Pranav Mistry, among the top 10 tech-brains of the world, believes Gujarat has shaped him into what he is today.
For close to two decades now, diamond traders from Palanpur have dominated the four diamond bourses at Antwerp – earning the Belgium town the tag of global hub for the precious carbon.
Palanpur now has its own gem, which is shining on like a crazy diamond, in the tech-sky of the world. Meet Pranav Mistry, head of Think Tank Team at Samsung Research America, who has conceptualised, devised and launched Samsung Galaxy Gear ‘smartwatch’ – hailed as harbinger of wearable computing. He is also credited with Project Akshar (bringing Indian scripts to cellphones) and SixthSense among several other bordering-on-the-sci-fi inventions.
Mistry now lives in and works from Cupertino in California, USA but that hasn’t disconnected him from the land. He is mighty proud of his upbringing in Gujarat, which was in full display when this scribe spoke with over the phone. “If I were to take a rebirth, I would want it to be in Palanpur,” said Mistry. “When I have kids in the future, I would want them to grow in such an environment. I come from a family of architects and there wasn’t ever a time I felt I should move out of Palanpur for ‘better opportunities’.”
The Palanpur boy is impressed by the robust infrastructure of Gujarat but believes that much of the potential in rural areas lies unharnessed. “I’m in touch with the chief minister (Narendra Modi) and the cabinet. I interacted with them at length, the last time I was there, about prospects of information technology in the state. I’m always open to invitation for any kind of help,” he said.
Mistry also doesn’t rule out a Gujarat sojourn in future; for, he believes in being on the move. “The future might even bring me to Gujarat to start an IT firm on the Amul model and assist the state and the state government in the tech-sphere.” He was in Gujarat in February this year, and is expected to come visiting again in early 2014.
Impact of Akshar left him speechless
“The Indian scripts that we see on cellphones today are a result of ‘Project Akshar’ – a project I was working on during my IIT days to bring about change in Rural India. I was on a bus ride en route Palanpur from Ahmedabad – coming home for holidays… It was nighttime and my co-passenger was a farmer. We started talking, like it’s on a long journey, and then, he took out his cellphone and showed me how he could now send messages in gujarati – a pride in his voice. I just nodded; speechless, surprised, moved at how a software developed by me has reached who it was meant for. Perhaps, it was only logical that the Gear gets all major Indian languages from the outset.
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