Khagol_114

No. 114 - April 2018 02 Ever curious and playful with ideas Naresh Dadhich Donald's piercing eyes, always bearing a poignant sparkle of seeing something new and insightful, as well as teasingly playful, arewhat themost fascinating and enchanting picture I have of him. I had first met him in 1986 in his office when he was about to leave to give lecture in a summer school. We had a warm hand shake and announced that he would throw me out in 10 minutes. And we instantly clicked because there was warmth and honesty in that welcome. He was one of the friends who would always host you at his home, without much ado and several of us enjoyed their warm hospitality and company. He was perhaps the first visitor to IUCAA when it was still in the conceptual stage and gave a brilliant set of lectures. Since then IUCAA has enjoyed a special relation, served on the Scientific Advisory Committee I first met Donald Lynden-Bell when I arrived as a post-doctoral fellow at the Institute of Astronomy, Cambridge, in the early 1980s. I had heard about him, and knew that he was a great astrophysicist, but little else. Since my interaction with him was limited to saying hello at coffee, I was rather surprised when he invited me and my wife Asha to lunch at his place on the Easter Sunday. That was the start of a long andwarm associationwith Donald and Ruth Lynden-Bell. I learnt a great deal fromDonald, about galaxies, quasars, classical dynamics and much else. I once asked Donald a question about orbits. His way of answering it was to sit in my office and to do a detailed calculation in an hour or so, a small part of which I am reproducing in the right. I also had the opportunity over the years, mainly during his visits to IUCAA, to learn from him about practical matters and how to deal with difficult situations, of which there were many in the early years of the new institute, which some of us were setting up in Pune. When he first came to IUCAA as a member of our Scientific Advisory Committee, I had expected that he would be fully focused on scientific matters and not concern himself with anything else, but on the contrary I found that he was taking a holistic view of the institute and considered every aspect of it important for ensuring excellent scientific performance over the years. In just a couple of days Donald had become fully aware of our strengths and weaknesses of those early years, and his sage advice proved to be very valuable for us in many ways. When I became the Director, Donald advised me, “not to try to please everyone”; that simple mantra provided me with great solace in many situations. I last met Donald just a few months before he passed away, when Ruth and he visited us in our home in Pune for a very short time. When he left, he promised that hewould come again quite soon for a longer stay. A calculation by Donald Lynden-Bell Ajit Kembhavi for two terms, and he had been visiting IUCAAquite regularly. It was warmly acknowledged in electing him the Honorary Fellow. There are two profound things I learnt from him, one keep on staring at equation slowly you will understand it, and second one should stretch to one's limit of capacity, never mind if you make a few mistakes - a few wrong papers are fine, else you would always underperform. It is a different matter that for a person likeme even stretching does not take one any further. He was a very warm and dependable and a great intellectual friend, philosopher and guide. However, the image of his ever engaging and searching eyes would always be reassuring and won't let himgo!