10. From the IIA Archives

Hasan presided over the function. Professor C N R Rao began his lecture by paying tribute to the late Professor M K Vainu Bappu, the founder of IIA, who he knew well and had interacted closely with during the annual meetings of the Indian Academy of Sciences. He said Bappu was a quiet scholar and a fine human being. He stood for excellence. Coming to the theme of his lecture, Professor Rao reminded the audience that he chose this general topic since it addressed the common profession of the audience and the speaker. ‘We all do science’. He remembered 1947, the year India got her freedom and he was still a student in Bangalore. Celebrations were spontaneous and everywhere. The speeches by Jawaharlal Nehru and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan were inspirational. Prime Minister Nehru was an ardent supporter of science and genuinely believed that development based on scientific and technological progress was good for mankind and for India, in particular. Under Nehru’s leadership, India came to be the first country whose government actually formulated a Science Policy and it was passed by the Parliament in 1958. Professor Rao referred to Homi Bhabha’s close proximity to Nehru and how at Bhabha’s instance, the Indian Atomic Energy Commission and the Department of Atomic Energy were established with Bhabha at the helm of both. There were great scientist-leaders in the country. Sir J C Ghosh, Professo