My respect and love towards Bengali's (okay, Didi is an exception for following the coalition dharma word by word, letter by letter :P) has reached saturation after reading about PC Mahalanobis.
In a country of >1 bn people, statistics and surveys matter a lot to ensure planned development and formulating correct policies for economic growth. Without these metrics, which policies to formulate, what to do etc. will only be too confusing and adhoc. For all this to be done, there needs to be a system in place and the person who raised the pillars for such a system in India is Professor Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis.
Mahalanobis graduated in Physics at Presidency College, Calcutta in 1912 and then finished Tripos at King's college, Cambridge. Then, he has returned back to Calcutta and started analyzing university exam results and some metrological problems. In 1922, when Bengal was hit by bad floods, he turned his attention on analysis on the past 50 years' rains and floods. Based on this analysis, he suggested a low cost plan to drain flood water contrasting with the views of many experts, but when implemented was found fruitful and workable. His surveys on crop cutting for agricultural production are still relevant because of their design. He succeeded in proving that sometimes survey results do exhibit a pattern similar to complete enumeration.
After Independence in 1947, there was a clear need for establishing a fundamentally pure statistical system for ensuring socio-economic development of India. Professor Mahalanobis was appointed the Honorary Statistical Advisor. Later this resulted in forming an independent National Sample Survey Organization(NSSO) in 1970. Now, I think, you would recollect the ad's coming on televisions these days requesting the public to co-operate with NSSO members coming to their houses. And that is this same organization. As a member of the Planning Commission, he contributed greatly to India's five year plans that resulted in faster Industrialization. Impressed by his models, then Prime Minister's of China and Vietnam have sent their country's statisticians to get trained under him.
Mahalanobis had a four step strategy - the statisticians should first analyze and extract results of properly designed surveys. The results should be used for selecting suitable development schemes. During implementation, the work being done has to be evaluated if it's meeting it's preset goals. Finally, corrections are to be done wherever the works are not meeting the goals. This same strategy of implementing schemes is relevant even today.
As a respect to this great man, the Government of India decided to celebrate his birthday, 29th of June, as Statistics Day. If you heard of a premier Institute in Calcutta - Indian Statistical Institute, Mahalanobis is the founder of it. He established this in 1931.
In a country of >1 bn people, statistics and surveys matter a lot to ensure planned development and formulating correct policies for economic growth. Without these metrics, which policies to formulate, what to do etc. will only be too confusing and adhoc. For all this to be done, there needs to be a system in place and the person who raised the pillars for such a system in India is Professor Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis.
After Independence in 1947, there was a clear need for establishing a fundamentally pure statistical system for ensuring socio-economic development of India. Professor Mahalanobis was appointed the Honorary Statistical Advisor. Later this resulted in forming an independent National Sample Survey Organization(NSSO) in 1970. Now, I think, you would recollect the ad's coming on televisions these days requesting the public to co-operate with NSSO members coming to their houses. And that is this same organization. As a member of the Planning Commission, he contributed greatly to India's five year plans that resulted in faster Industrialization. Impressed by his models, then Prime Minister's of China and Vietnam have sent their country's statisticians to get trained under him.
Mahalanobis had a four step strategy - the statisticians should first analyze and extract results of properly designed surveys. The results should be used for selecting suitable development schemes. During implementation, the work being done has to be evaluated if it's meeting it's preset goals. Finally, corrections are to be done wherever the works are not meeting the goals. This same strategy of implementing schemes is relevant even today.
As a respect to this great man, the Government of India decided to celebrate his birthday, 29th of June, as Statistics Day. If you heard of a premier Institute in Calcutta - Indian Statistical Institute, Mahalanobis is the founder of it. He established this in 1931.
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