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Dear Dr Terence Love Thank you for your informative post on the various dimensions of need analysis for the establishment and development of design related activities in any country. While there are unique needs in each region and country that is dictated by its history and status of current development we still need some estimate of how to place designers in an economy dominated by scientists, technologists, engineers and managers as it is in India today. We have a reported 40 million technically trained manpower across all disciplines in India and the design population is very small indeed when compared to this figure. The group of colleagues with whom I am working felt that even a basic list of comparative statistics from the industrialised countries and the newly industrialised ones would give us some basis for the initiation of a deeper study into the subject. The points that you have related are indeed very pertinent and our eventual interest must be to get a better understanding of all these dimensions as they apply to the Indian condition. While we are very convinced about the value of a new design school at the University level in India we do need to address the large number sceptics in the National administration who unfortunately still perceive design as one that provides aesthetic embellishment to the hard core research areas of science and technology. While design in India has made many successes it is still a drop in an ocean of opportunity that some of us see on a daily basis, particularly in the areas of development and outside the areas of conventional industry. I will get in touch with you off the list with specific questions since what you say about the design scene in Australia has many parallels in the Indian scene as well. With warm regards M P Ranjan from my office at NID 14 September 2003 at 8.35 pm IST ------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof. M P Ranjan Faculty of Design and Head, NID Centre for Bamboo Initiatives National Institute of Design Paldi Ahmedabad 380007 INDIA Fax: 91+79+6605242 Home: 91+79+6610054 Work: 91+79+6639695 ext 1090 -------------------------------------------------------------------