Vashishtha Narayan Singh (1942 – 2019) was an Indian mathematician best known for his PhD research work on reproducing Kernels and Operators with a Cyclic Vector at the University of California, Berkeley. He was known for challenging theories of Albert Einstein, especially his equation of mass-energy equivalence. This maths wizard was suffering from a mental disorder, schizophrenia, for a long time since the age of 40, and lived a much neglected and unknown life in his native village, Basantpur of Bihar, during his last years. He was not even recognised by the state government. However, in 2020, he was honoured with Padma Shri by the government of India posthumously.
Vashishtha Narayan Singh – Famous Indian Mathematician
An extraordinarily brilliant student in Mathematics since school days
Vashishtha Narayan Singh hailed from Basantpur village of Bhojpur District, Bihar. He was a brilliant student since school days, and his school, Netarhat Residential School, still mentions him as a matter of pride. During his graduation at Patna Science College, he was allowed by Patna University to appear in the final year of Mathematics while he was a first-year student and he topped the class. During the second year, he took the Master’s exams and topped the class this time as well.
Later, he took a PhD from the University of California in 1969. After a couple of years, he returned to India and taught mathematics at different colleges and universities, including IIT Kanpur, TIFR Mumbai and I.S.I Kolkata. During his early years in India, he showed early stages of his disease and was referred to the Central Institute of Psychiatry for treatment. However, he went missing for 4 years after a decade of his treatment in this institute.
This legendary mathematician died in penury and neglectance
He also struggled with his disease for almost half of his lifetime. During his last years, he served as a visiting professor of BNMU. Though he had a glorious journey as a mathematician, his last years were spent in penury. He was not under medical supervision during his last years. He passed away on Children’s Day in 2019.
Vashishtha Narayan Singh – Less-known and interesting facts
1. He was fond of teaching functional mathematics.
2. Since school days, he was fond of solving difficult mathematical problems and used to excel even his seniors in this subject.
3. He completed his PHD under the guidance of John L. Kelly, the renowned American mathematician.
4. During his years at the University of California, he was humiliated and ill-treated for being an outsider, and it was rumoured that his work was published under the names of other scientists.
5. After completing his research work, he worked in space theory at NASA before returning to his hometown after his studies in 1974. In the same year, he got married.
6. His wife left him a couple of years after their marriage in 1976, following his first schizophrenia attack. He lived with his mother later, who took care of him in his diseased stage.
7. It’s said that he suffered from ill health while in the US, and that was the reason why he couldn’t work on proving Einstein’s equation wrong before returning to India.
8. There is an organisation running in his name at Kankarbagh. A few years ago, in 2004, when he attended a function there on the occasion of the release of his biography, accompanied by his mother, he looked amazed and detached while facing the crowd.
9. Even when he became mentally challenged, his love towards mathematics was well visible. Though he had forgotten the whole world, he never forgot his mathematics books and diary filled with his theories wherever he goes, or attend a function.
10. He used to frequently play flute, and ‘Nagri Nagri Dware Dware’ was his favourite tune. He also liked reading religious books.
11. He topped final year class when he was in the first year of graduation.
12. Bollywood filmmaker Prakash Jha announced a biopic on this legendary mathematician one year before Singh’s death in 2018. However, the project is yet to kick off.
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