VIJAYAWADA: Vaddadi Srinivas Chakravarthy, a professor, is making efforts to promote science in the Telugu language. He translated some 70 popular science books and is distributing them to students in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh States free of cost.
A native of Visakhapatnam, Mr. Chakravarthy completed B. Tech. in Electrical Engineering from IIT Madras, MS and Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from University of Texas, Austin. He worked in an oil company at Houston, before returning to India.
“There is an extensive tradition of science popularisation and the related literature in the West, which is very less in Indian Languages. University libraries and the community libraries in the US have an impressive collection of science books for all age groups,” said Mr. Chakravarthy, who is currently working as professor in IIT Madras.
Speaking to The Hindu , the professor and a researcher in Computational Neuroscience said the literacy rate in India was low compared to developed countries, due to which superstitions and unscientific practices are quite strong.
“After observing the challenges and to improve science in local languages, I started translating science books scripted by Isaac Asimov, Jules Verne, Michael Faraday and other writers some 10 years ago on the topics including planets, volcanoes, lasers, comets and micro organisms. The books were published by Manchipustakam Publishers, Hyderabad, Jana Vignana Vedika, Nellore, and Peacock Classics, Hyderabad,” said the professor.
Some original books written with the topics ‘ Vaijnaanika Viplavakarudu Albert Einstein ’, ‘ Khagola Sastra Charitra ’ and ‘ Neeti Pai Telei Nagaralu ’ and the Andhra Pradesh government is distributing the book on Albert Einstein in some schools.
The IIT Madras is helping to distribute the copies of some of these books in several schools in rural areas in AP and Telangana. A similar project is being taken up in Tamil language with the help of AID India, an NGO, which is working on literacy in Tamil Nadu.
“We are planning to distribute the science books translated in Tamil language in the rural schools in Tamil Nadu,” said Mr. Chakravarthy.
