Congratulations to the Laureates of the Infosys Prize 2009: Kapil Sibal
Mr. Kapil Sibal, Union Minister for Human Resource Development, congratulates the Laureates of the Infosys Prize 2009 – Prof. Abhijit Banerjee, Prof. Upinder Singh, Prof. Thanu Padmanabhan, Prof. Ashoke Sen and Prof. K. VijayRaghavan.
Infosys Technologies Ltd. (Infosys) had set up “Infosys Science Foundation”, a not-for-profit trust to promote research in sciences in India. Under the aegis of the foundation, Infosys is honouring outstanding contributions and achievements by Indians across various sciences.
The annual award for each category is Rs. 50 lakh. Infosys said the prize, which also carries a citation and medallion, is “among the highest in terms of prize money for any award in India”. It was instituted by the Infosys Science Foundation formed this year.
The Infosys Science Foundation is funded by a corpus of Rs. 21.5 crore contributed by Infosys executive board members and an annual grant from Infosys Technologies Ltd.
The “Infosys India Prize” categories include:
Physical Sciences – Physics and Chemistry
Mathematical Sciences – Mathematics and Statistics
Engineering Sciences – All branches of Engineering
Life Sciences – Biology and Medicine
Social Sciences and Economics – Economics, History, Sociology, Political Sciences and other Social Sciences
The jury panel for each area were consisted of eminent international personalities in each area selected by the trustees of the foundation. The Infosys Science Foundation has created five juries of eminent international academicians who had judged nominations and selected the winners of the Infosys Prize under the categories of Social Sciences, Physical Sciences, Engineering and Computer Science, Mathematical Sciences and Life Sciences for 2009.
November 30, was the day when the prize announcement was made. Professor Upinder Singh is the winner in the inaugural social sciences. She is the professor of History at Delhi University and the second of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s three daughters. She will share the inaugural Rs 50 lakh Infosys Prize for Social Sciences with MIT economist Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee
Infosys officials acknowledged that Upinder Singh is the PM’s daughter only after being pressed into identifying her lineage.
Eminent economist and Nobel laureate Professor Amartya Sen, states the professor was awarded “in recognition of her contributions as an outstanding historian of ancient and early medieval India”.
The Infosys Prize will be awarded in three other disciplines this year — physical sciences, mathematical sciences, life sciences, while the engineering sciences prize is not being awarded in the absence of a suitable candidate. Thanu Padmanabhan of Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune, has been awarded the Infosys Prize for Physical Sciences “in recognition of his contribution to a deeper understanding of Einstein’s theory of gravity in the context of thermo dynamics and large scale structure in cosmology.
Ashoke Sen of Harish Chandra Research Institute, Allahabad, has been awarded the Infosys Prize for Mathematical Sciences in recognition of his fundamental contributions to mthematical pysics, in particular to String Theory.
K. Vijay Raghavan of National Centre of Biological Sciences, Bangalore, has won the Infosys Award for Life Sciences in recognition of his many contributions as a developmental geneticist and neurobiologist
