The 'inner life' of a rational scientist

There have been multiple biographies of Acharya Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858-1937), the pioneering interdisciplinary scientist, who was close to the epicentre of the many tumultuous socio-political movements that swept through Bengal and India during his lifetime.

- DEVANGSHU DATTA

Kunal Ghosh, for example, wrote an outstanding scientific biography a few years ago.

The influence of Bose (who usually spelt his name "Jagadis") extended far beyond the realm of personal scientific inquiry. He had relationships, good and bad, that spanned the global scientific community. As an eminent Bengali intellectual, he knew every other eminent Bengali of his era. This book explores some of those relationships as well as looking at the science.

Bose was a very complex individual. He was a rational scientist, who was also deeply religious. He had an explosive temper, and huge mood swings, which he struggled to control. He was a committed nationalist who believed in Satyagraha (from long before the term was coined) and bloody-minded enough to refuse to accept a salary lower than his white colleagues for many years. But there is also compelling evidence, referred to only in passing in this book, that he and his chemist colleague and friend, Acharya Prafulla Chandra Ray, allowed revolutionaries to tap into their knowledge of explosives, and to pilfer chemicals stored in the labs at Presidency College.

Many of Bose's most fascinating interactions were with his friend and coreligionist Rabindranath Tagore, and with another close friend, Swami Vivekananda, with whom he had violent, public differences of opinion about religion. That relationship led in turn to close friendships with two women, the Irishwoman Margaret Noble aka Sister Nivedita, and the American, Sarah Bull.