Auteur: M. S. Swaminathan

MONKOMBU SAMBASIVAN SWAMINATHAN (b. 1925) is a distinguished scientist of international repute whose work in the field of basic and plant genetics over a period of 30 years has justly earned him numerous national and international awards and honours. A Fellow of the National Science Academy and of the Royal Society of London, he has also been a recipient of the Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan awards from the President of India. In 1977 he was elected Foreign Associate of the National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A.. and in 1978 he became a Foreign Member of the Ail-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences of the U.S.S.R. He received the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership in 1971 More recently, he was elected independent Chairman of the FAO Council. In the course of a varied and distinguished career he has been Director General, Indian Council of Agricultural Research and Secretary to the Government of India, Ministry of Agriculture. In April 1980 he became Member, Planning Commission of India, a position he occupied until April 1982 when he was appointed Director General of the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines.