Bhabha
Homi Jehangir
Homi
Jehangir Bhabha was born on 30 October 1909 in a wealthy Parsi family
of Bombay
Bhabha
attended the Cathedral and John Connon Schools in Bombay. After
passing Senior Cambridge Examination at the age of 15 Bhabha entered
the Elphinstone College in Bombay and later the Royal Institute of
Science, also in Bombay. In 1927 Bhabha joined the Gonville and Caius
College in Cambridge.
Bhabha
was taught by Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac (1902-84), who was Lucasian
Professor of Mathematics (1932-69) at Cambridge and awarded the Nobel
Prize in Physics in 1933 with Erwin Schrodinger (1887-1961) for their
work in quantum theory. Bhabha joined the Cavendish Laboratory, from
where he obtained his Ph.D. in theoretical physics.
The
important contributions made by Bhabha while working at Cambridge
have been summarised by G. Venkataraman (in his book, Bhabha and His
Magnificent Obsessions, Universities Press, Hyderabad, 1994) as :
The
explanation of relativistic exchange scattering (Bhabha Scattering).
- The theory of production of electron and positron showers in cosmic rays (Bhabha-Heitler theory).
- Speculation about the Yukawa particle related to which was his suggestion of the name meson.
- Prediction of relativistic time dilatation effects in the decay of the meson.
In
1939 when the Second World War broke out, Bhabha was in India. He
came for a short holiday. However, the war changed his plan. Most of
the scientists in England had to take part in war activities and
there was no scope for doing basic research. So Bhabha had to abandon
his plan to return to England to resume his research work at
Cambridge. It may be recalled here that Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis
(1893-1972) who after completing the Physics Tripos made arrangement
to work under C.T.R. Wilson, the inventor of the cloud chamber, at
the Cavendish Laboratory came back to India for a short vacation. He
also could not go back because the First World War broke out. In 1940
Bhabha joined the Indian Institute of Science at Bangalore where a
Readership in Theoretical Physics was specially created for him.
Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman (1888-1970) was then the Director of the
Institute. Bhabha was made a Professor in 1944. Vikram Sarabhai
(1919-71) also spent a short period at the Institute when Bhabha was
there. At the Indian Institute of Science Bhabha guided research on
cosmic rays. He organised a group of young researchers in
experimental and theoretical aspects of cosmic ray research. After
spending a few years in India Bhabha was no longer interested in
going back to England. Perhaps this was because of his growing sense
of responsibility towards his motherland. Gradually he became
convinced that it was his duty to build up research groups in the
frontier of scientific knowledge. On April 20, 1944, Bhabha in a
letter to Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (1910-95) wrote: “…I have
recently come to the view that provided proper appreciation and
financial support are forthcoming, ‘it was one’s duty to stay in
one’s country and build up schools comparable with those that other
countries are fortunate in possessing.”
The
first three things that Bhabha felt necessary for putting India’s
nuclear programme on a sound footing were:
- The survey of natural resources, particularly materials of interest to atomic energy programme such as uranium, thorium, beryllium, graphite etc. To achieve this a special unit, Rare Minerals Division was created at Delhi with the help of Darashaw Nosherwan Wadia (1883-1969).
- Development of strong research schools in basic sciences particularly physics, chemistry and biology by providing facilities to and training up high quality research scientists.
- Development of a programme for instrumentation particularly in electronics. A unit called Electronics Production Unit was started in TIFR, which later formed the nucleus of the large corporation known as Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL) at Hyderabad.
When
Bhabha realised that technology development for the atomic energy
programme could no longer be carried out within TIFR he decided to
build a new laboratory entirely devoted to this purpose. He managed
to acquire 1200 acres of land at Trombay, near Bombay for this
purpose. Thus the Atomic Energy Establishment started functioning in
1954. The same year the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) was also
established.
Bhabha
was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1941. In 1943 he was
awarded the Adams Prize by the Cambridge University for his work on
cosmic rays, and in 1948 the Hopkins prize of the Cambridge
Philosophical Society. In 1963 he was elected Foreign Associate of
the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and Honorary Life Member of
the New York Academy of Sciences. In 1964 he was made Foreign
Corresponding Academician of the Royal Academy of Sciences, Madrid.
From 1960 until 1963 he was President of the International Union of
Pure and Applied Physics. He was president of the historic
International Conference of the Peaceful uses of atomic energy held,
under U.N. auspices, at Geneva in August, 1955. Bhabha was President
of the National Institute of Sciences of India in 1963 and President
of the Indian Science Congress Association in 1951. He was awarded
the title of Padma Bhushan by the Government of India in 1954.
