Today’s Hero - 341 M. S. Swaminathan Wednesday 07-Aug-13 Monkombu Sambasivan Swaminathan [Born: 07 Aug 1925, Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu] is a geneticist and international administrator, renowned for his leading role in India’s “Green Revolution,” a program under which high-yield varieties of wheat and rice seedlings were planted in the fields of poor farmers. Swaminathan, was educated in India and at University of Cambridge. He held a number of research and administrative positions mostly in the Indian civil service. While working in these positions he helped introduce Mexican semidwarf wheat plants to Indian fields and helped to bring about greater acceptance of modern farming methods. From 1972 to 1979 he was Director General of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, and he was Minister of Agriculture from 1979 to 1980. He served as Director General of the International Rice Research Institute (1982–88) and became President of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources in 1988
Posted on: Wed, 07 Aug 2013 05:04:29 +0000