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Satish Dhawan
Official Portrait
Born	(1920-09-25)25 September 1920 Srinagar,Jammu and Kashmir,British India (Present-dayJammu and Kashmir,India)
Died	3 January 2002(2002-01-03) (aged 81) Bengaluru,Karnataka,India
Alma mater	University of Punjab (BA,MA,) Punjab Engineering College (BE) University of Minnesota (MS) California Institute of Technology (PhD)
Known for	Indian space programme
Awards	Padma Bhushan(1971)Padma Vibhushan(1981)
Scientific career
Fields	Mechanical andaerospace Engineering
Institutions	Indian Space Research Organisation Indian Institute of Science California Institute of Technology National Aerospace Laboratories
Thesis	Direct Measurements of Skin Friction (1951)
Doctoral advisor	Hans W. Liepmann
Signature

Satish Dhawan (25 September 1920 – 3 January 2002) was an Indianmathematician andaerospace engineer. He served as the chairman ofISRO from 1972 to 1984 and is often regarded as the father of experimentalfluid dynamics research in India.

Born inSrinagar, Dhawan was educated in India and further on in United States. Dhawan was one of the most eminent researchers in the field ofturbulence andboundary layers, leading the successful and indigenous development of the Indian space programme.Thesecond launch pad of ISRO,Satish Dhawan Space Centre is named after him. He is greatly regarded as the man behindA. P. J. Abdul Kalam.^{[citation needed]}

Dhawan was born on 25 September 1920 inSrinagar in the princely state ofJammu and Kashmir (present-dayJammu and Kashmir,India). His father, Devi Dayal Dhawan, had migrated fromDera Ismail Khan to Srinagar.^[1]

Satish Dhawan grew up in Srinagar and Lahore. His father,Rai Bahadur Devi Dayal, was an MSc and LLB who joined the Punjab Civil Service and later became a sessions and district judge.^[2][3]

Dhawan was a graduate of what is now calledPunjab Engineering College in the city of Chandigarh in India, theMughalpura Technical College inLahore, Pakistan,British India, where he completed aBachelor of Science in physics and mathematics, a bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering and aMaster of Arts in English literature. In 1947, he completed aMaster of Science degree inaerospace engineering from theUniversity of Minnesota, Minneapolis, and an aeronautical engineering degree from theCalifornia Institute of Technology followed by a double PhD in mathematics and aerospace engineering under the supervision of his advisorHans W. Liepmann in 1951.^{[citation needed]}

In 1972, Dhawan became chairman of theIndian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) andsecretary to theGovernment of India at theDepartment of Space.^[4][5]

APJ Abdul Kalam explained that in 1979 when he was the director of aSatellite Launch Vehicle, the mission failed to launch the satellite in the orbit. Instead, it was put into theBay of Bengal. Abdul Kalam's team knew that there was a leakage in the fuel of the system, but they hoped that the leakage was negligible, and thus they thought there was enough fuel in the system. This miscalculation led to the mission's failure. Satish Dhawan, being the chairman at the time, called Abdul Kalam and conveyed to the press; "We failed! But I have very strong trust in my team and I believe that next time we will definitely succeed". This surprised Abdul Kalam, as the blame of the failure was taken by the chairman of ISRO. The next mission was prepared and launched successfully in 1980. When this succeeded, Satish Dhawan told Abdul Kalam to attend the press meet without his presence. It was observed that when the team failed, he took the blame. But when the team succeeded, he attributed the success to his team, thus portraying the picture of an ideal leader.^{[citation needed]}

Satish Dhawan was chairman of ISRO until 1984.^[4]

Dhawan joined as faculty at theIndian Institute of Science (IISc),Bangalore, in 1951 and became its director in 1962. Although he was the head of theIndian space programme, he devoted substantial efforts towards boundary layer research. His most important contributions are presented in the seminal bookBoundary Layer Theory byHermann Schlichting. He set up the country's firstsupersonic wind tunnel at IISc. He also pioneered research on relaminarization of separated boundary layer flows, three-dimensional boundary layers andtrisonic flows.^[6]

Dhawan carried out pioneering experiments in rural education,remote sensing andsatellite communications. His work resulted in operational systems includingINSAT, a telecommunications satellite;IRS, an Indian Remote Sensing satellite; and thePolar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV), which established India as a space-faring country.^[7]

Dhawan died on 3 January 2002 inBangalore.^[8] In honor of his contributions, the satellite launch center inSriharikota, Andhra Pradesh, was renamed the Satish Dhawan Space Centre following his death.Satish Chander Dhawan Government College For Boys inLudhiana is named after him.The Department of Mechanical Engineering Building at theIndian Institute of Technology, Ropar is also named in his honor as the Satish Dhawan Block. In 2019, theUttar Pradesh Textile Technology Institute in Kanpur named its computer center the Prof. Satish Dhawan Computer Centre.^{[citation needed]}

• Indian Institute of Science,Bangalore

• Senior scientific officer, 1951
• Professor and head of the Department ofAeronautical Engineering, 1955
• Director, 1962–1981^[9]

• California Institute of Technology, US

• Visiting Professor, 1971–72

• National Aerospace Laboratories,Bangalore

• Chairman, Research council, 1984–93

• Indian Academy of Sciences

• President, 1977–1979

• Indian Space Research Organisation

• Chairman, 1972–1984

• Indian Space Commission

• Chairman, 1972–2002

• Padma Vibhushan (India's second highest civilian honour), 1981^[10]
• Padma Bhushan (India's third highest civilian honour), 1971^[10]
• Indira Gandhi Award for National Integration, 1999
• Distinguished Alumnus Award,Indian Institute of Science
• Distinguished Alumnus Award, California Institute of Technology, 1969

He was married to Nalini Dhawan, a cytogeneticist, and his daughterJyotsna Dhawan is serving as senior principal scientist in theCentre for Cellular and Molecular Biology.

• 1953: "Direct measurements of skin friction", Technical Report 1121,National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, Washington DC.
• 1958; "Some properties of boundary layer flow during the transition from laminar to turbulent motion",Journal of Fluid Mechanics 3(4): 418 – 36doi:10.1017/S0022112058000094
• 1967: "Aeronautical Research in India", (22nd British Commonwealth Lecture), Journal of theRoyal Aeronautical Society 71: 149-184.
• 1982: "A glimpse of fluid mechanics research in Bangalore 25 years ago", inIndia: Surveys in fluid mechanics,Indian Academy of Sciences (Eds. R Narasimha, S M Deshpande) 1-15.
• 1988:Developments in Fluid Mechanics and Space Technology, (Eds. R Narasimha, APJ Abdul Kalam) Indian Academy of Sciences.
• 1991: "Bird flight",Sadhana Proceedings in Engineering Sciences, Indian Academy of Sciences.
• 2000: Special Section on Instabilities, transitions and turbulence, (Ed. R Narasimha)Current Science 79: 725-883.

• P.A. Davidson, Y. Kaneda, K. Moffatt, andK.R. Sreenivasan (eds, 2011).A Voyage Through Turbulence, chapter 11, pp 373–92,Cambridge University PressISBN 978-0-521-19868-4

• Satish Dhawan at theMathematics Genealogy Project
• Bird Flight by Satish Dhawan (2nd edition, 2020)

• 1920 births
• 2002 deaths
• California Institute of Technology alumni
• Space programme of India
• Recipients of the Padma Vibhushan in science & engineering
• ISRO people
• University of Minnesota College of Science and Engineering alumni
• Indian fluid dynamicists
• Recipients of the Padma Bhushan in science & engineering
• People from Srinagar
• University of the Punjab alumni
• Indian aerospace engineers
• Directors of the Indian Institute of Science
• Recipients of the Padma Shri in science & engineering
• 20th-century Indian engineers
• Engineers from Jammu and Kashmir
• 20th-century Indian physicists
• Om Prakash Bhasin Award recipients

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