Anant-Observations

Parag Sadhale -- RIP

2012-01-22T18:28:00.004+05:30

I read with great shock yesterday of the tragic demise of our colleague Prof. Parag Sadhale. I had spoken only once or twice with him, many years ago, when I think we served on the same committee for KVPY, which is so long ago that I have forgotten. I would see him once in a while in the mornings near Sanjay Nagar Police Station, where I guess the bus would come for his daughter to go to school. He always had the grace to say hello when I would run into him in the coffee line or elsewhere. I also understand that he was an accomplished harmonium player.

The manner of his passing is well known and there are no words to express the horror. Once again, it shows that men are not good at getting help at all. This should be a red flag to all those who are having negative thoughts that they must get help. It should also be a red flag to well wishers that they should not ignore signs when they see them, although in this case there do not seem to have been any. No one knows what private hell he was going through which brought him to this pass. I did find a report in Deccan Herald which said that he had spoken to his brother at length and that the latter agreed with his decision, which is totally bizarre. I hope that there was something wrong with that news item.

I would like to use this post to pay a silent tribute to his memory.

Update: There are some clarifications on the newspaper web-site from relatives.

I am quoted in IBT on the Higgs

2011-12-14T11:22:00.001+05:30

My afternoon email in response to a query via Prof. H. R. Krishnamurthy is quoted in the International Business Times here.

Higgs Seminar at CERN

2011-12-13T20:24:00.002+05:30

The best way that I could think of following the Higgs seminar was on the live blog reporting of Prof. Matt Strassler here. Thank you Prof. Strassler!

I am quoted by Mail Today

2011-09-26T19:25:00.003+05:30

Yes, it is true. I was contacted by Dinesh Sharma from Mail Today Delhi on Saturday to ask me about my views on the OPERA experiments `superluminal' neutrinos. The first I heard about this was from my old friend M. P. Srikanth on Friday morning who called agitatedly to ask if the heavens had fallen. He read about it on BBC News. I followed it up on many other sites and blogs and was able to talk to the Mail Today reporter, although in reality I am not an experimentalist and cannot really vouch for this. But the general drift seems to be that a lot more scrutiny must go into this. Also, coincidentally the main person Antonio Ereditato is from the Albert Einstein Centre for Fundamental Physics, University of Bern where I was a post-doc 1995-96 and to which I am a frequent visitor, including this year for about four weeks. In any case, check out page 18 on the 25th September issue of Mail Today at the following link.
I am quoted in the following:

B. Ananthanarayan, chairman of the Centre for High Energy
Physics at the Indian Institute ofScience, too echoed similar views. “Historically, neutrino experiments have been notoriously difficultto conduct because it is a fundamentally complex science. Therefore, scepticism is natural,” he said. “My feeling is that they have underestimated the errors.

I am quoted by Times of India

2011-09-22T20:13:00.004+05:30

Yes, it is true. I was `interviewed' by a Times of India reporter some time ago and I forgot about it. Today in my mailbox I found a copy of the Student Edition of the Times of India of September 6, 2011 Bangalore edition [no ecopies, I believe]. On page 6, Bangalore is featured as `More than a silicon city' by Ruth Dhanaraj, and several Institutions are featured. They say of the Indian Institute of Science:

``As famous as the Indian Institute of Science is today, not many people know the story behind its inception. The idea for an institute that would contribute that would contribute to India's development was long a dream of Jamsetji N Tata. During a chance encounter with Swami Vivekananda aboard a ship in 1893, they discussed this idea. Five years later, JN Tata invited Swami Vivekananda to be part of the committee that would draft a plan for an institute of research and higher education.

Bangalore was suggested as the best place to base the institute and IISc was eventually founded in 1909. The campus sits on 400 acres of land most of which was donated by the Maharaja of Mysore. Though the institute began with only two department: General and Applied Chemistry and Electro-Technology, today its ambit extends to almost all branches of science and engineering.''

``I have been with IISc for the past 15 years and it is a great place to work. I am sure one cannot find a better place elsewhere. At my time of joining this institute, I have five other offers in hand, but I have never had reason to regret my decision. I had finished my higher education in the US and Switzerland; I will say there is no place like IISc.

Here there is complete academic freedom as well as a vibrant intellectual atmosphere. Compared to other colleges there is a lot of world class research going on here. We also have highly trained, international faculty here. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, winner of the 2009 Nobel Prize for Chemistry has accepted a chair with us and will be spending time here -- not many other institutes can give you that!''

--B Ananthanarayan, chairperson, Centre for High Energy Physics, IISc

[Some minor inconsistencies and for the record, the five offers were including IISc,
and I said internationally trained faculty, and not trained, international faculty,
but in general for a telephone interview, it is quite faithful to what I said. I will try and upload a scanned copy, if I get around to it.]

Chess and the internet

2011-09-15T10:55:00.002+05:30

As a kid I used to play some chess but was not very good at it. In fact, big sister was far better than me, playing in the inter-school, college and perhaps even the state level. Recently my interest was (re)kindled at the time of the Anand-Topalov match and I discovered a very nice web-site which is one of several, where there is plenty of news, tactics, games, puzzles, and one can even play against the computer. I have been faring quite well with both black and white pieces when the computer is at the 1600 level. What is interesting is that the computer really punishes you for a mistake and you are done for. However, if you play cautiously and play many moves without mistakes, you can start beating it at this level. Even more amazing is that there are thousands of games that you can see and study. It is great fun to see how Anand has beaten top players and some of his games. On the other hand, I remember from long years ago that there was someone called Mir Sultan Khan who was supposed to have beaten Jose Raul Capablanca. So I asked google if there was indeed such a game. Here it is!

Thanking old teachers

2011-07-11T08:30:00.002+05:30

For many of us, our lives in school represent some of the most important years of life, and we also have excellent memories of our teachers. Considering that one finished Class X thirty three years ago, where was I going to find information on my old school teachers? A google search on the names of favourites teachers took me here. My comments on the blog got me in touch with Gopal Gurram, the owner of the blog. I wonder why many of us in India are so thankful to our teachers? Maybe because we cannot really take good teachers for granted? Maybe at that age, we will did not yet have a sense to entitlement. [The latter has been commented upon in a different context here.] Comments welcome

Rahul Basu -- In Memoriam

2011-03-05T20:22:00.004+05:30

It is with the most profound sorrow that I must write to you about the loss of our friend, collaborator, teacher and esteemed member of the High Energy Physics community.

The end came quite suddenly after a series of health problems, first in the form of lung infections and eventually cardiac arrest. I met him recently in December in Chennai at which time he was planning a holiday to Bali and Singapore. Apparently he had been recovering from a lung infection, but on his return there was a recurrence and he spent many weeks in the ICU. I spoke to him last month and he sounded a little tired, but apparently otherwise he was getting better. It seems that these infections had weakened him to such an extent that he had a set back.

Rahul was known to many of us for his organizational skill and enthusiasm in organizing schools, conferences, workshop, etc.. Some of our own students have recently heard his lectures in Chandigarh, and he was to lecture in April at the SINP school. For others he was a collaborator and friend to many of us. Recently many of us have known him for his blogging on As I Please, where his powerful language and logic and wit speak for themselves.

At this stage I have very few words left to say. I would like to request you all to join me in my thoughts and pay our respects to his memory.

Update: You can leave a message on the official memorial page here.

Hyderabad as the accidental tourist destination

2011-01-04T14:06:00.005+05:30

How can one's place of birth and childhood and growth possibly be a tourist destination? Easy: if you have moved away and your kid comes back every vacation to visit grandparents, granduncles and cousins. So that is what happened to us.

Of course Charminar is a must and we visited it last week. Impressive as ever. What is more, the weather was the best I could remember in years. Then we asked our driver to take us to `Paigah Palace' which I thought was nearby. He confidently took us to a nearby palace which was not Paigah but was the Chowmohalla Palace. This is terrific. We did not have much time and could only a small part of it. The Nizam's descendants in 2005 have allowed the public to come and walk through. It is a must.

Earlier we had done the usual Public Gardens and the Birla Mandir and a short walk along the Hussain Sagar where there are now two gardens on either side of the Necklace road.

We also visited the Mahavir Harina Vanasthali National Park, which is now a deer park in about 16 sq. km. of what was once the Nizam's hunting grounds. There is a safari ride for 15 min. and costs 5 rupees. There is no safari between noon and 3:00 pm. We also went back to the Public Gardens to the State Museum which has one of 6 Egyptians mummies in the country's museums, which had been bought from London and they say it is that of a 16 or 18 year old female and daughter of a Pharoah. The Buddhist and Bronze collections and Ajanta reproductions are excellent. There are also murals in several scripts and apparently there is a miniature which we did not see. This is not be confused with the Salar Jung Museum which we did not visit.

There is also a small tribal museum in Sankshema Bhavan at Masab tank which we visited.

For the tourist, there is also the crafts festival in December at the Shilparamam near the Hi-Tech city.

This is what we did this year. Last year, we had done the Qutb Shahi tombs, the Golconda fort and on an earlier occasion the famous Nehru Zoological Park near the Mir-Alam tank. So what more can one ask from one single city. And, don't forget that you can get by with Hindi if you are someone who does not know Telugu.

So if this information has been useful to you, happy holidays now or for later...

Phalax 6 is now out

2010-12-09T16:31:00.002+05:30

The editor of Phalanx wrote to me saying that Phalax 6 is out. You can read the editorial on the quagmire of higher education here.

`A Place in the Sun' by Charles Correa

2010-11-21T11:30:00.005+05:30

Recently I saw a book review of `A Place in the Sun' which is a collection of essays, lectures and the like by Charles Correa, brought out by Penguin India. I found a copy in our friendly neighbourhood lending library and borrowed it. It is a must read. I am amazed at his knowledge of history, geography and politics and his forthrightness which all shine brightly at the reader. There are so many things that I read here that I never knew about. He talks about the temple at Modhera near Ahmedabad which I had scarcely heard of. Also impressive is his compassion for the poor and the needy, for the homeless and the destitute, his breathtaking sweep of architecture across cultures, what goes into designing a building. Also of interest are his views on Mahatma Gandhi, Nehru, Corbusier and other personalities. Fabulous reading!

Let me regale you with some quotations:

1) The dedication `To the Eklavya in each of us'. (What a marvellous dedication!)

2) On page 91, from `Zero'

Postscript

I am in a plane flying to the US for this lecture. Everything seems so American -- the way people look, the way they talk, their gestures, their dress, even the colour of their hair: blond, red, brown blue...It's all so different from India. It's clear to me that I'm at the opposite end of the world. And I wonder: How can these people ever begin to understand a country like India? Or vice versa?

And then suddenly a baby cries. And astonishingly, all the differences fall away -- it sounds just like an Indian child! Perhaps within each of us, there's a Volume Zero struggling to get out?

3) From `Great City, terrible place'

CODA: If you drop a frog into a saucepan of very hot water, it will desperately try to hop out. But if you place a frog in tepid water and then gradually, very very gradually, raise the temperature, the frog will swim around happily, adjusting to the increasingly dangerous conditions. In fact, just before the end, just before the frog cooks to death, when the water is exceedingly hot, the frog relaxes, and a state of euphoria sets in (like those hot-tub baths in California). Maybe that’s what is happening to us in Bombay, as everyday we find it getting to be more and more of a great city…and a terrible place.

(This could easily be a metaphor for our entire country and not just Bombay! In any case, you will find a long excerpt from LiveMint here.)

19th Kumari L. A. Meera Memorial Lecture

2010-11-17T09:47:00.002+05:30

The 19th Kumari L. A. Meera Memorial Lecture will be given on Tuesday, November 23, 2010 at 6 pm at the Indian Institute of World Culture, Basavanagudi, Bangalore, by Prof. Rajaram Nityananda of the National Centre for Radio Astrophysics, Pune entitled "The Graver Side of Light". The trust web-site is here.

Abstract: Light has illuminated our understanding of space, time, and gravitation via Einstein’s special and general relativity. . The focus of this lecture is the interplay between gravity and light - redshifts, gravitational lenses, and black holes are already a standard part of how astronomers observe and model the universe, and more is to come. . .

Joseph Fox on Richard Heck's Nobel Prize

2010-10-13T14:41:00.002+05:30

Heck's seminal studies were conducted in the late 1960's, but he did not receive a major award for his work until 2004. Yet, his day has come, and to see Heck recognized on this grandest of stages is absolutely remarkable. Something is right in the world when the Nobel prize goes to such a modest individual, based so purely on merit. It reminds me of why I went into science in the first place.

That is from Joseph Fox's article on the Nobel Prize to Richard Heck.

Robert Edwards -- Nobel Laureate

2010-10-04T16:03:00.002+05:30

Great to read about this year's Nobel Prize in physiology, for the in-vitro pioneer Robert Edwards. I really like it when these prizes have gone to those who have made life better for many. Someday I hope that the pioneer of the Jaipur foot will also get a Nobel prize. If not for physiology, for peace!

What shall we blog about?

2010-10-03T16:10:00.002+05:30

The main trouble with a blog like this that has no specific agenda is that there is so much to blog about, which is why one ends up blogging so little. I received a message from Rahul Basu, the proud owner of As I Please that my blog seems to have nothing to say after the Dirac medal, when there is so much going on. (In this context, we note the sad passing of Nicola Cabibbo soon after the announcement of the Dirac medal.) Indeed, I would have like to blog about the Ayodhya decision, but what I wanted to say has been said so much better by a long list of signatories including Romila Thapar, Panikkar and so many others so much more scholarly than myself. What I found striking in another article by Thapar is "We cannot change the past"! While this is a truism, so much of politics and hell and brimstone in the media is generated around this. I was shocked to hear some say on TV that the work is not yet done, as the liberation of Krishnajanmabhoomi and Shankarjanmabhoomi (the Gyanvapi Mosque in Kashi!) [if I have got my `facts' right] is yet to be done. Closer home, i.e., in the scientific world there has been the earthquake about the the Bt Brinjal fiasco and the joint report of the academies. But this has been commented on by other so much more eminent commentators such as Rahul, and Nanopolitan. That is the problem: there is so much to blog about...

Cabibbo and Sudarshan awarded 2010 Dirac medal

2010-08-09T11:49:00.002+05:30

The Dirac Medal of the ICTP is announced every year on August 8. The highly deserving winners this year are N. Cabibbo and E. C. G. Sudarshan.

Choosing proper footwear

2010-07-27T09:18:00.002+05:30

I saw this safety tip on Fermilab Today and thought that it would be a good public service annoucement. See here. This is particularly important in our country where there is so much scope for hurting your feet -- bad roads, non-existent footpaths, slippery surfaces and the like.

The size of the proton

2010-07-26T16:15:00.002+05:30

Apparently the proton is 4% smaller than thought all these years. So I read in the Deccan Herald last Tuesday. It was a report on the following Nature paper based on muonic Hydrogen at the Paul Scherrer Institute in Switzerland. I will give a talk at our BSM coffee club tomorrow morning on this. The announcement for the talk is:

Dear all,

I will give a 10 min. talk on the paper "The size of the proton" just
published in Nature, in our BSM coffee club. CHEP, Chairman's office,
10am, Tuesday, 27/7/2010.

Best regards, Anant

K. C. Das Sweets off New BEL Road

2010-07-24T21:19:00.001+05:30

Gosh, I hope this is not becoming an advertising corner! However, it brings me great joy to inform the readership of this humble blog that K. C. Das now has an outlet just off New BEL Road. Coming from IISc, hang a right just before the 2nd petrol bunk on your right, just after the Reliance mobile store. You won't be disappointed!

"Just Books" in RMV - Sanjay Nagar

2010-07-23T13:51:00.004+05:30

So we have become members of Just Books that has opened a branch near where we live. It fills a long sensed gap in our lives. The decor is beautiful, the people are very nice and the book collection excellent for book lovers of all ages. They have a clever system that uses magnetic readers. It is above the erstwhile Baskin and Robbins opposite the Corner House on 80 ft road (opposite MSR Memorial Hospital).

Satish Joglekar -- link to As I Please

2010-07-13T16:35:00.000+05:30

Without comment: on convocation robes, or how not to fear history

2010-07-11T10:51:00.002+05:30

Consider the following that was recently reported:

Stoking a potential controversy, environment minister Jairam Ramesh on Friday called as "barbaric colonial relics" the practice of wearing the traditional coloured robe at convocation ceremonies and publicly removed his own gown at one such event.

On the other hand, Mahmoud Mamdani has the following to say:

For over a millennium, these gowns have been a symbol of high learning from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic. Should anyone ask you where they came from, tell them that the early universities of Europe – Oxford, Cambridge, le Sorbonne – borrowed them from the Islamic madressa of the Middle East. If they should seem incredulous, tell them that the gown did not come by itself: because medieval European scholars borrowed from the madressa much of the curriculum, from Greek philosophy to Iranian astronomy to Arab medicine and Indian mathematics, they had little difficulty in accepting this flowing gown, modeled after the dress of the desert nomad, as the symbol of high learning. Should they still express surprise, ask them to take a second look at the gowns of the ayatollahs in Iran and Iraq and elsewhere and they will see the resemblance. Education has no boundaries. Neither does it have an end.

A conversation with Khaleel Pasha

2010-07-10T12:52:00.003+05:30

At this time each year, I have to leave the (mental) gated community [fn. 1] in which I normally live, to head off to Wheeler Road to meet our auditor to finalize the taxes. Since there is already enough stress in life, I take an auto to get there to avoid looking for parking and to day dream in the auto while the poor driver is taking all the stress. So I get into this auto and the driver says that he wants 10 rupees more. I, of course, react a little angrily, and then he says that prices of all essential commodities are increasing but their rates are the same. So I acquiesce and agree to his `demand'. He realizes that I am kindred soul and starts to pour his heart out. This is easy as I can handle all the languages of Bangalore, including even Kannada and we chat in Hindustani [fn. 2]. I see his name (Khaleel Pasha) and address and ask him where he lives. He says near Banashankari, but he has to go to all parts of Bangalore to earn his daily bread. He then says that he lives in a `slum area' [fn. 3] and there is such pressure on any and all housing that the rents are crawling up all the time. He tells me that his rent is upwards of three thousand rupees a month, not counting electricity and water. He pays one hundred and fifty rupees a day to the owner of the auto, spends more than a hundred on fuel and oil for the auto. He then adds that he has to work all days of the week to make ends meet. He is indebted by three lakhs of rupees, as he had to take this loan to have his two sisters married, and now is looking out to have his younger brother married. Fortunately, he is already married. Then he goes on to say that the cheapest brand of rice that he considers edible is over thirty rupees a kilogram, and that all vegetables and edibles are becoming more and more expensive. He also adds that if there is an illness in any working person's family or if someone is inform or elderly, then it becomes a real problem. So here was my reality check from `shining' and `resurgent' India. No, I do not need to go to air-conditioned seminar halls or even to lectures Halls in JNU learn about the economic reality in this great land of ours.

fn. [1]: the treachery of language which has named what should really be "walled communities" as "gated communities".

fn. [2]: from wikipedia

Hindustani , literally: 'of Hindustan'), also known as Hindostani or more commonly Hindi-Urdu, is an Indo-Aryan language, the lingua franca of India and Pakistan.

fn. [3]: from the online dictionary

slum

noun

1.
Often, slums. a thickly populated, run-down, squalid part of a city, inhabited by poor people.
2.
any squalid, run-down place to live.

Strange that he should himself call his neighbourhood this.

Report from Valencia

2010-06-22T02:02:00.002+05:30

Imagine a little big city where you can breathe, walk for miles on a river bed that has been turned into a garden, with some beautiful modern buildings together known as the 'city of science and arts´ where the old city has Moorish buildings, where there are no crowds, the people polite, the weather perfect, miles of sandy beach. Can such a place be? The answer is yes, and it is Valencia on the Mediterranean coast. After the crowds and jostling and aging metro of Paris, what a change! Just outside the airport you will see olive groves, lush agricultural lands and I am also told orange groves.

Vladimir Arnold (1937-2010)

2010-06-17T18:29:00.003+05:30

I learnt today of the passing of Vladimir Arnold on June 3, 2010. Here is the obituary from New York Times. He was also a commentator on mathematics education. A quote on French teaching of mathematics reads:

To the question "what is 2 + 3" a French primary school pupil replied: "3 + 2, since addition is commutative". He did not know what the sum was equal to and could not even understand what he was asked about!

Another French pupil (quite rational, in my opinion) defined mathematics as follows: "there is a square, but that still has to be proved".

The full article can be found here.

Paris -- June 2010

2010-06-16T19:45:00.004+05:30

So here I am in scenic Paris en route to Valencia. I will present a seminar tomorrow on our recent work on pion-Kaon form factors. This work involving many of us has been evolving now for over a couple of years. Paris is as pretty ever with variable spring weather but unusually cool. Walked from the Hotel near Gobelins to Chatelet this morning to get a flavour of the city. Will not have time for tourism this time. Maybe in Valencia?

My article in `Phalanx' on doing science in India

2010-06-04T13:24:00.002+05:30

Phalanx is a Quarterly Review for Continuing Debate. I am pleased to say that it carries my article on doing science in India. As mentioned there, it is a foray into a complex subject and is hardly comprehensive, and does not propose any solutions. The editors added questions and issues to my write-up. Let me know what you think.

Coorg trip

2010-05-31T13:41:00.002+05:30

It is astonishing how many things one can pack into a trip if one has transport at one's own beck and call. The road to Coorg goes past that oh so cute bird sanctury at Ranganathittu, which we visited many times earlier on the bypass around Mysore. We stopped by the `Golden Temple' of the Tibetan settlement on the day after Buddha Poornima and so there were big crowds and large celebrations. In and around Coorg the coffee estates that one passes are spectacularly beautiful. You can squeeze in a visit to Tala Cauvery and Bhagamandala for the religiously oriented, the fort and Raja Seat in the town of Coorg and the Omkareshwar temple that I saw from the outside. The Abbi (Abby? Abbey?) falls are pleasant too and on the way back you can stop by the Nisargadhama where the Cauvery makes islands and you can walk around in the bamboo parks. Don't miss it!

Incredible India vs. Suvarna Karnataka

2010-05-31T13:40:00.002+05:30

During the road trip to Coorg I finally registered the full import of the slogan `Suvarna Karnataka' as the region was still green and lush in the plains and even more wonderful in the Hills. How true, I said to myself. But then I always felt that the new slogan `Incredible India' to be a bit laboured. But what do I know...

'Homestay' in Coorg

2010-05-31T13:37:00.003+05:30

The only context in which I have known home in conjunction with something else is `Homecoming' as in game or Queen long years ago in Delaware, until this weekend when we went to Coorg for a vacation and were accomodated in `homestay' arrangement. I don't know what the rules of grammar are, but maybe it should be `homestaying'? In any case, this is now a very popular thing it seems. It is a great alternative to staying in a Hotel and we had a fabulous experience. Keep watching this space for more on our visit.

More travel notes from the North-East

2010-04-25T11:59:00.004+05:30

After Kolkata, the North-East weathered the storm of two talks by yours truly, in Shillong and in Guwahati on Particle Physics in the era of the LHC. Speaking of storms, Meghalaya of course lived up to its name with lovely showers on the way and of terrific climate. I heard on the news that the country was in the grip of a heat-wave, which skirted around Shillong. Guwahati was having unseasonable heavy rain. Strongly recommend these wonderful areas for all who want to travel. I am not alone in these sentiments. There was a group of 4 IITM Professors, including my old teacher Prof. Krishniah who were there with their families on LTC.

On the road in Kolkata

2010-04-15T13:10:00.003+05:30

So here I am in hot, sunny and humid Kolkata, visiting the Saha Institute where I give a talk tomorrow. Got here early in the morning yesterday and met some friends. We learnt that there was to be a talk on Operation Green Hunt and UAPA and some other issues by Goutam Navlakha and Arundhati Roy in the University and we went off there. There were about a thousand people there. Impressive to see how much interest there is in the general population on these subjects. Off to Shillong and Guwahati later this week. I am reading `Roadrunner' by Dilip D'Souza while on the road. Strongly recommend. He talks about Kartik Kalyanram whose blog is here. His mami Sundari Mahadevan was my father's late brother's wife. Small world indeed.

Asian Age/Deccan Chronicle Editorial on the LHC

2010-04-03T09:23:00.000+05:30

For fear of link-rot, I am giving the entire editorial here.
---------------------------------------------------------------

April.03 : After the Large Hadron Collider at CERN in Geneva earlier this week reported collisions of beams of protons — each of which was accelerated in a 27-km ring that runs deep underground across the Swiss-French border region at “centre of mass” energy — three and a half times higher than the highest energy reached before — scientists at the European Organisation for Nuclear Research announced that the world had now entered an unprecedented era of exploration of the sub-nuclear domain.

This will cast light on many mysteries, including the nature of the so-called “dark matter” which is known to exist in galaxies and without which they cannot be held together. Also, theories of elementary particle physics advanced by a generation of scientists will now be validated or falsified. This considerable achievement results from decades of planning, construction, and work on precision engineering and highly advanced accelerator technology coupled with gigantic detection apparatus married to phenomenal grid-computing facilities. The discoveries of recent centuries show that in order to get to the basic building blocks of matter, one needs ever-increasing energies to probe matter at the smallest length scales. The LHC experiments, by reaching unprecedented energies, will throw open the windows to discovery. They will help go beyond what scientists know as the “standard model” that describes the familiar electromagnetism, weak interactions that lead to radioactive beta decay, and the strong interactions that keeps quarks inside protons and neutrons. The Higgs particle, termed the “God particle” required for the consistency of the standard model, might yet be one of the early spectacular discoveries at the LHC. Furthermore, when the collider replaces protons by ions of lead, which are very heavy, it is expected that conditions that must have prevailed just after the “Big Bang”, from which the entire cosmos arose, will be replicated on earth. These can be studied at high precision under controlled conditions.
The LHC could not have come into being but for the foresight and dedication of hundreds of scientists across the world and the funding from a consortium of European member states. Like all great voyages, the LHC has had its share of tragedies, with a technician’s life being lost in an accident, and the helium leak in 2008 that set it back over a year. While the field of particle physics might appear arcane, its allure captures the fancy of the young and the enthusiastic in science. The spinoffs are immense: nuclear medicine without which cancer treatment would be impossible arose from nuclear physics, of which particle physics is the descendant; and indeed, the world knows CERN as the birthplace of the World Wide Web. India can be justly proud of its observer status at CERN and of the immense contribution made by scientists from its leading research institutions and universities in the project. Companies like BHEL, ECIL, Kirloskar and Compton-Greaves have won international tenders to supply top-of-the-line components to the LHC, in a commendable example of industry-research partnership. This could not have happened without the foresight of pioneers like Homi Bhabha, the father of particle physics research in India, who believed that the destiny of modern nations can be shaped only by a commitment of its men and women to a life of science. It is worth recalling the words of Robert Wilson when asked if particle physics research had any defence implications: “It has only to do with the respect with which we regard one another, the dignity of men, our love of culture. It has to do with: Are we good painters, good sculptors, great poets? I mean all the things we really venerate in our country and are patriotic about. It has nothing to do directly with defending our country, except to make it worth defending.”

Delhi as the Accidental Tourist Destination

2010-03-25T20:51:00.003+05:30

Thanks to the one perk we have on the job, Leave Travel Concession,
here we are in Delhi to visit family, and also, as tourists. Yes, it is a fabulous
tourist destination, provided you have a comfortable family pad to return to. Or of course you have lots of money to afford hotel accomodation, which comes in all varieties. Tourism is rendered much more effective thanks to the metro which now reaches many destinations, or at any rate always reaches Connaught Place where the metro stop is called Rajiv Chowk. We visited Qutb Minar, and I learnt that the oldest mosque in the sub-continent due to Alauddin Khalji (I remember spelling it Khilji in all school examinations, but political correctness must have taken over) is in the same complex, Humayun's tomb and Lodhi gardens Tuesday. The city is really and I kid you not, full of history in every corner and every pore. We were clearly not the only ones to think of tourism as we ran into Raghu Rangarajan and extended family at Humayun's tomb! Today was the day for the Jama Masjid which is impressive for its sheer size. We walked up to the top of one of the minars, about 130 steps, not counting the 60 or so you have to climb up before you get to the minar, up a narrow spiral staircase, to reach the top from where you have a view of Shahjahanabad. Then a short rickshaw ride to the Red Fort which is also magnificent. There are actully three museums in there, and the entrance to all these costing virtually nothing. Then on to the National Museum just off India Gate on Janpath which is as good a museum as any in the world. But one was already too tired to enjoy these. The trick is not to pack too many things into the same day. And of course, you want to pick the time of the year when the weather is pleasant. Although today was alright, in general it has been 7 degrees hotter than `normal'. Good luck to all of you who want to visit the City of Djinns. And I have not included in this so many other sights such as the Lotus Temple, Birla Mandir, Malai Mandir, National Gallery of Modern Art, Purana Qila, the zoo... (OLO, have I left anything out?).

As I Please: Fond memories of a no longer popular writer

2010-03-15T08:33:00.000+05:30

As I Please: Fond memories of a no longer popular writer

I am linking to a fun post with lot so equally fun comments!

As I Please: P. C. Vaidya

2010-03-13T17:37:00.000+05:30

As I Please: P. C. Vaidya

Edge of physics

2010-02-02T13:56:00.002+05:30

That is the title of a new book by Anil Ananthaswamy, also class of 1985, IITM. Life was complicated as my classmates and I spent five years at IITM and are also the class of 1985, but not Anil. You may be wondering if we all failed a year, but no. We were the last 5 year batch, while Anil and his classmates were the first 4 year batch. But I digress. Today he will give a talk at CHEP on his adventures that resulted in this book. Anil also writes a blog. You can find information on the book here and the blog is here. In one of the articles on the blog, which you can find here, he talks of one of Hawking's many bets, which also features work of my thesis advisor Qaisar Shafi.

Reflections on Haiti, links

2010-01-18T19:39:00.004+05:30

Reflections of Fidel Castro Ruz on Haiti from Granma.

An article by Regine Chassagne from The Guardian.

As I Please: Fond memories of a no longer popular writer

2010-01-18T19:39:00.000+05:30

As I Please: Fond memories of a no longer popular writer

Man made disasters -- cold deaths in Delhi

2010-01-15T19:59:00.003+05:30

After writing about luckless Haiti, I guess one should also think about our own luckless compatriots, see, e.g. this.

"Why does the Anglophone Indian want to be a Novelist?" Check this out.

2010-01-15T09:46:00.001+05:30

The title of this post is that of an editorial at the new web-site. Check it out.

Luckless Haiti

2010-01-15T09:44:00.001+05:30

If there is a luckless country in the world, it must be Haiti.

Fortunately, through Facebook we were able to contact our old friend Dominique Toublan whose wife Farah is from Haiti, and checked that almost all their friends and relatives are alright. One aunt was still unaccounted for.

My article on Barack Obama's Nobel Prize

2009-12-21T19:25:00.001+05:30

Here is the link to my article on Barack Obama's Nobel Prize published on the Lok Raj Sangathan web-site.

Year end post

2009-12-20T10:00:00.003+05:30

Seems a bit early already for the year end post. But this is because we are going to go away to Hyderabad for the mandatory vacation (how can it be a vacation if it is mandatory? Anyway...). This has been a very bad year for blogging; maybe the next one will be better. Life has been hectic as the Chairman since end of January. Started with a lot of work organizing the Strong Frontier workshop in PPISR. The remaining months have been a blur. Scientifically it has been good with many projects finishing. However, scientifically it has been a great year for the world with the LHC recording collisions, with the first hints of dark matter detection from CDMS experiment. There has also been a lot of reading that I have been doing on general science on BBC which is quite extraordinary. These include stories of plants in Malaysia (I think) which trap and eat ~~science~~ mice, discovery of many new species in India, Western ghats and Arunachal Pradesh. And one should not forget the discovery of water by the Chandrayaan project. Have a left anything out? Comments welcome.

Article on bibliometric evaluation of scientists

2009-11-02T12:11:00.002+05:30

Here is a link to an article with an intriguing title, Bibliometric evaluation of individual researchers: not even right... not even wrong! by Franck Laloë and Remy Mosseri. Worth checking out.

Prof. M. S. Raghunathan gives the 18th Meera Memorial Lecture

2009-11-02T07:08:00.005+05:30

The 18th Meera Memorial Lecture will be given on
Thursday, December 3, 2009 at 6 pm at the Indian Institute of World Culture, Basavanagudi, Bangalore, by Prof. M. S. Raghunathan of TIFR Mumbai entitled "The queen of sciences: her realm, her influence and her health". The trust web-site is here.

Update: Here is the abstract

What is mathematics? That is evidently a difficult question to answer. Nevertheless mathematics has had an independent identity as an intellectual discipline since antiquity. In this talk, I will first discuss the main characterestics that contribute to giving mathematics its identity challenging in the process some common negative perceptions about mathematics, viz., that mathematics is a dry unimaginative subject, that its rigorous discipline is forbidding and that its cold logic destroys all sensitivity in its practitioners. I will then briefly dwell on the importance of mathematics to our society and finally say something about the state of mathematics research and teaching in our country

Program in IISc on the situation in Chattisgarh

2009-10-31T17:13:00.001+05:30

One of the members of Concern, an IISc student's forum wrote to me requesting me to advertise a programme they are organizing on Chattisgarh, November 7, 2009. [I will take this opportunity say that I am happy to post any students' organization's notice if they write to me as long as the tone is civilized and in my estimation they will not offend any particular group or community.] Details at their web-site here and here.

Mathematics and Physics

2009-10-31T10:51:00.002+05:30

Let me have the luxury of day-dreaming a little about the connection between mathematics and physics. To me it seems that the separation took place only about a 100 years ago. Perhaps Poincare did not consider himself either a mathematician or a physicist, but both. But the reason for this post is a reaction to some thoughts that have been in my mind for some time. Today it was catalyzed by reading a news item about the Shaw prize which was awarded to Donaldson and Taubes. It seems to me that Taubes notable achievements are in the mathematics arising from gauge theories and quantum field theories. He is concerned with various monopole solutions in part of his work. So the connection is quite clear. The other reason is the claim of objectivity in these disciplines which is supposed to transcend subjectivity, unlike in other spheres of human endeavour. But is this really so? Atiyah has written that mathematics will get a big boost from string theory, while Langlands has said that it will get a boost from quantum field theory and statistical mechanics. While there is no dispute about these, it seems to me that these are really quite subjective views in which there is a human intervention. In other words, are these assessments really objective, or is it that mathematics and physics are also like any other enterprises, guided by taste and aesthetics. This is not to say that there are no rigorous standards. Let me welcome comments.

2010 Sakurai Prize

2009-10-31T10:48:00.002+05:30

The 2010 Sakurai Prize honours all the discoverers of what is known as the Higgs mechanism. These are Hagen, Guralnik, Englert, Brout and Kibble, in addition to Higgs. Read about it here.

Appeal for Vikram Buddhi

2009-10-30T18:13:00.003+05:30

For the first time yesterday I heard of Vikram Buddhi who has been incarcerated in the USA under the most mysterious of circumstances. It appears very shocking. I believe the Hon. Minister Mr. S. M. Krishna has now promised help. I would urge you to go and sign the appeal here which was brought to my attention by my sister.

Thomas Henziger is President of new Institute of Science and Technology

2009-10-27T09:00:00.002+05:30

Those of you who read my posts from 2008 on my travel-log in Switzerland may rember a brief reference to old friend Thomas Henzinger in this here. Yesterday I received an alert from a friend Japhet Bagilishya that Thomas had moved back to Austria to take up an important post. It turns out that it is not just any old post: he is now the President of the Institute of Science and Technology in Vienna and you can read about it in an article from Nature.

India-Nobel prizes at "Reflections"

2009-10-23T15:35:00.001+05:30

Over at "Reflections" Shivanand Kanavi has many posts on the Indian near hits of Nobel prizes (NPs).

While it is sad for those gentlemen, is there not too much talk about NPs among in our science administration?

Magnetic monopoles in spin ice

2009-10-22T18:34:00.002+05:30

Part of my duties will be link to interesting science articles and posts. Leading candidate this Thursday is the article in magnetic monopoles in spin ice over at "As I please" which you can find
here.

A blogger is reborn?

2009-10-20T20:54:00.002+05:30

I feel impelled (one of my dictionaries warns me against getting impelled and compelled mixed-up incorrectly) to wake up and to become a blogger again. The hiatus in blogging resulted with a general dis-satisfaction with the quality of my own posts, turbulent events in personal and professional life, including serial hospitalizations of near and dear at the time of my last post 10 months or so ago, but a semblance of order seems to be creeping in now. A recently joined colleague asked me if I had stopped blogging because I am now Chairman of my Centre and if that has influenced my decision, while Rahul Basu over at "As I Please" has deleted my blog from his list of blogs he reads, and while Abi at "Nanopolitan" has been decrying the lack of science bloggers, and finally a mail today from some one at the Centre for Society and the Internet wrote to me on my views on open-source or something of that sort, even though I am no longer a regular blogger, etc., has prompted the decision to rise from the ashes. In the meantime, I have been continuing to read blogs. One of the important things that has made an impression on me is the elementary proof of the density Hales-Jewett problem on Timothy Gowers' blog featured very prominently on Nanopolitan which has woken me up to the importance of science/maths blogging. While it is impossible that this humble blog will ever find a niche of that sort, it is the paucity of Indian science blogs which has jolted me out. So let me promise all 3 readers of this blog (are there that many?) that I will make an effort.

Climate change affects Jupiter

2009-04-06T09:00:00.001+05:30

After a long long break from blogging I thought it is time to start again. Let us begin with this science story which says that climate change is there on Jupiter also. See here.

Abbas Tyrewala on the Mumbai attacks

2008-12-10T15:35:00.004+05:30

I was struck and intrigued at what I read here. This is a story on the reaction of Abbas Tyrewala (I had never heard of him before; I guess I do not follow Bollywood script writers, etc.) to the Mumbai attacks. He talks about his genuine fear of retaliation for the attacks with which he has nothing to do. He admires the Indian people (more precisely the people of Mumbai) for sticking together. The only question he does not ask is what exactly is a backlash? It is my humble submission that one can expect a backlash not from the common people of India, but from the horrid political parties which are known to be behind every one of such backlashes.

The events of November 2008: dos and don'ts

2008-11-30T20:00:00.003+05:30

DOs

Remember the victims and pay homage to their memory.

Thank the heroes and pay homage to their memory.

Hope against all hope that it will never happen again.

Be patient and wait for results of enquiry.

DON'Ts

Blame sections of Indian people who have nothing to do with this.

Blame other countries before there is any evidence.

Don't speculate and spread rumours.

Do not demonize others and spread prejudices.

The events of November 2008

2008-11-29T19:41:00.003+05:30

A minute of silence for the victims of November 2008. No words will be suffice to express the horror.

Two new words

2008-11-26T20:37:00.002+05:30

I came across two new words recently. One was invented by Aparna: she said that she wanted to spend a RELAXFUL Sunday at home. So we saw how words are born in this live example: I guess eight year olds are aware of words such as relaxing and restful this eight year old invented a new word for our edification! From a friend I learnt a new word today: FRENEMY for which many definitions are available on the urban dictionary. Check them out!

The 17th Meera Memorial Lecture

2008-11-26T16:40:00.004+05:30

Attention of readers of this humble blog: The 17th Kumari L. A. Meera Memorial Lecture will be delivered on December 12, 2008 (Friday) by Prof. P. Balaram, Director, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore at 6 pm at the Indian Institute of World Culture, B. P. Wadia Road, Basavanagudi. The title is `Chemical Analysis in the Age of Biology'. The web-site of the Meera Trust is here.

Update: You can read the abstract here.

My article on the Obama Presidency

2008-11-22T09:39:00.003+05:30

My article on the Obama Presidency and South Asia has been published by Lokrajsangathan. I am reproducing it below with a crucial typo corrected! The link is here.

The Obama Presidency and its Consequences to south Asia

by B. Ananthanarayan

On November 4, 2008 Senator Barack Obama was elected by a `landslide' to the Presidency of the United States of America. The election has taken place in the midst of a world wide economic crisis and financial meltdown, and in the midst of two highly unpopular wars in which the USA finds itself.

The electoral college landslide victory of Sen. Obama appears to be due mainly to the anti-incumbency factor: his opponent John McCain was directly identified as one who could continue the policies of the outgoing President George W. Bush in domestic as well as in international affairs. It is not entirely likely that Sen. Obama procured massive endorsements of his candidature following his nomination, and indeed the nomination of the Democratic Party as he was a relative newcomer and is not identifiably a member of hated ruling circles and the establishment (in contrast to his main rival for the Democratic Party nomination, Sen. Hillary Clinton).

Sen. Obama's appearance is expected to lend a `human face' to his administration, something that the previous administration could not muster. Even in this regard, it is worth noting that despite national and world wide media extravaganza and efforts to whip up record voter turnout, the figure stood at a little more than 60% of the electorate -- not significantly different from the 2004 election.

In his first comments after the election, Sen. Obama has been quick to say that there would be no quick-fixes to problems and has appealed to the American people to show courage and conviction to deal with their problems. In other words, Sen. Obama admits that his Presidency has the primary task of ensuring that the rule of the financial oligarchs and private moneyed interests receives a new lease of life.

As regards international affairs, during his campaign Sen. Obama repeatedly demonstrated his dexterity at sabre-rattling, by singling out Iran and Pakistan, that consist of fraternal peoples of India, as potential targets of his future Presidency. Such being the case, the peoples of South Asia can only be profoundly concerned at the election of Sen. Obama.

What Sen. Obama inherits is a world profoundly out of equilibrium, with the all round collapse of the arrangements that were in place at the time of the bipolar division of the world. The outright launch of wars of aggression by the Bush administration in Iraq and in Afghanistan which sought to bring in a new equilibrium, have not led to this state of affairs. One of the Obama Presidency's main project would be to try and stabilize the putative hegemony of the USA in world affairs, elimination of regimes unfavourable to US interests, and imposition of market driven economies and western style democracy, and try to meet success in a manner that the Bush administration could not. Despite repeated references to `change' it is likely that his administration will only continue brinkmanship in matters of engagement with Iran and with, e.g., Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

The perils for the people of India and the region are immense in this era. Recalling that having received the recognition of a responsible nuclear power through their various activities including negotiations towards the Indo-US Nuclear Deal, through their dealings in the IAEA, Indian ruling circles are waiting to flex their muscles. Indian military spending stays anomalously high, missile tests take place on a routine basis, provocative remarks are made on sensitive border issues, and so on, which do little to convince India's neighbours that her aims remain peaceable. At this time the ruling circles in India have been waiting with bated breath for the election process to conclude, and to figure out how to carry out their aims at this time. Their main aim would be to be in collusion with US activities and to emerge as a full-fledged world power, and to continue the arrangements that have already been made with the Bush administration. For instance, Sen. Obama's sabre rattling towards Pakistan brings a warm glow to the hearts of India's ruling circles. It is not unforeseeable that India would provide facilities for launching of attacks by the US from its territories in the imperialist wars that may be part of the Obama Presidency.

What then are the people of India to do? The first thing to do is to repudiate all sabre-rattling, and to demand the end of militarization of India, and of the region. They must demand that issues and problems must be settled by negotiation where all parties are treated with dignity. They must demand that India not be part of any strategic alliance with the US. They must demand that India should stop aspiring to be a military power, and instead be a factor for peace and development in the region. Such a demand must be combined with the ~~militarization~~ demilitarization of the inner-life of the country. Name calling and demonization of sections of the Indian people, whipping up of chauvinism must be repudiated. Conditions must be created for the progress of society --- this cannot possibly be achieved by any alliance with war mongering nations with or without a human face. An engagement with the USA must be one which is based on mutual respect for all countries and the peoples, not one of suppression by brute military power of India or of any of its neighbours. By articulating this in a principled and uncompromising way, the people of India can contribute to staving off the danger of war in the region.

Without comment: excerpt from an article on Obama

2008-11-01T13:56:00.003+05:30

When you bear this in mind, the US presidential race becomes surreal. The beatification of President Barack Obama is already under way; for it is he who “challenges America to rise up [and] summon ‘the better angels of our nature’”, says Rolling Stone magazine, reminiscent of the mating calls of Guardian writers to the “mystical” Blair. As ever, the Orwell Inversion Test is necessary. Obama claims that his vast campaign wealth comes from small individual donors, yet he has also received funds from some of the most notorious looters on Wall Street. Moreover, the “dove” and “candidate of change” has voted repeatedly to fund George W Bush’s rapacious wars, and now demands more war in Afghanistan while he threatens to bomb Pakistan.

That is from this article by John Pilger.

Here is one more quote:

Among ordinary Americans desperate for a secure life, his skin colour may help him regain this unjustified “trust”, even though it is of a similar hue to that of Colin Powell, who lied to the United Nations for Bush and now endorses Obama. As for the rest of us, is it not time we opened our eyes and exercised our right not to be lied to, yet again?

Our RN article on the puzzle in the B-meson system

2008-10-26T19:29:00.004+05:30

With my new co-worker Gauhar Abbas and a summer student from St. Stephen's, Kriti Ashok, I studied problems in the B-meson system, and in collaboration with my old friend S. Uma Sankar, an article was written for publication in Current Science explaining the issues in their Research News Section. The article may be found here.

My paper on the heat-kernel coefficients of `non-minimal' operators

2008-10-26T19:19:00.006+05:30

Some years ago while collaborating with Bachir Moussallam, I ran into the issue of so-called non-minimal operators and their heat-kernel coefficients which is of interest in chiral perturbation theory with virtual photons. On my own I tried to understand the issue and the results, found lots of results with no apparent connection, contradictory references, etc.. So I decided to sit down and work through the masses of xerox copies of papers on the subject and wrote a draft of a paper pointing out several connections, simplifications, working out special cases, etc.. I sent it to Journal of Physics and got one report which said it should be published as it is very useful, and another saying that all this is well known. It went to an adjudicator who pointed the possible reason why I was finding some inconsistencies, and said that the paper could not be published in that form. When I took this reason into account all the inconsistencies vanished and it was submitted again, and the round had almost the identical outcome as regards referees. The new adjudicator agreed that it should be published after many many more changes were to be accounted for. The happy outcome of this voyage of discovery may be found here. I am posting this as a part of my new policy of explaining on my blog what I do in my research as well, for the benefit of all the three readers of this blog!

(Teaching vs. Research) vs. (Teaching and Research)

2008-10-26T13:18:00.003+05:30

Many of my academic friends who blog have blogged in the past on the issue of Teaching and Research. I have participated in the comments on these. It is my humble submission that those who are primarily engaged in research actually do not really understand or appreciate how much it takes to be a good teacher. Often the arguments run that those in Research Institutes who are not doing great work and are somehow falling behind could be farmed off to Teaching Institutes. In fact one could write a farcical counter-proposal to this as follows: "X was hired to to a teaching Institute. Over the years X started getting really sick of students and teaching. He found that he does not find students questions and grading interesting any more. The Head of the Department summons him and says that we are aware that you once did some research also. In your graduate students days you held a research assistantship and even wrote a couple of papers. Now that you are really falling behind in teaching, maybe you should seriously consider a change in career and take up research in one of our premier Research Institutes. After all, all these years in a teaching environment would have given you special skills to deal with unpredictable situations that could arise in a research environment." Now back to reality after a few moments with farce: It is only recently I have come to discover how hard it is to hold the attention of students for a semester, leave alone a year. Not that I have not taught before; in fact I have been teaching for over a decade, not counting years of teaching assistantships during graduate student days. Recently I have been teaching some additonal classes as students wanted to learn about some advanced topics, not connected to the course I teach. The patience that is needed to prepare for lecture after lecture, make up homework assignments, conduct tests and exams, see students off and on is almost superhuman. Furthermore, if one's mind is so preoccupied, how is it possible to really do research? The magnitude of work required to do a good job of research is also awesome. Maybe it is only superhumans who can do a good job of both at the same time?

Chandrayaan launch

2008-10-22T19:46:00.002+05:30

We were already up this morning and were able to watch the launch live on TV. It was quite an enthralling experience. Can't imagine how much excitement there must have been at Shriharikota. What I find most impressive about such achievements is the teamwork. Without that how can one get any project of this magnitude done? I will look forward to reading about the actual take-off from the earth's gravitational field into that of the moon. What I found intriguing also is how they went ahead despite the strong cyclonic activity in the Bay of Bengal? [Speaking of this, I got really drenched this afternoon walking to IISc on New BEL Road.] Way to go.

The Indian blogosphere and the US election

2008-10-22T18:32:00.002+05:30

I must confess that I am pretty much surprised at the amount of bandwidth that has been consumed by the US election on the Indian blogosphere. Perhaps there are some reasons: many Indian people have lived in the US, have relatives there, read the English press, regale the stories on the idiocies of Palin, the foibles of McCain, the charm of Obama. But I still cannot understand the intensity of opinion and the singular preoccupation of an election circus in a far-away land. Much has been said about Obama's middle name --- does the American voter think of this before he or she casts her vote, is the American voter a bigot, the list is endless. [I wonder how much bandwidth was consumed in the American blogosphere on the Pratibha Patil vs. Bhairon Singh Shekawat election or the Ansari vs. Heptullah election! ] My humble submission is simply: who cares?! Why should anyone care who is elected President of the US. Does in make any difference to the average African-American if an African-American is elected President?! Will the streets of Washington D. C. be safer? Will there be fewer attacks on Afghan civilians by US armed forces? Will fewer people lose jobs?! On the issue of the possible bigotry of the Republican camp: who cares? Why not Indian people think about bigotry in India? Could it be that the Indian blogosphere is dominated by upper-caste types who are themselves not really victims of the endemic and widespread bigotry of our society and cannot relate to it, but can instead relate to purported bigotry against those of `colour' in the US? Such is the nature of confusion in my unsophisticated mind...

Recent talks that I have given

2008-10-14T17:20:00.003+05:30

I will be trying to link the talks that I give to this blog so that I have a record of these, and just in case one of you is also interested.

On September 10, 2008 I gave a talk here at CHEP in honour of the first beam at LHC. It was one of the best attended talks that I have given and to my satisfaction many students seem to have liked it. The link for the pdf file is here.

A shorter version was given as a colloquium at Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad and the link for the pdf file is here.

Travels 2008

2008-10-14T09:00:00.003+05:30

Just got back from 8 days of vacation and travel in Delhi and the region. We did a two day trip to Mathura, Agra and Fatehpur-Sikri. The region was unseasonably warm and we could not pack in too much despite travelling in an air-conditioned vehicle. The day temperatures were about 36 C and the night temperatures were also high, and even the mornings were warm and humid. Mathura was interesting and we visited the Bange-Behari temple, which I am told is one of the most important temples in the region. And the Nidhivan which is where Krishna is supposed to be dancing every night with his 16,020 Gopikas. Later we visited the Janmabhoomi. It seemed like we were visiting a prison because of the number of metal detectors and frisking we had to endure. As you know this is right next to a fort which is also a mosque. I do not know if the mosque is a place of worship. In any case, despite all the propaganda in our newspapers and electronic media, I did not sense any kind of tension in the air. The next day was the visit to the Taj. After reading the morning's tragic headlines (see my earlier post on `Death in America') we did get to the Taj by 8:15 and inside the complex by 8:30 (lucky as the gates were closed off by 9:00 for a visiting dignitary and we were told would reopen only at 13:00). And what a sight. Did not imagine its grandeur and stateliness, dimensions and yes, symmetry. It is also very simple: sounds contradictory but it is the simplicity and gives the grace. It looks good as new. This is what was most surprising. I did not expect a monument which is I believe 360 years old to look this new. As Aparna said of herself, "this is my first wonder of the world." Yes, mine too. And the first time. After spending a good hour and a half in the complex we then left for Fatehpur-Sikri. It is also very impressive and I visite my first Dargah as well, that of Salim Chisti. It was quite touching to see the faith of so many who come here to make a secret wish. Of course I am tired of talking about India's multi-religious society and and how it is syncretic, blah, blah, blah! Why is it so surprising? After all no matter what the religion is, the people of the country eat the same food, breathe the same air, drink the same water, spend the same money, travel by the same train. But that is another story. After a nice meal at the nearby Hotel Goverdhan which is owned by the father of one of Anita's students at Ramaiah Institute, we got a tour of this lovely little hotel with about 20 rooms, extremely clean, spacious and comfortable, went back to Mathura and rested for a while and got back home by 22:15. A lovely little holiday indeed.

Physics Nobel Prizes: 2008

2008-10-14T08:51:00.003+05:30

It was great to hear that Yochiro Nambu has finally be recognized by the Nobel committee. I learnt yesterday that he is now 87 years of age, and the work that has been recognized is about five decades old. It is very hard to imagine how he did the work when there was practically no framework, and nothing to go by. The idea of spontaneous symmetry breaking which was known in palable condensed matter systems was applied in particle physics at that time! To view pions as the bosons associated with a spontaneously broken (approximate) symmetry is now something that is taken for granted. It must have been out of the world at that time.

The second half is shared by Makoto Kobayashi and Toshihide Maskawa for their work on quark mixing that predicted the existence of the third generation (5th and 6th flavours) of quarks. I believe the mathematics was straightforward, but what a leap of faith! What an audacious idea! At a time when the fourth quark was only hypothesized (and needed for consistency), to say that there should be a fifth and a sixth!

`Death of an American Dream': Karthik Rajaram and family, in memoriam

2008-10-13T06:39:00.002+05:30

Last week I looked at the headlines in the newspaper at the Indian Oil Guest House in Mathura at 7 am, while on holiday enroute to the Taj Mahal. There was a headline `Death of an American Dream'. I thought that it must be an article on people losing their homes in the USA. But to my horror it was about a mass murder cum suicide in the USA. Continuing to read with suspension of disbelief, I saw the unmistakable name Karthik Rajaram, classmate from B. Tech.. Of course the name may not have immediately rung a bell but for some emails on a newsgroup on which I get mail. The horror of it all: to take three kids, wife and mother-in-law with him. The next day an article in the HT even gave his roll number 80076. Yes, we have already gone for a memorial service for Ajay Tambe, 80001. While there are no words to express this horror, I must take a stand on the issue of taking so many with him. There can be no justification. Because if there is, there will be more to come. My first reaction was anger at killing so many innocents, the next of great sadness that such a thing could happen. There are no more words.

My Outlook India article on the LHC

2008-09-20T15:08:00.004+05:30

My article on the LHC has just appeared in Outlook India, on page 123 of the print edition of the B-school special, dated September 29, ~~2009~~ 2008. There was no space for acknowledgements, but this would not have happened but for Diptiman Sen, Sudhir Kumar Vempati and S. Uma Sankar, and also Debasish Ghosh of Aerospace who I have never met. So this may be considered the acknowledgement.

Update: Thanks to Abbas Ali for pointing out the error in the date!

Here is the link.

It is reproduced below for fear of link rot (I have checked with the South India Associate Editor that it is ok to do this.)

Subatomic Slugfest

The CERN experiment is the Apollo moon mission of particle physics

B. Ananthanarayan

On September 10, when the first proton beam was injected into the 'Large Hadron Collider' (LHC) at CERN, in Geneva, science began an exciting new voyage of discovery. The LHC is an awesome machine that will collide intense beams of protons, which will be accelerated in two rings of 27 km circumference. The energy would be seven times larger than the highest ever achieved by accelerators. Four immense detectors will surround the four interaction points of the collisions, and detect the particles produced in the fireball of the impact. At a later stage, the protons will be replaced by nuclei of lead atoms to replicate conditions similar to those that existed at the time of the Big Bang.

Likened to the Apollo moon mission in grandeur, the LHC—an engineering marvel—is the result of the effort of thousands of scientists and engineers, whose purpose is to advance their understanding of nature at its most minuscule scale, which can be probed only with the highest energies. And past great discoveries have come with higher and higher energies. These discoveries have had massive spinoffs in technology: indeed, CERN is the mother of the worldwide web, just as the space programme led to the revolution in materials, and nuclear physics is at the heart of the modern cancer therapy.

The LHC was built at a cost of billions of Swiss Francs by CERN member-states, along with the participation of countries like India, which enjoys 'observer' status. It is a proud moment for many players from India—among these, the DAE Raja Ramanna Centre for Advanced Technology, barc, tifr and others have played notable parts, and teams from universities and research institutes have been involved at many stages of the project. ECIL, BHEL, Kirloskar Electric Co. Ltd, Crompton-Greaves Ltd are among companies that have participated in r&d and fabrication of components. The LHC project has demonstrated the coming of age of Indian science, technology, engineering and manufacturing in the 21st century.

The LHC will carry out its explorations in the deep sub-nuclear domain. Whereas people are familiar with chemistry as the science of atoms and molecules, we now know that atoms are made of nuclei and electrons, and nuclei of protons and neutrons, and protons and neutrons of quarks (and gluons). We have a picture of the elementary particles in nature, and how they participate in the electromagnetic interaction, weak and strong. The first arises from electrically charged particles interacting via the exchange of force carriers, namely mass-less photons, not unlike two children (electrons) who throw a tennis-ball (photon) back and forth in a game. The weak interactions lead to the decay of some radioactive isotopes, and also of free neutrons. Thus they are significant only at the sub-nuclear scale, and one may surmise that the corresponding force carriers are extremely massive. The strong interactions are those that trap quarks and gluons inside hadrons. There are also heavier quarks than those in protons and neutrons, all of which would have been abounding around us, but for the weak interactions, which lead to their spontaneous decay. Electrons too have heavier unstable cousins, and each of these have electrically neutral counterparts are known as neutrinos.

If indeed the electromagnetic and weak forces have a common origin as we now believe, how is it that the photon remained mass-less while the force carrier of the weak forces became massive? The question was answered by Peter Higgs in the 1960s, but at a price—a thus far undetected particle, the Higgs boson. With the gigantic energy in the collisions at LHC and the rates of collisions available here, we may at long last discover this particle. There has been gathering evidence for decades, and more recently of direct imprints, of so-called 'dark matter' in galaxies.Such particles will be produced in the fireballs of the LHC collisions and would leave distinct signatures in the detectors.

There have been many questions in the public mind about the project's safety. In popular theoretical scenarios, microscopic black holes are predicted to exist. If produced, they present no danger, as they bear no relation to the super-massive black sholes present in the centres of galaxies, and consequently we need have no fear of these! Furthermore, they would decay into conventional particles as a consequence of the results established by Steven Hawking.

It may yet be that the LHC will reveal wonders that no one has dreamt of. The voyage has just begun.

(The author is associate professor at the Centre for High Energy Physics, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, and serves on the Board of Editors of the European Physical Journal)

I moderate a panel discussion on reservations

2008-09-20T15:02:00.002+05:30

Arvind and Sarita of CONCERN, one of IISc's students organization requested me to moderate a panel discussion on aspects of the Reservation Policy. The three panelists were Prof. Muthiah from Osmania University, Thiru Adhyaman, social activist from Tamil Nadu, and Thiru Aanaimuthu, a venerable veteran of the struggle were the panelists. I don't know about others, but for me it was more eye opening than ever, about the condition of the Dalits in our country, and more so about the Dalits among the Dalits. I was particularly shocked to know about the Arundhatiars of TN. It was humbling for me to moderate the event.

India as a `Great Power' --- my article on the LRS page

2008-09-08T17:47:00.003+05:30

Here is my article on the subject on the LRS page, reproduce below for fear of link-rot.

India as a `Great Power'

What does it mean for the people of India?

by B. Ananthanarayan

In the preceding months there has been a tremendous amount of activity in the political mainstream and elsewhere on the Indo-US Nuclear Deal. Much has been written about the supposed surrender of sovereignty by India, and even more about the pros and cons for the people of the country in terms of the energy security offered, and a lot of bandwidth consumed by pitiless analysis of the 1-2-3 Agreement, etc.. There have been hairs split about whether or not India is right in brokering these arrangements with the hated Bush administration of the sole imperialist superpower of the world. The Left Parties have criticized the deal mainly in the context of giving in to imperialism, and have argued that the people of India have serious reservations about making any deal with the USA.

While all the above may be true, it has been less clearly enunciated that the Indo-US Nuclear Deal actually comes at a time when the Indian ruling circles have clearly capitalized on the gains they have made in the post-cold war era and have emerged on the world scene as an ascendent imperilialist power.

In an interviewed granted to the newspaper Daily News & Analysis dated August 23, 2008, the India scholar Dr. Marie-Carine Lall says that the deal has nothing to do with energy and instead that ``It has a lot to do with India getting the Great Power status. In the UN Security Council, for instance, all the permanent members are recognised nuclear powers. Even though India was known to be a nuclear power since 1974, due to the Nuclear-Non-proliferation Treaty, it was not recognised as one. The Manmohan Singh government is trying to rectify that. This was only going to be possible if the US did this kind of a deal with India.'', and further that, ``Even if the deal fails, the fact that the US has extended the deal and tried to negotiate it with India means that recognition has already taken place.''

Such being the case, it may then be contingent to ask what does this really mean for the people of India, and indeed for the peoples of the region, and that of the world. Indeed, the people of India need to quiz the ruling circles of India on what they plan to do with such a `Great Power' status. Such a quiz would necessarily lead to rejecting the vision of the ruling circles and would pave the path for offering a different one.

It may first be important to ask what `Great Power' status has historically meant in the context of the Big Five. World over, the opinion would be that this status has been treated as a license by these countries, with the possible exception of China, in the last several decades, to willy-nilly interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, destablize governments, help organize coups, make countries favoured destinations for finance capital, and at times the launch of outright
wars of aggression and conquest. Is this the kind of `Great Power' status that the people of India would like their country to enjoy? An answer to this question cannot come without first considering the historical realities in the country at this time.

At this time in the country, we have a situation where there are increasing attacks on all the peoples of the country, here in the name of crushing naxalism, there in the name of
curbing Islamic terrorism. We have a situation where anyone opposing any activities of the state, whether it is opposing SEZ laws, or seizure of tribal lands, is simply locked away. There are brutal
police firings on a daily basis, here in Kashmir, there in Jaipur, once in Andhra, another time in Orissa. There are fires being set ablaze between religious groups in Kashmir and Orissa and
elsewhere, while simultaneously there are preparations for the general elections in 2009 and state elections across the country. While there is mass discontent, the ruling circles are closing
their ranks to put up a united defence of their interests, while it promises more devastation for the people of India. While the people of India are acutely conscious of what it means to live
under the yoke of such a ruling class, and such a political system as the one under which they find themselves, this system is praised by the USA and other western powers as `the largest democracy'. Given this grim scenario, there can only be alarm if a `Great Power' status
is accorded to a country of which such a ruling class is at the helm. Indeed, the `Great Power' status can come in handy to whip up jingositic fervour and divert the anger of the masses against an external perceived enemy. It can be used to hound religious minorities in the country and cause bitter divisions among the people. It can also be used to interfere in the affairs of other countries to create favourable conditions for Indian big business to operate. It can be useful to carry out militarization of the region on a scale unparalleled in the past. And most importantly, the `Great Power' status can be used to obtain immunity from international law to carry out criminal activities within the country against the peoples of the country, and outside its
boundaries. This is the precipice at which the people of India and the regions are staring at, at this time.

What then are the people of India to do? They must reject the vision of India that is modelled on the European model of great nation states. They must reject the complete divorce between the polity and the people. They must show that to separate the economic and political discussion from the actual impact that it has on the people is not to the benefit of the people. A discussion must begin on how India can be a factor for world peace, a factor for a secure future for the people of the country as well as for the region. Its immense wealth and resource, its trained population, its self-sacrificing working masses and peastry, must be put the service of the people of India and of the region, and not just to that of the rulers of India. The absence of a discussion on this subject would prepare the grounds for an aggressive India that will heighten the risk of war in the region, and the risk of utter devastation for a large fraction of the population of the region. The challenge of the times is to initiate and carry forward such a discussion.

Spenta Wadia is interviewed by The Deccan Herald

2008-08-15T08:28:00.002+05:30

Spenta Wadia, well-known theoretical physicist and the founding director of the new International Centre for Theoretical Sciences was interviewed by The Deccan Herald. The link is here.
It is reproduced below due to fear of link rot.

ICTS in Blore to rekindle interest in basic sciences

Theres a need to meet paucity of good science teachers. The quality of science education in schools and colleges is perhaps one of the reasons why people dont take up basic sciences. You dont make them interesting enough. Its not only the money that takes people away says Spenta Wadia

With students turning their backs on science, the Centre has decided to seek reversal of the trend by creating a new International Centre for Theoretical Sciences (ICTS) in Bangalore. This prestigious institute will, among other things, try to bring young minds back to science research by improving the quality of science teaching in colleges and universities. Likely to be inaugurated by November 2009, the ICTS will be Tata Institute of Fundamental Research’s (TIFR) third centre in the Garden City. The other two centres being the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) and Centre for Applicable Mathematics (CAM). The ICTS promises to create the same level of academic excellence. The centre’s director Spenta Wadia spoke to Kalyan Ray of Deccan Herald about the upcoming institute and what role it would play in attracting students to science.

Bangalore already has too many institutes. Why one more?

It will not be just another centre. It will be driven by the visitors coming from all over the world for academic programmes. There will be parallel streams of subjects so that people from different streams can interact. Programmes on statistical physics and biology can run parallel as there are new areas in biology which use fundamentals of physics. This type of centre is unique in India.

What will be its main areas of research?

There will be emphasis on activities in areas overlapping traditional fields of science like biological physics, computational science, complex systems, fluids, the interface between cosmology, particle physics and string theory and new emergent areas of mathematics with applications in biology and finance.

Will you carry out any other activities besides research?

We also want to focus on teachers’ training and outreach. There’s a need to meet paucity of good science teachers. The quality of science education in schools and colleges is perhaps one of the reasons why people don’t take up basic sciences. You don’t make them interesting enough. It’s not only the money that takes people away.

But money is a factor. Science research is simply not a paying job...

Money is a very important factor. But there will be some percentage of people who would feel inspired if the teaching is good, if you produce good textbooks and if you make things interesting and exciting, because if you excite somebody’s mind at some point, that person might think that it (solving scientific challenges) is worthwhile. The government is now investing a lot of money in basic sciences and planning to increase the emoluments of scientists. So science research can be attractive in future.

Is it the reason that you keep outreach as one of the major ICTS activities to let people know about the wonders of science?

We would like to interact with the civic society at all levels. But specifically, we would target the university and college teachers.

Will there be an industry interface?

It’s important to have an academia-industry interface. It’s not very popular in India and we should make a beginning. For example, there is the concept of Math Clinic in which if an industry — ranging from engineering to financial and biotechnology — has certain mathematical problems, a set of mathematicians are invited to solve that problem.

Do you think that centres like ICTS will help in bringing students back to science?

Hopefully yes. We need to inspire students. Lack of inspirational teachers and inspirational labs are driving students away from science. Our existing laboratories are pathetic. In experimental sciences we are not good precisely because the laboratories in high school and colleges are so primitive.

Why did you choose Bangalore for the centre?

It is important for this centre to have already established scientific centres around it so that there will be mutual benefit. It’s a two-way symbiotic relationship.

How much land you have been promised by the government?

Originally we were shown 34 acres. Now we have got about 20 acres and trying for 15 acres more. It’s difficult to get lands in Bangalore. But the ICTS residential areas have to be close to the academic complex as the visitors will reside there. If they are unable to stay nearby, the effective time the visitors will spend in the centre will be far less. That’s why we are seeking additional land from Karnataka government.

Where’s the institution going to come up and when do you plan to start the construction?

The land is at Hesarghatta in Bangalore. Once the land is transferred to us, we will start the construction work. The funding — a couple of hundred crores of rupees — will come from the department of atomic energy through the TIFR, Mumbai.

Annoucement of membership to editorial board

2008-08-12T09:35:00.002+05:30

To all those loyal readers of this blog who also work in hadron physics, please note that I am now a member of the Editorial Board of European Physical Journal A. Part of duties is to solicit high quality articles within the aims and scope of the journal. Please consider this such a request.

Police firing in Kashmir...

2008-08-12T09:25:00.002+05:30

I guess one simply gets used to headlines such as `Police firing in Kashmir: 5 killed'. Whatever the rights and wrongs, how come this kind of thing happens every other day? Of course Kashmir could be replaced by Manipur, Nagaland,...Last year in Andhra we had police opening fire and several persons killed. Since this is a private reflection, comments are being turned off.

Abhinav Bindra's olympic gold

2008-08-11T21:10:00.003+05:30

Good news! That too in a sport where there is no chance of the athlete ever testing positive for performance enhancing substances, unless coffee or tea can be considered such. I wonder if I write a paper and test positive for coffee or tea, will the referee strip me of the paper? Anyway, the headlines have also screamed that he will now command up to 2 crores for endorsements. So that is what this is all about?!

Anbumani Ramadoss on Homosexuality laws

2008-08-11T20:32:00.002+05:30

There was a newsitem which I only briefly looked at. Dr. Anbumani Ramadoss says that to arrest the spread of HIV, it is important to legalize homosexuality. I would say that this ought to be a consequence, and not the raison d'etre for getting rid of such a blot on our collective conscience as the absurd, outdated homosexuality laws. To suggest that in the year 2008 consenting adults, should they choose to cohabit, be considered criminals is way beyond the pale. Correct me if I am wrong, but some one did file a PIL saying that these idiotic and unconscionable laws be scrapped, but was dismissed under the pretext that the PIL should be filed by an aggrieved party. Maybe the courts are too afraid to strike down the laws. If can be legislated away, so much the better.

Roddam Narasimha on India's 61st

2008-08-11T20:29:00.002+05:30

In the Sunday section of The Hindu, they had the views of many persons on India's 61st. This included the well-known scientist, engineer, technocract, intellectual, Roddam Narasimha (we like 300 m from him). I am happy to see such a person comment on a political matter. The question is not whether one agrees or disagrees, but in an atmosphere where scientists are supposed to have no views at all, it is good to hear someone speak. Hope to hear more from such persons.

Hiroshima Day, 2008

2008-08-11T20:27:00.003+05:30

August 6, 2008 has come and gone. The Hindu had a story on page 12 and Deccan Herald on page 14 (or something like that). It is worth spending a moment thinking about what it was really all about. And to pay homage to the victims. A good reminder of what war is really all about. As I write this, there is news of a war in some province in Georgia. By now one would have thought that Russians would have known what it is really like to roll in tanks and send fighter craft to bomb civilian areas. Collateral damage, I think they all call it.

Bangalore and Ahmedabad, July 2008

2008-08-11T20:08:00.000+05:30

This blog fell silent after those terrible events. It was too painful to write about.

Article on Indo-US Nuclear Deal

2008-07-24T18:06:00.002+05:30

Here is the link to Appa's article on the Indo-US Nuclear Deal and the Power of the Government to Enter into International Agreements, on the Lokrajsangathan web-site. I am reproducing it below for fear of link rot:

---

The Indo-US Nuclear Deal and the Power of the Government to Enter into International Agreements

C. A. Balasubramanian

[Additional Controller General of Accounts, Government of India (retired)]

Readers may kindly recall that a majority of the members of Parliament, eminent Political Analysts, our nuclear scientists and engineers who had spent a lifetime of dedicated service in building our nuclear power stations and operating them, besides working on R&D programmes, veteran journalists, social workers and former Prime Minister Mr. V. P. Singh have all come out against the agreement relating to the Indo-US Nuclear Deal, in no uncertain terms.

The 1-2-3 Agreement has been extensively commented upon by strategic analysts, experienced commentators and scientists, who do not have any axe to grind. They have pointed out that the deal goes against the strategic interests and energy security of India.

The official response to the various weighty criticisms or doubts have been dismissive and deplorably inadequate. The Hindu, in its editorial dated June 16, 2008, while commenting on the Government's efforts to persuade the Left Parties to let the Government go to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and negotiate a draft safeguards agreement, without showing the draft to them, said that the IAEA safeguards agreement is part of a project that vitally concerns India's nuclear energy and strategic future over the long term.

But non-consultation, non-transparency and a secretive mindset have characterized the handling of the nuclear deal by the Government from the time it was initiated in July 2005. It passes one's comprehension how, in spite of the horrendous consequences which will flow from the Deal, and which various experts, nuclear scientists and others have pointed out at great length, the Government has the brazenness to go about finalizing this Deal. It is as if the people of India and the members of Parliament that represent them do not exist, let alone have the prerogative of telling the Government what they think of the Deal - and order the Government what to do about it. According to the minority Government at the Centre, the Government thinks that the Deal is in the `national interest', and that should be sufficient for the Parliament and the people. The Government chooses to ignore the fact that whatever action it takes on any matter has to be in the national interest: that is the bottom line. If any action they take is not in the national interest, the Government will be guilty of treason, and will have to face action accordingly. If the adverse consequences of any action of the Government outweigh the presumed benefits expected from it, the Government is duty bound to drop the same.

It will be relevant to consider briefly the provisions of the Constitution of India regarding the Parliament and the Executive (that is the Government).

Legislation:

Traditionally, the main functions of a Legislature are to legislate. Parliament has the power to make laws within its area of competence, as defined and delimited under the distribution of legislative powers between the Union and the States.

Parliamentary control over Government:

In a parliamentary system of Government and under the scheme envisaged by our Constitution, Parliament has to ensure Executive or ministerial responsibility, financial control and administrative accountability. Parliamentary control over the Executive of the Government is based on: 1) the Constitutional provision of collective responsibility of the Council of Ministers to the popular House of Parliament, and 2) Parliament's control over the Budget (Articles 75, 114-116, 265). Parliamentary control over the Executive is political in nature. The answerability of the Executive is direct, continuous, concurrent and day to day, points out Subhash C. Kashyap in his book Our Consitution - An Introduction to India's Constitution and Constitutional Law.

There is a clear distinction between the functions of the Executive and those of Parliament (Art. 75) as defined by India’s Constitution makers. The Parliament deliberates, discusses, legislates, and has also a legitimizational role. The Executive governs - on behalf of Parliament and the people. The Executive has unlimited right to initiate and formulate legislative and financial proposals before Parliament and to give effect to approved policies unfettered and unhindered by Parliament. But Parliament has unlimited power to call for information, to discuss, scrutinize and put the seal of approval on proposals made by the Executive. The Government seems to be acting on the premise that, under Art. 73 (a), the Executive power of the Union extends to matters with respect to which Parliament has powers to make laws, and as Parliament has powers to make laws relating to agreements with a foreign power or foreign organization, the Government has power to enter into agreements on its own, as in the case of the Indo-US Deal. This is not a tenable argument.

The Government has no inherent powers. It can exercise powers which it was exercising before the Constitution came into force, and the powers vested in it by laws made by Parliament in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution. As no law has been passed by Parliament about the powers to be exercised by Government in matters of international agreements, etc., all such agreements have got to be approved by Parliament. It is the fault of Government not to have brought in legislation to govern such matters. If hundreds of agreements have been executed by Government with foreign Governments / organizations (since 1950) they have all to be legitimized by ratification by Parliament.

One of the arguments put forth is that there are no provisions in the Constitution which say that Government should not enter into agreements with foreign Governments, institutions, etc.. But powers cannot be claimed by Government on the basis of `non-existence'. Powers to be exercised by Government have to be specifically provided for in the Constitution and / or in the laws made by Parliament. And if there is any ambiguity, the interpretation should be in favour of Parliament and for strengthening Parliament and democracy, and not in favour of Government which will only lead to erosion of the Constitution.

The writer had in an earlier article on the Indo-US Nuclear Deal on this august web-site drawn attention to the statement issued by two former judges of the Supreme Court of India, J. J. V. R. Krishna Iyer and P. B. Sawant and a former Judge of the Bombay High Court Justice H. Suresh. They had unequivocally opined that the Executive has no power to enter into any agreement with a foreign Government or organization, which is binding on the nation. The agreement will be binding only when it is ratified by Parliament. There is an underlying assumption that, before the Union Government exercises its Executive power, there is a law enacted by Parliament on the subject concerned.

Making a detailed analysis of the Indo-US Deal, a former Prime Minister had posed the question: ``Is there a deal behind the Indo-US Deal?'' The time has also come to ask: ``Who is or who are behind this Deal?'' which is sought to be signed and sealed, circumventing Parliament, public opinion and the people of India. One of the top leaders had expressed the view that the Deal is not for the public interest, but for personal gains. Perhaps the leader has succeeded in hitting the nail on the head?

Some more thoughts on Teaching vs. Research

2008-07-20T13:19:00.003+05:30

There is one amazing thing that just struck me today. This was thinking about the recent conferment of the Fellowship of the Royal Society on Girish Agarwal. And not so long ago on Goverdhan Mehta. These two recepients of this greatest of recognition are both essentially teaching institute people. Although both of them were directors of Research Institutes towards the end of their formal retirement in India (Agarwal has now moved to the US where there is no retirement, and Mehta has an endowed chair in IISc), both of them spent bulk of their important scientific years at teaching institutes. And both of them were at the University of Hyderabad, a Central University for considerable number of years. In other words, data points such as these completely muddy the waters regarding any generalization that can be made regarding getting research accomplished or not, at teaching institutes or elsewhere. Comments welcome.

Ashwini Kumar Rath --- In Memoriam

2008-07-18T19:38:00.002+05:30

I heard the shocking news of the passing of my friend and post-doc colleague at Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, years 1992-93, Dr. Ashwini Kumar Rath. He visited Bangalore last year and dropped by my office. It never seemed like it was years since we met last; on an earlier visit to Bangalore. I remember the cups of tea, lunch, and the laughter and fun. He came to Anand with me when I visited Anita there along with some other friends. He was at Sambhalpur University in Orissa. I cannot believe I am writing this obituary already for a friend. His classmates from Institute of Physics Bhubaneshwar must all be as shocked as I am. How must his wife and son feel? And other relatives and friends. Let me observe here a minute of silence.

Striving for relevance

2008-07-17T12:15:00.003+05:30

Here are a few muddled thoughts about striving for relevance, a subject oft discussed at coffee tables, faculty lunches and the like here in scenic IISc and I am sure in other research Institutes in the country, and certainly on blogs. The main issue issue is research institutes vs. teaching institutes / institutions / Universities. The first question that pops to mind is why "vs.". There is a general trend now to believe that these should assist one another. I, on the other hand, want to talk about something completely different: this has to do with a certain implicit assumption that those in reserach institutes have plenty of time on their hands, while those in teaching institutes do not, as they are busy preparing for classes, tutorials, lab sessions, etc.. The latter may very well be true, but my question is whether the former is true. One thing that I can simply say off the bat, is that if one is spending a lot of time teaching, it is going to be very hard to find time for research. In a given subfield, it would be easily demonstrable that if number of publications of a given individual is taken as a yardstick, then those who are very busy teaching will have smaller numbers. Conversely, those who are in research institutes will have rather long list of publications, relatively speaking. Now my contention is that in order to actually accomplish this latter, one really does have to work very hard indeed. In fact, even in many of our research institutes, one has to really slog like crazy to get even a piece of work done, do the reading and research, finish the work, write up the results and publish. If one were to do all this sincerely, it would certainly not leave much time. Atleast that is my experience. In other words, it is clear that if one is teaching (a lot) then there is no question of having to strive for relevance, as the work you do justifies what you are paid for. It is my contention here that if one were to work very hard on research and publications,
which are what we have to show for work (not silly gross numbers --- but publication in the sense of the dictionary meaning: the act of bringing before the public; announcement.) then why this anxiety about relevance? Working in a research institute is just like any profession, terms of which are fairly clear. If one is true to this mandate then is there a real need to strive for relevance?

Caveat: I am not getting into the quagmire of those who are inactive in these research institutes. Such subjects are being discussed elsewhere on the blogosphere.

Krishna Kumar on Democracy and childhood school curriculum

2008-07-04T12:36:00.001+05:30

They refuse to recognise that democracy in a stratified and highly unequal society requires its citizens to possess a large heart and the capacity to apply individual judgment. These prerequisites develop best in common schools where children of the rich and the poor study together.

That is from Krishna Kumar's article in the Hindu.

Some light reading: Giraffe leads circus breakout.

2008-07-01T17:24:00.001+05:30

Even though Rsidd warns me against cutting and pasting articles, I think this will not violate any copyright laws (and the fear of linkrot, of course!) The original is here.
--

By Saeed Ahmed
CNN

(CNN) -- Fifteen camels, several llamas and a potbellied pig broke out of a circus near Amsterdam on Monday. The ringleader? A giraffe who bolted, too.

Police said the giraffe kicked open a fence and walked out.

"The other animals walked out with him," said Amsterdam police spokesman Rob Van Der Veen.

The animals were part of a traveling circus that had set up its tents in the city of Amstelveen, six miles outside the Dutch capital.

They made their break about 5:45 a.m., wandering about a residential street and riling up a neighborhood dog, police said.

Officers and circus employees rounded them up before they could get too far and returned them to their pens.

"It must have been a funny sight," Van Der Veen said. "Waking up in the morning and looking out the window to see those animals walk through the streets."

Searching for T. P. Kailasam's White House

2008-06-28T11:58:00.002+05:30

One of the pull-out sections of yesterday's Hindu had a article on searching for T. P. Kailsam's White House. Actually this is something of a misnomer, because he probably never lived there. It was the house of T. Paramasivam Iyer, Kailsam's father, from who he was estranged. Kailasam had a sister Padma, who was my father's mother, and had expired when Appa was a few months old. As a result even my father and his brother did not have any acquaintance with this celebrated writer. I guess my grandfather had some contact, but very little is known. One of Appa's cousin's, a niece of Kaisalam, who is over 80 years of age lives in Malleshwaram and is a painter. Apart from her, we do not know any other relatives. Unfortunately none of us know Kannada in which our distinguished relative wrote so much. Maybe some day...

Recognition of work

2008-06-26T11:28:00.004+05:30

Over at Tantu-jaal my friend Sunil Mukhi asks the question as to what is to be done if a person in highly privileged Institutes does not get much done. Strongly recommend this post.

Let me ask a different question: what does one do when a person at a Research Institute does a lot of work, or a person at a University does a lot of work. How does such a person gain recognition for his or her work? Now don't tell me, as many of my friends do, that satisfaction that you derive is what you are here for. Partly true. If this was the end of the story, why should there be so many little pieces of recognition? Is there any way in which objectively a person's work is recognized in India? What if he or she is not working some very hot area, at least not so hot at the time the work is being done? Don't tell me that history will judge, and all that sort of stuff. What happens to a person who is working in a subfield on which there is probably not much expertise in the country? How does one judge?

In a scenario where virtually all recognition is through a process of nomination by those who are already in this or that club, and not a process of open application, how does one recognize work? X or Y may be a good scientist and may be thoroughly obnoxious and offensive, and such a person in our set up will not receive recognition for the work he or she has done. Z may have crossed the path of this or that bigshot and is finished off for life. Sometime ago, I had the privilege of nominating a fellow physicist for an international award. Why me? The only eligibility criterion for the nominator was that he or she should be an active scientist. Even though I have never had any recognition myself, it did not disqualify me from making that nomination. For that matter, the Dirac Medal of the Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste also has an open nomination procedure.

What I would rather suggest is that there should be a recognized or prestigious forum, where every scientist is welcome to say exactly what he or she has done, and draw the attention of the community. Let the work speak for itself, in terms of published work, the actual publication, what it has sought to show, etc.. Such a forum would immediately destroy the old boys network and scratching backs and bending over backwards for recognition and the quid pro quo..

I am not turning off comments and invite all three of you who read this blog to post your opinions.

Without comment: Fidel Castro Ruz on Obama's speech

2008-06-18T21:02:00.003+05:30

My curiosity was kindled when the main stream press reported
that Obama had won Fidel Castro's endorsement. So I looked
around to see what he actually said. I reproduce below
the article from Granma. I don't see how anything here can
be thought of as an endorsement! In any case, I am turning
off the comments here because the views are not mine.

Reflections of Fidel
The empire’s hypocritical politics

IT would be dishonest of me to remain silent after hearing the speech Obama delivered on the afternoon of May 23 at the Cuban American National Foundation created by Ronald Reagan. I listened to his speech, as I did McCain’s and Bush’s. I feel no resentment towards him, for he is not responsible for the crimes perpetrated against Cuba and humanity. Were I to defend him, I would do his adversaries an enormous favor. I have therefore no reservations about criticizing him and about expressing my points of view on his words frankly.

What were Obama’s statements?

"Throughout my entire life, there has been injustice and repression in Cuba. Never, in my lifetime, have the people of Cuba known freedom. Never, in the lives of two generations of Cubans, have the people of Cuba known democracy. (…) This is the terrible and tragic status quo that we have known for half a century – of elections that are anything but free or fair (…) I won't stand for this injustice, you won't stand for this injustice, and together we will stand up for freedom in Cuba," he told annexationists, adding: "It's time to let Cuban American money make their families less dependent upon the Castro regime. (…) I will maintain the embargo."

The content of these declarations by this strong candidate to the U.S. presidency spares me the work of having to explain the reason for this reflection.

José Hernandez, one of the Cuban American National Foundation directors whom Obama praises in his speech, was none other than the owner of the Caliber-50 automatic rifle, equipped with telescopic and infrared sights, which was confiscated, by chance, along with other deadly weapons while being transported by sea to Venezuela, where the Foundation had planned to assassinate the writer of these lines at an international meeting on Margarita, in the Venezuelan state of Nueva Esparta.

Pepe Hernández’ group wanted to return to the pact with Clinton, betrayed by Mas Canosa’s clan, who secured Bush’s electoral victory in 2000 through fraud, because the latter had promised to assassinate Castro, something they all happily embraced. These are the kinds of political tricks inherent to the United States’ decadent and contradictory system.

Presidential candidate Obama’s speech may be formulated as follows: hunger for the nation, remittances as charitable hand-outs and visits to Cuba as propaganda for consumerism and the unsustainable way of life behind it.

How does he plan to address the extremely serious problem of the food crisis? The world’s grains must be distributed among human beings, pets and fish, the latter of which are getting smaller every year and more scarce in the seas that have been over-exploited by large trawlers which no international organization has been able to halt. Producing meat from gas and oil is no easy feat. Even Obama overestimates technology’s potential in the fight against climate change, though he is more conscious of the risks and the limited margin of time than Bush. He could seek the advice of Gore, who is also a democrat and is no longer a candidate, as he is aware of the accelerated pace at which global warming is advancing. His close political rival Bill Clinton, who is not running for the presidency, an expert on extra-territorial laws like the Helms-Burton and Torricelli Acts, can advise him on an issue like the blockade, which he promised to lift and never did.

What did he say in his speech in Miami, this man who is doubtless, from the social and human points of view, the most progressive candidate to the U.S. presidency? "For two hundred years," he said, "the United States has made it clear that we won't stand for foreign intervention in our hemisphere. But every day, all across the Americas, there is a different kind of struggle --not against foreign armies, but against the deadly threat of hunger and thirst, disease and

despair. That is not a future that we have to accept --not for the child in

Port au Prince or the family in the highlands of Peru. We can do better. We

must do better. (…) We cannot ignore suffering to our south, nor stand for the globalization of the empty stomach." A magnificent description of imperialist globalization: the globalization of empty stomachs! We ought to thank him for it. But, 200 years ago, Bolivar fought for Latin American unity and, more than 100 years ago, Martí gave his life in the struggle against the annexation of Cuba by the United States. What is the difference between what Monroe proclaimed and what Obama proclaims and resuscitates in his speech two centuries later?

"I will reinstate a Special Envoy for the Americas in my White House who will work with my full support. But we'll also expand the Foreign Service, and open more consulates in the neglected regions of the Americas. We'll expand the Peace Corps, and ask more young Americans to go abroad to deepen the trust and the ties among our people," he said near the end, adding: "Together, we can choose the future over the past." A beautiful phrase, for it attests to the idea, or at least the fear, that history makes figures what they are and not all the way around.

Today, the United States has nothing of the spirit behind the Philadelphia declaration of principles formulated by the 13 colonies that rebelled against English colonialism. Today, they are a gigantic empire undreamed of by the country’s founders at the time. Nothing, however, was to change for the natives and the slaves. The fomer were exterminated as the nation expanded; the latter continued to be auctioned at the marketplace —men, women and children—for nearly a century, despite the fact that "all men are born free and equal", as the Declaration of Independence affirms. The world’s objective conditions favored the development of that system.

In his speech, Obama portrays the Cuban Revolution as anti-democratic and lacking in respect for freedom and human rights. It is the exact same argument which, almost without exception, U.S. administrations have used again and again to justify their crimes against our country. The blockade, in and of itself, is an act of genocide. I don’t want to see U.S. children inculcated with those shameful values.

An armed revolution in our country might not have been needed without the military interventions, Platt Amendment and economic colonialism visited upon Cuba.

The Revolution was the result of imperial domination. We cannot be accused of having imposed it upon the country. The true changes could have and ought to have been brought about in the United States. Its own workers, more than a century ago, voiced the demand for an eight-hour work shift, which stemmed from the development of productive forces.

The first thing the leaders of the Cuban Revolution learned from Martí was to believe in and act on behalf of an organization founded for the purposes of bringing about a revolution. We were always bound by previous forms of power and, following the institutionalization of this organization, we were elected by more than 90% of voters, as has become customary in Cuba, a process which does not in the least resemble the ridiculous levels of electoral participation which, many a time, as in the case of the United States, stay short of 50% of voters. No small and blockaded country like ours would have been able to hold its ground for so long on the basis of ambition, vanity, deceit or the abuse of power, the kind of power its neighbor has. To state otherwise is an insult to the intelligence of our heroic people.

I am not questioning Obama’s great intelligence, his debating skills or his work ethic. He is a talented orator and is ahead of his rivals in the electoral race. I feel sympathy for his wife and little girls, who accompany him and give him encouragement every Tuesday. It is indeed a touching human spectacle. Nevertheless, I am obliged to raise a number of delicate questions. I do not expect answers; I wish only to raise them for the record.

Is it right for the president of the United States to order the assassination of any one person in the world, whatever the pretext may be?

Is it ethical for the president of the United States to order the torture of other human beings?

Should state terrorism be used by a country as powerful as the United States as an instrument to bring about peace on the planet?

Is an Adjustment Act, applied as punishment to only one country, Cuba, in order to destabilize it, good and honorable, even when it costs innocent children and mothers their lives? If it is good, why is this right not automatically granted to Haitians, Dominicans, and other peoples of the Caribbean, and why isn’t the same Act applied to Mexicans and people from Central and South America, who die like flies against the Mexican border wall or in the waters of the Atlantic and the Pacific?

Can the United States do without immigrants, who grow vegetables, fruits, almonds and other delicacies for U.S. citizens? Who would sweep their streets, work as servants in their homes or do the worst and lowest-paid jobs?

Are crackdowns on illegal residents fair, even as they affect children born in the United States?

Are the brain-drain and the continuous theft of the best scientific and intellectual minds in poor countries moral and justifiable?

You state, as I pointed out at the beginning of this reflection, that your country had long ago warned European powers that it would not tolerate any intervention in the hemisphere, reiterating that this right be respected while demanding the right to intervene anywhere in the world with the aid of hundreds of military bases and naval, aerial and spatial forces distributed across the planet. I ask: is that the way in which the United States expresses its respect for freedom, democracy and human rights?

Is it fair to stage pre-emptive attacks on sixty or more dark corners of the world, as Bush calls them, whatever the pretext may be?

Is it honorable and sane to invest millions and millions of dollars in the military industrial complex, to produce weapons that can destroy life on earth several times over?

Before judging our country, you should know that Cuba, with its education, health, sports, culture and sciences programs, implemented not only in its own territory but also in other poor countries around the world, and the blood that has been shed in acts of solidarity towards other peoples, in spite of the economic and financial blockade and the aggression of your powerful country, is proof that much can be done with very little. Not even our closest ally, the Soviet Union, was able to achieve what we have.

The only form of cooperation the United States can offer other nations consist in the sending of military professionals to those countries. It cannot offer anything else, for it lacks a sufficient number of people willing to sacrifice themselves for others and offer substantial aid to a country in need (though Cuba has known and relied on the cooperation of excellent U.S. doctors). They are not to blame for this, for society does not inculcate such values in them on a massive scale.

We have never subordinated cooperation with other countries to ideological requirements. We offered the United States our help when Hurricane Katrina lashed the city of New Orleans. Our internationalist medical brigade bears the glorious name of Henry Reeve, a young man, born in the United States, who fought and died for Cuba’s sovereignty in our first war of independence.

Our Revolution can mobilize tens of thousands of doctors and health technicians. It can mobilize an equally vast number of teachers and citizens, who are willing to travel to any corner of the world to fulfill any noble purpose, not to usurp people’s rights or take possession of raw materials.

The good will and determination of people constitute limitless resources that cannot be kept and would not fit in the vault of a bank. They cannot spring from the hypocritical politics of an empire.

Fidel Castro Ruz

May 25, 2008

10:35 p.m.

Translated by ESTI

- Reflections oF Fidel

Defining new genre of films

2008-06-11T09:04:00.003+05:30

As all the three faithful readers of this blog (are there that many?) know, I have been travelling a little, and finally have some airport / travel stories to tell. No, not as interesting as the last one about bumping into Guenther Grass, but this time the only thing that came to my mind is what I am going to say below. Actually it had already to my mind earlier when I was watching a couple of bits of films on this world movies channel, which seemed to be mainly Spanish films, where really not much happened. The movies were not very interesting, and not very challenging. Then it occured to me that these must come from a genre of films designed for in-flight entertainment. My beliefs were reinforced after looking at the selection on Emirates flights. They were exactly that! But there is another genre of films on Star and HBO which boggles my mind even more. Now which one of us in India would be interested in US war films, where the great white nation mainly takes on the yellow peril or middle-eastern terrorists? Even if these films have Denzel Washington starring as a high-ranking general? Or the other genre of US college and teenage films? Do not those who are responsible for scheduling of films study what genre would or would not be interesting? Even more mind boggling were the films on Discovery or Nat Geo, where there was a long series of documentaries on fishing for crabs in the North Sea. How many of us have ever seen the North sea, sailed on boats or are interested in eating crabs? This genre is really not for me...

preventing diabetes, promoting human rights -- an interview with my big sister

2008-06-11T08:50:00.001+05:30

Padma has just been interviewed in YWCA North Rhode Island, and she talks about preventing diabetes and her views on human rights, etc.. Here is the link.

Goodbye Lausanne

2008-06-05T14:37:00.004+05:30

The time has come to bid `au revoir' or `auf wiedersehen' to Lausanne again. It was a very nice visit, made nice by friends and the atmosphere here. This is what I wrote to Prof. Pramod Rastogi who helps co-ordinate the ISBRI programme under which I visited here.

I am writing to you to thank you and the officers, especially Dr. Barbara Baumann for facilitating my visit to the EPFL under the aegis of the ISBRI. I
had first heard of this from my colleague, Prof. V. Venkatraman who had also visited EPFL a couple of years ago. My enquries to you and Dr. Baumann were
met with enthusiastic replies. I was also very happy that the application procedure was transparent and clear and was conducted in a very professional
manner. I sent a pdf file with the proposal and my curriculum vitae, and in a couple of months I had a positive reply. I sought a prepartory period of
some months which was also approved. I am pleased to inform you that I have now spent most of my planned one month at EPFL in a very productive manner.
I must also record my thanks to Prof. Shaposhnikov for his hospitality and that of the members of the group here. I hope that it would be possible to
visit again in future.

It is worth recording here that the atmosphere that is prevalent at the EPFL is one of the greatest professionalism. The work facilities are outstanding
and it would be hard to imagine how things could be better. In fact, it is this kind of hassle free atmosphere that makes a visit to Switzerland
particularly welcome for many of us from India. I found the time spent here, free of my usual administrative work and other routine matters, to be of
utmost satisfaction. Besides the collaborative work at the EPFL, I was also able to work on other research problems profiting from the hassle free
atmosphere that I referred to earlier.

As you are aware, I have deep ties with Switzerland, having spent three years as a post-doctoral fellow, of which two were actually in Lausanne itself.
I am happy to renew these ties as well, although the members of the erstwhile Institute of Theoretical Physics are now retired. This bond between people
who have once worked here and the country of Switzerland itself is of value and it would be great if an instrument like the ISBRI were to play a role in
strengthening such ties.

Of course for Anita and me Lausanne will always have a special place. But now it is time to head back home...

Raychaudhuri --- some correspondence regarding

2008-06-03T18:16:00.002+05:30

Updated: In view of the comment of RS, I have removed email addresses.
While in general I agree with his observation, I do not think any one
would mind their mail being displayed when it is about paying respect
to the work of another scientist. It is like quoting from an article.
I do not see why any one would object.

Date: Fri, 30 May 2008 15:52:25 +0530 (IST)

Subject: Raychaudhuri

Dear Dr. Buchert,

I enjoyed the seminar you presented at Lausanne last week, although i know
very little about the subject. I was pleasantly surprised to know that the
work of A. K. Raychaudhuri continues to be of use in modern research. You
may be interested (from a human interest angle) in the following:

http://www.ias.ac.in/resonance/April2008.htm (click here)

I hope some of the articles are to your liking.

Sincerely,
B. Ananthanarayan

------------
Date: Fri, 30 May 2008 13:26:42 +0200

Subject: Re: Raychaudhuri

Dear college,

I am pleased to learn that you enjoyed the talk. Of course,
Raychaudhuri's equation is key to many research questions.
I actually saw some of these articles, and thank you for
sending me this site.

Best
Thomas

--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Centre de Recherche Astrophysique de Lyon UCBL / CNRS UMR 5574 / ENS
9, avenue Charles Andre F-69230 Saint-Genis-Laval

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Even more travels in scenic Switzerland

2008-06-03T00:55:00.002+05:30

For those of you who are sick of tourists and would like to see absolutely beautiful places of a different kind, not the rugged Alps, I strongly recommend the Jura range. Yesterday I took the postal bus to the valley of Brevines eventually to Le Locle in the canton of Neuchatel from the railway station. Of course you would know that Les Brevines is known as the Swiss Siberia as it is the coldest region in the country in winter. Now the pine forests are calm and beautiful. Then I went into the cute town of Neuchatel, all in the watch making area of the country. The bad news is that the Physics Dept. there has been closed down and the members transferred to Bern making the Institute there bigger. This will be from August 1. This morning I thought I had a lot of time when I reached Bern at about half past nine and since my meeting with Leuwyler was only at 1 pm, why not go to Lucerne by the train a few minutes later and get back by 1. Terrible mistake as it took an hour and a half to get to Lucerne and I suddenly realized that I could not make it back for 1 if I stayed in Lucerne and jumped into a train to Zuerich which would go through Zug. Now Zug is to Switerland what Switerland is to the world. It is the banking centre of banking centres and so I thought it would be nice to see this groovy place even if from the train. This was mistake number two, as in Zurich I would have only about 3 minutes to catch the train to Bern to make it by three minutes to 1 pm. I had to really run as I was at the rear end of the train to get to the main bay and to platform 12. The train started as I got in. In Bern it was good to see Leuwyler who told me that he would have to leave by 3 and not 5 as he earlier thought as he had a train to catch from Geneva. So you guessed right. I took the train with him and hopped off at Lausanne and got an extra hour of physics with him. The back by the quarter to eight train from Lausanne to Biel and by funiculaire to Evilard. Today was the most I ever spent in a train, all unplanned but now I am ready to sleep.

Prof. Qaisar Shafi recognized at UD

2008-05-31T19:13:00.002+05:30

I just got a message from Monika Shafi that Prof. Qaisar Shafi, my teacher and Ph. D. supervisor has been awarded a Faculty Excellence award at the University of Delaware. Here is the link.

The story is reproduced below:

College of Arts and Sciences recognizes faculty excellence

1:49 p.m., May 21, 2008--Faculty members in the College of Arts and Sciences were recognized with awards for excellence in teaching, service, research and advising, at a program held May 6 before a capacity crowd in the Hartshorn Theatre.

Dean Tom Apple presented the awards, which were selected by the College Senate Awards Committee.

Margaret Stetz, Mae and Robert Carter Professor of Women's Studies, received the Outstanding Teaching Award. "While her research and scholarship are prolific, her lectures and other presentations are in demand and her wit and style are legendary, it is for her teaching that we honor her today," Apple said. He quoted a nomination from one of her students who said, "I loved this class. I wish we could have it as a year-long class.”
Anthony Seraphin, assistant professor of mathematical sciences, was presented the Outstanding Service Award. Apple noted that Seraphin has served on various search committees for the Department of Mathematical Sciences, chairs the Educational Affairs Committee for the college, serves on the College Committee on Diversity in Faculty Recruitment and Retention and is on the AAUP Steering Committee.

Susan Groh, assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry, received the Outstanding Advisement Award. "In addition to teaching a full load, she advises 70-80 students per year," Apple said. She also advises Habitat for Humanity, Alpha Lambda Delta Honor Society and the St Thomas More Oratory Student Organization and serves on the advisory board of the HHMI Undergraduate Science Education Program and the Board of Senior Thesis Readers.

Qaisar Shafi, professor of physics, was presented the college's Outstanding Scholar Award. "Prof. Shafi has published over 180 papers in refereed journals," Apple said, "and his publication venues are the very best in his field; his citation index stands well over 6,000, and many of his papers are highly cited. In the past five years alone, he has delivered over 50 talks at major international conferences, schools and workshops while simultaneously collaborating with and training postdocs and Ph.D. students."
Apple also introduced two members of the college faculty who received University awards this year: Ken Haas, professor of sociology and criminal justice, and Patricia Sloane-White, assistant professor of anthropology, each received the University's Excellence in Teaching Award.

The program included a report by Apple on the highlights of the 2007-08 academic year and his goals for the future. Departments and programs also showcased their accomplishments at a reception after the event.

Onset of the monsoon

2008-05-31T19:01:00.001+05:30

The great joy is here! Here is the story from the Deccan Herald.

India's southwest monsoon keeps its date
Thiruvananthapuram, IANS:
The southwest monsoon, which brings the eagerly awaited rainy season vital for India's agriculture, set in over Kerala on Saturday, within the range of expected onset, bringing relief from oppressive heat.

According to observations at 8.30 a.m., it covered most parts of the south Arabian Sea, Kerala, some parts of Tamil Nadu, parts of the southwest and west central Bay of Bengal, the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) said.

It pointed out that the conditions were favourable for further advance of monsoon into some more parts of the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal, remaining parts of Kerala, some more parts of Tamil Nadu and some parts of Karnataka and northeastern states in the next two to three days.

The IMD had earlier predicted the monsoon onset over Kerala would be on May 29 with a model error of plus or minus four days.

In 2007, IMD predicted the monsoon onset on May 24 and the actual date was four days.

Current meteorological analysis and numerical weather prediction models suggest that isolated to scattered rain or thundershowers activity accompanied with thunder squall are likely over plains of northwest India during next three to four days.

Scattered rain/thundershowers activity accompanied with strong thunder squall are also likely over West Bengal, Sikkim and Orissa during the next 48 hour

CNN travel article on walking in Switzerland

2008-05-31T18:38:00.001+05:30

Here is an article for those who love walking. The original link is here.

Lesson from Switzerland: Get up, get out and hike

* Story Highlights
* Walking is the No. 1 sport in Switzerland
* Every Swiss village, city and mountain is crisscrossed with paths
* The Swiss also ride bikes to get around
* Next Article in Travel »

By Sheila Norman-Culp
Associated Press

FTAN, Switzerland (AP) -- Limbs and lungs aching after a 5 1/2-hour, above-the-treeline hike in the Swiss Alps, I plopped down with pride upon the roughhewn log that served as a bus stop bench.
art.switzerland.ap.jpg

Hikers take in the view in Chur, Switzerland.

"That was a monster!" I said to my husband, reliving the trek across unstable slate fields and rugged mountain meadows, along trails carved by rushing streams, meandering cows and burrowing marmots.

Then the Bachman family from Basel walked by. They had done the same hike with 5-year-old twins, a 7-year-old and a 9-year-old.

"At least you beat the twins," my husband smirked.

Only the twins and their mother, Damia, waited with us for the bus. The older kids and their father continued down a grueling 1 1/2-hour switchback trail to the resort of Scoul. In a further blow to my ego, I learned that the Bachmans were on a three-week summer vacation and had gone on similar hikes nearly every day.

"The hardest thing is stopping every hour to feed them," Damia Bachman said. "They are always hungry."

There are times in life when something that has been abundantly obvious to others for so long finally becomes obvious to you. Like most Americans, I honestly had no idea how sedentary I had become.
Don't Miss

* From France to Italy over Mont Blanc
* Bern: Switzerland's playful capital

It's not just our fast-food culture that's making us the oversized laughingstocks of the world. It's also that we sit too much -- at work, in the car, at school, at home.

We spend weekends and evenings as passive observers, watching sports or movies, playing video games, surfing the Internet -- all sitting down.

In most of America, virtually every activity requires a hop in the car. Even when parents do walk, they often keep toddlers in strollers months too long because it's faster that way.

Plenty of American families are involved in sports, but that can mean nothing more strenuous than sitting in the bleachers watching a child's tournament. While exercise walking is by far America's most popular sport -- practiced by nearly 90 million people in 2007, according to a survey by the National Sporting Goods Association -- that survey includes anyone who did it at least once that year.

In Switzerland, walking is also No. 1, but here it's a daily commitment practiced at distances that would leave most Americans panting.

Lorenz Ursprung, head of sports promotion at the Swiss Office of Sport, said it's easy to see walking's appeal.

"You can do it as a family, a couple, by yourself. You don't need any expensive equipment. You don't even have to go anywhere -- you can walk out your back door," he said.

Of course, it doesn't hurt that every single Swiss village, city and mountain is crisscrossed with paths, ranging from flat sidewalks by the lake to heart-stopping alpine trails.

The Swiss walk for pleasure: to breathe fresh air, talk with friends, give the dog a romp, head to a cafe for lunch. They walk to do errands, pick up groceries, go to work. On Sundays, when most stores are closed, paths are filled with three-generation families, all out for a walk.

"Every single weekend, we went hiking with the family," reminisced Sandro Della Rossa, a 27-year-old language teacher in Zurich. "Sometimes when I was a teenager, all I wanted to do was stay home and hang out with my friends. But no, I had to go hiking with the family.

"I didn't appreciate it then -- but I do now."

On weekends, morning trains are filled with elderly hikers heading into the mountains with walking poles. Packs of 10- to 13-year-olds gather for overnight mountain treks led by 16- and 17-year-olds, with nary a parent in sight. Young couples lug infants and toddlers on their backs as they trek up to see glaciers.

I've even seen a father hike up to the Matterhorn base camp, his prepubescent sons following eagerly, on a trail where one slip could mean an early death.

In the cities, Swiss toddlers zip along on tiny wooden balance bikes, expected to keep up with their parents.

And every day, hundreds of students, professors and office workers march up the hill to the University of Zurich along a slope so steep it also has a funicular train. Those 218 steps leave me gasping.

"It's the most direct route and I don't have to buy a monthly tram pass," explained student Lukas Schneider. "It's jammed during rush hour, but it's quite dramatic, don't you think?"

The Swiss penchant for movement is not limited to walking. All types of people -- the old, the fat, bankers in suits, women in skirts -- regularly ride bikes to get around, despite the many steep streets. Some Zurich postmen pick up the mail using little wagons attached to bicycles.

Part of our problem in America may be fear: Kids rarely walk or bike to school because parents are afraid of bad drivers and pedophiles. Part may be our speeded-up culture: Parents often feel too rushed in the morning to walk their children to school.

Jonathan Dorn, editor-in-chief of Backpacker magazine, in Boulder, Colorado, says many U.S. towns also lack the infrastructure the Swiss have -- sidewalks, safe street crossings, schools that are close to students' homes.

But he also thinks more American children could turn into lifelong walkers if parents broke some bad habits.

"Maybe it's not practical to walk your kids to school," he said. "But instead of letting them watch videos Saturday morning, take them out to your local park and walk. They will whine for about 10 minutes, then find a frog or climb a tree."

BBC article on Swiss puncutality

2008-05-31T18:35:00.002+05:30

Just thought I would reproduce this article here for kicks. The original link is here.

Switzerland's obsession with time

Switzerland is famous for its watches and its trains that run on time. But, asks Imogen Foulkes, can punctuality become too much of a good thing?

Euro 2008 countdown clock in Bern
Euro 2008 fans will be able to depend on punctual transport

In the centre of Bern there is an electronic clock which is ticking off the days, hours, minutes and seconds until the start of Euro 2008 - a reminder that Europe's football championships begin on 7 June and Switzerland is the proud host.

Seeing the clock caused me to reflect on Switzerland and time.

My first job in this country was as a journalist for Swiss Broadcasting's international service. Not so different from the BBC World Service in fact, apart from one curious thing.

Every day at exactly nine, 12 and four, the offices were all empty, and the elevators up to the staff restaurant were all full.

Why? Morning coffee, lunch and afternoon coffee it turned out. Always at the same time.

Not because the company ordered it but because the Swiss do it that way.

Electronic timekeepers

One of my first assignments was at the city hospital, but I made the mistake of arranging an interview for 9am.

I wandered through empty corridors, passing wards where patients lay quietly, not a doctor or nurse in sight.

I finally found my neurologist in, of course, the canteen, coffee at his elbow.

Swiss alps
There are new daily timesheets, in which all work activity must be recorded at 15 minute intervals
"But what if you don't want coffee at nine?" I finally asked a colleague. "What if you fancy a cup at 10? Or what if you're hungry at two?"

I was greeted with a puzzled frown. "Well," came the reply, "I'd be on my own, because everyone goes at nine. I'd have no-one to talk to."

But despite the national enthusiasm for punctuality, Swiss companies are now trying to formalise the timekeeping of their employees and there is currently a boom in time management software.

Bureaucratic insanity

I know a woman who works as a translator. It is a quiet office, everyone works individually and phone calls are rare.

This woman likes to swim for an hour at lunchtime and because - yes, you have guessed it - everyone takes lunch at the same time, her local pool is full at midday.

So she took the revolutionary step of going for lunch at 1330.

The school timetables are not just strict, they are Byzantine in their complexity

The pool was almost empty, it was bliss - until she got back to work and found an email from her boss saying that under the new system, lunch after two o'clock was not possible.

I have another friend who works part-time, in theory every morning from eight until noon. But sometimes it gets very busy and he works on until two.

Or he did until the newly-installed electronic timekeeper began deducting an hour's wage as soon as it got to one, because of course he could not possibly be at his desk, he had to be at lunch.

The most bizarre system of all is about to be imposed on my former colleagues at Swiss Broadcasting: a new daily timesheet, in which all work activity must be recorded at 15-minute intervals.

Imagine, if you will, racing to get a television report edited in time for the evening news and having to stop every quarter of an hour to explain what you are doing.

Management claim it will allow them to compare the cost effectiveness of programmes. Journalists say it is a bureaucratic insanity.

School timetables

And then there are the schools. Punctuality is prized in the classroom too. Children who are late can expect punishment.

But the school timetables are not just strict, they are Byzantine in their complexity. A regular nine-to-four day is unheard of. Instead children come and go throughout the day.

Letzigrund Stadium in Zurich, Euro 2008 venue
It will be interesting to see how the Swiss adapt to the different habits of all these visitors
Here, for example, is a snapshot of my two sons' timetable.

On Monday, one starts school at 0730, the other at 0820.

One comes home at 11, the other at 12, one goes back at two, the other is home for the afternoon.

It goes on like that all week but not in the same way, of course. Each day is cleverly different.

The only thing that is sacrosanct is the two-hour lunch break. Forget about school dinners. Switzerland still operates on the principle that Mum is at home, so children are always home for lunch.

I have a friend with three children who tried for years to get a job but never succeeded because - and she worked it out precisely - given the school timetable, she could never be out of the house for more than an hour and 43 minutes.

Transport system

But there is one glorious, positive side to this obsession with timekeeping: the trains. They really do run - nearly always - on time.

So the hundreds of thousands of football fans who are about to descend on Switzerland for Euro 2008 need not worry about missing the kick-off.

An intricate and integrated transport system is already in place, with extra trams and trains laid on in all the host cities.

What will be interesting, though, is to see how the Swiss adapt to the different habits of all these visitors.

The Italians are going to Zurich and may well want their cappuccino at 11, not nine.

The French are coming to Bern. What if they want a five-course lunch at two?

Perhaps it is just as well for punctilious Swiss restaurant managers that the Spanish team is playing in neighbouring Austria, since their fans tend to enjoy dinner at 10.

Still, I am sure it will all go smoothly, as long as there is no extra time.