“Those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind” are awarded the noble prize according to the will of Alfred Nobel who was a Swedish chemist, industrialist, engineer and an extraordinary man who invented dynamite. After his death in 1896, five prizes were made that came to be known as the “Nobel prizes” and were first awarded in the year 1901. The noble prizes were divided among six fields that were of physics, chemistry, medicine or physiology, literature and peace. A person who is awarded with noble prize gets a gold medal, a diploma, money and a huge amount of worldwide respect. The Nobel Prize got funds from Alfred Nobel’s wealth and almost 94% of his wealth was given to the Nobel foundation according to the resources. People who have given most precious things to the mankind have been awarded with the Nobel Prize and among them; some of the brilliant minds are from India too. So listed below are the Indians who made their country proud by receiving the Nobel Prize.
- Rabindranath Tagore
In the whole Asia, Rabindranath Tagore was the first person to receive the Nobel Prize for literature in the year 1913 for his collection Gitanjali that was published in London in 1912. He was born on 7th May 1861 and was an Indian polymath, composer, playwright, writer, artist and a social reformer. Tagore, who was fond of poetry from a very young age, wrote some beautiful masterpieces that were loved by the people who felt his writings from their heart. On March 25th, year 2004, his Nobel prize was stolen along with his other belongings from the university Visva Bharthi but was returned too as soon as the thieves were arrested.
- CV Raman
Sri Chandrashekhara Venkata Raman was the second Indian to receive the Nobel Prize in India but he was the first Indian to receive the Nobel Prize in the field of physics for his brilliant work in the research of scattering light. From Tamil Nadu, CV Raman was born on 7th November 1888. Throughout his young age Raman received a lot of prizes for physics. 1922 was the year when his work got published that consisted of “molecular diffraction of light”. He collaborated with people which led him to the discovery of the radiation effect because of which he received the 1930 Nobel Prize in physics.
- Har Gobind Khorana
When British were still ruling India, Har Gobind Khorana was born in Raipur, Punjab. His father was a poor man but he wanted to educate his children so they became the first literate family of their small village. After completing his higher education Khorana was able to move to England in the year 1945 with the help of the government of India where he did his PhD. He and Marshall w. Nirenberg who was his work partner researched on genetics that successfully led them to the Nobel Prize (1968) in medicine. They both shared the Nobel Prize.
- Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa who helped many people was born on 26th August 1910 in Serbia. The experience of people who met her tells that she was a calm and peaceful lady. She moved to India in her teenage years and served all of her life to help the needy and people living in poverty. Darjeeling was her home before she was called to Calcutta, where she started her mission to end poverty with the help of the organization called missionaries of charity. Her dedication and hard work to end poverty made her receive the Nobel Prize for peace.
- Amartya Sen
Sen was born on 3rd November 1933 in Shantiniketan, Bengal. An Indian economist and a philosopher, Amartya has contributed to welfare economics, social and economic justice and also social choice theory along with many other works. In 1972 he moved to United Kingdom and United States to work and is currently a professor at Thomas w. Lamount University and a Harvard professor for economics and philosophy. For his work in welfare economics, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in the year 1988 and even Bharat Ratna award of India in the year 1999.
- Subhramanyan chandrashekhar
Born in Lahore 19th October 1910, Subhramanyan belong to a Tamil Brahmin family and his paternal uncle was no other than the Nobel Prize winner CV Raman. Due to his brilliant academics, he received a scholarship from the Indian government to study abroad which made him a student at the University of Cambridge. He became an astrophysicist and his work on physical processes that are important to the structure and evolution of stars made him receive the Nobel Prize in 1998 which he shared with William A. Fowler.
- Venkatraman Ramakrishnan
62nd president of the royal society, Ramakrishnan was born in 1952 in Chidambaram, Tamil Nadu. Both his parents were scientists who influenced him to study chemistry. Ramakrishnan started researching on ribosomes at the Yale University. In the year 2009 he received the Nobel Prize in chemistry along with Ada Yonath and Thomas a. Steitz. He also received India’s Padma Vibhushan in the year 2010.
- Kailash Satyarthi
11th January 1954 was the day when Kailash was born in Vidisha, India. He completed his studies in electrical engineering and started teaching young minds. He loved children so he dedicated his life to them by starting an organization called Bachpan Bachao Andolan so that he could help to free the children who were stuck in slavery. There were many other organizations that were started by him for children’s rights and for their education. To free children from child labour and to give them a good life was his main motto as he was following Mahatma Gandhi’s beliefs which led him to Nobel Prize for peace in the year 2014.
- Abhijeet Banerjee
Abhijeet was raised in Calcutta and was born on 21st February 1961 to parents who were both economics professors. He completed his M.A in economics at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi in 1983 where he was also arrested during a protest and imprisoned in Tihar jail but was later released on bail. He moved to the United States where because of his excellent work along with Esther Duflo and Michael Kremer, he received a Nobel Prize in economic sciences in the year 2019.
