KERALA:
New Delhi:
While much has been written about the educational background of several engineers and scientists involved in the Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft that soft-landed on the moon’s South Pole on August 23, bringing India into the ranks of the US, Russia, and China in the field of space technology.
However, Chandrayaan’s hero and ISRO chairman S. Somanath has been totally ignored as far as his educational background and his alma mater are concerned.
Many people may not know that he is a product of TMK College of Engineering, at Kollam in Kerala, set up by a Muslim businessman – Thangal Kunju Musaliar – in 1958. An Aided autonomous institution, the college is affiliated to APJ Abdul Kalam Technological University, Kerala.
College’s Placement Manager Harish TP, when contacted, told this scribe that Somanath visited the college last year and also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for setting up a course in spacecraft at his alma mater in collaboration with ISRO.
According to Harish, the course is in the process of being designed by ISRO scientists and the college’s faculty members.
Former director of ISRO’s satellite centre TK Alex also studied at this college.
The college has the distinction of being the first private engineering college in Kerala, indicating the educational interest of its founder Thangal Kunju Musaliar, or in short TKM who died in 1966. He traced his ancestry to Malik ibn Deenar, an Islamic missionary who came to India in 8th century, and in a later generation to Sheikh Ali Hassan Musaliar whose tomb exists in the premises of the Sheikh Masjid at Karunagapally.
According to the college’s website, TKM, a cashew nut businessman set up TKM educational trust in 1956 paving the way for the setting up of the college.
The college’s foundation stone was laid on February 3, 1958, by India’s first president Dr. Rajendra Prasad, and formally inaugurated on July 3, 1958, by Prof. Humayum Kabir, the then Union Minister for Scientific and Cultural Affairs.
TKM’s eldest son Dr. Shahal Hassan Musaliar is now the chairman of the TMK trust. The trust now runs several institutions including TKM College of Arts and Sciences, TKM Institute of Technology, TKM Institute of Management, TKM School of Communication and Information Technology, TKM Centenary Public School, TKM High School, TKM Higher Secondary School, and more recently the TKM Centre for Advanced Learning and TKM School of Architecture, having thousands of students.
source: http://www.indiatomorrow.net / India Tomorrow/ Home> Debate / by Syed Khalique Ahmed / August 28th, 2023