The academic hub of Tirupati paid tributes to veteran cancer expert V. Shanta, who died in Chennai on Tuesday.
Dr. Shanta’s last visit to Tirupati was in 2019, when she came to deliver a special address at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER Tirupati) campus on the occasion of International Women’s Day.
“Extremely hard working and dedicated lady”, IISER Director K.N. Ganesh said while paying tributes to her. Recalling her scintillating and thought-provoking lecture delivered to their students two years back, Dr. Ganesh observed that her talk was the first in the series of lectures planned with famous women scientists on that day every year, as part of the institute’s goal of inspiring Gen-X girls to take up a career in science.
“A humble person, she immediately agreed to our invitation and came from Chennai to deliver a lecture on the theme ‘Cancer treatment in India, past, present and future’,” a faculty member recalled. Some students of the institute recollected the interactive nature of the ace scientist and her quest to inculcate scientific temper in young scientists. The institute called her demise a loss to the global scientific fraternity.
Similarly, it was over three decades back that she had visited Sri Venkateswara Medical College (SVMC). “It was for our annual day that she came as a chief guest in 1989-90. I received the ‘Best Outgoing Student’ award from her on that day”, recalls Alladi Mohan, who is now the head of medicine department at SVIMS University.
