Back from Edinburgh
Prafulla Chandra Ray was born on 2 August 1861 in Raruli-Katipara, now in Bangladesh. After higher studies in chemistry at Edinburgh University, he returned to Calcutta and taught at Presidency College.
Even with good degrees, positions and resources did not come easily in the colonial system, and laboratories and science careers were scarce. He built an inorganic chemistry research programme anyway; his work on mercurous nitrite became well known.
From lab to industry
Ray’s vision went beyond the laboratory. He saw the need for an Indian chemical industry, and in the 1890s he started Bengal Chemical & Pharmaceutical Works on a small scale. It grew into one of India’s early modern chemical companies, an early model of science-based Indian enterprise.
Teacher of a generation
He was active in four roles at once: teacher, historian of Indian chemistry, entrepreneur and public intellectual. Generations of his students carried Indian chemistry forward.
He was among the first scientists to link self-reliant industry and science education with nation-building. Science, his life shows, can make its mark through industry, teaching and institutions as well as research papers.
Sources
- American Chemical Society: P. C. Ray
- Bengal Chemicals
- University of Calcutta
- axial.acs.org/inorganic-chemistry/remembering-acharya-prafulla-chandra-ray-father-of-indian-chemistry
- bengalchemicals.co.in/
- caluniv.ac.in/