Autobiography of apj abdul kalam pdf file

Uploaded by Sharon Shoba on November 1, Hamburger icon An icon used to represent a menu that can be toggled by interacting with this icon. Web icon An illustration of a computer application window Wayback Machine Texts icon An illustration of an open book. Texts Video icon An illustration of two cells of a film strip. Video Audio icon An illustration of an audio speaker.

Audio Software icon An illustration of a 3. They become so emotionally involved with their work that any dilution of the success of their effort fills them with grief. I remember him as a diminutive man with a towering personality and eyes that radiated intelligence. His dedication to his work was exemplary. UR Rao, would be engineered by my team to fit into the nose cone of the Rohini Rocket.

At an altitude of km, the nose cone would be separated by explosion of pyros triggered by an electronic timer. With this, the X-ray sensors would be exposed to space for collecting the required information about the emissions from stars. Together, Prof. Oda and Prof. Rao were a unique blend of intellect and dedication, which one rarely sees.

One day, when I was working on the integration for Prof. To me they looked flimsy, but Prof. Oda stuck to his stand that the Indian timers be replaced by the Japanese ones. I yielded to his suggestion and replaced the timers. The rocket took off elegantly and attained the intended altitude. But the telemetry signal reported mission failure on account of timer malfunction.

Oda was so upset that tears welled up in his eyes. I was stunned by the emotional intensity of Prof. He had clearly put his heart and soul into his work. Sudhakar was my colleague in the Payload Preparation Laboratory. As part of the pre-launch schedule, we were filling and remotely pressing the hazardous sodium and thermite mix.

As usual, it was a hot and humid day at Thumba. After the sixth such operation, Sudhakar and I went into the payload room to confirm the proper filling of the mix. Suddenly, a drop of sweat from his forehead fell onto the sodium, and before we knew what was happening, there was a violent explosion which shook the room. For a few paralysed seconds, I did not autobiography of apj abdul kalam pdf file what to do.

The fire was spreading, and water would not extinguish the sodium fire. Trapped in this inferno, Sudhakar, however, did not lose his presence of mind. He broke the glass window with his bare hands and literally threw me out to safety before jumping out himself. Sudhakar spent many weeks in the hospital recuperating from the severe burns he had received.

At TERLS, I was involved with rocket preparation activities, payload assembly, testing and evaluation besides building subsystems like payload housing and jettisonable nose cones. Working with the nose cones led me, as a natural consequence, into the field of composite materials. The versatility of composites, in the sense that they possess very desirable structural, thermal, electrical, chemical and mechanical properties, fascinated me.

I was so enthused with these man-made materials that I was in a hurry to know everything about them almost overnight. I used to read up everything available on related topics. An FRP composite is composed of an inorganic fibre woven into a matrix that encloses it and gives the component its bulk form. We made highstrength glass cloth laminates to build non-magnetic payload housings and flew them in two-stage sounding rockets.

We also wound and test flew rocket motor casings of up to mm diameter. Slowly, but surely, two Indian rockets were born at Thumba. They were christened Rohini and Menaka, after the two mythological dancers in the court of Indra, the king of the sky. The Indian payloads no longer needed to be launched by French rockets. Could this have been done but for the atmosphere of trust and commitment which Prof.

He made every man feel directly involved in problem solving. Sarabhai was matter-of-fact and never tried to hide his disappointment. He used to talk with us in an honest and objective manner. Sometimes I found him making things look more positive than they actually were, and then charming us by his almost magical powers of persuasion. That was his subtle way of challenging each one of us to stretch our capabilities.

At the same time, even if we failed to meet certain objectives, he would praise whatever we had accomplished. Whenever he found any one of us going over his head and attempting a task for which he did not have the capability or skill, Prof. Sarabhai would reassign activity in such a way so as to lower pressure and permit better quality work to be performed.

Early next year, Prof. Sarabhai wanted to see me urgently in Delhi. By now I was accustomed to Prof. He was always full of enthusiasm and optimism. In such a state of mind, sudden flashes of inspiration were almost natural. On reaching Delhi, I contacted Prof. Delhi being a slightly unfamiliar place, with an unfriendly climate for someone like me, conditioned to the warm and humid climate of South India, I decided to wait in the hotel lounge after finishing my dinner.

I have always been a religious person in the sense that I maintain a working partnership with God. I was aware that the best work required more ability than I possessed and therefore I needed help that only God could give me. In this partnership, I have always received all the power I needed, and in fact have actually felt it flowing through me.

Today, I can affirm that the kingdom of God is within you in the form of this power, to help achieve your goals and realise your dreams. There are many different types and levels of experience that turn this internal power reaction critical. Sometimes, when we are ready, the gentlest of contacts with Him fills us with insight and wisdom. This could come from an encounter with another person, from a word, a question, a gesture or even a look.

Without the slightest warning, something new breaks into your life and a secret decision is taken, a decision that you may be completely unconscious of, to start with. I looked around the elegant lounge. Somebody had left a book on a nearby sofa. As if to fill the small hours of that cold night with some warm thoughts, I picked up the book and started browsing.

I must have turned only a few pages of the book, about which I do not remember a thing today. It was some popular book related to business management. I was not really reading it, only skimming over paragraphs and turning pages. Suddenly, my eyes fell on a passage in the book, it was a quotation from George Bernard Shaw. The gist of the quote was that all reasonable men adapt themselves to the world.

Only a few unreasonable ones persist in trying to adapt the world to themselves. All progress in the world depends on these unreasonable men and their innovative and often nonconformist actions. I started reading the book from the Bernard Shaw passage onwards. The author was describing certain myths woven around the concept and the process of innovation in industry and business.

I read about the myth of strategic planning. The author was of the opinion that it is essential for a project manager to learn to live with uncertainty and ambiguity. He felt that it was a myth to hold that the key to economic success is computability. A quotation from General George Patton was given as a counterpoint to this myth—that a good plan violently executed right now is far better than a perfect plan executed next week.

It is a myth that to win big one must strive to optimize, the author felt. Optimization wins only on paper, but would invariably lose later in the real world, the book said. Waiting in the hotel lobby at 1 a. But then, Prof. Sarabhai had always exhibited a strong component of unorthodoxy in his character. Suddenly, I became aware of another man who came and sat down on the sofa opposite mine.

He was a well-built person with an intelligent look and refined posture. Unlike me—always disorderly in my dress— this man was wearing elegant clothes. Notwithstanding the odd hours, he was alert and vivacious. There was a strange magnetism about him which derailed the train of my thoughts on innovation. And before I could get autobiography of apj abdul kalam pdf file to the book, I was informed that Prof.

Sarabhai was ready to receive me. I left the book on the nearby sofa from where I had picked it up. I was surprised when the man sitting on the opposite sofa was also asked to come inside. Who was he? It was not long before my question was answered. Even before we sat down, Prof. Sarabhai introduced us to each other. Sarabhai ordered coffee for both of us and unfolded his plan of developing a rocket-assisted take-off system RATO for military aircraft.

This would help our warplanes to take off from short runways in the Himalayas. Hot coffee was served over small talk. It was totally uncharacteristic of Prof. But as soon as we finished the coffee, Prof. Sarabhai rose and asked us to accompany him to Tilpat Range on the outskirts of Delhi. As we were passing through the lobby, I threw a cursory glance at the sofa where I had left the book.

It was not there. Sarabhai asked us. By that evening, the news of India taking up the indigenous development of a device to help short run take-offs by high performance military aircraft, with myself heading the project, was made public. RATO motors were mounted on aircraft to provide the additional thrust required during the take-off run under certain adverse operating conditions like partially bombed-out runways, high altitude airfields, more than the prescribed load, or very high ambient temperatures.

The Russian RATO motor shown to us at the Tilpat Range was capable of generating a kg thrust with a total impulse of kgseconds. It weighed kg and had a double base propellant encased in steel. After a detailed analysis of the available options, I chose a fibreglass motor casing. We decided in favour of a composite propellant which gives a higher specific impulse and aimed at a longer burning time to utilize it completely.

I also decided to take additional safety measures by incorporating a diaphragm which would rupture if the chamber pressure for some reason exceeded twice the operating pressure. Two significant developments occurred during the work on RATO. The first was the release of a ten-year profile for space research in the country, prepared by Prof.

This profile was not merely an activity plan laid down by the top man for his team to comply with, it was a theme paper meant for open discussions, to be later transformed into a programme. In fact, I found it was the romantic manifesto of a person deeply in love with the space research programme in his country. The plan mainly centred around the early ideas which had been born at INCOSPAR; it included utilization of satellites for television and developmental education, meteorological observations and remote sensing for management of natural resources.

To this had been added the development and launch of satellite launch vehicles. The plan talked about the realisation of a SLV for injecting lightweight satellites into a low earth orbit, upgrading of Indian satellites from laboratory models to space entities and development of a wide range of spacecraft subsystems like the apogee and booster motors, momentum wheel, and solar panel deployment mechanism.

It also promised a wide range of technological spin-offs like the gyros, various types of transducers, telemetry, adhesives, and polymers for non-space applications. The second development was the formation of a Missile Panel in the Ministry of Defence. Both Narayanan and I were inducted as members. The idea of making missiles in our own country was exciting, and we spent hours on end studying the missiles of various advanced countries.

The distinction between a tactical missile and a strategic missile is often a fine one. However, in warfare, this term is used to denote the kind of target rather than its distance from missile launch. Tactical weapons are those that influence a battle, and the battle may be by land, sea or air, or on all three together. In those days, however, strategic missiles were synonymous with intermediate range ballistic missiles IRBMs with ranges in the order of nautical miles or km and inter-continental ballistic missiles ICBMs with a capability of going even further.

Gp Capt Narayanan had an ineffable enthusiasm for indigenous guided missiles. He was a great admirer of the strong arm approach of the Russian Missile Development Programme. Gp Capt Narayanan passionately advocated the development of these missiles in the country. While working together on RATO motors and on the Missile Panel, Narayanan and I played the roles of student and teacher interchangeably wherever required.

He was very eager to learn about rocketry and I was very curious to know about airborne weapon systems. Right from the day of our pre-dawn visit to the Tilpat Range with Prof. He had arranged everything that was required before being asked. He obtained funding of Rs 75 lakhs with a further commitment towards any unforeseen costs. At times, I often laughed at his impatience, and read for him these lines from T.

Virtually nothing indigenous was available. Together, we made a long shopping list and drew up an import plan. But this made me unhappy—was there no remedy or alternative? Was this nation doomed to live with screwdriver technology? Could a poor country like India afford this kind of development? Babu had joined us a few months ago and the only thing I knew about him was that he had a very positive attitude and was articulate.

I called him into my office and did a bit of loud thinking. The next evening, Babu came to me before the appointed time. His face was beaming with promise. The RATO system can be made without imports. The only hurdle is the inherent inelasticity in the approach of the organization towards procurement and subcontracting, which would be the two major thrust areas to avoid imports.

These demands were unheard of in government establishments, which tend to be conservative, yet I could see the soundness of his proposition. The RATO project was a new game and there was nothing wrong if it was to be played with a new set of rules. Hearing my plea for administrative liberalization and seeing the merits behind it, Prof.

Sarabhai approved the proposals without a second thought. Through his suggestions, Babu had highlighted the importance of business acumen in developmental work with high stakes. To make things move faster within existing work parameters, you have to pump in more people, more material and more money. We had also gone in for a high energy composite propellant and an event-based ignition and jettisoning system in real-time.

A canted nozzle was designed to deflect the jet away from the aircraft.

Autobiography of apj abdul kalam pdf file: AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF APJ ABDUL KALAM

We conducted the first static test of RATO in the twelfth month of the project initiation. Within the next four months, we conducted 64 static tests. And we were just about 20 engineers working on the project! Sarabhai gave me the additional responsibility of designing the fourth stage of the SLV. Recognising the immense socio- economic benefits of space technology, Prof.

Sarabhai decided into go full-steam ahead with the task of establishing indigenous capability in building and launching our own satellites. He personally participated in an aerial survey of the east coast for a possible site for launching satellite launch vehicles and large rockets. The crescent-shaped island has a maximum width of 8 km and lies alongside the coastline.

The island is as big as Madras city. The Buckingham Canal and the Pulicat lake form its western boundary. Inwe had formed the Indian Rocket Society. By this time, Prof. Sarabhai had already hand-picked a team to give form to his dream of an Indian SLV. I consider myself fortunate to have e press What made Prof. Sarabhai pick a few of us for this great mission?

One reason seemed to be our professional background. Dr Gowarikar was doing outstanding work in the field of composite propellants. MR Kurup had established an excellent laboratory for propellants, propulsion and pyrotechnics. Muthunayagam had proved himself in the field of high energy propellants. The fourth stage was to be a composite structure and called for a large number of innovations in fabrication technology; perhaps that was why I was brought in.

I laid the foundation for Stage IV on two rocks—sensible approximation and unawed support. I have always considered the price of perfection prohibitive and allowed mistakes as a part of the learning process. I prefer a dash of daring and persistence to perfection. I have always supported learning on the part of my team members by paying vigilant attention to each of their attempts, be they successful or unsuccessful.

In my group, progress was recognized and reinforced at every tiny step. Although I provided access to all the information that my co-workers in Stage IV needed, I found I could not spend enough time to be a useful facilitator and a source of support. I wondered if there was something wrong with the way in which I managed my time. At this stage, Prof.

Sarabhai brought a French visitor to our work centre to point out the problem to me. This gentleman was Prof. They were then developing the Diamont launch vehicles. Curien was a thorough professional. Sarabhai and Prof. Curien helped me set a target. While they discussed the means by which I could reach it, they also cautioned me about the possibilities of failure.

While I arrived at a better awareness of Stage IV problems through the supportive counselling of Prof. Curien, Prof. Curien to reinterpret his own progress in the Diamont programme. Curien advised Prof. Sarabhai to relieve me of all the minor jobs which posed little challenge and to give me more opportunities for achievement. I recall how this brought a subtle smile to Prof.

They told us that they did not need our Stage IV anymore. As a matter of fact, the Diamont and SLV airframes were incompatible. The diameters were quite different and to attain interchangeability, some radical innovations were required. I wondered where I should start. I decided to look around for solutions among my own colleagues. I used to carefully observe my colleagues to see if their daily routine reflected their desire to constantly experiment.

I also started asking and listening to anyone who showed the slightest promise. Some of my friends cautioned me about what they termed as my naivete. I made it an unfailing routine to make notes on individual suggestions and gave handwritten notes to colleagues in engineering and design, requesting concrete follow-up action within five or ten days.

I had invested great hope and effort in the fourth stage, so that it could be flown with a Diamont rocket. The other three stages of SLV, involving enormous work in the area of rocket propulsion were at least five years away.

Autobiography of apj abdul kalam pdf file: This book is written for the

After all, I had thoroughly enjoyed working on this project. This method worked wonderfully well. Our plus point, he noted, was that each of us worked with those below and above in the hierarchy. I made it a point to have the team meet at least once every week. Though it took up time and energy, I considered it essential. How good is a leader?

No better than his people and their commitment and participation in the project as full partners! The fact that I got them all together to share whatever little development had been achieved— results, experiences, small successes, and the like—seemed to me worth putting all my energy and time into. It was a very small price to pay for that commitment and sense of teamwork, which could in fact be called trust.

Within my own small group of people I found leaders, and learned that leaders exist at every level. This was another important aspect of management that I learned. It was reconfigured and upgraded from a kg, mm diameter stage to a kg, mm diameter stage. Competence for all major systems of a launch vehicle had been established in Thumba by now. Sarabhai was an exemplar in the art of team-building.

On one occasion, he had to identify a person who could be given the responsibility for developing a telecommand system for the SLV. Two men were competent to carry out this task—one was the seasoned and sophisticated UR Rao and the other was a relatively unknown experimenter, G Madhavan Nair. During one of Prof. Sarabhai did not take much time to back the young experimenter in preference to an established expert.

Madhavan Nair not only lived up to the expectations of his leader but even went beyond them. SLVs and missiles can be called first cousins: they are different in concept and purpose, but come from the same bloodline of rocketry. InProf. Sarabhai came to Thumba on one of his routine visits. He was shown the operation of the nose-cone jettisoning mechanism.

As always, we were all anxious to share the results of our work with Prof. We requested Prof. Sarabhai to formally activate the pyro system through a timer circuit. Sarabhai smiled, and pressed the button. To our horror, nothing happened. We were dumbstruck. I looked at Pramod Kale, who had designed and integrated the timer circuit. In a flash each of us mentally went through an anlysis of the failure.

Autobiography of apj abdul kalam pdf file: Wings of Fire is an

Sarabhai to wait for a few minutes, then we detached the timer device, giving direct connection to the pyros. Sarabhai pressed the button again. The pyros were fired and the nose cone was jettisoned. Sarabhai congratulated Kale and me; but his expression suggested that his thoughts were elsewhere. We could not guess what was on his mind. The suspense did not last for long and I got a call from Prof.

Sarabhai was staying at the Kovalam Palace Hotel, his usual home whenever he was in Trivandrum. I was slightly perplexed by the summons. Sarabhai greeted me with his customary warmth. He talked of the rocket launching station, envisaging facilities like launch pads, block houses, radar, telemetry and so on—things which are taken for granted in Indian space research today.

Then he brought up the incident that had occurred that morning. He is the son of a boat owner in Rameswaram. A P J Abdul Kalam has received the coveted civilian awards Padma Bhushan in the year and Padma Vibhushan inand the highest civilian honour Bharat Ratna inHe is also the recipient of several other awards and an associate of many professional institutions.

In starting he introduces us to her family and tries to familiarize us with his birthplace Rameswaram. He was also influenced by his close friend Ahmed Jalaluddinthey talk about spirituality sometimes which shows that he believed in spirituality and also in God or Khuda. He always went to the temple of Lord Shiva with his friends. This is the story of Kalam's rise from obscurity and his personal and professional struggles, as well as the story of Agni, Prithvi, Akash, Trishul and Nag-missiles that have become household names in India and that have raised the nation to the level of a missile power of international reckoning.

This is also the saga of independent India's struggle for technological self-sufficiency and defensive autonomy-a story as much about politics, domestic and international, as it is about science. The 'created' metadata field on the Open Library, indicating when the first version of this record was created. LCC: Q Global file ID in Libgen.

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