Feature Article
V. Radhakrishnan
—Scientist Par Excellence
K. SMILES MASCARENHAS
S
IR Isaac Newton once said: “I do not
know what I may appear to the world,
but to myself I seem to have been
only a boy playing on the seashore, and
diverting myself in now and then finding a
smoother pebble or prettier shell than
ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth
lay all undiscovered before me.”
I do not know if this description of
Newton about himself fits him perfectly
well. When it came to unraveling the riddles
of Nature, Newton worked like a maniac
with single-minded devotion. Whether it is
the Brachistochrone problem or his work
on Alchemy, Newton devoted his entire
time to the answer he was seeking till he
reached the solution. So, the description
of a boy playing casually on a seashore,
now and then diverting his attention to a
smoother pebble, does not suit the great
Isaac Newton.
But I do know of a person who would
fit the description of a “boy on a seashore”
absolutely perfectly. He is none other than
Prof. V. Radhakrishnan, who entered the
heavenly abode on the 3rd of March 2011.
Fondly known as RAD to all his friends, he
was the Director of the Raman Research
Institute, Bangalore from 1972 to 1994, and
a distinguished astrophysicist in his own right.
It is remarkable that to climb the ladder of
success not once did he make use of the
fact that he was the second son of the
illustrious Sir C.V. Raman!
SCIENCE REPORTER, MAY 2011
Radhakrishnan had his own way of
enjoying science. He would have a casual
talk with anyone who was interested in
science often promulgating some deep
notions about science to his avid listener,
without any fear of the latter plagiarizing
his thoughts. In fact, he would not bother if
anyone plagiarized his work, and would
delight in the thought that somebody had
taken pains to popularize his ideas. To the
author of this article he once disclosed his
profound ideas about the Poincare sphere
and Polarization states of electromagnetic
waves that are not found in any book on
Field Theory (which neither he nor the
author of this article bothered to publish
anyway!). To him science must be done
for the sheer joy of exploration and not for
personal glory and gain.
He had a very casual approach to
life as well as science and had his own
views about ‘holistic’ and ‘alcoholistic’ way
of living. He was unassuming, highly
reserved about his own achievements, but
was quick to appreciate and encourage
the work done by others. He was a source
of inspiration to the members of his institute
and motivated his colleagues towards
higher human values. He never “bossed”
his colleagues, and would often come
down heavily on others who attempted to
terrorize their subordinates!
Professor Radhakrishnan was born in
Tondaripet, a suburb of Madras, on 18th of
56
May 1929. Right from a very young age,
he had iconoclastic ideas about a
ritualistic way of living. He refused to attend
the sacred thread ceremony performed
for every Brahmin boy at the age of eight
or nine. He never believed in caste, creed,
religion or hierarchy and would often sit
on the ground to have tea with the staff at
the Workshop of RRI. He would never
hesitate to taste non-vegetarian dishes and
was poles apart from his illustrious father
who abhorred alcoholic beverage!
He completed his B.Sc (Hons) from
Mysore University, and later a short stint as
a staff at the Madras Institute of Technology,
Chennai. When one of his fellow staff (who,
at a later date, would be the Head of the
ECE Department when the author of this
article was a student at M.I.T), recognized
him and asked if he was the son of Sir C.V.
Raman, all that he got was an angry glare
and a harsh “No!” as the reply!
Adventurous as he was always
destined to be, he got himself the most
powerful and speedy motorbike that was
available at that time, much to the
consternation of his beloved mother. He
promptly met with an accident and had
to be hospitalized for some time. However,
this incident never deterred him from taking
risks in his later adventures.
He started his research career as a
research scholar at the Department of
Physics, Indian Institute of Science,
Bangalore and thereafter was in the
research faculties of various world famous
institutes. He worked in the Chalmers
University of Technology, Gothenburg,
Sweden as a Research Assistant during
1955-58. He was a Senior Research Fellow
of the California Institute of Technology,
USA, before joining the Radiophysics
Division of the Commonwealth Scientific
and Industrial Research Organisation,
Sydney, Australia as the Principal Research
Scientist.
Prof. Radhakrishnan returned to India
in 1972 and took up the task of the Director
of the Raman Research Institute. During his
tenure, he suoervised quality work in the
field of astronomy, liquid crystals and other
areas of frontline research in physics. He
would often engage in conversation with
“experts” in various fields and corner them
with difficult questions. It would make
everyone wonder if there was anything in
science that he was not aware of. The
University of Amsterdam conferred the
most prestigious Doctor Honoris Causa
degree on Prof. Radhakrishnan in 1996.
Feature Article
Prof. V. Radhakrishnan, who
entered the heavenly abode on
the 3rd of March 2011, was fondly
known as RAD to all his friends.
Prof. Radhakrishnan (left) having a casual chat with the author
(right) during a ‘Moonlight Dinner’. One of his close associates,
Dr. R.S. Arora, is in the center.
Prof.
Radhakrishnan
would
encourage his colleagues to think beyond
the language of mathematics. Often he
would come up with some remarkable
simple explanation about some of the
most complicated ideas in physics.
Perhaps it was this uncanny insight he had
about the way Nature worked that
enabled him to enjoy science. The great
Hanbury Brown once remarked that
Radhakrishnan would often stump others
with some very difficult questions.
In 1987, the author of this article had
a memorable experience of exploring
ancient Egypt with him. Even while taking
a ride on a ‘felucca’ (an Egyptian sailboat)
on the Nile, he would pose a question:
“Can the sailboat go against the wind?” It
is a pity that no one persuaded him to
write a book on physics explaining its
hidden beauty. If he did, it would have
ranked among classics like the great
Feynman Lectures on physics.
It is amazing that a theoretician like
him loved to build hardware electronics
projects, something very uncommon. This
enabled him to move on to technically
innovative and astronomically farreaching studies of the polarization of the
radio waves. These include the detection
of radio waves from belts surrounding
Jupiter that were similar to our own Van
Allen radiation belt. He and his colleagues
were the first to determine the true rotation
of the core of Jupiter. He applied
interferometric techniques to polarized
brightness distributions and carried out a
study of the Zeeman Effect in the 21cm
line emitted by a hydrogen atom.
Prof. Radhakrishnan along with his
colleagues discovered that pulsar emission
is generally very highly polarized, with linear
polarization dominating over circular. It is
widely assumed that the polarization is
determined by magnetic fields in or above
the emission region, which are anchored
to the solid neutron-star crust. Rapid swings
of polarization position angle through the
pulse, first observed in the Vela pulsar by
him and Cooke (1969), implying that the
emission beam originates near a symmetry
axis, which is fixed with respect to the
neutron star. For most pulsars, the
‘Radhakrishnan-Cooke Model’ accounts
very successfully for the observed positionangle variations. The work done by him
and his colleagues on millisecond pulsars
received wide acclamation from the
scientific community.
Prof. Radhakrishnan served on various
committees in various capacities. To name
a few, he was the Vice President of the
International Astronomical Union during
1988-1994. He served as the Chairman of
Commission J (Radio Astronomy) of the
International Union of Radio Sciences
(1981-1984). He was a Foreign Fellow of
both the Royal Swedish Academy of
Sciences and the U.S. National Science
Academy. He was an Associate of the
Royal Astronomical Society and a Fellow
of the Indian Academy of Sciences,
Bangalore. He was the member of the
Foreign Advisory Committee for the
Netherlands Foundation for Radio
Astronomy, Steering Committee of the
Australia Telescope National Facility,
CSIRO, Australia and Advisory Committee
for the Green Bank Radio Telescope,
National Radio Astronomy Observatory, USA
As a boy along the seashore, it was
not only in the field of astronomy that Prof.
Radhakrishnan kept his mark but also in
the design and fabrication of hang-gliders,
57
micro-light aircraft and sailboats. His
contributions in these fields were duly
acknowledged by the Government of
India, when the Aeronautics Research
Development Board of the Ministry of
Defence funded his efforts for designing
and fabricating hang-gliders and the ISRO
funded his efforts for designing sailboats.
Prof. Radhakrishnan was also a
connoisseur of fine arts including music
and fine wine. He was active till his end.
On October 2010, he set sail from Kochi
to the Persian Gulf in his yacht Eldemer
designed by him. He had returned to
Bangalore a few months ago and was
preparing for a longer voyage via
Malaysia. That was not the first time he had
embarked on a voyage such as this one.
In 1965, he sailed from Britain to Australia.
I even heard (I am not absolutely sure),
that he attended a party hosted by a
friend on the night before the day he died.
J.R.D. Tata once said: “If I have any
merit, it is getting along with individuals,
according
to
their
ways
and
characteristics... At times it involves
suppressing yourself. It is painful but
necessary… to be a leader… you have
got to lead human beings with affection.”
I do not know if Radhakrishnan was
aware of what the great Tata said, but I
am sure that he meticulously followed
those guidelines word for word while
handling every individual.
Prof. K. Smiles Mascarenhas is currently the Dean
(Academic Affairs), at the Coimbatore Institute of
Engineering and Technology, Narasipuram Post,
Coimbatore–641109, Tamil Nadu. Formerly, he was
a Scientist at the Millimeterwave Lab of the Raman
Research Institute, Bangalore from March 1977 to
August 1993. Email: [email protected]
SCIENCE REPORTER, MAY 2011