientific temperament.
Scientific temperament is not restricted to science labs or class rooms. Scientific temperament refers to an individual’s attitude of logical and rational thinking. An individual is considered to have scientific temper if he employs a scientific method of decision-making in everyday life. Scientific temperament is important for bringing about a progressive society that is free of superstitions and irrational practices. It helps in developing the nation in all spheres and promoting tolerance among people for differing thoughts and ideas.
As Jawaharlal Nehru writes in his book, The Discovery of India, “Scientific temper is a way of life — an individual and social process of thinking and acting which uses a scientific method which may include questioning, observing reality, testing, hypothesizing, analyzing and communicating.” We should encourage our children and youth to explore the world around them, to welcome new light, new knowledge, conduct new experiments, even when their results are unfavorable to our preconceived opinions and long-held theories. This will trigger innovation. It is only then that inventions, discoveries and new findings will be made for the benefit of our society and humanity. Underdevelopment or backwardness of our land can be attributed to our lack of scientific temperament.