Jayant Narlikar, visionary astrophysicist and science populariser, dies at 86

Jayant Vishnu Narlikar, a visionary Indian astrophysicist whose bold cosmological theories and deep dedication to science education reshaped India’s scientific landscape, died on 20 May 2025 in Pune. He was 86.

Narlikar’s life and work spanned an era of transformation in modern physics — from the post-Einsteinian revolutions of gravity to the institutional scaffolding of astrophysics in a newly independent India. For over six decades, he remained a tenacious challenger of orthodoxy and a luminous bridge between rigorous theory and the public imagination.

Born on 19 July 1938 in Kolhapur, Maharashtra, Narlikar grew up in an academic household. His father, Vishnu Vasudev Narlikar, was a noted mathematician. His early education was at Banaras Hindu University before he headed to the University of Cambridge for a PhD under the British astronomer Fred Hoyle.

Their collaboration produced the Hoyle–Narlikar theory of gravitation, a conformal theory deeply rooted in Mach’s principle, and a striking early attempt to frame gravity not as a force transmitted by a field but as “action at a distance.” Their shared scepticism of the Big Bang model, which they felt was mathematically unsatisfactory due to its singularities, led to the development of the Quasi-Steady State Cosmology, an alternative vision of a universe without a beginning.

Though this work remained outside mainstream acceptance, Narlikar never flinched. He valued conceptual clarity and logical coherence above fashionable trends. “Division by zero is not allowed,” he often said, with the moral firmness of a mathematician.

Narlikar returned to India in 1972 and joined the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), assembling a group of scientists whose influence would shape Indian astrophysics for generations. Among them were Thanu Padmanabhan, Sanjeev Dhurandhar and Ajit Kembhavi — all leaders in fields from gravitational wave detection to data-intensive observational astronomy.

“He gave me total freedom of thought,” recalled Tarun Souradeep, now director of the Raman Research Institute and one of Narlikar’s last students. “I worked on off-beat ideas, which he delighted in taking very seriously.” On one occasion, Souradeep submitted a paper with both their names; Narlikar promptly struck his own name off the author list. “It was entirely your work,” he said.

In 1988, Narlikar founded what many see as his most enduring institutional legacy: the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in Pune. Conceived as a hub where scholars from across Indian universities could share resources and research time, IUCAA was a pioneering experiment in scientific democracy.

He structured it around an “eight-fold way” — a Buddhist-inspired schema outlining education, research, training and outreach — and persuaded architect Charles Correa to design the campus. Correa, coming off a project on classical Indian astronomy, was intrigued by the chance to build for modern stargazers.

The idea behind IUCAA stemmed from the practical challenges of astronomical research. High-quality telescopes are prohibitively expensive and often underused due to limited observing time. To address this, a shared institutional model was envisioned — one that would allow universities across the country to access advanced facilities collectively. From these beginnings in a cramped 100-square-foot apartment, IUCAA steadily grew into a vibrant, green research campus.

But Narlikar’s influence extended well beyond academic circles. He was a dedicated science communicator and one of India’s earliest and most prolific writers of science fiction. A story exploring black holes and time dilation, submitted anonymously, won him his first award and launched a writing career that brought scientific ideas to a wider audience. His accessible and engaging popular science books became fixtures in school curricula and earned him the UNESCO Kalinga Prize in 1996.

Narlikar saw public engagement as a core scientific duty. Under his leadership, IUCAA became deeply involved in science outreach, especially at the school level. He was an outspoken critic of pseudoscience and unscientific beliefs, including astrology, and consistently championed rational, evidence-based thinking. For him, values like justice and equality were not abstract ideals but guiding principles, lived out through his work and public advocacy.

His many honours included the Padma Bhushan (1965), the Padma Vibhushan (2004), the Prix Jules Janssen, and the Govind Swarup Lifetime Achievement Award from the Astronomical Society of India.

Narlikar is survived by his three daughters — Geeta, Girija and Leelavati — all scientists. His wife, mathematician Mangala Narlikar, with whom he shared both a household and a commitment to intellectual integrity, died in 2023.

It is rare to find a scientist equally at ease formulating cosmological theories, founding institutions, mentoring iconoclasts and penning science fiction. Rarer still to find one who, until the end, remained curious, civil and unshakably principled.

In our last conversation in January 2025, he returned, as he often did, to first principles: “The universe,” he mused, “is not obliged to follow our prejudices. But we are obliged to understand it honestly.”