Trail Blazers -Essays I Sem

Gopalaswamy Doraiswamy Naidu 

Gopalaswamy Doraiswamy Naidu was an Indian engineer and inventor. He is commonly referred to as the ‘Edison of India’ for his significant contributions to the fields of technology, industry and development.

            G.D.Naidu was born on March 1893 in Kalangal, India. He was a mischievous child at school and was frequently punished for his habit of hurling sand at teachers during classes. He once lit a stack of hay on fire, simply to see what would happen. Overtime, Naidu would come to appreciate the importance and value of a proper and comprehensive education.

            The significant moment of Naidu’s life came when he was still a youngster. A foreigner had ridden through the village of Kalangal on a motorcycle. The majority of the people in the village ignored the foreigner but for Niadu, this sight of the motorcycle – cutting the silence of the village with the roar of its churning dust in its wake was inspiring. Naidu kept an eye out at all times for another glimpse of the vehicle and felt desperate. He left behind the tranquil peace of his village in search of technology and modern achievements.

            Coimbatore was a city ripe with opportunity, and Naidu wasted no time. The first thing he did was got a job as a waiter to accomplish his dreams, and so worked diligently and saved money. He tracked down the foreigner and succeeded in getting the motorcycle for 400 rupees from him. He picked up the habit of riding the trains from city to city. He relished the ability to travel so quickly. He became familiar with how the engine operated, in procuring a job as a mechanic.

            In 1920 Naidu expanded his horizons and set up his own business. He also dabbled in the cotton business. Overtime his transport business expanded and UMS, (Universal Motor Service) of public transport vehicles in the country. His passion for technology extended to cameras and film. He filmed the funeral of King George in London. He even secured manufacturing razors contracts with Adolf Hitler. He tried his hand at politics, but lost the 1936 provincial General elections. He was gifted a Rolls-Royce car, making him one of the very few and elite Indian’s who possessed such a statement of wealth.

In his mid-forties, he collaborated with D.Balasundaram to create India’s first indigenous motor. A company within Naidu’s group, called National Electric works, made the motor in 1937. He continued to invent, creating an electric razor that was manufactured in Germany.

            In 1941, he invented five-valve radios, focused on camera equipment, created a distance adjuster for film cameras. He had piqued his interest in agriculture to identify new forms and varieties of cotton, maize and papaya. He apparently had the entire building within eight hours time. It was a source of curiosity for Sir C.V. Raman and Mokshagundam Visvesvaraiah.

            G.D. Naidu began setting up several charitable and philanthropic foundations that helped under privileged sections of society. Despite his dislike for studies, he firmly believed the importance of education and made it his mission to set up the first polytechnic in India. It was later called Hope College, in Coimbatore. He was so passionate about education that in 1945 he was made the principal of the college (Government College of Technology). On 4^th January 1974, Naidu passed away.  In the words of Sir C.V. Raman, G.D. Naidu was a great educator, an entrepreneur, a warm-hearted man and truly a man in millions. 

Gorur Ramaswamy Gopinath 

Gorur Ramaswamy Gopinath is an entrepreneur and founder of the Indian airlines Air Deccan. He is a retired captain of the Indian Army, an author, a politician, and a multi millionaire, and he is considered by many to be a pioneer for low-cost air travel within India.

G.R. Gopinath was born on 13 November 1951 in the village of Gorur, in Karnataka, India. His father was a school teacher and a farmer. Due to living in a village in Karnataka, Gopinath attended a Kannada-medium school till fifth standard. As the headmaster informed all the students that an admissions examination was going to be held in their school for those wishing to later join the Defense Forces, he appeared for the test. Unfortunately, the examination was in English, so he failed in the examination. On discovering the paper was in English, the headmaster wrote a stern letter to the Ministry of Defense in Delhi. He even went so far as to challenge the validity of the examination, questioning why the ministry believed intelligence meant understanding English. This yielded good result as Gopinath and some of the other boys were invited to take the exam and they got through the exam with flying colors. He learnt an important lesson from his headmaster, one has to be proactive and try as hard as possible to steer things one’s way.

Gopinath joined the Sainik School, Bijapur, where the level of education was greater. He was chanced to serve as a captain in the Indian Army in several places in North India. He was part of the Bangladesh liberation war in 1971. Gopinath was among the many other members of the Indian Army who were involved in trying to diffuse the situation. The war eventually ended with the declaration of separate Bangladesh in December 1971. He travelled across the land of opportunity during his vacation. The trip to U.S. set a good example of the grit and confidence that he would later put to good use in India.

The active part of his life in the Indian Army came to an end when Gopinath resigned from his job. He returned home with little more than six thousand rupees. With the money he had a deal with his uncle and purchased ten acres of land. He took to farming and bear with the odds of life before meeting with success. His grit and determination paid off. He also met a woman and ended up marrying her during this period of time. He was the recipient of the Rolex Laureate Award, for establishing an ecologically sustainable sericulture farm.

Gopinath began to branch out and show his penchant for being proactive. He secured a deal with Royal Enfield and was able to start a business called Malnad Mobikes and also opened a hotel in Hasan. He was a man of numerous talents, started writing and frequently contributing articles in Kannada for magazines and agricultural publications. His experience led to him to start new ventures – Water Resource Management consultancy and supplying Irrigation systems.

Gopinath decided to try and tackle the world of politics. While helping his daughter with her education, he was exposed to major community issues including poverty and problems with Bangalore’s infrastructure. He met with several influential community leaders and over time invited by the Bharatiya Janata Party. However his first electoral foray was a disaster. He backed out of politics.

Colonel A.J. Sam was a pivotal figure in Gopinath’s life and a good friend in the army. After resigning, he had taken a freelance job as a helicopter pilot. Gopinath saw the value of such training and pictured the ease with which helicopters could transport vehicles, men and materials easily from one place to another. He decided to go into the transport business. He, A.J.Sam and Colonel Jayanth Poovaiah agreed to set up the business together, company named Deccan Aviation, the low-cost airline in 2003.

In 2006 Gopinath was knighted with the Chevelier de la Legion d’Honneur, the highest civilian award conferred by the French government. In 2007, Vijay Mallya, sensing the great potential in Air Deccan, met with Gopinath and together they decided to merge Air Deccan with Mallya’s airlines, Kingfisher Airlines. Since then, Gopinath has founded Deccan charters and Deccan 360, which focuses on cargo and the express logistics business. The future lies wide open to such great entrepreneurs like Gorur Ramaswamy Gopinath.  

DR. VIJAY BHATKAR

Dr. Vijay Bhatkar, The architect of India’s Information Technological revolution. Information technology has made the world smaller. The press of a button opens before us a vast ocean of information on innumerable subjects and domains. This dream became a reality in India through the efforts of Dr. Vijay Bhatkar, a computer scientist. He is the creator of India’s indigenous super computer.

Dr. K. R. Narayanan had suggested the name of Dr. Bhatkar for realizing the dream of the late Prime Minister of India, Rajiv Gandhi, of indigenously building a supercomputer. Dr. Bhatkar did not let him down. Out of this inspiration was formed the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (CDAC) and the development of Param, India’s first supercomputer.

Dr. Bhatkar was born on 11 October, 1946 in Muramba in Akola district (near Murtijapur) to a highly educated couple. He completed his schooling in Murtijapur in a school established by Saint Gadgebaba. He was in the merit list of the board exams and acquired his degree in engineering at the age of 18. He acquired his M.Tech from the Sayajirao University in Baroda and then got his PhD from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi at the age of 26.

He worked for many years in the electronics domain as the Director of Celtron. Through this company, he worked on many major computerization projects which included the Kolkata metro project, traffic management in metros, defence projects for the Defence as well as several government departments, electricity control etc. He was also a member of the scientific advisory committee for the central government. Later, at CDAC, he helped develop GIST, the multilingual technology because of which software could be used in various Indian languages.

As immersed as he is in science and technology, his interests also span diverse subjects like Indian culture, Vedas, Upanishads and saint literature and spirituality. Inspired by the thoughts of Swami Vivekananda, he left CDAC to involve himself in the Education to Home project which aims to make education more accessible to the students.

He was bestowed with many awards while handling posts on national and international level. The central government awarded him the Padmashri and the Maharashtra government awarded him the Maharashtra Bhushan award. He has written more than seventy research papers and has authored eight books.

Influenced by the ideologies of Saint Gadgebaba at a young age, he strives today to find a balance between science and spirituality. Wanting all the religious centres in India to be centres of knowledge too, he has started to work on this project from Alandi.

Dr. Bhatkar is still proficiently active today, at the same time studying European cultures and working towards his spiritual quests too. He is also a role model for the youth in India. 

SUDHA MURTHY

Sudha Murthy is an Indian social worker and author. Murthy began her professional career as a computer scientist and engineer. She is the chairperson of the Infosys Foundation and a member of public health care initiatives of the Gates Foundation. She has founded several orphanages, participated in rural development efforts, supported the movement to provide all Karnataka government schools with computer and library facilities, and established the 'The Murthy Classical Library of India' at Harvard University. Murthy also teaches computer science and composes fiction. Dollar Sose (English: Dollar Daughter-in-Law), a novel originally authored by her in Kannada and later translated into English as Dollar Bahu, in 2001. Murthy has also acted in Marathi film Pitruroon and Kannada film Prarthana.

EARLY LIFE

Sudha Murthy was born on 19 August 1950, in Shiggaon in northern Karnataka, India. The daughter of a famous surgeon Dr. R.H. Kulkarni, Murty and her siblings were raised by her parents and maternal grandparents. These childhood experiences form the historical basis for her first notable work entitled ‘How I Taught my Grandmother to Read & Other Stories’. Two institutions of higher learning, the H.R. Kadim Diwan Building housing the Computer Science & Engineering (CSE) department at IIT Kanpur and the Narayan Rao Melgiri Memorial National Law Library at NLSIU, were both endowed and inaugurated by the Infosys Foundation.

Murthy completed B.E. in Electrical Engineering from the B.V.B. College of Engineering & Technology, standing first in her class and receiving a gold medal from the Chief Minister of Karnataka. Thereafter, she completed an M.E. in Computer Science from the Indian Institute of Science, standing first in her class and receiving a gold medal from the Indian Institute of Engineers.

After graduation, Murthy became the first female engineer hired at India's largest auto manufacturer TATA Engineering and Locomotive Company or TELCO. Murthy had written a postcard to the company's Chairman complaining of the "men only" gender bias at TELCO. As a result, she was granted a special interview and hired immediately. She met N.R. Narayana Murthy while employed as an engineer at TELCO in Pune, and the two got married. 

INFOSYS FOUNDATION

Murthy who heads as the chairperson of Infosys Foundation as well as the seed investor behind Infosys and venture capital firm Catamaran Ventures.

AWARDS

In 2004, Murthy was presented with the Raja-Lakshmi Award "in recognition of her outstanding contribution to social work" by the Sri Raja-Lakshmi Foundation in Chennai.

In 2006, Murthy was awarded the Padma Shri, the fourth highest-ranking civilian award from the Government of India, and received an honorary doctorate for her contributions in the spheres of social work, philanthropy, and education.

In 2011, Murthy was conferred honorary LL.D (Doctor of Laws) degrees for their contributions to promote formal legal education and scholarship in India. She was the recipient of the R.K. Narayana's Award for Literature and the Padma Shri in 2006.

WRITINGS

Murthy is a prolific fiction author in Kannada and English. She has published several books, mainly through Penguin, that espouse her philosophical views on charity, hospitality and self-realization through fictional narratives. Some of her notable books in Kannada are Dollar Sose, Runa, Kaveri inda Mekaangige, Hakkiya Teradalli, Athirikthe, Guttondu Heluve. The book ‘How I Taught My Grandmother to Read & Other Stories’ has been translated into 15 languages including Hindi, Marathi and Assamese. Her latest book is ‘The Day I Stopped Drinking Milk’. Other notable books by her are Wise and Otherwise, Old Man and his God and Gently Falls the Bakula.