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Journalism of Courage
NEW DELHI, FEBRUARY 20: When twelve-year-old Tathagat Avtar Tulsi received a letter on Thursday from Sulabh International social service orgnisation appointing him as honorary principal scientific advisor, it did not come as a surprise to him.
This is but one of the amazing achievements of this child prodigy from Bihar who last December obtained a first class post graduate degree in physics from Patna University, perhaps the youngest in the world to do so. He appeared at the examination in August last year at the age of 11 years ten months.
After battling out his claim to bypass age restrictions and procedural wrangles successfully in Delhi High Court, Tathagat became the youngest matriculate by passing the CBSE examination in 1997 at the age of nine years and six months, an achievement that earned mention in the Guinness Book of World Records, and a year later secured the bachelors degree with honours from Patna University.
His job offer came following his proposal to work on conversion of human sewage into mineral oil. “The basis of this assumption is that the components of human excreta and mineral oil are not much different,” he says. “The main component of mineral oil is hydrocarbons which also can be obtained from human excreta by reacting it with certain enzymes or bacteria to join the isolated hydrogen and carbon available,” he explains.
Tathagat’s ambition, however, is to get into the realm of nuclear physics and is waiting for Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) to clear his application for Ph.D. in the subject. The quest for a Nobel prize could begin only after that.
