A well-known Indian statistician and scientist, Mahalanobis is greatly popular for introducing new methods of sampling. Mahalanobis is remembered by Indians as an Indian scientist and as an applied statistician. His most significant contribution in the field of statistics was the Mahalanobis Distance. Besides these, he had also made pioneering studies in the field of anthropometry and had founded the Indian Statistical Institute.
Originally the family of Mahalanobis belonged to Bikrampur in Bangladesh. As a child, Mahalanobis grew up in an environment surrounded by socially active reformers and intellectuals. He had his initial education from Brahmo Boys School in Calcutta. Then he enrolled himself into Presidency College and got a BSc. degree with specialisation in Physics. In the year 1913, Mahalanobis left for England for further studies and came in contact with S. Ramanujan, the famous mathematician from India. After completion of his studies, he returned to India and was invited by the Principal of Presidency College to take classes in Physics. Soon he was introduced to the importance of Statistics and realised that it was very useful in solving problems related to meteorology and anthropology. Many of his colleagues took interest in Statistics and as a result in his room in the Presidency College a small statistical laboratory grew up where scholars like Pramatha Nath Banerji, Nikhil Ranjan Sen, and Sir RN Mukherji actively participated in all discussions. The meetings and discussions led to the formal establishment of the Indian Statistical Institute and was formally registered on April 28, 1932. Initially the Institute was in the Physics Department of Presidency College, but later with passing time the Institute expanded.
The most important contributions of Mahalanobis are related to large-scale sample surveys. He had pioneered the concept of pilot surveys and sampling methods. He also introduced a method of measuring crop yields. In the later stage of his life, Mahalanobis became a member of the Planning Commission of India. During his tenure as a member of the Planning Commission of India, he significantly contributed to the Five-Year Plans of India.
The Mahalanobis Model was implemented in the Second Five-Year Plan of India and it assisted in the rapid industrialisation of the country. He had also corrected some of the errors of the census methodology in India. Besides statistics, Mahalanobis also had a cultural bent of mind. He had worked as a secretary to Rabindranath Tagore particularly during the foreign visits of the great poet and also worked in the Vishwa Bharati University. Mahalanobis was honoured with the second highest civilian award of the country, Padma Vibhushan, for his immense contribution to the field of science.
Mahalanobis died on June 28, 1972 at the age of 78. Even at such a ripe age he participated in his research work and discharged all his duties perfectly. In year 2006, Government of India declared June 29, the birthday of Mahalanobis, as the National Statistical Day.
