Dr.
C.V. Raman was born on November 7, 1888 in an orthodox South Indian Brahmin family in tirchurappalli, Tamilnadu. His father's name was Chandra Shekhar Aiyer who had special interest in science and mathematics. His mother Parvati was a pious lady. Raman was a very brilliant student since his early childhoodHe passed his matriculation at the age of 11 and at 15 graduated from the Presidency College, Chennai.
He was the only student to get a first class. He completed his Master's degree in Physics from the same college and broke all previous records.After ten years of Government services, Raman resigned to work as a professor of physics at the Kolkata University. He stayed there for fifteen years. It was the period when he received world wide recognition for his work in optics and scattering of light his pioneering research on the molecular scattering of light, the phenomenon that causes changes in the nature of light when it passes through a transparent medium-solid, liquid or gaseous-culminated in his getting the Noble Prize for Physics in 1930.
In 1943, Raman set up the Raman Research Institute in Bangalore. There he served as its director and remained active until his death on November 21, 1970, at the age of eighty two. He was proud to be an Indian. Till the day he died, he did not give up his traditional Indian turban in favour of a European hat. Thus he was a great scientiest ever produced by India.
