MS Krishnan

MS Krishnan ( Maharajapuram Seetharaman Krishnan ; born August 24, 1898 in Thanjavur , † April 24, 1970 in Thanjavur) was an Indian geologist .

Life

Growing up in humble circumstances, Krishnan was a brilliant student. He studied on a scholarship in England, received his doctorate there in 1924 and was a member of the Geological Survey of India (GSI) on his return . He mapped in Orissa , identified the Gangpur formation (1937) and published on mineral resources such as manganese , gypsum, mica , limestone, iron ore in the previous Madras presidency (published 1952). He also dealt with the petrography of the Girnar and Osham mountains in Gujarat ( Kathiawar ), Khondalit , minerals in Madhya Pradesh , the Vindhyan formation in northern India, the flood basalts of the Dekkan Trapps , the Tertiary of Thanjavur and the course in myths traditional rivers ( Indobrahm , Sarasvati ). In 1935 he was President of the Geology Section at the Indian Science Congress. As President of the Geological Survey of India, he organized the extraction of the large lignite deposits discovered in Neyveli during his time as Director of the South Area of ​​the GSI and the development of gold mining in Karnataka . He promoted geophysics especially for prospecting purposes in India. In 1953 he published on the succession of the Orogenes in the Archaic of India.

In addition to his work at the Geological Survey, whose first director he was born in India, he taught geology at Presidency College in Madras from 1920/21 , from 1928 to 1930 at Forest College in Dehradun and from 1933 to 1935 at Presidency College in Calcutta . He was on numerous Indian committees on geology and science, but also on coal mining (in the late 1940s, he proposed nationalization). From 1948 to 1951 he was head of the Indian Bureau of Mines, 1957/58 director of the Indian School of Mines in Dhanbad and 1958 to 1960 head of the Faculty of Geology and Geophysics at Andhra University in Waltair . 1961 to 1963 he was the founding director of the Indian National Institute for Geophysics in Hyderabad . During a visit to his hometown near Thanjavur, he fell ill and died after an abdominal operation.

He wrote a standard work on the geology of India on the suggestion of Cyril S. Fox of the Geological Survey, since he noticed in the teaching in Calcutta that a modern textbook was missing. In 1940 he discovered an 18 meter long Cretaceous fossil tree trunk that is now part of the National Fossil Wood Park in Sathanur .

After India's independence, he was sent to the United States in 1947 to train on rare earths and radioactive minerals, and then organized their search in India.

In 1970 he received the Padma Bhushan . In 1956 he was President of the Indian Science Congress.

Fonts

• Geology of India and Burma, 1943, with 6 editions, archives
• Introduction to the Geology of India, 1944 (abridged version of his 1943 book)

Web links

• AV Sankaran: MS Krishnan, geologist par excellence