Celebrating Ramanujan's 131st Birthday

When I reviewed Ken Ono's "My Search for Ramanujan: How I Learned to Count" for MAA's Math Horizons (PDF here) in 2016, I had no idea that two years later I would visit the land of birth of the extraordinary Indian genius the book concerned. Yet, yesterday, at the Ramanujan Math Park deep in rural India, I had the honour and pleasure of meeting educators and school children who have been directly inspired by his life and legacy.

Srinivasa Ramanujan (1887-1920) had almost extra-terrestrial mathematical insights and visions that are still being digested by the world's leading mathematicians today, almost a century after his premature death. Ken Ono (along with Indian Fields Medallist Manjul Bhargava) served as mathematics consultant on the The Man Who Knew Infinity. The film contained some fine acting, and was notable both for its accurate treatment of the academic culture at Cambridge in the period and the authenticity of the mathematics portrayed, but it drew some criticism in India. It followed fast on the heels of the Tamil/English production Ramanujan, which is arguably more sensitive to the cultural context of Ramanujan's origins. That film attracted reviews both positive and less positive.

Today, 22 December 2018, is actually the 131st anniversary of Ramanujan's birth, a day now celebrated in India as National Mathematics Day. Yesterday, I spent several delightful hours at the Agastya International Foundation's highly innovative "Campus Creativity Lab" located in a beautiful 172-acre campus in Kuppam, Andhra Pradesh, a two-hour drive east of Bangalore, in south India. One of the gems on that campus is the highly engaging original Ramanujan Math Park, inaugurated a year ago today.

 

The Ramanujan Math Park was conceived, partially funded and executed by the distinguished mathematician Sujatha Ramdorai (via Gyanome, who have hosted a Ken Ono lecture on Ramanujan in the past) and her husband Srinivasan Ramdorai (via Agastya), along with V. Sivashankara Sastry, a mathematics communicator based in nearby Kolar. Dr Ramdorai is passionate about the importance of Ramanujan as a role model for youngsters growing up in India, especially those far from cities and the special educations opportunities available there:

"Ramanujan needs to be celebrated and discussed in his own country, especially among the younger generation. It is ironic that 131 years after his birth, recognition and accolades in India have to be chanelled through the West. His home town Kumbakonam is in the Cauvery Basin of Tamil Nadu, and the region is considered as a civilizational and cultural anchor for the Tamils. One of the aims of the Ramanujan Math Park is to celebrate Ramanujan and give the children of rural India a True Hero in this era of fake news and false icons."

A visit to the Ramanujan Math Park

What follows are a handful of snapshots of one person's experiences exploring this delightful facility for a few hours, on a typical day when over 500 underprivileged school children from the area arrived by bus with their teachers. The plan is to have all children from within a 100km radius visit the campus twice a year, for up to six years, thereby providing them with repeated exposure to the displays and demonstrations on offer. Dozens of clever interative activities and unique learning experiencs are available at the Ramanujan Math Park, and the people running it, many of whom are devoted volunteers, are to be commended for their ingenuity and resourcefulness.

 

 

It was my good fortune to interact with 30 grade IX pupils from Zilla Parishad High School, Kenumakulapalle, Santipuram (Mandala).

 

Out of 30 pupils, I asked who had a birthday in December, November, October, .... The 5th student's birthday matched the 4th one: 23rd October. They were very surprised, after all there are over 360 diffent possible birthdays. I was not so surprised, in fact I was quietly confident of a birthday match once all birthdays had been revealed. It was nice that it happened so soon. What is going on here?

 

Finally a nice example of the Ramanujan Math Park making a difficult concept (4 dimensional geometry) very tangible, by taking advantage of a familiar natural resource: our sun.