Bibliometrics and scientometrics in India: An overview of studies during 1995-2014, Part I: Indian publication output and its citation impact

Abstract

An analysis of 801 papers published in the area of bibliometrics and scientometrics during 1995-2014 indicates a steep increase in the number of papers published by Indian researchers as compared to the number of papers published during 1970-1994. This indicates a growing interest of Indian scholars in scientometrics and bibliometrics. The paper provides several reasons for this steep increase. The main focus of research is on bibliometric assessment of India and other countries followed by cross national assessment and bibliometric analysis of individual journals. CSIR-NISTADS is the top producing institute contributing about one-third (31.4%) of the total output followed by the output of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre and CSIR-NISCAIR. The distribution of citation data indicates that about one-fifth (21.7%) papers remained uncited. The paper identifies journals in which these uncited papers were published. Only 15% papers were cited more than 20 times. Most of the prolific authors as well as highly cited authors were from the institutions belonging to the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research. Among all authors B.M. Gupta (CSIR-NISTADS) produced the highest number of papers, but the impact as seen in terms of citation per paper and relative citation impact, S. Arunachalam (MSSRF) topped the list.