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Acharya Jagadis Chandra Bose a Pioneer of Modern Indian Science Subodh Mahanti

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Acharya Jagadis Chandra Bose a Pioneer of Modern Indian Science Subodh Mahanti Registered with the Registrar of Newspapers of India: R.N. 70269/98 Postal Registration No. : DL 11360/2002 Monthly Newsletter of Vigyan Prasar October 2002 Vol. 5 No. 1 VP News Inside SAARC Book Fair In Dhaka igyan Prasar participated in the first SAARC Book Fair 2002 held at Dhaka, EDITORIAL Bangladesh, during 26-29 September 2002 under the aegis of SAARC Book V * Acharya Jagadis Development Council, Chandra Bose representing National Publishers’ Associations * Ginger-Really a of the SAARC countries. Zing Thing The venue of the Book Fair was Shilpakala * Digital Television Academy in Dhaka and it * Recent Developments in Shri V.K. Joshi and Dr. Subodh Science & Technology Mahanti presenting some Vigyan Prasar publications to Begum Selima Rahman, Hon’ble Minister * Interview With Prof. Asis of State of Cultural Affairs, Datta Govt of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh. was organized by Bangladesh Publishers’ Council. The Fair was inaugurated by Begum Selima Rahman. Hon’ble Minister of State of Cultural Affairs, Govt of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh. Publishers from, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka participated in the Fair. Seventeen Publishers from India Including Vigyan Prasar and Publications Division, Govt. of India took part in the fair. The closing ceremony was graced by Hon’ble Foreign Minister of Bangladesh Mr. M. Morshed Khan. Vigyan Prasar’s books were well appreciated by the visitors at the Fair. Publishers from other foreign countries showed keen interest in Vigyan Prasar’s books. It appears that there is lot of scope for promoting Vigyan Prasar’s books in SAARC countries. Popular Science Writing in 19th Century Bengal s part of its effort to document popular science writings in different Indian Alanguages, Vigyan Prasar had commissioned a project to Science Communicator’s Forum, Kolkata for popular science writings in Bengali. Earlier, a similar project for Hindi was completed by Vigyan Parishad Prayag. The period covered in Bengali was 1818 to 1860. The final project report in the form of compilation of selected articles/writings and with a detailed introduction was handed over to Vigyan Prasar by Professor Sushil K. Mukherjee, former Vice Chancellor of Calcutta University, Jadavpur University and Kalyani University, at Kolkata on Prof. S.K. Mukherjee handing over the manuscript to Dr. S. Mahanti of Vigyan Prasar on Aug. 24, 2002 at Kolkata. August 24, 2002. The function was held at Loreto Day School, Sealdah, Kolkata. Also seen Dr. Amit Chakrabarty and Prof. S.S. Ray (Sitting) Contd. on page ......24 ...think scientifically, act scientifically ... think scientifically, act scientifically ... think scientifically, act... Published and Printed by Dr. Subodh Mahanti on behalf of Vigyan Prasar, C-24, Qutab Institutional Area, New Delhi-110 016 Printed at Rakmo Press Pvt. Ltd, C-59, Okhla Industrial Area Phase-I, New Delhi-110 020. Editor: Dr. V.B.Kamble CMY Acharya Jagadis Chandra Bose A Pioneer of Modern Indian Science Subodh Mahanti “In a large forest the trees shed their dry leaves one by one in profusion thus making the soil underneath fertile. In a country where there is continuous research in science, knowledge of it in fragmentary bits is being spread constantly. This is how one’s heart’s soil is quickened, becoming fertile with an alive feeling in science. It is the loss of it that has left our mind unscientific. We feel the impoverishment not only in our education, but also in the field of our occupation where we are bowed with frustration.” Rabindranath Tagore in ‘Bishwa-Parichaya’ quoted from its English version titled “Our Universe” translated by Indu Dutt. “If there was been any success in my life that was built on the unshakable foundation of failure…” Jagadis Chandra Bose “Bose was a physicist and a physicist he remained in his outlook to the very end.” Meghanad Saha “The generally accepted interpretation of Jagadis Chandra’s scientific activities is that he had essentially the biologist’s conception of Nature; lack of opportunities for biological studies while as a student in Calcutta and later lack of any teaching post in biology, induced Jagadis Chandra to take up the post of teacher in physics….” D.M. Bose He (Bose) was modern India’s first physicist after all, one of her very first scientists. He was his motherland’s first active participant in the Galilean - Newtonian tradition. He had confounded the British disbeliever. He had shown that the Eastern mind was indeed capable of the exact and exacting thinking demanded by western science. He had broken the mould. S. Dasgupta in “Jagadis Chandra Bose and the Indian Response to Western Science”. agadis Chandra Bose, popularly the Royal Institution, London, a Jknown as J.C. Bose, occupies Friday Evening Discourse, then a unique position in history of most prestigious and visible modern Indian science. He is platform for announcing new regarded as India’s first modern discoveries. It was Michael scientist. But then it is also true Faraday (1791-1867) who started that Bose was not the only pioneer the Friday Evening Discourse in of modern Indian science. Prafulla 1826. Some of the most Chandra Ray (1861-1944), who prominent British scientists established an Indian school of worked in the Royal Institution chemistry and a chemical industry, and participated in these and Srinivasa Ramanujan (1887- discourses. In this lecture Bose 1920), the great mathematician, demonstrated his devices for the are equally familiar names in the generation and detection of radio annals of modern history of Indian waves. science and who were Bose’s Bose did pioneering contemporaries. It was research, first in physics and then Ramanujan, who was first elected in physiology. In 1888 Heinrich as Fellow of the Royal Society, the Rudolf Hertz (1857-94) produced ultimate recognition given by the and detected electromagnetic British Scientific establishment. waves in the 60 cm wavelength But then as one of Bose’s range and in doing so he verified biographers, Subrata Dasgupta, James Clerk Maxwell’s (1831-79) writes : “Bose was the first Indian electromagnetic theory. However, to be admitted in person to the Bose was the first to produce sanctum sanctorum of English, millimeter-length radio waves and thus western science”. In January study their properties. Bose also 1897 Bose delivered a lecture at J.C. Bose perfected the method of Dream 2047 CMY transmission and of reception of electromagnetic waves. came directly under crown rule. Lord Canning, Governor In recent years there has been welcome news of proper General, as the East India Company’s Chief Administrator credit being given to Bose for his pioneering work in the of India used to be called since 1772 when Warren Hastings area of wireless telegraphy. The assumed the office, was proclaimed Institute of Electrical and Electronics Viceroy. Bose’s ancestral home was at Engineers (IEEE) in one of their the village named Rarikhal in Vikrampur, publications wrote : “ Our investigative not far from Dhaka (then Dacca), the research into the origin and first major capital of present-day Bangladesh. His use of solid state diode detector devices father Bhagaban (also spelt as led to the discovery that the first Bhagwan) Chandra Bose served the transatlantic wireless signal in British India Government in various Marconi’s world-famous experiment executive and magisterial positions. At was received by Marconi using the iron- the time when Bose was born, Bhagaban mercury-iron-coherer with a telephone Michael Faraday Heinrich Rudolf Chandra was Deputy Magistrate of Hertz detector invented by Sir J.C. Bose in 1898.” Bose was a Faridpur and it is here Bose’s early pioneer in microwave optics technology. He was the first to childhood was mainly spent. Bhagaban Chandra was no show that semiconductor rectifiers could detect radio waves. ordinary government servant. To quote Patrick Geddes, who Bose’s galena receiver was amongst the earliest examples was Professor of Botany at St. Andrews University, and the of a lead sulphide photo conducting device. author of one of the most authentic biographies of Bose : Bose’s his theories about the relationship between “Bose’s father – Bhagaban Chunder Bose, Deputy living and non-living and plant’s response to stimuli Magistrate of Faridpur – was the active defender, not were not taken seriously in his time and even today only of the townlet but of the scores of villages around some of his ideas have remained esoteric. However, as well. The modern magistrate is mainly settled as D.M. Bose, who succeeded Bose as Director of between his courthouse and his home; but here in the Bose Institute, has pointed out “his model of an those days a man was needed, picked not only for electric eye which records with electric signals judicial capacity, intelligence and local knowledge, message received from outside world, his physical but for active initiative and courage and thus prepared model of memory as a mechanism for storing at any moment to assume command of his own police information justified his being considered a precursor and his people as well, and be ready even to raid the of the modern discipline of cybernetics.” It is now James Clerk raiders. Of this readiness various stories might be recognised that Bose had made very significant Maxwell told. As a single example, hearing of a gang of contributions to the field of chronobiology and circadian dacoits in his neighourhood, Mr. Bose mounted an elephant rhythms even before these two technical terms were and with the very few police available, rode straight into the coined. very heart of the dacoits’ camp. Taken by surprise, they Bose was the pioneer of experimental science in India. broke and scattered; the ready magistrate dropped down, He was an inventor of the first order.
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