Turaga Sundara Rama Prasada Rao

Turaga Sundara Rama Prasada Rao was an Indian engineer, known for his contributions in the fields of petroleum refining and heterogeneous catalysis. He was a former director of the Indian Institute of Petroleum and a former deputy general manager of the Indian Petrochemicals Corporation Limited. He was known for his studies in petrochemical engineering; his studies have been documented by way of a number of articles and Google Scholar, an online repository of scientific articles has listed 123 of them. He also co-edited a book, Recent Advances in Basic and Applied Aspects of Industrial Catalysis, published by Elsevier. He was an elected fellow of Indian National Academy of Engineering, and the Indian Academy of Sciences. He was also a member of Andhra Pradesh Akademi of Sciences, Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers, and New York Academy of Sciences. He shared the 1996 Om Prakash Bhasin Award for Engineering with M. R. Srinivasan and C. G. Krishnadas Nair. He received the Petrotech Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004. He was also a recipient of several other honors including Chemtech Outstanding Scientist Award, K. G. Naik Gold Medal, FICCI Award Technology Award of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research. He used his science and engineering achievements to develop and commercialise more than 10 technologies in collaboration with leading Indian companies including Bharat Petroleum, Indian Oil, GAIL, Indian Petrochemicals, Reliance, and Cadila Pharmaceuticals. He also led Indian Petrochemicals to acquire catalyst manufacturing capabilities, expanding India’s position in the global catalyst manufacturing industry. Besides being an accomplished technocrat, he was widely recognised as a successful leader of Indian R&D institutions. As Director of CSIR - IIP during 1990-1999, he combined his passion for science and engineering with his experience in industry to transform the institute from a sick laboratory to a vibrant, world-class innovation centre. Since retiring from Government sector in 1999, he had been passionately championed science-based entrepreneurship in India. He was a recipient of the INAE Life Time Contribution Award in Engineering for the year 2020. He died in Hyderabad on 7 April 2022, at the age of 83.