> Dr. A.P.J. Kalam was a friend of mine for over 40 years — from 1973. The first time I met him was about a year earlier, when he was working as a Junior Scientist at the Aeronautical Development Establishment in Bangalore, where its Director, Air Cmd. Krishnamurty had taken me to see a “hovercraft” being developed by ADE. With lot of enthusiasm, Dr. Kalam and his co-workers demonstrated the functioning of the hovercraft under development.
He said that it would be very useful to travel over the sea near his native place in Rameswaram over some distances after further development was done. From October 1973 for over six months, our interaction was quite intense as he had been nominated by Prof. Satish Dhawan as a member of the task force set up by the government on using artificial satellites for different purposes. I was the Chairman of the task force, which had members from the three services, Department of Space, Department of Telecommunications and a few others. Dr. Kalam’s contribution to preparing the report was substantial. Even at that time he was talking about including “payload recovery” after re-entry of that module from space. He and his team prepared the sketches, and made presentations to the task force members. The task force report, which was declassified in 1981, indeed covered this aspect in a simple academic way. From that time onwards, due to some commonality of professional interests, we stayed in touch. I used to attend seminars and workshops conducted by the ISRO, where we met a few times.
In mid-1981, I invited Dr. Raja Ramanna who was at that time our Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister, and Dr. Kalam, who was working as Director at the ISRO headquarters in Bangalore, to the Defence Electronics Application Laboratory (DEAL) in Dehradun to inaugurate and deliver a technical lecture there. In his speech, Dr. Kalam paid compliments to our laboratory saying that while everyone complained about our poor communications, DEAL was able to contact him two to three times a day during the past few days. After that function, Dr. Rajaramanna had a discussion in my office about the possibility of Dr. Kalam joining as Director of the DRDL in Hyderabad to provide leadership to India’s missiles programme. Dr. Kalam replied that Prof. Satish Dhawan would have to decide on that. That was how Dr. Kalam joined the DRDO. This episode has been covered in Dr Kalam’s first book “Wings of Fire”.
In June 1982, he joined as Director of DRDL while I was Director of the Defence Electronics Research Laboratory from January 1982. By then DRDL and DLRL had been working closely for a few years on different aspects of DRDL’s missile programmes. This necessitated that these two laboratories interact quite closely. Inputs from many DRDO laboratories, apart from these two laboratories, resulted in the famous Integrated Guided Missiles Development programme (IGMDP) of India. Dr. Kalam’s superb personal qualities, and his proven capability of team building, hard work and utmost sincerity and honesty were the important assets which were sorely needed to provide leadership to a complex, multi-disciplined, multi-organizational IGMDP. Dr. Kalam’s willingness to hear the viewpoint of any person engaged in the projects, capacity of convincing leaders of several industries to undertake development/production work, and giving importance to everyone in the team resulted in IGMDP giving the desired results, though with some time and cost overruns.
This gave the Armed Forces and the government enough confidence to undertake collaborative projects with Russia (Brahmos) Israel (BARAK-8SAM) and France (MAITRI) as well as with Bharat Dynamics Limited( MBDA project) in Hyderabad. The visualisation, planning and establishment of Research Centre Imarat, a 2,000-acres facility a few kilometres away from DRDL, was principally intended to develop some of the technologies needed for the IGMDP and carry out evaluation and integration of missile hardware and software. This was successfully done by Dr. Kalam by pooling the knowledge and talents of large numbers of engineers, scientists, industrialists and administrators. This gigantic task could not have been done by others. The legacy created and implemented by Dr. Kalam is used by all DRDO laboratories now. That is what DRDO and our country has gained from Dr. Kalam’s stint at the DRDO from June 1982 to June 1991. It significantly changed the way major laboratories in DRDO handled their projects as well as the human and financial resources placed under them.
Dr. Kalam with the author and other colleagues having a casual moment at a kacheri in Kanchanbagh, the DRDO staff accommodation.
In Kanchanbagh, where DRDO officers and staff were given accommodation, we started a carnatic music sabha called Hamsadwani, organising one kacheri each month. Despite his many commitments, Dr. Kalam did manage to attend a few of the concerts, always held in. He knew about my deep interest in carnatic music. Once in 1985 or so, both of us were staying in the same room of the DRDO guest house (which was then in a hired house in Khelgaum constructed for the Asian Games. During our informal chat, he expressed his intense desire to play on the veena “Endero mahanu bhavulu”. I said he would find it very difficult as it is the most difficult of the Pancha Ratna kritis of Saint Tyagaraja and the kriti has lot of embellishments. But he said he knew the meaning of the lyric and so wanted to learn it and play it on the veena. As I did not know Tamil script and he did not know Telugu script, we spent lot of time to ensure that he copied the lyric that I was dictating without errors. He wanted me to send him a tape on which this kriti had been recorded as vocal and also on the veena, which I did. About a month or two later, when both of us were attending a meeting, Dr. Kalam vocally rendered one of the charanams of the kriti, to my utter surprise. Such was his determination to fulfill any target he set for himself.
During the last week of December 1991, we were both returning from Delhi to Hyderabad by Indian Airlines. I was panicking as we both were “wait-listed passengers” and I had already planned to go to Tirumala the next day with my wife and son as I was retiring on the December 31. I told Dr. Kalam that I will ring up the head of Airports Authority of India and tell him that a Padma Bhushan awardee and his friend had been wait-listed on the Hyderabad flight and request his help to get two seats. Dr. Kalam said firmly that his Padma Bhushan must not be used for this purpose. He was continuously assuring me that Lord Venkateswara himself would ensure that I and my family would have darsan as planned. I did end up asking a friend in AAI for help, but that incident revealed to me Dr. Kalam’s integrity and openness.
When we two were in Kanchanbaug, he mentioned that after his retirement or even earlier, he wanted to finance two or three mobile hospitals using big bus bodies and employ some doctors and use their talents and services to provide medical aid and medicines to poor families living away from cities. So Dr. Kalam being involved in Ambulance 108 was no surprise to me.
Dr. Kalam was conferred the Honorary Doctor of Science degree, first by Wolverhampton University, U.K., in 2007.This was followed by several universities awarding him honorary degrees -- over 30 of them, a unique recognition of his deep interest in several areas of science and technology. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1981, the Padma Vibhushan in 1990 and India’s highest civilian award, the Bharat Ratna, in 1997. When I was awarded Lifetime Achievement Award from DRDO in 2012, he congratulated me on the phone saying something to the effect “You have got the lifetime award of the DRDO now, which you should have got earlier.” I said no DRDO scientist would ever get the Bharat Ratna, which he had got. He said, “You never know.”
In 2006, I went to see Dr. Kalam at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. I was ushered into his picturesque room, which had a splendid view of a fountain in the adjacent garden. When I was going towards his desk to greet him he stood up, surprising me. After we shook hands and sat down, he enquired whether I was still perusing my musical interests (Yes!). Seeing my diary in my hand, he enquired whether I had brought a book as a present. I said, what present could I bring the President of India. He smiled and said my calling on him was a present! He suggested that I should write a book on my experiences in the DRDO. While I was doubtful of coming out with anything worth publishing, the much-published author was confident, saying start it and see, it would take only a modest effort. The visit justified the wise statement that some persons occupying a position bring prestige to that position rather than other way round.
As President of India, Dr. Kalam personified dignity and optimism throughout India and abroad. Many dignitaries say that his stirring speeches, whether at a seminar, a college function or in Parliament, brought out his simplicity in oration and action .This aspect was applauded by one and all and may be the principle reason for his being loved and respected. For a very long time, Dr. Kalam will remain as one of the finest human beings ever to have lived. The successful and illustrious life that he lived, and the legacy he has left for us will continue to inspire and encourage children and youngsters in the world, especially in India for many years to come.
May his soul rest in eternal peace.
(E. Bhagiratharao is a former director of Defence Electronics Research Laboratory)
