The Oft-Forgotten Genius

Kariamanikkam Srinivasa Krishnan, born on this day, was unarguably one of India's smartest brains. However, the magnanimity of C.V. Raman relegated Krishnan to a life that was spent in the shadows of Raman's brilliance for a long time.

Sir Kariamanikkam Srinivasa Krishnan doing what he loved in his chamber; Source: Springer

Kariamanikkam Srinivasa Krishnan, or KSK as he was known to some, was the son of a farmer-scholar in Watrap of Tamil Nadu. His father was a wonderful mind which had traversed the depths of Sanskrit and Tamil literature.

Krishnan was enrolled into the Hindu Higher Secondary School of his village, from where he went to American College and then the famed Christian College of Madras. Life came full circle when he came back to his village and began teaching students at Hindu Higher Secondary School.

He had bigger ambitions though. In the year 1920, he began working with C.V. Raman, who at the time was engaged in studying light scattering under the aegis of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, Calcutta.

Raman published his first in a long series of works in 1922 on "Molecular Diffraction of Light". Several published articles and 6 years later, his theory was proved and thus came into being the "Raman Effect", for which he was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1930.

KSK's contributions to the Raman Effect and the invaluable help which he was to Raman was however, lost in the pages of history books.

After 1928, he began doing his own thing just so that he would not be just another name that is mentioned in passing by to Raman's work. He joined Dacca University in Bangladesh as a reader in the Physics Department. Along with B.C. Guha, Santilal Banerjee, and Ashutosh Mukherjee, he researched the magnetic properties of the crystals in relation to their structure.

Their work bore fruit in 1933 when The Royal Society of London published their findings and KSK finally got his moment in the spotlight.

KSK continued his collaboration with Santilal Banerjee even when he returned to India and together, they published multiple papers in countless renowned journals. His work got him inducted into the Royal Society in 1940 and six years later, fetched him Knighthood as well.

The adulation for KSK back in India too was overwhelming. Jawahar Lal Nehru said of him,

“What is remarkable about Krishnan is not that he is a great scientist but something much more. He is a perfect citizen, a whole man with an integrated personality.”

Sir Kariamanikkam Srinivasa Krishnan lived a full life that ended on 14th June, 1961. He was a genius and a down-to-earth one at that. His experiences in life had humbled him, which helped him stand out in a time when intellectuals were considered snobbish and full of themselves. He devoted his life to the service of Science and never once, did he think of recognition in all his years of work.