C. Venkataraman Sundaram

Chokkanathapuram Venkataraman Sundaram (7 November 1929 – 15 August 2008) was an Indian chemical metallurgist, best known for the commissioning of the Fast Breeder Test Reactor at Kalpakkam. He was the director of the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR). He was a recipient of the Sanjay Gandhi Award for Science and Technology as well as the National Metallurgists Day Award and an elected fellow of the Indian National Science Academy, the Indian Academy of Sciences and the Indian National Academy of Engineering. The Government of India awarded him the Padma Bhushan, the third highest civilian award, in 1986.

Biography

C. V. Sundaram was born on 7 November 1929 at Ottappalam, in Palakkad district of the south Indian state of Kerala. His doctoral research was at the Indian Institute of Science under the guidance of Brahm Prakash, a noted metallurgist who was a recipient of such honors as Padma Shri, Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize and Padma Bhushan, which earned him a doctoral degree (DIISc) in 1952. In 1956, he joined the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE) where he was entrusted with the responsibility of the production of refractory metals. His next move was to Bhabha Atomic Research Centre as the head of the department of metallurgy in 1975 where he worked until 1982, when he was appointed as the director of Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR). He served out his regular career at IGCAR and after retirement from official service in 1989, he continued his association with DAE as a consultant to the Nuclear Fuel Complex. Later, he moved to the National Institute of Advanced Studies, a centre of higher learning, as the Homi Bhabha visiting professor until his full retirement in 2001. His studies have been documented by way of a number of articles. Besides, he published two books on science, Materials Technology: Challenges and Opportunities, published in 1995 and Atomic Energy in India, 50 Years, published by the Department of Atomic Energy in 1998. He also translated the Shivananda Lahari of Adi Shankaracharya into English. He was an honorary member of the Indian Institute of Metals and a regular member of the Metallurgical Society (USA). He served as the chief editor of the Transactions journal of the Indian Institute of Metals from 1972 to 1980 as well as the Metals Materials and Processes journal and sat in the editorial board of the Journal of Nuclear Materials.

Awards and honors The Indian Institute of Metals (IIM) awarded Sundaram, the Kamani Gold Medal in 1967; IIM honored him again in 1985 with the Platinum Medal in 1985, the same year as he received the Distinguished Alumnus Award of the Indian Institute of Science. In between, he received the National Metallurgists' Day Award in 1970 He received two more awards in 1985, the Sanjay Gandhi Award for Science and Technology of the Government of India The next year, he received the third highest civilian honor from the Government of India, the Padma Bhusan. The Indian Nuclear Society awarded him the INS Homi Bhabha Lifetime Achievement Award in 2001 and the Ministry of Mines of the Government of India selected him for the Lifetime Achievement Award in 2006. He was an elected fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences (1974), the Indian National Science Academy (1979) and the Indian National Academy of Engineering.

Selected bibliography Books

Articles