Akademik

n.

The state of being upgraded; the act or an instance of upgrading.

"The banking industry emerged as a major buyer of networking products with foreign and Indian banks embarking on massive network upgradation projects."

— Atanu Roy, et al., "State of the Mart: Fast Forward," Computers Today, July 15, 2000

The protocol also envisages the possibility of continuous technological upgradation in the existing fields of manufacture.

—"USSR — Machine Building," BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, November 28, 1979

Upgradation is one of those redundant words that probably grew in the fertile fields of corporate self-importance. After all, the existing nouns "upgrade" and "upgrading" seem downright wimpy compared to the muscular "upgradation" with its four syllables and "-ation" suffix.

This redundancy may explain why upgradation isn't in any dictionary (at least those that I have, including the OED 2; if you see it in a dictionary, let me know). However, a case can be made that it should be in the dictionaries because the word is both old and popular.

For evidence of its longevity, I managed to track it back to at least the above citation from 1979.

For evidence of its popularity, I checked through the Lexis-Nexis database of newspapers, magazines, and other media and found thousands of citations. However, the pattern of these citations is interesting. There were only 72 from 1979 to 1989. Then the numbers look like this:

1990 - 13

1991 - 10

1992 - 31

1993 - 46

1994 - 55

1995 - 44

1996 - 77

1997 - 483

1998 - 908

1999 - 853

2000 - 1,028

As you can see, for some reason usage of the word exploded in 1997 - 1998 and has continued apace. So if upgradation isn't in any dictionary, it's likely because its popularity is relatively recent.

I hear alot of Asian's using this word, particularly of Indian or Pakistani origin. It's the kind of word you would hear on "Fone Jacker" from the Indian guy who is trying to sell Broadband. If someone in the UK uses this word, I intentionally make comment as it's not a real word!I have to agree! This word is often used by Indian IT contractors who have picked up bad language habits! Check this; http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/upgradationupgradation is the application of a new specification by a corporation employing workers from asian nation for supportization of its operation.

Is that adequate clarification?When human speaks a word which is understood by other human then that becomes language. Indian or Pakistani invented this word "upgradation' same as English invented "Put" and "But" which doesn't make sense.

You will see 'more to come' so keep watching....From a training clinic by Microsoft that was published 27-Jul-2010;

"This is because the SharePoint Server 2007 master pages, page layouts, and CSS are included with SharePoint Server 2010 and applied to the site after the upgradation."

no one has really asked the meaning because it was clear, the question is it's existence which you really can't just accept because it really is not a word.

Using suffix -tion is not supposed to be abused and doesn't apply to all things you do... I'm scratching my head during the WRITATION of this comment.It is very annoying hearing this word.I really hate this word. Just use "upgrade" please!The reason for the explosion of usage in 1997 - 1998 timeframe: The huge influx of IT workers from India on H1-B visas that paranoid corporations brought in to work on the Y2K "bug" that everyone worried was going to melt us down. Even after Y2K, the numbers of foreign IT workers keeps increasing, and they have some strange affinity for the word.