Prafulla Chandra Ray (1861-1944)
Prafulla Chandra Ray was an eminent Indian Scientist who is hailed as the “Father of Indian pharmaceuticals”. His most notable work on the nitrites and hypo-nitrites of metals, especially mercury, earned him fame worldwide and respect among his peers globally.
The pioneering chemist founded a chemical manufacturing company, “Bengal Chemicals and Pharmaceutical Works Ltd.”. He lived a simple life and spent most of his life serving the poor and contributing towards scientific advancements in India. He was associated with the “Sadharan Brahmo Samaj” for most of his life. He was a respected and revered figure not only in Bengal but in the whole country. Many institutions were named after him, as a sign of respect.
Birth and education
Prafulla Chandra Ray was born on 2 August 1861 in Raruli-Katipara, a village in Bangladesh. It was located on the banks of river Kapotakshi. His early education started in his village school which was established by his father, a land proprietor, Harish Chandra Ray. He was frequently absent from school and there wasn’t much progress in his education.
Their family later moved to Calcutta for better education. In 1871, he was admitted to the Hare School founded by David Hare. [David Hare was born in Scotland. He was a philanthropist, who had made lot of money in watch making business. He devoted his life to the betterment of the people of Bengal. He was an inspired person, who did extensive work in spreading western education in Bengal.]
Ray couldn’t stay long in this school. He was afflicted with dysentery which bothered him for the rest of life too. He had to leave the school but devoted those two years of break to read English classics and the literary and historical writings in Bengali. He also learnt Latin and Greek during this period. He was a voracious reader. He was never satisfied with just the text books. History and Biology were his favourite genres. The lives of Newton and Galileo interested and impressed him a lot. He considered the great physicist Benjamin Franklin as his role model. Ray admired Benjamin Franklin’s ‘Never say Die’ attitude.
After recovering from his illness, in 1874, Ray joined Albert School which was founded by Keshab Chandra Sen. In 1879; he passed the entrance examination from the Albert School and took admission into the Metropolitan Institution which was established by Pandit Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. In those days, Metropolitan Institution had no science classes or laboratories and Ray attended lectures on Physics and Chemistry in the Presidency College as an external student. As an enthusiastic student, Ray set up a mini laboratory with crude apparatus and during one experiment, there was a huge blast in their room.
In 1882, while he was preparing for his B.A examination, he took an all India competitive examination. He was awarded one of the two Gilchrist Prize Scholarships. It paved his way to go to England for studies. There, Ray enrolled in the B.Sc. programme of Edinburgh University where he studied physics, chemistry and biology amongst other subjects. He didn’t restrict his studies to only natural sciences. He read books on history, literature, political economy and finance.
Ray obtained B.Sc. degree in 1885 from Edinburgh University and his doctorate in 1887. His thesis was on “Conjugated sulphates of the copper magnesium group—A study of Isomorphous Mixtures and Molecular Combinations.” He was awarded the Hope Scholarship Prize, which allowed him to work on his research for one year after completion of his doctorate. He was elected the vice-president of the Edinburgh University Chemical Society in 1888.
His career
Ray returned to India in 1888, after 6 fruitful years. He wanted to do further research in chemistry and share his knowledge with others. But there was no scope for it in India and he settled as a chemistry lecturer, a post specially created for him, at the Presidency College in Calcutta. Here he carved a place for himself as a devoted scholar, inspiring teacher and tireless researcher.
He soon became Professor of Chemistry and managed to receive funds for establishing a new chemistry laboratory in 1894. He started working on problems related to food adulteration; especially focusing his research on purity of ghee and mustard oil. He got his research published in Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1894.
Early days as a scientist
Ray initiated research to discover some of the elements missing from the then incomplete periodic table. While analyzing certain rare minerals, he discovered mercurous nitrite, a compound that until then had been considered quite unstable. He spent next several years exploring this salt and its many derivatives.
He also developed methods for preparing ammonium nitrite, alkyl ammonium nitrite, and other compounds. On these researches and results, he wrote more than 100 papers on mercury salts and got them published.
Ray conducted systematic chemical analysis of a number of rare Indian minerals with the objective of discovering some of the missing elements in Mendeleev’s Periodic Table. While in this process, he isolated mercurous nitrite in 1896 that brought him international recognition, as it was an unknown compound till then.
Another important contribution made by Ray was the synthesis of ammonium nitrite in pure form. Till then, the chemists had a firm notion that ammonium nitrite (NH4NO2) decomposed very swiftly under the influence of heat giving out nitrogen and water. Ray demonstrated his discoveries in front of several renowned scientists in a meeting at the Chemical Society of London. William Ramsay praised the way Ray had derived the result diligently and patiently following the research. He compared Ray to Berthelot and credited him to be the founder of Chemistry school in India.
Contributions
Ray has a long list of contributions. The most important was that he was able to develop chemistry teaching and research in India like never before. He had a good following of students and many were inspired to take chemistry to take up research.
He worked in Presidency College for 26 years and then joined the University College where he worked for 20 years. He retired from his service at 75 but continued as Emeritus Professor. He was given the informal title Acharya out of love and respect his students had for him.
Ray was a true nationalist and patriot. He was deeply involved in the movement for India’s independence. The credit to bring Mahatma Gandhi to Calcutta for the first time goes to Ray. He became closely associated with Gopala Krishna Gokhale and Mahatma Gandhi. Even though Ray was such an eminent scientist who loved science, he always used to say Science can wait but Swaraj cannot.
Ray published his much celebrated work The History of Hindu Chemistry in 1902. Its second volume was published in 1908. The inspiration behind this was Berthelot.
Ray had set a chemical business in 1892 to compete with English products. He named his company, Bengal Chemical Pharmaceutical Works Ltd. He made drugs from indigenous materials. He also wanted to create jobs for the unemployed youth. Later, he made the leading chemists of the company, its shareholders. The company produced various chemicals and kept on adding new products like perfumes. His philosophy was to enjoy work and hardship.
Ray had deep regards for rural life. He was concerned about them and found pleasure in their company than in the company of city folks. He used to carry sago, arrow-root and sugar candy with him to villages with no grocer’s shops and used to distribute them.
He played an exemplary role in the Bengal famine of 1922. He helped collect money ( Rs. 3 lakh) to buy supplies for the people in the famine hit areas.
He was a great organizer and a teacher in the truest sense.
He was also a prolific writer and wrote extensively on a variety of subjects in both English and Bengali. ‘Life and Experience of a Bengali Chemist’ was his autobiography written in 1932.
In 1893, he wrote a book on zoology titled Simple Zoology. For that, he did extensive research. He read several books, visited zoos and museums and also dissected a few animal dead bodies.
Ray wrote a series of scholarly articles on Shakespeare and contributed articles in many Bengali periodicals like Basumati, Manashi, Bharatbarsha.
Ray was philanthropic and gave away most of his earnings to charity. He spent nine-tenths of his income on charity. He made an endowment of ten thousand for Chemistry as annual prize and ten thousand for research prize in zoology and botany. He supported many poor students in their needs for study and food.
At the time of his retirement, he donated Rs. 1,80,000 to the Calcutta University for the extension and development of the Chemistry Department.
Achievements
Prafulla Chandra Ray was a deserving recipient of the “Companion of the Order of the Indian Empire”. (1911)
He was awarded several honorary doctorates which include one from Durham University and Dhaka University.
He breathed his last on 16 June 1944.
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