Dr.Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan

–    Dr.Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan was born in Tirutani on 5th September 1888 into a poor Brahmin family. His father sarvepalli veeraswami was employed on a mearge salary in the zamindari. His mother’s name was sitamma. It was a mearge income and to take care of a large family.

                Radhakrishnan went through most of his education on scholarships. He initially went to school in Tirutani and then to the Lutheran mission school in Tirupati for his high school. He joined the voorhee’s college in Vellore but switched to the Madras Christian College at the age in 17. 

He choose philosophy as his major and attained a B.A and M.A. in the field. He was afraid that his M.A. thesis “The ethics of the vedanta” would offend his philosophy professor Dr.A.G. Hogg instead Dr.Hogg commented Radhakrishnan on doing an excellent job. Radhakrishnan’s M.A. thesis was published when he was only 20  Radhakrishnan was married to sivakamuamma at the age of 16. 

                While still in Vellore, Radhakrishnan’s accepted an assistant lectureship at Madras Presidency college in 1909.while at the mastered the classics of Hindu philosophy, namely the Upanishads, Bhagvad Gita, Brahmasutra and commentary of Sankara, Ramunuja and Madhava. He also acquainted himself with Buddhists and Jain philosophy. At the same time he read philosophical commentaries of plato, Plotinus, Kant, Bradly and Bergson, later on in his life, he studied marxism and existentialism. 

                 Dr.  Radhakrishnan died on 17April 1975.