Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam, born on 15th October, 1931 in a small village in

Rameswaram in Tamil Nadu, rose to become the President of India. Even though he came
from a poor and humble background, his desire to contribute to society never faded from
his vision. He specialized in Aeronautical Engineering from Madras Institute of Technology.
Dr. Kalam joined the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) as a
scientist. In 1969, Dr. Kalam was transferred to the Indian Space Research Organisation
(ISRO).

In 1963 to 1964, he visited NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia; Goddard
Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland; and Wallops Flight Facility.[11][27] Between the
1970s and 1990s, Kalam made an effort to develop the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV)
and SLV-III projects, both of which proved to be successful.

In 1998, along with cardiologist Soma Raju, Kalam developed a low cost coronary stent,
named the "Kalam-Raju Stent".[35][36] In 2012, the duo designed a rugged tablet computer
for health care in rural areas, which was named the "Kalam-Raju Tablet".[37]

Contribution of APJ Abdul Kalam to ISRO

Dr Kalam was part of the Indian National Committee for Space Research (INCOSPAR), which
was set up by Dr. Vikram Sarabhai, father of Indian space programme. INCOSPAR, the team
of rocket engineers of which Kalam was a part, set up the Thumba Equatorial Rocket
Launching Station (TERLS) that is used by ISRO to launch sounding rockets even today.

At a time when India had hardly dreamt of its own Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV), Dr. Kalam
made significant contribution as Project Director to develop India's first indigenous Satellite
Launch Vehicle (SLV-III) which successfully injected the Rohini satellite in the near earth
orbit in July 1980 and made India an exclusive member of Space Club. Kalam has also played
a contributory role in the development of Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).

After the success of the SLV programme, Dr. Kalam also became the director of two
projects, Project Devil and Project Valiant, which aimed at developing ballistic missiles from
the technology of SLV programme. In the 1970s, the goal of Project Devil was to produce a
short-range surface-to-air missile. Although discontinued in 1980 without achieving full
success, Project Devil, led to the later development of the Prithvi missile.

He took up the responsibility of developing Indigenous Guided Missiles at DRDO.

After working for two decades in ISRO and mastering launch vehicle technologies, Dr. Kalam
took up the responsibility of developing Indigenous Guided Missiles at Defence Research
and Development Organisation as the Chief Executive of Integrated Guided Missile
Development Programme (IGMDP) in 1983. The programme led to the development of four
projects namely Short range surface-to-surface missile (Prithvi), Short range low-level
surface-to-air missile (Trishul), Medium range surface-to-air missile (Akash) and Third-
generation anti-tank missile (Nag).

Under the leadership of Abdul Kalam, the project of IGMDP proved to be successful by
producing missiles like first Prithvi missile in 1988 and then the Agni missile in 1989. Due to
his contribution he was known as "Missile Man of India."

This also earned him the title of 'Missile Man of India'.

He was the brain behind multiple nuclear tests carried out at Pokhran in 1998 which made
India a nuclear weapon state.

Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam was the Scientific Adviser to the Defence Minister of India between
1992 and 1999 when India went ahead with the nuclear explosions at Pokhran. He
supervised the Pokhran II explosions as the CEO of DRDO. While camping in the Thar desert
for over a fortnight, he said:

"The testing was a 'defining moment' in the country's history, next only to adopting the path
of economic liberalisation in 1991."