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Showing posts with label Legends. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Legends. Show all posts

Saturday, July 25, 2015

Mainstream, VOL LIII No 30 New Delhi July 18, 2015

I SALUTE YOU

Monday 20 July 2015by Som Benegal
One more link with the past has gone,
One more patriot gone to rest forever,
United with history in the journal of her life.
O, Aruna Asaf Ali, I salute you
For your tireless wanderings
Through the maze of revolution,
But never faltering even though
Your comrades locked you out at journey’s end.
Som Benegal

Friday, December 26, 2014

ISRO's Radhakrishnan in Nature journal's top ten list

Dr. K. Radhakrishnan, Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is one of the 2014 top ten scientists chosen by the prestigious journalNature. This is the first time in the recent past that the journal has chosen an Indian working in India. He is listed along with other people like Andrea Accomazzo, the Rosetta flight operations director, European Space Agency.
The reasons for choosing Dr. Radhakrishnan are pretty simple and straightforward.
When India’s Mangalyaan successfully settled into Mars orbit on September 24, 2014, the country became the first and only nation to have done so on its maiden attempt. India also became the first Asian country to reach Mars.
The space organisation crossed two other major milestones this year. In January, the space organisation achieved spectacular success with the spaceflight of an Indian cryogenic engine and stage. India has been striving hard for some years to indigenously develop a cryogenic engine to improve the reliability of GSLV rockets and to take the rocket to greater heights.
The recent launch of the heaviest and tallest GSLV Mark III and the successful re-entry of the unmanned crew module were the other landmark achievements.
“It’s recognition for executing a major technological mission by bringing in synergy of a large team,” said Dr. Radhakrishnan about Nature choosing him as one of the top ten scientists in the world. The team is as large as 16,000 members, with the younger generation alone accounting for 4,500.
“ISRO is a wonderful and unique organisation. There is wonderful team spirit and openness,” is how he describes an organisation that he joined in 1971. He had worked in various major capacities before becoming Chairman.
He was with the then Department of Ocean Development for five years from 2000-2005 and was a Founder Director of the Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services (INCOIS), Hyderabad.
If the number of young people wanting to join ISRO skyrocketed after the success of the Chandrayaan moon mission, the Mangalyaan magic is bound to generate much greater attraction. “These missions have been able to generate remarkable interest in the younger generation. If we are already able to attract the best brains in the country, these achievements provide a fillip to that,” he said.
“Just after the September 24 event [when Mangalyaan settled into Mars orbit], ISRO got many postcards from people. The Facebook of ISRO has 900,000 likes,” he said
At a time when other government research organisations are struggling to get the best, motivated people, ISRO has been like a magnet attracting and retaining. Dr. Radhakrishnan shares the secret behind this. “The challenge provided by the job itself attracts people. To retain people, the job should be challenging,” he said. “There is also good working culture and ambience. There is also pride associated with the job, and in a society how people look at you also matters.”
“I don’t subscribe to that,” he said about women not being on par with men when it comes to science. “Women make for good scientists and engineers,” Dr. Radhakrishnan said. “ISRO has over 20 per cent women scientists and even in senior positions like project directors.”
He does acknowledge that the visual impact of a rocket launch excites people and goes a long way in helping people connect with ISRO. “A rocket taking off certainly excites people but so is the impact [of the satellites] made on people and their lives,” he stressed. To drive home the point, he cites the advance cyclone warning provided to people in the two recent instances.
The next major events on ISRO’s calendar is the developmental flight of GSLV Mark III vehicle with a fully operational cryogenic engine in two years’ time. The other is the launch of Chandrayaan-2 mission configured with an Orbiter, Lander and Rover for in-situ investigation of the lunar surface in 2016-2017. ISRO has already developed and tested a lunar Rover.
But it remains to be seen if Dr. Radhakrishnan will be in the saddle till then. He is due to retire on December 31, 2014.

Thursday, September 04, 2014

Alma Mater of Legends to Get New Life

Posted by Elets News Network (ENN)



Intellectuals who put the country on the path of progress are often remembered. Unfortunately though, we have failed to recognise the institutions that nurtured these legends. In a move directed at correcting this anomaly and for facilitating the right infrastructure and environment to students at such institutes, the Human Resource Development ministry is about to embark on an exercise to draw up a list of schools and colleges whose alumni have won the country international recognition in different spheres.
The exercise, to be carried out in collaboration with the states will honour the alma mater of these historic figures and also help breathe new life into these institutes.
Also on the agenda is a move to pay tribute to national leaders such as S. Radhakrishnan, Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Swami Vivekananda, Zakir Husain, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Deen Dayal Upadhyay, Madan Mohan Malaviya among others by instituting 50 new centres across universities and institutions of higher education. The University Grants Commission will offer the seed money of Rs. 7.5 lakh to set up these centres which will be named after people who have made stellar contribution towards education, social reform and nation building. Universities and institutions of higher education can apply for the grant and set up these centres.
- See more at: http://digitallearning.eletsonline.com/2014/09/alma-mater-of-legends-to-get-new-life/#sthash.IbmvbePU.dpuf