Even at the age of 98, Dr MS Swaminathan's passing away is surely an untimely loss.
He was forever working, and forever accessible to all who wanted to, and needed to, consult him.
And there was both need and want to dig into his brains. His achievements were stupendous, and yet unending, like a perennial flow of wisdom.
A Padmashri in 1967, a Padmabhushan in 1972, a Padmavibhushan in 1989, his admirers were waiting for him to get the Bharat Ratna too and also cross 100 years in age. Alas, he went away before either could happen.
An ever-working scientist without the preachy noise of an activist, yet he was awarded the Magsaysay Award in 1971.
And he won the World Food Prize in 1987, as a testimony to his exemplary achievements in ensuring food security worldwide. As a plant geneticist, he played a stellar role developing high-yielding varieties of both wheat and rice. Verily, he was 'THE' father of India's Green Revolution.
Not merely as the top Indian scientific administrator, heading the gargantuan Indian Council of Agricultural Research from 1972 to 1980, he thereafter was elevated worldwide as DG from 1982 till 1988 of the International Rice Research.
I attended his last book release function in 2016, where the Prime Minister testified how Dr Swaminathan coped with humility the mountains of honours he was ladled with all through his decades of enormous work.
In between, he literally and undoubtedly, and very deservedly, decorated the Rajya Sabha as one of the 12 nominated MPs from 2007 till 2013.
But what literally took the cake and put the icing on it was his chairmanship of the National Farmers Commission. In a path-breaking and voluminous report (10 volumes in all), he gave the pioneering recommendation in 2005 that MSP should not be less than actual farming costs plus 50%. Since then, this has been the war cry of farming activists, and governments too are increasing MSP year after year.
If the Green Revolution increased our annual food grains' output from 50 million tonnes to more than 300 million tonnes, Dr Swaminathan's National Farmers Commission Report finally made it respectable for all stakeholders to seriously take stock of farmers' incomes.
As someone who worked for 35 years in the IAS, holding top positions in ministries of Food, Agriculture, and Rural Development, I have to put on record that I never came across a more knowledgeable, and more successful leader of the rural situation. As for his modesty and accessibility, Dr Swaminathan was a lesson to emulate.
His going away is indeed an untimely loss, for we needed more of his guidance. May he rest in peace, and continue to lead us from the heavens!
(The author is former Agriculture Secretary and CMD of Food Corporation of India)
