"Faint" Stop

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"Faint" Stop

1975: IIT KGP:

My PhD Guide, Prof SDM, was the only genius I met and worked with.

14 years ago I wrote a 17-page Homage to him titled:

"Sudhansu Datta Majumdar - The Genius Who Touched My Life"

which is still widely read.

Like any other genius, he had his quota of eccentricities.

Most of his long mathematical calculations he would do in his head. He once told me his concentration was yogic.

In the beginning when I used to go to him with a problem that was baffling me, he would close his eyes, fall silent for a good ten minutes, and emerge with the hint for its solution, like:

"Apply Faltung!"

(He would always refer to it by its crisp German name rather than its lofty English translation: Convolution Theorem)

Slowly and steadily by his personal touch I too acquired in a small dose his habit of headstrong calculations :)

But when he was not thinking, he would drivel, some times for hours and hours on all sorts of topics of which he had the least idea.

And he was always tensed up like taut string about to snap.

And he was heading our department for a year just before his retirement, by when he was thirty years older to me, and fifteen years to our youthful Director.

One noon then I was in his office discussing the panel of foreign examiners of my thesis ready to be signed by him the next day.

And then Prof R barged in suddenly, delivered a hand-scribbled note from our Director, and left.

As SDM picked it up and read it, his eyes rolled up and his bent head gently dropped itself onto the table in front of him.

I panicked, ran into the corridor, collected a couple of colleagues, telephoned the ambulance; and all was helter-skelter, myself praying devoutly to our various gods in their respective heavenly abodes :)

By and by his head lifted and stood itself up, he smiled wanly, took a sip from the hot tea we had fetched, dismissed the ambulance, thanked the colleagues for the tea; and after every guest left, he grinned and said:

"Oh! I fainted! This is the fourth time. Earlier three were when:

1. I was watching the chariot race in the movie "Ben-Hur"

2. I saw one of the "Great Calcutta Killings" with my own eyes

3. The local surgeon was teasing out glass pieces embedded in my palm without giving me anesthesia."

...And then he picked up that Note from our Director, re-read it, grimaced, and said:

"The Director has banged me in front of Prof R. Look at this...he writes:

'...I don't like this HoD and Prof R may meet me...' "

And handed me that hastily scribbled note.

I inspected it, laughed uproariously, said sorry, and handed the note back to him saying:

"Sir! You missed the tiny full-stop between 'this' and 'HoD'. Take a look!"

And having a re-look, it was his turn to burst out laughing:

"Oho! I missed that full-stop. It is hardly legible"

"Yes sir! It is indeed faint"

:)

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