Radhanath Sikdar
Encyclopedia
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
n mathematician
Mathematician
A mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....
who, among many other things, calculated the height of Peak XV in the Himalaya and showed it to be the tallest mountain
Mountain
Image:Himalaya_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|The Himalayan mountain range with Mount Everestrect 58 14 160 49 Chomo Lonzorect 200 28 335 52 Makalurect 378 24 566 45 Mount Everestrect 188 581 920 656 Tibetan Plateaurect 250 406 340 427 Rong River...
above sea level
Sea level
Mean sea level is a measure of the average height of the ocean's surface ; used as a standard in reckoning land elevation...
. Peak XV was later named Mount Everest
Mount Everest
Mount Everest is the world's highest mountain, with a peak at above sea level. It is located in the Mahalangur section of the Himalayas. The international boundary runs across the precise summit point...
.
Early life
Radhanath was born as youngest child of Tituram, a resident of Jorasanko in Calcutta. Radhanath Sikdar was educated at "Phiringi" Kamal Bose's School and Hindu College (now called Presidency CollegePresidency College, Kolkata
Presidency University, Kolkata, formerly Hindu College and Presidency College, is a unitary, state aided university, located in Kolkata, West Bengal. and one of the premier institutes of learning of liberal arts and sciences in India. In 2002 it was ranked number one by the weekly news magazine...
) in Calcutta, India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. Alone among the great Derozian
Young Bengal
The Young Bengal movement was a group of radical Bengali free thinkers emerging from Hindu College, Calcutta in the early 19th century. They were also known as Derozians, after their firebrand teacher at Hindu College, Henry Louis Vivian Derozio....
s he took to science as his life's mainstay. He worked for the Surveyor General of India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, a division of the British Raj
British Raj
British Raj was the British rule in the Indian subcontinent between 1858 and 1947; The term can also refer to the period of dominion...
in India. He joined the Great Trigonometric Survey
Great Trigonometric Survey
The Great Trigonometric Survey was a project of the Survey of India throughout most of the 19th century. It was piloted in its initial stages by William Lambton, and later by George Everest. Among the many accomplishments of the Survey were the demarcation of the British territories in India and...
in 1831.
Great Trigonometric Survey
When in 1831 George EverestGeorge Everest
Colonel Sir George Everest was a Welsh surveyor, geographer and Surveyor-General of India from 1830 to 1843.Sir George was largely responsible for completing the section of the Great Trigonometric Survey of India along the meridian arc from the south of India extending north to Nepal, a distance...
was searching for a brilliant young mathematician with particular proficiency in spherical trigonometry
Spherical trigonometry
Spherical trigonometry is a branch of spherical geometry which deals with polygons on the sphere and the relationships between the sides and the angles...
, the Hindu College maths teacher Dr. John Tytler superlatively recommended his pupil Radhanath, then only 19. Radhanath joined the Great Trigonometric Survey
Great Trigonometric Survey
The Great Trigonometric Survey was a project of the Survey of India throughout most of the 19th century. It was piloted in its initial stages by William Lambton, and later by George Everest. Among the many accomplishments of the Survey were the demarcation of the British territories in India and...
in 1831 December as a "computor" at a salary of thirty rupee
Indian rupee
The Indian rupee is the official currency of the Republic of India. The issuance of the currency is controlled by the Reserve Bank of India....
s per month. Soon he was sent to Sironj near Dehra Dun where he excelled in geodetic surveying. Apart from mastering the usual geodetic processes, he invented quite a few of his own. Everest was extremely impressed by his performance, so much so that when Sikdar wanted to leave GTS and be a Deputy Collector, Everest intervened, proclaiming that no government officer can change over to another department without the approval of his boss. Everest retired in 1843 and Col. Waugh
Andrew Scott Waugh
Major General Sir Andrew Scott Waugh was a British army officer and surveyor now remembered as the man who named the highest mountain in the world after Sir George Everest, his predecessor in the post of Surveyor-General of India.-Career:Waugh began work on the Great Trigonometric Survey of India...
became the Director.
After 20 years in the North, Sikdar was transferred to Calcutta in 1851 as the Chief Computor. Here apart from his duties of the GTS, he also served as the Superintendent of the Meteorological department. Here he introduced quite a few innovations that were to remain standard procedure for many decades to come.The most notable was the formula for conversion of barometric readings taken at different temperatures to 32 degrees Fahrenheit.
At the order of Col. Waugh he started measuring the snow capped mountains near Darjeeling. Compiling data about Peak XV from six different observations, he eventually came to the conclusion the Peak XV was the tallest in the world. He gave a full report to Waugh who was cautious enough not to announce this discovery before checking with other data. When after some years, he was convinced, only then did he publicly announce the same. The norm, strictly followed by Everest himself, was that while naming a peak, the local name should be preferred. But in this case, Waugh made an exception. He paid a tribute to his ex-boss by proposing that the peak be named after Everest. Everest agreed, and Sikdar was conveniently forgotten.
Other
It appears that while Everest and Waugh both extolled him for his exceptional mathematical abilities, his relations with the colonial administration were far from cordial. Two specific instances are on record.In 1851 a voluminous Survey Manual (Eds. Capt. H. L. Thullier and Capt. F. Smyth) was published by the Survey Department. The preface to the Manual clearly and specifically mentioned that the more technical and mathematical chapters of the Manual were written by Babu Radhanath Sikdar. The Manual proved to be immensely useful to surveyors. However, the third edition, published in 1875 (i.e., after Sikdar's death) did not contain that preface, so that Sikdar's memorable contribution was de-recognized. The incident was condemned by a section of British surveyors. The paper Friend of India
The Statesman
The Statesman is an Indian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper founded in 1875 and published simultaneously in Kolkata, New Delhi, Siliguri and Bhubaneswar. The Statesman is owned by The Statesman Ltd., its headquarters at Statesman House, Chowringhee Square, Calcutta and its national...
in 1876 called it 'robbery of the dead'.
It is also on record that Sikdar was fined a sum of 200 rupees by the British court in 1843 for having vehemently protested against the unlawful exploitation of survey department workers by the Magistrate Vansittart. The incident was reported in detail in The Bengal Spectator edited by another great Derozian Ramgopal Ghosh
Ramgopal Ghosh
Ramgopal Ghosh was an Indian businessman, social reformer, orator and one of the leaders of the Young Bengal group. He was called the Indian Demosthenes. Ghosh was one of the persons who helped John Elliot Drinkwater Bethune to establish his girls school.-Early life:The family hailed from Bagati,...
.
In 1854, he along with his Derozian friend Peary Chand Mitra
Peary Chand Mitra
Peary Chand Mitra , was an Indian writer, journalist and a member of Derozio’s Young Bengal group, who played a leading role in the Bengal renaissance with the introduction of simple Bengali prose...
started the Bengali journal Masik Patrika, for the education and empowerment of women. He used to write in a simple and uncluttered style that was rather atypical for the age.
Sikdar had retired from service in 1862.
He died on 17 May 1870 at Gondalpara, Chandannagar in his villa by the side of the Ganga.
Recognition
In recognition of Sikdar's mathematical genius the German Philosophical Society's BavariaBavaria
Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...
branch of Natural Science made him a Corresponding Member in 1864, a very rare honour those days.
The Department of Posts, Government of India
Indian Postal Service
The Department of Posts functioning under the brand name India Post , is a government operated postal system in India; it is generally referred to within India as "the post office"....
, launched a postal stamp on June 27, 2004, commemorating the establishment of the Great Trigonometric Survey
Great Trigonometric Survey
The Great Trigonometric Survey was a project of the Survey of India throughout most of the 19th century. It was piloted in its initial stages by William Lambton, and later by George Everest. Among the many accomplishments of the Survey were the demarcation of the British territories in India and...
in Chennai
Chennai
Chennai , formerly known as Madras or Madarasapatinam , is the capital city of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, located on the Coromandel Coast off the Bay of Bengal. Chennai is the fourth most populous metropolitan area and the sixth most populous city in India...
, India on April 10, 1802. The stamps feature Radhanath Sikdar and Nain Singh
Nain Singh
Pandit Nain Singh Rawat was one of the first of the pundits who explored the Himalayas for the British. He hailed from the Johaar Valley of Kumaon...
, two significant contributors to society. The Great Arc refers to the systematic exploration and recording of the entire topography of the Indian subcontinent
Indian subcontinent
The Indian subcontinent, also Indian Subcontinent, Indo-Pak Subcontinent or South Asian Subcontinent is a region of the Asian continent on the Indian tectonic plate from the Hindu Kush or Hindu Koh, Himalayas and including the Kuen Lun and Karakoram ranges, forming a land mass which extends...
which was spear-headed by the Great Trigonometric Survey
Great Trigonometric Survey
The Great Trigonometric Survey was a project of the Survey of India throughout most of the 19th century. It was piloted in its initial stages by William Lambton, and later by George Everest. Among the many accomplishments of the Survey were the demarcation of the British territories in India and...
.
External links
- The man who 'discovered' Everest, BBC Online.