National Mathematics Day is observed on December 22 every year to celebrate the life and works of Srinivasa Ramanujan. It was on this day, in 1887, the great mathematician was born. To mark the 125th birth anniversary of Ramanujan, in 2012, then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced that the day will be celebrated as the National Mathematics Day and the year as the National Mathematics Year.
Ramanujan was born at Erode to a Tamil Brahmin Iyengar family. He studied at the Government College. In college, he failed exams due to his negligence for subjects other than Maths.
In 1912, Ramanujan started working as a clerk in the Madras Port Trust. One of his colleagues, who was also a mathematician, referred him to Professor GH Hardy of Trinity College, Cambridge University.
Ramanujan joined Trinity College a few months before World War I began and received a Bachelor of Science (BSc) degree in 1916. He was elected to the London Mathematical Society and the Royal Society. He was the first Indian to be elected a Fellow of Trinity College.
Though Ramanujan had almost no formal training in pure mathematics, he made substantial contributions to the field, including solutions to mathematical problems then considered unsolvable.
During his short life – he died in 1920 at the age of 32 – Ramanujan independently compiled nearly 3,900 results.
Srinivasa Ramanujan (centre) with his colleague GH Hardy (extreme right) and other scientists outside the Senate House at the University of Cambridge. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
Signature of Srinivasa Ramanujan (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
GH Hardy, Ramanujan's colleague and Mentor (Wikimedia)