Top virologist Kang quits govt institute

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 6

Top virologist Gagandeep Kang today created a stir as she quit the Translational Health Science and Technology Institute (THSTI), Faridabad, an autonomous body under the Ministry of Science and Technology.

Kang resigned as the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) institute’s executive director close on the heels of the controversy around the ICMR announcing intentions to launch India’s first indigenous Covid vaccine by August 15.

Kang was earlier named head of the ICMR group on Covid vaccine research, which was later disbanded.

The scientist, who made history last year by becoming the first woman working in India to be elected to the Royal Societies UK in the 400 plus years of its history, is learnt to have cited personal reasons for the resignation from the institute she had been serving for five years. Her tenure was to end next year.

Officials at DBT did not comment on the development. It was not immediately clear what triggered the move on Kang’s part, but the timing of her resignation did raise eyebrows.

A researcher in the government system said Kang, who was a professor at CMC, Vellore, before coming to THSTI, had been hoping for some time to return to the parent institute where she has her primary lab research set up. Kang did not answer calls or messages. “This is a huge loss to the DBT institute,” said this researcher.

An acclaimed biologist, Kang was formally inducted as the Fellow of Royal Societies (FRS) at a ceremony in London on July 12 last year.

Her inauguration as the Fellow meant she signed the same prestigious Book of Fellows which Issac Newton signed in his life and times.

She was awarded in recognition of her contributions to vaccine development in India and establishment of training programmes in clinical translational medicine.

Kang has family roots in Punjab’s Samrala and is a foremost leader in the development of indigenous Rotavirus vaccine.

She has built national rotavirus and typhoid surveillance networks and established laboratories to support vaccine trials.