Text-II - Epitome of Wisdom

UNIT-I                                            Sir Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya

Sir Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya, a notable engineer, scholar, statesman, was born on 15^th September 1861 in Muddenahalli in the Chikkaballapur Taluk of Kolar District of (then) Mysore state, to Srinivasa Shastry and Venkatalakshmamma, who were good and pious couple and led a very simple and spiritual life. Though his parents were not well off, both of them decided to educate Visvesvaraya.

Visvesvaraya’s early education was at their tiny taluk “Chikkaballapur”, where he learnt deep respect for the culture and traditions of the land. Visvesvaraya was a good and deligent student and was keenly interested in studies. With his parents consent and blessings this spiritual boy has joined the Central College at Bangalore for higher education when he was fifteen years old. But unfortunately his pocket was empty and he had no roof over his head. But, this disciplined boy  did not bog down for his helpless state and became a tutor and happily earned for his higher education. Visvesvaraya was not satisfied though he stood high in B.A. Examination and joined the Science College at Poona to study Engineering and ranked the first in his course.

As soon as the results were out, Visvesvaraya was appointed as an Assistant Engineer at Nasik, by the government of Bombay, where he worked with utmost commitment and excelled in his post. A very difficult task was assigned to Visvesvaraya when he was 32 years old i.e., “to find a way to supplying water from the river Sindhu to a town called Sukkur” for which Visvesvaraya prepared an ingenious plan which amazed the other famous Engineers where he developed a new system called the “Block System” where he devised steel doors, that could stop the wasteful water in dams, seeing that even the British officers of those days were surprised for his skill in performing tasks and praised him a lot for his invention.

The government has recognised and appreciated Visvesvaraya’s genius and sincerity and he was promoted to higher positions. Visvesvaraya was promoted as a Chief Engineer at Hyderabad where he showed an extraordinary performance that was simply impossible at that time.

When the river Musi was in floods, Visvesvaraya surveyed the entire area and went through the official records of the previous floods and studied the figures of heavy rainfall in different parts of the world including the River Musi. With this study, he proposed the construction of dams across the River Musi and its tributary River Esi along with this, he suggested that, ”lovely parks should be laid out on the banks of the river. He also constructed Himayathsagar and Osmansagar dams which provide water for the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad, besides these, he was also instrumental for all the privilages which Hyderabad has got such as improved drained system, plenty of water sources and electricity even today.

Visvesvaraya was knighted as a commander of the British Indian Empire by King George V for his countless contributions to the public and he became the Dewan of Mysore in 1913 and his tenure was upto 1918. The resourcefulness of Visvesvaraya earned him the position of the Chief Engineer in the Mysore state. Besides all these Visvesvaraya was not just interested in buildings, roads and bridges but recognised the Indians’ miserable condition, most of them are just farmers, who just purely depended on rains for their food. He wanted to bring some remarkable change in them noticing poverty, ignorance and sickness.

Visvesvaraya constructed Krishnarajasagara Dam which is nearby the renowned Brindavan Gardens has not only been constructed for the purpose of irrigation but also to provide electricity to the Kolar Gold fields, that was completed by July 1915.

Visvesvaraya once said that “the curse of our nation is laziness.“ and he realized that the industry is the backbone of accounts and he started agricultural and horticultural shows to motivate the people towards them and took up the rehabilitation of handloom industry. With the initiation of   Visvesvaraya, State Bank of Mysore came forward in 1913  for financing various projects such as the Mysore Soap Factory, the Parasitoid laboratory, the Mysore Iron and Steel Works in Bhadravathi , besides these many rice mills, oil mills, sugarcane crushing mills and power looms sprang up everywhere and the Industrialization  picked up momentum. It was Visvesvaraya who gave the Clarion call -Industrialize or Perish.

Visvesvaraya was not only a neatly dressed and ready to work man but also known for his discipline and tidiness, besides all these he was a straight forward man. Visvesvaraya believed in the value of education and increased 6500 schools in Mysore state during his tenure   and also he is responsible for the establishment of Visvesvaraya College of Engineering and the Bangalore Agricultural University. He achieved so much in his six years of  tenure as Dewan where others could not have accomplished even in sixty years, for which people have praised him as a “Magician” for the fast progress being done by him and also compared him with “Bhishmacharya” for which  Visvesvaraya replied “what a small man I am before  Bhishmacharya”?

Visvesvaraya is a fearless patriot, the arrangements at Durbar pained him when he went there for the first time in 1910 during Dussera festivities and revolted against the Europeans for their behaviour. Visvesvaraya is a selfless man. In 1918, at the age of 57, he took voluntary retirement and later he worked as a chairman giving advice for the restoration of Bhadravathi iron and steel factory when it was in trouble. For his advice, he earned more than hundred thousand rupees, but the whole amount he donated for the establishment of “Sri Jayachamarajendra Polytechnic Institute of Bangalore. He also established the Maharani’s College in Mysore where the first hostel for girls was opened. He also made arrangements for the government to give scholarships to the intelligent students, to go to foreign countries for studies.

Visvesvaraya is a man of commitment, he did not care the person even if one is powerful who hindered the growth. Visvesvaraya argued that when they must discuss a resolution upon that India should have a national government, for which Englishmen objected. Visvesvaraya is a simple man, when the government had arranged to have him carried in a chair where he could not go by car when he went to Fatna, where he was called to study a plan for a bridge across the River Ganga.

In 1955, when he was 94 years of age Visvesvaraya was honored with “Bharath Ratna” or the “Gem of India”   by the government of India. Visvesvaraya’s   memory remained “pristine” even when he was almost a hundred years old. He could easily pick up the files related to the River Musi about 50 years after it was tamed. Visvesvaraya passed away on 14 April 1962, when his age was 101 years old. 

 “Success in life depends on action, that is on what you do, and not what you feel or think and the price of success is hardwork. This was in fact exemplified by Visvesvaraya  during his lifetime.”

He was by birth poor, by tradition a gentleman, by occupation an engineer, by circumstances he is a Dewan, by ideology a scientist and by efforts an industrialist. He had the conviction and strength of mind to act accordingly. He had been a combination of endeavor, adventure, courage intellect, capacity and strength. He led the country to the path of progress and his each and every creation was considered mighty and magnificent. But, far mightier and far more magnificent was the matchless Dreamer, Achiever and Leader who paved the way to modern India.