1992 - Annual Report

Abstract

During the year under review, the Institute adopted a new CONSTITUTION & BYELAWS for its governance. Accordingly the governing bodies are now the Board and the Executive Council of the Institute. While the Board meets once a year and considers the general policy matters and approves the budget of the Institute, the Executive Council meets as often as necessary and guides the Institute in all its activities. The Institute will have the benefit of distinguished academicians as members on both these bodies and I am confident that their wide experience will be very useful for us. The byelaws have been so framed that the decision-making is fair and swift, so that they help ’ in achieving all the objectives of the Institute. The quest for exceptionally talented faculty to increase the strength of the Institute continued. A large number of applications reflected a keen interest in the Institute and offers were made to a few. The idea of holding intensive workshops on various special topics continued during the year under review. Belonging to this category was a workshop on Geometrical Phases, a topic in which there is considerable activity in our country. The proceedings of the workshop which was conducted during 7-11 October 1991 is to be published by the Indian National Science Academy as one of its journal supplements and it will be simultaneously regarded as one in the series of IMSc reports. Following the announcement of Nobel prize for P. de Gennes, a one day symposium highlighting the Physics of Complex Fluids was held. The thirtieth anniversary was observed with another one day symposium and the event was fittingly inaugurated by the Institute’s founder Director Professor Alladi Ramakrishnan. The space crunch in the Institute will hopefully disappear, once the third floor to the Library Building is completed. The construction work made considerable progress during the year and it is expected that it will be ready for occupation soon. The academic activities of the Institute, the various seminars and colloquia held during the year, the distinguished visitors to the Institute etc. will be detailed in the report. I would like to highlight the special honours won by our distinguished faculty. Prof. G. Rajasekaran was awared FICCI medal for his contributions in gauge field theories. Prof. R. Balasubramanian was honoured with B.M.BIRLA AWARD, 1991 for his Contributions to Number Theory. The year saw the formal retirement of Professor R.Vasudevan, after the completion of five years of extension of his appointment after his superannuation. He has been associated with the Institute since its inception and his contribution to its growth will be in the cherished memory of the Institute for all time to come. The upgrading of the infrastructure of the Institute to make it responsive to the needs of the academic activity is the task of the administrative machinery. Shri G.Sethuraman, Chief Administrative Officer and the other staff members continue to provide the necessary initiative. This report has been prepared through the efforts of Professor R.Parthasarathy and the Committee consisting of Prof.S.Nag, Dr.R.Ramanujam, and Mr.K.S.Santhanagopalan. Mrs.S.M.Parijatham prepared the Latex version of the Annual Report.