Arun Kumar Biswas

Arun Kumar Biswas was a professor at Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur (India) during 1963–95. He is well known for his contributions in the area of mineral engineering, archaeometallurgy, minerals and gems in antiquity, history of science, philosophy, science and music, etc. Biswas was the founding member of Indian Institute of Mineral Engineers (1969). Founder president of Indian Language Society in the early 1980s at IIT K, he served several organizations in various honorary capacities: Mahendralal Sircar Research Professor in History of Science at the Asiatic Society, Kolkata (1995–2001); the AICTE Emeritus Fellow at the Jadavpur University (2001–2004); and INSA Research Fellow in Kolkata. He was a member of the INSA National Commission for History of Science and, the editorial board member of the Indian Journal of the History of Science. Biswas completed his Master and Doctorate degrees in Applied Chemistry from Science College, Kolkata in 1959. He then went to MIT as a Fulbright Fellow and worked on hysteresis of contact angle under the guidance of Professor Antoine Marc Gaudin. He returned to India and joined the Department of Metallurgical Engineering at IIT Kanpur in 1963. He became Associate Professor and Professor in 1968 and 1971, respectively. He married Sulekha in 1964, and their only child, Sandipan was born in 1973. Biswas authored over 150 technical papers and 25 monographs and edited multi-authored volumes. He built his international reputation in diverse fields including History of Science, Applied Chemistry, Mineral Engineering, Languages and Literature, Linguistics, History of Religion and Archaeo-metallurgy. His sterling contributions in the field of history of minerals and metals and archaeo-metallurgy are most well known internationally. He also wrote several detective novels featuring the private investigator Alokesh Roy and his team. Biswas received several awards and honors for his academic and literary achievements, such as the National Mineral Award (1975), the Jawaharlal Nehru Fellowship (1980–82), the Pitambar Pant National Environment Fellowship Award (1986–88), the M.N. Saha Birth Centenary Award (1994), the Sukumar Sen Memorial Gold Medal (2002), the Meghnad Saha Memorial Award (2004), the Rabindra Puraskar (2005) and the Padma Shri (2014). Biswas passed away on 30 November 2015 in Kolkata due to cardiac arrest. He was 81 years old.