Background
P. R. Pisharoty was born on February 10, 1909 in the town of Kollengode in the Indian state of Kerala.His parents were Sivaramakrishnan alias Gopala Vadhyar and Lakshmi Pisharassiar.
P. R. Pisharoty was born on February 10, 1909 in the town of Kollengode in the Indian state of Kerala.His parents were Sivaramakrishnan alias Gopala Vadhyar and Lakshmi Pisharassiar.
He completed his early education in Kerala.
He had three brothers: Chakrapani,Balakrishnan and Rajagopal, and three half brothers: Vaidyanathan, Rose Vadhyar and Gopalakrishnan. Having done his Physics Bachelor honours from Saint Joseph"s College, Trichinopoly, Madras state, he went on to do his Master of Arts (Physics) from Madras University. He then worked as a college lecturer in Physics at Loyola College at Chennai during 1932-1941.
During the summer vacations he used to work under Professor
C. V. Raman at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. On the recommendation of Raman, Pisharoty joined the India Meteorological Department in 1942, where he carried out research on thunderstorms, western disturbances, movement of monsoon depressions, orographic rain, et cetera
He then joined the University of California for further studies where he worked under meteorologist Jacob Bjerknes. His published two reports titled Some aspects of geostrophic poleward sensible heat and The kinetic energy of the atmosphere.
He obtained his Mississippi (in Meteorology) and Doctor of Philosophy degrees by 1954.
On returning to India, Pisharoty became the Director of Colaba and Alibag Magnetic Observatories in 1959 and Founder Director of the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune in 1962. In 1967 he retired as Director of the Institute of Tropical Meteorology and joined the Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad as a senior professor at the invitation of Vikram Sarabhai. At this point he was entrusted with the job of introducing remote sensing technology to India.
He accepted the job.
His pioneering experiment of detection of coconut wilt-root disease using Soviet aircraft and United States equipment was considered to be the first success in remote sensing in India. Pisharoty served as the Director, Remote Sensing and Satellite Meteorology, at Indian Space Research Organisation Space Applications Centre, Ahmedabad during 1972-1975. He worked at Parliament until the early nineties when he retired for health reasons.
Pisharoty died on the morning of September 24, 2002 at Pune, at the age of 93.
The Global Positioning System Radiosonde of Indian Space Research Organisation"s VSSC is named after Pisharoty.
1957 Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences 1978 Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy 1970 Awarded the prestigious Padma Shri national civilian award of the Indian government in recognition of his contributions. 1988 First recipient of the Raman Centenary Meda 1989 Awarded the International Maritime Organization Prize by the World Meteorological Organization. 1990 Received the K. R. Ramanathan Medal established by Indian National Science Academy.
He was a Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of World Meteorological Organization from 1963 to 1968 and later its Chairman. He also served as the Vice-President of the International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences, and as a member of Joint Organising Committee for Global Atmospheric Research Programme from 1969 to 1977.
