Reported by Shruthi Rajaram
Alladi Centenary Foundation in Chennai, had organized a talk on the much acclaimed mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan, on Sunday, August 5,
The math lovers spent a splendid evening, relishing the talk. Prof. Krishnaswami Alladi, mathematician – professor of Mathematics at the University of Florida, addressed the gathering with an informative speech.
He took the audience through a journey of Ramanujan’s life history. He talked about interesting incidents in the scholar’s career.
“As Ramanujan’s fame spread, another mathematician Hardey, invited him to England to work with him. Ramanujan was not sent because of the fear that arose in his mother who was later convinced by a dream in which the Goddess of Namakkal assured a safe future for him. However, the latter part of the story still remains a doubt.!” He said
A very interesting piece of information given by Prof. Alladi was his experience when he witnessed a play on this great Indian personality called ‘Partitions’.
David Freeman wrote a script titled ‘The first class man’ on the life of Ramanujan, which won the Tribeca Sloan Award – 2007.
Sloan Foundation provides awards in the form of grants for the development of worthy scripts into film productions. So, there is every possibility of this stage production
being made into a movie (not a documentary) in near future.
This play focuses on the Hardy-Ramanujan formula of partitions and the reason behind its discovery. Prof. Alladi briefed about these formulae and has also suggested a few modifications in the accuracy of Ramanujan’s character in the play, since he was also in the panel during the discussions about the script.
Maths genius Ramanujan will be on the silver screens soon!