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ALBERT EINSTEIN’S INTERACTION WITH INDIAN PHYSICISTS -THEORY OF RELATIVITY AND INDIA’S REACTION

RAJINDER SINGH*RAJINDER SINGH*RAJINDER SINGH*RAJINDER SINGH*RAJINDER SINGH*

About hundred years ago, British astrophysicists confirmed Albert Einstein’s hypothesis that sun’sgravitational field deflects light. Indian English daily “The Statesman” in its Nov. 12, 1919 editionreported the results. Publication of the news is often mentioned in M.N. Saha’s biographies, whowith S.N. Bose, in those days was translating A. Einstein’s and Hermann Minkowski’s papers inEnglish, which were later published in the form of a book titled “The principle of relativity”.Einstein’s correspondence with Indian men of science are available. Results of its analysis will beexplored in a forthcoming book. In the present communication, the exchange of ideas betweenIndian scientists and Einstein on the theory of relativity, and reception of the theory by Indianscientific community are explored. Also, it is argued that in the beginning of the 20th centuryIndian men of science were well equipped, and did not work in isolation.

ARTICLE

* Research Group: Physics Education and History of Physics,Physics Institute, University of Oldenburg, Germany. E-mail:rajinder.singh@uni-oldenburg.de

Introduction

As far as the research related to the theory ofrelativity is concerned, India is a global player,as is evident from different articles.1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8 One

of the well-known works in the post independent India isthe equation given by Indian physicist Amal KumarRaychaudhuri9; which describes the motion of nearby bitsof matter. “The Raychaudhuri equation is central to theunderstanding of gravitational attraction in astrophysics andcosmology, and in particular underlies the famoussingularity theorems of general relativity theory.”10

There are a number of biographies and articles, whichdeal with various aspects of Albert Einstein’slife.11,12,13,14,15,16 However, to the best of my knowledge,his interaction with Indian men of science remainsunexplored. This will be done in future. The present articledeals with the following:

The working condition of Indian scientists in thebeginning of the 20th century.

Amal Kumar Raychaudhuri. Credit: INSA.

Einstein’s communication and connections withsome of the Indian scientists, and

Reception of the theory of relativity by the Indianscientific community.

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In order to understand the background, in thefollowing section a short review of the origin of the theoryof relativity is given.

The Origin of Albert Einstein’s Theory ofRelativity

Most of the physics textbooks give an impression thatEinstein waved the magic stick and theory of relativity wasborn. Study of historical literature shows that it was notthe case. For instance, it is: (i) the British physicist JamesC. Maxwell, for the first time in 1877, used “the doctrineof relativity of all physical phenomena’ in the sense inwhich we understand” today.17(ii) The Frenchmathematician J.H. Poincare in 1898 proposed that “Thereis no absolute time”, and two years later, in an article heused the words; “The principle of relative motion (emphasisin original), to signify that it is possible to ascertain onlythe relative motions of bodies.”18

In 1905, without referring to any article, Einsteinwrote the ‘Special Theory of Relativity’, which dealt withelectrodynamic phenomenon based on the followinghypotheses. (a) Principle of constancy of light in a movingas well as stationary medium. (b) Principle of invarianceof physical laws. With the hypotheses he questioned theabsoluteness of space, time and mass. That is, they varydepending on, whether the observer is at rest or in motion.19

Also, he established the equivalence of mass and energy;and change of mass with velocity.20,21

Albert Einstein. Credit: “Wiki-Public domain.”

In his paper on ‘Special Theory of Relativity’, Einsteindid not refer to the previous research work. In 1914, L.Silberstein, in the “Preface” of his book “The theory ofrelativity” stated that “Einstein’s theory of relativity wasdirectly derived” from Lorentz work.22 About two monthsbefore his death, Einstein confessed that before he wrotehis own paper in 1905, he had read two papers of theDutch physicist Hendrik Lorentz from the year 1892 and1895; but they had no influence on his work.23

It is well known that after finishing his education atthe university, Einstein did not get an appointment at auniversity. Due to his friend Michele Besso, an Engineer,he got a position at a patent office in Bern, where heworked from 1902 to 1909. During this period he continuedhis research career. In 1914, before he came to Berlin, hehad taught at different universities such as Zürich andPrague. Einstein’s diary shows that he worked hard to givefinal form to the theory of relativity. More importantly, hisfriends Marcel Grossmann (Mathematician) and MicheleBesso helped him. For instance, “In collaboration with hislifelong friend Michele Besso, Einstein studied theperihelion motion of Mercury on the basis of the “Entwurf”[Draft] theory.”24

Special theory of relativity, applied to the phenomenonof gravitation led to the introduction of the General Theoryof Relativity in 1916.25 The three cardinal points ofEinstein’s theory were: (a) the determination of theperihelion precession of Mercury’s orbit by the conceptthat the gravitation was mediated by the curvature of spaceand time. (b) Prediction of the deflection of stars’ light bythe Sun and (c) the gravitational redshift of light in heavenlybodies like stars.26,27

Even before Einstein, J. Soldner in 1804 in his paper“On the deflection of a light ray from its rectilinear motion,by the attraction of a celestial body at which it nearlypasses” had discussed the concept of deflection of light bycelestial bodies.28 Einstein showed that the deflection valuegiven by Soldner was only half than as it should be.29 InMay 1919, the British astronomers, F.W. Dyson, A.S.Eddington, C. Davidson and their colleagues performedexperiments; and published their results in 1920. Theyshowed the correctness of Einstein’s prediction. However,they suggested the repetition of experiments in future.30

As far as the discovery of the theory of relativity isconcerned, historical researches show that Poincare gavecredit to H.A. Lorentz and Lorentz to A. Einstein.31 Now,the question to be asked is: What was Einstein’scontribution in the creation of the theory of relativity?According to the physicist, Wolfgang Pauli: “The formal

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gaps left by Lorentz’s work were filled by Poincare. Hestated the relativity principle to be generally and rigorouslyvalid. It was Einstein, finally, who in a way completed thebasic formulation of this discipline.’”32

Einstein’s geniality lies in the fact that he combinedthe previous experimental and theoretical knowledge fromvarious fields to give “The fundamentals of the generaltheory of relativity.”33

Indian Physicists and the Early Phase of theTheory of Relativity

Research Facilities - Availability of literature onrelativity : The report of the Indian Association for theCultivation of Sciences (IACS) from the year 1915 (whichwas published in 1917, thus contained information fromthe year 1916) shows that the Association, which was stillnot a center of science (as after 1920s), was gettingscientific journals from Sweden, Denmark, Holland, Japan,U.S.A. and Hungary.34 There was no German Journal atthe Association in the said year. G. Prasad, a professor ofmathematics at the University of Calcutta, in his lecture atthe IACS referred to Einstein’s article from the year 1916.This leaves no doubt that the University subscribed Germanjournals.

In 1917, C.V. Raman reported the working at thePhysics Department, University College of Science. In thereport we find that S.N. Basu taught“Elasticity and Molecular Physics, &Theory of Relativity”; whereas M.N. Saha“Thermodynamics and Quantum Theory”.Bose himself later recalled that AsutoshMookherjee asked him to teach theory ofrelativity. “There were some books inEnglish on relativity – we got hold ofthem.”35

In 1920, the library of theAssociation was getting importantinternational journals, especially Germanjournals like “Physikalische Zeitschrift”.36

According to the Annual Report – IACSof 1921, library bought several importantbooks and 18 periodicals for the library.The list contains important internationaljournals from the U.S.A., U.K., Germanyand France. A few of them to bementioned are: “American J. Sci.”,“Physical Review”, “Nature”, “Phil.Mag.” “Astrophysical J.“, “Proceedingsand Transactions of the Royal Society

London“, “Physikalische Berichte“, “Zeitschrift für Physik“,“Physikalische Zeitschrift“ and “Annalen der Physique”.

The library of the IACS possesses the acquisitionrecord of different books, journals and proceedings.Unfortunately, date of buying the literature is missing(Figure 1). It can be assumed that the books procured arefrom the 19th century or beginning of the 20th century.Figure 1 shows that the IACS possessed almost all newlypublished books on the theory of relativity. Some of themto be mentioned are:

1. Einstein A., Die Grundlagen der allgemeinenRelativitätstheorie (The fundamentals of generaltheory of relativity), Verlag Johann AmbrosiusBarth, Leipzig 1916.

2. Silberstein L. The theory of relativity, Macmillanand Co. Ltd. London 1914.

3. Cunningham E., Relativity and the electron theory,Longmans, Green and Co., London 1915.

4. Max von Laue, Vol. 1. Das Relativitätsprinzip derLorentztransformation (The relativity principle ofLorentz transformation. Vol. 2. Die allgemeineRelativitätstheorie und Einsteins Lehre von derSchwerkraft (The general theory of relativity andEinstein’s doctrine of gravity), Druck und Verlagvon Friedr. Vieweg & Sohn, Braunschweig 1921

Figure 1: A page of library register showing books on the theory of relativity. Credit: IACS.

74 SCIENCE AND CULTURE, MARCH-APRIL, 2019

5. Weyl H., Space-time-matter, (translated fromGerman by Henry L. Brose), Methuen & Co. Ltd.,London 1922 (first edition published in 1918).

Saha in his article: “Time and space - The newscientific theory”, which was published in “The Statesman”in 1919 (Figure 2), gave a summary of work done by H.Lorentz, H. Minkowski, H. Weyl, W. de Sitter and A.Eddington.37 This suggests that Saha had enough literatureon theory of relativity. Without it he would not have knownthe scientific work of other physicists.

Figure 2: Headlines of Saha’s article in “The Statesman”. Longer versionof the article is to be found in reference (R. Kochhar and J. Narlikar,1985, p. 23)

Not only the study of journals, but also the questionpapers of the University of Calcutta show, how importantwas the teaching of the theory of relativity. For instance,(i) Within two years of the verification of Einstein’s theory,the University of Calcutta in a question paper asked itsstudents “Explain the fundamental principles of thegeneralised (gravitational) theory of relativity and give ashort account of the evidence in favour of this theory.”38

(ii) In 1922 we find: “Enunciate Einstein’s Principle ofequivalence and explain clearly why it has been called thefundamental hypothesis in generalised theory ofrelativity.”39 (iii) In 1930 there was a complete paper with9 questions (5 to be attempted by students) on Relativity.The paper setters were P.C. Mahalanobis and S.N. Bose.40

Astrophysical researches in India and workingcondition : The construction of solar observatories isknown in India, even before the advent of the British-IndiaEmpire., as shown by different authors.41,42 Due to variousreasons (such as its southern, dust free, high altitudelocation), the British men of science started constructionof “modern” observatories at Kodaikanal. As far as theworking conditions were concerned:

“The arrival of John Evershed in 1907 (…) heraldedthe observatory’s golden age. Choosing to come toIndia, no doubt to work in solitary splendor,Evershed made Kodaikanal into a world-class, state-of-the-art observatory. He put the newly acquiredspectroheliography into working order, made aprismatic camera using the prisms he had broughtwith him, and assembled a number of spectrographs.In 1911 he finally constructed an auxiliaryspectroheliography and bolted it to the existinginstrument so that now the sun could bephotographed not only in the light of calcium Kspectral lines but also in hydrogen alpha.”43

However, the foundation of the Astronomical Societyof India is related to observation of the famous Halley’sComet, which was observed in India during April - May1910. In the Journal of Astronomical Society of India(founded in 1910), in its first volume we see under “Extractfrom Publications” that Indian men of science was informedabout A. Eddington while explaining De Sitter’smathematically loaded paper before the Royal AstronomicalSociety, explained the Principle of Relativity as applied toAstronomy.44 This example definitely shows that themembers of the Society as well as readers of the journalswere aware of the theory of relativity.

In order to be informed about the national andinternational researches in the field, the Society subscribedjournals from: Royal Astronomical Society London,Astronomical Society of Italy, Royal Observatory ofBelgium, Paris Observatory and others. With a donationof Rupees 100 from the Maharaj Rana Bahadur SirBhawani Singh a set of back issues of the “Monthly Noticesof the Royal Astronomical Society” from 1867 werepurchased.45 About a decade later it was reported that:

“The library now contains about three hundredvolumes including several recent publications onAstronomy. … It is council’s intention to enlargethe Library to represent astronomical researches toboth past and present and thus to make it worthy ofconsultation.”46

The “Journal of the Astronomical Society” of Indiastarted appearing shortly after the foundation of the Society.In it a brief summary of the new discoveries outside Indiawere reported. The journal was circulated widely withinIndia and abroad. It was exchanged with ”The RoyalAstronomical Society”, “The British AstronomicalAssociation”, “The Royal Astronomical Society of Canada”,“The Astronomical Society of Barcelona” Leeds,Greenwich, and “The Vatican Observatory, Rome.47 In the

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annual report of the ASI for the year 1919-1920 it wasreported:

“The year opened with cash balance of Rs. 1806-15-6 which came to Rs. 2678-4-8 at its close. Inaddition to this the Society holds GovernmentPromissory Notes and Port Trust Debentures to anominal value of Rs. 1200. This asset over theliabilities of the 30th September 1920 stood at Rs.1062-13-8 against 2919-5-8 in the previous year.”48

Obviously, the ASI had sound financial conditions.However, the research work was not satisfactory, becausemost of the members had their own profession, thus littletime was left for original investigations.49

Theoretical work on the theory of relativity

G. Prasad, M.N. Saha and S.N. Bose : M.N. Saha’sand S.N. Bose’s interactions and communications with A.Einstein are explored elsewhere.50,51 Thus, in the followingthese details are not included.

Ganesh Prasad. Credit: ISNA.

Ganesh Prasad, Rashbehari Ghosh Professor ofApplied Mathematics, Head of the MathematicsDepartment; University of Calcutta; studied in U.K. andGermany.52 In Göttingen his PhD guide was the well-knownGerman mathematician Christian Felix Klein. Prasad alsocame in contact with the mathematician David Hilbert andphysicist and mathematician Arnold Sommerfeld.

Prasad, in 1910, translated the first two parts ofHermann Minkowski’s paper “Raum und Zeit” (Space andtime) from the year 1909, and published in the “Bulletinof the Calcutta Mathematical Society”, 1, 135-141, 1910.53

At the IACS, Ganesh Prasad while delivering lecture“Mathematics and Mathematical Physics in 1916” toldabout the progress of Mathematics in Europe. He stateed

that in spite of war, scientific work was going on. In“Professor Einstein’s memoir entitled, - ‘The formalfoundation of the general relativity-theory.’ – The authorfirst gives the fundamental notions of the general relativity-theory and then develops the foundation of the absolutedifferential calculus.”54 Evidently, before M.N. Saha andS.N. Bose, Prasad began with the theory of relativity atthe University of Calcutta, though his work was not asextensive as Bose’s, who had to teach the subject.

M.N. Saha and S.N. Bose, who were appointed inthe Department of Applied Mathematics (later shifted toDepartment of Physics), authored the book “The principleof relativity”, which was published in 1920, by theUniversity of Calcutta. The book is based on four articlesfrom A. Einstein and H. Minkowski from the years 1916and 1908 respectively. Bose translated Einstein’s articlefrom the year 1916. P.C. Mahalanobis, Presidency CollegeCalcutta, wrote “Foreword”, and some “Notes” in thebook.55 Obviously, Bose and Saha had original articles fromthe years 1908 and 1916. After the end of 1920s none ofthem communicated with Einstein to discuss about thetheory of relativity, nor they extensively worked in thisfield. Not in the sense as N.R. Sen who later came toknown as the founder of the “Calcutta School of Relativity”(detail later). Before exploring these details, in thefollowing paragraphs we shall see some of theircontemporaries. One such example is that of JyotirmayGhosh, who interacted with Einstein to get feedback.

J. Ghosh and Albert Einstein : J. Ghosh was bornon Jan. 1, 1896 in village Ghasiara of the Magurasubdivision of District Jessore (now in Bangladesh). Hetook his B.A. degree from Presidency College, Calcutta in1916. He obtained his M.A. degree of Calcutta Universityin 1918 in Mixed Mathematics. Three years later he was

Jyotirmay Ghosh. Credit: INSA

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appointed as Lecturer in Mathematics at the DhakaUniversity. In 1925, for higher studies he went to theUniversity of Edinburgh and obtained PhD degree in 1927,“On some problems in elasticity and on radially symmetricgravitational field in continuous matter.” He returned toIndia and was appointed a Reader in Mathematics in theUniversity of Dhaka.”56

Jyotirmay Ghosh was one of the few Indian physicistswho communicated with Einstein. J. Ghosh, fromEdinburgh, on Feb. 8, 1927, wrote to A. Einstein: “I sendherewith a short paper which contains certain types ofradially symmetric solutions of the new equations ofgravitation which you have suggested in the“Mathematische Annalen” (Dec., 1926).”57 Ghosh requestedto communicate the note to “Mathematische Annalen” orany other journal, with his comments or alterations, ifnecessary.

In reply, on Feb. 23, 1927, Einstein wrote that hisequation Rik – ¼ qikR= – k1 Tik was not meant that Tikrepresent the electromagnetic Tensor, whose scalar identityvanishes. As in your work you do not say anything on Tik;I cannot imagine, which physical problems can be solvedwith it. I can recommend the paper to the “Annalen” onlyif I get a clear idea on solving of the problem.58

J. Ghosh took nearly six years to solve the problem.The detail was published in “Zeitschrift für Physik”59 andin a short note in “Nature”. For the radically symmetricfield he gave an equation. However, he was unable tointerpret a part of the proposed equation.60 Two years laterhe came out with a complete solution61, about which the“Nature” wrote that on June 2, 1935, it received a shortletter from Prof. Ghosh. “To make it intelligible to a widerrange of readers it seems advisable to incorporate it withsome reference to Einstein’s own work.” The gravitationalequations (Rpq – 1/2 gpqR = – 8Π Epq) originally proposedrepresent a law of conservation of momentum or mass andenergy. Einstein later “gave electromagnetic andcosmological reasons for suggesting that the coefficient ½should be replaced by ¼.” “Nature” wrote that ProfessorGhosh:

“has investigated the solutions of the new equationin four cases, corresponding to empty space, a singleparticle, an electron, and a rather more generalsystem with radial symmetry. The results all containa term belonging to [Willem] de Sitter’s world. Thusthe new field equations automatically involve thecosmological constant, which is usually introducedas a special hypothesis. It is desirable that Prof.Ghosh’s work should be extended to a more general

distribution of masses, but this appears to bedifficult.”62

It seems that Ghosh sent his article to Einstein, whoin a long letter of Aug. 26, 1935, discussed about theinterpretation of his own equation. Einstein told Ghosh thathis (Ghosh’s) Ansatz lacks general validity. He alsoinformed him that with N. Rosen he has written an articledealing with such aspects.63 In it the atomic phenomenawas discussed by the method of general relativity. It isbased on the idea of removing the singularities of thesolutions of the field equations by a simple modification.64

N.R. Sen, who also worked on the theory of relativityin the 1920s-1930s is better known to the scientificcommunity than J. Ghosh, as we shall see below.

N.R. Sen and Kolkata School of Relativity : NikhilRanjan Sen (also written as Nikhilranjan Sen), did D.Sc.from the Calcutta University in the year 1921. In finalexaminations at the Presidency College, N.R. Sen was onthe third place, while S.N. Bose and M.N. Saha were firstand second respectively.

Nikhil Ranjan Sen. Credit: INSA.

Sen went to Europe on study leave; and studied inBerlin, Munich and Paris. In Berlin his PhD guide wasMax von Laue, Friedrich Wilhelms-University Berlin. Sen’sinvestigations in the general theory of relativity andcosmology earned him the Ph.D. degree.65 His thesis waspublished under the title: “Über die Grenzbedingungen desSchwerefeldes an Unstetigkeitsflächen“ (About theboundary conditions of the gravitational field atdiscontinuous surfaces) in “Annalen der Physik”, as isevident in a footnote.66 With Max von Laue, N.R. Sencritically discussed the de Sitter’s world.67,68 Sen alsodiscussed the problem of expanding universe. His article

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“On Fresnel’s convection in general relativity” wascommunicated by A.S. Eddington.69,70 “Sen gave aderivation of Fresnel’s convection coefficient in generalrelativity from Maxwell’s equations in generalized spaceby assuming plane electromagnetic waves in thegravitational fields inside a uniformly moving material.”71

The author U.R. Burman wrote:

“Sen’s investigations on the model of the universehave shown that models not perfectly spherical canalso be in exact equilibrium and form a staticuniverse, but the total mass of such a configurationwould exceed that of a uniform Einstein world. Inthe light of this result the phenomenon of theexpanding universe could easily be understood.” 72

No doubt, G. Prasad, M.N. Saha, S.N. Bose and C.V.Raman began with theory of relativity in Kolkata; but N.R.Sen73 was the person to establish “Kolkata school ofRelativity”.74

Not only in Bengal, but also in other parts of theIndia research work was being done on relativity by otherscientists. One such example is that of V.V. Narlikar, whoestablished this field in Benares.

Vishnuv V. Narlikar and Benares School ofRelativity : V.V. Narlikar the founder of “Benares Schoolof Relativity” studied at the University of Cambridge. Hebegun research work on relativity under A.S. Eddington.List of his publications shows that during his stay inCambridge he wrote 10 articles. Two of them in associationwith the renowned British physicist Joseph Larmor.75 There

V.V. Narlikar. Credit: INSA.

is no evidence that V.V. Narlikar and Ramji Tiwaricommunicated with Einstein. However, Albert EinsteinArchive possesses their article “On Einstein’s GeneralisedTheory of Gravitation” which was sent to Einstein by HansFreistadt, U.S.A., on Nov. 3, 1949.76 In a short note to“Current Science” Narlikar and Tiwari informed the readersthat that they had “outlined a method of successiveapproximations for working out the interaction between agravitational field and an electromagnetic field.” Theyobtained ten gravitational field equations showing how thegravitational potentials … are modified on account of theelectrostatic and electromagnetic potentials.”77

Ratan Lal Brahmachry and Albert Einstein : A14 year old young boy Ratan Lal Brahmachari from theSt. Paul’s College, Calcutta, on Sept. 4, 1945 wrote a letterto Einstein and sent a manuscript of about 18 pages. Hewanted to prove the existence of the aether as a materialsubstance (detail later). He proposed the followingtransmutation:

Matter → radiation → matter → (a)ether → matter

In the letter he mentioned that he came to particularconclusions after a talk with Mr. S.N. Bose “(Youremember his light quantum statistics in Zeitschrift fürPhysik, 1924) at Dacca.”78

It is unknown whether Einstein replied the letter.

Brahmachari studied physics under S.N. Bose. Whileworking at the Indian Institute of Statistics, Calcutta, hewrote on: “A Solution of the combined gravitational andmesic field equations in general relativity”79, and spendsome time in Hamburg, Germany, as his publicationindicates.80 He was better known for his researches inbiochemistry; in particular tiger pheromone studies.

Experimental Work on the Theory ofRelativity

As in the U.S.A. and Europe, in India the study ofrelativity was closely related to the astrophysical researches.For instance, the Kodaikanal Observatory (founded in 1899)was well-equipped otherwise J. Evershed et al. would nothave been able to perform world class observations, anddiscover the Evershed effect, which describes, “the radialflow of gas across the photospheric surface of the penumbraof sunspots from the inner border with the umbra towardsthe outer edge.”81 Like most of the other astrophysicists,J. Evershed and his colleagues did not think of theory ofrelativity to interpret their results. This was done by others(detail later).

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J. Evershed, T. Royds and A.A.N. Ayyar -Observation of the red-shift in India : From historicalpoint of view, the red-shift was observed by L.E. Jewell(1896), G.E. Hale and W.S. Adams (1907), H. Buisson andG. Fabry (1910) in the case of double star Sirius B.82,83 Itseems that these results were unknown to Einstein, who in1911 predicted the gravitational redshift in spectrum oflight. As far as the Indian contribution is concerned, at theKodaikanal Observatory, in 1913, J. Evershed studied theeffect of gravitational field and observed the displacementin solar spectra. He attributed the effect to the motion ofsolar material.84 A year later T. Royds from the sameObservatory, attributed the effect to changes of density. InBerlin, their results were interpreted by Erwin F. Freundlichas red-shift.85 In 1915 A.A. Narayana Ayyar (also writtenas Aiyar) studied “the displacement at the Sun’s limb oflines sensitive to pressure and density”.86,87 The BritishJournal “Nature” reported that A.A. Narayana Aiyar, firstassistant at the Kodaikanal studied the “Spectral linedisplacement at the Sun’s limb” and published results inBulletin No. 44 of the Kodaikanal Observatory. He verifiedEvershed’s and Royds’ results that pressure and density arelower at the limb than at the centre of the disc. Also, hefound out that “certain lines, particularly those of calciumand sodium, are much more sensitive to pressure anddensity than iron lines, and that therefore the limb shiftsof such lines should provide a much more rigorous test asto whether there is a large difference of pressure anddensity between the sun’s limb and centre.”88

In 1922, from the U.S.A., Charles Edward St. John,who belonged to the anti-relativistic group (other importantpersons to be mentioned are: D.C. Miller, H. Shapley …)doubted Einstein’s theory. Later John changed his opinion.This story is explored in detail by the German historian ofscience K. Hentschel in: “The conversion of St. John: Acase study on the interplay of theory and experiment”.Therein we read:

“.. in the general euphoria about St. John’s results,it would be forgotten that it was he [Evershed] whohad, already in 1918, obtained tentativeconfirmations of GRS (Gravitational Red Shift) atthe Kodaikanal Observatory, but at that time no onehad taken him seriously due to his conflict with St.John’s results of 1917.”89

Observation of Solar eclipse in Australia andIndia’s contribution

According to the Report of the Meeting of theAstronomical Society of India of October 26, 1910, M.Smith – Director of the Kodaikanal Observatory, and G.T.

Walker – Director General of the Observatories in Indiawere Vice-Presidents of the Society. For about 15 years,the Society acted as a platform for astrophysicists toexchange ideas and coordinate research. M.N. Sahadelivered lectures, which were based on his research work.C.V. Raman was much more active, as he occupied differentpositions. He came in contact with British astrophysicists,who communicated his papers at the initial stage. Thesedetails are explored elsewhere.90

We have seen that F.W. Dyson, A.S. Eddington, C.Davidson et al. in a paper on “A determination of thedeflection of light by the sun’s gravitational field, fromobservations made at the total eclipse of May 29, 1919”suggested repetition of experiments in future.91 Theopportunity for it came about three years later. In order toobserve solar eclipse, which was going to occur inSeptember 21, 1922, in Wallal, West Australia, Gilbert T.Walker, planned an expedition, which was supported bythe Government of India with a grant of Rs. 4500. J.Evershed wrote that the previous results had a certainambiguity, “and we had at Kodaikanal a 12-inch photo-visual lens which is particularly well adapted for thisproblem giving a large field of good definition and a largescale than the lenses used previously, or that would belikely to be used by other expeditions.”92 The other causefor the justification of the expedition was:

“The results of previous eclipses gave values of theangular rotation in the coronal region largely inexcess of the mean values obtained from sunspotsand from displacements of lines in the reversinglayer, and seemed to indicate a very remarkable lawfor the angular rotation at different levels; but, owingto the low dispersion hitherto used at eclipses, thevalues obtained are not very reliable, hence thedesirability of repeating the measures with morepowerful instruments such as were available atKodaikanal or could be constructed without muchdifficulty.”93

Initially C.V. Raman, University of Calcutta was amember of the Indian team. He promised to assist theexpedition. In the end, due to lack of funds, only threepersons: Walker, Mrs. J. Evershed and Prof. Maclean ofWilson College Bombay were in the team. Shortly beforedeparture, the latter became ill and had to stay at home.Before departure the required instruments like the Einsteincamera were constructed at the Kodaikanal, and a 16-inchcoelostat (which was to be used with Einstein Camera) wasborrowed from the Joint Eclipse Committee of the RoyalAstronomical Society and the Royal Society.

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The team left Madras on July 28, 1922, and arrivedBroome on Aug. 18, 1922; and awaited for 8 days for thearrival of the team from America and Canada. On 28th ofAugust the various parties arrived: From Perth (WilliamWallace Campbell and his wife Elisabeth Campbell –Director of Lick Observatory, California), Dr. and Mrs.Adams of New Zealand – Members of the Canadian andAustralian team. The expedition party consisted of 35persons from Australia, India and Canada.94 “On April 12,1923, Campbell confirmed Einstein’s theory of relativity,with measurements from over 100 stars. His cable to Britishastronomer Frank Dyson ended with the words “We neednot repeat Einstein text next eclipse.”” 95 The contributionof Indian team was not encouraging. They developed thephotographic plates, but did not find proper results. Theexpedition was evaluated as a complete failure.96 As far asJ. Evershed is concerned, his “final view was that theEinstein effect account for most of the red-shift at the limbbut there remained a definite unexplained 25 residualshift.”97

In the above paragraphs we see that Raman did notaccompany the team. The reason seems to be his visit tothe U.K. in 1922 as he mentioned in his article on thetheory of relativity (detail below).

From Heaven to Earth - C.V. Raman’sLaboratory Experiments to Test the Theoryof Relativity

E. Cunningham in “Relativity and theelectron”98 about the introduction of theconcept of aether and relativity, wrote:

“since all astronomical observationsare made by optical means, that theframe of reference in practice mustbe actually the medium relative towhich light is propagated. Thusarose the attempt to determine thevelocity of the earth relative to theaether.”99

In 1810 French scientist D. Aragoperformed experiments to determine thevelocity of the earth relative to aether.100

His countryman A.J. Fresnel hypothesizedthat aether outside a moving body remainsstationary, while inside a body drifts with diminishedvelocity. He gave an equation for the dragging coefficient,with its dependence on the refraction index. H. Fizeauexperimentally detected the dragging effect, but theobserved magnitude was much lower than expected.

In 1920 Raman and Nihal Karan Sethi, Benares HinduUniversity, performed experiments to test the theory ofrelativity. The project was supported with a special grantby the Calcutta University.101 Raman and Sethi foundMichelson-Morley apparatus, which disapproved theexistence of either, too complicated. They adopted similarexperimental setup as H. Fizeau’s (Figure 3). Instead ofwater as medium, they decided for air. From size andobservations point of view they improved the apparatus.

About their motivation Raman and Sethi wrote:

“More recently it has gained additional importanceon account of the fact that this law [Fresnelhypothesis] follows as a matter of course fromEinstein’s remarkable principle of the relativity ofspace and time, and its experimental verification isnow looked upon as one of the proofs of thecorrectness of his theorem of the addition ofvelocities and consequently of the special principleof relativity.“103

The preparation of the construction of apparatus beganin July 1920 and was complete in January 1921. Tomeasure the convection of light in moving gases, 200-foot(60.96 meter) long pipes were taken (Figure 4). To keepthem straight, they were supported by many pillers, eachat a distance of 10 ft. A pressure-blower of a 3-h.p. gasengine was applied; which was supposed to producevelocity of 50 m/s. (In Michelson-Morley it was 25 m/s).104

Figure 3: H. Fizeau’s experiment to measure the relative speeds of light in moving water.102

Figure 4: Set up of Raman’s experiment. AB and CD Pipes: of length 200 feet (60.96 meter)each. Galvanised-iron popes of 1.5 inches internal diameter. A large refracting telescope witha 7 inch object-glass and a focal length of over 7 feet, mounted on a brick piller. L2R –reflecting arrangement. R – Reflecting mirror. L2 – Lens. P – Plane-parallel glass plate. S –Source of light. Credit: Indian Academy of Sciences.

Raman and Sethi wrote that the fringes obtained wereexcellent and steady, “though the light itself ‘boiled’ verybadly, except in the cool mornings.” The engine and blower,which should draw the air through the pipes wereineffective. The attained speed of air/gases was not 50 m/

80 SCIENCE AND CULTURE, MARCH-APRIL, 2019

s as expected, but only 20 m/s. To make observations onlyon two evening weather was favourable. They noted:

“the fringes were seen very steadily, and appearedto show a slight but unmistakeable shift on reversingthe direction of the air-current. On the secondoccasion an attempt was made to estimate themagnitude o[ the shift by setting a cross wire onthe fringes and comparing the shift observed onreversing the air-current with that produced byflexure of the microscope tube by a known smallload. The shift was estimated to be about 1/20thpart of a fringe, which was of the right order ofmagnitude and in the direction indicated bytheory.”105

The expected fringe shift was one tenth of a fringe.The authors admitted that the results are not conclusive.They hoped, in future, to have favourable conditions andto install a more powerful blower with steady electric drive.Raman also mentioned that the experiment had to bediscontinued as he got invitation to visit Europe. Here hemeant his first visit to U.K. to attend a conference of BritishEmpire, where he was sent to represent the University ofCalcutta.

D.C. Miller, President of the American PhysicalSociety, repeated Michaelson-Morley experiments withimproved instruments. His measurements were much moreextensive. He believed to have observed drift.106 He wasconvinced that the previous observations do not supportEinstein’s theory of relativity. After Raman came to knowabout these results, for the year 1926-1927, he asked for agrant of Rs. 10,000 from the University of Calcutta. A partof it was to be utilized, as told by Raman, to prove thecorrectness of Einstein’s theory of relativity (Figure 5).107

Which experiments he performed, remains unknown as inhis or that of his associates’ publications there is noindication of such experiments.

Figure 5: Grant for Raman for to test the theory of relativity. Credit:University of Calcutta.

Independent of the results, Raman’s experiment was“big science” experiment before the construction ofcyclotron in Kolkata. Years later, the author S. Ramaseshanwrote about Raman’s experiment as follows: “Theexperiment would probably be considered ambitious eventoday since efforts on a similar scale are under way all

over the world to combine light from optical telescopesseparated by large distances.”108

Criticism of Einstein’s Ideas by Shah M.Sulaiman

In Germany, criticism of Einstein’s work is ofteninterpreted as anti-Semitic. Authors G.O. Mueller and K.Kneckebrodt analysed publications on relativity from theyears from 1920 to 1944; and came to the conclusion thatthe number of publications, which are motivated by anti-Semitic is less than one percent.109 From historical pointof view, Einstein’s great supporters like Max Planck andMax von Laue belong to those persons who did not believein his ideas immediately. They took time to accept thereality. Not only the German community, but also theSwedish men of science were reluctant to the theory ofrelativity. For instance, in the 1920s, the Swede S.Arrhenius “claimed that the results of the British eclipseexperiment could not be admitted as evidence, as questionsremained on their degree of exactness.”110 None of the fivemembers of the Physics Nobel Prize Committee “approvedof relativity theory or had been convinced that the eclipseexperiment had yielded proof in its favour.”111,112 In”Interpretation and misinterpretation of special and thegeneral theory of relativity by Albert Einstein’scontemporaries”113 different cases are discussed, however,it did not go in detail about the criticism by the Indianjurist Shah M. Sulaiman.

Shah Muhammad Sulaiman. Credit: “Sci. Cult.”.

Shah Muhammad Sulaiman was a jurist andeducationist. He obtained Mathematical and Law Tripos

VOL. 85, NOS. 3–4 81

from Cambridge. He was awarded the Doctor of Lawdegree by the University of Dublin. He was the ChiefJustice of the Allahabad High Court (1932-1937) and theVice Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University (1938-1941).

In “Science and Culture” Sulaiman wrote a numberof articles to criticise Einstein’s theory as well as to showthe strength of his own theory.114,115,116,117,118 In one of thepapers, under the subtitle “The perihelion of Mercury” hediscussed the value of the perihelion of Mercury found bydifferent scientists. He opined:

“In view of the great uncertainty of the variousassumptions made in the calculations, it cannot beseriously maintained that the unexplained residue inthe advance of the perihelion of one solitary planetin any way confirm General Relativity.”119

Regarding the “spectral shift”, he stated: “Accordingto Einstein’s theory the spectral shift of light from the Sunshould be 0.00844 A° for a wavelength of 4000A° U. …”.The observations by J. Evershed, Charles Edward St. John,Leonard Grebe and Albert Bachem suggest that the actualobserved value may be up to half for the centre and alittle more for the limb. Further: “Relativity is unable toexplain the deficiency at the centre or the excess of shiftat the limb.

Generally, it was believed that the observation of thespectrum of white dwarf Sirus B confirm Einstein’s theory.However, in 1933 it was criticized so far the temperaturewas ignored. If it is taken into account, the discrepancywas far away from the predicted values. Sulaiman’s arguedthat even if, the values agree with Einstein’s theory, the“relativity theory cannot claim any credit for it, because ithas been shown … that the same value can be deducedfrom the strict Newtonian law without any new assumptionwhatsoever.”120 Here he meant his own theory, whichexplained the observations. “The deflection of light” wasconsidered the main proof of the theory of relativity. Suchvalues were measured in 1919, 1922 and 1929 by threeindependent groups. Erwin Finlay Freundlich from Germanyanalysed all the results and came to the conclusion thatthe actual corrected value in all the three cases was about2’’.20 and was far from Einstein’s value (1’’.74). Sulaimangave his semi classical theory, which gave the value 2’’.24

as given by E.F. Freundlich, a friend and supporter ofEinstein.

Sulaiman’s other argument was that Simon Newcomb,U.S.A., has observed the eccentricities of the orbits ofVenus, Earth and Mars, were increasing, while that ofMercury were decreasing. These can be explained neitherby Newton’s nor by Einstein’s theory; whereas his theory

gives the right results. Same is true in the case of theeccentricities of relative orbits of double stars.

Sulaiman’s conclusion was that numerous correctionsmust be introduced in Newton’s mechanics to explain theresults, before we declare it as failed.

“Similarly, in view of the great uncertainty as tothe values for the perihelion and the spectral shiftand in view of the proved excess in the value ofthe deflection of light, it can no longer be assertedthat General Relativity has been verified. Andtherefore there is no necessity to accept itsextraordinary postulates.”121

From theoretical point of view Sulaiman criticisedEinstein for:

“(1) denying the absoluteness of space, time andmotion, (2) making the velocity of light absolute,independent of the motion of observers, (3) givingto space curvature and other properties, (4) makingspace finite and yet making its finite limit incapableof being attained, (5) denying reality to force andmaking it a property of space, (6) for introducing acosmological force of repulsion with the consequentexpansion of the universe.”122

Some of the Indian authors in “Current Science”attacked Sulaiman for his “too simple” theory, which didnot contain mathematical tensor. He tried to refute hisopponents.123,124,125,126,127,128 Raman while writingSulaiman’s obituary for “Nature” stated that his scientificideas were semi-classical. Not surprisingly his hypothesiswere scarcely recognised.129 In contrast, M.N. Sahaappreciated the success of Sulaiman’s semi-classicaltheory.130 Even, the international journals like “Science”wrote encouraging reviews of his theory. For instance, the“Science” in its Nov. 30, 1934, issue reported that aCambridge trained mathematician and jurist has proposed“A new mathematical theory of relativity, which mayoverthrow the world-famous theories of Professor AlbertEinstein.” It is a sane borderline between Newton’s andEinstein’s concepts. About his criticism of Einstein’s lawof gravitation, the journal wrote that Shah says, “Relativitydenies the absoluteness of space, time and motion, but canhardly deny the absoluteness angular motion or suddenchange of motion.”131

Some of the Indian physicists supported Sulaiman’sscientific ideas. M.N. Saha was one of them. A.C. Banerjeeand M.N. Saha nominated him for the Fellowship of theNational Institute of Sciences of India (today known asINSA). According to the nomination letter: “Sir S M

82 SCIENCE AND CULTURE, MARCH-APRIL, 2019

Sulaiman has formulated an intensely original Theory ofRelativity, which has attracted widespread attention inEurope and America.’ Dr Shapley, the renownedAstronomer, has characterized this theory as ‘one of thehighlights of Astronomy during the past year (1934)’.”Sulaiman was elected as Fellow in 1937.

M.N. Saha, while writing Sulaiman’s obituary statedthat his most interesting contribution was the explanationof the variation in red-shift observed across the solar disc.He predicted that the shift for the light from the edge shouldbe about double of Einstein’s value. Indeed this wasobserved by T. Royds at the time of solar eclipse in 1936.He announced the results in July 1937.132,133

Conclusions

Albert Einstein’s contribution to the theory of relativityis undisputed. However, it is wrong to give him sole creditas the founder of the theory of relativity, as is done inmost of the textbooks. Knowingly or unknowingly Einsteinignored Poincare’s and Lorentz’s contributions, on whichthe theory was based. It is questionable that withoutprevious knowledge, Einstein could have developed thetheory. The lesson to be learnt from the story is that inorder to come closer to the truth, such as the discovery ofthe theory of relativity, one needs to study the contributionof the contemporaries. They will show that any discoveryin the world is not a one man show. It is always based onthe existing knowledge from the past.

A short history of the theory of relativity in Indiancontext shows that the mathematician G. Prasad, Universityof Calcutta, was the first to translate, in 1910, H.Minkowski’s article on “Space and Time”. M.N. Saha andS.N. Bose, who began their research career in Prasad’sDepartment, translated Minkowski’s and Einstein’s articlesto write “The principle of relativity.” Definitely, they werenot the first persons to write on the theory of relativity.

In some Indian circles, some scientists, particularly,India’s Nobel Laureate C.V. Raman, took pride by tellingabout the poor working conditions. C.V. Raman for hisexperimental work on theory of relativity got huge grant.This reconfirms my thesis that Raman was not a poorscientist.134 Not only Raman, but other scientists workingon astronomy and theory of relativity had all possiblejournals, and equipments which they required for researchwork. Whenever they planned visits abroad they werefinanced privately (in the from of Scholarships from theUniversity of Calcutta) or grants sanctioned by the British-India Government.

In the 1920s and 1930s most of the physicists who

worked on the theory of relativity visited U.K., France andGermany for higher studies; and worked under renownedphysicists like Max von Laue, Albert Einstein, A.S.Edington and many more. Obviously, they were not“isolated” from the scientific world. This type of transferof scientific man-power might have been not of the samelevel as that of the USA scientists to Europe in thebeginning of the 20th century. But, on the internationallevel, India was definitely not in the worst position ascompare to Africa, Latin America and other Asian countries.For instance, if we see the history of the Physics NobelPrize (from 1901-1964), only 24 countries were involved.In the list: “India is on 13th place. India’s four Physicsnominees got 28 proposals. Compared to the Europeancountries like Germany, France and U.K., this numberseems to be quite low; but compared to Canada andAustralia this number is reasonably good. In fact, India isat the top if we compare the country with all other coloniesof the British Empire. Only ten European countries(including Russian Federation) are ahead of India.”135

“Japan and India are the only two countries from the Asiancontinent. There is not a single candidate from Africa. FromLatin American only two countries appear, that is, Braziland Peru.” If Indian men of science would have had “poor”working conditions and worked in “isolation”, they wouldnot have achieved such position.

Shah M. Sulaiman’s example could be revealing foryoung Indian scientists. Unlike, most of his countrymen,he did not follow Einstein blindly. He was criticized. Butwith his own limited ideas he developed his theory whichsuccessfully explained the experimental observations, whichwere not explained by Newton’s and Einstein’s theories.Why his theory did not get international fame and wasadopted, needs further research.

Bengali men of science like Saha appreciatedSulaiman’s work, and nominated him for the Fellowshipof the INSA. This would suggest the broadminded approachof Saha and his colleagues to the contemporary science. Itis further supported by the fact that “Science and Culture”,a journal founded by Saha, gave Sulaiman chance topublish his disputed views in the journal. In contrast, the“Current Science” was much more critical. Its mainapproach was to ignore Sulaiman’s theory and publishcriticism for criticism sake.

Today, in the field of theory of relativity, India is aglobal player. It is not surprising because from the verybeginning Indian scientists were involved in the field ofrelativity. This suggests that the success of a subjectdepends not only on money, but also to start a particularsubject at the right time.

VOL. 85, NOS. 3–4 83

Acknowledgements

I thank Prof. S.C. Roy, Editor-in-Chief “Science andCulture” and Member of the “Commission of History ofScience” INSA, for commenting and correcting the earlyversion of this paper; and sending articles published byS.M. Sulaiman in “Sci. Cult.”. I am thankful to thearchivists and librarians for the following institutions forsending me, here, referred to documents: Albert Einsteinarchive – Hebrew University, Niels Bohr archiveCopenhagen, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library Delhi,Asiatic Society Kolkata, University of Calcutta, IndianAssociation for the Cultivation of Sciences, Indian NationalScience Academy. Last but not least, I thank Prof. MichaelKomorek and Members of the Research Group: PhysicsDidactics and History of Physics, University of Oldenburg,for their kind support.

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