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Professor Arun Kumar Choudhury

Professor Arun Kumar Choudhury (January 6, 1923 – September 6, 1987) is regarded as a legend in the fields of Electronics and Computer Science by the national and international forums of scientists for his truly pioneering contributions to: i)	multifaceted research in several areas including Analog Computers, Circuit Theory, Control Systems, and Digital Computers, ii)	spread of education in these areas starting from 1951 when there was hardly any proper infrastructure for learning and undertaking research in electronics and computing in the whole country, iii)	building appropriate educational infrastructure in electronics and computer science in terms of laboratory equipment and appropriate human resources for teaching, iv)	perpetuating his dynamic vision of research and teaching in the evolving areas through numerous research schools formed by a large group of his students in India and abroad who themselves are established as internationally renowned eminent scientists and educationists in their respective fields. The Path Breaking Work Going back to 1952, even when the semiconductor device “transistor” was not available in the country, not only he designed and successfully developed an Analog Computer for computational purposes using the vacuum tube-based left-over spares from the World War II, but also pursued research in the then nascent area (in the perspective of the whole world) and supervised the PhD works of several research students. This was certainly the very first contribution to this area in the whole country.

Subsequently, his research and teaching during the 1950s included other branches of electronics, encompassing Circuit Theory and Control Systems. His pioneering endeavors in this direction culminated in mentoring and producing a number of brilliant researchers who, in their later life, proved themselves as eminent scientists in different parts of the world following the beacon of learning shown by him.

Beginning late 1950s, Professor Choudhury concentrated on undertaking research in the broad area of Digital Computers which was also in its infancy at that time throughout the whole world. He again made pioneering research contributions to the area of minimization of switching functions, fault-tolerant computing and microprogramming, which advanced the very fundamental concepts in building the powerful digital computers of the present day. The PhD thesis by one of his students Amarendra Mukhopadhya in 1962 on minimization of switching function was, in fact, the first ever PhD thesis on digital computers in the whole country. In the context of the whole country, he initiated research in the areas of VLSI design, fault-tolerant computing, and high-performance computing. His pioneering research in the area of digital computers led to the production of numerous brilliant students who themselves created internationally acclaimed research schools in their respective organizations spread over different parts of the world.

Publications In these areas, he published more than 200 research articles. He was instrumental in building the first analog computer in India, and was among the very few persons in the country, who, nearly 35 years ago, initiated research in the area of VLSI design, fault-tolerant computing, and high performance computing.

Specialization Prof. Choudhury is best known for his seminal work on switching circuit optimization, threshold logic, unate-cascade realizability and fault- tolerant synthesis of sequential machines.

A Beloved Faculty Advisor Professor Choudhury supervised more than 60 PhD students in his entire career, who subsequently held responsible positions in Indian institutions like IIT, IISc, ISI, JU, CU, BESU, and many foreign universities and research labs. Professor Choudhury’s galaxy of students are living testimony of what he accomplished as a teacher with meager resources, what infectious optimism he instilled in them to carry on his vision and mission of teaching and research. He had an exceptionally intuitive mind and versatile vision in research and teaching. As a one-man army, he pioneered research in all these areas including Analog Computing, Control Engineering, Circuit Theory and Digital Computers.

During the 1970s and 1980s, Professor Choudhury’s students largely shouldered the responsibility of teaching Electronics, Circuit theory and Computer Science in premier institutions of India, without which the growth of these disciplines would have been seriously hampered. Some of them went abroad and established themselves as leaders in their respective fields. Even now, more than 50 years later, Professor Choudhury’s students and their students are torchbearers of his rich and illustrious legacy.

Summarily, Professor Choudhury was not only a legendary researcher and outstanding creative thinker, but also a great teacher, in fact a teacher of the teachers of the teachers who could successfully carry the vision of his dynamism and passion for research, commensurate with the day-to-day technological innovations and progress world-wide in the continuously evolving areas. He was a great visionary and a teacher in its truest sense with the utmost dedication to the building of the knowledge-base of his students and creating a proper infrastructure for the next generations to learn the essence of the subjects through both theory and practice. He founded the Department of Computer Science and Engineering of the University of Calcutta in 1980 to fulfill his objective.