Speakers Anonymous: Event to celebrate 900th birthday of Bhaskaracharya

In January this year there was a special meet in a town in northern Maharashtra to celebrate the 900th birthday of the Indian mathematician Bhaskara-charya. The event was worth celebrating and an occasion to remind ourselves of the mathematical achievements of Bhaskara.

Indeed there are so many contributions that Bhaskara had made in arithmetic, algebra and geometry as well as in spherical trigonometry and observational astronomy that several hours would be needed to do justice to them all. Nevertheless, three talks were arranged for the meeting. I was to speak on astronomy, another on mathematics, while a third was to give an overall appreciation of Bhaskara’s achievements. Let us call these speakers A, B and C.

The meeting was scheduled to start at 10 in the morning and was expected to be over in two hours. The actual time table turned out to be different. It started half an hour late, presumably because some local dignitaries were late in arriving. But then started a sequence of mini-functions honouring local VIPs, of which some seven-eight were on the dais and several more amongst the audience. This was followed by a long but drab account of what the main organisation arranging the function did over the years. Then some VIPs from the floor and the dais made speeches, giving an admirable demons-tration of how one can talk a lot and say nothing.

By now the scheduled two hours were coming to an end and the audience was getting restless. They had come to hear speakers A, B and C whose turn had still not come. The speakers too noticed this phenomenon and started a mental exercise on cutting down their proposed texts so as to compensate the patient listeners on the floor for the delay. Speaker C must have found this hard since he had done good homework on what Bhaskara had done and was prepared to speak much longer. When I as speaker A began my talk, I could not help referring to this circumstance. Because of the long time spent on formal but irrelevant ceremonies, we were missing a part of the excellent speech that C was to give. I said, it was like Sachin Tendulkar being sent to bat at position of number 8.

This account describes the rule rather than an exception of how our public functions are conducted. Before the main part of the function there are so many time-wasting little ceremonies and talks that the audience begins to wonder when the main talk will take place. But this is not the end: for, the vote of thanks is still to be proposed. This operation is a long-drawn-out affair involving the enumeration of a long list of persons and organisations.

Having opted for an exhaustive list the speaker must ensure that no one is left out. But, alas, none of us are perfect and some names are inevitably left out, causing a lot of heartburn. But while this ritual is dragging on, the audience starts leaving. This is their reaction to the time wasted earlier.

The Friday Evening Discourses regularly given at the Royal Institution of Great Britain show how it can be done. This lecture series has a long history dating back to Michael Faraday in the 19th century. It begins with a formal dinner followed by a few minutes for the speaker to spend quietly in a small anteroom. The speaker enters the auditorium at the stroke of 9 and speaks on the announced topic exactly for one hour. No time is spent on introducing the speaker or reviewing what RI does.

But here comes the most difficult part. The speaker must finish at the stroke of 10. This is the part that many speakers find hard to do! Indeed one speaker ran away at the prospect. The story is that Faraday himself stepped in and gave a marvellous extempore speech. Since then speakers are locked in when they are in the anteroom just before the lecture. At the end of the lecture there is no vote of thanks and the audience gets a chance to talk to the speaker or ask questions at a post-lecture reception.

Contrast this with a typical public function in Pune. Apart from the main speaker billed as chief guest, there is someone to inaugurate the function. There is another dignitary to preside over the talk. There are additional important persons invited as guests of honour. And finally, of course, the person proposing the vote of thanks. Can we not bypass all these distractions and concentrate on the main talk as the RI does? When the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research was established, its founder Homi Bhabha set a new tradition for the public talks at the institute. There would be no vote of thanks at the end. Instead, the person introducing the speaker would propose the vote of thanks, in anticipation, before the talk. This procedure reduced the number on the dais to just two. That is, one more than in the Royal Institution.

The writer, a renowned astrophysicist, is professor emeritus at Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics, Pune University Campus