Biography of Ramanujam Mathematician

Biography of Ramanujam Mathematician

Who was Ramanujam?

Ramanujam is one the best line mathematicians of the world. He was born in a poor Brahman family in village Irod in the state Tamilnadu on 22nd December 1887.  His father lived in village Kumbh Konam, and served a cloth keeper as an accounts clerk.

About Ramanujam’s , his mother is hearsay. It is said that for many years after marriages, his mother did not bear any child. On this account, she was always worried, seeing his daughter worried, Ramaanujam’s maternal grandfather worshipped goddess Nam Giri Devi in village Namkal. As a result thereof child Sri Nivas Ramanujam was born.

Early Life

At the age of 5 years, Ramanujam was sent to school. After two years, he was sent the High School at Kumbh Konam. He had special interest in Mathematics. He used to put the questions about planets, starts and boundary, to his classmate and teachers.

When he was in class III, one day, his teacher was explaining when a number is divided by itself, the dividend is one, Ramanujam put the question, does this rule also apply to Zero? In class IV, he read the three orders of serial in Algebra, or parallel order, ascending order and descending order.

This is taught in Intermediate classes at present. When in class IV he read Trigonometry and in class V, he acquired expansion of sin and cos. At the age of 17, he passed the High School Examination with distinction and he was awarded government scholarship. By the time, he reached the first year of degree classes he was so much involved in Mathematics that other subjects had been almost neglected and the result was, that he failed. As significance, his scholarship was discontinued. Due to poor economic condition he had to discontinue his college education.

Those days, economic problems much troubled Ramanujam. At that very time, he was married. After marriage, the problems were doubted, and he was compelled to find some service at the earliest possible.

Dr. Vakankar Period

With great difficulty, he could get a job in Madras Trust on rupees 33 per month. During this period, Dr. Vakankar was very much impressed by his knowledge of Mathematics. Through Dr. Vakankar’s efforts, he got a scholarship of rupees seventy five for two years in the University of Madras, and he got rid of the job a clerk.

Now, he was free from financial anxiety and he devoted his whole time to the study of Mathematics. He wrote some articles, which he sent to Dr. Hardy fellow of Mathematics in the Trinity College. Dr. Hardy and other mathematicians of England were much impressed with his papers. They, consequently made efforts to call Ramanujam to Cambridge.

Dr. Novil

When in India, Dr. Novil met Ramanujam and requested Ramanujam to accompany him to England to which Ramanujam acquiesced Dr. Novil offering him a scholarship of Rs.250 and preliminary expenses of the Journey out of this amount, he arranged payment of sixty per month to his mother, and set out to on the journey to England with Dr. Novil in 1917.

Legacy of Ramanujam

On 28th February 1918, he was made fellow of Royal Asiatic Society. He was the first Indian to receive this honour. On 27 February, 1919 he left for India and arrived at Bombay on 27th March on account of unsuitable climate of England.

His health had badly deteriorated. For health reasons, he was taken to Kaveri Kordu Mandi. From there, he was taken to Kukha Konam. His heatlh continued deteriorating, but light of his mind did not faint till the last moment. He was busy with his work up to end.  He did the whole work on Tock Theta Function while he was in bed as patient.

When condition of health deteriorated much, he was taken to Madras (now Chennai). In village Chetpur, near Madras, this mathematician of International repute died on 26th April, 1920. His death made poor the world of Mathematics