iNDICA NEWS BUREAU-
Online event celebrates the transformative role of the Indian president scientist on his country and the world
Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam, India’s 11th president, passed on more than 5 years ago, but he left behind a legacy that is vital and invaluable.
A legacy that, during the COVID 19 pandemic, which shook the world and knocked several nations off their feet, inspired health care experts to carry on serving humanity.
Speakers at the event, “Celebrating the life of Dr. Abdul Kalam,” organized to mark the 90th birthday of the rocket scientist who became India’s president, agreed that his teachings and vision are relevant and will continue to inspire people.
“Action-driven APJ, has been the source of inspiration for millions, especially the youth,” said Dr. Prasun Mishra founder and CEO of the American Association for Precision Medicine (AAPM), in his opening speech.
The event was organized by the AAPM India Community in partnership with the Lead India Foundation.
Kalam, a teacher, scientist, author, statesman and politician possessed 48 doctoral degrees and ignited the minds of young people with his motivational speeches, Mishra said.
He said that AAPM went by Dr Kalam’s exhortation to act first when it set up a task force to tackle the rise of the COVID-19 in Jan 2020. It initially helped China with resources and supplies. and then focused on the US when the disease came this way. Nine teams with a total of 315 people addressed AI data, partnerships, prevention policies, diagnostics, therapeutics, mental health, supply chain, investments and impact investments.
AAPM India, launched last year, helps learn from precision medicine in the US. Health care in the US is structured, while it is fragmented in India and still coming together, Mishra said. emphasizing the need to help India learn from the American digital health base.
Mishra was at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) when he personally met Dr Kalam, who went on to become his role model.
Another speaker, Dr Hari Eppanapally, the chairman of Lead India Foundation (LIF), said the foundation was the brainchild of Kalam, set up to provide affordable quality education and healthcare, transform youth into responsible citizens, and to engage them in the nation’s development.
Eppanapally paid rich tributes to Kalam and narrated how he benefited from the president’s mentorship.
Dr Arvind Thiagarajan. founder of HD Medical Inc, another mentee of Kalam, said he himself was born with a congenital heart condition and so sought to become a doctor, but ended up in engineering/ Thiagarajan recalled how, when his team came up with a prototype of the device to detect cardiac defects, Kalam exhibited childlike curiosity.
Thiagarajan said Kalam excelled not only in nuclear science, space research and missile technology, but also had good insights in cardiac research. He said that experts in medical engineering later provided the same suggestions that Kalam already had after a short introduction.
Thiagarajan has invented the world’s first intelligent stethoscope, the HD Steth, with an integrated ECG, a wireless device that can be placed over the heart to detect cardiac conditions and murmurs using AI. The FDA-approved device has helped in screening, detecting and treating more than 75,000 children with congenital heart conditions in rural and tribal areas in India, Thiagarajan said.
Jagadeesh Daneti, founder of Pink Jaguars Entertainment, which is making a biopic dubbed in 15 Indian languages titled “Mission Kalam,” said it took his company 5 ½ years to work on the project. Dantei exhorted global citizens to contribute for the project, too.
Usha Roopnarayan, a former member of the assembly in South Africa, founder of Power to Empower, an author and a poet, extolled Kalam’s humility and humanity, saying human beings were not just bone and flesh, but emotional beings who deserved to be treated with dignity.
Ponraj Vellaichamy technical, advisor to Kalam, and co-author of the latter’s book, “Manifesto for Change” in 2014, recalled his experiences with the scientist. Vellaichamy said that when India attained freedom in 1947, a young Kalam was inspired by two leaders with two extreme ideals, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and Mahatma Gandhi.
Taking a cue from Netaji’s call to empower India with a great army, Kalam gave India the missile technology to make it a power to reckon with. Following Gandhi’s ideals, Kalam came up with a developed India Vision 20-20 to make India knowledge and economic superpower, a poverty-free nation, removing inequality and giving quality education to all. Vellaichamy described how Kalam had inspired a junior scientist like himself to have the vision to make India self-reliant in defense technology, inspiring him to design automated manufacturing and assembling systems.
The speakers at the closing keynote panel included Krishnaswamy Srinivasan, founder of the Power Point Foundation; Madam Suvarna Pappu, CEO of Royal Affairs of Kalinga Royal House and the producer of the biopic on Kalam; Dr Kamala Maddalli, author and global VP at Deep Lens; Dr.Jagannath Pattnaik, vice-chancellor of the ICFAI University in the Indian state of Sikkim; Caroline Schwab, founder of B1World Internation GmbH (B.I.G); and Dr Mahender Dewal, founding member and head of R&D at Expansion Technology Inc.
