Academic writing, ranging from producing term papers, articles to quality research papers, is an uphill battle for students, academicians and scholars. To understand what makes academic writing dry, cumbersome, and uninspiring, we have to first understand what academic writing is, its intentions, and how it becomes important. We could define academic writing as a form of organized research, practiced and utilized to convert acquired knowledge to inform, explain and persuade to create significant interventions in the course of knowledge. But the convoluted notions surrounding academic writing makes it infamous and lead to unethical academic practices like plagiarism, which threatens academic integrity. So a rightful approach is required to free academic writing from the misconception that it has to be bloated and unreadable. 

The indictments against academic writing and the impediments faced by students in writing better have a close connection. Since appropriate and economic use of language is the crux of all forms of writing, proficiency in the language is a prerequisite. In India, English is the language used in academic and professional spheres as it has become an essential language. Yet, even the students who pursue higher studies in English language and literature are apprehensive about writing a piece of their own. Writing in English is complicated by several components like grasp on spelling and punctuation, command over language, and the need for extensive vocabulary, etc. Our classrooms do not encourage the students nor they are trained enough to produce good academic pieces, for there is language interference, insufficiency of views and guidance. Also, being second language learners of English, they find writing in English a challenging task. Improving academic writing skills should therefore involve enhancing the linguistic competence development of the students. But the problem does not end even if these barriers are transcended.

The production and transmission of knowledge entail its clear and proper enunciation. Though it is a fact that academic writing possesses distinct and uniques linguistic characteristics, like all other forms of writing, readability, proper articulation of ideas and logical cohesion are vital. There is always a difference between writing to be understood and writing to impress. But in academia, it seems there exists this misconception that embellishing writing with jargons and complex words would make it sound more ‘academic’ and authoritative. Most of the time academic writing thus end up as an exercise to show off, often convoluting trivial things by dressing them in unnecessary and unrelated jargons, making it unpleasant to read and impossible to understand. All this throw light on the importance of how critically grounded knowledge is inevitable for academic writing. Critical thinking should be nurtured in students to develop, synthesize, and present their ideas persuasively and coherently. It would effectually end the abuse of jargons and encourage discipline specific mode of writing, guaranteeing quality in academic writing. Even then, the writing process is not complete and an important factor that ensures quality in research and academic writing is left to be addressed.

The transformative potential of research is contingent on publishing and disseminating knowledge. Since the academia is responsible for this, the limited outputs impact the effective flow of knowledge too. In Indian academic space, there is greater emphasis on the finished product but total neglect of the process of producing. The difficulty and complexity of academic writing arise from the fact that it is a continuous process comprising the formulation of arguments, developing support through research, constant revision, editing and restructuring. The role of peer review, feedback and process of revision thus become important in this process, for they ensure productive and error-free writing. The lack of sufficient academic writing training and ignorance about the nature of plagiarism and it's complexities should be blamed for this. The ideal solution is to provide better assistance to students, which would instill in their minds respect towards other's work and their own, thereby safeguarding the optimal production of knowledge and its transmission.

The challenges academic writing faces in the Indian context points to the dire need for a writing pedagogy that would effectively address and resolve these issues. Since these challenges are closely connected to the problems students are having with writing, teachers will have to train the students with a framework that would enable them to produce well-written works. This must provide systematic instructions in identifying and solving their problems. Since better writing skill is an indispensable part of student's academic life, providing them with content and discipline based writing techniques are inevitable for preventing them from resorting to plagiarism and other unfair practices. Critical thinking should be promoted and a sound academic writing programme aimed at assisting students to write better and productively from an early stage. Fortunately Indian universities and colleges have turned their attention towards this matter by addressing academic writing as a vital process that determines and augment the body of knowledge. Writing pedagogy is slowly evolving with the potential to vindicate academic writing and this development is optimistic.