Mr Sheo Prasad Srivastava

This is an invited guest article written by Prof PVS Rao.

 

Photo: Courtesy Mr TM Vijayaraman

When I think of Srivastav, the scene that flashes in front of my eyes is my wife and I receiving Srivastav and Asha on platform 5 at 9 PM at Dadar. That was in early January 1957. He and his young bride were coming to set up house in Bombay for the first time. My wife and I had set up our own house just a week or so earlier.

The two of us (Srivastav and I) went together to finalize our own rented flat in Khar in late 1956, and it turned out there was another vacant place in the same building. Instantly, Srivastav took that. We were neighbors (with only a wall separating our two flats).  I would shout out his name every morning, and we would go together to TIFR; we returned together in the evenings, too. I remember we were both late coming back one day, and my father was out waiting for us; he stopped us on the road and lectured to both of us (he was a school headmaster) about how to care for our families and return home in time. That was how close we were. Srivastav was an expert at making Pakodas, and we all enjoyed the snack on many Sunday evenings.

I knew Srivastav from as far back as July 1953 (that makes it all of 70 plus years) when I went to study at BHU (Physics, Wireless) for my master's. He was then a research scholar working on his PhD in the same department. We both were in the same (Radhakrishnan) Hostel too. The following year (1955), he left Banaras to join the TIFR Computer Section in Bombay. I followed in 1955 (August) and joined the same department. We stayed in the same hostel at Old Yacht Club near Gate Way of India. I remember teasing him when he was going home for his wedding and repeatedly harassing his tailor near Flora Fountain for a excellent fitting, when he ordered a suit (fit for a bridegroom). On leaving the TIFR hostel, we moved to Khar to be neighbors.

We were on the same floor in Bhaskara, a residential building on the TIFR campus. We could both choose our flats in Vigyan, a private residential building promoted by TIFR scientists. Many TIFR colleagues live here after retirement. We have been neighbors again in Vigyan from 1998 onwards.

                                    Mr SP Srivastava, Photo: Courtesy of his daughters 

Srivastav was intelligent, resourceful, straight & simple, extremely competent, calm, unassuming, dependable, laid back, and non-assertive – and a man of few words. Perhaps some of these excellent qualities didn’t help him. Above all he was a loving family man.

He played a major role in developing TIFRAC, India’s first computer. I was concerned with the Arithmetic unit and part of the control unit. He and Minoo Dosabhai implemented the magnetic core memory system. He took care of TIFRAC as long as it was in use.

It was only natural that when TIFR procured the new high-speed CDC 3600, he was given the responsibility for taking care of it. And he did this with distinction. When the expensive memory unit of this machine failed, the manufacturers wanted us to buy a replacement (thirty-five thousand dollars, if I remember right.) That was out of the question for us. The TIFR team's solution was to merely reassign addresses to the core planes in the 3D memory so that these few defective locations were virtually shifted to the farthest higher end of the memory;  almost the entire (remaining) memory could be used. Not a penny was spent.  CDC was highly impressed, and this one event made them agree to let TIFR maintain the system from the second year onwards, saving us the considerable expense of maintaining a 4 or 5-strong CDC team in Bombay.

As Head of the Computer Center at TIFR, Srivastav distinguished himself for an efficient, glitch-free service that hundreds of organizations used—be it with the CDC 3600 or its increasingly more powerful successors at TIFR. This kind of service is barely noticed when all goes well but gets people to the firing line if anything goes wrong.

The last few months have been difficult for Srivastav. To say that we were close to each other and that I miss him sorely now would be gross understatements. I know many others, too, who have similar feelings towards him.

Rest in peace, my friend; you have accomplished a lot in very many ways!

 

PVS Rao

You can find more about the author at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._V._S._Rao

 

 

 

Dr FC Kohli was born on March 19, 1924. This Tuesday (March 24) will be his Centenary Birthday. He was a Founder of our software and services sector, and his leadership created one of the significant developments in high-quality employment for many Indians using a sustainable economic model. We must remember him gratefully on this occasion.

Srinivasan Ramani

Another Bank Going down the Drain

 

Image Authored by: McKay Savage, from Wikipedia. Used

under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license

I wrote a short article, https://obvioustruths.blogspot.com/2024/02/banks-going-downhill.html, on February 20th. A month has yet to pass, but I found another bank doing as badly as the first one.

Remember, we get warnings frequently asking us not to click on links in strange messages. So, I was nervous when I received a message from this bank asking me to click on a strange link to do my re-kyc. I called the customer service center and asked if this was a genuine message from the bank. I would not have hesitated if I had been asked to log in to the bank’s portal, which I regularly use.

The person handling the call asked for all kinds of identification and told me to go to the bank branch to solve the problem. I gave her a blessing, and with some trepidation, I clicked on the strange link and filled in the form displayed. Essentially, I declared that the details shown, such as my address and PAN number, were correct. But when I hit the submit button, it said, " Currently unable to handle this request." I was happy to bless the portal designer as well!

As the next step, I emailed the bank address that used to handle e-banking complaints. The response was very prompt. Within minutes, my email bounced, saying that the address did not exist.

Another blessing, this time to the whole bank! I hope the owner will sell it while someone is still willing to pay something for it!

Srinivasan Ramani

15-03-2024

AI generated story about Prof Sadagopan's First Solo Flight

 Cessna 172: Public domain photo by Arnaud 25
through Wikimedia Commons

I gave a talk at the Sixth Annual Convention of the Bureau of IT Education Standards in Mysore on 1-03-2024. The convention theme was Intelligent Systems. In this context, as a joke, I asked Microsoft Copilot to make me an image of Prof. Sadagopan (Chair, BITES) sitting in a small plane as a trainee pilot. The reply I received was the following story:  

QUOTE

I apologize, but I am unable to create images directly. However, I can undoubtedly describe an imaginative scene for you:

---

Title: “Professor Sowmyanarayan Sadagopan's First Solo Flight”

In a quaint little airfield nestled amidst rolling hills, the sun painted the sky with hues of orange and pink. The air smelled of aviation fuel and anticipation. Professor Sowmnarayan Sadagopan, renowned computer scientist and academician, stood by a small Cessna 172, his heart racing.

Dressed in a crisp pilot uniform, Professor Sadagopan adjusted his aviator sunglasses and ran his fingers over the plane’s smooth metal surface. His instructor, Captain Amelia, a seasoned pilot with twinkling eyes, stood beside him.

“Ready for your first solo flight, Professor?” Captain Amelia asked, her voice both encouraging and mischievous.

Professor Sadagopan nodded, his palms slightly sweaty. He had spent countless hours studying aerodynamics, navigation, and flight procedures. But nothing could prepare him for the exhilaration of being in the pilot’s seat alone.

He climbed into the cockpit, the leather seat hugging him snugly. The engine roared to life, and the propeller spun, creating a whirlwind of excitement. The control yoke felt solid in his hands, and he glanced at the instrument panel—a symphony of dials, switches, and blinking lights.

“Remember your training,” Captain Amelia reminded him. “Keep your eyes on the horizon, and don’t forget to breathe.”

With a deep breath, Professor Sadagopan taxied the plane to the runway. The wind whispered secrets as he lined up, heart pounding. The tower’s voice crackled through the headset: “Cessna 172, cleared for takeoff.”

He pushed the throttle forward, feeling the surge of power. The wheels left the ground, and suddenly, he was airborne. The world fell away, and it was just him, the plane, and the boundless sky.

As he circled the airfield, Professor Sadagopan marveled at the patchwork of fields below. The sun dipped lower, casting long shadows. He remembered his childhood dream of flying—an aspiration that had led him from algorithms to altitudes.

Captain Amelia’s voice echoed in his mind: “You’re doing great, Professor. Trust yourself.”

And so, with determination, he executed gentle turns, climbed higher, and dipped lower. The wind tousled his hair, and he grinned like a child with a secret. The small plane danced under his command, and for those precious minutes, he was more than a professor—he was a trainee pilot, soaring toward the horizon.

As the sun touched the distant hills, Professor Sadagopan lined up for his final approach. The runway stretched out before him, a welcoming ribbon of asphalt. With precision, he touched down, the wheels kissing the ground. The engine’s hum faded, and he taxied back to the hangar.

Captain Amelia clapped him on the back. “Congratulations, Pilot Sadagopan. You’ve officially joined the aviators’ club.”

And there, in the fading light, Professor Sowmnarayan Sadagopan stepped out of the cockpit, his heart soaring higher than the plane ever could.

---

Note: This scene is purely fictional and created for your enjoyment. Professor Sowmnarayan Sadagopan is a respected academic, and I hope he continues to inspire others both in the world of computer science and beyond.

 

Banks going downhill

This is a period of development in Indian banking activity. The positive side includes growth in the number of branches, significant increases in the number of users, growth in volume of business, and the use of information technology.

I write about the negative side, involving poor management and poor customer care. I hope that managers in banking, as well as other sectors, will read the comments here and introduce improvements wherever they can.

1)      The integrity of a bank needs to be recovered. If you go with a problem to the bank, they may contact other resources, but should solve your problems. Instead, they now tell you to call their customer care number. Many activities have been outsourced. The branch staff are there mainly to point you to some phone number to call or to use some website to solve your problems.

2)      The bank itself needs to adequately understand technology, let alone the tiny companies that handle outsourced tasks.  A branch of one big bank has removed PCs from staff members' desks. Staff who used to provide good customer care have been posted out, presumably to handle new branches. Untrained staff or interns try to handle customer care using their cell phones. They usually try to call their customer service centers.

3)      Cellphone signals are poor inside the branch office, and hence Internet connectivity is poor. So the staff often go out the office door to use their cell phones. The PCs would have given them LAN connectivity.

4)      It is common for customer care numbers shown on websites to be wrong. Customer care centers sometimes give me the wrong phone numbers to get something done.

5)      I have had customer care numbers tell me I am 51 on the waiting list. Voice response systems are not meant to keep callers hanging for 30 minutes or more! Such systems should have adequate capacity to respond to customers in five minutes or less.

6)      No one seems to audit how many customers who try to carry out tasks on the bank’s websites drop out in desperation because the site is not user-friendly.

B      Many bank websites do not work correctly. If you complain, the bank asks you to use their cell phone apps based on more up-to-date technology. Why don't the banks have their websites tell you to use a cell phone app instead of asking you to log in and suffer the confusion caused by obsolete technology?  

Srinivasan Ramani

A simple way to reduce dangerous strokes

 

I saw a simple BP monitor on a conveniently accessible wall-mounted tray in an office corridor. The quiet corridor gave users some privacy. It was a valuable contribution to the health of staff members. The risk of a stroke for the average adult male is between 2 to 3% per year. The prevalence of stroke has increased by 50 percent over the last 17 years, and at present, 1 in 4 people are at risk of getting a stroke in their lifetime (Visit https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(10)61894-6/fulltext ).

A quote in the lobby of a well-known hospital says, “What you took a lifetime to learn, you can lose in minutes. " The reference is to the speed required to deal with the signs of a stroke. Brain cells start dying, and the faster one acts, the more one saves.

Undetected high blood pressure is a silent killer. It hits suddenly.  

How can you reduce the risk of a stroke? Visit https://www.cdc.gov/stroke/risk_factors.htm#:~:text=The%20chance%20of%20having%20a,65%20years%20also%20have%20strokes.

 

Srinivasan Ramani

We should make the national language really effective

Many Indians face problems when they meet the local police for verification of residential address for a passport renewal or to complain about an accident, etc. The police often tell them to sign a document in the regional language. Many countries in the world have their documents in two languages. The US, which has English as its majority language, has its documents in English and Spanish. Should the higher courts not rule that every form used in law and order in India should be in the regional language as well as in the national language?

States of India should recognize that inconveniencing Indians who do not know their regional language is not improving their ease of doing business index. They are cutting their nose to spite their own face! Wooing global investors to invest in their states and acting jingoistically is counterproductive.

Srinivasan Ramani