(): Commemorating 100 years of its establishment, the Physics department of Allahabad University (AU), organised Meghnad Saha Memorial Lecture. The department felicitated eminent professor of Physics at IISER Pune and a Padma Bhushan awardee, Prof Deepak Dhar, who was also the chief guest, on the occasion. Prof NKS Gaur and Prof Gautam Gangopadhyay graced the occasion as guest of honour while AU Vice-Chancellor (VC) Prof Sangita Srivastava presided over the function. Prof Deepak Dhar was felicitated by the V-C and was conferred with the Meghnad Saha Centenary award. AU also conferred him with the honorary degree of Doctor of Science (DSc) and Prof VK Tiwari, Head of the department, read the citation for Prof Dhar. In a brief address, Prof Dhar expressed how special this honour given by AU is to him. He said, “I feel grateful and honoured for the recognition just as a child would feel proud to have their parents applaud their achievements. Parents nurture children and imbibe values in them. One day when children grow up, they look back and feel gratitude to them. For me, the university has been that parent and I owe all I have achieved to my early years in the university.” The guest of honour Prof Gautam Gangopadhyay, who has done exhaustive research on the life of Meghnad Saha, was a guest of honour on the occasion. He said that Meghnad Saha had created a community of Physics that binds AU to the science community of Kolkata and probably across the country. AU V-C Prof Sangita Srivastava mentioned about the alumni of AU who are working at top positions in the diverse areas of academia, judiciary, bureaucracy etc.
“The achievements of alumni are because of the virtues and habits imbibed in them from their teachers in the university. It has been an honour for me to sign the honorary DSc degree to be bestowed upon the renowned Physicist Prof Dhar,” she said.