Chandrayaan's success owes much to Kasturirangan's 'opinion swell', says ex-ISRO chief
The success that Chandrayaan enjoys today is possible only because of the "
opinion swell
" created in its favour by K Kasturirangan, former chief of the
Indian Space Research Organisation
(ISRO), said
A S Kiran Kumar
, who headed ISRO between 2015 and 2018.
A former colleague of Kasturirangan, Kumar, who said he had known him for more than 50 years, pointed out that it was not easy to convince the government about
space missions
in those days.
"It required a lot of, one can say, 'opinion swell' among the scientific and technical organisations. And he deftly created scenarios and situations where people came together and talked about it," added Kumar on Wednesday, recalling his days with Kasturirangan.
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Kumar also recalled how Kasturirangan could think long-term. While India was moving ahead in technological aspects, scientists were often working in isolation, he said.
"Kasturirangan possessed the knack to bring them together and make them work towards a common goal. This is no trivial task. We are now seeing the fruits of his tremendous capabilities. He was not only able to seed an idea but also make it work and bring it to fruition," said Kumar.
Live Events
A remembrance event honouring Kasturirangan was held at the
Raman Research Institute
(RRI), jointly organised by the RRI Trust and the Indian Academy of Sciences.
More than 20 eminent speakers from Indian academia, science, education, and policymaking, including Kumar, paid tribute and shared their memories during the event.
Among the speakers were Tarun Souradeep, Director of RRI, and Raghavan Varadarajan, President of the Indian Academy of Sciences.
Ganesh Pillai, the newly appointed Scientific Secretary of ISRO, gave an overview of Kasturirangan's achievements that extend beyond his days at ISRO. He called Kasturirangan "a man with the Midas touch-whatever he touched flourished."
Prof P Balaram, former Director of the Indian Institute of Science, and Prof V S Ramamurthy, former Secretary of the Department of Science & Technology, Government of India, also spoke about their long association with the scientist.
The heartfelt reflections were moderated by Jyotsna Dhawan, Chair of the RRI Trust, who also shared her personal memories of him. Brinda Nagarajan, personal secretary to Kasturirangan, spoke on behalf of his family.
RRI is a premier research institution pursuing cutting-edge fundamental research in select frontier areas of physics under contemporary research themes. It was founded by Indian science Nobel Laureate Sir C V Raman in 1948.
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