A Portrait of J. C. Bose

Acharya Jagadischandra Bose (1858 – 1937) was the first Indian scientist to achieve international reputation in experimental science.

He chose science as his vocation at a time when it was believed that the Indians are incapable of objectively studying the nature or producing scientific knowledge.

Bose did pioneering research, first in physics and then in plant physiology. As a physicist, he was first to produce millimetre-length micro-waves and study their properties.

As a biologist, he experimented both with Non-living as well as Living matter, using apparatus which he himself invented (he was also a brilliant inventor) and proposed an important generalisation on the similarity of responses in the Living and the Non-Living things.

This theory was highly controversial in his time since it challenged the basic distinction between Living and Non-living things on which western science was premised.

Bose taught at Presidency College (now Presidency University) from 1885 to 1915. In 1917, he founded Bose Institute which was the first institution in India for doing inter-disciplinary research.