Dr M.S.Swaminathan.
Many many happy returns of the day .Today is his birthday. Mankombu Sambasivan Swaminathan (born 7 August 1925 ,age 96 years) is an Indian agronomist, agricultural scientist, plant geneticist, administrator and humanitarian. Swaminathan is a global leader of the Green Revolution in India.He has been called the main architect of the "green revolution in India" for his leadership and role in introducing and further developing high-yielding varieties of wheat and rice.
In 1960, when India was facing mass shortage of food, M S Swaminathan along with Norman Borlaug and other scientists developed the HYV (high yielding variety) seeds of wheat. This development led to Green Revolution in India and M S Swaminathan is known as 'The Father of Green Revolution'. Swaminathan's collaborative scientific efforts with American scientist Norman Borlaug, spearheading a mass movement with farmers and other scientists and backed by public policies, saved India and Pakistan from certain famine-like conditions in the 1960s. His leadership as Director General of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines (1982-1988) was instrumental in his being awarded the first World Food Prize in 1987, recognized as the Nobel or the highest honours in the field of agriculture. United Nations Environment Programme has called him 'the Father of Economic Ecology'.
From 1972 to 1979 he was Director General of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research(ICAR), and he was principal secretary of the Indian ministry of agriculture and irrigation; from 1979 to 1980. He served as president of the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (1984–90).
Information compiled by:
Dr. Bhairavsinh Raol
