Prof. S. G. Dani (DAE Centre for Excellence in Basic Sciences - University of Mumbai)

I grew up in a medium-sized town, and was interested in mathematics even as a child, and especially enjoyed doing "riders" in Euclidean geometry. I earned a scholarship of the National Science Talent Search (the first batch, when "National" was not a part of the name), and with that, I could persuade my father to let me pursue academics. Initially I was excited by the idea of becoming a physicist, and did B.Sc. from the University of Bombay with Physics major, but was persuaded at that stage by some peers that the more interesting problems in physics are really mathematical, and it would be prudent to get trained in mathematics first, especially in the context of the reputation of the mathematics department of the University. Since then I have assiduously pursued mathematics, through thick and thin, and though it has been a bumpy ride, the journey has been thoroughly enjoyable.

Prof. Chandan Singh Dalawat (HRI Allahabad)

I was born in a small village in the foothills of the Aravallis and I've been interested in mathematics since my school days. Not knowing that it was possible to pursue a career in mathematics, I joined an engineering college. There, I happened to learn about the mathematics research centres in India and decided to join one of them. From there I went to Orsay to complete my doctorate. I have been working in Allahabad for more than fifteen years now, mostly on the arithmetic of local fields. I have a keen interest in teaching and in cultivating mathematics in India.

Prof. Neela Natraj (IIT Bombay)

Neela Nataraj works in the broad research area of Numerical Analysis and is currently Professor and the Head of the Department of Mathematics, IIT Bombay. She completed her Ph.D. from IIT Delhi in 1998 and has been a faculty member in both IITD and IITB. She is also an Executive Committee Member of the Indian Women in Mathematics and is involved in organizing activities related to training and outreach for women mathematicians in India. In addition, she is a member of core committee member from India of the BRICS Mathematics Conference. Prof. Nataraj has been actively working to promote research in the areas of Applied Mathematics and Scientific Computing in India by way of actively organizing CIMPA workshops in India and is a part of the project - National Programme on Partial differential Equations: Theory, Computation and Applications during 2012-2017. Prof. Nataraj has supervised 8 Ph.D. students out of which four students are girls.

Prof. Kaushal Verma (IISc Bangalore)

Kaushal Kumar Verma specialises in complex analysis. He received his Ph.D. from Indiana University Bloomington. He was awarded the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize in 2014. Dr. Verma has made fundamental contributions to the problem of characterizing bounded domains in C² with noncompact automorphism groups shedding new light on several issues related to a long standing conjecture of Greene and Krantz.

Prof. Shreemayee Bora (IIT Guwahati)

I did my MSc in Mathematics from Gauhati University in December, 1996 and PhD from IIT Guwahati in May, 2002. I was also a Postdoctoral fellow in TU Berlin during 2003-2004 where I worked with Prof. Volker Mehrmann and his colleagues. I joined IIT Guwahati in December 2005, where I am currently a full professor. Over the years I have had the good fortune of being able to collaborate with many talented mathematicians in my area of research. I love my work and constantly derive inspiration from my peers as well as my bright young students.

I was attracted to mathematics at an early age due to the twin influences and encouragement of my late father who was an engineer and my late maternal uncle who was an accomplished Mathematician. I soon realised that here was a subject where I need not memorise anything provided I got the logic and intuition right. So I became naturally inclined towards it. I discovered that I could do well in it with relatively less effort in comparison to other subjects and this made me take up a career in mathematics.

Prof. Geetha Venkataraman (Ambedkar University Delhi)

Mathematics was my favourite subject at School, though I fell in love with mathematics during the second year of my BA (Hons) in Mathematics at St. Stephen’s College, University of Delhi, when I first encountered abstract algebra and real analysis. It has remained a passion and a career choice through my Masters and Doctoral studies at University of Oxford and my first job in the Department of Mathematics at St. Stephen’s College. I am currently Professor of Mathematics and Dean Assessment, Evaluation and Student Progression at Ambedkar University Delhi. My area of research is in finite group theory. I am also interested in mathematics education at the higher levels and in issues related to women in mathematics. In the last few years I have developed a keen interest in Bird Watching and Bird Photography.

Some of my photographs can be seen at

http://orientalbirdimages.org/photographers.php?action=birder&Birder_ID=1291

For more on my research interests and publications see

https://aud-in.academia.edu/GeethaVenkataraman

https://aud-in.academia.edu/GeethaVenkataraman/CurriculumVitae

Prof. Dheeraj Kulkarni (IISER Bhopal)

I stumbled upon the fun and joy involved in mathematics while studying physics during college days. This fun grew into a passion soon. I received Ph.D. from IISc, Bangalore. My thesis was concerned with topics in Symplectic and Contact Topology which is an emerging area of research in recent times. Mathematical works of Milnor, Thurston, Arnold and Gromov give me inspiration to ask a few mathematical questions and pursue them a bit further.