This is an invited guest article written by Prof PVS Rao.
Photo: Courtesy Mr TM Vijayaraman
When I think of Srivastav, the scene that flashes in front of my eyes is my wife and I receiving Srivastav and Asha on platform 5 at 9 PM at Dadar. That was in early January 1957. He and his young bride were coming to set up house in Bombay for the first time. My wife and I had set up our own house just a week or so earlier.
The two of us (Srivastav and I) went together to finalize
our own rented flat in Khar in late 1956, and it turned out there was another
vacant place in the same building. Instantly, Srivastav took that. We were neighbors
(with only a wall separating our two flats).
I would shout out his name every morning, and we would go together to
TIFR; we returned together in the evenings, too. I remember we were both late
coming back one day, and my father was out waiting for us; he stopped us on the
road and lectured to both of us (he was a school headmaster) about how to care
for our families and return home in time. That was how close we were. Srivastav
was an expert at making Pakodas, and we all enjoyed the snack on many Sunday
evenings.
I knew Srivastav from as far back as July 1953 (that makes
it all of 70 plus years) when I went to study at BHU (Physics, Wireless) for my
master's. He was then a research scholar working on his PhD in the same
department. We both were in the same (Radhakrishnan) Hostel too. The following
year (1955), he left Banaras to join the TIFR Computer Section in Bombay. I
followed in 1955 (August) and joined the same department. We stayed in the same
hostel at Old Yacht Club near Gate Way of India. I remember teasing him when he
was going home for his wedding and repeatedly harassing his tailor near Flora
Fountain for a excellent fitting, when he ordered a suit (fit for a bridegroom).
On leaving the TIFR hostel, we moved to Khar to be neighbors.
We were on the same floor in Bhaskara, a residential
building on the TIFR campus. We could both choose our flats in Vigyan, a
private residential building promoted by TIFR scientists. Many TIFR colleagues live
here after retirement. We have been neighbors again in Vigyan from 1998
onwards.
Mr SP Srivastava, Photo: Courtesy of his daughters
Srivastav was intelligent, resourceful, straight &
simple, extremely competent, calm, unassuming, dependable, laid back, and
non-assertive – and a man of few words. Perhaps some of these excellent qualities
didn’t help him. Above all he was a loving family man.
He played a major role in developing TIFRAC, India’s first
computer. I was concerned with the Arithmetic unit and part of the control
unit. He and Minoo Dosabhai implemented the magnetic core memory system. He
took care of TIFRAC as long as it was in use.
It was only natural that when TIFR procured the new high-speed
CDC 3600, he was given the responsibility for taking care of it. And he did
this with distinction. When the expensive memory unit of this machine failed,
the manufacturers wanted us to buy a replacement (thirty-five thousand dollars,
if I remember right.) That was out of the question for us. The TIFR team's
solution was to merely reassign addresses to the core planes in the 3D memory so
that these few defective locations were virtually shifted to the farthest higher
end of the memory; almost the entire
(remaining) memory could be used. Not a penny was spent. CDC was highly impressed, and this one event
made them agree to let TIFR maintain the system from the second year onwards,
saving us the considerable expense of maintaining a 4 or 5-strong CDC team in
Bombay.
As Head of the Computer Center at TIFR, Srivastav
distinguished himself for an efficient, glitch-free service that hundreds of organizations
used—be it with the CDC 3600 or its increasingly more powerful successors at
TIFR. This kind of service is barely noticed when all goes well but gets people
to the firing line if anything goes wrong.
The last few months have been difficult for Srivastav. To
say that we were close to each other and that I miss him sorely now would be
gross understatements. I know many others, too, who have similar feelings
towards him.
Rest in peace, my friend; you have accomplished a lot in
very many ways!
PVS Rao
You can find more about the author at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._V._S._Rao
