·
Work Hard
- Simple
living high thinking
- Think big
- Take the
team along and give them credit
- Invest in
the Future of the Country
Wednesday, December 23, 2015
Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam: Unedited material collected for Effective People by Prof TV Rao
·
Work Hard
Abdul Kalam
APJ Abdul Kalam was born on 15 October 1931 at the
South Indian state of Tamil Nadu. He belonged to a very poor family of
Rameshwaram. Kalam's father was Jainulabdeen Marakayar was the Panchayat Board
President. He was the owner of a few boats which were used to ferry pilgrims
between Rameshwaram and Dhanushkody.
Abdul Kalam was studying and working simultaneously.
After the school gets over in the evening, again he will go around Rameswaran
for collection of dues from customers. As a young boy Kalam was walking,
running and studying all together. One day, when all his brothers and sisters were
sitting and eating, Kalam mother went on giving him chapattis (even though they
were rice eaters only, wheat was rationed). When kalam finished eating, his
elder brother called him privately and scolded “Kalam do you know what was
happening? You went on eating Chappati, and mother went on giving you. She has
given all her chappatis to you. It is difficult time. Be a responsible son and
do not make your mother starve”. First time Kalam had a shivering sensation and
he could not control himself. Kalam rushed to mother and hugged her. Even
though he was studying in 5th class, he had a special place in his home because
he was the last guy in the family. There used to be no electricity. Their house
was lit by the kerosene lamp that too between 7 to 9 PM. Kalam mother specially
gave him a small kerosene lamp so that he can study up to 11 PM. Kalam still
remember his mother in a full moon night which has been portrayed with the
title “mother” in his book “Wings of Fire”.
Later he
studied at Schwartz High School, in Ramanathapuram. Subsequently, he moved to
St. Joseph's College, Trichi. After completing the B.Sc degree course from St.
Joseph's, he joined the Madras Institute of Technology, the best institution
for technical education in South India at that time.
While Kalam was studying aeronautical engineering in
MIT, Chennai, (1954-57) during the third year of his course, he was assigned a
project to design a low-level attack aircraft together with six other
colleagues. Kalam was given the responsibility of system design and system
integration by integrating the team members. Also, he was responsible for
aerodynamic and structural design of the project. The other five of Kalam team
took up the design of propulsion, control, guidance, avionics and
instrumentation of the aircraft. Kalam design teacher Prof. Srinivasan, the
then Director of MIT, was their guide. He reviewed the project and declared
Kalam work to be gloomy and disappointing. He didn’t lend an ear to Kalam
difficulties in bringing together data base from multiple designers. Kalam
asked for a month’s time to complete the task, since he had to get the inputs
from five of his colleagues without which Kalam cannot complete the system
design. Prof. Srinivasan told Kalam "Look, young man, today is Friday
afternoon. I give you three days time. If by Monday morning I don’t get the
configuration design, your scholarship will be stopped." Kalam had a jolt
in his life, as scholarship was his lifeline, without which he cannot continue
with his studies. There was no other way out but to finish the task. Kalam team
felt the need for working together round the clock. They didn’t sleep that
night, working on the drawing board skipping their dinner. On Saturday, Kalam
took just an hour’s break. On Sunday morning, he was near completion, when he
felt someone’s presence in his laboratory. It was Prof. Srinivasan studying
Kalam progress. After looking at Kalam work, he patted and hugged him
affectionately. He had words of appreciation: "I knew I was putting you
under stress and asking you to meet a difficult deadline. You have done great
job in system design”.
Kalam specialized in Aeronautical Engineering and
became a full-fledged aeronautical engineer after being trained at Hindustan
Aeronautics Limited, Bangalore.
Kalam was shocked and felt
orphaned after Sarabhai’s sudden death in the early hours of December 31,
1971, due to cardiac arrest. Dr. Sarabhai had been in reality Kalam’s mentor -
the man who influenced him the most and moulded his professional career. After
the initial shock, Kalam decided to work as hard as possible to fulfil the
dreams of Dr. Sarabhai, which he thought was the best tribute he could pay to
the departed soul.
Kalam, as project leader,
believed in integrating people working on a project. He did not believe that
solo performance helped very much in the execution of complex projects. What
was required was coordination and excellent teamwork. The project leader was
only the captain of the team.
Kalam
communicate freely with all the teams working on the SLV-3 project and acted as
a sensor to every constructive idea or suggestion coming from any colleague at
any level. A great deal of time was spent on communication which became his
mantra. He fought against bureaucratic delays and insensitiveness and finally
got the help of Dr. Brahm Prakash who delegated financial powers to the Project
Team.
Kalam gave the maximum freedom with responsibility
and accountability to all his team mates which he found produced good results.
As the project leader he had somehow to keep abreast of all that was happening
around in real time and had to update his knowledge which called for proper
time-management. Perhaps his being a bachelor also helped, as he could devote
all seven days in the week to the management of the project.
In 1973 Prof. Satish Dhavan (the Chairman of the
Atomic Energy and Space Commission) gave Abdul Kalam the task to build the
satellite launch vehicle to launch a satellite in to the orbit. In 1979, they
were ready with thousands of engineers, 10,000 of workers and staff all worked
together with 44 sub-systems and thousands of components. It was built in
Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, and also of the Space Centre. Then they moved
that vehicle from Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre to the now Satish Dhavan Space
Centre at Shriharikotta. The launch vehicle was on the launch pad and the day
17th August 1979, and Abdul Kalam was the Mission Director, Project Director
and all were in the control centre and the computer takes over at T-8 minutes.
Because it was very difficult for Kalam as a mission director to check hundreds
of parameters so they hand over the whole launch of the rocket system to the
computer at T-8 minutes, Kalam handed over to the computer for the launch,
thousands of people were waiting at the launch mission canters and they were working
throughout the country and some out range centre, at exactly T-8 minutes
computer took over. And at T-4 minute’s computer put a hold. It said don’t
launch. At that time the whole rocket system was alive. Every explosive system,
propellant system, electronic system, all were on, and ready of launch and
computer says don’t launch, at T-4 minutes. Then immediately computer printout
comes out. There is some problem in the second stage control system; there is a
leakage, so you don’t launch. Behind Kalam there were a number of experts;
six-seven experts with 10 to 20 years experience. And Kalam turn to them and
they have their computers to find out, what happened and they told him within a
minute, they say there is problem in second stage control system and that we
cannot launch; computers say don’t launch. But we believe as experts, the
igniters i.e. oxidizers is sufficiently more there and even through there is a
leakage in system you can launch. They asked Kalam to launch. Kalam put the
rocket in the manual mode. Rocket took
off. 100 seconds. Beautiful launch and rocket first stage did its job. It’s a
four-stage rocket system, and then second stage, within a second it goes into a
spin. It should be steady; it is a
controlled system by guided system. But it was going into a spin. Kalam knew he
lost the rocket system; within few seconds instead of putting the satellite in
the orbit, the whole system went in the Bay of Bengal. It was a failure.
It is very important, for entrepreneurs. Life is not
so simple. We have to handle failures with a stout heart. Chairman, Prof.
Satish Dhawan, at exactly 6.30 came to Kalam room, Kalam was very tired of
continuously working; he asked Kalam to join him for a press conference. On
that day, in the morning there is a press conference. Hundreds of press
reporters, media people have assembled. Prof. Dhawan told Kalam that he is
going to handle the press conference and you are going to come with me. He took
Kalam there. There was the press, national press, international press. They
asked a lot of questions, how you can put 20 crores in Bay of Bengal, one guy
asked. And like that so many serious questions, after all people will ask
questions, it is the people’s money. Prof. Dhawan said, ‘Yes, we had a
failure’. First time we have launched. We have gained lot of system. And
definitely we will succeed. And I will give all the support to my
technologists; I will give all the support to my scientists. We will succeed in
a year’s time, he said. Kalam was the Mission Director, Project Director, he
has failed the mission. With Kalam five thousand people have worked. But
Chairman of the Indian Space Research Organization, takes the responsibility of
the failure. He completely switched Kalam failure to his failure. Exactly after
one year, 18th July 1980 they go to the launch pad. And countdown starts. At
T-8 minutes Kalam handover to the computer. Computer checks out. It initiates
the rocket system. First stage gives the required velocity. Second stage gives
the required velocity. Third stage gives the required velocity. And, fourth
stage gives the escape velocity to put the satellite in the orbit. Kalam can
see the performance in front of himself, he took the mike and he announce to
all at the station. “Here is your Mission Director, the satellite is in orbit
and we congratulate you.” Kalam told them. After thirty minutes, Prof. Satish
Dhavan called Kalam and asked him to conduct the press conference. failure he
took it and success he gave Kalam and to his team.
This great lesson no university taught Abdul Kalam.
No book taught him. But that one person, that institution, that taught him such
a big lesson.
Kalam joined the Defence Research and Development Organization
(DRDO) as the Director of the Defence Research and Development Laboratory
(DRDL) at Hyderabad on June 1, 1982. Kalam was aware of the work going on at
DRDL in the indigenous development of missile systems. His first task before
formulating an action plan was to have detailed discussions with the scientists
of DRDL, to evaluate the ongoing work. For these review meetings, he followed
what Dr. Sarabhai used to do at Thumba, namely, bring in experts from outside
institutions such as the Indian Institute of Science (IIS), IITs, CSIR, TRIF
and so on. Thus he opened the window so that fresh air and new ideas could
enter the laboratory.
Kalam was making full use of all the lessons he had
learnt at Thumba during his long service of about 20 years there. He had found
that participative management was essential in executing complex projects like
the SLV-3.
After much discussion, an action plan with a
timeframe of 12 years and an estimated expenditure of Rs. 3900 million was
drawn up and placed before the Government.
Kalam was asked to give a presentation at New Delhi.
At a meeting presided over by the Defence Minister and attended by the three
Service Chiefs, Dr. Arunachalam and other senior officials, proposals were made
on the design of the heat shields for building long-range missiles in future.
This was a project that interested Kalam very much.
Everybody present at the meeting was quite excited
about these proposals. At the end of the meeting the Defense Minister asked
Kalam and Dr. Arunachalam to meet him later in the evening. At this meeting the
Minister asked for an Integrated Guided Missile Development Programme (IGMDP),
and that too, by the next morning! It was indeed a tall order. But Kalam and
Arunachalam worked the whole night and produced an action plan. The minister
quickly cleared the proposal.
The atmosphere in the eighties at the DRDL was very
similar to that at Thumba during the sixties and seventies. Kalam could
capitalize on the tremendous enthusiasm, exuberance and the strong desire on
the part of all concerned to make a grand success of the IGMDP. He took his own
time in selecting competent leaders for the five missile projects, from among
the many talented scientists that DRDL had.
Using the
consortium approach, he involved several institutions and organizations
scattered all over the country to carry out various tasks directly related to
the IGMDP. Through concurrent engineer in the period required to execute the
project was reduced to the minimum possible. All the lessons learnt at Thumba
stood him in good stead in the execution of the most complex and challenging
project ever undertaken in the country.
A site had to be selected for the missile
flight trials. It was finally decided to select Balasore in Orissa state as the
Interim Test Range (ITR) which was made an independent establishment to be got
ready by December, 1986. As a bachelor and a workaholic, Kalam could devote
about 90 hours a week for his work.
Much of the credit for the grand success of the IGMDP
goes to Kalam, the captain of the team who headed the DRDL for about ten years,
before he was called upon, in July, 1992 - to shoulder greater responsibilities
as the Scientific Advisor to the Defence Minister and Secretary, Department of
Defence R&D.
Dr. Kalam took up academic pursuit as Professor,
Technology & Societal Transformation at Anna University, Chennai from
November 2001 and was involved in teaching and research tasks. Above all he
took up a mission to ignite the young minds for national development by meeting
high school students across the country.
http://www.abdulkalam.com/kalam/jsp/display_content.jsp?menuid=22&menuname=Dr.Kalam%F6s%20Page&linkid=130&linkname=Profile&content=457&columnno=0&starts=0&menu_image=-
A born visionary and a teacher at heart, Dr.
APJ Abdul Kalam, has demonstrated outstanding leadership qualities. During his
entire tenure, he was often seen defying the security arrangement to reach out
and interact with the young children during his public meetings. He will always
be remembered for his vision of a developed India by 2020.
The key to Kalam motivation has always been to look
at how far I had still to go rather than how far I had come. ‘From Wings of
Fire’
Kalam remember his father starting his day at 4 am
by reading the namaz before dawn. After the namaz, he used to walk dawn to a
small coconut grove we owned, about 4 miles from our home. He would return,
with a dozen coconuts tied together thrown over his shoulder, and only then
would have his breakfast. This remained his routine even when he was in his
late sixties. Kalam through out his life tried to emulate his father in his own
world of science and technology.
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/17646299/WINGS-OF-FIRE-AUTOBIOGRAPHY-APJ-ABDUL-KALAM
While there were many significant events during
Abdul Kalam tenure( 2002- 2007 ‘President’), a question from a little girl Anukriti
of Sri Sathya Sai Jagriti Vidya Mandir School, of Darwa village from Haryana, during
children’s visit to Rashtrapati Bhavan on May 22, 2006, rings in Kalam mind ever after. Anukriti asked Kalam “why
India cannot become a developed nation before the year 2020”. Kalam appreciated
the question and said it was indeed a thoughtful question and assured her that that
her dream would be taken to the highest institution of the nation and we would
work for it to achieve before 2020. This question reflects how the desire to
live in developed India has entered into the minds of the youth. The same
feelings are echoed by over fifteen lakh youth, whom Kalam have met so far and
who represent the dream of the 540 million youth of the nation. The aspirations
of the young to live in a prosperous, safe and proud India should be the
guiding factor in whatever profession we contribute.
Abdul Kalam visit to Nagaland on 26th October 2002,
assuming post of President. It was a unique experience for Kalam at Khuzama
village to meet tribal village council members and discuss with them the
village progress and the dream of village citizens. Kalam was very happy to see
the empowered village council functioning with financial powers and taking
decisions. Kalam saw a prosperous village with fruits and vegetables
production. However, there is a need for providing physical connectivity in
Nagaland through quality roads for enabling faster movement of products from
villages to the market. That meeting gave Abdul Kalam a powerful message about
the transformation which can take place to the 600,000 villages of India, if
all the villages are empowered to deal with their development and are well
connected among themselves and with the urban societies.
On February 24, 2007, at Coimbatore, Kalam had a
very beautiful experience. As he got ready for meeting the first person out of
twenty appointments, a wheel chair was in sight with a smiling person probably
in his late fifties; unfortunately he has no hands and legs. His radiant face
was revealing his happy state of mind. He introduced himself as Vidwan
Coimbatore SR Krishna Murthy. Kalam greeted him and asked him how this had
happened. He smilingly said that it was from by birth. He thanked God, his
parents, teachers and many others for giving him confidence, training and help.
Kala, asked him, what Kalam could do for him? He said, “I don’t need anything
from you. I would like to sing in front of you”. Kalam readily agreed. He sang
melodiously the Saint Thyagraja’s pancha ratna kriti entharo mahanubavulu in
Sriragam giving me a glimpse of his talent. Kalam was quite touched. Despite
being physically challenged, the latent talent of music could blossom in this
person with his positive attitude and perseverance, encouraged by the parents,
teachers, academics and rasikas. Now he wants to give, give and give his art to
inspire others. Of course, by his merit of music, in July 2007, he performed in
the Rashtrapati Bhavan art theatre.
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