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Arindama Singh
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Some Interesting Links
The image on the top right is the Forbidden Forest. |
Map Paradox? I understand, I cannot be objective on such an issue of writing my own story. Nonetheless, there have been written many autobiographies. Please bear with me if you want to go through this subjective account. Sorala is a small village in the interrior of Orissa, India known only to very few neighbouring villages for its 100 years old mobile theatre group (Jatra Party). I was born and brought up in this small village in the sixties. I studied at several institutions, including Ravenshaw College (BA,1981), Utkal University (MA,1983-84), and IIT Kanpur(Ph.D.,1989-90). I have worked for JNT University (1989-91), University of Hyderabad (1991-95), and IIT Madras (1995-...). If you have chanced upon this site by mistake, here is the way out of the forbidden forest. Please feel free to go through the narrative if you are still curious.
Background |
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I was born in a family of land cultivators in the village of Sorala, under Cuttak district, state of Orissa, India. I speak Oriya from my childhood, the language of the people of Orissa. Both the language and the people of Orissa are called Oriya (Read as O-rdi-aa, 'rd' as in 'ordinary'). Orissa is one of the most beautiful states in India in its natural flora and fauna and the unnatural (or, too much natural?) sculptures. It is also one of the poorest states in India. It remains poor mainly due to the laziness and ignorance of its inhabitants, and the wrath of nature. Cuttack is the business town of Orissa and also it houses the the head quartes of Cuttack district. The Oriya dialect spoken by the inhabitants of Cuttack is the official (written) Oriya. This scenario is changing slowly. Cuttack is about 65 kilometers South West of my village. My village, Sorala is in the plains and having no river nearby. The Pattamundai Canal constructed by the British still irrigates its lands. The irrigation is no more dependable than the monsoon. People here mostly depend on agriculture though the land is not so fertile. They have usually two crops, paddy and a variety of pulse. Nearby, about two kilometers, there is a small hill, now known as Lalitagiri which happened to host a Buddhist University called Pushpagiri during the reign of king Ashoka. The archaic remains are getting a face-lift so that tourists might be attracted. In the agricultural off-season the villagers concentrate upon the mobile opera and perform at various places for having an extra income. It is surprising that even after the TV revolution in Orissa, which started in 1982 during the Asiad Games held in India, still the opera thrives. The other art-form of Palla is dying. A Palla group normally has five members, the main member, called the gayak sings and explains an old epic with figurative references and descriptions from various other epics, whereas the other members repeat after him the songs often interpersing it with jocular songs appropriate to the context. In my childhood, I enjoyed the pallas more than the opera, because there was an educative tag attached to it. Moreover, the gayak from our village (He was the only one in a 50 kilometer radius.) liked me very much due to my appreciation of his art-form from an early age. My parents are simple village folks. My mother was a drop-out from her third standard, and my father was a drop-out from his tenth. Both of them can read, write, deliver small convincing lectures on the scriptures, in Oriya. My father can read and write English limited to official documents. It is a patriarchal family. And much depended on the activities of the male members of the family. Now my parents are living in the same village, occasionally visit me and live with me for some months before returning. My sister, my only sibling, is married with two children. She lives in western Orissa with her family. She usually reaches my parents before I do, in case of emergency. |
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My grand father was the head of the family till his death. I spent my childhood with my grandparents. My grandmother was an illiterate and my grandfather could read, write and speak fluently in Oriya. One of his passions was to sing devotional songs in gatherings, called kirtans along with smoking ganja. At that time ganja was not a banned drug and it was available from notified shops. He was a ganja addict, but the sessions were limited to twice a day. After his first session, in the morning, he goes to field for work. In the evening his second session is followed by recitation of devotional songs with some of his friends, or alone, in our house. Leaving aside this bad habit of his, he was a respectable person in every way. He was much loved and respected by the villagers for his magnanimity and innocence. My grandmother was the protector of the family. She was as shrewed as my grandfather was innocent. However, she never came on way of my grandfather's charitable nature. Both of them were my bed partners in my childhood. And every night to put me into sleep, they told me stories from Mahabharat, Ramayan, and Panchatantra. My grandfather had Panchatantra by heart with the morals in Sanskrit. It was these stories that gave, and still gives, me the strength. It is the strength of the deceased that had been passed over to me by my intimate association with them. My father was the secretary of our panchayat. It was almost no income, but it demanded work everyday. Whether it really demanded that much attention or it was a fancy of my father to be away from the rice fields, I could not judge. He did not like to be in the fields, it was my grand father's responsibility. As he was the only child, my grandparents loved him too much. He founded one new opera party to train the village youth for performing and then finally graduating them to the already existing mobile theatre. The party used to perform at the time of several village festivals. This continued for some years and finally dismantled for the reasons unknown to me. He was much influenced by cinema. At that time, in my village, he was the only person having a bicycle, a radio and a watch. He also liked to use perfume and smoke cigarette. Now, he no more smokes, he only chews paan. His association with the panchayat earned him respect from surrounding villages and he was satisfied with it. We were rich in the sense that our rice used to stay till the year end, whereas others in the village had to come to us at the end of the year for taking loan. The loan was in terms of some measures of rice and it was returned after the harvest without any interest. All this was due to the hard work of my grandfather. My father was keeping his money earned as salary from his job at the panchayat for building a house. At the time we had a thached roof with walls of dried mud to live in. And it was a dream of my father to build a house with baked bricks and concrete. He finally did it and his life time dream has been fulfilled. I was a naughty and angry child. Almost every day my parents received complaints from the neighbours about my conduct. At certain times, it was really unbearable. However, I liked to read, write, and do mathematics. And that was it; the village teacher liked me. So, I did not have to take heed to the complaints from others. The complaints were lodged so often that sometimes I was subjected to brutal beatings from my father. I remember the beatings and also their ineffectiveness in modifying my behaviour. Slowly the complaints reduced and I became a better child due to the help I received from unexpected quarters. On the evenings of fullmoon there used to be a village gathering at the banyan tree of the village. At least one person, usually the oldest one, from each family should come to attend it. People used to do kirtan and then Bhagavatha, the Oriya translation of Srimad Bhagavatham by Jagannath Dash into nine-sylable couplets, was to be read. Once the villagers knew that I was able to read texts fluently, they once asked me to do it at the gathering. I did it in my own way. Somehow it pleased them and then after I became the offcial reader of Bhagavatha at those gatherings. I learnt the adult behaviour from Bhagavatha including the nature of a devoted Hindu. The teachings of Bhagavatha and the appreciation of the villagers that I received for reading the text transformed me. I was branded as the best among all the children, though I was not a good student. The village teacher liked me, perhaps because I was the grandson of my grandfather and perhaps I was the son of my father, but certainly not due to my performance in the examinations. |
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The reading of Bhagabata made me participate in all the village fesivals. In the process, I learnt a lot about the Hindu culture and Hindu mythology. When my father saw that I was going through the transition from childhood to adolescence, he bought me three books, all by Swami Sivananda. they were about celebacy, repetition of holy aphorisms, and about Yogasana (now wrongly referred to as Yoga). I was deeply influenced by these books. I started practising them and became an expert in doing various yoga postures, mudras, and pranayama. I wanted to become a sanyasi, an ascetic. To that end, I prepared myself by reading more of Hindu literature and Hindu philosophy. My interest in Logic and mathematics grew out of this studies. At that time, I found mathematics to be the only subject having no connection to the world, and I wanted to be a sanyasi, leaving this world. So, it was the only subject I was working on. These books, in denouncing sex, taught me the intricacies of it, and the psychological effect it could bring on an individual. It provided me sex education though indirectly. I also took onto mystique practices including exorcism. I became famous in the neighbourhood as a good exorcist, who without doing much rites, could cure the people. I experimented a bit more. I just performed the required rites (in my simplified way) as a show-off without reciting any of the mantras. Nonetheless, people got cured as usual. When I reported this fact to my guru, from whom I learnt the art, he told me that I got mantra siddhi (mastery); and after that there would not be any need to recite the mantras. This led to my disbelief in the practice and I left it. I continued, however, practising yogasana and meditation. It kept me immune from running after fashion. It kept me focused and organised. It also taught me how to work for a goal with dilligence and detachment. I started reading western philosophy and to my surprise, Descartes, Kant, Hegel, Berkeley told me almost the same thing that I already learnt from Hindu Philosophy. I met Manjit, a student of History during this time. (No idea, where is he now.) He was attracted towards my personality due to my detached attitude. His association led me to reading Marx. I could not understand much of Marx. But I liked his ideas on redefining the fundamental concepts in Economics. It was neither a philosophy nor a religion for me. But this reading helped me to think about social issues. During this time I read Bertrand Russell. I learnt English from him. I later met Abhaya, a student of Philosophy. (Now in Macquarie University, Australia.) I liked his easy-going attitude, and kindness. Under his influence I started reading Wittgenstein and Sartre. I liked the 'talking from his head' of Wittgenstein, and 'talking from his heart' of Sartre. This period was marvelous. I cannot fathom how much change was brought in me during my adoloscence. It was such a deep cut, that I feel absorbed in it; I have remained an adolescent all my life. My religious beliefs were not affected by the social ramifications. It was completely devoid of any superstition. It was easy for me living an agnostic. A Belief-O-Matic test at beliefnet.org puts me as:
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At that time, in Orissa, we had 11+2+2 model of education. The 11 years of schooling was further divided into LP, UP, ME, and HSC. In detail:
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I had my lower primary education in my village school, which was yet to be recognised by the government. The school was a big hall with mud floor, mud walls, and a thatched roof, accomodating all the three classes -- Standard I to III, under the supervision of one teacher. How was he able to manage, I have no idea. All that I learnt there was how to read and write in Oriya, four basic operations including mugging up of multiplication table upto 10, and how to do small story problems (used to be called arithmatic) orally. The school teacher used to give me thrashing with his cane if I did something wrong, and also used to offer me a candy the next day if I answered something correct while others could not. He happened to tell my father that I would do well when I grew up. This was sufficient motivation for me to study. Along with our multiplication tables, we were maintaining the school garden, and occasionally, maintaining the school. The maintenance of the school meant mixing cowdung with water and then wiping the floor with the muddy solution, and getting bamboo sticks for fixing the broken window railings. There was no Middle English school in my village. I had to go to Balichandrapur, a village with a market place, three kilometers away from home. The school at Balichandrapur had more rooms, more teachers, tables and chairs for teachers, and small desks for students to write; though the rooms had thatched roofs, mud walls, mud floors, and bamboo-stick window railings. It was hard to walk three kilometers in the morning and harder in the evening. The students from Balichandrapur could go home for lunch, and children like me had to drink plenty of water drawing from the school well. During the reign of monsoon, the road to school had a blanket of thick mud that often comes upto our knees. It was taking more than an hour to reach the school. There was not much of home work, except a few sums, and hand-writing. In summer, it was a pleasure to return from school. On the way we had three pools. And we had to choose or sometimes take concensus among us as to which pool we should dip in. After it was decided, we simply had to keep our bags on the bank of the pool, undress, and dive into water. How naturally we learnt swimming! |
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The school at Balichandrapur started classes beyond ME, but it was not recognised as a high school (for teaching HSC). My father did not want to take risk. He put me in Nanda Kishore Vidya Mandir, a high school recognised by the government. This school was started by the poet Nanda Kishore Bala, in his village, Kusupur, about five kilometers away from my village. So, I had good exercise to keep myself fit. Five kilometers to walk in the morning and also in the evening, with water from the school well at lunch time. I was roughly 11 years old at that time studying in Standard VIII. I was too bad a student to be noticed by the teachers. Kusupur was a village of businessmen. There were also many educated persons in the village including a freedom fighter. There was a post office with telephone facility. Their children were expected to be more advanced than us coming from a village without a road. So, it was a bliss not to get noticed. Somehow we were pulling on. We had two sections in Standard VIII, and the newly arrived students were put in a different section. The physical education teacher was teaching us mathematics. Once I overheard him telling to another teacher that I could do mathematics better than even the children in the first section. That was it; I moved on to putting my effort on mathematics; but mathematics alone. Certainly my marks were nowhere near the highest, but I thrived on. The hard walking continued for a bit longer than a year. My grandfather found a person willing to sell an old bicycle for one hundred rupees. My father baught it and I was relieved from the gym-workout. In standard IX, we had a new maths teacher. He used to give home-work and ask the following day whether we completed it or not. After making a table of who completed which sum, he summons one by one to the black board. And for each mistake on the board, one thrasing of the cane is awarded. It forced me to become thorough. My kerosene lantern would be burning till I complete the home-work properly. But why was I doing that? Was it just for challenge? No idea! Certainly, I enjoyed doing that. It was at this time I got the three books that my father gave me to read. I also enjoyed their hang-over. The exciting uneventfulness of the school days could be used to learn yoga, exorcism, and mathematics. Towards the end of the school, before our High School Certificate Examinations, I left home to become a sanyasi. This was the year 1977, almost at the end of Emergency Period. I travelled by train (for the first time) to Kolkata, Dacca, Benaras, and Haradwar in search of a guru from whom I could learn the art of becoming a sanyasi. I saw how the sanyasis were living with what goals. They were too worldly for me to be accepted as guru. I came back home after 18 days ending the misery of my family. I saw how much my family wanted me to be with them, and promised never to leave home again. People of my village wrongly pointed out fingers at a teacher from my school. It was Shri Rupakar Sarangi, the teacher I adored most. I was attracted to him due to his knowledge on the scriptures. He was the best in Mathematics, English, Oriya, and Sanskrit. He came to our school on the last year of my schooling. But we recognised each other immediately. I used to almost live in his house. He would occasionally give me a construction-problem from Euclidean geometry. And it was never an easy problem. During those days his wife provided me food and I solved the problems. At other times, he used to relate to me Hindu philosophy. It was my close association with him that prompted people to blame him when I left home. My interest in mathematics is mostly due to him. He decided to settle down near my village after retirement. Now also when I visit him he gives me a geometry problem. And as usual, it is never easy to solve. Nonetheless, I enjoy it the most. |
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The emergency period had to end and the elections had to take place for forming the new government. As a result, our exams were postponed a month. And I got two months time to prepare. I just browsed through some test papers in each subject and wrote the exam. No wonder, I passed, but with a second class. Then I had to decide what to study. My father wanted me to study science so that I might become an engineer. But I had no interest in science. My teacher, Shri Rupakar Sarangi advised me to go for arts, but keeping mathematics as one of the subjects. It was a piece of good advice. He also helped me in choosing other subjects. We had to choose four subjects along with the compulsory langauges: English and Oriya. I went for Mathematics, Statistics, Logic, and Economics. It was the last subject I was least interested. The result was good; I passed with first class scoring just pass marks in the languages. This was my Intermediate in Arts at Kendrapara college about 30 kilometers from my village. At this time, I learnt to stay away from home, in the college hostel. Here I met Mr. Sankarsan Mohanty, a science student, who was destined to be my life-long friend. He took up Statistics as his main subject and is now teaching the same in Orissa. I had more friends from science than from arts due to the fancyful subjects I had chosen as electives. The science students found me interesting; not as a person, but merely for the choices I had made. I had faced a lot of trouble in understanding the English language; for, this was the first instance where the medium of instruction was English, and I was neglecting the language. Most trouble I faced was in understanding the concept of continuity in calculus. I bought calculus books in Oriya, but that did not help. I read many more authors and tried to solve more problems; that helped. I could also learn a little bit of English from these books. It was the logic course that taught me the simplicity of English language. For the first time, I understood that grammar was not important, but logic was. I liked the simplified grammar: subject-predicate. Logic became a universal grammar for me. It provided a grammar for both English and Oriya; I was excited. |
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For my bachelors degree, I opted for a better college, Ravenshaw College at Cuttack. Only best students of orissa could get admitted there. It was told that bachelors is the stage where one should choose a career oriented course. For the students from Arts streams, Economics was in high demand. So, I enrolled for BA with Economics honours. The curriculum included 200 marks in English, 100 marks in Oriya, 600 marks in the 'honours' subject and 300 marks in the 'pass' subject. And I kept my 'pass' subject as Mathematics. However, I was feeling uncomfortable that I was going against my wish, taking up Economics rather than Mathematics as my honours subject. A friend, Maheswar Senapti who was my room mate at Kendrapara College also, joined in Economics along with me. He scolded me and told, 'Arindam, in any subject, if you do well, you will certainly be able to earn your bread. And I bet, you will do well in Mathematics. Imagine what would you do if you do bad in Economics. Don't decieve yourself.' Deceive myself! - that was a new phrase to me. I liked the phrase and the moral support for pursuing my interest. So, I applied for a change; took up Mathematics for honours and Statistics as my pass subject. It was a good choice, for I scored well and came out as Utkal University's best graduate (Rank 1 in BA). Cuttack was a much bigger town than Kendrapara. Ravenshaw College was much bigger than kendrapara College. The tall buildings and the huge quadrangle with wide lawns and a sundial in the middle was engulfing. The hostels had tall roofs which could accomodate elephants rather than the midgets as we were. We were the mafus (illiterate villagers without manners and styles) in the eyes of the towns-folk. So it was safer to stick to old friends. Slowly, I realised that these perceptions were deceptive, they were self-imposed, not facts. I could make friends with the day scholars and found them as sensible, innocent, and good natured as us. It was again Mathematics that helped to through away the misconception. Many friends asked me their doubts and friendship developed. The teachers were good and inspiring. Once a student asked Professor RKBS Somaya Julu that he was not able to understand what a matrix was. The professor shot back -- What is Konark temple? Silence. Then he replied, 'it is a particular form built out of pieces of stone, it is a particular arrangement; what else?' During these days, I started reading English fiction and western philosophy. I also read books by the rationalist Dr. Kovoor. I learnt English from Bertrand Russell. After reading an essay by him, I would try to make it shorter. That was the exercise I practiced to learn English. And most of the time, I failed; his writings were too brief and precise to be rewritten. Under the influence of Manjit (a friend doing his BA in History) I read Marx and Lenin. The russian books were cheap and I had a nice collection. Association with Manjit also led me to watch movies, which I never did earlier. However, I deferred it till the final exams. And after finishing each paper, we went to a movie; that was the schedule we followed till the exams were over. By this I understood why we need to perform meaningless acts. |
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I made it a point to move to another place for my MA degree. The place can be a bit far, but not outside Orissa; that was dictated by my parents and grand parents. So the only choice was Utkal University, officially code named(?) Vani Vihar at Bhubaneswar, the capital town of Orissa about 85 kilometers away from home. I joined in. The Department of Mathematics was OK, but the environment in the university was quite depressing. Due to frequent strikes and backdoor political activities the exams were getting postponed. The two-years programmes were completed in almost three years. The seniors had to stay in the hostels till they complete their exams. As a result, the freshers were not getting rooms in hostels. I found a senior doing his MA in political science who was from a village near mine. He gracefully accomodated me in his hostel room. Hostels had stopped to provide boarding facilities due to many practical difficulties. So, the daily routine was to finish bath in the morning, eat brunch at one of the unhygienic university canteens, attend classes, spend time here and there including the library (which was a meeting place for friends and so-called immature lovers), eat dinner, and come to the senior's room at around 10 O'clock in the night to sleep. This was quite frustrating; I lost touch with mathematics. I started reading some more fiction and sometimes, flipped the pages of maths books. The environment was depressing due to another factor. Somehow each student was convinced that one would not be able to earn his bread by studying the usual stuff. One must look through the news papers, the magazines meant to prepare one for the competitive exams, which were bassically the clerical openings in banks. Only the enlightened ones could aim for the IAS (Indian Administrative Service). And for me, this was not acceptable, because I was not at all keen to reading magazines having bogus articles preaching unnatural ways of getting through an interview etc. A friend, during this period, once challenged me for taking a test from Reader's Digest supposed to tell the test-taker about his appropriateness to various jobs along with giving a judgement on the level of his comprehension. And I scored there 90% surprising the friend. It meant that my comprehension level was exceptional and I was fit to be a philosopher. That led me to brand these tests as another kind of tarrot. Many of the fellow students were taking to various kinds of drugs, partly due to frustration, and partly due to fashion and the macho that was attached to it. The authorities did not care what the students were doing; they had their own problems. After about eight months, I got a room in the hostel. It was a relief. However, we had to cook our food, unofficially though. And it was horrible. In each room there would be an electric heater with a pot of rice on it, voltage being too low. It would take at least two hours for the rice to be prepared. Interest in studies was going too low to be revived. The temptations of frustration was too high. It was supposed to be very wise of some one to realize the level of frustration and keep talking about it. I became articulate and due to my shadow of being the best graduate, I also made friends from the opposite sex. However, no relationship developed because I was too cautious and conscious of the consequnces. Moreover, I found them too worldly and too serious for triffle things like looks, sarees, jewels, lipsticks, movies etc. Whichever girl I met during that time was devoid of any intellectual pursuit. It was so uninteresting. Here I met Abhaya, a student of MA in Philosophy, and liked his creative approach to almost everything. He was a kind person; and would shower his unconditional love on almost everybody; atleast, his behaviour was like that. Under his influence I started reading Wittgenstein and Sartre. To understand Sartre, I had to read more of existentialistic literature which was also tailormade for the environment we were living in. I found Wittgenstein closer to the Hindu grammarians and logicians. Since I was only reading maths and not doing it, I liked logic and set theory; it was enough just to think rather than write anything to understand logic. I did some extra readings on that. I read a bit of automata theory and hoped to read Church, Turing, Tarski and Goedel in a later time. Among many papers, we had a viva voce. An external expert had to judge what maths we had learnt during our stay at Vani Vihar. Professor Swadhin Pattanayak (Now, Director of Institute of Mathematics and Applications, Bhubaneswar) came from sambalpur University as the expert. After the viva voce he suggested me to go to SUNY at Stoney Brook for doing research in functional analysis. Now also if he finds someone good enough, he inspires and helps him to pursue research at a good institute. However my family would not agree. I needed them to agree, for who would have given me money to go for it! Till that time my father was spending for me (He geve me Rs 100-200 from IA to MA per month. I also had National Scholarship at MA stage.). And I had to drop the idea. Professor G Das of Vani Vihar suggested to go to IIT Kanpur as the next choice. |
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Thus thinking, whether I will be able to go to Stoney Brook, I went home. About after 15 days I got a letter from Abhaya with advertisements for Ph.D. programme from IIT Kanpur, IIT Delhi, and IIT Madras. It was always a friend who helped me in this regard, because I was not reading the news papers. I wrote a letter to each of the three institutes asking for an application form. The first two institutes sent the required forms, but not the third. I got selected at IIT Kanpur after a written test and an interview, and was happy. Two days later I had to go to IIT Delhi for an interview. So, I just went to Delhi from Kanpur. I did not require it, but I had booked a train ticket earlier, and I wanted to accompany a friend who did not get selected at IIT Kanpur. So both of us went there. My surname 'Singh' was misleading; usually Singhs are from Punjab, UP or Bihar. Nobody would think a Singh from Orissa. So in the interview at IIT Delhi, I was asked questions in Hindi, the mother tongue of UP and Bihar, a language which a Punjabi can also understand and reply with. Since I had the habit of reading the scriptures in Hindi, I could understand what they were asking, but I could never speak in Hindi. However, I answered in Oriya. Another professor came of help; he could not bear with not understanding what I was talking and asked me waht language I was talking in. After learning that I was talking in my mother tongue in reply to their questions in their mother tongue, they started the conversation in English. It was a relief, but I have sufficiently provoked them to insult me. Immediately, I informed them that I had been selected at IIT Kanpur and I would be joining there soon. They were kind enough to take my pun in good spirit. I joined IIT Kanpur (IITK) as a research scholar in mathematics and Abhaya joined in Philosophy. Kanpur is about 1400 kilometers from Cuttack and somehow my family gave me permission to study there. In the holidays after the MA exams, I took up the job of a private tutor and hoarded some money which I took with me for initial expenditure at IIT Kanpur. The scholarship for the first month would be disbursed in the first week of the second month. On the third week of my joining at IITK, my grandfather expired. It was really a difficult situation for me. I had to come home, mainly for social reasons, though not for rituals. Mr. B P Patra, a research scholar in Philosophy (now in Xaviers institute of Management, Bhubaneswar) came to my risk, lent me sufficient money to manage the situation. It was in August 1984. I could repay him by October second. But this was the time when winter set in. I got an old room-heater from Prakash Rath, a research scholar in Physics (now in ONGC) and managed the cold nights. His favourites were Sherlock Holmes which I read and Bruce Lee, whom also I watched. I enjoyed life at Kanpur, where I was forced to speak in English, and occasionally, by friends, in Hindi. Here I met Rashmi R Mishra, doing research in Physics (Now at BITS, Pilani). He was a very amusing, smart, kind, and unassuming person having a very good sense of humour. Due to him, I came to know the fantastic characters like Asterix, Obelix, Tintin and Captain Haddock. He was fond of PG Wodehouse, and once thought of keeping a buttler in the hostel. I also met Biswa R Patnaik, an M.Tech. student of Electrical Engineering, who also liked to chew paan. He taught me the ways of the playing cards. Now he is in Canada working in a software company. I also met Manoranjan Satpathy, now a faculty in Computer Science at University of Reeding, UK. By the end of two years, Abhaya thought of leaving IITK for some US university and I was thinking of fixing a topic for research. Almost all faculties were having two or three Ph.D. students working with them. Professor Mohan K Kadalbajoo somehow allowed me to work with him. I started reading books and papers on Singular Perturbation and their numerics. Due to family pressure, I also got married. My wife was staying with my family and I at IITK. This remained so for a semester till I could get a family accomodation in the campus. Then after I started living a married life. I soon found out that I had to do a lot of computation. We had DEC 1090 system in IITK with around 30 terminals. But throughout the day all the terminals would be kept busy by the B.Tech. students. I prefered the nights. Thus my computation schedules would start after 11 O'clock night. Once I got so involved in computing that it became morning 6 O'clock, the next day, ofcourse. And I had to show the results to my supervisor. So, I went for a walk, had a cup of tea, met Professor Kadalbajoo in his office, and then went to sleep. There was almost no pressure from my Professor; and that was what I liked the most about him. If he had something to say, he would invite me for a dinner and talk so softly that nobody could guess that he was suggesting me something because he was dissatisfied with my work last month. Now also he talks softly and gives advice as an elder brother. He had to leave to USA on a visiting assignment for two years during my stay at IIT Kanpur. Professor PC Das became my supervisor during his absence. During those two years, I met him only four times. Each time, I presented something I was working on and asked him for references to sort out my difficulties; and he would ask me to read an old book. That was good; I learnt a lot from those books. Twice he asked me to come to his residence for reading some russian texts of Vassilleva and Thikhonov on singular perturbation. He read and translated into English so that I could follow. These two sittings of roughly two hours each was invaluable to me and my work. Inspired by the texts, I learnt a bit of Russian so that I could read other russian works myself. It was during the absence of my supervisor I read the works of Church, Turing, Tarski and Goedel. There was no email facility at that time, and I could not talk to my supervisor; telephone was too costly. Sometimes I was getting depressed, thinking whether I could complete my Ph.D. work at all. Once I wrote to Professor Kadalbajoo that most probably I would have to leave this unfinished. He was too patient to bear with my mood variations. There followed a doze of inspiration, of hope. |
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I submitted my thesis after completing four and a half year. I could stay in IITK for one more semester. By that time we were three; my son was roughly a year old. Sudarsan Nayak, a research scholar in mathematics (Now teaching mathematics in Orissa) told me that there was an advertisement for a post of lecturer at Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University (JNTU), Hyderabad. But the time was short. He suggested to contact one of his friends at Hyderabad by telegram who could send an application form. It was, Arun K Pujari (Now Professor of Computer Science at University of Hyderabad). And it clicked; I got the form in time. It was in january 1990. By April, I was at JNTU. |
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JNTU had only three affiliated colleges at Kukatpally, Ananthapur, and Kakinada. The university's main building was at Masab Tank, Hyderabad. Here the administration decided to start six schools of excellence to have only M.S., M.Tech. and Ph.D. programmes. They required one person from Numerical analysis to work in the School of Environment and Water Resources. I was the person to work in this school under the co-ordination of a group of faculties working in Water Resources, mainly. There was no teaching work for the next one year. Besides helping them in computing, I spent my time reading theory of computation. I was living with my wife and son in Mehdipatnam, four kilometers far from work. It was my practice to take a walk while returning from work. Once during this walk, I met Chinmoy Goswami, who was working as reader in Philosophy (Now Professor) at University of Hyderabad. He was also living in Mehdipatnam within a kilometer from my residence. His university was 15 kilometers away. He invited me to read Model Theory where topology is used to prove results in Logic. Almost all the evenings of the next six months were spent this way in his flat. I found in him a very kind person, an intellectual, a brother, and a fantastic friend. When some openings in mathematics came up in his university, he asked me to try it so that we could devote more time to Logic, even at the University. It was a good idea, though I would have to travel a lot more than being at JNTU. I preferred learning more logic and teaching more mathematics than living peacefully with less load and less work. By this time teaching started at JNTU and I was teaching to M.Tech. students in Environmental Engineering, the only course in mathematics. At the end of the semester, I joined in the Department of Mathematics, University of Hyderabad. |
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University of Hyderabad had started functioning from its new campus at the suburb of the city. The buildings were new, people were friendly. I came to know that Professor V Kannan, head of the Department, once explained to the staff the meaning of my name before my joining. In the first semester I had two courses to teach to the M.Sc. maths students. I had to prepare more than three hours for a one-hour lecture. I made it a practice not to take any notes with me so that I would have to think in front of students. It was for this show-off, I had to prepare more. However, I enjoyed both the preparation and the interaction with the students. I used to travel by the public buses to and from the university. Everyday it was a waste of two hours. Moreover, Chimoy Goswami and I have started reading together the texts on Logic at the university. So I decided to move closer to the university. Another friend, Ramesh C Pradhan (Now, Professor in Philosophy at university of Hyderabad), who was once a teacher at Utkal University when I was a student, was living within two kilometers from the university. He could negotiate with his neighbour and I took that house on rent. I purchased a bicycle and the travel to university became peaceful. Since there was no room for the computer lab, the newly acquired computer (A 286-PC) was kept in my room. And with curiosity, I played with the DOS, contacted the computer centre of JNTU to get copies of some word processors and compilers. I liked the Prolog language and Chi-write word processor. It complemented my experiences with Fortran 77. Chinmoy Goswami prepared his class notes on Logic in a book form. I suggested him to type into Chi-write using the 286-machine. Initially I had to help him. Once I commented that perhaps I would have to write another book on Logic so that I could teach from it. His notes could only be used for the philosophy students. He immediately challenged me for writing one that could go for both maths and philosophy students. And the work started, first modifying what he wrote and then adding more chapters. I enjoyed writing the book and enjoyed the discussions with him regarding that. I was also able to discuss Logic with Professor Arun K Pujari of Computer and Information Sciences (Univ of Hyd) and we had published collaborative work. All was well except promotion prospective, which was bleak. There were seniors in the department who were not yet promoted. Here again, I received help from a friend. Professor Pujari once gave me a paper cut-out adveritsing opennings at IIT Madras. |
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In December 1995, I joined IIT Madras as Assistant Professor in the Department of Mathematics. I was excited because it was an IIT with a hope to see IITK in it. However, it was a disappointment. The first encounter was with the dealing assistant in Taramani Guest House. Since I had not booked a room prior to my journey, he refused point blank to do anything. Now I understand his difficulties, but at that time, I could not imagine how could it happen. Incidentally I met a person Mr. Amulya K Panda, (Now in a software company at Bangalore) who was a QIP research scholar in Civil Engineering living in Krishna Hostel. He agreed to accomodate me for a night. The next day I talked to the Chairman of Wardens (Professor Viswanath of Chemistry) and he gave me a room in Cauvery Hostel for next 15 days. I also found M T Nair (Now Professor in Maths, IIT Madras) in the same position. I tried to take a flat on rent in the neighbouring village, Vellacherry in the hope of bringing my family from Hyderabad. In the department, the affairs were no better. I had written to the Head of Maths much prior to my joining at the institute and I also received from him a hearty welcome in terms of revealing the assignment of courses to me in the following semester. However, I had to wait for around a week after joining, to get a room in the department. It was unbelivable that I joined in an IIT, perhaps the only one at that time, which was fond of sending its faculty menmbers to the streets in spite of it being a residential institution. It took a long time for me to understand the situation. There were quite a few PCs available in the computer lab of the department, and I had to go to the institute computer centre for checking my emails. For inducting the new faculties into writing funded projects, ICSR (Industrial Consultancy and Research Projects of IITM) asked us to write a small project basing on which they may give each of us Rs 50,000/- for buying a PC and stationary items. It took around six months to get a PC under that, and I started work. Subsequently I wrote another project and DST funded it. Upon getting a better PC I moved the ICSR-PC to the department computer lab. From the new project I also tried to wire some of the other rooms in the department with network cables. Later, when the administration agreed to do it institute-wide these old cables had to be abandoned; so it was a sheer waste considering the short-sightedness of the people concerned. Things went on well. My teaching improved due to my interaction with the undergraduate students. Comparing 1996 and 2006, IITM has improved a lot. This is due to the efforts of all the people living here, and most importantly, due to the willingness of the administrators towards improving the conditions. I am happy to be here; working with collegues who are also my friends. I enjoy the love showered on me by my parents, wife, son, daughter, collegues, and most important, my students. Sometimes, I wonder, how fortunate I am; getting all these and my rice and sambar just for pursuing my own interest in Mathematics! |