Mankombu Sambasivan Swaminathan was an agricultural scientist, plant geneticist, and humanitarian whose work and leadership during India’s “green revolution” helped fight famine.
- Died: September 28, 2023 (Who else died on September 28?)
- Details of death: Died in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India at the age of 98.
- We invite you to share condolences for M. S. Swaminathan in our Guest Book.
M. S. Swaminathan’s legacy
Swaminathan’s father was a general surgeon, and he grew up surrounded by and interacting with farmers, shaping his perspective on the intersection between good health and food production from an early age. Witnessing the effects of the 1934 Bengal famine was instrumental in convincing him to study agriculture instead of medicine. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Maharaja’s College in Trivandrum, Kerala, then went to the University of Madras, where he studied agricultural science. Finally, at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) in New Delhi, he studied genetics and plant breeding, and earned a post-graduate degree in cytogenetics.
Throughout the 1950s, Swaminathan continued his studies at universities across the world, including in the Netherlands and the United States. In the mid-1950s, he collaborated with Nobel Prize-winning agronomist Norman Borlaug to create high-yield, good quality, and disease-free crops to help feed India’s population, especially strains of wheat and rice. The modifications he pursued were integral to India’s so-called “green revolution” by helping farmers to produce more on their land and combat famine.
In 1972, Swaminathan was named director-general of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and a secretary to the Government of India, then in 1979, began working with the Planning Commission. By the 1980s, he was doing similar work internationally, bringing his breakthroughs to the Philippines, United States, and elsewhere. In his later years, Swaminathan focused on humanitarian work, co-chairing the United Nations Millennium Project addressing hunger, among many other positions.
Over the course of his career, Swaminathan received 84 honorary doctorates, was a fellow in more than 30 science academies, and earned an array of awards, including the Albert Einstein World Science Award, the first World Food Prize, a Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, and the Four Freedoms Award.
Notable quote
“The cost, risk and return structure of farming determines farmers interest in farming. Today these are unfavourable.”—from a 2015 interview with NDTV
Tributes to M. S. Swaminathan
Full obituary: The New York Times
