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Homi Jehangir Bhabha the Patron of Radio Astronomy in India

Kaushik Ghosh,

PhD Research Scholar,

Visva-Bharati,

Radio Astronomy was developed after the WWII as a new discipline. But it was not introduced in India still 1963. Encouraged by the nationalist feeling to become a part of Indian scientific development some Indian scholars of radio astronomy then were in abroad wanted to return to their motherland.

During the meetings of the American Astronomical Society and several other occasions Govind Swarup, T.K. Menon and M.R. Kundu discussed the possibility of their returning to India and the forming of a major astronomical group.1 In this regard, Govind Swarup in late 1950s communicated with Pawsey, Frank Kerr and Christianson regarding his plan of initiating radio astronomical research in India.2 This group of experts advised him to include T.Krishnan in his group. Pawsey was doubtful regarding their future success in India. But he left the final decision of their return to India on themselves wishing a successful future.3 In June 1961 Pawsey suggested that the group should form with Swarup and Krishnan at the core.4 This group was well connected with the international network of radio astronomers all over the world. The international perception regarding the bureaucratic red tape of Indian scientific establishment was echoed in Christiansen’s caution to Swarup:

You two and Menon and Kundu should get together for a united attack on the monolith of Indian bureaucracy.5

Therese Indian scholars abroad were greatly inspired by the national reconstruction and scientific development programme of India wanted to start their work in India. These Indian scholars discussed the matter during the 25th General Assembly meeting of the International

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Astronomical Union at Berkeley (USA) from 15-24 August 1961 and decided to form a radio astronomy group after returning India.

During 1960s T. Krishnan a physics tripos from Cambridge was working with world famous radio astronomer J.L. Pawsey and W.N. Christiansen at Australia. T.K. Menon after completing his PhD from Harvard was working at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory at Charlottesville. M.R. Kundu after completing his PhD from Paris, was then at the University of Michigan. He was a part of the Yves-André Rocard headed group from École Normale Supérieure. Govind Swarup a student of K.S. Krisnan at NPL, Delhi in early 1950s was sent to Sydney (Australia) to study Radio Physics under Colombo Plan fellowship programme in 1955. Then he went to Stanford University, USA for his PhD on radio astronomy.

This group initially planned to send their proposal to Dr. D.S. Kothari, Chairman of UGC, M.S. Thacker, Director General of CSIR, Committee of Space Research and NPL. But their meeting with astrophysicist M.K. Bappu turned their attention to Bhabha, who told them to send a copy of their proposal for its execution otherwise it would fail.6 Bappu trained at Harvard was then the Director of Kodaikanal Observatory had firsthand experience of the functioning of Indian science management knew very well of Bhabha’s willingness to promote new fields of scientific research as well as of his capability. This is the excellent evidence that not only international network had played vital role in shaping Indian scientific developments, but local collaborators had also played their important part. Sometimes the international network had to depend on their local collaborators.

T. Krishnan, T.K. Menon, M.R. Kundu and Govind Swarup sent the Proposal for the formation of a Radio Astronomy Group in India’ in 23 September to H.J. Bhabha, Chairman of UGC, D.G.O. of CSIR, NPL and five foreign referees. Their proposal was clear and they had stated clearly regarding the first research problem they wished to take up. They had also mentioned the way that would fulfill their objectives. Their proposal clearly stated:

Recent experiments indicate a great need for studying the discrete sources of sun, the slowly varying component and solar radio bursts with very high resolution. This could be done using of six dishes that were presented to the National Physical Laboratory of India by the C.S.I.R.O. of Australia and which are not in use to the best of our knowledge. Also, we plan to construct

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receivers for studying the spectrum of polarization solar bursts. The simultaneous study of the sources of the slowly varying component as well as solar bursts over a wide range of frequencies will provide us with highly valuable information on electron density in the solar corona and mechanism of generation of energetic particles during solar flares, which in turn will be useful for studies on solar cosmic rays, geometric storms the Van Allen radiation belts, etc. A cheap, but very high resolution radio telescope of a novel design for galactic and extra-galactic research would be the next step in our program.7

They had also mentioned that building of telescope in India would cost low due to the availability of cheap labour in India.8 This group of four sent copies of their proposal to Bart Bok, D.J. Denisse, Jan Oort, Joe Pawsey and Harlow Shapley and requested them to send their confidential assessments to the authorities in India. As the group was the part of the recently developed radio astronomy group based on USA, France, UK and Australia and their works were well known among the international radio astronomers, the referees extended their full support to them. Bart Bok, the Dutch-American astronomer made a very generous recommendation in his letter to Bhabha for the group. He informed Bhabha that these scholars with their high research quality background might absorbed in any university in the world. Formation of this group would result important development in near future. He also reminding Bhabha the contribution of Dr. M.K. Vaina Bappu, the Director of Kodaikanal Observatory revealed the two benefits of the establishment of this radio astronomy group. It would give India two major anchor points for its whole astronomical progress, one radio astronomical and other optical.9 Bok wrote:

It seems to me that their offer to return India as a group is a unique one, and one that should by all means be accepted and acted upon promptly. An offer like the present one comes only rarely in the history of the scientific development of a nation which, scientifically is obviously coming of age.10J.K. Oort, Director of the Leiden Observatory and J.L. Pawsey also extended their full support to this proposal.11 Pawsey reminded Bhabha that the administration should encourage the promising activities.12

J.H. Oort’s letter needed special attention. In the letter he addressed Bhabha, Kothari and Thaker as ‘Dear Colleagues’. From this addressing it is evident that world scientific community had a kind of ‘family bonding’. Members of this community were connected through an invisible

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bonding.13 This kind of bonding had resulted the formation of a complex international network of the scientists. That network played vital role in the development of science all over the world.

UGC and CSIR had acknowledged their proposal and assured them to respond quickly after necessary discussions.14 Bhabha was at the time in Geneva. M.G.K. Menon forwarded these letters to him. But Bhabha responded quickly. Bhabha met Menon at Wasington DC on 1961 and after discussing the proposal expressed his wish to support the proposal. Menon’s note is the proof of Bhabha’s willingness for the project. Menon told Bhabha for a fund of Rs. 3 lakhs in the first year and Rs. 5 lakhs in the case of non-availability of the dishes of NPL. Menon noted:

He talks quite happily of fund outlays of 50 to 100 lakhs. Unbelievable for us at present. He seemed perfectly sincere and credible. A few other points:

1. TIFR can create any number of positions at any time without any red tape. 2. We have sufficient money for travel to meeting etc. 3. Will have provisions for visitors and for arranging meetings in India. 4. Liberal study leave provisions.15

During January 1962 Professor Bart Bok was visiting TIFR on the occation of the inauguration ceremony of TIFR new buildings. Bhabha had discussed the proposal with him in details and agreed to arrange a Rs. 3 lakhs initial budget for the group. Bhabha sent a telegram to each of the four:

WE HAVE DECIDED TO ESTABLISH RADIOASTRONOMY GROUP STOP LETTER FOLLOWS WIYH OFFER BHABHA.16

Readership was offered to Menon and three others were offered the position of fellows. This unequal offer created great dissatisfaction and annoyance among them. Krishnan was doubtful about their power of implementation of their plan from the position of a mere fellow. Bhabha in his letter to Krishnan clearly expressed his thinking on posts and designations:

The ability of a member of the staff to press for a particular programme does not depend in this institute on his designation, but being able to convince his fellow scientists and the Faculty about the sensibleness of the project.17 Mukul Kundu questioned the ‘idea of different ranks’ and found this offer unacceptable.18 Govind Swarup in this situation being worried wrote to T.K. Menon

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that though he was not personally worried about the title of his position but for the execution of their team works properly all four members of the group should need equal footing at TIFR.19 Govind Swarup was the first among them to take the offer. He resigned from the Assistant Professorship at Standford University and returned to India on 31 March 1963. Swarup joined TIFR in April 1963. On Homi Bhabha’s request NPL and CSIR authorities transferred the thirty- two Potts Hill dishes to TIFR in the middle of 1963.20 On Govind Swarup’s request Pawsey managed the permission from CSIRO authorities to donate these dishes to India under Colombo Plan in 1955.21 Govind Swarup just had started his work at TIFR in juke 1963 saw Hazard’s article ‘Investigation of the radio source 3C273 by the method of lunar calculations’ in a recent issue of ‘Nature’.22 The paper discussed the observations of a lunar occultation of the radio sources made with the 64 m Parkes Radio Telescope.23 Marteen Schmidt’s companion paper ‘A star-like object with large red-shift’.24 This was the period when huge controversy was running between the Steady State and Big Bang cosmologies.25 To conduct more accurate observations Swarup taking advantage of India’s closeness to the Equator decided to build large cylindrical radio telescope in a suitable South Indian hill.26 First he discussed his plan with M.G.K. Menon, Dean of the Physics Faculty of TIFR. In August 1963 he had a long discussion of two hours with Bhabha. When in the meeting Swarup asked Bhabha whether he should prepare a detailed project document, Bhabha replied:

Young man, you do not waste your time writing a project report; your main problem would be collect a team; when you have managed that, you can submit a project report and proceed with its design and construction.27

Swarup soon hired two research associates Vijay Kapahi and J.D. Isloor from the DAE training school. Two technical assistants, S.K. Pandit and Y.G. Sindhe were also hired.28 Thereafter Swarup started installation of his equipments.Ramesh Sinha also joined the group. N.V.G. Sarma and M. Joshi leaving their job at NPL joined Swaqrup’s group in 1964. In that year D.S. Bagri with a M.Tech degree also joined the group29 Mukul Kundu joined TIFR in late 1965.

Based on Swarup’s design the Potts Hill dishes were installed to build an effective radio interferometer was established at Kalyan near Bombay. They used simple and novel transmission system to connect the antennas. The work on Kalyan Radio Telescope was started in late 1963

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and set up was completed in April 1965. It was put into operation from June 1965.30 It was first used to make a two-dimensional map of the quiet sun at 610 MHz.31

After an extensive search a suitable hill at Ooty was chosen for the proposed equatorial radio telescope. Selected site was situated ‘in the picturesque Nilgiri Hills’ in South India at an altitude of about 2100 meters.32 The project got green signal from Bhabha as part of an Inter University Centre. Bhabha got Nehru’s approval for the project as it would give a boost to science education in India. Tamilnadu Government allotted a 600 acre plot for that. But Bhabha’s tragic death hated the project for a while.

Notes and References:

1 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 26. 2 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 26. 3 J.L. Pawsey to Govind Swarup, dated- 26 October 1960, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 4 J.L. Pawsey to Govind Swarup, dated- 29 June 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 5Cited in- Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 26. 6 T.K. Menon during his interview with Indira Chowdhury on 11 January revealed that. Quoted in- Indira Chowdhury, ibid.,p.185. 7 ‘PROPOSAL FOR THE FORMATION OF A RADIO ASTRONOMY GROUP IN INDIA’ by T. Krishnan, T.K. Menon, M.R. Kundu and Govind Swarup to H.J. Bhabha, Chairaman of the UGC, D.G.O. CSIR, NPL, and five foreign referees, dated- 23 September, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection, pp. 3-4. 8 ‘PROPOSAL FOR THE FORMATION OF A RADIO ASTRONOMY GROUP IN INDIA’ by T. Krishnan, T.K. Menon, M.R. Kundu and Govind Swarup to H.J. Bhabha, Chairaman of the UGC, D.G.O. CSIR, NPL, and five foreign referees, dated- 23 September, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection,p.4. 9 Bart Bok to H.J. Bhabha, dated- 5 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 10 Bart Bok to H.J. Bhabha, dated- 5 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 11 J.H. Oort to H.J. Bhabha, dated-23 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection; J.L. Pawsey to H.J. Bhabha, dated- 6 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 12 J.L. Pawsey to H.J. Bhabha, dated- 6 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 13 J.H. Oort to H.J. Bhabha, dated-23 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection.

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14 D.S. Kothari to T.K. Menon, dated-13 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection’ M.S. Thacker to T.K. Menon, 5 October 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 15 T.K. Menon’s note to Govind Swarup, dated-14 November 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 16 Telegram of Bhabha to Govind Swarup, dated-20 January 1962, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 17 H.J. Bhabha to T. Krishnan, dated- 6 April 1962, D-2004-00398, TIFR Archives. 18 M.R. Kundu to Govind Swarup, dated- 11 November 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 19 Govind Swarup to T.K. Menon, 1 December 1961, Professor Govind Swarup’s Personal Collection. 20 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 27. 21 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 25. 22C. Hazard, ‘Investigation of the radio source 3C273 by the method of lunar calculations’, Nature, 197, 1963, p. 1037.

23 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, pp. 27. 24 M. Schmidt, A’ star-like object with large red-shift’, Nature, 197, 1963, p. 1040.Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 27.

25 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 27. 26 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 27. 27 Cited by Govind Swarup, in- ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 27. 28 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 27. 29 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 29. 30 Tata Institute of Fundamental Research: 1947-70 (Silver Jubilee Report), p.294. 31 Tata Institute of Fundamental Research: 1947-70 (Silver Jubilee Report), p.294. 32 Govind Swarup, ‘From Potts Hill (Australia) to Pune (India): The Journey of a Radio Astronomer’, Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006, p. 29.

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