ACADEMIA Letters

What is the worst that can happen? Rejection? Submit it!

P Ravi Shankar

The Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) is a premier insti-
tution in India. Started in the 1960s the institute is situated in the modern ‘planned’ Indian
city of Chandigarh at the foothills of the Himalayas. In the late 1990s, I was a postgraduate
student (junior resident) in the department of pharmacology at PGIMER. The department had
done some cutting-edge work in the areas of toxicology and pharmacovigilance in the 80s and
90s.
Rat doctor: Most residents (who had an undergraduate degree in medicine) worked on
animal research projects for their undergraduate dissertations. This has been the safe and
trusted path in India and pharmacologists mostly did studies on animals. One of our teachers
even joked that on joining the MD in Pharmacology program after completing her undergrad-
uate medical studies she metamorphosed from a doctor for humans to a doctor for rats. After
joining the department I was getting used to handling animals and was introduced to the re-
search process and scholarly publishing. The institute had an excellent library and we had the
PubMed and Medline databases on CD-ROM.
What is the worst that can happen? The Professor and Head of the Department (HOD)
was dynamic and active person. He constantly encouraged us to do research and publish.
Original articles, reviews, letters to the editor were the major article types that we worked
on. He motivated us to always try a ‘premier’ journal first and then try other less prominent
journals in a stepwise manner if the paper was not accepted. He used to say, ‘What is the
worst that can happen? Rejection? Submit it!’ His constant encouragement made us come to
terms with rejection and consider it as an integral part of the publication process. The key is
not to get demotivated and continue to pursue different publishing options.
Paper was King: In the 1990s and early 2000 publishing was mostly paper based. The
internet was beginning to make inroads but publishing meant you had to go down to the li-

Academia Letters, July 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: P Ravi Shankar, ravi.dr.shankar@gmail.com

Citation: Shankar, P.R. (2021). What is the worst that can happen? Rejection? Submit it!. Academia Letters,
Article 2134. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL2134.

1
brary, read through different journals, make notes using pen and paper, pen your words down
in a manuscript and then type it out using a word processing program. In those days, com-
puters were still a rarity and the HOD was kind enough to allow us to use the services of the
department secretary. You looked through printed and bound copies of different journals to
see the type of articles they publish and the instructions to authors which may appear only in
some issues. One problem was that sometimes the issue you were looking for may have been
borrowed by someone and be unavailable.
Publishing in the pre-internet era: In my humble opinion publishing was far more difficult
in the pre-internet era. You had to type out the article, take multiple printouts, arrange them
properly and then post the copies to the journal. Our HOD was kind enough to cover postage
expenses from department funds. We could also use the department printer for printouts. The
journal received and processed the article and them posted copies to different reviewers for
their inputs. The reviewers read through the article, completed the printed forms, and mailed
them back. After an article was accepted proofs were mailed to the corresponding author who
made the corrections, answered the queries, and mailed them back. The whole process was
tedious and time consuming.
Publishing today: The internet has made the process easier and maybe quicker. Today you
can search for past issues of journals and journal instructions online. There are tools which
can recommend suitable journals for your paper based on the title and the abstract. The entire
submission process is online, and you no longer need to print and post paper copies. The online
system ensures all relevant information is submitted and reviews are done online. The expense
and the time associated with publishing has reduced. Today with the ongoing coronavirus
pandemic, online questionnaires to collect responses are widely used. These ensure the data
is available in a form which can be analysed right away.
My Professor’s advice and me: Though it is slowly changing research productivity in not
very high in Indian medical colleges. For long an argument was put forth that research is
important only if there are postgraduate students. My Professor’s advice has had a significant
impact on my career. I may not have been lucky enough to have postgraduate students during
most of my career, but I have been able to have publications in collaboration with colleagues
and co-investigators from different regions. I am happy to have been included in the updated
science-wide author databases of standardized citation indicators as a career researcher and
for the year 2019 [1].
Implications for young researchers: I believe the advice I received has important impli-
cations for postgraduate students and young researchers especially in the developing world.
Resources here are particularly limited and we must choose research topics which are impor-
tant and relevant. Our research must be properly conducted using validated instruments. Once

Academia Letters, July 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: P Ravi Shankar, ravi.dr.shankar@gmail.com

Citation: Shankar, P.R. (2021). What is the worst that can happen? Rejection? Submit it!. Academia Letters,
Article 2134. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL2134.

2
the data is analysed and the paper is written we will be having a good idea about the ‘worth’
of the study. Research guides and faculty can help students develop this skill of critical self-
appraisal of their research. We are fond of our research as we have invested time, money, and
effort. It is important to take a step back and look at it objectively. The researcher should
be familiar with important journals in the field. If possible, a journal which makes the entire
manuscript freely available to readers should be chosen. This may not always be the case as
many of these journals have article processing charges, and funds for paying the charges may
not be available. Online search can help us know the indexing and abstracting information of
journals and their rank within the field.
Publishing advice for young researchers: The aims and scope of the journal should be
read carefully, and previously published articles examined. One of the challenges is the sig-
nificant variation in the formatting requirements of different journals. Mendeley for Desktop
is a free software which can assist with different styles of referencing and formatting. If a
researcher is reasonably confident that an article may be suitable for a journal, then it may be
worthwhile to make a pre submission enquiry. Many journals may, however, want the author
to formally submit the manuscript so that they can examine the same. It is important to quickly
respond to queries from the journal and to revise the manuscript according to comments from
the editor and reviewers. If the manuscript is rejected, then it is important to move on and
think about the next journal to which it can be submitted. Creating a list of possible journals in
terms of priority will be useful. Sometimes new journals or publishing concepts appear which
may eventually become mainstream. When these are new, they are more likely to accept sub-
missions from the developing world. Blogs could also be a good option and certain blogs are
well established and authoritative. A few journals also have their own blogs for more informal
submissions. Preprints can be an option if the journal to which you are submitting your paper
has no objection. For those who like to pursue the humanities and creative writing there are
several medical humanities journals and blogs. Many mainstream journals also accept poems
and very short (50 or 55 word) stories. Many are also beginning to accept articles in other
formats like videos explaining the work and video abstracts where the significance of the work
is briefly presented.
Thus, several publication options are available to the students and academicians of today.
Belief in oneself and in one’s work is important. So is the courage to submit your work to
leading journals. I circle back to my Professor who was fond of saying, ‘What is the worst that
they can do? Reject!’. The ability to bounce back quickly after a rejection is also important
though as I age, I am afraid my ability to do so is steadily decreasing.

Academia Letters, July 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: P Ravi Shankar, ravi.dr.shankar@gmail.com

Citation: Shankar, P.R. (2021). What is the worst that can happen? Rejection? Submit it!. Academia Letters,
Article 2134. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL2134.

3
References
Ioannidis JPA, Boyack KW, Baas J.Updated science-wide author databases of standardized ci-
tation indicators. PLoS Biol 2020;18(10): e3000918. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.3000918

Academia Letters, July 2021 ©2021 by the author — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0

Corresponding Author: P Ravi Shankar, ravi.dr.shankar@gmail.com

Citation: Shankar, P.R. (2021). What is the worst that can happen? Rejection? Submit it!. Academia Letters,
Article 2134. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL2134.