Page 9 - Ramanujan Yatra

Whilst we continued to rope in subject matter experts for discourses in Ramanujan Yatra, we felt the need to get a set of popular science articles together in form of a book that would have a fairly long shelf life, something that everyone would want to retain—articles on popular mathematics written by all of us who worked relentlessly to make the Ramanujan Yatra successful. Dr T.V. Venkateswaran, my colleague and senior scientist at Vigyan Prasar who is also a well-known science communicator and a prolific popular science writer, stepped forward to organize and coordinate this side of the Yatra. He worked very closely with the different members of the core committee of the Ramanujan Yatra and encouraged them to pick up topics around the legend and contribute to this compendium. He suggested the members of the core committee gather valuable information from various discourses during this Yatra and use them in their articles. This is how thoughts, facts, and interpretation of various experts from their discourses came in handy for the authors of the articles in this compendium. Interestingly, every author whose article is included here has been an avid Mathematics lover. Prof. Parthasarathi Mukhopadhyay is well known for having translated the famous book on Ramanujan–The Man who knew Infinity in Bangla. Mr VSS Sastry is yet another Mathematics lover whose passion for the subject is revered globally. His knack for developing creativity in understanding Maths and Science through pop up books is well known. Other distinguished authors and members of the core committee of this Ramanujan Yatra who’ve contributed with their articles include Shri Vivek Monteiro, Prof. Jonaki Ghosh, Dr Parimal Acharjee, Prof V Sukumaran, and Dr T.V. Venkateswaran.
On behalf of Vigyan Prasar, I thank all the above-mentioned authors for getting us their valuable articles in time, which I am quite sure, would be liked by one and all. This book wouldn’t have been completed unless the team that worked hard to get the discourses organized in time. Prof R Ramanujam of IMSC played the key role in getting us the internationally acclaimed subject matter experts for the Yatra, and we thus remain indebted to him for his support for the Yatra. He himself delivered a couple of interesting lectures on the legend and his life in Tamil and English. The Ariviyal Palagai (a Vigyan Prasar initiative) team of Mr Srikumar B and Mr Baskar RS worked very hard to put all the discourses in place and ensured that it was duly attended by a significantly large audience. Mr Nimish Kapoor and his team of Ms Sumita Mukherjee, Mr Amitesh Banerjee, and Mr Bipro Kumar Sen got this compendium produced in time. The list of all those who contributed is indeed large. Yet, the brain behind the initiation and execution of this Yatra deserves full applause, and he is none other than Dr T.V. Venkateswaran.
The Yatra would come to an end on December 22nd, 2020 but for everyone who would read this book, I feel that a new edition of the Yatra would begin in their mind to explore more about Srinivasa Ramanujan, whose genius has made him immortal.
Nakul Parashar PhD Director, Vigyan Prasar
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