होमी जहांगीर भाभा Homi J. Bhabha

होमी जहांगीर भाभा Homi J. Bhabha

Homi Jehangir Bhabha was born in Bombay in 1909. At Cambridge he worked out electron–positron scattering and the cascade theory of cosmic-ray showers. He founded the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in 1945. He chaired India’s Atomic Energy Commission from 1948 until his death on Mont Blanc in 1966.

Curated by Nikhil Sharma: a Cambridge physicist whose name is on a law of particle physics. War stranded him in India in 1939 and he stayed to build TIFR and Trombay. He planned India’s atomic future around thorium. He painted and collected art and chose people before buildings.

A portrait from the Mondadori archive, 1960s. Photograph: Archivio Mondadori (photographer unknown), Wikimedia Commons, Public domain.
  • 1945 TIFR founded: With support from the Sir Dorabji Tata Trust
  • 1956 Apsara critical: The first research reactor in Asia to go critical
  • 3 Stage plan: Uranium to plutonium to thorium for India’s power
  • 5 Nobel nominations: For physics in 1951 and 1953 to 1956

The facts

Born
30 October 1909 in Bombay into a wealthy Parsi family (Wikipedia: Homi J. Bhabha)
Family
Son of the lawyer Jehangir Hormusji Bhabha and Meherbai Panday. Dorabji Tata of the Tata Group was his uncle (Wikipedia: Homi J. Bhabha)
Education
Cathedral and John Connon School, Elphinstone College and the Royal Institute of Science. Then Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge. PhD 1935 (Wikipedia: Homi J. Bhabha)
Founded
The Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (1945) and the Atomic Energy Establishment, Trombay (1954), now BARC (Bhabha Atomic Research Centre: About BARC)
Offices
First chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission from 1948 to 1966. Secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy from 1954 (Wikipedia: Homi J. Bhabha)
World roles
President of the 1955 UN Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy. President of IUPAP from 1960 to 1963 (Britannica: Homi Bhabha)
Honours
Fellow of the Royal Society (1941). Adams Prize (1942). Padma Bhushan (1954) (Wikipedia: Homi J. Bhabha)
Art
A painter and patron of the Progressive Artists’ Group. TIFR holds the large collection he began (Wikipedia: Homi J. Bhabha)
Died
24 January 1966 when Air India Flight 101 crashed on Mont Blanc. He was 56 (Wikipedia: Air India Flight 101)

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