page_title: Satinder Vir Kessar
section_title: Biography
hierarchical_section_title: Satinder Vir Kessar / Biography
caption_attribution_description: English: Student Centre, Panjab University
context_page_description: Satinder Vir Kessar is an Indian synthetic organic chemist, academic and an Emeritus professor of Panjab University. He is known for his researches in steroidal and heterocyclic chemistry. He is an elected fellow of The World Academy of Sciences and all the three major Indian science academies, viz. The Indian National Science Academy, the Indian Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Sciences, India. The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, the apex agency of the Government of India for scientific research, awarded him the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize for Science and Technology, one of the highest Indian science awards, in 1972, for his contributions to chemical sciences.
context_section_description: S. V. Kessar was born in Hoshiarpur, in the undivided Punjab of British India on 9 June 1932 to Durga Dass, a lawyer and his homemaker wife, Susheela Devi. His schooling was at DAV Senior Secondary School, Hoshiarpur and later at Indian Military Academy after which he graduated in chemistry from Panjab University in 1953. While continuing his studies at the same institution for MSc by research, he appeared for the Civil Services Examination in 1953 and stood among the top 100 candidates. Choosing to pursue a career in chemistry, he passed MSc (hons) and moved to the US to join the University of Southern California where he studied under the guidance of M. C. Kloetzel to secure a PhD in 1958. He stayed in the US for a while more to complete his post-doctoral studies at the laboratory of S. W. Benson and returned to India to start his career as an assistant professor at PEC University of Technology (then known as Punjab Engineering College). Returning to his alma mater, Panjab University in 1959 as a lecturer, he spent the rest of his academic career there where he served as a Reader (from 1963) and as a Professor (from 1974). On his superannuation from service, he was made the Emeritus Professor of the university. In between, he also served as a CSIR Distinguished Chair from 1992 to 1997, the first professor to hold the position.
  Kessar is married to Urmi, his colleague at Panjab University and an art historian and they have two daughters, Bindu and Radha. The couple lives in Chandigarh.
caption: Student Centre, Panjab University.
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