Meghnad Saha Biography 
Meghnad Saha was an Indian astrophysicist who was known for his Saha equation with which he described the chemical and physical conditions of stars. He was born on 6th October 1893 in a small village called Seoratali about 40 km from Dhaka which is now in Bangladesh. His parents are Jagannath Saha and Bhubaneswari Debi. He belonged to a poor family and due to poverty he was allowed to pursue his higher education unwillingly by his father.
He is the youngest of the five sons in the family and he was offered free boarding and lodging when at school. He joined Dhaka Collegiate School in 1905 and studied with the help of stipend. Then he joined Kishorilal Jubilee School and in 1909 he pssed the Collegiate entrance examination. He got highest marks in Mathematics, English, Sanskrit and Bengali and entered Intermediate Dhaka College. There he spent two years and after finishing his B. Sc did his M. Sc.
He was involved with Anushilan Samiti and took part in freedom struggle. After the First World War, he confirmed the Einstein’s theory of general relativity and announced his discovery of deflexion of starlight. He got D. Sc degree in 1918. He married Radharani. He was interested in the selective radiation pressure.
He laid foundation for Theory of Thermal Ionization. Using his equation one can determine the state of ionization of the elements that make up the star. He spent one year in the Nernst’s lab and attended the University of Colloquium every week. He went to Switzerland from Germany and then back again to England. There he met Eddington at Cambridge. He started to work with Henry Norris Russell of Princeton University. He prepared Hertzsprung-Russell diagram. He found out that most stars are clustered in a band.
He returned back to India in November 1921 and joined the Calcutta University as professor of physics. He became the fellow of the Royal Society of London. He started to suffer from health problems due to high blood pressure. He died on 16th February 1956.
Published: N/A
Updated: October 12, 2017
