Vedic Sankhya and Modern Mathematics

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The statistician who knew the importance of sankhya

By Manju Gupta

'He even brought out the Indian Statistical Institute's first

journal entitled Sankhya, so named because "we believe that the idea

underlying this integral concept of statistics finds adequate

expression in the ancient Indian word sankhya. In Sanskrit, the

usual meaning is ´number', but the original root meaning was

´determinate knowledge'. In the Atharva Veda, a derivative form

sankhyata occurs in the sense of both ´well-known' and ´numbered'.

The lexicons give both the mean-ings. Amarkosa gives sankhya as

vicarana (deli-beration, analysis) as well as ´number'; also

sankhyavan as panditah (wise, learned).'

 

PRASANTA Chandra Mahalanobis, one of the top statisticians of the

world, was born on June 29, 1893, in the house built by his

grandfather. He was the elder of the two brothers. His mother died

when he was only 14 years old.

 

Even as a child, Mahalanobis had an analytical mind and developed a

distaste for everything conventional but a liking for things with a

touch of originality. As he grew up, his novel ideas came to be

looked upon as whims or idiosyncrasies. Even during school days, he

loved reading books on subjects not strictly within the school

curriculum. An incident occurred when he was in Presidency College,

preparing for his intermediate examination in science. It was

customary for a student to pass the preliminary examination before

the final. Mahalanobis wrote two essays in the paper on English but

did not appear for the examinations in other subjects. The principal

of the college was so impressed with his two essays that he allowed

Mahalanobis to appear for the final examination.

 

He was efficient in organising literary meets, sports and dramas and

at the age of 15, acted in Rabindranath Tagore's play Bisharian.

 

His early education was in the Brahmo Boys' School founded in 1904

by his grandfather. He passed matricu-lation in 1908, intermediate

in science in 1910 and B.Sc. in 1912 from Presidency College,

Calcutta. In 1913, he left for England and joined King's College. He

had been in Cambridge for a year and eight months and passed the

Tripos examination from the University of Cambridge: Part I in

mathematics in 1914 and Part II in physics in 1915. He became

interested in statistics and purchased a set of Biometrika.

 

Mahalanobis became close to S. Ramanujan, the great mathematician.

Once Mahala-nobis went to Ramanujan's room to have lunch with him.

Mahalanobis came inside the room and sat down, flipping through the

pages of Strand magazine, which had published a number of puzzles.

Ramanujan was preparing something in a pan on the fire. Mahalanobis

began to solve the problems and told Ramanujan jocularly, "Now, here

is a problem for you." Ramanujan said, "What problem, tell me," and

continued with his cooking. Mahalanobis read out the problem and

Ramanujan promptly answered, "Please, take down the solution," and

dictated a continued fraction. Mahalanobis was amazed at Ramanujan's

genius as a mathematician.

 

On his return from England, Mahalanobis married the daughter of

famous educatio-nist, H.C. Maitra, according to Brahmo Samaj

marriage rites. He was soon offered professor-ship in physics at

Presidency College, Calcutta. He joined the college and worked there

for 33 years.

 

Initially Mahalanobis continued his statistical studies at home and

later wrote his first paper on ´The Stati-stical An-alysis of Anglo-

Indian Stature'. Since 1925 onwards he presented many statistical

papers. He even brought out the Indian Statistical Institute's first

journal entitled Sankhya, so named because "we believe that the idea

underlying this integral concept of statistics finds adequate

expression in the ancient Indian word sankhya. In Sanskrit, the

usual meaning is ´number', but the original root meaning was

´determinate knowledge'. In the Atharva Veda, a derivative form

sankhyata occurs in the sense of both ´well-known' and ´numbered'.

The lexicons give both the mean-ings. Amarkosa gives sankhya as

vicarana (deli-beration, analysis) as well as ´number'; also

sankhyavan as panditah (wise, learned).

 

"The same dual sense is attached to its derivative from sankhya

which is the name of the most famous analytic philosophy of ancient

India. The name of the philosophical system is explained in both

ways: as a philosophy based essentially on enumeration of the

categories beginning with Nature or root cause. Or else a philosophy

by which is revealed the adequate knowledge of reality. The root

meaning is also met with in the Mahabharata, in the Gita portion,

where the sankhya system of philosophy is classified with the

Vedanta as being based on jnana (intellectual cognition) as

distinguished from the yoga systems. Sridhara, in his commentary on

the Gita, explains sankhya as samyagjnana that is, ´proper

cognition' or ´adequate knowledge'. The history of the word sankhya

shows the intimate connection, which has existed for more than 3,000

years in the Indian mind between ´adequate knowledge' and ´number'."

(to quote P.C. Mahalanobis.)

 

Jawaharlal Nehru had realised the potential of Mahalanobis and thus

appointed him the Honorary Statistical Adviser. He became the

architect of the Second Five-Year Plan and a member of the Planning

Commission from 1955 to 1967. Besides writing four books on jute

census, statistical sampling, and two on planning, Mahalanobis wrote

a number of scientific papers.

 

Mahalanobis was invited by many countries and frequently undertook

tours of the world. In 1972, he started feeling unwell and had to

undergo an abdominal operation. He stood the operation well but

after 21 days of intense suspense, mingled with hope and despair, he

passed away on June 28, 1972, just a day before his birthday.

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