Eureka moments: Science writer Hari Pulakkat on his new book, Space. Life.Matter

But he knows how to get both editors and readers to pay attention. “You must find that balance between knowing what is significant and knowing what people want to read,” Pulakkat says. “And you must tell the story with as much accuracy as skill.”

Both traits feature amply in his first book, Space. Life. Matter. The Coming of Age of Indian Science. It’s a step up from the usual. There’s no jargon, no barrage of statistics, no passages droning on and on about obscure theory. Pulakkat’s focus is clear: he examines the period between 1947 and 2000 and focuses on the individuals who made India’s scientific achievements possible, often against harsh odds. The 15 chapters cover milestones marked in outdated chemistry labs, fledgling nuclear reactors, smelly tanneries, gold mines, space observatories, dusty libraries and dinky government offices.

Pulakkat won the Indira Gandhi Prize for Popularisation of Science in 2020. He is the editor of Shaastra, a science and technology magazine published by IIT-Madras. The book offers both the long view and the close-up, making his stories both personal and rigorously informative. “This book is only a brief part of what happened,” he warns. And yet, it’s a bigger story than we’ve seen so far. Excerpts from an interview.

Science is indeed universal and it’s behind all the things we enjoy today – health, conveniences, cities. I wanted to look at science in India. We’ve been, since Independence, largely a poor nation. But our science and technology has been sophisticated. We rank higher on the knowledge index than similar nations. I wanted to understand how we got here.

Consider that India was only 12% literate in 1947. And in a new nation, everything needs money. Of course, science helps improve the quality of life, brings economic growth. But our government invested in sciences for a bigger reason – to build capabilities, develop negotiating power with the world, and develop our own technology when it was denied to us by the West.

We did turn a corner in the 1990s. There was less scarcity. I call it a coming of age in the sense that India’s childhood phase is over.

So much of the book is about people, and stories of adversity and triumph within science.

I’ve had, for 10 years, a vague idea about writing of how people thrive in difficult circumstances, and how adversity makes them creative. I have a habit of meeting someone without knowing much about them – it allows for more discovery, less bias. With Indian scientists, the good thing is that so many of their stories just haven’t been told before. Like that of the radio astronomy pioneer Govind Swarup, whom I’d heard of but never met. Just consider his audacity! In the 1960s, at a time when no one in India had even seen a telescope, he dreamed of building a gigantic one in Ooty. So many of the great minds I met I the three years I researched this book told me, “No one has asked me this before”. I wanted to piece together as much as I could.

Are the humanities and sciences any closer to understanding each other in India?

This has been a poor relationship historically, around the world. India, especially, didn’t focus much on the humanities – we setup technical institutes but let our universities flounder. Even today, science students know the science, arts students know the arts. But as other countries have done, we must collaborate, not separate. It will help us tell science stories with more honesty and accuracy, to larger audiences. We don’t do it enough. Even today, it’s hard to make a decent living as a science writer.

What do the coming years look like for Indian science?

I think it will be more of “like this only”. We had a good period between 2000 and 2010; there was good funding for research. Then things stagnated again. Improvement will be marginal at best, even as a difficult phase approaches. We need science to tackle the crises of tomorrow: climate change, resource management, population growth. We’re not investing in it enough.