Dr Gill fondly remembered
Manav Mander
Tribune News Service
Ludhiana, September 17
He was an epitome of a teacher who possesses knowledge about each and every detail of his subject. You name the plant and he knew its characteristics. Despite being rich in knowledge and being awarded Padma Bhushan in 1992, he was a down-to-earth man.
We are talking about none other than Dr Khem Singh Gill, former vice-chancellor of Punjab Agricultural University (PAU) who passed away this morning at Hero Heart Institute. He was 89. He is survived by a daughter and two sons.
Dr Gill was also the vice-president of The Kalgidhar Trust, a Sikh charity organisation.
Dr Gill was a great academician and researcher who did remarkable work in the development and identification of improved cultivars of wheat, which revolutionised wheat production in Punjab and several other parts of India and Pakistan.
A condolence meeting was also held on the PAU campus today.
Dr Baldev Singh Dhillon, Vice-Chancellor of PAU, said today, they had lost a great scientist and great academician in whose footsteps they would like to follow.
“He was a man of great knowledge. The void created by him can never be filled and the kind of knowledge he had about plants can never be possessed by anyone,” said Dr Dhillon.
He devoted his life to the service of mankind. An epitome of humility and unending dedication, Dr Gill with his stature stands tall among the Indians world over,” said Dr RS Sidhu, Registrar of PAU.
Dr Sardara Singh Johl, a renowned agriculture economist, sharing about Dr Gill who was also his colleague at PAU, said he was a man who possessed huge knowledge.
“He would know each and every minute detail of the plants and never missed any detail. He was a great man, whom I had a long association with. The loss create by his death is huge and can never be filled,” said Johl.
Roop Lal sharma, retired Horticulture Sub-inspector from PAU, said he was a man of word, possessed vast knowledge but yet he was a down-to-earth man. “Once I went to meet him at his farm house and I was astonished to see him washing his own clothes at the tubewell. If he decided anything, then nobody was able to change it. He was a very humble man and I was taken away by his hospitality,” he added.
Dr Gill was also the founding trustee of The Kalgidhar Trust along with Baba Iqbal Singh. As Director of the Akal Academies, he set up the first academy at Muktsar in Punjab in 1993. This wave of setting up academies continued over the years, and today there are 117 Akal Academies functioning in Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh. Dr Gill remained the Director of these academies.
MAJOR CONTRIBUTIONS
- He and his team developed 16 wheat varieties and one of his landmark achievements in wheat improvement was the development and release of WL 711 variety of bread wheat in 1976 which remained predominant variety for 10 years.
- Dr Gill played key role in breeding disease resistant hybrids in pearl millet. Under his leadership, several high-yielding hybrids resistant to major fungal diseases were released for commercial cultivation.
- Earlier at the start of his career, Dr Gill developed improved cultivars of linseed and sesame. He initiated and strengthened teaching and research programmes in Genetics at Hisar and Ludhiana campuses of PAU.
Awards and Honours
Dr Gill was the recipient of Rafi Ahmad Kidwai Memorial Prize (1976), Team Research Award by ICAR (1981), FICCI Award (1985), Appreciation Awards by the United States Department of Agriculture, Washington (1981, 1987 and 1991), Medals for Wheat Research and as a Trustee of the Board by the Mexican Government, CIMMYT, Mexico (1973 and 1993), Golden Jubilee Awards by ICAR (1991), Padma Bhushan by the Government of India (1992) and Silver Jubilee Award by the Indian Society of Oilseed Research (1993).
