Harsh Gupta

Harsh Kumar Gupta (born 1942) is an Indian earth scientist and seismologist, known for his pioneering work on estimation of reservoir-induced earthquakes. He is a former vice chancellor of the Cochin University of Science and Technology (CUSAT) and a Raja Ramanna Fellow at the National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI), Hyderabad. A recipient of the 1983 Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology, the highest Indian award in the science and technology category, and the 2008 Waldo E. Smith Award, Gupta was awarded the fourth highest Indian civilian honour of the Padma Shri in 2006.

Biography Gupta Ji, born on 28 July 1942, did his Schooling in St.George's College, Mussoorie ( Batch of 1957) and graduate studies (BSc Hons) at the Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad, from where he also secured his master's degree (MSc) in Applied Geophysics. Later, he obtained a doctoral degree (PhD) from the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee and pursued advanced studies in Seismology at the International Institute of Seismology and Earthquake Engineering, Tokyo, on a two-year UNESCO fellowship. Moving to the US, he joined the University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) as a research scientist in 1972, a post he held till 1977. In 1982, he became the director of the Centre for Earth Science Studies, Thiruvananthapuram and worked there till 1987. He also served as the project director of the Kerala Mineral Development and Exploration Project (KMDEP) during the same period.

Legacy Gupta's researches have been focused on the study of earthquakes and he is known to have developed methodology for discriminating normal earthquakes from reservoir-induced ones. namely, Disaster Management, Oceanology, Geothermal Energy: An Alternative Resource for the 21st Century, Reservoir Induced Earthquakes (Developments in Geotechnical Engineering), and Three Great Tsunamis. He has also edited 15 books,

Gupta headed the team which set up the Indian Tsunami Warning System. reportedly in record time. and he received the 100 Years of International Geophysics Memorial Medal of the USSR Academy of Sciences in 1985. He became an elected Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy (INSA) in 1989, and two years later, he was selected for the 1991 National Mineral Award. The year 2000 brought him two awards, Indian Geophysical Union Millennium Award and Indian Society of Applied Geochemists Millennium Award.

Gupta received the National Mineral Award for a second time in 2002 and the Professor K. Naha Memorial Award of the Indian National Science Academy in 2004. The Government of India included him in the Republic Day Honours list for the civilian award of the Padma Shri in 2006. He is also a recipient of the 2003 Jawaharlal Nehru Birth Centenary visiting Fellowship and 2008 Nayudamma Memorial Gold Medal Award. The same year, the American Geophysical Union honoured him with the Waldo E. Smith Award.

Selected bibliography