Veerasingham Dhuruvasangary
Veerasingham Dhuruvasangary B.Sc, M.Sc., M. Phil (5 September 1950 - 2 December 2006) was a scientist and inventor born in Point Pedro, Sri Lanka. His father named him after the Pole Star, "Dhuruvan Natchathra". He is the youngest from 12 siblings. Being born in a successful family encouraged one of his brothers to V. Anandasangary, become a Tamil politician. In his student years, Dhuruvasangary attended Hartley College, and completed his M.Sc at Patrice Lumumba University, Moscow, USSR in 1977 and his M.Phil at Peradeniya University, Sri Lanka in 1983 (Assessment of Drainage Effects in the Mahaweli Area. M.Phil Thesis. PGIA, University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka).
As a soil research and development engineer, Dhuruvasangary hard work and perseverance finally paid by receiving a patent for a microscope which capable of converting into a telescope.[1] Apart from the achievements, he also designed a world clock and developed other inventions such as solar oven, and a device to measure snow and hail precipitation.
Books
Currently, Dhuruvasangary wrote 3 books through his career which are:
- Research Articles on Palymyrah Palm (1979),
- Lost Aviation Technology (1994) and
- En Muliyam Tamil (The Story of My Language, 2005; translated into English by Dhuruvasangary and C. Radhakrishnan).
The Lost Aviation Technology and En Muliyam Tamil were written and published after he emigrates to Canada. He wrote many articles and editorials on science and technology, archaeology, religion, and history. He spent the majority of his life developing simple, low cost, scientific, and technological solutions to problems faced by the average person.
Central thesis
The uniting thesis of his work was that pre-colonial ancient societies such as Sumeria, Indus Valley, Sri Lanka, Mesopotamia, etc., had complex science and technology, the content of which he developed utilizing available forms of evidence, including: archaeological, literary, mythological, and religious practices. These, he argued, were forms of true science, which involved a process of verification placing the human factor first, as opposed to what he called capitalist era pseudo-science, which uses profit as its measure of verification.