People with truly remarkable achievement and contribute very significantly towards bettering our world, gets rewarded with the most reputed award, Nobel Award.
Nobel is the single most honoured and prestigious award on Earth.
India too has received a fair share of Nobel awards, and Indians who achieved this award are titled as Nobel Laureates of India.
We will discuss about five such Indian Nobel prize winners who have made us proud.
Everyone on this earth works for something or the other be it monetary gain or achieving some goals, but Nobel Laureates are people who work selflessly towards the betterment of our society.
They say that good work never goes without rewards. Therefore, we all continue to do some of the other good work like helping others.
Some ambitious ones try to invent or discover new things. But doing something that really stirs up the world and gets rewarded big time is very rare.
While Nobel Laureates from India are far fewer in number than certain other countries, they indicate that Indians are capable of contributing something exceptional to the world. Here is a list of Nobel prize winners in India.
Nobel Prize Winners of India
1. Rabindranath Tagore
Rabindranath Tagore was the first Nobel prize winner in India.
The Nobel Foundation, Sweden, conferred the Nobel award on Tagore in 1913, at a time when the Indian subcontinent was under British occupation.
He is also referred to as ‘Bard of Bengal’. Rabindranath Tagore was conferred the Knighthood by the British rulers.
He renounced it following Jallianwala Baug massacre of unarmed Indian freedom fighters by armed British troops.
He shares the title as National Poet of India along with many other contemporary and legendary Indian writers. Rabindranath Tagore was the first non-European to win the Nobel.
He is honoured as Nobel Laureates in Literature. The Nobel Foundation conferred the award in recognition of his literary work ‘Gitanjali,’ that provided Europeans with a new look at Indian culture in those years.
Rabindranath Tagore is best known for writing the current National Anthem of India, ‘Jana-Gana-Mana,’ which consists of the opening lines of a larger poem.
He is credited with creating the musical version of India’s National Song, ‘Vande Mataram’ written by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee.
Rabindranath Tagore also founded the Shantiniketan ashram and Visva Bharati University in Bengal.
On May 25, 2004, the original Nobel award won by Rabindranath Tagore was stolen from Visva Bharati University.
In December that year, Nobel Foundation presented two replica Nobel awards to the university to replace the stolen one.
Unfortunately, Rabindranath Tagore could not be honoured with India’s highest civilian honour, the Bharat Ratna, because the award is not given posthumously and was instituted only in 1954.
2. Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman
Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman was an Indian physicist and scientist who discovered the Raman Effect or the phenomenon of light scattering through various transparent mediums.
He won the Nobel award in 1930 for this ground-breaking discovery.
The Indian government honoured CV Raman with India’s highest civilian award, Bharat Ratna, immediately after it was constituted in 1954.
CV Raman is the first Asian and first Indian to win the Nobel award for science and honoured as Nobel Laureates in Physics. Hence his name is taken under Indian Nobel Laureates.
CV Raman is also known for his experiments and findings of various effects of light on iridescent materials including pearls, agate, opal and other precious stones.
He has written several scientific papers on various effects of life. CV Raman is the founder of Ithe ndian Journal of Physics in 1929.
The British Empire conferred Knighthood on CV Raman in recognition of his contributions in Physics. CV Raman also holds the Lenin Peace Prize from Russia. He has headed several prestigious scientific institutes in India.
3. Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa, now also known as Saint Teresa of Kolkata became the third Indian citizen to win the Nobel award. However, Mother Teresa was not born as an Indian citizen.
She was born in Skopje in Albania and migrated to India to conduct missionary work. Her Albanian name is Anjeze Gonxhe Bojakxiu.
The Nobel award was conferred on Mother Teresa in 1979 in recognition of her works of charity, especially for the uplift of downtrodden masses of the Indian society and victims of leprosy.
After several controversies, Mother Teresa was conferred sainthood by the Vatican in December 2015, almost 27 years after her death. She is now known also as Saint Teresa of Kolkata.
Mother Teresa was also honoured with the Bharat Ratna by the Indian government. She won several prestigious accolades from various countries for her charity works in India.
Mother Teresa was honoured with Ramon Magsaysay Award for Peace and International Cooperation too.
The works of Mother Teresa in India were not free from controversy. She was accused of trying to proselytize people of indigenous faith into Christianity.
Medical clinics run by her Missionaries of Charity drew strong criticism from human rights activists for lacking proper healthcare facilities despite receiving millions of Dollars as aid and grants from Indian and foreign sources.
Also read : List Of 9 Top NGOs In India Doing Remarkable Work
4. Amartya Sen
Amartya Kumar Sen is a prominent Indian economist and author who won the Nobel award in 1998. Hence he is yet another Nobel Laureates of India.
The Nobel was given in recognition of Amartya Sen’s contribution to welfare economics, social choice theory and works in economic and social justice, among others.
In 1999, the Indian government honoured Amartya Sen with the highest civilian accolade, Bharat Ratna.
He also holds various prestigious honours bestowed by universities, countries and civil society organizations.
Amartya Sen has written several books on economics and its various facets.
They provide vital insights to economics about various situations including famines, panic buying and another common phenomenon.
He is the first Indian to win a Nobel in the Economics field. Amartya Sen was conferred honorary citizenship by Bangladesh since his family hails from that part of the Indian subcontinent.
5. Kailash Satyarthi
Featured in LinkedIn Power Profiles for 2017 and 2018, child rights activist Kailash Satyarthi won the Nobel award in 2014 and entered into the list of Nobel Laureates from India.
The award is shared with Malala Yousufzai of Pakistan, who suffered severe facial mutilation at the hands of Islamic fanatics.
Kailash Satyarthi is the founder or Bachpan Bachao Andolan or ‘Save Childhood Movement’ of India.
His organization has rescued close to 90,000 children from slavery, bonded labour and other inhumane conditions imposed by landlords and other human traffickers.
Kailash Satyarathi also conducted the Global March against Child Labour covering some 103 countries in 1998.
Several suggestions made by Kailash Satyarthi to end child labour and trafficking are now mentioned in laws and rules enacted by UNICEF are binding upon signatory nations.
Kailash Satyarthi was honoured with the Bharat Ratna by the Indian government.
Additionally, he has also won accolades from UNESCO, child rights organizations and various countries for contributions to the elimination of child labour and human trafficking.
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In Conclusion:
There are several other persons of Indian origin that have also won Nobel awards in various fields.
However, since they hold foreign citizenships, they cannot be considered as Nobel awards bagged by Indians. Mother Teresa had acquired Indian citizenship before winning the award.