Whilst I was researching the Partition, I came across an interesting document in microfilm form. The barely legible document is a report done by Nalini Ranjan Sarkar Committee appointed by Lord Wavell in 1943 on the recommendation of BN to develop an Indian engineering ecosystem on the lines of MIT. Basheshar Nath and his Bangladesh insurance partner Nalini Ranjan Sarkar had visited New England to understand the development of reinsurance. Whilst they were in the Boston area, they got to visit MIT.
Both came back to India and recommended to Viceroy Wavell that a strong India needed a new system of higher education. I then dug into the archives of the iit system. I found the following report.
This report, credit for which is claimed by Nehru was actually commissioned in 1944 and completed in March 1946. A cover page with a Ashoka Chakra was added to this document.
However the inside of the report remains the same as in the original. The report gives the list of members – one of who is alive to this date. It also says it was done for the Viceroys Council.
The 47 page report of March 1946 makes interesting reading though. It did come as a surprise though that the IITs were actually a British invention. And the father of the IIT system was actually Lord Wavell.
The same man who was moved out to accommodate the Father of the Partition – Lord Mountbatten. An act he was supposedly handsomely awarded for.
In 2004, thanks to President Kalam, I got to use the Golf Course in the Rashtrapati Bhavan. The caddy there was almost 90 years old. After retiring, he continued to work on contract. He described to me that Nehru and Madam Edwina would spend the whole day, all days of the week in Raisina Hill. And often wondered when they went to work at all.
My research also unveiled another story. A lawyer called Hotchand Advani from Lahore. He was BNs lawyer and built some of Bombays most enduring institutions – Jai Hind College (my alma mater), KC College, HR College … he also acquired thr Framroz Court building at marine drive as a memory of the Framroz court in Pakistan. His son Kumar Advani was a CA from England & Wales. And was my first boss. His other son – Ashok Advani set up Business India. Both didn’t get married. Kumar passed on a few years ago. It was Kumar who first introduced me to Dr Manmohan Singh to help evolve a framework for liberalisation.
The world as they say is round.
Drum beaters rarely are the true source.
Nehru did not think of IIT.
It was advanced work in progress when he latched on to the bandwagon.
But putting an Ashoka Chakra on a pre independence document is kind of cute. It reminds one of Chinese electric buses being converted to made in India to get access to the Rs 50,000 crore subsidy.
Of course the underlying belief was that no one would notice. Even ai missed it.
That is why ai is yet to get there. Connecting the dots leads to unexpected places.
