Anna Mani

Anna Mani (23 August 1918 – 16 August 2001) was an Indian physicist and meteorologist. She retired as the Deputy Director General of the Indian Meteorological Department and also served as a visiting professor at the Raman Research Institute.
Mani made contributions to the field of meteorological instrumentation, conducted research, and published numerous papers on solar radiation, ozone, and wind energy measurements.
Anna Mani’s work in meteorology remain impactful and valuable to today’s society. In fact, Mani’s visions and work allowed India to become a world leader in harnessing wind power today. Her meteorological innovations expanded India’s scientific field as well as the country’s development post-independence. But most importantly, Anna Mani is an inspiration for many young women to pursue their dream despite the societal limits placed on their identities. Mani not only held a position in a male dominated field, she was also able to inspire a team of men to work with her. This paved the path for many future female scientists and showed the world that girls can be more than caregivers. As Anna Mani once stated, " Me being a women had absolutely no bearing on what I chose to do with my life.”
Life
Early years
Anna Modayil Mani was born in 1918 at Peermade, then Travancore, now Kerala, India to a Syrian Christian family. Her father was a civil engineer. She was the seventh of eight children in her family, and a voracious reader. Impressed by Gandhi during Vaikom satyagraha and inspired by his nationalist movement, she took to wearing only khadi garments.
Anna Mani's formative years were spent engrossed in books, and by the age of eight she had read almost all the books in Malayalam at her public library. On her eighth birthday, she declined to accept her family's customary gift of a set of diamond earrings, asking instead for a set of Encyclopædia Britannica. The world of books opened her to new ideas and imbued in her a deep sense of social justice which informed and shaped her life.
Education
During the early 1900’s, it was rare for young girls in India to receive an education. In fact, less than one percent of the Indian female population was literate at the time and less than a thousand of college enrollments were females. However, Mani sought to break the norm and pursue her passion for learning through higher education. Mani attended the Presidency College, Chennai (then Madras) where she earned a Bachelor of Science degree with honors in physics and chemistry. Later in 1940, the prestigious Indian Institute of Science gave Mani a scholarship to continue her education and research in physics. Through her pursuit for education in science, Mani set a strong foundation for her later works and accomplishments.
Career
After graduation, Mani made several pathbreaking contributions to the scientific research field. At the Institute of Science, Mani was mentored by C.V. Raman, who is a winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics for his work in the properties of rubies and diamonds. Mani worked tirelessly and often sacrificed up to 20 hours in the lab recording and analyzing the luminescence of diamonds. Between 1942 and 1945, Anna Mani authored five single academic paper on the spectroscopy of rubies and diamonds. In addition, Mani wrote a PhD dissertation at the University of Madras for a formal degree, however she was declined due to her lack of a master’s degree. Despite this pitfall, Mani continued her research internship with a government scholarship award in England. At the Imperial College London, Mani would be introduced to meteorology and various weather instruments. This was her first step in charting a path as meteorologist and revolutionizing the scientific community in India.
Meteorology
Before India gained its independence in 1947, the country relied on other countries for simple scientific instruments. When Anna Mani returned to India in 1948, she joined the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) and worked in the instruments division. She worked with politician S. P. Venkiteshwaran, who had a vision of making India self-reliant in the scientific field. With this mission in mind, Mani helped with manufacturing and calibrating various weather instruments for India. She eventually took charge of the division and led 121 men under her. With her team of scientists, they “standardized the drawings for nearly 100 different weather instruments and started their production.” More impressively, Mani ventured into two unexplored field in India at the time: solar energy and wind power. Her team set up a network of monitoring stations across India to harness solar radiation as well as measurement equipment to study wind patterns. To further India’s self-reliance, Mani’s team designed and developed various radiation instruments. Additionally, Mani was one of the few during her time who saw the potential of the ozone layer and the crucial role it played. Therefore, she invented the ozonesonde, which is a reliable instrument used to measure the ozone layer. As a result of her work, she became a part of the International Ozone Commission. The instruments and research developed by Mani and her team helped India predict the weather with precision, as well as expand its meteorological field.
Death
In 1994, Mani suffered a stroke and died on 16 August 2001 in Thiruvananthapuram, a week before her 83rd birthday.
Books
Mani retired as the deputy director general of the India Meteorological Department in 1976. However, she did not stop working and wrote two books: Handbook of Solar Radiation Data for India (1980) and Solar Radiation over India (1981).
Anna Mani’s work in meteorology remain impactful and valuable to today’s society. Her contributions expanded the exploration of solar energy, wind power, ozone layers, and various weather instruments. In fact, Mani’s visions and work allowed India to become a world leader in harnessing wind power today.
Selected publications
1992. Wind Energy Resource Survey in India, vv. 2. xi + 22 pp. Ed. Allied Publ. ,
1981. Solar Radiation over India x + 548 pp.
1980. The Handbook for Solar Radiation data for India
Honors
Mani participated in various organizations such as the International Solar Energy Society, Indian National Science Academy, American Meteorological Society, and others. Mani was honored and recognized for her important contributions and in 1987 she was awarded the INSA K. R.Ramanathan Medal.
The World Meteorological Organization remembered her on her 100th birth anniversary and published her life profile along with an interview.
On 23 August 2022, Google honoured Mani with a Google Doodle on her 104th birth anniversary.
References
1918 births
2001 deaths
Indian women physicists
20th-century Indian physicists
Indian meteorologists
Women meteorologists
Scientists from Kerala
Scientists from Thiruvananthapuram
Gandhians
Women Indian independence activists
Indian independence activists from Kerala
20th-century Indian women scientists
Women in Kerala politics
Women from the Kingdom of Travancore
People from the Kingdom of Travancore
People from Idukki district
Women scientists from Kerala
Indian optical physicists
20th-century Indian earth scientists
Indian women earth scientists
Syrian Christians