A Tribute to Dr Kalam: India’s beloved President, Scientist, Writer, Missile Man and Teacher

“I wonder what is it about Dr APJ Abdul Kalam that touches so many people,” says Uday Damodaran, professor of finance at XLRI Jamshedpur.

The former President of India, Dr Kalam, passed away on Monday evening after suffering a massive cardiac arrest. He collapsed while delivering a lecture on Livable Planet earth at IIM Shillong.

In his last moments, Dr Kalam was doing something he loved. Teaching.

“Often he (Dr Kalam) would ask me, ‘You are young, decide what will you like to be remembered for?’ I kept thinking of new impressive answers, till one day I gave up and resorted to tit-for-tat. I asked him back, ‘First you tell me, what will you like to be remembered for? President, Scientist, Writer, Missile man, India 2020, Target 3 billion…. What?’ I thought I had made the question easier by giving options, but he sprang on me a surprise. ‘Teacher,’ he said,” writes Srijan Pal Singh in I Never Knew Yesterday Was My Last Day With Dr Kalam Sir.

Post his tenure as a President, Kalam became a visiting professor at the IIM Shillong, IIM Ahmedabad and IIM Indore, an honorary fellow of IISc Bangalore, Chancellor of the Indian Institute of Space Science and Technology Thiruvananthapuram, professor of Aerospace Engineering at Anna University and an adjunct at many other academic and research institutions across India. He taught information technology at the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad and technology at Banaras Hindu University and Anna University. (Source)

Dr Kalam was also a part of various social reform programmes such as  What Can I Give Movement. In the eighties and nineties, he received the highest civilian awards - Bharat Ratna, Padma Vibhushan and Padma Bhushan.

Uday Damodaran had the fortune of meeting Dr Kalam in 2004 (during his presidency) at IIM Kozhikode. “We had got him to plant a sapling and had arranged for an absolutely clean, white towel to be brought on a silver (coloured!) tray. But by the time the towel was brought to him, Dr Kalam had wiped his hands on his trousers and had moved towards the podium. He seemed to have been itching to speak to the students! I loved the way he spoke to the students that day. It was as if he was talking to a bunch of small, innocent kids (not a bunch of smart MBAs!). He kept saying, “If you have some ideas you write to me, OK? At least that is the way I remember that day,” recalls Damodaran.

Kalam was a man of many talents. Considered as the most popular President of the country, he was also the brain behind India’s missile programme and acted as the Chief Scientific Adviser to Vajpayee. He also played an important role in 1998 Pokhran nuclear test.
“He was simple, and did not seem to be aware that he was simple. He was good without seemingly being aware that he was good. I think that is what set him apart. Many of us don't bother about being simple or good. Some of us consciously try to appear simple or good. A few of us are simple or good but are conscious of being so. Dr Kalam was simply good without (seemingly, at least) being conscious of it,” says Damodaran.