Editorial

Spirit of Science
The heavy downpour that Ahmedabad witnessed yesterday brought with it some beautiful gifts…. the joy of listening to and reading about two great scientists of the World and India.

While interacting with students at the founder’s day at Ahmedabad University, Bharat Ratna APJ Abdul Kalaam spoke of his vision of the twenty-first Century University…a seat of learning where research would be its hallmark. A University which focuses on Research would certainly scale peaks of excellence.

The monograph on two times Nobel Laureate Marie Curie that I am reading also speaks of her unstinting commitment to the laboratory. Madame Curie says “If the conquests useful for humanity touch your heart, if you are overwhelmed before the astonishing results of electric telegraphy,……and of other wonderful discoveries, if you are jealous of the part your country may claim in the spreading of these marvelous things, take an interest, I beg of you, in those sacred places to which we give the expressive name of laboratories. Demand that they be multiplied and ornamented, for these are the temples of the future, of wealth, and of well being. It is in them that humanity grows, fortifies itself, and becomes better.”

Both these legends also share a Patriotic dream and a commitment to humanity.
To inculcate the spirit of enquiry would mean nurturing curiosity and ‘questioning’ right from a tender age. As this enduring struggle to understand continues and goes on to become a vocation of a Scientist, it can certainly lead to great leaps in the journey of mankind, in the evolution of matter, mind, spirit and more...This is often not a comfortable, calm, idyllic path. A true scientist pursues his mission which resonates with his intuition and struggles against all odds, obstacles and even calamities.

In a lifetime of struggle in the laboratory with matter and mind, dotted with the highest joy of discovery, she along with her husband, Pierre Curie, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for their research on the radiation phenomena, which also strangely came to haunt her as she eventually died of Leukemia. Her tireless research efforts to quell her questions, backed by her intuition later gave her the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1911, for discovering Radium and Polonium. Never before or after has there been such a laureate to receive this honor twice.

When Madame Curie needed a gram of radium for her research which she couldn’t buy, a subscription among all the women of America, rich and poor was organized to gift her one gram of Radium. Royalties on her patents may have made her very rich but she instead believed, “Radium was not to enrich anyone. Radium is an element. It belongs to all people.”

Sh. Kalaam in his address to the students, last weekend, asked them to instill righteousness in the heart, which would lead to beauty of character. Beauty of character would, in turn, lead to harmony in the family. Harmony in the family would give order to the Nation, which, in turn, would bring about Peace in the World. This, he felt, can happen only if the parents and the primary school teachers can sow righteousness in the hearts of young children and inculcate the spirit of giving, giving and giving.

Marie Curie breathed her last in July 1934 and 76 years later as we read about this exceptional soul who could give all and receive nothing, the question that arises is ‘what could be our humble homage to her?’ An unflinching support to the spread of scientific temper and research across schools, colleges and the community and a mission of sowing righteousness in tender, little hearts.

Smt. Jayanti S. Ravi