Cosmic Anger: Abdus Salam – The First Muslim Nobel Scientist by Gordon Fraser. Oxford University Press. Hardback ISBN 9780199208463
The late Abdus Salam – the only Nobel scientist from Pakistan – came from a small place in the Punjab called Jhang. The town is also famous for “Heer-Ranjha”, a legendary love story of the Romeo-and-Juliet style that has a special romantic appeal in the countryside around the town. Salam turned out to be another “Ranjha” from Jhang, whose first love happened to be theoretical physics. Cosmic Anger, Salam’s biography by Gordon Fraser, is a new, refreshing look at the life of this scientific genius from Pakistan.
In chapter 10, Fraser discusses the special relationship between Salam and the former President of Pakistan, Ayub Khan. I feel that more emphasis was required about the fact that for 16 years, from 1958 to 1974, Salam had the greatest influence on the scientific policies of Pakistan. On 4 August 1959, while inaugurating the Atomic Energy Commission, President Ayub said: “In the end, I must say how happy I am to see Prof. Abdus Salam in our midst. His attainments in the field of science at such a young age are a source of pride and inspiration for us and I am sure that his association with the commission will help to impart weight and prestige to the recommendations.” Salam was involved in setting up the Atomic Energy Commission and other institutes such as the Pakistan Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology and the Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission in Pakistan.
Finally, I find the book to be a well written account of the achievements of a genius who was a citizen of the world, destined to play a memorable role in the global development of science and technology. At the same time, in many ways Salam was very much a Pakistani. In the face of numerous provocations and frustrations, he insisted on keeping his nationality. He loved the Pakistani culture, its language, its customs, its cuisine and its soil where he was born and is buried.
Hafeez Hoorani, National Centre for Physics, Quaid-E-Azam University.
Categories: Book Reviews
There are of course uncountable good articles on Prof. Dr. Abdus Salam. Here is just one I came across recently:
http://www.rashedhaq.com/interests/abdus-salam-beacon-of-science/
In his achievements, Dr. Salam saw a certain special Providence of God. Let me quote from the transcript of one of his interviews. The questi0ns asked by Lewis Wolpert or Alison Richards are in inverted comas:
“But I am not quite sure how you got to Cambridge.”
I got to Cambridge by means of a scholarship from Small Peasants’ welfare fund which was set up by the Prime Minister of the State of Punjab at that time.
“Did you come from a peasant background?”
That’s right. Although my father was a Civil Servant, he had a small parcel of land and he qualified. So I got one of those scholarships and the interesting thing is that only five scholarships were offered, and the other four people who got them could not get university admission that year. Then came the partition of the country and the scholarships disappeared. So the entire purpose of that fund and those scholarships seemed to be to get me to Cambridge.
“Did you really think that fate was playing a hand? After all, each of these events was very much a matter of chance.”
Certainly my father, who was a deeply religious man, always said that this was a result of his prayers. He wanted his son to shine in some field. Of course, in the beginning he was thinking of me as a Civil Servant, but when I decided that I was going to do research, he felt that this was something very appropriate and encouraged me. But the whole sequence of events, my getting a scholarship at the right time, my getting to Cambridge at all at the right time, and then being interested in science, was all, he thought, very much a part of something deeper.
http://knol.google.com/k/dr-abdus-salam-nobel-laureate-in-physics#