A tribute to the life and achievements of the IISc alumnus who left his mark on Indian aerospace engineering The name of Dr Sitaram Rao Valluri, who passed away on 23 January 2019, aged 94, will forever be linked with the National Aeronautical Laboratory (NAL; now National Aerospace Laboratories). Valluri had many stellar accomplishments in […]
On 8 February 1966, 18-year-old Uma Jagannath began her career as Readers’ Assistant at IISc, even before her results were out. She had just written her Diploma examination in library science at the Government Polytechnic for Women, Bangalore. After getting her results, she was immediately made the Library Assistant. In an interview with Connect, […]
A short history of the messes In 1954, Morris Travers, who had been IISc’s first Director, wrote to AG Pai, the then-Registrar. In a letter looking back on his time at IISc, Travers (who had worked at theInstitute from 1906 to 1914, and had been involved in setting it up) said: “When I first went […]
A 1963 memo about a certain kind of ‘pest’ on campus IISc offers a home to a range of flora and fauna, from the slender loris to stray dogs, and has a number of visitors passing through, including rare birds such as the Kashmir flycatcher. In a circular from the Archives, dated 26 April 1963, […]
“I have had no occasion to analyse ganja for the purpose of giving evidence in court” On 26 October 1936, HR Uzielli, Secretary to the Government of Madras, Revenue Department, wrote IISc’s Director a letter about a drug investigation in which an Institute faculty member had been involved. A man named Dandapani Pillai had been […]
The story of an IISc scientist who brought molecular techniques into research on the deadly disease in India A young T Ramakrishnan, who lived with his family in Ernakulam in Kerala, helplessly watched his mother being sent to Andhra Pradesh’s Madanapalle sanatorium, one of the few such medical facilities in the country created to […]
M Jagannadha Rao’s 1943 missive against having a Common Dining Hall In 1943, construction began on a new dining hall and auditorium designed by Otto Koenigsberger, meant to serve as a common dining hall for all students. It was meant to replace the nine messes on campus in which students ate with their respective communities or […]
The Common Dining Hall built by Otto Koenigsberger in 1944 was a creative experiment forced upon him by circumstances The Students’ Hostel Office in IISc is located in a unique building. Sandwiched between Nesara and Kabini restaurants, its unusual form is surprisingly well-concealed, even from the discerning eyes of those who walk past it routinely. […]
Rations, blunders and too much ragi in the late 1940s When I joined the Institute (specifically, the Department of Electrical Technology) in 1947, the many messes attached to each of the four wings of the hostel had already been closed down and a common mess had started in the newly built auditorium. If there was […]
“What struck me was the amount of butter they served during breakfast: a full one-inch cube!” I was in the IISc hostel during 1956-59, when I was a student studying for D.IISc in the Department of Electrical Communication Engineering, and again during 1960-61 when I was a research student under the late Dr BS Ramakrishna, […]
