A Tribute To A Great
Scientist Of Sikkim
Dr. A. R. Ghosh Research Laboratory Of Organic Synthesis: First Ever Research Laboratory Of Chemistry In Sikkim
“National
Science Day” is observed on 28th February every year across the
country to mark and celebrate the contributions of scientists towards the
development of India. On this very day in 1928, Prof. CV Raman announced the
discovery of the “Raman Effect” and
for this, he was awarded the “Nobel Prize” in 1930. The day is celebrated to
promote scientific temper and the importance of science in everyday life.
On this auspicious
day, I want to pay tribute and respect
to mybeloved research supervisor and a great scientist of Sikkim, Late Dr.
Aloranjan Ghosh who had established the first ever research laboratory in
Sikkim Government College in 1991 in the department of chemistry.
Late Dr. Aloranjan
Ghosh, popularly known as “Ghosh Sir” was an eminent scholar, student friendly
and favourite teacher of Chemistry at Sikkim Government College, Tadongin early
1980’s to early 1990’s. He was a brilliant researcher in organic synthesis and
did his Ph.D from North Bengal University under the supervision of another
brilliant Organic Chemistry professor Late Dr.Tapan Dasgupta before joining
this institution. In those days, in addition to usual teaching, learning and
evaluation duties in the institution he had a keen interest in research work.
Due to his devotion in research and plan to establish the possibility of
setting up a “Research Laboratory in Synthetic Organic Chemistry” in the
Department of Chemistry,he was very much fortunate to receive all kinds infrastuctural
support, encouragement and loving care from two great personalities of the
institution. Late Principal, Shri R.K Rai of the institute and Dr. C.B Sunwar, Head
of the Department of Chemistry,both of them had supported him like anything to
establish the “First ever Research Laboratory of Chemistry” in the institute
and in the state of Sikkim as well.Education Department, Government Sikkim also
provided basic support in this regard. The
members of “Board of Research Studies” of University of North Bengal
(affiliating university) was constituted by the then Registrar, Dr. T.K
Chatterjee and the team visited our institute. After a careful inspection,
Sikkim Government College got approval to conduct “Research work with research
scholars leading to Ph.D programme” in 1991.
Dr. Ghosh had a clear
vision, strong will power and objectives in conducting high quality research
work in synthetic organic chemistry which could be comparable to any standards
including various universities and research institutions across the country and
abroad. In those days, it appeared very funny to many professors in and around
the state and outside the state of Sikkim as well and many people were surprised
to learn that research work is about to start in an undergraduate college where
usually no support and infrastructuralfacilities are available as well as equipment’s
are difficult to procure. But he proved everyone wrong by awarded with two
research projects simultaneously in 1992 and 1993 respectively. In those days
awarded with CSIR & UGC research projects for an UG college teacher was not
only a day dream but was really very difficult. Dr. Rajib Kumar Bose was his
first research scholar in CSIR research project in 1992 whilethe author
(Bhaskar Chakraborty) was his second research scholar in 1993. Dr. Ghosh was
very dynamic and hardworking and he used to spent hours after hour with us in
the research laboratory even after the usual college hours (4PM to 9PM). In
those days, there were no internet connectivity and we had only MS-DOS version
computer attached with a dot matrix printer. Reports and research findings were
saved and preserved in small discs and following his advice we used to keep
those discs in vacuum desiccator in order to keep moister free and research
data in safe custody. During our evening and night research work he used to
inspire us with many unknown facts about his research career as well as other
scientists too. He always wanted to be updated himself with latest developments
in our field of research and for that he used to communicate regularly with
many eminent scientists of our country and abroad also. We had enriched
ourselves with those updates and new references. During that period (1992 to
1996), Dr. C.B Sunwar, HOD, Chemistry also had started research work with one of
the lecturer, Shri Biswajit Bhaumik of the chemistry department on “Clay
Mineral Interactions”. Later on one more scholar joined under Dr. Sunwar as
research scholar but they could not complete Ph.D programme. 12thNovember,
1994 was a historicday for our institution when Rajib Kumar Bose submitted Ph.D
thesis to the university and subsequently awarded Ph.D degree in “Synthetic
Organic Chemistry” in 1995. Unfortunately, Dr. Ghosh started suffering from
early 1995 and was diagnosed with cancer and eventually, he left all of us for
heavenly abode in January 1996 at the age of 46 only.I was in the middle of my
research work and my only satisfaction was he could hear about my two research
papers published for the first time from our institution in “Journal
of Chemical research” (RSC,UK)& “CSIR-Indian
Journal of Chemistry, Section-B” in 1995. I was awarded Ph.D degree in May
1996 but Sir could not hear the good news.
Meanwhile, I had
joined this institution in 1994 and after my Ph.D degree, following his pathway
and dedicated love for this research laboratory, I started continuing research
work in the same field with many more new concepts and applications. In 2001
and 2004, I had received two research projects (minor & major) from UGC,
New Delhi and later on from DST-GOI, DBT-GOI in 2009 & 2012 respectively. As
a mark of respect, I decided to dedicate the name our research laboratory in
the name of our beloved sir and in 2002 the research laboratory was given a new
name “Dr. A.R Ghosh Laboratory of Organic
Synthesis”. Like my supervisor (Dr. A.R Ghosh), I also had a strong determination
and will power and believed that I could supervise research scholars for Ph.D
degree. Dr. Manjit Singh Chettri was my first research scholar andtill date
seven (7) research scholars (one of them is partially at Cardiff University, UK
in 2019) have completed Ph.D degree under my supervision with as many as 78
number of research publications in UGC accredited, Scopus indexed research journals
of repute in Organic Chemistry with total Google Citation index of 624 (hi
index 27 & hi index 30). Thus, I could carry forward Sir’s dream into
reality because he always wanted this “Research Laboratory” should continue and
functional with many more new concepts of research work and our state “Sikkim”
may find its place in the research map of our country and abroad. Today it
gives me immense pleasure and self-satisfaction that I could complete “25th years of Independent Research"
in this laboratory!
During this course of
research work we could establish many new concepts of "Green Chemistry" methodologies and
their further applications and the research works that have been published in
well reputed world ranking (peer reviewed & with good impact factor)
research journals which eventually given me many opportunities to showcase our
research works for presentation in international and national forums (invited
lectures in conferences and seminars) and also as "Academic Visitors" to foreign universities. With the recent
advances, in “Interdisciplinary Research”
(also Sir had this concept in early 1990’s), we are conducting many new
research works with my research scholars in the laboratory and the research
findings are regularly published in leading scientific journals. In future, I
believe my research scholars will take the baton from me and will provide
opportunity to many more research scholars from various parts of Sikkim and
carry forward research works in this research laboratory with new innovative
concepts and thereby Late Dr. A.R. Ghosh will remain alive among us as a
benchmark in research in our institution as well as in Sikkim.
This article is
dedicated to Madam Smt.Sikha Ghosh (Wife of Late Dr. A.R Ghosh.
