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During my stay at Ramanathapuram, my relationship with him grew beyond that of teacher and pupil. To take an example from my own life, I had been fascinated by the mysteries of the sky and the flight of birds from early childhood. I used to watch cranes and seagulls soar into flight and longed to fly.

Simple, provincial boy though I was, I was convinced that one day I, too, would soar up into the skies. Indeed, I was the first child from Rameswaram to fly. Iyadurai Solomon was a great teacher because he instilled in all the children a sense of their own worth. Father used to visit each boy every night with a Bible in his hand. His energy and patience was amazing. He was a very considerate person who took care of even the most minute requirements of his students. On One day, when I was in the fourth form, my mathematics teacher, Deepavali, on his instructions, the Brother in charge of the hostel and Ramakrishna Iyer, was teaching another class.

Inadvertently, I wandered the mess volunteers would visit each room and distribute good gingelly into that classroom and in the manner of an old-fashioned despot, oil for the ritual bath. Ramakrishna Iyer caught me by the neck and caned me in front of the whole class. Many months later, when I scored full marks in mathematics, I stayed on the St.

Take my word, this boy is and the other a Syrian Christian from Kerala. The three of us had a going to bring glory to his school and to his teachers. When I was made secretary of the vegetarian made up for the earlier humiliation! Father Kalathil, over for lunch one Sunday. Our menu included the By the time I completed my education at Schwartz, I was a self- choicest preparations from our diverse backgrounds.

The result was confident boy determined to succeed. The decision to go in for further rather unexpected, but Rev. Father was lavish in his praise of our efforts.

To us, in those days, the We enjoyed every moment with Rev. Father Kalathil, who participated awareness of the possibilities for a professional education did not exist; in our unsophisticated conversation with childlike enthusiasm. It was a higher education simply meant going to college. The nearest college memorable event for us all. My teachers at St. The In , I arrived at St. Thothathri Iyengar Intermediate examination. I was not a bright student in terms of and Prof.

I began to read the great classics, Tolstoy, Scott and brother Mustafa Kamal, who ran a provision store on the railway station Hardy being special favourites despite their exotic settings, and then I road, would call me in to give him a little help and then vanish for hours moved on to some works in Philosophy.

It was around this time that I together leaving the shop in my charge. I sold oil, onions, rice and developed a great interest in Physics. The fastest moving items, I found, were cigarettes and bidis. I used to wonder what made poor people smoke away their hard- The lessons on subatomic physics at St.

When spared by Mustafa, I would be put in charge of his teachers, Prof. Chinna Durai and Prof. Krishnamurthy, introduced me kiosk by my younger brother, Kasim Mohammed. There I sold novelties to the concept of the half-life period and matters related to the radioactive made of seashells. Sivasubramania Iyer, my science teacher at Rameswaram, had never taught me that most subatomic particles are At St.

Father unstable and that they disintegrate after a certain time into other particles. TN Sequeira. He taught us English and was also our hostel warden. We All this I was learning for the first time. Everything solid, thus, contains much empty space within and he not talking of the same thing? I wonder why some people tend to see everything stationary contains great movement within. It is as though science as something which takes man away from God. As I look at it, the great dance of Shiva is being performed on earth during every moment the path of science can always wind through the heart.

For me, science of our existence. When I joined the B. Nor did I have any information fairy tales. I am an avid reader of books on cosmology and enjoy reading about career opportunities available to a student of science.

Only after about celestial bodies. Many friends, while asking me questions related obtaining a B. I had to to space flights, sometimes slip into astrology. Quite honestly, I have go into engineering to realise my dreams. I could have joined the never really understood the reason behind the great importance attached Engineering course long ago, right after finishing my Intermediate course. As an art, I have Better late than never, I told myself as I made the detour, applying for nothing against astrology, but if it seeks acceptance under the guise of admission into the Madras Institute of Technology MIT , regarded as science, I reject it.

I do not know how these myths evolved about planets, the crown jewel of technical education in South India at that time. The highly complicated calculations manipulated around this prestigious institution was an expensive affair. Around a thousand the precise movements of celestial bodies, to derive highly subjective rupees was required, and my father could not spare that much money.

As I see it, the Earth is the most At that time, my sister, Zohara, stood behind me, mortgaging her gold powerful and energetic planet. As John Milton puts it so beautifully in bangles and chain. I vowed to release her bangles. What if the Sun from mortgage with my own earnings. The only way before me to earn Be centre to the World, and other stars. I The planet earth, so steadfast though she seem, went ahead at full steam.

In sensibly three different motions move? What fascinated me most at MIT was the sight of two Wherever you go on this planet, there is movement and life.

Even decommissioned aircraft displayed there for the demonstration of the apparently inanimate things like rocks, metal, timber, clay are full of various subsystems of flying machines. I felt a strange attraction towards intrinsic movement—with electrons dancing around each nucleus.

After by the nucleus, by means of electric forces which try to hold them as completing my first year, when I had to opt for a specific branch, I close as possible.

Electrons, just like any individual with a certain amount almost spontaneously chose aeronautical engineering. The goal was very of energy, detest confinement.

The tighter the electrons are held by the clear in my mind now; I was going to fly aircraft. I was convinced of nucleus, the higher their orbital velocity will be: in fact, the confinement this, despite being aware of my lack of assertiveness, which probably of electrons in an atom results in enormous velocities of about km came about because of my humble background. Around this time, I per second! These high velocities make the atom appear a rigid sphere, made special efforts to try and communicate with different kinds of just as a fast-moving fan appears like a disc.

It is very difficult to people. I often assisted my brother Kasim Mohamed in his shop selling artifacts on this street. This is his house, from where I would borrow books while at Rameswaram. The words on the plaque read “Let not thy winged days be spent in vain. When once gone no gold can buy them back again. They are the best examples of small-town Indian teachers committed to nurturing talent.

Learning without wisdom is of no use. In the course of my education at MIT, three teachers shaped my Prof. KAV Pandalai taught me aero-structure design and analysis. Their combined contributions formed the foundation on which He was a cheerful, friendly and enthusiastic teacher, who brought a I later built my professional career.

He was an Austrian with rich practical experience in aeronautical engineering. During the Prof. Narasingha Rao was a mathematician, who taught us theoretical Second World War, he had been captured by the Nazis and imprisoned aerodynamics. I still remember his method of teaching fluid dynamics. Understandably, he had developed a very strong After attending his classes, I began to prefer mathematical physics to dislike for Germans.

Inciden- tally, the aeronautical department was any other subject. Walter Repenthin. Another well-known aeronautical design reviews. If it had not been for Prof. My teachers revealed these truths to me. Through their Notwithstanding these irritants, Prof. Sponder preserved his meticulous teaching, they created within me an excitement about individuality and maintained high professional standards.

He was always aeronautics. Their intellectual fervour, clarity of thought and passion for calm, energetic and in total control of himself. He kept abreast of the perfection helped me to launch into a serious study of fluid dynamics- latest technologies and expected his students to do the same. I consulted modes of compressible medium motion, development of shock waves him before opting for aeronautical engineering. The trouble with The structural features of aeroplanes began to gain new meanings— Indians, Prof.

In those days, a new climate of under stress and asking you to meet an impossible deadline. I never political enlightenment and industrial effort was sweeping across the expected you to perform so well. I had to test my belief in God and see if it could fit into the During the rest of the period of the project, I participated in an essay matrix of scientific thinking.

If so, I Tamil is my mother tongue and I am proud of its origins, which have wondered, was matter alone the ultimate reality and were spiritual been traced back to Sage Agastya in the pre-Ramayana period; its phenomena but a manifestation of matter?

Were all ethical values relative, literature dates back to the fifth century BC. It is said to be a language and was sensory perception the only source of knowledge and truth? I moulded by lawyers and grammarians and is internationally acclaimed wondered about these issues, attempting to sort out the vexing question for its clear-cut logic.

The value system did not remain outside the purview of this wonderful language. I wrote in which I had been nurtured was profoundly religious. The article that true reality lay beyond the material world in the spiritual realm, and evoked much interest and I won the competition, taking the first prize that knowledge could be obtained only through inner experience.

We project to design a low-level attack aircraft together with four other were posing for a group photograph as part of a farewell ritual. All the colleagues. I had taken up the responsibility of preparing and drawing graduating students had lined up in three rows with the professors seated the aerodynamic design. My team mates distributed among themselves in the front. Suddenly, Prof. Sponder got up and looked for me. I was the tasks of designing the propulsion, structure, control and standing in the third row.

I instrumentation of the aircraft. One day, my design teacher, Prof. I offered a dozen excuses for the future. I finally pleaded for sat with Prof. Sponder for the photograph. There I worked on engine overhauling as part of withdrawn. I could see no other way out but to finish the task as I had a team. Hands-on work on aircraft engine overhauling was very been instructed. That night, I remained at the drawing board, skipping educative. When a principle learnt in the classroom is borne out by dinner.

On Sunday morning, I was very near completion, when unexpectedly running into an old friend among a crowd of strangers. Srinivasan HAL, I worked on the overhauling of both piston and turbine engines. Coming straight from the gymkhana, The hazy concepts of gas dynamics and diffusion processes in the he was still in his tennis outfit and had dropped in to see my progress. After examining my work, Prof. Srinivasan hugged me affectionately I was also trained in radial engine-cum-drum operations.

I did calibrations of a fixed- pitch fan fitted to a super-charged engine. I opened up pressure and acceleration-cum-speed control systems, and air starter supply systems of turbo-engines. Getting to understand feathering, un-feathering and 3 reversing of propeller engines was very interesting. The demonstration of the delicate art of beta blade angle control by HAL technicians still lingers in my memory. They had neither studied in major universities, nor were they merely implementing what their engineer-in-charge was suggesting.

They had been working hands-on for years and this had given them something like an intuitive feel for the work. T Two alternative opportunities for employment, both close to my long- hrough the window of the compartment, I watched the standing dream of flying, presented themselves before me when I came countryside slip past.

From a distance, the men in the fields in out of HAL as a graduate aeronautical engineer. I sat glued to the window. Almost I applied for both. The interview calls arrived from both the places almost everywhere, people were engaged in some activity which had a rhythm simultaneously. The boy from the streams. Occasionally, a child would appear and wave at the train. Coromandel Coast took a train to the North of India.

My destination was more than km away, and was to be my first encounter with It is astonishing how the landscape changes as one moves northwards. The rich and fertile plains of the river Ganga and its numerous tributaries have invited invasion, turmoil, and change.

The tenth century brought Muslims, who later mingled with the local people and became an integral part of this country. One empire gave way to another. Religious conquests continued. All this time, the part of India south of the Tropic of Cancer remained largely untouched, safe behind the shield of the Vindhya and Satpura mountain ranges.

The Narmada, Tapti, Mahanadi, Godavari, and Krishna rivers had woven a net of almost unassailable protection for the tapering Indian peninsula. To bring me to Delhi, my train had crossed all these geographical impediments through the power of scientific advancement. I did well at the interview. Then I proceeded to Dehra as you can rely upon the eternally unbroken promise of sunrise At the Selection Spring.

When the student is ready, the teacher will appear—How true! Here Perhaps they were looking for physical fitness and an articulate manner. You are not I could only finish ninth in the batch of 25 examined to select eight destined to become an Air Force pilot. What you are destined to become officers for commissioning in the Air Force. I was deeply disappointed. Forget this failure, as it was It took me some time to comprehend that the opportunity to join the Air essential to lead you to your destined path.

Search, instead, for the true Force had just slipped through my fingers. I dragged myself out of the purpose of your existence.

Become one with yourself, my son! Surrender Selection Board and stood at the edge of a cliff. I knew that the days ahead would be difficult. There were questions to be answered and a plan of action to be prepared. In response, I was handed my appointment letter. I joined the next day as Senior Scientific Assistant on a basic I bathed in the Ganga and revelled in the purity of its water. If this was to be my destiny, I thought, let walked to the Sivananda Ashram situated a little way up the hill.

I had read that sadhus were psychic was in If I was not flying aeroplanes, I was at least helping to make I met Swami Sivananda—a man who looked like a Buddha, wearing them airworthy. During my first year in the Directorate, I carried out a a snow-white dhoti and wooden slippers. He had an olive complexion design assignment on supersonic target aircraft with the help of the and black, piercing eyes.

I was struck by his irresistible, almost child- officer-in-charge, R Varadharajan, and won a word of praise from the like smile and gracious manner. I introduced myself to the Swamiji. My Director, Dr Neelakantan. To gain shop-floor exposure to aircraft Muslim name aroused no reaction in him. Before I could speak any maintenance, I was sent to the Aircraft and Armament Testing Unit further, he inquired about the source of my sorrow.

At that time, they were involved in a tropical explanation of how he knew that I was sad and I did not ask. I participated in the performance I told him about my unsuccessful attempt to join the Indian Air Force assessment of its operation systems.

He smiled, washing away all my Even in those days, Kanpur was a very populous city. It was my first anxiety almost instantly. Then he said in a feeble, but very deep voice, experience of living in an industrial town. The cold weather, crowds, Desire, when it stems from the heart and spirit, when it is pure and noise and smoke were in total contrast to what I was used to in intense, possesses awesome electromagnetic energy.

We tried to read as much literature as included in the design team. I completed this task with the other team we could find on hovercrafts, but there was not much available. We members. Then, I undertook a preliminary design study on a Human tried to consult people knowledgeable in this area, but could find none. I later carried out the design and development of a Vertical One day, I simply took the decision to proceed with the limited information Takeoff and Landing Platform.

I was quick to see at least a metaphorical Bangalore and I was posted to the new establishment. After all, the Wright Bangalore as a city was in direct contrast to Kanpur.

In fact, I feel Brothers made the first aeroplane after fixing bicycles for seven years! I saw in the GEM project great opportunities for ingenuity and growth. I suppose, it is because Indians have been both afflicted and enriched by We went straight into hardware development after spending a few centuries of migrations.

Loyalty to different rulers has dulled our capacity months on the drawing board. Instead, we have developed an extraordinary There is always the danger that a person with my kind of background— ability to be compassionate and cruel, sensitive and callous, deep and rural or small-town, middle-class, whose parents had limited education— fickle, all at the same time. To the untrained eye, we may appear colourful will retreat into a corner and remain there struggling for bare existence, and picturesque; to the critical eye, we are but shoddy imitations of our unless some great turn of circumstance propels him into a more various masters.

The Part by part, subsystem by subsystem, stage by stage, things started relationship between the heart and the head of an earthy Indian has moving. Working on this project, I learned that once your mind stretches been eroded by the divided sensibilities of our cities. I spent my evenings to a new level it never goes back to its original dimension.

He was The workload at ADE during the first year of its inception was quite keenly interested in the progress of our small project, which he envisioned light.

I, being the leader of the alone a flying machine. The development are solved. We had a working. Dr Mediratta was visibly pleased And all such things as geniuses use; — with the achievement. But by this time, Krishna Menon was out of office Two bats for patterns, curious fellows! In the new order, not many A charcoal-pot and a pair of bellows. In fact, even today, we import hovercrafts.

The When the project was about a year old, Defence Minister Krishna project was mired in controversies and was finally shelved. It was a Menon made one of his routine visits to ADE. I escorted him into our new experience for me. So far, I had believed that the sky was the limit, assembly shop.

For a prototype, its form, fit and finish was beyond our expectation, given the rudimentary infrastructure we possessed. One day, Dr Mediratta called with. He inquired about the state of our hovercraft. When told that it was in perfect condition to be flown, he asked me to organize a demonstration Defence Minister Krishna Menon flew in the Nandi, overruling the for an important visitor the next day. A Group Captain in the laboratory during the next week as far as I knew.

Observing this wordless communication, Krishna machine. I was struck by the objectivity and clarity of his thinking. His request filled me laugh and signalled to me to start the machine. He was very happy. Finally, here was someone who was interested in my work. However, the next the ground. We were not flying, but were definitely floating in the air. This was a breakthrough a young man like ride and departed. But not before introducing himself—he was Prof.

Labels mattered very little. There Rocket Engineer. I was unsure about the set up the Equatorial Rocket Launching Station at Thumba, a sleepy type of questions I would have to face at the interview. There was fishing village near Trivandrum now Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. This was the quiet beginning of modern rocket-based research dualities which arise from wish and hate.

But those in India. The site selected at Thumba lay between the railway line and men of virtuous deeds in whom sin has come to an end, the sea coast, covering a distance of about two and a half km and freed from the delusion of dualities, worship Me measuring about acres.

In addition, there was the delicate matter of acquiring The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and a site of religious significance.

The Collector of Trivandrum then, K free of doubt. I decided to take things as they came. Since neither Prof. Dr I decided this was the best attitude to take. Dereira, who was the Bishop of Trivandrum in The St. Mary Magdalene church housed Commission. The prayer room was my friendliness. There was none of the arrogance or the patronising attitudes which To this day, the church is maintained in its full glory and, at present, interviewers usually display when talking to a young and vulnerable houses the Indian Space Museum.

One of the important functions of prayer, I believe, is to act as a stimulus to creative ideas. Within the mind are all the resources required for successful living. Ideas are present in the consciousness, which when released and given scope to grow and take shape, can lead to successful events. God, our Creator, has stored within our minds and personalities, great potential strength and ability.

Jallaluddin and Samsuddin were self-reliant, positive, optimistic men who undertook their work with the assurance of success. It is from these two persons that I drew the core creative power of my mind.

My sentiments could not be contained, and I could feel the mist of tears in my eyes. The intensity and purity of their faith in my capabilities broke my last defences, and tears welled up in my eyes. They attempt to get out of them rather than suffer them. Everybody prostrated themselves except Iblis, or Satan, who refused. Does not that make me nobler than Achievers Adam? This is no place for your contemptuous pride. One of my most vivid memories What makes life in Indian organizations difficult is the widespread of LRC is of a piece of sculpture depicting a charioteer driving two prevalence of this very contemptuous pride.

It stops us from listening to horses, one representing scientific research and the other technological our juniors, subordinates and people down the line. You cannot expect a development, metaphorically encapsulating the interconnection between person to deliver results if you humiliate him, nor can you expect him to research and development. Unfortunately, the earth-orbiting science and applications satellites. Here, has to be changed. I saw a painting prominently displayed in the reception lobby.

It depicted As the process of confronting and solving problems often requires a battle scene with a few rockets flying in the background. A painting hard work and is painful, we have endless procrastination. Actually, with this theme should be the most commonplace thing at a Flight Facility, problems can be the cutting edge that actually distinguish between but the painting caught my eye because the soldiers on the side launching success and failure.

They draw out innate courage and wisdom. It was a sounding rocket, called Nike- fighting the British. The rocket was assembled in the church country but commemorated here on the other side of the planet. I was building I have referred to earlier. The only equipment available to happy to see an Indian glorified by NASA as a hero of warfare rocketry. The assembled rocket was to be shifted from the church building training, but Prof. After the successful to the launch pad by truck. When the rocket was lifted by the crane and launch of Nike-Apache, he chose to share with us his dream of an was about to be placed on the launcher, it started tilting, indicating a leak Indian Satellite Launch Vehicle.

As we were fast approaching the Prof. The very news of launch time, 6 p. People manually, using our collective muscle power and finally placing it on the would work virtually round the clock because of their enthusiasm to launcher.

Sarabhai something new, something that had not been done In the maiden Nike-Apache launch, I was in charge of rocket before in our country—be it a new design or a new method of fabrication integration and safety. Two of my colleagues who played a very or even an out-of-the-way administrative procedure. Sarabhai active and crucial role in this launch were D Easwardas and R would often assign multiple tasks to a single person or a group.

I When we were relaxing the next evening at the dinner table, we knew that all I had to do was to remain alert and focussed on my purpose, received news of the assassination of President John F Kennedy in and sooner or later, an opportunity to do a challenging job would enter Dallas, Texas. We were appalled. The Kennedy years were a significant my laboratory. Sarabhai was ever-willing to try out novel approaches and liked The Soviet Union built missile sites in Cuba, from which it would to draw in young people.

He had the wisdom and judgement which have been possible to launch attacks on American cities. In my opinion, he was an ideal experimenter offensive missiles to Cuba. America also threatened to respond to any and innovator. When there were alternative courses of action before us, Soviet nuclear attack from Cuba on any country in the Western whose outcome was difficult to predict, or to reconcile varying Hemisphere by retaliating against the USSR.

After fourteen days of perspectives, Prof. Sarabhai would resort to experimentation to resolve intense drama, the crisis was resolved by the Soviet Premier Khrushchev the issue. A ordering that the Cuban bases be dismantled and the missiles returned bunch of young, inexperienced, but nevertheless energetic and to Russia.

Sarabhai had a detailed discussion with us on research in particular. It was a great example of leadership by trust. He was creating a new frontier in the field of science and technology in India. A new generation, scientists and engineers in their The rocket launch site later blossomed into the Thumba Equatorial 30s and early 40s, was being charged with an unprecedented dynamism.

Vikram Sarabhai—had comprehended the full operational sounding rockets were developed. These rockets had wide implications of the challenge and had not balked at taking it on.

Right ranging capabilities, and to date several hundreds of these rockets have from the day INCOSPAR was formed, he was aware of the need to been launched for various scientific and technological studies. It lifted a nominal 7 kg payload produced indigenously. It was soon followed by another, to which With this in view, a wide-ranging programme for scientific and one more solid propellant stage was added to dispatch multi-experiment technological development in rocket fuels, propulsion systems, payloads weighing nearly kg to an altitude of over km.

Incidentally, this laboratory has on polyurethane and polybutane polymer. It later resulted in the setting produced a large number of Indian space scientists of extremely high up of a Propellant Fuel Complex PFC to manufacture strategic calibre over the years. What is it The development of Indian rockets in the twentieth century can be that distinguishes a sounding rocket from a Satellite Launch Vehicle seen as a revival of the eighteenth century dream of Tipu Sultan. When SLV and from a missile?

In fact, they are three different kinds of Tipu Sultan was killed, the British captured more than rockets and rockets. Sounding rockets are normally used for probing the near-earth subsystems of rockets in the battle of Turukhanahally in His environment, including the upper regions of the atmosphere. While they army had 27 brigades, called Kushoons, and each brigade had a company can carry a variety of scientific payloads to a range of altitudes, they of rocket men, called Jourks. These rockets had been taken to England cannot impart the final velocity needed to orbit the payload.

The final stage of a launch vehicle provides the or patent regime. With the death of Tipu, Indian rocketry also met its necessary velocity for a satellite to enter an orbit. This is a complex demise—at least for years. A missile, though belonging to the same family, is a still more complex system.

When the targets are Hermann Oberth in Germany gave rocketry new dimensions. With this booty, they started to run fabrication of sounding rockets and their associated on-board systems their deadly arms race with missiles and warheads. Sarabhai took the challenge of giving physical dimensions to this dream. Very many individuals with myopic vision questioned the relevance of space activities in a newly independent nation which was finding it difficult to feed its population.

But neither Prime Minister Nehru nor Prof. Sarabhai had any ambiguity 5 of purpose. Their vision was very clear: if Indians were to play a meaningful role in the community of nations, they must be second to none in the application of advanced technologies to their real-life problems. They had no intention of using it merely as a means to display our might. Sarabhai would openly review the progress of work with the entire team.

He never gave directions. Rather, through a free exchange of views, he led us forward into new terrain which often revealed an unforeseen solution. Perhaps he was aware that though a particular goal might be clear to himself, and he could give adequate directions for its accomplishment, his team members might have resisted working towards a goal that made no sense to them.

He considered the collective understanding of the problem the main attribute of effective leadership. Sarabhai took a series of decisions that were to become the life-mission of many. And this would not be done one-by-one but concurrently, in a multi-dimensional fashion. In the development of payloads for the sounding rockets, instead of getting a certain payload and then engineering it to fit into the rocket, we discussed the matter threadbare with the payload scientists working in different organ-izations and at different locations.

Sarabhai assigned cone of the Rohini Rocket. At an altitude of km, the nose cone me the task of providing interface support to payload scientists. Almost would be separated by explosion of pyros triggered by an electronic all physical laboratories in India were involved in the sounding rocket timer. With this, the X-ray sensors would be exposed to space for programme, each having its own mission, its own objective and its own collecting the required information about the emissions from stars.

These payloads were required to be integrated to the rocket Together, Prof. Oda and Prof. Rao were a unique blend of intellect and structure so as to ensure their proper functioning and endurance under dedication, which one rarely sees. One day, when I was working on the flight conditions. We had X-ray payloads to look at stars; payloads fitted integration for Prof. To me they looked flimsy, of the upper atmosphere; sodium payloads to find out wind conditions, but Prof. Oda stuck to his stand that the Indian timers be replaced by its direction and velocity.

We also had ionospheric payloads to explore the Japanese ones. I yielded to his suggestion and replaced the timers. I not only had to interact with scientists The rocket took off elegantly and attained the intended altitude.

Oda was so upset that tears welled up in his eyes. I was stunned France, Germany and Japan. He had clearly put his heart and soul into his work. I often read Khalil Gibran, and always find his words full of wisdom.

If you are a writer the hazardous sodium and thermite mix. As usual, it was a hot and humid who would secretly prefer to be a lawyer or a doctor, your written words day at Thumba. After the sixth such operation, Sudhakar and I went into will feed but half the hunger of your readers; if you are a teacher who the payload room to confirm the proper filling of the mix. Suddenly, a would rather be a businessman, your instructions will meet but half the drop of sweat from his forehead fell onto the sodium, and before we need for knowledge of your students; if you are a scientist who hates knew what was happening, there was a violent explosion which shook science, your performance will satisfy but half the needs of your mission.

Oda and Sudhakar, who bring to their mind. He broke the glass window with his bare hands and literally threw work a personal touch of magic based upon their individual character, me out to safety before jumping out himself. Sudhakar their hearts. They become so emotionally involved with their work that spent many weeks in the hospital recuperating from the severe burns he any dilution of the success of their effort fills them with grief.

I remember him as a assembly, testing and evaluation besides building subsystems like payload diminutive man with a towering personality and eyes that radiated housing and jettisonable nose cones. Working with the nose cones led intelligence. His dedication to his work was exemplary. He would bring me, as a natural consequence, into the field of composite materials. That was his subtle way composite bows made of wood, sinew, and horn as early as the eleventh of challenging each one of us to stretch our capabilities.

The versatility of composites, in the sense that they possess would praise whatever we had accomplished. Whenever he found any very desirable structural, thermal, electrical, chemical and mechanical one of us going over his head and attempting a task for which he did not properties, fascinated me.

Delhi being a slightly unfamiliar Subramanian and MN Satyanara-yana, great satisfaction. We made high- place, with an unfriendly climate for someone like me, conditioned to the strength glass cloth laminates to build non-magnetic payload housings warm and humid climate of South India, I decided to wait in the hotel and flew them in two-stage sounding rockets.

We also wound and test lounge after finishing my dinner. I have always been a religious person in the sense that I maintain a Slowly, but surely, two Indian rockets were born at Thumba. They working partnership with God. I was aware that the best work required were christened Rohini and Menaka, after the two mythological dancers more ability than I possessed and therefore I needed help that only God in the court of Indra, the king of the sky.

The Indian payloads no longer could give me. I made a true estimate of my own ability, then raised it by needed to be launched by French rockets. In this partnership, I have but for the atmosphere of trust and commitment which Prof. Today, I can affirm that the kingdom of God is knowledge and skills. He made every man feel directly involved in problem within you in the form of this power, to help achieve your goals and solving.

He used to talk with us in an honest and objective manner. Many a time, it could come even were, and then charming us by his almost magical powers of persuasion. Without the slightest warning, something nevertheless in a successful manner. He was a well-built person with an intelligent I looked around the elegant lounge.

Somebody had left a book on a look and refined posture. Unlike me—always disorderly in my dress— nearby sofa. As if to fill the small hours of that cold night with some this man was wearing elegant clothes. Notwithstanding the odd hours, warm thoughts, I picked up the book and started browsing. I must have he was alert and vivacious. And before I could get back to the book, It was some popular book related to business management.

I was I was informed that Prof. Sarabhai was ready to receive me. I left the not really reading it, only skimming over paragraphs and turning pages.

I was surprised Suddenly, my eyes fell on a passage in the book, it was a quotation from when the man sitting on the opposite sofa was also asked to come inside. George Bernard Shaw. The gist of the quote was that all reasonable Who was he? It was not long before my question was answered. Even men adapt themselves to the world. Only a few unreasonable ones persist before we sat down, Prof. Sarabhai introduced us to each other.

He in trying to adapt the world to themselves. Sarabhai ordered coffee for both of us and unfolded his plan of conformist actions. I started reading the book from the Bernard Shaw passage onwards. This would help our warplanes to take off from short runways in the The author was describing certain myths woven around the concept Himalayas. Hot coffee was served over small talk. It was totally and the process of innovation in industry and business. I read about the uncharacteristic of Prof.

But as soon as we finished the coffee, myth of strategic planning. It is generally believed that substantial Prof. The author was of the opinion that it is essential for cursory glance at the sofa where I had left the book. It was not there. Sarabhai showed us felt that it was a myth to hold that the key to economic success is a Russian RATO.

A quotation from General George Patton was given as a could you do it in eighteen months time? Sarabhai asked us. It is a myth that to Prof. I recalled what win big one must strive to optimize, the author felt. After dropping us back at the Hotel Ashoka, Prof. By that evening, Waiting in the hotel lobby at 1 a.

But then, Prof. Muhammad Khan. Parveen Bhardwaj. Yash Santani. Dr Mohd Arif. David Kinsella. Soniya Angel. Saeed Ahmed Rid. Adil Sultan.

Tandu Venkanna. Priyank Patel. Monica Otieno. Richard Bitzinger. Akash Kaparthy. Amala Sheefa. Gaurav Kampani. Anup Kumar Das. Swami Narasimhananda. Memo Memocan. Naeem Salik. Riser Riser. Ravinder S Chhatwal.

Pedro Fernandez. Ravi roshan. AmAn GoyAl. Florence Sborowsky. Ajey Lele. Toufique Sohoo. Aman Chaurasia. Reetika Dhall. Evolvehr Attiq Khan. Sandeep Sharma. Panchali Mukherjee. Anuj Poddar. Log in with Facebook Log in with Google. Remember me on this computer. Enter the email address you signed up with and we’ll email you a reset link.

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Resonance Satish Dhawan — A creative teacher. Vision A Vision for the New Millennium. You will then be able to see the document with all All Rights Reserved the regular Acrobat Reader features. This book cannot be legally lent or given to others without the written permission of Sulekha. Born in , the son of a little educated boatowner in Rameswaram, Tamilnadu, he had an unparalleled career as a defence scientist, culminating in the highest civilian An Autobiography award of India, the Bharat Ratna.

I remember the war days when life was challenge and toil— Miles to walk, hours before sunrise, Walking to take lessons from the saintly teacher near the temple. Contents Again miles to the Arab teaching school, Climb sandy hills to Railway Station Road, Collect, distribute newspapers to temple city citizens, Preface Few hours after sunrise, going to school. Acknowledgements Evening, business time before study at night. Epilogue I still remember the day when I was ten, Sleeping on your lap to the envy of my elder brothers and sisters It was full moon night, my world only you knew Mother!

My Mother! When at midnight I woke with tears falling on my knee You knew the pain of your child, My Mother. Your caring hands, tenderly removing the pain Your love, your care, your faith gave me strength To face the world without fear and with His strength.

We will meet again on the great Judgement Day, My Mother! He has an intuitive rapport with the humblest and simplest people, an indication of his own simplicity and innate spirituality.

For myself, writing this book has been like a pilgrimage. Many of you may never Preface meet Dr Kalam in person, but I hope you will enjoy his company through this book, and that he will become your spiritual friend. I could include in this book only a few incidents among the many This might seem to disqualify me as his biographer, and I certainly narrated to me by Dr Kalam.

In fact, this book provides only a thumbnail had no notion of being one. It is quite possible that certain important asked him if he had a message for young Indians. His message fascinated incidents have been inadvertently dropped and that the contribution of me. Later, I mustered the courage to ask him about his recollections so some individuals to the projects co-ordinated by Dr Kalam has gone that I could pen them down before they were buried irretrievably under unrecorded. Since a quarter-century of professional life separates me the sands of time.

I am solely responsible for such the fading stars of dawn—all somehow stolen from his very busy shortcomings, which are, of course, completely unintentional.

The profundity and range of his ideas Arun Tiwari mesmerized me. He had tremendous vitality and obviously received immense pleasure from the world of ideas. His conversation was not always easy to follow, but was always fresh and stimulating. There were complexities, subtleties, and intriguing metaphors and subplots in his narrative, but gradually the unfolding of his brilliant mind took the form of a continuous discourse.

When I sat down to write this book, I felt that it required greater skills than I possessed. But realising the importance of this task and regarding it an honour to have been permitted to attempt it, I prayed earnestly for the courage and calibre to complete it. Historically, people have always fought and Dr SK Salwan, who were very generous in sharing their time and among themselves on one issue or another. Prehistorically, battles were knowledge with me. With the passage of time, wars were waged over religious and ideological beliefs; and now the dominant I am thankful to Prof.

KAV Pandalai and Mr R Swaminathan, for struggle of sophisticated warfare is for economic and technological critical reviews of the text. I thank Dr B Soma Raju for his tangible, but supremacy. Consequently, economic and technological supremacy is always unspoken support, for this project. My sincere thanks go to my equated with political power and world control. A few nations who have grown very strong technologically, over the past few centuries, have wrested control, for their own purposes. These It has been a pleasure to work with Universities Press, and the co- major powers have become the self-proclaimed leaders of the new operation of the editorial and production staff is much appreciated.

What does a country of one billion people, like India, do There are many fine people, such as the photographer Mr. Prabhu, in such a situation? We have no other option but to be technologically who have selflessly enriched me and this book in ways beyond measure.

But, can India be a leader in the field of technology? My answer I thank them all. And let me validate my answer by narrating some And finally, my deepest gratitude to my sons, Aseem and Amol— incidents from my life. My childhood is precious to me, but would Arun Tiwari it be of interest to anyone else?

In a longer life and can complete at least one of your projects. The Lord answered my prayers and Tiwari was able to get individual destiny and the social matrix in which it is embedded cannot back to work in a month. He did an excellent job in helping to realise be seen in isolation.

Having been persuaded of this, it did seem germane the Akash missile airframe from scratch within the short space of three to include the accounts of my frustrated attempt to become an Air years.

He then took up the task of chronicling my story. Over the last Force pilot and of how I became, instead of the Collector my father year, he patiently transcribed the bits and pieces of my story and dreamed I would be, a rocket engineer.

He also went through my personal Finally, I decided to describe the individuals who had a profound library meticulously and selected from among the pieces of poetry those influence on my life. This book is also by way of a submission of thanks, that I had marked while reading, and included them in the text. It is also a tribute to the unflagging enthusiasm and establishment in modern India, struggling to establish itself in the efforts of my young colleagues who helped to realise our collective technological forefront.

It is the story of national aspiration and of co- dreams. The famous words of Isaac Newton about standing on the operative endeavour. They played major roles in my life and in the story of Each individual creature on this beautiful planet is created by God Indian science.

Whatever I have achieved in life is through His help, and an expression of His will. He showered His grace on me I completed sixty years of age on 15 October I had decided through some outstanding teachers and colleagues, and when I pay my to devote my retirement to fulfilling what I saw as my duties in the tributes to these fine persons, I am merely praising His glory.

All these sphere of social service. Instead, two things happened simultaneously. We are all born with a divine fire in us. Our efforts should be reminiscences with him, so that he could record them. He was someone to give wings to this fire and fill the world with the glow of its goodness. He was a mere 32 years old, but was fighting valiantly for his life.

Our locality was predominantly Muslim, but there were quite a few Hindu families too, living amicably with their Muslim neighbours. There was a very old mosque in our locality where my father would take me for evening 1 prayers. I had not the faintest idea of the meaning of the Arabic prayers chanted, but I was totally convinced that they reached God.

When my father came out of the mosque after the prayers, people of different religions would be sitting outside, waiting for him. Many of them offered bowls of water to my father who would dip his fingertips in them and say a prayer. This water was then carried home for invalids. I also remember people visiting our home to offer thanks after being cured.

I was born into a middle-class Tamil family in the island town of My father always smiled and asked them to thank Allah, the benevolent Rameswaram in the erstwhile Madras state. My father, and merciful.

One of the most vivid memories true generosity of spirit. He had an ideal helpmate in my mother, of my early childhood is of the two men, each in his traditional attire, Ashiamma. I do not recall the exact number of people she fed every discussing spiritual matters. When I was old enough to ask questions, I day, but I am quite certain that far more outsiders ate with us than all the asked my father about the relevance of prayer. My father told me there members of our own family put together.

Rather, prayer made possible a My parents were widely regarded as an ideal couple. We lived in our ancestral house, to-earth Tamil. It was a fairly large he really is, and in the stage he has reached—good or bad—every human pucca house, made of limestone and brick, on the Mosque Street in being is a specific element within the whole of the manifest divine Being. So Rameswaram.

My austere father used to avoid all inessential comforts why be afraid of difficulties, sufferings and problems? When troubles come, and luxuries. However, all necessities were provided for, in terms of try to understand the relevance of your sufferings. Adversity always presents food, medicine or clothes. In fact, I would say mine was a very secure opportunities for introspection. She advice? He put his hands on my shoulders and looked would place a banana leaf before me, on which she then ladled rice and straight into my eyes.

For quite some time he said nothing, as if he was aromatic sambhar, a variety of sharp, home-made pickles and a dollop judging my capacity to comprehend his words. Then he answered in a low, of fresh coconut chutney. Whenever they are in trouble, they look become a close friend of mine, despite the difference in our ages. He for someone to help them. Whenever they reach an impasse, they look was about 15 years older than I and used to call me Azad.

We used to to someone to show them the way out. Every recurrent anguish, longing, go for long walks together every evening. As we started from Mosque and desire finds its own special helper. For the people who come to me Street and made our way towards the sandy shores of the island, in distress, I am but a go-between in their effort to propitiate demonic Jallaluddin and I talked mainly of spiritual matters.

The atmosphere of forces with prayers and offerings. This is not a correct approach at all Rameswaram, with its flocking pilgrims, was conducive to such discussion. One must understand the difference Our first halt would be at the imposing temple of Lord Shiva. Circling between a fear-ridden vision of destiny and the vision that enables us to around the temple with the same reverence as any pilgrim from a distant seek the enemy of fulfilment within ourselves.

I remember my father starting his day at 4 a. After the namaz, he used to walk down to a small coconut with Him. He would present all his doubts to God as if He were standing grove we owned, about 4 miles from our home. He would return, with nearby to dispose of them. I would stare at Jallaluddin and then look about a dozen coconuts tied together thrown over his shoulder, and only towards the large groups of pilgrims around the temple, taking holy dips then would he have his breakfast.

This remained his routine even when in the sea, performing rituals and reciting prayers with a sense of respect he was in his late sixties.

I never doubted that the prayers in the temple reached the same I have throughout my life tried to emulate my father in my own world destination as the ones offered in our mosque. I only wondered whether of science and technology. I have endeavoured to understand the Jallaluddin had any other special connection to God. And once an me to excel in my studies and enjoyed my success vicariously. Never individual severs his emotional and physical bondage, he is on the road did I find the slightest trace of resentment in Jallaluddin for his deprivation.

Rather, he was always full of gratitude for whatever life had chosen to I was about six years old when my father embarked on the project of give him. He worked at building entire island who could write English. He wrote letters for almost anybody the boat on the seashore, with the help of a relative, Ahmed Jallaluddin, in need, be they letters of application or otherwise. Nobody of my who later married my sister, Zohara. I watched the boat take shape.

My father was doing good business with the boat when, one day, outside world. Jallaluddin always spoke to me about educated people, of a cyclone bringing winds of over miles per hour carried away our scientific discoveries, of contemporary literature, and of the achievements boat, along with some of the landmass of Sethukkarai. The Pamban of medical science.

Half a century later, I can still feel the surge of pride in earning commodity. By local standards, however, the personal library of STR my own money for the first time. Every child is born, with some inherited characteristics, into a specific He encouraged me to read all I could and I often visited his home to socio-economic and emotional environment, and trained in certain ways borrow books.

I inherited honesty and self-discipline from my Another person who greatly influenced my boyhood was my first father; from my mother, I inherited faith in goodness and deep kindness cousin, Samsuddin. He was the sole distributor for newspapers in and so did my three brothers and sister.

But it was the time I spent with Rameswaram. The newspapers would arrive at Rameswaram station Jallaluddin and Samsuddin that perhaps contributed most to the uniqueness by the morning train from Pamban. The was a one-man organization catering to the reading demands of the unschooled wisdom of Jallaluddin and Samsuddin was so intuitive and 1,strong literate population of Rameswaram town. These responsive to non-verbal messages, that I can unhesitatingly attribute newspapers were mainly bought to keep abreast of current developments my subsequently manifested creativity to their company in my childhood.

A few readers with a Aravindan, and Sivaprakasan. All these boys were from orthodox Hindu more cosmopolitan outlook would discuss Hitler, Mahatma Gandhi and Brahmin families. As children, none of us ever felt any difference amongst Jinnah; almost all would finally flow into the mighty political current of ourselves because of our religious differences and upbringing. Ramanadha Sastry was the son of Pakshi Lakshmana Sastry, the high Dinamani was the most sought after newspaper.

Since reading the printed priest of the Rameswaram temple. Later, he took over the priesthood of matter was beyond my capability, I had to satisfy myself with glancing the Rameswaram temple from his father; Aravindan went into the business at the pictures in the newspaper before Samsuddin delivered them to his of arranging transport for visiting pilgrims; and Sivaprakasan became a customers.

But soon India was forced to join the Allied Forces and something One day when I was in the fifth standard at the Rameswaram like a state of emergency was declared.

The first casualty came in the Elementary School, a new teacher came to our class. I used to wear a form of the suspension of the train halt at Rameswaram station. The cap which marked me as a Muslim, and I always sat in the front row newspapers now had to be bundled and thrown out from the moving next to Ramanadha Sastry, who wore a sacred thread. The new teacher train on the Rameswaram Road between Rameswaram and Dhanuskodi.

In That forced Samsuddin to look for a helping hand to catch the bundles accordance with our social ranking as the new teacher saw it, I was and, as if naturally, I filled the slot. Samsuddin helped me earn my first asked to go and sit on the back bench. The image of him weeping when I shifted to the last row headquarters in Ramanathapuram. I know you have to go away After school, we went home and told our respective parents about to grow.

Does the seagull not fly across the Sun, alone and without a the incident. Lakshmana Sastry summoned the teacher, and in our nest? You must forego your longing for the land of your memories to presence, told the teacher that he should not spread the poison of social move into the dwelling place of your greater desires; our love will not inequality and communal intolerance in the minds of innocent children.

They are the sons the island. They come through you but sense of conviction Lakshmana Sastry conveyed ultimately reformed not from you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts.

For this young teacher. He but not your soul. Your soul dwells in the house of tomorrow which none did his best to break social barriers so that people from varying of us at Rameswaram can visit, not even in our dreams. May God bless backgrounds could mingle easily. He used to spend hours with me and you, my child!

His wife was horrified for my boarding there. Somehow, I did not take to the new setting. The at the idea of a Muslim boy being invited to dine in her ritually pure town of Ramanathapuram was a thriving, factious town of some fifty kitchen. She refused to serve me in her kitchen. Sivasubramania Iyer thousand people, but the coherence and harmony of Rameswaram was was not perturbed, nor did he get angry with his wife, but instead, served absent.

I missed my home and grabbed every opportunity to visit me with his own hands and sat down beside me to eat his meal. His wife Rameswaram. The pull of educational opportunities at Ramanathapuram watched us from behind the kitchen door. I wondered whether she had was not strong enough to nullify the attraction of poli, a South Indian observed any difference in the way I ate rice, drank water or cleaned sweet my mother made.

In fact, she used to prepare twelve distinctly the floor after the meal. When I was leaving his house, Sivasubramania different varieties of it, bringing out the flavour of every single ingredient Iyer invited me to join him for dinner again the next weekend. Observing used in the best possible combinations. My father visualized me as a Collector in the kitchen and served me food with her own hands.

The Rameswaram. I tried hard to do as he said, which was to strive to control my thoughts and my mind and, through these, to influence my destiny. Ironically, that destiny did not lead me back to Rameswaram, but rather, swept me farther 2 away from the home of my childhood. My teacher, Iyadurai Solomon, was an ideal guide for an eager young mind that was yet uncertain of the possibilities and alternatives that lay before it. He made his students feel very comfortable in class with his warm and open-minded attitude.

I used to watch cranes and seagulls soar into flight and longed to fly. Simple, provincial boy though I was, I was convinced that one day I, too, would soar up into the skies. Indeed, I was the first child from Rameswaram to fly. Iyadurai Solomon was a great teacher because he instilled in all the children a sense of their own worth. Father used to visit each boy every night with a Bible in his hand.

His energy and patience was amazing. He was a very considerate person who took care of even the most minute requirements of his students. On One day, when I was in the fourth form, my mathematics teacher, Deepavali, on his instructions, the Brother in charge of the hostel and Ramakrishna Iyer, was teaching another class. Inadvertently, I wandered the mess volunteers would visit each room and distribute good gingelly into that classroom and in the manner of an old-fashioned despot, oil for the ritual bath.

Ramakrishna Iyer caught me by the neck and caned me in front of the whole class. Many months later, when I scored full marks in mathematics, I stayed on the St. Take my word, this boy is and the other a Syrian Christian from Kerala. The three of us had a going to bring glory to his school and to his teachers. When I was made secretary of the vegetarian made up for the earlier humiliation! Father Kalathil, over for lunch one Sunday. Our menu included the By the time I completed my education at Schwartz, I was a self- choicest preparations from our diverse backgrounds.

The result was confident boy determined to succeed. The decision to go in for further rather unexpected, but Rev. Father was lavish in his praise of our efforts. To us, in those days, the We enjoyed every moment with Rev. Father Kalathil, who participated awareness of the possibilities for a professional education did not exist; in our unsophisticated conversation with childlike enthusiasm.

It was a higher education simply meant going to college. The nearest college memorable event for us all. My teachers at St. The In , I arrived at St. Thothathri Iyengar Intermediate examination. I was not a bright student in terms of and Prof. Suryanarayana Sastry, walking together on the campus inspires examination grades but, thanks to my two buddies back in Rameswaram, me to this day.

I had acquired a practical bent of mind. When I was in the final year at St. I began to read the great classics, Tolstoy, Scott and brother Mustafa Kamal, who ran a provision store on the railway station Hardy being special favourites despite their exotic settings, and then I road, would call me in to give him a little help and then vanish for hours moved on to some works in Philosophy. It was around this time that I together leaving the shop in my charge. I sold oil, onions, rice and developed a great interest in Physics.

The fastest moving items, I found, were cigarettes and bidis. I used to wonder what made poor people smoke away their hard- The lessons on subatomic physics at St. When spared by Mustafa, I would be put in charge of his teachers, Prof. Chinna Durai and Prof. Krishnamurthy, introduced me kiosk by my younger brother, Kasim Mohammed.

There I sold novelties to the concept of the half-life period and matters related to the radioactive made of seashells. Sivasubramania Iyer, my science teacher at Rameswaram, had never taught me that most subatomic particles are At St.

As I look at it, the great dance of Shiva is being performed on earth during every moment the path of science can always wind through the heart. For me, science of our existence. When I joined the B. Nor did I have any information fairy tales. I am an avid reader of books on cosmology and enjoy reading about career opportunities available to a student of science.

I could have joined the never really understood the reason behind the great importance attached Engineering course long ago, right after finishing my Intermediate course. As an art, I have Better late than never, I told myself as I made the detour, applying for nothing against astrology, but if it seeks acceptance under the guise of admission into the Madras Institute of Technology MIT , regarded as science, I reject it.

I The planet earth, so steadfast though she seem, went ahead at full steam. In sensibly three different motions move? What fascinated me most at MIT was the sight of two Wherever you go on this planet, there is movement and life. Even decommissioned aircraft displayed there for the demonstration of the apparently inanimate things like rocks, metal, timber, clay are full of various subsystems of flying machines.

I felt a strange attraction towards intrinsic movement—with electrons dancing around each nucleus. After by the nucleus, by means of electric forces which try to hold them as completing my first year, when I had to opt for a specific branch, I close as possible. Electrons, just like any individual with a certain amount almost spontaneously chose aeronautical engineering. The goal was very of energy, detest confinement.

These three teachers were Prof. It was Professor Sponder, Prof. KAV Pandalai and Prof. Narasingha Rao. Each one of Pandalai who opened up the secrets of structural engineering to us. His students were free to disagree with him on several points in the classroom. Sponder taught me technical aerodynamics. He was an Austrian with rich practical experience in aeronautical engineering. During the Prof. Narasingha Rao was a mathematician, who taught us theoretical Second World War, he had been captured by the Nazis and imprisoned aerodynamics.

I still remember his method of teaching fluid dynamics. Understandably, he had developed a very strong After attending his classes, I began to prefer mathematical physics to dislike for Germans.

He kept abreast of the perfection helped me to launch into a serious study of fluid dynamics- latest technologies and expected his students to do the same. I consulted modes of compressible medium motion, development of shock waves him before opting for aeronautical engineering.

The trouble with The structural features of aeroplanes began to gain new meanings— Indians, Prof. Sponder used to observe, was not that they lacked biplanes, monoplanes, tailless planes, canard configured planes, delta- educational opportunities or industrial infrastructure—the trouble was in wing planes, all these began to assume increasing significance for me.

Why aeronautics? Why not electrical engineering? Why not me to mould a composite knowledge. In those days, a new climate of under stress and asking you to meet an impossible deadline. I never political enlightenment and industrial effort was sweeping across the expected you to perform so well. I had to test my belief in God and see if it could fit into the During the rest of the period of the project, I participated in an essay matrix of scientific thinking.

I wrote in which I had been nurtured was profoundly religious. The article that true reality lay beyond the material world in the spiritual realm, and evoked much interest and I won the competition, taking the first prize that knowledge could be obtained only through inner experience. We project to design a low-level attack aircraft together with four other were posing for a group photograph as part of a farewell ritual.

All the colleagues. I had taken up the responsibility of preparing and drawing graduating students had lined up in three rows with the professors seated the aerodynamic design. My team mates distributed among themselves in the front.

Suddenly, Prof. Sponder got up and looked for me. I was the tasks of designing the propulsion, structure, control and standing in the third row.

That night, I remained at the drawing board, skipping educative. When a principle learnt in the classroom is borne out by dinner. On Sunday morning, I was very near completion, when unexpectedly running into an old friend among a crowd of strangers.

Srinivasan HAL, I worked on the overhauling of both piston and turbine engines. Coming straight from the gymkhana, The hazy concepts of gas dynamics and diffusion processes in the he was still in his tennis outfit and had dropped in to see my progress. After examining my work, Prof. Srinivasan hugged me affectionately I was also trained in radial engine-cum-drum operations. I did calibrations of a fixed- pitch fan fitted to a super-charged engine. I opened up pressure and acceleration-cum-speed control systems, and air starter supply systems of turbo-engines.

Getting to understand feathering, un-feathering and 3 reversing of propeller engines was very interesting. The demonstration of the delicate art of beta blade angle control by HAL technicians still lingers in my memory. They had neither studied in major universities, nor were they merely implementing what their engineer-in-charge was suggesting. They had been working hands-on for years and this had given them something like an intuitive feel for the work.

The boy from the streams. Occasionally, a child would appear and wave at the train. Coromandel Coast took a train to the North of India. My destination was more than km away, and was to be my first encounter with It is astonishing how the landscape changes as one moves northwards. The rich and fertile plains of the river Ganga and its numerous tributaries have invited invasion, turmoil, and change.

The tenth century brought Muslims, who later mingled with the local people and became an integral part of this country. One empire gave way to another.

Religious conquests continued. All this time, the part of India south of the Tropic of Cancer remained largely untouched, safe behind the shield of the Vindhya and Satpura mountain ranges. The Narmada, Tapti, Mahanadi, Godavari, and Krishna rivers had woven a net of almost unassailable protection for the tapering Indian peninsula. To bring me to Delhi, my train had crossed all these geographical impediments through the power of scientific advancement.

I did well at the interview. Then I proceeded to Dehra as you can rely upon the eternally unbroken promise of sunrise At the Selection Spring. When the student is ready, the teacher will appear—How true! Here Perhaps they were looking for physical fitness and an articulate manner. You are not I could only finish ninth in the batch of 25 examined to select eight destined to become an Air Force pilot. What you are destined to become officers for commissioning in the Air Force.

I was deeply disappointed. Forget this failure, as it was It took me some time to comprehend that the opportunity to join the Air essential to lead you to your destined path. Search, instead, for the true Force had just slipped through my fingers. I dragged myself out of the purpose of your existence.

I could it be so. Finally, I was filled with mental peace. No more did I feel any feel intense vibrations when I entered. I saw a large number of sadhus bitterness or resentment at my failure to enter the Air Force. All this seated all around in a state of trance. I had read that sadhus were psychic was in If I was not flying aeroplanes, I was at least helping to make I met Swami Sivananda—a man who looked like a Buddha, wearing them airworthy.

During my first year in the Directorate, I carried out a a snow-white dhoti and wooden slippers. He had an olive complexion design assignment on supersonic target aircraft with the help of the and black, piercing eyes. I was struck by his irresistible, almost child- officer-in-charge, R Varadharajan, and won a word of praise from the like smile and gracious manner. I introduced myself to the Swamiji. My Director, Dr Neelakantan. To gain shop-floor exposure to aircraft Muslim name aroused no reaction in him.

Before I could speak any maintenance, I was sent to the Aircraft and Armament Testing Unit further, he inquired about the source of my sorrow. At that time, they were involved in a tropical explanation of how he knew that I was sad and I did not ask. I participated in the performance I told him about my unsuccessful attempt to join the Indian Air Force assessment of its operation systems. He smiled, washing away all my Even in those days, Kanpur was a very populous city.

This energy is Rameswaram. I was particularly troubled by the ubiquitous presence of released into the ether each night, as the mind falls into the sleep state. To me, it Each morning it returns to the conscious state reinforced with the cosmic seemed that a feeling of loneliness pervaded the city. The people on the currents. That which has been imaged will surely and certainly be streets had all come from their villages in search of jobs in factories, manifested.

We members. Then, I undertook a preliminary design study on a Human tried to consult people knowledgeable in this area, but could find none. I later carried out the design and development of a Vertical One day, I simply took the decision to proceed with the limited information Takeoff and Landing Platform. I was also associated with the and resources available. Three years passed. This endeavour to produce a wingless, light, swift machine opened Then the Aeronautical Development Establishment ADE was born in the windows of my mind.

I was quick to see at least a metaphorical Bangalore and I was posted to the new establishment. After all, the Wright Bangalore as a city was in direct contrast to Kanpur. In fact, I feel Brothers made the first aeroplane after fixing bicycles for seven years! I saw in the GEM project great opportunities for ingenuity and growth. I suppose, it is because Indians have been both afflicted and enriched by We went straight into hardware development after spending a few centuries of migrations.

In Kanpur, I saw paan-chewing imitations of Wajid Ali favourable environment. I knew I had to create my own opportunities. Shah, and in Bangalore it was replaced by dog-walking sahibs.

I would enter the assembly shop leaving my other The team was a small working group, comprising four persons at the problems outside, just as my father used to enter the mosque for prayer, level of Scientific Assistant. Our experiments with the available parts and components did not exactly The project was, by any standards, bigger than our collective delight my senior colleagues. Many even called us a group of eccentric capabilities.

None of us had any experience in building a machine, let inventors in pursuit of an impossible dream. I, being the leader of the alone a flying machine. The development are solved. We had a working. Dr Mediratta was visibly pleased And all such things as geniuses use; — with the achievement.

It was a Menon made one of his routine visits to ADE. I escorted him into our new experience for me. So far, I had believed that the sky was the limit, assembly shop. Inside, on a table lay the GEM model broken down into but now it appeared that the limits were much closer. There are boundaries sub-assemblies. The minister fired one question after another at me, determined to ensure that the prototype would go into test flight within I was unwilling to face reality.

A Group Captain in the laboratory during the next week as far as I knew. I was sure about my The next day Dr Mediratta brought a visitor to our hovercraft—a competence in flying the machine I had made, and therefore shook my tall, handsome, bearded man. He asked me several questions about the head in negation. Observing this wordless communication, Krishna machine. I was struck by the objectivity and clarity of his thinking. His request filled me laugh and signalled to me to start the machine.

He was very happy.

By using our site, you agree to abdul kalam books wings of fire free download collection of information through the use of cookies. To learn more, view our Privacy Policy. To browse Academia. At the same time as he has helped create India’s awesome weaponry, Kalam has maintained the ascetic rigour of his personal life, working 18 hours a day and practicing the veena. With characteristic modesty, Kalam pc-aquarium deluxe 4.0 free the greatness of his achievement to the influence of his teachers and mentors.

He describes the struggles of his boyhood and youth, bringing alive everyday life in a small town in Wing India and the inspirational role of educators. He describes the role of visionary Indian scientists, such as Dr Vikram Sarabhai, and of the creation of a coordinated network of research institutions. This is also the abduk of independent India’s struggle for technological self abdul kalam books wings of fire free download and defensive autonomy -a story as much about politics, domestic and international, as it is about science.

This might seem to disqualify me as his biographer, and I certainly had no notion of being one. One day, while speaking to him, I Petr Topychkanov. Terrorists attack the Indian parliament and kill two ministers and 12 MPs.

There is no doubt that Pakistan had a hand in this, and in a month India goes booos war. Pakistan threatens to use nuclear weapons if Увидеть больше does not stop the invasion. Indian troops close in on Lahore, and Pakistan launches Ghauri missiles with nuclear warheads aimed at Delhi A long-range radar for missile defense detects the Ghauri missiles 30 seconds after their launch.

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Born inthe abdul kalam books wings of fire free download of a little educated boatowner in Rameswaram, Tamilnadu, he had an unparalleled career as a defence scientist, culminating in the highest civilian An Autobiography award of India, the Bharat Ratna. I remember the war days when life was challenge and toil— Miles to walk, hours before sunrise, Walking to take lessons from the saintly teacher near the temple. Contents Again miles to the Arab dowload school, Climb sandy wiings to Railway Station Downlowd, Collect, distribute newspapers to temple city citizens, Preface Few hours after sunrise, going to school.

Acknowledgements Evening, business time before study at night. Epilogue I still remember the day when I was ten, Sleeping on your lap to the envy of my elder brothers abduul sisters It was full moon night, my world only you knew Mother! My Mother! When at midnight I woke with tears falling on my knee You knew the pain of your child, My Mother. Your caring vree, tenderly removing the pain Your love, your pf, your faith gave me strength To face the world without fear and with His strength.

We will meet again on the great Judgement Day, My Mother! He has an intuitive rapport with the humblest and simplest people, an indication of his own simplicity and innate spirituality. For myself, writing dowhload book groovemixer for pc free download been like a pilgrimage. Many of you may never Preface meet Dr Kalam in person, but I hope you will enjoy his company through this book, and that he will become your spiritual friend.

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– Да тут несколько тысяч долларов. – Я действую по инструкции, сэр. – Пилот повернулся и скрылся в кабине. Дверца за ним захлопнулась.

Утечка прекратилась! – крикнул техник. – Вторжение прекращено. Наверху, на экране ВР, возникла первая из пяти защитных стен. Черные атакующие линии начали исчезать.

Формула, утверждают они, – это мистификация, к которой не следует относиться серьезно. – Аукцион? – Сьюзан подняла. Стратмор кивнул: – Как раз сейчас японские компании скачивают зашифрованную версию «Цифровой крепости» и пытаются ее взломать.

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In Kanpur, I saw paan-chewing imitations of Wajid Ali favourable environment. I knew I had to create my own opportunities. Shah, and in Bangalore it was replaced by dog-walking sahibs. Here too, I longed for the depth and calmness of Rameswaram. The Part by part, subsystem by subsystem, stage by stage, things started relationship between the heart and the head of an earthy Indian has moving.

Based on my preliminary studies on ground-handling equipment. Whenever he was in Bangalore, he always found some time equipment, a project team was formed to design and develop an to review the progress of our project. His confidence in our ability ignited indigenous hovercraft prototype as a ground equipment machine GEM. I would enter the assembly shop leaving my other The team was a small working group, comprising four persons at the problems outside, just as my father used to enter the mosque for prayer, level of Scientific Assistant.

Our experiments with the available parts and components did not exactly The project was, by any standards, bigger than our collective delight my senior colleagues. Many even called us a group of eccentric capabilities. None of us had any experience in building a machine, let inventors in pursuit of an impossible dream. I, being the leader of the alone a flying machine. The development are solved. We had a working. Dr Mediratta was visibly pleased And all such things as geniuses use; — with the achievement.

But by this time, Krishna Menon was out of office Two bats for patterns, curious fellows! In the new order, not many A charcoal-pot and a pair of bellows. In fact, even today, we import hovercrafts. The When the project was about a year old, Defence Minister Krishna project was mired in controversies and was finally shelved. It was a Menon made one of his routine visits to ADE. I escorted him into our new experience for me. So far, I had believed that the sky was the limit, assembly shop.

I had put my heart and soul into Nandi. In this period of confusion and uncertainty, memories from my childhood came back to me and I The hovercraft was christened Nandi, after the bull ridden by Lord discovered new meanings in them. For a prototype, its form, fit and finish was beyond our expectation, given the rudimentary infrastructure we possessed.

One day, Dr Mediratta called with. He inquired about the state of our hovercraft. When told that it was in perfect condition to be flown, he asked me to organize a demonstration Defence Minister Krishna Menon flew in the Nandi, overruling the for an important visitor the next day. A Group Captain in the laboratory during the next week as far as I knew. I was sure about my The next day Dr Mediratta brought a visitor to our hovercraft—a competence in flying the machine I had made, and therefore shook my tall, handsome, bearded man.

Finally, here was someone who was interested in my work. However, the next the ground. We were not flying, but were definitely floating in the air. This was a breakthrough a young man like ride and departed. But not before introducing himself—he was Prof.

Within this area, stood a large church, whose steadfast in their vows. Land acquisition from private parties is always a difficult and time-consuming process, especially in densely populated I reminded myself that the best way to win was to not need to win. In addition, there was the delicate matter of acquiring The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and a site of religious significance.

He was looking at me as if in reference to a larger whole. I took some time off before going abroad and went to dream was enveloped by the larger dream of a bigger person.

My father was very pleased to learn about the opportunity that had come my way. He took me to the mosque and organized a special namaz in thanksgiving. I could feel the power of God flowing in a circuit through my father to me and back to God; we were all under the spell of the prayer. One of the important functions of prayer, I believe, is to act as a stimulus to creative ideas. Within the mind are all the resources required for successful living. Ideas are present in the consciousness, which when released and given scope to grow and take shape, can lead to successful events.

God, our Creator, has stored within our minds and personalities, great potential strength and ability. Prayer helps us to tap and develop these powers. Ahmed Jallaluddin and Samsuddin came to see me off at Bombay airport. It was their first exposure to a big city like Bombay, just as I myself was about to have my first exposure to a mega city like New York.

The intensity and purity of their faith in my capabilities broke my last defences, and tears welled up in my eyes. They attempt to get out of them rather than suffer them. Everybody prostrated themselves except Iblis, or Satan, who refused. Does not that make me nobler than Achievers Adam?

This is no place for your contemptuous pride. One of my most vivid memories What makes life in Indian organizations difficult is the widespread of LRC is of a piece of sculpture depicting a charioteer driving two prevalence of this very contemptuous pride. It stops us from listening to horses, one representing scientific research and the other technological our juniors, subordinates and people down the line.

You cannot expect a development, metaphorically encapsulating the interconnection between person to deliver results if you humiliate him, nor can you expect him to research and development. Unfortunately, the earth-orbiting science and applications satellites. Here, has to be changed. I saw a painting prominently displayed in the reception lobby. It depicted As the process of confronting and solving problems often requires a battle scene with a few rockets flying in the background.

A painting hard work and is painful, we have endless procrastination. Actually, with this theme should be the most commonplace thing at a Flight Facility, problems can be the cutting edge that actually distinguish between but the painting caught my eye because the soldiers on the side launching success and failure. They draw out innate courage and wisdom. It was a sounding rocket, called Nike- fighting the British.

The rocket was assembled in the church country but commemorated here on the other side of the planet. I was building I have referred to earlier.

When the rocket was lifted by the crane and launch of Nike-Apache, he chose to share with us his dream of an was about to be placed on the launcher, it started tilting, indicating a leak Indian Satellite Launch Vehicle. As we were fast approaching the Prof. The very news of launch time, 6 p. People manually, using our collective muscle power and finally placing it on the would work virtually round the clock because of their enthusiasm to launcher.

When telemetry and ground support. The launch was smooth and problem- Prof. We obtained excellent flight data and returned with a sense of he asked me, almost in the same breath, to take up studies on a rocket- pride and accomplishment. The two things had no apparent connection except in the mind of this great visionary. I When we were relaxing the next evening at the dinner table, we knew that all I had to do was to remain alert and focussed on my purpose, received news of the assassination of President John F Kennedy in and sooner or later, an opportunity to do a challenging job would enter Dallas, Texas.

We were appalled. The Kennedy years were a significant my laboratory. Sarabhai was ever-willing to try out novel approaches and liked The Soviet Union built missile sites in Cuba, from which it would to draw in young people. He had the wisdom and judgement which have been possible to launch attacks on American cities. In my opinion, he was an ideal experimenter offensive missiles to Cuba. America also threatened to respond to any and innovator. When there were alternative courses of action before us, Soviet nuclear attack from Cuba on any country in the Western whose outcome was difficult to predict, or to reconcile varying Hemisphere by retaliating against the USSR.

Sarabhai had a detailed discussion with us on research in particular. It was a great example of leadership by trust. He was creating a new frontier in the field of science and technology in India.

A new generation, scientists and engineers in their The rocket launch site later blossomed into the Thumba Equatorial 30s and early 40s, was being charged with an unprecedented dynamism. Vikram Sarabhai—had comprehended the full operational sounding rockets were developed.

These rockets had wide implications of the challenge and had not balked at taking it on. Right ranging capabilities, and to date several hundreds of these rockets have from the day INCOSPAR was formed, he was aware of the need to been launched for various scientific and technological studies.

What is it The development of Indian rockets in the twentieth century can be that distinguishes a sounding rocket from a Satellite Launch Vehicle seen as a revival of the eighteenth century dream of Tipu Sultan. When SLV and from a missile? In fact, they are three different kinds of Tipu Sultan was killed, the British captured more than rockets and rockets.

Sounding rockets are normally used for probing the near-earth subsystems of rockets in the battle of Turukhanahally in His environment, including the upper regions of the atmosphere. While they army had 27 brigades, called Kushoons, and each brigade had a company can carry a variety of scientific payloads to a range of altitudes, they of rocket men, called Jourks.

These rockets had been taken to England cannot impart the final velocity needed to orbit the payload. The final stage of a launch vehicle provides the or patent regime. With the death of Tipu, Indian rocketry also met its necessary velocity for a satellite to enter an orbit.

This is a complex demise—at least for years. A missile, though belonging to the same family, is a still more complex system. In Meanwhile, rocket technology made great strides abroad. Konstantin addition to the large terminal velocity and onboard guidance and control, Tsiolkovsky in Russia , Robert Goddard in USA and it must have the capability to home onto targets. When the targets are Hermann Oberth in Germany gave rocketry new dimensions. With this booty, they started to run fabrication of sounding rockets and their associated on-board systems their deadly arms race with missiles and warheads.

Perhaps he was aware that though a particular goal might be clear to himself, and he could give adequate directions for its accomplishment, his team members might have resisted working towards a goal that made no sense to them. He considered the collective understanding of the problem the main attribute of effective leadership. Sarabhai took a series of decisions that were to become the life-mission of many.

And this would not be done one-by-one but concurrently, in a multi-dimensional fashion. In the development of payloads for the sounding rockets, instead of getting a certain payload and then engineering it to fit into the rocket, we discussed the matter threadbare with the payload scientists working in different organ-izations and at different locations.

With this, the X-ray sensors would be exposed to space for programme, each having its own mission, its own objective and its own collecting the required information about the emissions from stars. These payloads were required to be integrated to the rocket Together, Prof. Oda and Prof. Rao were a unique blend of intellect and structure so as to ensure their proper functioning and endurance under dedication, which one rarely sees. One day, when I was working on the flight conditions.

We had X-ray payloads to look at stars; payloads fitted integration for Prof. To me they looked flimsy, of the upper atmosphere; sodium payloads to find out wind conditions, but Prof.

Oda stuck to his stand that the Indian timers be replaced by its direction and velocity. We also had ionospheric payloads to explore the Japanese ones.

I yielded to his suggestion and replaced the timers. I not only had to interact with scientists The rocket took off elegantly and attained the intended altitude. Oda was so upset that tears welled up in his eyes. I was stunned France, Germany and Japan. He had clearly put his heart and soul into his work.

I often read Khalil Gibran, and always find his words full of wisdom. If you are a writer the hazardous sodium and thermite mix. As usual, it was a hot and humid who would secretly prefer to be a lawyer or a doctor, your written words day at Thumba.

After the sixth such operation, Sudhakar and I went into will feed but half the hunger of your readers; if you are a teacher who the payload room to confirm the proper filling of the mix. Suddenly, a would rather be a businessman, your instructions will meet but half the drop of sweat from his forehead fell onto the sodium, and before we need for knowledge of your students; if you are a scientist who hates knew what was happening, there was a violent explosion which shook science, your performance will satisfy but half the needs of your mission.

I remember him as a assembly, testing and evaluation besides building subsystems like payload diminutive man with a towering personality and eyes that radiated housing and jettisonable nose cones.

Working with the nose cones led intelligence. His dedication to his work was exemplary. He would bring me, as a natural consequence, into the field of composite materials. That was his subtle way composite bows made of wood, sinew, and horn as early as the eleventh of challenging each one of us to stretch our capabilities. The versatility of composites, in the sense that they possess would praise whatever we had accomplished. Whenever he found any very desirable structural, thermal, electrical, chemical and mechanical one of us going over his head and attempting a task for which he did not properties, fascinated me.

I was aware that the best work required were christened Rohini and Menaka, after the two mythological dancers more ability than I possessed and therefore I needed help that only God in the court of Indra, the king of the sky.

There are many different types and levels of experience that turn this internal power reaction critical. Sometimes, when we are ready, the Prof. Sarabhai was matter-of-fact and never tried to hide his gentlest of contacts with Him fills us with insight and wisdom. This disappointment. He used to talk with us in an honest and objective manner. Many a time, it could come even were, and then charming us by his almost magical powers of persuasion.

Without the slightest warning, something nevertheless in a successful manner. He was a well-built person with an intelligent I looked around the elegant lounge. Somebody had left a book on a look and refined posture. Unlike me—always disorderly in my dress— nearby sofa. As if to fill the small hours of that cold night with some this man was wearing elegant clothes. Notwithstanding the odd hours, warm thoughts, I picked up the book and started browsing. I must have he was alert and vivacious.

And before I could get back to the book, It was some popular book related to business management. I was I was informed that Prof. Sarabhai was ready to receive me. I left the not really reading it, only skimming over paragraphs and turning pages.

I was surprised Suddenly, my eyes fell on a passage in the book, it was a quotation from when the man sitting on the opposite sofa was also asked to come inside. George Bernard Shaw.

The gist of the quote was that all reasonable Who was he? It was not long before my question was answered. Even men adapt themselves to the world. Only a few unreasonable ones persist before we sat down, Prof.

This would help our warplanes to take off from short runways in the The author was describing certain myths woven around the concept Himalayas. Hot coffee was served over small talk. It was totally and the process of innovation in industry and business. I read about the uncharacteristic of Prof. But as soon as we finished the coffee, myth of strategic planning. It is generally believed that substantial Prof.

The author was of the opinion that it is essential for cursory glance at the sofa where I had left the book. It was not there. Sarabhai showed us felt that it was a myth to hold that the key to economic success is a Russian RATO. A quotation from General George Patton was given as a could you do it in eighteen months time? Sarabhai asked us.

It is a myth that to Prof. I recalled what win big one must strive to optimize, the author felt. After dropping us back at the Hotel Ashoka, Prof. By that evening, Waiting in the hotel lobby at 1 a. But then, Prof. Sarabhai had always exhibited a strong heading the project, was made public. I was filled with many emotions— component of unorthodoxy in his character.

The plan talked about the realisation of a When you are the hammer, strike. SLV for injecting lightweight satellites into a low earth orbit, upgrading of Indian satellites from laboratory models to space entities and RATO motors were mounted on aircraft to provide the additional development of a wide range of spacecraft subsystems like the apogee thrust required during the take-off run under certain adverse operating and booster motors, momentum wheel, and solar panel deployment conditions like partially bombed-out runways, high altitude airfields, more mechanism.

It also promised a wide range of technological spin-offs than the prescribed load, or very high ambient temperatures. The Air like the gyros, various types of transducers, telemetry, adhesives, and Force was in dire need of a large number of RATO motors for their S- polymers for non-space applications.

Over and above, there was the 22 and HF aircraft. It weighed kg and had a double base propellant encased in Ministry of Defence. Both Narayanan and I were inducted as members. The development work was to be carried out at the Space Science The idea of making missiles in our own country was exciting, and we and Technology Centre with the assistance of the Defence Research spent hours on end studying the missiles of various advanced countries.

The distinction between a tactical missile and a strategic missile is often a fine one. However, in warfare, this term is used motor casing. We decided in favour of a composite propellant which to denote the kind of target rather than its distance from missile launch. I also decided to take additional safety measures by in counter-force attacks on their strategic forces or in counter-value incorporating a diaphragm which would rupture if the chamber pressure attacks on the society, which in essence means his cities.

This profile was not merely an activity plan laid down in a tactical role, notwithstanding its range of some km. In those by the top man for his team to comply with, it was a theme paper meant days, however, strategic missiles were synonymous with intermediate for open discussions, to be later transformed into a programme.

In fact, range ballistic missiles IRBMs with ranges in the order of nautical I found it was the romantic manifesto of a person deeply in love with the miles or km and inter-continental ballistic missiles ICBMs with a space research programme in his country. The plan mainly centred around the early ideas which had been born Gp Capt Narayanan had an ineffable enthusiasm for indigenous guided at INCOSPAR; it included utilization of satellites for television and missiles.

He was a great admirer of the strong arm approach of the Russian developmental education, meteorological observations and remote sensing Missile Development Programme. To this had been added the here, where space research has already prepared the soil for a bonanza development and launch of satellite launch vehicles. A large number of Surface- The next evening, Babu came to me before the appointed time. The RATO system locations. Gp Capt Narayanan passionately advocated the development can be made without imports.

The only hurdle is the inherent inelasticity of these missiles in the country. He was very eager to learn about rocketry and I approval by a single person instead of an entire hierarchy, air travel for was very curious to know about airborne weapon systems. He had and expeditious accounting procedures.

He obtained These demands were unheard of in government establishments, which funding of Rs 75 lakhs with a further commitment towards any tend to be conservative, yet I could see the soundness of his proposition. At times, I often laughed at his impatience, was to be played with a new set of rules. I weighed all the pros and cons and read for him these lines from T. Hearing my plea for administrative liberalization And the creation and seeing the merits behind it, Prof.

Sarabhai approved the proposals Between the emotion without a second thought. And the response Through his suggestions, Babu had highlighted the importance of Falls the Shadow. Virtually nothing indigenous was available. Together, we made people, more material and more money. But this made me your parameters! Instinctive businessman that he was, Babu did not unhappy—was there no remedy or alternative? I to live with screwdriver technology? We had also gone in for a high energy after I took up the RATO projects, I saw a young colleague, Jaya Chandra composite propellant and an event-based ignition and jettisoning system in Babu going home.

Babu had joined us a few months ago and the only real-time. A canted nozzle was designed to deflect the jet away from the thing I knew about him was that he had a very positive attitude and was aircraft. We conducted the first static test of RATO in the twelfth month articulate. I called him into my office and did a bit of loud thinking. Within the next four months, we conducted 64 you have any suggestions?

Babu remained silent for static tests. And we were just about 20 engineers working on the project! Sarabhai gave me the additional responsibility of designing the fourth stage of the SLV. What made Prof. Sarabhai pick a few of us for this great mission? Dr Gowarikar was doing outstanding work in the field of composite propellants.

MR Kurup had established an excellent laboratory for propellants, propulsion and pyrotechnics. Muthunayagam had proved himself in the field of high energy propellants. The fourth stage was to be a composite structure and called for a large number of innovations in fabrication technology; Movers perhaps that was why I was brought in.

I laid the foundation for Stage IV on two rocks—sensible approximation and unawed support. I have always considered the price The future satellite launch vehicle SLV had also been conceived of perfection prohibitive and allowed mistakes as a part of the learning by this time. Recognising the immense socio- economic benefits of space process. I prefer a dash of daring and persistence to perfection.

I have technology, Prof. Sarabhai decided in , to go full-steam ahead with always supported learning on the part of my team members by paying the task of establishing indigenous capability in building and launching vigilant attention to each of their attempts, be they successful or our own satellites.

The island is as big as Madras city. They Canal and the Pulicat lake form its western boundary. Curien was a In , we had formed the Indian Rocket Society. Soon after, the thorough professional. Together, Prof. Sarabhai and Prof. Curien, Prof. Sarabhai had already hand-picked a team to give Prof.

Curien to reinterpret his own progress in the Diamont programme. Curien advised Prof. Sarabhai to relieve me of all the minor cancelled their Diamont BC programme. They told us that they did not jobs which posed little challenge and to give me more opportunities for need our Stage IV anymore.

It was a great shock, making me re-live achievement. I recall how this Air Force, and at Bangalore, when the Nandi project was aborted at brought a subtle smile to Prof. As a matter of fact, the Diamont and SLV airframes were I had invested great hope and effort in the fourth stage, so that it incompatible. The diameters were quite different and to attain could be flown with a Diamont rocket. The other three stages of SLV, interchangeability, some radical innovations were required. I wondered involving enormous work in the area of rocket propulsion were at least where I should start.

I also started enjoyed working on this project. In time, RATO filled the vacuum created asking and listening to anyone who showed the slightest promise. Some in me by the Diamont BC Stage. I When the RATO project was underway, the SLV project slowly started made it an unfailing routine to make notes on individual suggestions and taking shape. Competence for all major systems of a launch vehicle had gave handwritten notes to colleagues in engineering and design, requesting been established in Thumba by now.

Through their outstanding efforts, concrete follow-up action within five or ten days. Curien testified, while for a big leap in rocketry. Sarabhai was an exemplar in the art of team-building. On one counterparts in Europe could barely manage in three years. Our plus occasion, he had to identify a person who could be given the responsibility point, he noted, was that each of us worked with those below and above for developing a telecommand system for the SLV.

Two men were in the hierarchy. I made it a point to have the team meet at least once competent to carry out this task—one was the seasoned and sophisticated every week. Though it took up time and energy, I considered it essential. UR Rao and the other was a relatively unknown experimenter, G How good is a leader? No better than his people and their commitment Madhavan Nair. The fact that I got them dedication and abilities, I did not rate his chances as very good.

Madhavan Nair not only lived up to the trust. Within my own small group of people I found leaders, and learned expectations of his leader but even went beyond them. He was to later that leaders exist at every level. SLVs and missiles can be called first cousins: they are different in We had modified the existing SLV-IV Stage design to suit the Diamont concept and purpose, but come from the same bloodline of rocketry.

A airframe. It was reconfigured and upgraded from a kg, mm massive missile development project had been taken up by DRDO at diameter stage to a kg, mm diameter stage.

Sarabhai spent the next hour in re-defining our tasks, and, in the small hours of the morning, the decision to set up a Rocket In , Prof.

Sarabhai came to Thumba on one of his routine visits. Engineering Section was taken. He was shown the operation of the nose-cone jettisoning mechanism.

To our horror, nothing happened. We were dumbstruck. I development of new ideas. He was not especially concerned with the looked at Pramod Kale, who had designed and integrated the timer circuit. In a flash each of us mentally went through an anlysis of the failure. We Prof. Sarabhai to wait for a few minutes, then we detached they were inevitable but generally manageable.

Sarabhai congratulated Kale and me; but his expression anticipate them. But this time, by a strange twist of fate, the failure of suggested that his thoughts were elsewhere. We could not guess what the timer circuit led to the birth of a rocket engineering laboratory. The suspense did not last for long and I got a call from It was my usual practice to brief Prof. Sarabhai after every Missile Prof. After attending one such meeting in Delhi on 30 discussion.

December , I was returning to Trivandrum. Sarabhai was Prof. I spoke to him home whenever he was in Trivandrum.

I was slightly perplexed by the on the telephone from the airport lounge about the salient points that had summons.

Sarabhai greeted me with his customary warmth. He emerged at the panel meeting. He instructed me to wait at Trivandrum talked of the rocket launching station, envisaging facilities like launch Airport after disembarking from the Delhi flight, and to meet him there pads, block houses, radar, telemetry and so on—things which are taken before his departure for Bombay the same night. Then he brought up the When I reached Trivandrum, a pall of gloom hung in the air. The incident that had occurred that morning.

This was exactly what I had aircraft ladder operator Kutty told me in a choked voice that Prof. My apprehension of a reproach from my leader, however, was Sarabhai was no more. He had passed away a few hours ago, following unfounded. Sarabhai did not conclude that the failure of the pyro a cardiac arrest. I was shocked to the core; it had happened within an timer circuit was the outcome of insufficient knowledge and lack of skill hour of our conversation.

It was a great blow to me and a huge loss to on the part of his people or of faulty understanding at the direction stage. Indian science. That night passed in preparations for airlifting Prof. He also asked me to consider if my work was possibly being affected by any problem of which I was hitherto unaware. For five years, between to , about 22 scientists and engineers He finally put his finger on the key issue.

We lacked a single roof to had worked closely with Prof. All of them were later to take carry out system integration of all our rocket stages and rocket systems. Not only was Prof. Sarabhai a Electrical and mechanical integration work was going on with a great scientist, but also a great leader. I still remember him reviewing significant phase difference—both in time and in space. There was little the bi-monthly progress of the design projects of SLV-3 in June The first three Before taking up the responsibility of organizing space research in presentations went through smoothly.

Mine was the last presentation. Sarabhai had introduced five of my team members who had contributed in various established a number of successful industrial enterprises. He was aware ways to the design. The presentations Prof. Sarabhai founded Sarabhai Chemicals, Sarabhai Glass, Sarabhai were discussed at length and the conclusion was that satisfactory Geigy Limited, Sarabhai Merck Limited, and the Sarabhai Engineering progress had been made.

Now with the indigenization of RATO, you do for the project? Sarabhai his mission had acquired a new dimension—independence in the really annoyed. We just witnessed an excellent example. It rupees in foreign exchange. I recalled this on the day of the successful was an outstanding demonstration of team work. I have always seen a trial of the RATO system. Including trial expenses, we spent less than project leader as an integrator of people and that is precisely what Kalam Rs.

Sarabhai as the Mahatma Gandhi of Indian science at Rs. MGK Menon at the helm, full swing. All the subsystems had been designed, technologies identified, Prof. The processes established, work centres selected, manpower earmarked and whole complex at Thumba, which included TERLS, the Space Science schedules drawn.

The only hitch was the lack of a management structure and Technology Centre SSTC , the RPP, the Rocket Fabrication Facility to effectively handle this mega-project and coordinate activities which RFF , and the Propellant Fuel Complex PFC were merged together were spread over a large number of work centres with their own ways to form an integrated space centre and christened the Vikram Sarabhai of working and management.

Sukhoi jet aircraft became airborne after a short run of m, as With organizers like Easwardas, Aravamudan, and SC Gupta available, against its usual run of 2 km. We used the 66th RATO motor in the test. I articulated my doubts to Dr Brahm Prakash.

This effort was said to have saved approximately Rs 4 crores in foreign exchange. The vision of the industrialist scientist had finally borne fruit. Yet another major task was the augmentation of degraders and cautioned me against outrightly seeking optimal launch facilities at SHAR with systems integration and checkout facilities performance from the participating work centres. The SLV mission will be set in March Dr Brahm you who did not eat or walk about the market squares.

We test you by Prakash formed four Project Advisory Committees to advise me on means of one another. Will you not have patience? My job was going to be to showing you an account of those who have gone before you and an avoid those who were interested neither in the work nor in the workers. Allah guides to His light promote conditions where work and workers went together.

I visualized whom He will. He has knowledge of all things. The first Group was made and operation of a standard SLV system, SLV-3, capable of reliably and responsible for looking after the overall executive aspects of SLV expeditiously fulfilling the specified mission of launching a 40 kg satellite project management, including administration, planning and evaluation, into a km circular orbit around the earth.

The Integration and Flight Testing Group was assigned the tasks major tasks. One such task was the development of a rocket motor of generation of facilities required for integration and flight testing of system for the four stages of the vehicle. The critical problems in the SLV They were also asked to carry out the analysis of the vehicle, completion of this task were: making an 8.

The high mass ratio apogee rocket motor system which would use high- Subsystems Development Group was given the job of interacting with energy propellants.

Another task was vehicle control and guidance. Three various divisions of VSSC and was made responsible for ensuring that types of control systems were involved in this task—aerodynamic surface all technological problems in the development of various subsystems control, thrust vector control and reaction control for the first, second were overcome by creating a synergy amongst the available talent in and third stages and the spin-up mechanism for the fourth stage.

Inertial these divisions. If it had not been for synergistic efforts, the whole project would have remained a non-starter. These men were in the habit of celebrating their successes together—in a sort of mutual appreciation club.

This boosted morale, and helped them a great deal to accept setbacks and to revitalize themselves after periods of intense work. Each member of the SLV-3 project team was a specialist in his own field. It was natural therefore that each one of them valued his independence. To manage the performance of such specialists the team Thrusters H leader has to adopt a delicate balance between the hands-on and the aving taken up the leadership of executing the SLV-3 project, hands-off approach.

The hands-off approach committee work, material procurement, correspondence, trusts team members and recognizes their need for autonomy to carry reviews, briefings, and for the need to be informed on a wide range of out their roles, as they see fit.

It hinges on their self-motivation. When subjects. If he goes too far hands-off, he is seen as was living in. I used to prepare a general schedule during my morning abdicating his responsibility or not being interested. Each one of these minutes, I would scan all the papers and quickly divide them into different men rose to his present position through consistent hard work and rock- categories: those that required immediate action, low priority ones, ones like will power.

It was indeed an exceptionally talented team. Then I would put the high priority papers in front of me and everything else out of sight. The list of materials went up to over 1 million components. From his side, Prof. From our side, we stainless steel, electroforming techniques, and ultra-precision process evolved a matrix type of management to achieve productive interfacing tooling.

We also decided to make some important machines in-house, with more than industries. The target was that our interaction with like the litre vertical mixer and the groove machining facility for our them must lead to their technology empowerment.

Three things I stressed third and fourth stages. Many of our subsystems were so massive and before my colleagues—importance of design capability, goal setting and complex that they implied sizeable financial outlays. Without any realisation, and the strength to withstand setbacks. Now, before I dwell hesitation, we approached industries in the private sector and developed on the finer aspects of the management of the SLV-3 project, let me talk contract management plans which later became blueprints for many about the SLV-3 itself.

This remained his routine even when in the sea, performing rituals and reciting prayers with a sense of respect he was in his late sixties. I never doubted that the prayers in the temple reached the same I have throughout my life tried to emulate my father in my own world destination as the ones offered in our mosque. I only wondered whether of science and technology. I have endeavoured to understand the Jallaluddin had any other special connection to God. And once an me to excel in my studies and enjoyed my success vicariously.

Never individual severs his emotional and physical bondage, he is on the road did I find the slightest trace of resentment in Jallaluddin for his deprivation. Rather, he was always full of gratitude for whatever life had chosen to I was about six years old when my father embarked on the project of give him.

He worked at building entire island who could write English. He wrote letters for almost anybody the boat on the seashore, with the help of a relative, Ahmed Jallaluddin, in need, be they letters of application or otherwise.

Nobody of my who later married my sister, Zohara. I watched the boat take shape. My father was doing good business with the boat when, one day, outside world. Jallaluddin always spoke to me about educated people, of a cyclone bringing winds of over miles per hour carried away our scientific discoveries, of contemporary literature, and of the achievements boat, along with some of the landmass of Sethukkarai.

The Pamban of medical science. Half a century later, I can still feel the surge of pride in earning commodity. By local standards, however, the personal library of STR my own money for the first time.

Every child is born, with some inherited characteristics, into a specific He encouraged me to read all I could and I often visited his home to socio-economic and emotional environment, and trained in certain ways borrow books. I inherited honesty and self-discipline from my Another person who greatly influenced my boyhood was my first father; from my mother, I inherited faith in goodness and deep kindness cousin, Samsuddin.

He was the sole distributor for newspapers in and so did my three brothers and sister. But it was the time I spent with Rameswaram. The newspapers would arrive at Rameswaram station Jallaluddin and Samsuddin that perhaps contributed most to the uniqueness by the morning train from Pamban.

The was a one-man organization catering to the reading demands of the unschooled wisdom of Jallaluddin and Samsuddin was so intuitive and 1,strong literate population of Rameswaram town. These responsive to non-verbal messages, that I can unhesitatingly attribute newspapers were mainly bought to keep abreast of current developments my subsequently manifested creativity to their company in my childhood.

Ramanadha Sastry was the son of Pakshi Lakshmana Sastry, the high Dinamani was the most sought after newspaper. Since reading the printed priest of the Rameswaram temple. Later, he took over the priesthood of matter was beyond my capability, I had to satisfy myself with glancing the Rameswaram temple from his father; Aravindan went into the business at the pictures in the newspaper before Samsuddin delivered them to his of arranging transport for visiting pilgrims; and Sivaprakasan became a customers.

Jallaluddin would tell me stories Ramayana and from the life of the Prophet were the bedtime stories my about the war which I would later attempt to trace in the headlines in mother and grandmother would tell the children in our family. Our area, being isolated, was completely unaffected by the war. But soon India was forced to join the Allied Forces and something One day when I was in the fifth standard at the Rameswaram like a state of emergency was declared.

They are the sons the island. They come through you but sense of conviction Lakshmana Sastry conveyed ultimately reformed not from you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts.

The at the idea of a Muslim boy being invited to dine in her ritually pure town of Ramanathapuram was a thriving, factious town of some fifty kitchen. She refused to serve me in her kitchen. Sivasubramania Iyer thousand people, but the coherence and harmony of Rameswaram was was not perturbed, nor did he get angry with his wife, but instead, served absent. I missed my home and grabbed every opportunity to visit me with his own hands and sat down beside me to eat his meal.

His wife Rameswaram. The pull of educational opportunities at Ramanathapuram watched us from behind the kitchen door. I wondered whether she had was not strong enough to nullify the attraction of poli, a South Indian observed any difference in the way I ate rice, drank water or cleaned sweet my mother made.

Ironically, that destiny did not lead me back to Rameswaram, but rather, swept me farther 2 away from the home of my childhood. My teacher, Iyadurai Solomon, was an ideal guide for an eager young mind that was yet uncertain of the possibilities and alternatives that lay before it. He made his students feel very comfortable in class with his warm and open-minded attitude.

He used to say that a good student could learn more from a bad teacher than a poor student from even a skilled teacher. During my stay at Ramanathapuram, my relationship with him grew beyond that of teacher and pupil. To take an example from my own life, I had been fascinated by the mysteries of the sky and the flight of birds from early childhood. I used to watch cranes and seagulls soar into flight and longed to fly. Simple, provincial boy though I was, I was convinced that one day I, too, would soar up into the skies.

Indeed, I was the first child from Rameswaram to fly. Iyadurai Solomon was a great teacher because he instilled in all the children a sense of their own worth. Father used to visit each boy every night with a Bible in his hand. His energy and patience was amazing. He was a very considerate person who took care of even the most minute requirements of his students.

On One day, when I was in the fourth form, my mathematics teacher, Deepavali, on his instructions, the Brother in charge of the hostel and Ramakrishna Iyer, was teaching another class. Inadvertently, I wandered the mess volunteers would visit each room and distribute good gingelly into that classroom and in the manner of an old-fashioned despot, oil for the ritual bath.

Our menu included the By the time I completed my education at Schwartz, I was a self- choicest preparations from our diverse backgrounds. The result was confident boy determined to succeed.

The decision to go in for further rather unexpected, but Rev. Father was lavish in his praise of our efforts. To us, in those days, the We enjoyed every moment with Rev. Father Kalathil, who participated awareness of the possibilities for a professional education did not exist; in our unsophisticated conversation with childlike enthusiasm. It was a higher education simply meant going to college. The nearest college memorable event for us all. My teachers at St. The In , I arrived at St.

Thothathri Iyengar Intermediate examination. I was not a bright student in terms of and Prof. Suryanarayana Sastry, walking together on the campus inspires examination grades but, thanks to my two buddies back in Rameswaram, me to this day.

Chinna Durai and Prof. Krishnamurthy, introduced me kiosk by my younger brother, Kasim Mohammed. There I sold novelties to the concept of the half-life period and matters related to the radioactive made of seashells. Sivasubramania Iyer, my science teacher at Rameswaram, had never taught me that most subatomic particles are At St. Father unstable and that they disintegrate after a certain time into other particles.

TN Sequeira. He taught us English and was also our hostel warden. We All this I was learning for the first time. Everything solid, thus, contains much empty space within and he not talking of the same thing? I wonder why some people tend to see everything stationary contains great movement within.

It is as though science as something which takes man away from God. As I look at it, the great dance of Shiva is being performed on earth during every moment the path of science can always wind through the heart. For me, science of our existence. When I joined the B. Nor did I have any information fairy tales. I am an avid reader of books on cosmology and enjoy reading about career opportunities available to a student of science. Only after about celestial bodies.

Many friends, while asking me questions related obtaining a B. I had to to space flights, sometimes slip into astrology. Quite honestly, I have go into engineering to realise my dreams. I could have joined the never really understood the reason behind the great importance attached Engineering course long ago, right after finishing my Intermediate course.

As an art, I have Better late than never, I told myself as I made the detour, applying for nothing against astrology, but if it seeks acceptance under the guise of admission into the Madras Institute of Technology MIT , regarded as science, I reject it.

Around a thousand the precise movements of celestial bodies, to derive highly subjective rupees was required, and my father could not spare that much money. As I see it, the Earth is the most At that time, my sister, Zohara, stood behind me, mortgaging her gold powerful and energetic planet. As John Milton puts it so beautifully in bangles and chain. I vowed to release her bangles. What if the Sun from mortgage with my own earnings.

The only way before me to earn Be centre to the World, and other stars. I The planet earth, so steadfast though she seem, went ahead at full steam. In sensibly three different motions move? What fascinated me most at MIT was the sight of two Wherever you go on this planet, there is movement and life. Even decommissioned aircraft displayed there for the demonstration of the apparently inanimate things like rocks, metal, timber, clay are full of various subsystems of flying machines.

The goal was very of energy, detest confinement. The tighter the electrons are held by the clear in my mind now; I was going to fly aircraft. I was convinced of nucleus, the higher their orbital velocity will be: in fact, the confinement this, despite being aware of my lack of assertiveness, which probably of electrons in an atom results in enormous velocities of about km came about because of my humble background.

Around this time, I per second! These high velocities make the atom appear a rigid sphere, made special efforts to try and communicate with different kinds of just as a fast-moving fan appears like a disc. It is very difficult to people. I often assisted my brother Kasim Mohamed in his shop selling artifacts on this street. This is his house, from where I would borrow books while at Rameswaram. The words on the plaque read “Let not thy winged days be spent in vain. When once gone no gold can buy them back again.

They are the best examples of small-town Indian teachers committed to nurturing talent. Learning without wisdom is of no use. In the course of my education at MIT, three teachers shaped my Prof. KAV Pandalai taught me aero-structure design and analysis. Their combined contributions formed the foundation on which He was a cheerful, friendly and enthusiastic teacher, who brought a I later built my professional career. These three teachers were Prof.

It was Professor Sponder, Prof. KAV Pandalai and Prof. Narasingha Rao. Each one of Pandalai who opened up the secrets of structural engineering to us. His students were free to disagree with him on several points in the classroom. Sponder taught me technical aerodynamics. He was an Austrian with rich practical experience in aeronautical engineering. During the Prof. Narasingha Rao was a mathematician, who taught us theoretical Second World War, he had been captured by the Nazis and imprisoned aerodynamics.

I still remember his method of teaching fluid dynamics. Understandably, he had developed a very strong After attending his classes, I began to prefer mathematical physics to dislike for Germans. Inciden- tally, the aeronautical department was any other subject. Walter Repenthin.

Another well-known aeronautical design reviews. If it had not been for Prof. My teachers revealed these truths to me. Through their Notwithstanding these irritants, Prof. Sponder preserved his meticulous teaching, they created within me an excitement about individuality and maintained high professional standards. He was always aeronautics. Their intellectual fervour, clarity of thought and passion for calm, energetic and in total control of himself.

It is said to be a language and was sensory perception the only source of knowledge and truth? I moulded by lawyers and grammarians and is internationally acclaimed wondered about these issues, attempting to sort out the vexing question for its clear-cut logic. The value system did not remain outside the purview of this wonderful language. I wrote in which I had been nurtured was profoundly religious. The article that true reality lay beyond the material world in the spiritual realm, and evoked much interest and I won the competition, taking the first prize that knowledge could be obtained only through inner experience.

My team mates distributed among themselves in the front. Suddenly, Prof. Sponder got up and looked for me. I was the tasks of designing the propulsion, structure, control and standing in the third row. I instrumentation of the aircraft. One day, my design teacher, Prof. I offered a dozen excuses for the future. I finally pleaded for sat with Prof. Sponder for the photograph. There I worked on engine overhauling as part of withdrawn. I could see no other way out but to finish the task as I had a team.

Hands-on work on aircraft engine overhauling was very been instructed. That night, I remained at the drawing board, skipping educative. When a principle learnt in the classroom is borne out by dinner. On Sunday morning, I was very near completion, when unexpectedly running into an old friend among a crowd of strangers. Srinivasan HAL, I worked on the overhauling of both piston and turbine engines.

Coming straight from the gymkhana, The hazy concepts of gas dynamics and diffusion processes in the he was still in his tennis outfit and had dropped in to see my progress.

After examining my work, Prof. Srinivasan hugged me affectionately I was also trained in radial engine-cum-drum operations. I did calibrations of a fixed- pitch fan fitted to a super-charged engine. I opened up pressure and acceleration-cum-speed control systems, and air starter supply systems of turbo-engines. Getting to understand feathering, un-feathering and 3 reversing of propeller engines was very interesting. The demonstration of the delicate art of beta blade angle control by HAL technicians still lingers in my memory.

They had neither studied in major universities, nor were they merely implementing what their engineer-in-charge was suggesting. They had been working hands-on for years and this had given them something like an intuitive feel for the work. T Two alternative opportunities for employment, both close to my long- hrough the window of the compartment, I watched the standing dream of flying, presented themselves before me when I came countryside slip past. From a distance, the men in the fields in out of HAL as a graduate aeronautical engineer.

I sat glued to the window. Almost I applied for both. The interview calls arrived from both the places almost everywhere, people were engaged in some activity which had a rhythm simultaneously. The boy from the streams. Occasionally, a child would appear and wave at the train. Coromandel Coast took a train to the North of India. My destination was more than km away, and was to be my first encounter with It is astonishing how the landscape changes as one moves northwards.

The rich and fertile plains of the river Ganga and its numerous tributaries have invited invasion, turmoil, and change. The tenth century brought Muslims, who later mingled with the local people and became an integral part of this country.

What you are destined to become officers for commissioning in the Air Force. I was deeply disappointed. Forget this failure, as it was It took me some time to comprehend that the opportunity to join the Air essential to lead you to your destined path.

Search, instead, for the true Force had just slipped through my fingers. I dragged myself out of the purpose of your existence. Become one with yourself, my son! Surrender Selection Board and stood at the edge of a cliff. I knew that the days ahead would be difficult. There were questions to be answered and a plan of action to be prepared. In response, I was handed my appointment letter. I joined the next day as Senior Scientific Assistant on a basic I bathed in the Ganga and revelled in the purity of its water.

If this was to be my destiny, I thought, let walked to the Sivananda Ashram situated a little way up the hill. I could it be so. Finally, I was filled with mental peace.

No more did I feel any feel intense vibrations when I entered. I saw a large number of sadhus bitterness or resentment at my failure to enter the Air Force. All this seated all around in a state of trance. I had read that sadhus were psychic was in If I was not flying aeroplanes, I was at least helping to make I met Swami Sivananda—a man who looked like a Buddha, wearing them airworthy. During my first year in the Directorate, I carried out a a snow-white dhoti and wooden slippers.

I introduced myself to the Swamiji. My Director, Dr Neelakantan. To gain shop-floor exposure to aircraft Muslim name aroused no reaction in him. Before I could speak any maintenance, I was sent to the Aircraft and Armament Testing Unit further, he inquired about the source of my sorrow. At that time, they were involved in a tropical explanation of how he knew that I was sad and I did not ask. I participated in the performance I told him about my unsuccessful attempt to join the Indian Air Force assessment of its operation systems.

The cold weather, crowds, Desire, when it stems from the heart and spirit, when it is pure and noise and smoke were in total contrast to what I was used to in intense, possesses awesome electromagnetic energy.

You can rely, young man, upon this ageless promise as surely leaving behind the smell of their soil and the protection of their families. We tried to read as much literature as included in the design team. I completed this task with the other team we could find on hovercrafts, but there was not much available. We members. Then, I undertook a preliminary design study on a Human tried to consult people knowledgeable in this area, but could find none. I later carried out the design and development of a Vertical One day, I simply took the decision to proceed with the limited information Takeoff and Landing Platform.

I was also associated with the and resources available. Three years passed. This endeavour to produce a wingless, light, swift machine opened Then the Aeronautical Development Establishment ADE was born in the windows of my mind. I was quick to see at least a metaphorical Bangalore and I was posted to the new establishment. After all, the Wright Bangalore as a city was in direct contrast to Kanpur. In fact, I feel Brothers made the first aeroplane after fixing bicycles for seven years!

I saw in the GEM project great opportunities for ingenuity and growth. I suppose, it is because Indians have been both afflicted and enriched by We went straight into hardware development after spending a few centuries of migrations. Loyalty to different rulers has dulled our capacity months on the drawing board.

To the untrained eye, we may appear colourful will retreat into a corner and remain there struggling for bare existence, and picturesque; to the critical eye, we are but shoddy imitations of our unless some great turn of circumstance propels him into a more various masters. In Kanpur, I saw paan-chewing imitations of Wajid Ali favourable environment.

I knew I had to create my own opportunities. Shah, and in Bangalore it was replaced by dog-walking sahibs. Here too, I longed for the depth and calmness of Rameswaram.

He was The workload at ADE during the first year of its inception was quite keenly interested in the progress of our small project, which he envisioned light.

The development are solved. We had a working. Dr Mediratta was visibly pleased And all such things as geniuses use; — with the achievement. But by this time, Krishna Menon was out of office Two bats for patterns, curious fellows! In the new order, not many A charcoal-pot and a pair of bellows.

In fact, even today, we import hovercrafts. The When the project was about a year old, Defence Minister Krishna project was mired in controversies and was finally shelved. It was a Menon made one of his routine visits to ADE. I escorted him into our new experience for me. So far, I had believed that the sky was the limit, assembly shop. Inside, on a table lay the GEM model broken down into but now it appeared that the limits were much closer.

There are boundaries sub-assemblies. The minister fired one question after another at me, determined to ensure that the prototype would go into test flight within I was unwilling to face reality. I had put my heart and soul into Nandi. In this period of confusion and uncertainty, memories from my childhood came back to me and I The hovercraft was christened Nandi, after the bull ridden by Lord discovered new meanings in them.

For a prototype, its form, fit and finish was beyond our expectation, given the rudimentary infrastructure we possessed.

He asked me several questions about the head in negation. Observing this wordless communication, Krishna machine. I was struck by the objectivity and clarity of his thinking. His request filled me laugh and signalled to me to start the machine. He was very happy. Finally, here was someone who was interested in my work. However, the next the ground. We were not flying, but were definitely floating in the air.

This was a breakthrough a young man like ride and departed. But not before introducing himself—he was Prof. Labels mattered very little. There Rocket Engineer. I was unsure about the set up the Equatorial Rocket Launching Station at Thumba, a sleepy type of questions I would have to face at the interview. There was fishing village near Trivandrum now Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. This was the quiet beginning of modern rocket-based research dualities which arise from wish and hate.

In addition, there was the delicate matter of acquiring The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and a site of religious significance. The Collector of Trivandrum then, K free of doubt. I decided to take things as they came. Since neither Prof. Dr I decided this was the best attitude to take. Dereira, who was the Bishop of Trivandrum in The St.

Mary Magdalene church housed Commission. The prayer room was my friendliness. There was none of the arrogance or the patronising attitudes which To this day, the church is maintained in its full glory and, at present, interviewers usually display when talking to a young and vulnerable houses the Indian Space Museum.

He was looking at me as if in reference to a larger whole. I took some time off before going abroad and went to dream was enveloped by the larger dream of a bigger person. My father was very pleased to learn about the opportunity that had come my way. He took me to the mosque and organized a special namaz in thanksgiving. I could feel the power of God flowing in a circuit through my father to me and back to God; we were all under the spell of the prayer.

One of the important functions of prayer, I believe, is to act as a stimulus to creative ideas. Within the mind are all the resources required for successful living.

Ideas are present in the consciousness, which when released and given scope to grow and take shape, can lead to successful events. God, our Creator, has stored within our minds and personalities, great potential strength and ability. Prayer helps us to tap and develop these powers.

Ahmed Jallaluddin and Samsuddin came to see me off at Bombay airport. It was their first exposure to a big city like Bombay, just as I myself was about to have my first exposure to a mega city like New York. Jallaluddin and Samsuddin were self-reliant, positive, optimistic men who undertook their work with the assurance of success. It is from these two persons that I drew the core creative power of my mind.

My sentiments could not be contained, and I could feel the mist of tears in my eyes. The intensity and purity of their faith in my capabilities broke my last defences, and tears welled up in my eyes.

They attempt to get out of them rather than suffer them. Everybody prostrated themselves except Iblis, or Satan, who refused. Does not that make me nobler than Achievers Adam? This is no place for your contemptuous pride. One of my most vivid memories What makes life in Indian organizations difficult is the widespread of LRC is of a piece of sculpture depicting a charioteer driving two prevalence of this very contemptuous pride. It stops us from listening to horses, one representing scientific research and the other technological our juniors, subordinates and people down the line.

The assembled rocket was to be shifted from the church building training, but Prof. After the successful to the launch pad by truck. When the rocket was lifted by the crane and launch of Nike-Apache, he chose to share with us his dream of an was about to be placed on the launcher, it started tilting, indicating a leak Indian Satellite Launch Vehicle. As we were fast approaching the Prof. The very news of launch time, 6 p.

People manually, using our collective muscle power and finally placing it on the would work virtually round the clock because of their enthusiasm to launcher. Sarabhai something new, something that had not been done In the maiden Nike-Apache launch, I was in charge of rocket before in our country—be it a new design or a new method of fabrication integration and safety.

Two of my colleagues who played a very or even an out-of-the-way administrative procedure. Sarabhai active and crucial role in this launch were D Easwardas and R would often assign multiple tasks to a single person or a group. Though Aravamudan. Easwardas undertook the rocket assembly and arranged some of those tasks would appear totally unrelated in the beginning, the launch.

Aravamudan, whom we called Dan, was in charge of radar, they would, at a later stage, emerge as deeply interconnected. When telemetry and ground support. The launch was smooth and problem- Prof. We obtained excellent flight data and returned with a sense of he asked me, almost in the same breath, to take up studies on a rocket- pride and accomplishment. The two things had no apparent connection except in the mind of this great visionary.

Sarabhai was ever-willing to try out novel approaches and liked The Soviet Union built missile sites in Cuba, from which it would to draw in young people. He had the wisdom and judgement which have been possible to launch attacks on American cities.

In my opinion, he was an ideal experimenter offensive missiles to Cuba. America also threatened to respond to any and innovator. When there were alternative courses of action before us, Soviet nuclear attack from Cuba on any country in the Western whose outcome was difficult to predict, or to reconcile varying Hemisphere by retaliating against the USSR.

It later resulted in the setting produced a large number of Indian space scientists of extremely high up of a Propellant Fuel Complex PFC to manufacture strategic calibre over the years. What is it The development of Indian rockets in the twentieth century can be that distinguishes a sounding rocket from a Satellite Launch Vehicle seen as a revival of the eighteenth century dream of Tipu Sultan. When SLV and from a missile? In fact, they are three different kinds of Tipu Sultan was killed, the British captured more than rockets and rockets.

With this booty, they started to run fabrication of sounding rockets and their associated on-board systems their deadly arms race with missiles and warheads. Sarabhai took the challenge of giving physical dimensions to this dream. Very many individuals with myopic vision questioned the relevance of space activities in a newly independent nation which was finding it difficult to feed its population.

They had no intention of using it merely as a means to display our might. Sarabhai would openly review the progress of work with the entire team. He never gave directions.

Rather, through a free exchange of views, he led us forward into new terrain which often revealed an unforeseen solution. Perhaps he was aware that though a particular goal might be clear to himself, and he could give adequate directions for its accomplishment, his team members might have resisted working towards a goal that made no sense to them.

Oda stuck to his stand that the Indian timers be replaced by its direction and velocity. We also had ionospheric payloads to explore the Japanese ones. I yielded to his suggestion and replaced the timers.

I not only had to interact with scientists The rocket took off elegantly and attained the intended altitude. Oda was so upset that tears welled up in his eyes. I was stunned France, Germany and Japan.

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For quite some time he said nothing, as if he was aromatic sambhar, a variety of sharp, home-made pickles and a dollop judging my capacity to comprehend his words.

Then he answered in a low, of fresh coconut chutney. Whenever they are in trouble, they look become a close friend of mine, despite the difference in our ages. He for someone to help them. Whenever they reach an impasse, they look was about 15 years older than I and used to call me Azad.

This is not a correct approach at all Rameswaram, with its flocking pilgrims, was conducive to such discussion. One must understand the difference Our first halt would be at the imposing temple of Lord Shiva. Circling between a fear-ridden vision of destiny and the vision that enables us to around the temple with the same reverence as any pilgrim from a distant seek the enemy of fulfilment within ourselves. I remember my father starting his day at 4 a. After the namaz, he used to walk down to a small coconut with Him.

He would present all his doubts to God as if He were standing grove we owned, about 4 miles from our home. He would return, with nearby to dispose of them. I would stare at Jallaluddin and then look about a dozen coconuts tied together thrown over his shoulder, and only towards the large groups of pilgrims around the temple, taking holy dips then would he have his breakfast. This remained his routine even when in the sea, performing rituals and reciting prayers with a sense of respect he was in his late sixties.

He wrote letters for almost anybody the boat on the seashore, with the help of a relative, Ahmed Jallaluddin, in need, be they letters of application or otherwise. Nobody of my who later married my sister, Zohara. I watched the boat take shape. My father was doing good business with the boat when, one day, outside world. Jallaluddin always spoke to me about educated people, of a cyclone bringing winds of over miles per hour carried away our scientific discoveries, of contemporary literature, and of the achievements boat, along with some of the landmass of Sethukkarai.

He was the sole distributor for newspapers in and so did my three brothers and sister. But it was the time I spent with Rameswaram.

The newspapers would arrive at Rameswaram station Jallaluddin and Samsuddin that perhaps contributed most to the uniqueness by the morning train from Pamban. The was a one-man organization catering to the reading demands of the unschooled wisdom of Jallaluddin and Samsuddin was so intuitive and 1,strong literate population of Rameswaram town.

These responsive to non-verbal messages, that I can unhesitatingly attribute newspapers were mainly bought to keep abreast of current developments my subsequently manifested creativity to their company in my childhood. A few readers with a Aravindan, and Sivaprakasan. All these boys were from orthodox Hindu more cosmopolitan outlook would discuss Hitler, Mahatma Gandhi and Brahmin families. As children, none of us ever felt any difference amongst Jinnah; almost all would finally flow into the mighty political current of ourselves because of our religious differences and upbringing.

Events from the fetch me the princely sum of one anna. Jallaluddin would tell me stories Ramayana and from the life of the Prophet were the bedtime stories my about the war which I would later attempt to trace in the headlines in mother and grandmother would tell the children in our family.

Our area, being isolated, was completely unaffected by the war. But soon India was forced to join the Allied Forces and something One day when I was in the fifth standard at the Rameswaram like a state of emergency was declared.

The new teacher train on the Rameswaram Road between Rameswaram and Dhanuskodi. In That forced Samsuddin to look for a helping hand to catch the bundles accordance with our social ranking as the new teacher saw it, I was and, as if naturally, I filled the slot. Samsuddin helped me earn my first asked to go and sit on the back bench. The image of him weeping when I shifted to the last row headquarters in Ramanathapuram. I know you have to go away After school, we went home and told our respective parents about to grow.

They are the sons the island. They come through you but sense of conviction Lakshmana Sastry conveyed ultimately reformed not from you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For this young teacher. He but not your soul. Your soul dwells in the house of tomorrow which none did his best to break social barriers so that people from varying of us at Rameswaram can visit, not even in our dreams.

She refused to serve me in her kitchen. Sivasubramania Iyer thousand people, but the coherence and harmony of Rameswaram was was not perturbed, nor did he get angry with his wife, but instead, served absent. I missed my home and grabbed every opportunity to visit me with his own hands and sat down beside me to eat his meal. His wife Rameswaram. The pull of educational opportunities at Ramanathapuram watched us from behind the kitchen door.

I wondered whether she had was not strong enough to nullify the attraction of poli, a South Indian observed any difference in the way I ate rice, drank water or cleaned sweet my mother made. In fact, she used to prepare twelve distinctly the floor after the meal. When I was leaving his house, Sivasubramania different varieties of it, bringing out the flavour of every single ingredient Iyer invited me to join him for dinner again the next weekend.

Observing used in the best possible combinations. My father visualized me as a Collector in the kitchen and served me food with her own hands.

Father used to visit each boy every night with a Bible in his hand. His energy and patience was amazing. He was a very considerate person who took care of even the most minute requirements of his students. On One day, when I was in the fourth form, my mathematics teacher, Deepavali, on his instructions, the Brother in charge of the hostel and Ramakrishna Iyer, was teaching another class. Inadvertently, I wandered the mess volunteers would visit each room and distribute good gingelly into that classroom and in the manner of an old-fashioned despot, oil for the ritual bath.

When I was made secretary of the vegetarian made up for the earlier humiliation! Father Kalathil, over for lunch one Sunday. Our menu included the By the time I completed my education at Schwartz, I was a self- choicest preparations from our diverse backgrounds. The result was confident boy determined to succeed. The decision to go in for further rather unexpected, but Rev. Father was lavish in his praise of our efforts. To us, in those days, the We enjoyed every moment with Rev. Father Kalathil, who participated awareness of the possibilities for a professional education did not exist; in our unsophisticated conversation with childlike enthusiasm.

Father unstable and that they disintegrate after a certain time into other particles. TN Sequeira. He taught us English and was also our hostel warden.

We All this I was learning for the first time. Everything solid, thus, contains much empty space within and he not talking of the same thing? I wonder why some people tend to see everything stationary contains great movement within. It is as though science as something which takes man away from God.

As John Milton puts it so beautifully in bangles and chain. I vowed to release her bangles. What if the Sun from mortgage with my own earnings. The only way before me to earn Be centre to the World, and other stars. I The planet earth, so steadfast though she seem, went ahead at full steam. In sensibly three different motions move? What fascinated me most at MIT was the sight of two Wherever you go on this planet, there is movement and life. Even decommissioned aircraft displayed there for the demonstration of the apparently inanimate things like rocks, metal, timber, clay are full of various subsystems of flying machines.

I was convinced of nucleus, the higher their orbital velocity will be: in fact, the confinement this, despite being aware of my lack of assertiveness, which probably of electrons in an atom results in enormous velocities of about km came about because of my humble background.

Sponder taught me technical aerodynamics. He was an Austrian with rich practical experience in aeronautical engineering. During the Prof. Narasingha Rao was a mathematician, who taught us theoretical Second World War, he had been captured by the Nazis and imprisoned aerodynamics.

Through their Notwithstanding these irritants, Prof. Sponder preserved his meticulous teaching, they created within me an excitement about individuality and maintained high professional standards. He was always aeronautics. Their intellectual fervour, clarity of thought and passion for calm, energetic and in total control of himself. He kept abreast of the perfection helped me to launch into a serious study of fluid dynamics- latest technologies and expected his students to do the same.

Sponder used to observe, was not that they lacked biplanes, monoplanes, tailless planes, canard configured planes, delta- educational opportunities or industrial infrastructure—the trouble was in wing planes, all these began to assume increasing significance for me. Why aeronautics? Why not electrical engineering? Why not me to mould a composite knowledge. In those days, a new climate of under stress and asking you to meet an impossible deadline. I never political enlightenment and industrial effort was sweeping across the expected you to perform so well.

I had to test my belief in God and see if it could fit into the During the rest of the period of the project, I participated in an essay matrix of scientific thinking. If so, I Tamil is my mother tongue and I am proud of its origins, which have wondered, was matter alone the ultimate reality and were spiritual been traced back to Sage Agastya in the pre-Ramayana period; its phenomena but a manifestation of matter?

The article that true reality lay beyond the material world in the spiritual realm, and evoked much interest and I won the competition, taking the first prize that knowledge could be obtained only through inner experience.

When a principle learnt in the classroom is borne out by dinner. On Sunday morning, I was very near completion, when unexpectedly running into an old friend among a crowd of strangers. Srinivasan HAL, I worked on the overhauling of both piston and turbine engines. Coming straight from the gymkhana, The hazy concepts of gas dynamics and diffusion processes in the he was still in his tennis outfit and had dropped in to see my progress.

After examining my work, Prof. Srinivasan hugged me affectionately I was also trained in radial engine-cum-drum operations. I did calibrations of a fixed- pitch fan fitted to a super-charged engine.

I opened up pressure and acceleration-cum-speed control systems, and air starter supply systems of turbo-engines. Getting to understand feathering, un-feathering and 3 reversing of propeller engines was very interesting. The demonstration of the delicate art of beta blade angle control by HAL technicians still lingers in my memory. They had neither studied in major universities, nor were they merely implementing what their engineer-in-charge was suggesting. They had been working hands-on for years and this had given them something like an intuitive feel for the work.

T Two alternative opportunities for employment, both close to my long- hrough the window of the compartment, I watched the standing dream of flying, presented themselves before me when I came countryside slip past. From a distance, the men in the fields in out of HAL as a graduate aeronautical engineer. I sat glued to the window. Almost I applied for both. The interview calls arrived from both the places almost everywhere, people were engaged in some activity which had a rhythm simultaneously.

The Narmada, Tapti, Mahanadi, Godavari, and Krishna rivers had woven a net of almost unassailable protection for the tapering Indian peninsula.

To bring me to Delhi, my train had crossed all these geographical impediments through the power of scientific advancement. I did well at the interview. Then I proceeded to Dehra as you can rely upon the eternally unbroken promise of sunrise At the Selection Spring. When the student is ready, the teacher will appear—How true! Here Perhaps they were looking for physical fitness and an articulate manner.

You are not I could only finish ninth in the batch of 25 examined to select eight destined to become an Air Force pilot. What you are destined to become officers for commissioning in the Air Force. I was deeply disappointed. Forget this failure, as it was It took me some time to comprehend that the opportunity to join the Air essential to lead you to your destined path.

In response, I was handed my appointment letter. I joined the next day as Senior Scientific Assistant on a basic I bathed in the Ganga and revelled in the purity of its water. If this was to be my destiny, I thought, let walked to the Sivananda Ashram situated a little way up the hill. I could it be so. Finally, I was filled with mental peace. No more did I feel any feel intense vibrations when I entered. I saw a large number of sadhus bitterness or resentment at my failure to enter the Air Force.

All this seated all around in a state of trance. I had read that sadhus were psychic was in If I was not flying aeroplanes, I was at least helping to make I met Swami Sivananda—a man who looked like a Buddha, wearing them airworthy. During my first year in the Directorate, I carried out a a snow-white dhoti and wooden slippers.

He had an olive complexion design assignment on supersonic target aircraft with the help of the and black, piercing eyes. I was struck by his irresistible, almost child- officer-in-charge, R Varadharajan, and won a word of praise from the like smile and gracious manner. I introduced myself to the Swamiji. My Director, Dr Neelakantan. To gain shop-floor exposure to aircraft Muslim name aroused no reaction in him. Before I could speak any maintenance, I was sent to the Aircraft and Armament Testing Unit further, he inquired about the source of my sorrow.

It was my first anxiety almost instantly. Then he said in a feeble, but very deep voice, experience of living in an industrial town. The cold weather, crowds, Desire, when it stems from the heart and spirit, when it is pure and noise and smoke were in total contrast to what I was used to in intense, possesses awesome electromagnetic energy. This energy is Rameswaram. I was particularly troubled by the ubiquitous presence of released into the ether each night, as the mind falls into the sleep state.

To me, it Each morning it returns to the conscious state reinforced with the cosmic seemed that a feeling of loneliness pervaded the city. The people on the currents. That which has been imaged will surely and certainly be streets had all come from their villages in search of jobs in factories, manifested. You can rely, young man, upon this ageless promise as surely leaving behind the smell of their soil and the protection of their families.

Instead, we have developed an extraordinary There is always the danger that a person with my kind of background— ability to be compassionate and cruel, sensitive and callous, deep and rural or small-town, middle-class, whose parents had limited education— fickle, all at the same time. To the untrained eye, we may appear colourful will retreat into a corner and remain there struggling for bare existence, and picturesque; to the critical eye, we are but shoddy imitations of our unless some great turn of circumstance propels him into a more various masters.

In Kanpur, I saw paan-chewing imitations of Wajid Ali favourable environment. I knew I had to create my own opportunities. Shah, and in Bangalore it was replaced by dog-walking sahibs.

Here too, I longed for the depth and calmness of Rameswaram. The Part by part, subsystem by subsystem, stage by stage, things started relationship between the heart and the head of an earthy Indian has moving. Working on this project, I learned that once your mind stretches been eroded by the divided sensibilities of our cities. I spent my evenings to a new level it never goes back to its original dimension. He was The workload at ADE during the first year of its inception was quite keenly interested in the progress of our small project, which he envisioned light.

Dr Mediratta was visibly pleased And all such things as geniuses use; — with the achievement. But by this time, Krishna Menon was out of office Two bats for patterns, curious fellows! In the new order, not many A charcoal-pot and a pair of bellows. In fact, even today, we import hovercrafts. The When the project was about a year old, Defence Minister Krishna project was mired in controversies and was finally shelved.

It was a Menon made one of his routine visits to ADE. I escorted him into our new experience for me. So far, I had believed that the sky was the limit, assembly shop.

Inside, on a table lay the GEM model broken down into but now it appeared that the limits were much closer. There are boundaries sub-assemblies. The minister fired one question after another at me, determined to ensure that the prototype would go into test flight within I was unwilling to face reality. I had put my heart and soul into Nandi. In this period of confusion and uncertainty, memories from my childhood came back to me and I The hovercraft was christened Nandi, after the bull ridden by Lord discovered new meanings in them.

I was sure about my The next day Dr Mediratta brought a visitor to our hovercraft—a competence in flying the machine I had made, and therefore shook my tall, handsome, bearded man. He asked me several questions about the head in negation. Observing this wordless communication, Krishna machine. I was struck by the objectivity and clarity of his thinking.

His request filled me laugh and signalled to me to start the machine. He was very happy. Finally, here was someone who was interested in my work. However, the next the ground. We were not flying, but were definitely floating in the air. This was a breakthrough a young man like ride and departed. But not before introducing himself—he was Prof. Labels mattered very little.

There Rocket Engineer. I was unsure about the set up the Equatorial Rocket Launching Station at Thumba, a sleepy type of questions I would have to face at the interview. There was fishing village near Trivandrum now Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. This was the quiet beginning of modern rocket-based research dualities which arise from wish and hate.

Within the mind are all the resources required for successful living. Ideas are present in the consciousness, which when released and given scope to grow and take shape, can lead to successful events. God, our Creator, has stored within our minds and personalities, great potential strength and ability. Prayer helps us to tap and develop these powers.

The intensity and purity of their faith in my capabilities broke my last defences, and tears welled up in my eyes.

Here, has to be changed. I saw a painting prominently displayed in the reception lobby. It depicted As the process of confronting and solving problems often requires a battle scene with a few rockets flying in the background. A painting hard work and is painful, we have endless procrastination. Actually, with this theme should be the most commonplace thing at a Flight Facility, problems can be the cutting edge that actually distinguish between but the painting caught my eye because the soldiers on the side launching success and failure.

Though Aravamudan. Easwardas undertook the rocket assembly and arranged some of those tasks would appear totally unrelated in the beginning, the launch. Aravamudan, whom we called Dan, was in charge of radar, they would, at a later stage, emerge as deeply interconnected. When telemetry and ground support. The launch was smooth and problem- Prof. We obtained excellent flight data and returned with a sense of he asked me, almost in the same breath, to take up studies on a rocket- pride and accomplishment.

The two things had no apparent connection except in the mind of this great visionary. I When we were relaxing the next evening at the dinner table, we knew that all I had to do was to remain alert and focussed on my purpose, received news of the assassination of President John F Kennedy in and sooner or later, an opportunity to do a challenging job would enter Dallas, Texas.

When there were alternative courses of action before us, Soviet nuclear attack from Cuba on any country in the Western whose outcome was difficult to predict, or to reconcile varying Hemisphere by retaliating against the USSR. After fourteen days of perspectives, Prof. Sarabhai would resort to experimentation to resolve intense drama, the crisis was resolved by the Soviet Premier Khrushchev the issue.

A ordering that the Cuban bases be dismantled and the missiles returned bunch of young, inexperienced, but nevertheless energetic and to Russia. Sarabhai had a detailed discussion with us on research in particular. It was a great example of leadership by trust. He was creating a new frontier in the field of science and technology in India. A new generation, scientists and engineers in their The rocket launch site later blossomed into the Thumba Equatorial 30s and early 40s, was being charged with an unprecedented dynamism.

Vikram Sarabhai—had comprehended the full operational sounding rockets were developed. These rockets had wide implications of the challenge and had not balked at taking it on. Right ranging capabilities, and to date several hundreds of these rockets have from the day INCOSPAR was formed, he was aware of the need to been launched for various scientific and technological studies. It lifted a nominal 7 kg payload produced indigenously. It was soon followed by another, to which With this in view, a wide-ranging programme for scientific and one more solid propellant stage was added to dispatch multi-experiment technological development in rocket fuels, propulsion systems, payloads weighing nearly kg to an altitude of over km.

This is a complex demise—at least for years. A missile, though belonging to the same family, is a still more complex system. In Meanwhile, rocket technology made great strides abroad.

Their vision was very clear: if Indians were to play a meaningful role in the community of nations, they must be second to none in the application of advanced technologies to their real-life problems. They had no intention of using it merely as a means to display our might. Sarabhai would openly review the progress of work with the entire team.

He considered the collective understanding of the problem the main attribute of effective leadership. Sarabhai took a series of decisions that were to become the life-mission of many.

UR Rao, would be engineered by my team to fit into the nose were told rather than use my legitimate authority, Prof. Sarabhai assigned cone of the Rohini Rocket. At an altitude of km, the nose cone me the task of providing interface support to payload scientists. Almost would be separated by explosion of pyros triggered by an electronic all physical laboratories in India were involved in the sounding rocket timer. With this, the X-ray sensors would be exposed to space for programme, each having its own mission, its own objective and its own collecting the required information about the emissions from stars.

These payloads were required to be integrated to the rocket Together, Prof. Oda and Prof. Rao were a unique blend of intellect and structure so as to ensure their proper functioning and endurance under dedication, which one rarely sees. That which has been imaged will surely and certainly be streets had all come from their villages in search of jobs in factories, manifested. You can rely, young man, upon this ageless promise as surely leaving behind the smell of their soil and the protection of their families.

We tried to read as much literature as included in the design team. I completed this task with the other team we could find on hovercrafts, but there was not much available.

I suppose, it is because Indians have been both afflicted and enriched by We went straight into hardware development after spending a few centuries of migrations. Loyalty to different rulers has dulled our capacity months on the drawing board. Instead, we have developed an extraordinary There is always the danger that a person with my kind of background— ability to be compassionate and cruel, sensitive and callous, deep and rural or small-town, middle-class, whose parents had limited education— fickle, all at the same time.

Working on this project, I learned that once your mind stretches been eroded by the divided sensibilities of our cities. I spent my evenings to a new level it never goes back to its original dimension. He was The workload at ADE during the first year of its inception was quite keenly interested in the progress of our small project, which he envisioned light. Based on my preliminary studies on ground-handling equipment. Whenever he was in Bangalore, he always found some time equipment, a project team was formed to design and develop an to review the progress of our project.

I escorted him into our new experience for me. So far, I had believed that the sky was the limit, assembly shop. Inside, on a table lay the GEM model broken down into but now it appeared that the limits were much closer. There are boundaries sub-assemblies.

The minister fired one question after another at me, determined to ensure that the prototype would go into test flight within I was unwilling to face reality. I had put my heart and soul into Nandi. In this period of confusion and uncertainty, memories from my childhood came back to me and I The hovercraft was christened Nandi, after the bull ridden by Lord discovered new meanings in them. For a prototype, its form, fit and finish was beyond our expectation, given the rudimentary infrastructure we possessed.

This was the quiet beginning of modern rocket-based research dualities which arise from wish and hate. But those in India. The site selected at Thumba lay between the railway line and men of virtuous deeds in whom sin has come to an end, the sea coast, covering a distance of about two and a half km and freed from the delusion of dualities, worship Me measuring about acres.

In addition, there was the delicate matter of acquiring The best performances are accomplished when you are relaxed and a site of religious significance.

It is from these two persons that I drew the core creative power of my mind. My sentiments could not be contained, and I could feel the mist of tears in my eyes.

One of my most vivid memories What makes life in Indian organizations difficult is the widespread of LRC is of a piece of sculpture depicting a charioteer driving two prevalence of this very contemptuous pride. It stops us from listening to horses, one representing scientific research and the other technological our juniors, subordinates and people down the line.

You cannot expect a development, metaphorically encapsulating the interconnection between person to deliver results if you humiliate him, nor can you expect him to research and development.

Unfortunately, the earth-orbiting science and applications satellites. Here, has to be changed. I saw a painting prominently displayed in the reception lobby. It depicted As the process of confronting and solving problems often requires a battle scene with a few rockets flying in the background.

It was a great example of leadership by trust. He was creating a new frontier in the field of science and technology in India. A new generation, scientists and engineers in their The rocket launch site later blossomed into the Thumba Equatorial 30s and early 40s, was being charged with an unprecedented dynamism. Vikram Sarabhai—had comprehended the full operational sounding rockets were developed. These rockets had wide implications of the challenge and had not balked at taking it on.

When SLV and from a missile? In fact, they are three different kinds of Tipu Sultan was killed, the British captured more than rockets and rockets. Sounding rockets are normally used for probing the near-earth subsystems of rockets in the battle of Turukhanahally in His environment, including the upper regions of the atmosphere.

While they army had 27 brigades, called Kushoons, and each brigade had a company can carry a variety of scientific payloads to a range of altitudes, they of rocket men, called Jourks. These rockets had been taken to England cannot impart the final velocity needed to orbit the payload. The final stage of a launch vehicle provides the or patent regime. With the death of Tipu, Indian rocketry also met its necessary velocity for a satellite to enter an orbit. This is a complex demise—at least for years.

A missile, though belonging to the same family, is a still more complex system. In Meanwhile, rocket technology made great strides abroad. Konstantin addition to the large terminal velocity and onboard guidance and control, Tsiolkovsky in Russia , Robert Goddard in USA and it must have the capability to home onto targets.

Very many individuals with myopic vision questioned the relevance of space activities in a newly independent nation which was finding it difficult to feed its population. But neither Prime Minister Nehru nor Prof. Sarabhai had any ambiguity 5 of purpose. Their vision was very clear: if Indians were to play a meaningful role in the community of nations, they must be second to none in the application of advanced technologies to their real-life problems.

One day, when I was working on the flight conditions. We had X-ray payloads to look at stars; payloads fitted integration for Prof. To me they looked flimsy, of the upper atmosphere; sodium payloads to find out wind conditions, but Prof. Oda stuck to his stand that the Indian timers be replaced by its direction and velocity. We also had ionospheric payloads to explore the Japanese ones.

I was stunned France, Germany and Japan. He had clearly put his heart and soul into his work. I often read Khalil Gibran, and always find his words full of wisdom. If you are a writer the hazardous sodium and thermite mix. As usual, it was a hot and humid who would secretly prefer to be a lawyer or a doctor, your written words day at Thumba.

For a few paralysed seconds, I did not know what to do. The The personal unhappiness and failure to achieve results that comes from fire was spreading, and water would not extinguish the sodium fire. But there Trapped in this inferno, Sudhakar, however, did not lose his presence of are exceptions to this like Prof. Oda and Sudhakar, who bring to their mind. He broke the glass window with his bare hands and literally threw work a personal touch of magic based upon their individual character, me out to safety before jumping out himself.

That was his subtle way composite bows made of wood, sinew, and horn as early as the eleventh of challenging each one of us to stretch our capabilities. The versatility of composites, in the sense that they possess would praise whatever we had accomplished. Whenever he found any very desirable structural, thermal, electrical, chemical and mechanical one of us going over his head and attempting a task for which he did not properties, fascinated me.

I used to read up everything available on related topics. I was performed. Sarabhai wanted to see me urgently in Delhi. In February By now I was accustomed to Prof. In such a state of mind, to the International Space Science Community. On this occasion, she sudden flashes of inspiration were almost natural. Delhi being a slightly unfamiliar Subramanian and MN Satyanara-yana, great satisfaction. We made high- place, with an unfriendly climate for someone like me, conditioned to the strength glass cloth laminates to build non-magnetic payload housings warm and humid climate of South India, I decided to wait in the hotel and flew them in two-stage sounding rockets.

We also wound and test lounge after finishing my dinner. I have always been a religious person in the sense that I maintain a Slowly, but surely, two Indian rockets were born at Thumba.

They working partnership with God. I was aware that the best work required were christened Rohini and Menaka, after the two mythological dancers more ability than I possessed and therefore I needed help that only God in the court of Indra, the king of the sky. The Indian payloads no longer could give me.

I made a true estimate of my own ability, then raised it by needed to be launched by French rockets. In this partnership, I have but for the atmosphere of trust and commitment which Prof.

Today, I can affirm that the kingdom of God is knowledge and skills. He made every man feel directly involved in problem within you in the form of this power, to help achieve your goals and solving. There are many different types and levels of experience that turn this internal power reaction critical.

Sometimes, when we are ready, the Prof. Sarabhai was matter-of-fact and never tried to hide his gentlest of contacts with Him fills us with insight and wisdom. This disappointment. He used to talk with us in an honest and objective manner. Many a time, it could come even were, and then charming us by his almost magical powers of persuasion.

And before I could get back to the book, It was some popular book related to business management. I was I was informed that Prof.

Sarabhai was ready to receive me. I left the not really reading it, only skimming over paragraphs and turning pages. I was surprised Suddenly, my eyes fell on a passage in the book, it was a quotation from when the man sitting on the opposite sofa was also asked to come inside. George Bernard Shaw.

Sarabhai introduced us to each other. He in trying to adapt the world to themselves. Sarabhai ordered coffee for both of us and unfolded his plan of conformist actions. I started reading the book from the Bernard Shaw passage onwards. This would help our warplanes to take off from short runways in the The author was describing certain myths woven around the concept Himalayas. Hot coffee was served over small talk. It was totally and the process of innovation in industry and business.

I read about the uncharacteristic of Prof. But as soon as we finished the coffee, myth of strategic planning. It is generally believed that substantial Prof. The author was of the opinion that it is essential for cursory glance at the sofa where I had left the book.

It was not there. Sarabhai showed us felt that it was a myth to hold that the key to economic success is a Russian RATO.

I was filled with many emotions— component of unorthodoxy in his character. The plan talked about the realisation of a When you are the hammer, strike. SLV for injecting lightweight satellites into a low earth orbit, upgrading of Indian satellites from laboratory models to space entities and RATO motors were mounted on aircraft to provide the additional development of a wide range of spacecraft subsystems like the apogee thrust required during the take-off run under certain adverse operating and booster motors, momentum wheel, and solar panel deployment conditions like partially bombed-out runways, high altitude airfields, more mechanism.

Tactical for some reason exceeded twice the operating pressure. Two significant weapons are those that influence a battle, and the battle may be by land, developments occurred during the work on RATO. The first was the sea or air, or on all three together. This profile was not merely an activity plan laid down in a tactical role, notwithstanding its range of some km. In those by the top man for his team to comply with, it was a theme paper meant days, however, strategic missiles were synonymous with intermediate for open discussions, to be later transformed into a programme.

He was a great admirer of the strong arm approach of the Russian developmental education, meteorological observations and remote sensing Missile Development Programme.

He had and expeditious accounting procedures. He obtained These demands were unheard of in government establishments, which funding of Rs 75 lakhs with a further commitment towards any tend to be conservative, yet I could see the soundness of his proposition. At times, I often laughed at his impatience, was to be played with a new set of rules. I weighed all the pros and cons and read for him these lines from T.

Hearing my plea for administrative liberalization And the creation and seeing the merits behind it, Prof. Sarabhai approved the proposals Between the emotion without a second thought. And the response Through his suggestions, Babu had highlighted the importance of Falls the Shadow. Virtually nothing indigenous was available. Together, we made people, more material and more money. But this made me your parameters!

Instinctive businessman that he was, Babu did not unhappy—was there no remedy or alternative? I to live with screwdriver technology? We had also gone in for a high energy after I took up the RATO projects, I saw a young colleague, Jaya Chandra composite propellant and an event-based ignition and jettisoning system in Babu going home.

We conducted the first static test of RATO in the twelfth month articulate. I called him into my office and did a bit of loud thinking.

Within the next four months, we conducted 64 you have any suggestions? Babu remained silent for static tests. And we were just about 20 engineers working on the project! Sarabhai gave me the additional responsibility of designing the fourth stage of the SLV. What made Prof. Sarabhai pick a few of us for this great mission? Dr Gowarikar was doing outstanding work in the field of composite propellants. MR Kurup had established an excellent laboratory for propellants, propulsion and pyrotechnics.

Muthunayagam had proved himself in the field of high energy propellants. The fourth stage was to be a composite structure and called for a large number of innovations in fabrication technology; Movers perhaps that was why I was brought in. I laid the foundation for Stage IV on two rocks—sensible approximation and unawed support. I have always considered the price The future satellite launch vehicle SLV had also been conceived of perfection prohibitive and allowed mistakes as a part of the learning by this time.

Recognising the immense socio- economic benefits of space process. I prefer a dash of daring and persistence to perfection.

At this stage, Prof. The Sarabhai brought a French visitor to our work centre to point out the crescent-shaped island has a maximum width of 8 km and lies alongside problem to me. This gentleman was Prof. The island is as big as Madras city. They Canal and the Pulicat lake form its western boundary. Curien was a In , we had formed the Indian Rocket Society. Soon after, the thorough professional. Together, Prof. Sarabhai and Prof.

Curien, Prof. Sarabhai had already hand-picked a team to give Prof. Curien to reinterpret his own progress in the Diamont programme. Curien advised Prof. Sarabhai to relieve me of all the minor cancelled their Diamont BC programme.

They told us that they did not jobs which posed little challenge and to give me more opportunities for need our Stage IV anymore. It was a great shock, making me re-live achievement. I recall how this Air Force, and at Bangalore, when the Nandi project was aborted at brought a subtle smile to Prof.

As a matter of fact, the Diamont and SLV airframes were I had invested great hope and effort in the fourth stage, so that it incompatible. The diameters were quite different and to attain could be flown with a Diamont rocket. The other three stages of SLV, interchangeability, some radical innovations were required. I wondered involving enormous work in the area of rocket propulsion were at least where I should start.

I decided to look around for solutions among my five years away. However, it did not take me long to shelve the own colleagues. After all, I had thoroughly daily routine reflected their desire to constantly experiment. I also started enjoyed working on this project. In time, RATO filled the vacuum created asking and listening to anyone who showed the slightest promise. Some in me by the Diamont BC Stage. I When the RATO project was underway, the SLV project slowly started made it an unfailing routine to make notes on individual suggestions and taking shape.

Competence for all major systems of a launch vehicle had gave handwritten notes to colleagues in engineering and design, requesting been established in Thumba by now. Through their outstanding efforts, concrete follow-up action within five or ten days. Curien testified, while for a big leap in rocketry. Sarabhai was an exemplar in the art of team-building. On one counterparts in Europe could barely manage in three years. Our plus occasion, he had to identify a person who could be given the responsibility point, he noted, was that each of us worked with those below and above for developing a telecommand system for the SLV.

During all together to share whatever little development had been achieved— one of Prof. Sarabhai putting all my energy and time into. It was a very small price to pay for did not take much time to back the young experimenter in preference to that commitment and sense of teamwork, which could in fact be called an established expert. Madhavan Nair not only lived up to the trust. Within my own small group of people I found leaders, and learned expectations of his leader but even went beyond them.

It was reconfigured and upgraded from a kg, mm massive missile development project had been taken up by DRDO at diameter stage to a kg, mm diameter stage. Sarabhai spent the next hour in re-defining our tasks, and, in the small hours of the morning, the decision to set up a Rocket In , Prof.

Sarabhai came to Thumba on one of his routine visits. Engineering Section was taken. He was shown the operation of the nose-cone jettisoning mechanism. As always, we were all anxious to share the results of our work with Mistakes can delay or prevent the proper achievement of the Prof. We requested Prof. Sarabhai to formally activate the objectives of individuals and organizations, but a visionary like Prof.

Sarabhai smiled, and pressed Sarabhai can use errors as opportunities to promote innovation and the the button. To our horror, nothing happened. We were dumbstruck. I development of new ideas. He was not especially concerned with the looked at Pramod Kale, who had designed and integrated the timer circuit. In a flash each of us mentally went through an anlysis of the failure. We Prof. Sarabhai to wait for a few minutes, then we detached they were inevitable but generally manageable.

It was in the handling of the timer device, giving direct connection to the pyros. Sarabhai the crises that arose as a consequence that talent could often be revealed. The pyros were fired and the nose cone was I later realised by experience, that the best way to prevent errors was to jettisoned. Sarabhai congratulated Kale and me; but his expression anticipate them.

But this time, by a strange twist of fate, the failure of suggested that his thoughts were elsewhere. We could not guess what the timer circuit led to the birth of a rocket engineering laboratory. The suspense did not last for long and I got a call from It was my usual practice to brief Prof. Sarabhai after every Missile Prof. After attending one such meeting in Delhi on 30 discussion.

December , I was returning to Trivandrum. Sarabhai was Prof. I spoke to him home whenever he was in Trivandrum. I was slightly perplexed by the on the telephone from the airport lounge about the salient points that had summons. Sarabhai greeted me with his customary warmth. He emerged at the panel meeting. He instructed me to wait at Trivandrum talked of the rocket launching station, envisaging facilities like launch Airport after disembarking from the Delhi flight, and to meet him there pads, block houses, radar, telemetry and so on—things which are taken before his departure for Bombay the same night.

Then he brought up the When I reached Trivandrum, a pall of gloom hung in the air. The incident that had occurred that morning. This was exactly what I had aircraft ladder operator Kutty told me in a choked voice that Prof. My apprehension of a reproach from my leader, however, was Sarabhai was no more. He had passed away a few hours ago, following unfounded. Sarabhai did not conclude that the failure of the pyro a cardiac arrest.

I was shocked to the core; it had happened within an timer circuit was the outcome of insufficient knowledge and lack of skill hour of our conversation. It was a great blow to me and a huge loss to on the part of his people or of faulty understanding at the direction stage. Indian science. That night passed in preparations for airlifting Prof. He also asked me to consider if my work was possibly being affected by any problem of which I was hitherto unaware.

For five years, between to , about 22 scientists and engineers He finally put his finger on the key issue. We lacked a single roof to had worked closely with Prof. All of them were later to take carry out system integration of all our rocket stages and rocket systems. Not only was Prof.

Sarabhai a Electrical and mechanical integration work was going on with a great scientist, but also a great leader. I still remember him reviewing significant phase difference—both in time and in space. There was little the bi-monthly progress of the design projects of SLV-3 in June The first three Before taking up the responsibility of organizing space research in presentations went through smoothly.

His Swastik Oil Mills did pioneering work in the extraction of oil from oilseeds, manufacture of synthetic detergents and of cosmetics. Suddenly, a senior scientist who worked closely with Prof. But what did astronomical costs at that time. Now with the indigenization of RATO, you do for the project? Sarabhai his mission had acquired a new dimension—independence in the really annoyed.

We just witnessed an excellent example. It rupees in foreign exchange. I recalled this on the day of the successful was an outstanding demonstration of team work.

I have always seen a trial of the RATO system. Including trial expenses, we spent less than project leader as an integrator of people and that is precisely what Kalam Rs. Sarabhai as the Mahatma Gandhi of Indian science at Rs. MGK Menon at the helm, full swing.

All the subsystems had been designed, technologies identified, Prof. The processes established, work centres selected, manpower earmarked and whole complex at Thumba, which included TERLS, the Space Science schedules drawn. The only hitch was the lack of a management structure and Technology Centre SSTC , the RPP, the Rocket Fabrication Facility to effectively handle this mega-project and coordinate activities which RFF , and the Propellant Fuel Complex PFC were merged together were spread over a large number of work centres with their own ways to form an integrated space centre and christened the Vikram Sarabhai of working and management.

The renowned metallurgist, Dr Brahm Prakash, took over as Prof. I wondered why I was selected for this task when Bareilly Air Force station in Uttar Pradesh, when a high performance there were stalwarts like Gowarikar, Muthunayagam, and Kurup around. Sukhoi jet aircraft became airborne after a short run of m, as With organizers like Easwardas, Aravamudan, and SC Gupta available, against its usual run of 2 km.

We used the 66th RATO motor in the test. I articulated my doubts to Dr Brahm Prakash. This effort was said to have saved approximately Rs 4 crores in foreign exchange. The vision of the industrialist scientist had finally borne fruit.

Yet another major task was the augmentation of degraders and cautioned me against outrightly seeking optimal launch facilities at SHAR with systems integration and checkout facilities performance from the participating work centres. The SLV mission will be set in March Dr Brahm you who did not eat or walk about the market squares.

Allah guides to His light promote conditions where work and workers went together. I visualized whom He will. He has knowledge of all things. The first Group was made and operation of a standard SLV system, SLV-3, capable of reliably and responsible for looking after the overall executive aspects of SLV expeditiously fulfilling the specified mission of launching a 40 kg satellite project management, including administration, planning and evaluation, into a km circular orbit around the earth.

The critical problems in the SLV They were also asked to carry out the analysis of the vehicle, completion of this task were: making an 8. The high mass ratio apogee rocket motor system which would use high- Subsystems Development Group was given the job of interacting with energy propellants. Another task was vehicle control and guidance. Three various divisions of VSSC and was made responsible for ensuring that types of control systems were involved in this task—aerodynamic surface all technological problems in the development of various subsystems control, thrust vector control and reaction control for the first, second were overcome by creating a synergy amongst the available talent in and third stages and the spin-up mechanism for the fourth stage.

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Coromandel Coast took a train to the North of India. My destination was more than km away, and was to be my first encounter with It is astonishing how the landscape changes as one moves northwards. The rich and fertile plains of the river Ganga and its numerous tributaries have invited invasion, turmoil, and change. The tenth century brought Muslims, who later mingled with the local people and became an integral part of this country.

I dragged myself out of the purpose of your existence. Become one with yourself, my son! Surrender Selection Board and stood at the edge of a cliff. I knew that the days ahead would be difficult. There were questions to be answered and a plan of action to be prepared. In response, I was handed my appointment letter.

I joined the next day as Senior Scientific Assistant on a basic I bathed in the Ganga and revelled in the purity of its water. If this was to be my destiny, I thought, let walked to the Sivananda Ashram situated a little way up the hill. I could it be so. Finally, I was filled with mental peace. No more did I feel any feel intense vibrations when I entered.

I saw a large number of sadhus bitterness or resentment at my failure to enter the Air Force. All this seated all around in a state of trance. I had read that sadhus were psychic was in If I was not flying aeroplanes, I was at least helping to make I met Swami Sivananda—a man who looked like a Buddha, wearing them airworthy. During my first year in the Directorate, I carried out a a snow-white dhoti and wooden slippers. He had an olive complexion design assignment on supersonic target aircraft with the help of the and black, piercing eyes.

I was struck by his irresistible, almost child- officer-in-charge, R Varadharajan, and won a word of praise from the like smile and gracious manner. I introduced myself to the Swamiji.

My Director, Dr Neelakantan. To gain shop-floor exposure to aircraft Muslim name aroused no reaction in him. Before I could speak any maintenance, I was sent to the Aircraft and Armament Testing Unit further, he inquired about the source of my sorrow. At that time, they were involved in a tropical explanation of how he knew that I was sad and I did not ask. I participated in the performance I told him about my unsuccessful attempt to join the Indian Air Force assessment of its operation systems.

You can rely, young man, upon this ageless promise as surely leaving behind the smell of their soil and the protection of their families.

We tried to read as much literature as included in the design team. I completed this task with the other team we could find on hovercrafts, but there was not much available. We members.

Then, I undertook a preliminary design study on a Human tried to consult people knowledgeable in this area, but could find none. I later carried out the design and development of a Vertical One day, I simply took the decision to proceed with the limited information Takeoff and Landing Platform. I was also associated with the and resources available.

I spent my evenings to a new level it never goes back to its original dimension. He was The workload at ADE during the first year of its inception was quite keenly interested in the progress of our small project, which he envisioned light. Based on my preliminary studies on ground-handling equipment. Whenever he was in Bangalore, he always found some time equipment, a project team was formed to design and develop an to review the progress of our project.

His confidence in our ability ignited indigenous hovercraft prototype as a ground equipment machine GEM. I would enter the assembly shop leaving my other The team was a small working group, comprising four persons at the problems outside, just as my father used to enter the mosque for prayer, level of Scientific Assistant. Our experiments with the available parts and components did not exactly The project was, by any standards, bigger than our collective delight my senior colleagues.

Many even called us a group of eccentric capabilities. None of us had any experience in building a machine, let inventors in pursuit of an impossible dream. I, being the leader of the alone a flying machine. The development are solved. We had a working. Dr Mediratta was visibly pleased And all such things as geniuses use; — with the achievement. But by this time, Krishna Menon was out of office Two bats for patterns, curious fellows!

In the new order, not many A charcoal-pot and a pair of bellows. In fact, even today, we import hovercrafts. The When the project was about a year old, Defence Minister Krishna project was mired in controversies and was finally shelved. It was a Menon made one of his routine visits to ADE. I escorted him into our new experience for me.

So far, I had believed that the sky was the limit, assembly shop. Inside, on a table lay the GEM model broken down into but now it appeared that the limits were much closer. There are boundaries sub-assemblies. The minister fired one question after another at me, determined to ensure that the prototype would go into test flight within I was unwilling to face reality. I had put my heart and soul into Nandi. In this period of confusion and uncertainty, memories from my childhood came back to me and I The hovercraft was christened Nandi, after the bull ridden by Lord discovered new meanings in them.

We were not flying, but were definitely floating in the air. This was a breakthrough a young man like ride and departed. But not before introducing himself—he was Prof. Labels mattered very little. There Rocket Engineer. I was unsure about the set up the Equatorial Rocket Launching Station at Thumba, a sleepy type of questions I would have to face at the interview. There was fishing village near Trivandrum now Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. This was the quiet beginning of modern rocket-based research dualities which arise from wish and hate.

There was none of the arrogance or the patronising attitudes which To this day, the church is maintained in its full glory and, at present, interviewers usually display when talking to a young and vulnerable houses the Indian Space Museum. He was looking at me as if in reference to a larger whole. I took some time off before going abroad and went to dream was enveloped by the larger dream of a bigger person. My father was very pleased to learn about the opportunity that had come my way.

He took me to the mosque and organized a special namaz in thanksgiving. I could feel the power of God flowing in a circuit through my father to me and back to God; we were all under the spell of the prayer. One of the important functions of prayer, I believe, is to act as a stimulus to creative ideas. Within the mind are all the resources required for successful living. Ideas are present in the consciousness, which when released and given scope to grow and take shape, can lead to successful events.

Does not that make me nobler than Achievers Adam? This is no place for your contemptuous pride. One of my most vivid memories What makes life in Indian organizations difficult is the widespread of LRC is of a piece of sculpture depicting a charioteer driving two prevalence of this very contemptuous pride.

Actually, with this theme should be the most commonplace thing at a Flight Facility, problems can be the cutting edge that actually distinguish between but the painting caught my eye because the soldiers on the side launching success and failure. They draw out innate courage and wisdom. It was a sounding rocket, called Nike- fighting the British. The rocket was assembled in the church country but commemorated here on the other side of the planet. I was building I have referred to earlier.

The only equipment available to happy to see an Indian glorified by NASA as a hero of warfare rocketry. The assembled rocket was to be shifted from the church building training, but Prof. After the successful to the launch pad by truck. When the rocket was lifted by the crane and launch of Nike-Apache, he chose to share with us his dream of an was about to be placed on the launcher, it started tilting, indicating a leak Indian Satellite Launch Vehicle.

It lifted a nominal 7 kg payload produced indigenously. It was soon followed by another, to which With this in view, a wide-ranging programme for scientific and one more solid propellant stage was added to dispatch multi-experiment technological development in rocket fuels, propulsion systems, payloads weighing nearly kg to an altitude of over km. Incidentally, this laboratory has on polyurethane and polybutane polymer. It later resulted in the setting produced a large number of Indian space scientists of extremely high up of a Propellant Fuel Complex PFC to manufacture strategic calibre over the years.

In Meanwhile, rocket technology made great strides abroad. Konstantin addition to the large terminal velocity and onboard guidance and control, Tsiolkovsky in Russia , Robert Goddard in USA and it must have the capability to home onto targets. When the targets are Hermann Oberth in Germany gave rocketry new dimensions. With this booty, they started to run fabrication of sounding rockets and their associated on-board systems their deadly arms race with missiles and warheads.

Sarabhai took the challenge of giving physical dimensions to this dream. Very many individuals with myopic vision questioned the relevance of space activities in a newly independent nation which was finding it difficult to feed its population. But neither Prime Minister Nehru nor Prof. Sarabhai had any ambiguity 5 of purpose. Their vision was very clear: if Indians were to play a meaningful role in the community of nations, they must be second to none in the application of advanced technologies to their real-life problems.

In the development of payloads for the sounding rockets, instead of getting a certain payload and then engineering it to fit into the rocket, we discussed the matter threadbare with the payload scientists working in different organ-izations and at different locations.

Oda and Prof. Rao were a unique blend of intellect and structure so as to ensure their proper functioning and endurance under dedication, which one rarely sees. One day, when I was working on the flight conditions. We had X-ray payloads to look at stars; payloads fitted integration for Prof. To me they looked flimsy, of the upper atmosphere; sodium payloads to find out wind conditions, but Prof.

Oda stuck to his stand that the Indian timers be replaced by its direction and velocity. We also had ionospheric payloads to explore the Japanese ones.

I yielded to his suggestion and replaced the timers. I not only had to interact with scientists The rocket took off elegantly and attained the intended altitude.

If you are a writer the hazardous sodium and thermite mix. As usual, it was a hot and humid who would secretly prefer to be a lawyer or a doctor, your written words day at Thumba.

Sudhakar their hearts. They become so emotionally involved with their work that spent many weeks in the hospital recuperating from the severe burns he any dilution of the success of their effort fills them with grief. I remember him as a assembly, testing and evaluation besides building subsystems like payload diminutive man with a towering personality and eyes that radiated housing and jettisonable nose cones. Working with the nose cones led intelligence. His dedication to his work was exemplary.

Whenever he found any very desirable structural, thermal, electrical, chemical and mechanical one of us going over his head and attempting a task for which he did not properties, fascinated me.

I was so enthused with these man-made have the capability or skill, Prof. Sarabhai would reassign activity in materials that I was in a hurry to know everything about them almost such a way so as to lower pressure and permit better quality work to be overnight. I used to read up everything available on related topics.

I was performed. Sarabhai wanted to see me urgently in Delhi. In February By now I was accustomed to Prof. In such a state of mind, to the International Space Science Community. On this occasion, she sudden flashes of inspiration were almost natural.

Notwithstanding the odd hours, warm thoughts, I picked up the book and started browsing. I must have he was alert and vivacious. And before I could get back to the book, It was some popular book related to business management. I was I was informed that Prof.

George Bernard Shaw. The gist of the quote was that all reasonable Who was he? It was not long before my question was answered. Even men adapt themselves to the world. Only a few unreasonable ones persist before we sat down, Prof. Sarabhai introduced us to each other. He in trying to adapt the world to themselves.

Sarabhai ordered coffee for both of us and unfolded his plan of conformist actions. I started reading the book from the Bernard Shaw passage onwards. This would help our warplanes to take off from short runways in the The author was describing certain myths woven around the concept Himalayas.

Hot coffee was served over small talk. It was totally and the process of innovation in industry and business. I read about the uncharacteristic of Prof. But as soon as we finished the coffee, myth of strategic planning. It is generally believed that substantial Prof. The author was of the opinion that it is essential for cursory glance at the sofa where I had left the book.

It was not there. Sarabhai showed us felt that it was a myth to hold that the key to economic success is a Russian RATO. A quotation from General George Patton was given as a could you do it in eighteen months time? Sarabhai asked us. It is a myth that to Prof. I recalled what win big one must strive to optimize, the author felt.

After dropping us back at the Hotel Ashoka, Prof. By that evening, Waiting in the hotel lobby at 1 a. But then, Prof. Sarabhai had always exhibited a strong heading the project, was made public.

The first was the sea or air, or on all three together. This profile was not merely an activity plan laid down in a tactical role, notwithstanding its range of some km.

In those by the top man for his team to comply with, it was a theme paper meant days, however, strategic missiles were synonymous with intermediate for open discussions, to be later transformed into a programme. In fact, range ballistic missiles IRBMs with ranges in the order of nautical I found it was the romantic manifesto of a person deeply in love with the miles or km and inter-continental ballistic missiles ICBMs with a space research programme in his country.

The plan mainly centred around the early ideas which had been born Gp Capt Narayanan had an ineffable enthusiasm for indigenous guided at INCOSPAR; it included utilization of satellites for television and missiles. He was a great admirer of the strong arm approach of the Russian developmental education, meteorological observations and remote sensing Missile Development Programme.

To this had been added the here, where space research has already prepared the soil for a bonanza development and launch of satellite launch vehicles. A large number of Surface- The next evening, Babu came to me before the appointed time. The RATO system locations. Gp Capt Narayanan passionately advocated the development can be made without imports. The only hurdle is the inherent inelasticity of these missiles in the country. He was very eager to learn about rocketry and I approval by a single person instead of an entire hierarchy, air travel for was very curious to know about airborne weapon systems.

At times, I often laughed at his impatience, was to be played with a new set of rules. I weighed all the pros and cons and read for him these lines from T. Hearing my plea for administrative liberalization And the creation and seeing the merits behind it, Prof.

I to live with screwdriver technology? We had also gone in for a high energy after I took up the RATO projects, I saw a young colleague, Jaya Chandra composite propellant and an event-based ignition and jettisoning system in Babu going home. Babu had joined us a few months ago and the only real-time. A canted nozzle was designed to deflect the jet away from the thing I knew about him was that he had a very positive attitude and was aircraft. We conducted the first static test of RATO in the twelfth month articulate.

I called him into my office and did a bit of loud thinking. Within the next four months, we conducted 64 you have any suggestions? Babu remained silent for static tests. And we were just about 20 engineers working on the project! Sarabhai gave me the additional responsibility of designing the fourth stage of the SLV. What made Prof. Sarabhai pick a few of us for this great mission? Dr Gowarikar was doing outstanding work in the field of composite propellants.

I have always considered the price The future satellite launch vehicle SLV had also been conceived of perfection prohibitive and allowed mistakes as a part of the learning by this time. Recognising the immense socio- economic benefits of space process. I prefer a dash of daring and persistence to perfection. I have technology, Prof. Sarabhai decided in , to go full-steam ahead with always supported learning on the part of my team members by paying the task of establishing indigenous capability in building and launching vigilant attention to each of their attempts, be they successful or our own satellites.

He personally participated in an aerial survey of the unsuccessful. In my group, progress was recognized and reinforced at every tiny step. Although I provided access to all the information that my co-workers Prof. I wondered if there was something He finally selected the Sriharikota island, km north of Madras now wrong with the way in which I managed my time. At this stage, Prof. The Sarabhai brought a French visitor to our work centre to point out the crescent-shaped island has a maximum width of 8 km and lies alongside problem to me.

This gentleman was Prof. The island is as big as Madras city. They Canal and the Pulicat lake form its western boundary. Curien was a In , we had formed the Indian Rocket Society. Soon after, the thorough professional. Together, Prof. Sarabhai and Prof. Curien, Prof. Sarabhai had already hand-picked a team to give Prof. Curien to reinterpret his own progress in the Diamont programme. Curien advised Prof.

Sarabhai to relieve me of all the minor cancelled their Diamont BC programme. They told us that they did not jobs which posed little challenge and to give me more opportunities for need our Stage IV anymore. It was a great shock, making me re-live achievement. I recall how this Air Force, and at Bangalore, when the Nandi project was aborted at brought a subtle smile to Prof. As a matter of fact, the Diamont and SLV airframes were I had invested great hope and effort in the fourth stage, so that it incompatible.

The diameters were quite different and to attain could be flown with a Diamont rocket. The other three stages of SLV, interchangeability, some radical innovations were required. I wondered involving enormous work in the area of rocket propulsion were at least where I should start. I decided to look around for solutions among my five years away. However, it did not take me long to shelve the own colleagues. After all, I had thoroughly daily routine reflected their desire to constantly experiment.

Madhavan Nair not only lived up to the trust. Within my own small group of people I found leaders, and learned expectations of his leader but even went beyond them.

He was to later that leaders exist at every level. SLVs and missiles can be called first cousins: they are different in We had modified the existing SLV-IV Stage design to suit the Diamont concept and purpose, but come from the same bloodline of rocketry. A airframe. It was reconfigured and upgraded from a kg, mm massive missile development project had been taken up by DRDO at diameter stage to a kg, mm diameter stage.

Sarabhai spent the next hour in re-defining our tasks, and, in the small hours of the morning, the decision to set up a Rocket In , Prof. Sarabhai came to Thumba on one of his routine visits. Engineering Section was taken. He was shown the operation of the nose-cone jettisoning mechanism.

As always, we were all anxious to share the results of our work with Mistakes can delay or prevent the proper achievement of the Prof. We requested Prof. Sarabhai to formally activate the objectives of individuals and organizations, but a visionary like Prof. Sarabhai smiled, and pressed Sarabhai can use errors as opportunities to promote innovation and the the button. To our horror, nothing happened. We were dumbstruck. I development of new ideas. He was not especially concerned with the looked at Pramod Kale, who had designed and integrated the timer circuit.

In a flash each of us mentally went through an anlysis of the failure. We Prof. Sarabhai to wait for a few minutes, then we detached they were inevitable but generally manageable.

We could not guess what the timer circuit led to the birth of a rocket engineering laboratory. The suspense did not last for long and I got a call from It was my usual practice to brief Prof. Sarabhai after every Missile Prof. After attending one such meeting in Delhi on 30 discussion.

Sarabhai did not conclude that the failure of the pyro a cardiac arrest. I was shocked to the core; it had happened within an timer circuit was the outcome of insufficient knowledge and lack of skill hour of our conversation.

It was a great blow to me and a huge loss to on the part of his people or of faulty understanding at the direction stage. Indian science.

That night passed in preparations for airlifting Prof. He also asked me to consider if my work was possibly being affected by any problem of which I was hitherto unaware. For five years, between to , about 22 scientists and engineers He finally put his finger on the key issue. We lacked a single roof to had worked closely with Prof. All of them were later to take carry out system integration of all our rocket stages and rocket systems. Not only was Prof. Sarabhai a Electrical and mechanical integration work was going on with a great scientist, but also a great leader.

I still remember him reviewing significant phase difference—both in time and in space. There was little the bi-monthly progress of the design projects of SLV-3 in June These responsive to non-verbal messages, that I can unhesitatingly attribute newspapers were mainly bought to keep abreast of current developments my subsequently manifested creativity to their company in my childhood.

A few readers with a Aravindan, and Sivaprakasan. All these boys were from orthodox Hindu more cosmopolitan outlook would discuss Hitler, Mahatma Gandhi and Brahmin families.

As children, none of us ever felt any difference amongst Jinnah; almost all would finally flow into the mighty political current of ourselves because of our religious differences and upbringing. Ramanadha Sastry was the son of Pakshi Lakshmana Sastry, the high Dinamani was the most sought after newspaper.

For reasons I have never been able to understand, a sudden demand used to arrange boats with a special platform for carrying idols of the for tamarind seeds erupted in the market. I used to collect the seeds and Lord from the temple to the marriage site, situated in the middle of the sell them to a provision shop on Mosque Street. Events from the fetch me the princely sum of one anna. Jallaluddin would tell me stories Ramayana and from the life of the Prophet were the bedtime stories my about the war which I would later attempt to trace in the headlines in mother and grandmother would tell the children in our family.

The image of him weeping when I shifted to the last row headquarters in Ramanathapuram. I know you have to go away After school, we went home and told our respective parents about to grow.

May God bless backgrounds could mingle easily. He used to spend hours with me and you, my child! His wife was horrified for my boarding there. Somehow, I did not take to the new setting. The at the idea of a Muslim boy being invited to dine in her ritually pure town of Ramanathapuram was a thriving, factious town of some fifty kitchen. She refused to serve me in her kitchen. Sivasubramania Iyer thousand people, but the coherence and harmony of Rameswaram was was not perturbed, nor did he get angry with his wife, but instead, served absent.

Observing used in the best possible combinations. My father visualized me as a Collector in the kitchen and served me food with her own hands. The Rameswaram. I tried hard to do as he said, which was to strive to control my thoughts and my mind and, through these, to influence my destiny. Ironically, that destiny did not lead me back to Rameswaram, but rather, swept me farther 2 away from the home of my childhood.

My teacher, Iyadurai Solomon, was an ideal guide for an eager young mind that was yet uncertain of the possibilities and alternatives that lay before it. He made his students feel very comfortable in class with his warm and open-minded attitude. He used to say that a good student could learn more from a bad teacher than a poor student from even a skilled teacher.

Many months later, when I scored full marks in mathematics, I stayed on the St. Take my word, this boy is and the other a Syrian Christian from Kerala.

The three of us had a going to bring glory to his school and to his teachers. When I was made secretary of the vegetarian made up for the earlier humiliation! Father Kalathil, over for lunch one Sunday. Our menu included the By the time I completed my education at Schwartz, I was a self- choicest preparations from our diverse backgrounds.

Father Kalathil, who participated awareness of the possibilities for a professional education did not exist; in our unsophisticated conversation with childlike enthusiasm. It was a higher education simply meant going to college. The nearest college memorable event for us all. My teachers at St. The In , I arrived at St. Thothathri Iyengar Intermediate examination. I was not a bright student in terms of and Prof.

Suryanarayana Sastry, walking together on the campus inspires examination grades but, thanks to my two buddies back in Rameswaram, me to this day. I had acquired a practical bent of mind. When I was in the final year at St. I began to read the great classics, Tolstoy, Scott and brother Mustafa Kamal, who ran a provision store on the railway station Hardy being special favourites despite their exotic settings, and then I road, would call me in to give him a little help and then vanish for hours moved on to some works in Philosophy.

I wonder why some people tend to see everything stationary contains great movement within. It is as though science as something which takes man away from God.

Quite honestly, I have go into engineering to realise my dreams. I could have joined the never really understood the reason behind the great importance attached Engineering course long ago, right after finishing my Intermediate course. As an art, I have Better late than never, I told myself as I made the detour, applying for nothing against astrology, but if it seeks acceptance under the guise of admission into the Madras Institute of Technology MIT , regarded as science, I reject it.

I do not know how these myths evolved about planets, the crown jewel of technical education in South India at that time.

The highly complicated calculations manipulated around this prestigious institution was an expensive affair. Around a thousand the precise movements of celestial bodies, to derive highly subjective rupees was required, and my father could not spare that much money. As I see it, the Earth is the most At that time, my sister, Zohara, stood behind me, mortgaging her gold powerful and energetic planet. As John Milton puts it so beautifully in bangles and chain.

I vowed to release her bangles. What if the Sun from mortgage with my own earnings. The only way before me to earn Be centre to the World, and other stars. I The planet earth, so steadfast though she seem, went ahead at full steam. In sensibly three different motions move? What fascinated me most at MIT was the sight of two Wherever you go on this planet, there is movement and life. Even decommissioned aircraft displayed there for the demonstration of the apparently inanimate things like rocks, metal, timber, clay are full of various subsystems of flying machines.

In the course of my education at MIT, three teachers shaped my Prof. KAV Pandalai taught me aero-structure design and analysis. Their combined contributions formed the foundation on which He was a cheerful, friendly and enthusiastic teacher, who brought a I later built my professional career.

During the Prof. Narasingha Rao was a mathematician, who taught us theoretical Second World War, he had been captured by the Nazis and imprisoned aerodynamics.

Walter Repenthin. Another well-known aeronautical design reviews. If it had not been for Prof. My teachers revealed these truths to me. Through their Notwithstanding these irritants, Prof. Sponder preserved his meticulous teaching, they created within me an excitement about individuality and maintained high professional standards.

I consulted modes of compressible medium motion, development of shock waves him before opting for aeronautical engineering. The trouble with The structural features of aeroplanes began to gain new meanings— Indians, Prof. Sponder used to observe, was not that they lacked biplanes, monoplanes, tailless planes, canard configured planes, delta- educational opportunities or industrial infrastructure—the trouble was in wing planes, all these began to assume increasing significance for me.

Suddenly, Prof. Sponder got up and looked for me. I was the tasks of designing the propulsion, structure, control and standing in the third row. I instrumentation of the aircraft. One day, my design teacher, Prof.

I offered a dozen excuses for the future. I finally pleaded for sat with Prof. Sponder for the photograph. There I worked on engine overhauling as part of withdrawn. I could see no other way out but to finish the task as I had a team. Hands-on work on aircraft engine overhauling was very been instructed. That night, I remained at the drawing board, skipping educative. When a principle learnt in the classroom is borne out by dinner.

I did calibrations of a fixed- pitch fan fitted to a super-charged engine. I opened up pressure and acceleration-cum-speed control systems, and air starter supply systems of turbo-engines.

They had been working hands-on for years and this had given them something like an intuitive feel for the work.

One empire gave way to another. Religious conquests continued. All this time, the part of India south of the Tropic of Cancer remained largely untouched, safe behind the shield of the Vindhya and Satpura mountain ranges. The Narmada, Tapti, Mahanadi, Godavari, and Krishna rivers had woven a net of almost unassailable protection for the tapering Indian peninsula. To bring me to Delhi, my train had crossed all these geographical impediments through the power of scientific advancement.

If this was to be my destiny, I thought, let walked to the Sivananda Ashram situated a little way up the hill. I could it be so. Finally, I was filled with mental peace. No more did I feel any feel intense vibrations when I entered. I saw a large number of sadhus bitterness or resentment at my failure to enter the Air Force.

The people on the currents. That which has been imaged will surely and certainly be streets had all come from their villages in search of jobs in factories, manifested. You can rely, young man, upon this ageless promise as surely leaving behind the smell of their soil and the protection of their families. We tried to read as much literature as included in the design team. I completed this task with the other team we could find on hovercrafts, but there was not much available.

Three years passed. This endeavour to produce a wingless, light, swift machine opened Then the Aeronautical Development Establishment ADE was born in the windows of my mind. I was quick to see at least a metaphorical Bangalore and I was posted to the new establishment. After all, the Wright Bangalore as a city was in direct contrast to Kanpur. In fact, I feel Brothers made the first aeroplane after fixing bicycles for seven years! I saw in the GEM project great opportunities for ingenuity and growth.

I knew I had to create my own opportunities. Shah, and in Bangalore it was replaced by dog-walking sahibs. Here too, I longed for the depth and calmness of Rameswaram. The Part by part, subsystem by subsystem, stage by stage, things started relationship between the heart and the head of an earthy Indian has moving.

In fact, even today, we import hovercrafts. The When the project was about a year old, Defence Minister Krishna project was mired in controversies and was finally shelved.

I was sure about my The next day Dr Mediratta brought a visitor to our hovercraft—a competence in flying the machine I had made, and therefore shook my tall, handsome, bearded man.

But not before introducing himself—he was Prof. Labels mattered very little. There Rocket Engineer. I was unsure about the set up the Equatorial Rocket Launching Station at Thumba, a sleepy type of questions I would have to face at the interview. There was fishing village near Trivandrum now Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. This was the quiet beginning of modern rocket-based research dualities which arise from wish and hate. But those in India. The site selected at Thumba lay between the railway line and men of virtuous deeds in whom sin has come to an end, the sea coast, covering a distance of about two and a half km and freed from the delusion of dualities, worship Me measuring about acres.

I could feel the power of God flowing in a circuit through my father to me and back to God; we were all under the spell of the prayer. One of the important functions of prayer, I believe, is to act as a stimulus to creative ideas. Within the mind are all the resources required for successful living. Ideas are present in the consciousness, which when released and given scope to grow and take shape, can lead to successful events. God, our Creator, has stored within our minds and personalities, great potential strength and ability.

Prayer helps us to tap and develop these powers. Ahmed Jallaluddin and Samsuddin came to see me off at Bombay airport. It was their first exposure to a big city like Bombay, just as I myself was about to have my first exposure to a mega city like New York. Jallaluddin and Samsuddin were self-reliant, positive, optimistic men who undertook their work with the assurance of success.

It is from these two persons that I drew the core creative power of my mind. My sentiments could not be contained, and I could feel the mist of tears in my eyes. The intensity and purity of their faith in my capabilities broke my last defences, and tears welled up in my eyes.

They attempt to get out of them rather than suffer them. Everybody prostrated themselves except Iblis, or Satan, who refused. Does not that make me nobler than Achievers Adam?

After the successful to the launch pad by truck. When the rocket was lifted by the crane and launch of Nike-Apache, he chose to share with us his dream of an was about to be placed on the launcher, it started tilting, indicating a leak Indian Satellite Launch Vehicle. As we were fast approaching the Prof. The very news of launch time, 6 p. People manually, using our collective muscle power and finally placing it on the would work virtually round the clock because of their enthusiasm to launcher.

Easwardas undertook the rocket assembly and arranged some of those tasks would appear totally unrelated in the beginning, the launch. Aravamudan, whom we called Dan, was in charge of radar, they would, at a later stage, emerge as deeply interconnected.

It was soon followed by another, to which With this in view, a wide-ranging programme for scientific and one more solid propellant stage was added to dispatch multi-experiment technological development in rocket fuels, propulsion systems, payloads weighing nearly kg to an altitude of over km. Incidentally, this laboratory has on polyurethane and polybutane polymer. It later resulted in the setting produced a large number of Indian space scientists of extremely high up of a Propellant Fuel Complex PFC to manufacture strategic calibre over the years.

Sounding rockets are normally used for probing the near-earth subsystems of rockets in the battle of Turukhanahally in His environment, including the upper regions of the atmosphere.

While they army had 27 brigades, called Kushoons, and each brigade had a company can carry a variety of scientific payloads to a range of altitudes, they of rocket men, called Jourks.

These rockets had been taken to England cannot impart the final velocity needed to orbit the payload. The final stage of a launch vehicle provides the or patent regime.

With the death of Tipu, Indian rocketry also met its necessary velocity for a satellite to enter an orbit. This is a complex demise—at least for years. A missile, though belonging to the same family, is a still more complex system. In Meanwhile, rocket technology made great strides abroad.

Konstantin addition to the large terminal velocity and onboard guidance and control, Tsiolkovsky in Russia , Robert Goddard in USA and it must have the capability to home onto targets. When the targets are Hermann Oberth in Germany gave rocketry new dimensions. With this booty, they started to run fabrication of sounding rockets and their associated on-board systems their deadly arms race with missiles and warheads.

They had no intention of using it merely as a means to display our might. Sarabhai would openly review the progress of work with the entire team. He never gave directions. Rather, through a free exchange of views, he led us forward into new terrain which often revealed an unforeseen solution. Perhaps he was aware that though a particular goal might be clear to himself, and he could give adequate directions for its accomplishment, his team members might have resisted working towards a goal that made no sense to them.

I may even say that the most significant achievement of the sounding rocket programme was to establish and maintain nation-wide mutual trust. UR Rao, would be engineered by my team to fit into the nose were told rather than use my legitimate authority, Prof. Sarabhai assigned cone of the Rohini Rocket. At an altitude of km, the nose cone me the task of providing interface support to payload scientists.

Almost would be separated by explosion of pyros triggered by an electronic all physical laboratories in India were involved in the sounding rocket timer. With this, the X-ray sensors would be exposed to space for programme, each having its own mission, its own objective and its own collecting the required information about the emissions from stars.

He had clearly put his heart and soul into his work. I often read Khalil Gibran, and always find his words full of wisdom. If you are a writer the hazardous sodium and thermite mix. As usual, it was a hot and humid who would secretly prefer to be a lawyer or a doctor, your written words day at Thumba. After the sixth such operation, Sudhakar and I went into will feed but half the hunger of your readers; if you are a teacher who the payload room to confirm the proper filling of the mix.

Suddenly, a would rather be a businessman, your instructions will meet but half the drop of sweat from his forehead fell onto the sodium, and before we need for knowledge of your students; if you are a scientist who hates knew what was happening, there was a violent explosion which shook science, your performance will satisfy but half the needs of your mission.

He would bring me, as a natural consequence, into the field of composite materials. That was his subtle way composite bows made of wood, sinew, and horn as early as the eleventh of challenging each one of us to stretch our capabilities. The versatility of composites, in the sense that they possess would praise whatever we had accomplished. Whenever he found any very desirable structural, thermal, electrical, chemical and mechanical one of us going over his head and attempting a task for which he did not properties, fascinated me.

In such a state of mind, to the International Space Science Community. On this occasion, she sudden flashes of inspiration were almost natural. Delhi being a slightly unfamiliar Subramanian and MN Satyanara-yana, great satisfaction. We made high- place, with an unfriendly climate for someone like me, conditioned to the strength glass cloth laminates to build non-magnetic payload housings warm and humid climate of South India, I decided to wait in the hotel and flew them in two-stage sounding rockets.

We also wound and test lounge after finishing my dinner.

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