Between 1840 and 1920, India experienced a gradual change in the nature of scientific activity, as the amateur and autodidact were gradually replaced by the professional scientist. The mathematician and journalist, Yesudas Ramchandra, may be taken as a representative figure. Later, there emerged scientists who may be seen as cultural analogues of German Kulturtriiger. The chemist P.C. Ray, the physicist J.C. Bose, and M.L. Sircar, the founder of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science, belong to this genre. While some of these scientists were Renaissance men, their efforts were instrumental in inaugurating a third phase, namely that of the professional scientist. By the 1890s, most of the large presidency towns in India had universities, but research was not in their charter. The task of the leading members of the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science was to found a scientific research system. The year 1914, when the First Indian Science Congress was organised, was a landmark in the profession- alisation of Indian science. The research system thus emerged in tandem with the nationalist struggle. Page-164, Reconfiguring the Centre: The Structure of Scientific Exchanges Between Colonial India and Europe DHRUV RAINA Minerva 34: 161-176, 1996. © 1996 KluwerAcademic Publishers. Printed in The Netherlands.
Posted on: Mon, 21 Apr 2014 10:55:42 +0000
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