Borrowed from SAMPADA old editions – for the 10th Anniversary Special Issue – Interviews section. This one is of Dr Roddam Narasimha, 1953 Mech.
On the occasion of our 100th Edition, Team Sampada had the honor to interact with Dr. Roddam Narasimha and learn about his thoughts. Our beloved and proud UVCE Alumni, Dr. Roddam Narasimha hails to the Mechanical Batch of 1953. and is a renowned Aerospace Scientist and Academician. He was honored with the Padma Bhushan in 1987 and the Padma Vibhushan in 2013. Here is the special interview:
Team Sampada: Please tell us of the most memorable memories from your college days that you reminisce even today.
Dr.Roddam Sir: The most memorable event for me was our Student Tour of South India, visiting industries, dams and other places of significance for the young engineering hopeful. I remember in particular the Mettur dam, the PSG Industries in Coimbatore, the Thermal Power Station and the Railway Workshop at Basin Bridge in Madras: the others have faded out of my memory. But in fact the most enjoyable part of the visit was that we got to know each other personally in the student group, better than ever, traveling, eating together and chatting throughout the trip.
Team Sampada: It would be great if you can share your memories of the faculty present during your time in college and how their teaching impacted you in your career.
Dr.Roddam Sir: The most striking faculty member on campus for me was undoubtedly Prof B R Narayana Iyengar. He had come back from MIT with a Master’s degree, and his teaching (in a course on Machine Design) had an appealing American flavour. He was systematic in his teaching, always clear, and often used a recent American text-book (– I have forgotten the author’s name) in addition to the standard British text of the time. I was very pleased when I won the Saradamba Prize at the Convocation for scoring the highest marks in his subject at the final examination.
Then there was Dr B P Gopalakrishna, who taught us Hydraulics and Hydraulic Machines. He was always serious and was very knowledgeable, and the students listened carefully at his lectures. He would often fill the whole blackboard with a complex drawing that described (e.g.) some hydraulic turbine – in surprising detail – and they were excellent drawings, all done free-hand.
And then there was Mr Habibullah (I believe from Central College), who always appeared in a long coat and Fez cap, to teach us Analytical Geometry. He was another serious teacher, who was a master of the subject and his lectures always seemed meticulously prepared and were delivered without a break.These three, and some others as well, made a great impact on me, whose value I realized only in much later years.
Team Sampada: How important is it for us to uphold the heritage of our college in this present world of new structures growing every day?
Dr.Roddam Sir: Any College or University of distinction must maintain its legacy: that is what attracts good faculty and students, which is essential for maintaining, and even enhancing, the quality of the education provided: for each generation will be compared with the best in the past. By legacy I mean the history of the College, the great men who built the institution, and the achievements of its faculty and students over generations. Paradoxically, it is the fact of past achievement that inspires the faculty and students to do new things as the world of science and technology keeps changing ever more rapidly. Valuing our legacy does not mean doing the same old thing forever, but just the opposite: namely moving with new science and technology – in fact creating it and disseminating it to new generations, just as the pioneers did in the early years. A century-old institution that does not value its legacy is unlikely to survive in a changing world.
Team Sampada: Winning the Padma Vibhushan award, how do you describe the journey that led to receiving that great honor?
Dr.Roddam Sir: It was a pleasant surprise – it was not as if I had been working for it. In the first decade or so after my return from the US with a PhD from Caltech, I was mostly busy with my teaching and research, but in the 70s I slowly began to be drawn into the bigger projects in aeronautics and space. So while I carried on my basic research on some scientifically fascinating but also technologically important problems, such as how laminar flows go turbulent and turbulent flows can go laminar, and what happens inside a shock wave, I was also involved in technological problems per se, like the LCA Tejas, Parallel Computing and Atmospheric Research Satellites, all relevant to the national aerospace programmes. I was also involved in policy issues as well, as a Member of the Space Commission, a member of the Science Advisory Council to the Prime Minister, and the Board of Directors of HAL; was Director of the National Aerospace Laboratories and later of the National Institute of Advanced Studies; and worked of for numerous other bodies of the Government of India. I therefore see the Padma Vibhushan as a national recognition of my contributions to basic research, technology development and national policy matters, especially in aerospace but also in other areas, like atmospheric science, education and strategic studies.
Team Sampada: As students and Alumni what are the small things we can trigger to bring about a change in UVCE?
Dr.Roddam Sir: Students and alumni do not have to restrict their attention to small problems. For example, what is going to be the role of UVCE in the 21st century, when so many IITs, IIITS, NITs, and private colleges and universities are being set up all across the country? Alumni should take the lead in starting a major debate on the subject, and offer all help they can, based on their experience. Should UVCE continue as it is, or become something like an IIT, or convert to a Visvesvaraya Institute of Technology, or do something else? Alumni help can include advice and analysis, financial support to new, advanced programmes, facilitating visits of alumni as well as distinguished foreign scientists and engineers for collaborative programmes – so there is no limit to what can be done. But of course all this requires some dedicated people, at UVCE as well as elsewhere, who can devote time, and energy and resources to map UVCE’s future.
Team Sampada: Being a recipient of such a great honor, any words of wisdom for the engineers?
Dr.Roddam Sir: Engineering is a powerful discipline: it has strong connections with science, mathematics, technology and economics; it is not only affected by these other disciplines, but also affects them, and indeed the whole nation. Our own great founder Sir M Visvesvaraya is an excellent example of what an engineer can do, and did do, in the first half of the 20th century for the State of Mysore (and indeed the whole of India). Mysore in fact became a model State, Mahatma Gandhi called it Rama-rajya, and Bangalore (as the PM said three days ago) ‘represents not just the State of Karnataka, but entire India on the world stage’ – because of its strength in S&T. The current President of China (Xi Jinping) is a chemical engineer, his Vice-President is a mathematician and his Premier is an economist : and their impact on the future of the world may be mind-boggling. So, China is showing us what a combination of engineering, science and economics can do for a country. Can we do that here?
– Dr Roddam Narasimha, Sampada-100
