Odishatv Bureau

Bhubaneswar/New Delhi: Making Odisha proud, young Odia Geo-scientist from Berhampur Dr Ashit Kumar Swain has received National Geoscience Award 2017 from President of India Ram Nath Kovind for his contribution towards research in the field of Geoscience.

Swain, nominated for his outstanding Glaciology research carried out in Antarctica, Arctic as well as in the Himalayas, was conferred with the National Geoscience Awards in New Delhi on 16 May, 2018 along with four others from the GSI team comprising Prakash Kumar Shrivastava, Dr Sandip Kumar Roy and Amit Dharwadkar.

A resident of Ambapua in Berhampur of Ganjam district, Swain was born to Ladu Kishore Swain and Late Sushila Swain. He spent his childhood at Umerkote, where his father was a teacher at the Government High School. He studied at F.M. College in Balasore, Khallikote College in Berhampur and later in University of Allahabad before taking up research assignments at Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata.

Swain has made significant contributions in Glaciology through his dedicated involvements in 11 Geo-Scientific expeditions including First Indian South Pole Expedition, six Antarctica, two Arctic and two Himalayan Glaciological Expeditions.

Swain is presently working as a Geoscientist at the Geological Survey of India, Gangtok.

To see the complete list of awardees, CLICK HERE

Eleven National Geoscience Awards for the year 2017 were conferred by the President on 22 geoscientists, including Swain, for their outstanding contributions in nine different fields of geosciences. Dr Shib Sankar Ganguli, Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur received the Young Scientist Award – 2017 for his meritorious contributions in the field of Applied Geoscience.

Among others, Narendra Singh Tomar, Minister of Rural Development, Panchayati Raj and Mines, Haribhai Parthibhai Chaudhary, Minister of State (Mines), Anil Mukim, Secretary, Ministry of Mines, N Kutumba Rao, Director General, Geological Survey of India, senior officers of Ministry of Mines, GSI, and other Central Ministries graced the occasion.

In his address, Tomar applauded the awardees for their innovation and research in the fields of Geosciences and also showed his indebtedness to the President for distributing these awards. He aptly reminded the awardees the challenges of geosciences and its age-old contributions towards the economic development of the States and the local community.

He also mentioned about the recent endeavours put forward by Ministry of Mines in amending the Mining Regulations that fostered the mineral-rich States in achieving additional economic resources through auctioning of mining blocks and also the relentless scientific endeavour that GSI is putting forward in mineral explorations and other fields of Geosciences.

Anil Mukim, Secretary, Mines outlined briefly the history of this Award which started way back in 1966 by the Ministry of Mines. He emphasised that the scientific excellence has its relevance only when it benefits the society and towards this objective, the disciplines for the National Geoscience Awards have been selected carefully.

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