Abstract
FEW men of science in Great Britain know that an Indian, Ardaseer Cursetjee (Wadia), was admitted into the fellowship of the Royal Society so early as 1841. The following information was given to Prof. A. V. Hill, biological secretary of the Royal Society, by Colonel S. L. Bhatia, of the Indian Medical Service, who obtained details from Sir R. P. Masani of Bombay. In the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of 1865 he appears as "Ardeseer Cursetjee, Esquire, of Bombay" and as the first Indian elected a fellow of the Royal Society in the records of that Society. There is corroboration in "History of the Lodge Rising Star of Western India" by D. F. Wadia. "It was at the very meeting (of the Lodge) held at the Town Hall on 15 December 1843, that four gentlemen were proposed for initiation to be ballotted for at the next meeting. They were Mr. Ardeseer Cursetjee Wadia (the first native gentleman admitted a Fellow of the Royal Society, who had a great engineering reputation and was at this time Chief Engineer in the Government Dockyard) and Messrs. Mirza Ali Mahomed Shoostry, Hajee Hasham Ishphanee and Mahomed Jaffer, who were leading Mogul Mahomedan merchants of the day."
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Ardaseer Cursetjee (Wadia), F.R.S. Nature 153, 706–707 (1944). https://doi.org/10.1038/153706d0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/153706d0