The Rohini Godbole way of teaching, talking and engaging with students

Professor Rohini Godbole lived a simple life with “no arrogance,” says Sanjeeta Sharma Pokharel, an ecologist who had discussed everything but physics with Prof. Godbole during her postdoctoral stint at the Indian Institute of Science in 2021. Pokharel’s path crossed with Godbole in 2013 frequently before she met Godbole in person in 2021 to discuss her campus newsletter works.

“I started asking random questions that came to my mind such as what inspired her to be a physicist,” says Pokharel, now an associate professor at Kyoto University, and she would generously share her insights. Pokharel mostly found Godbole soft-spoken and wearing a demure salwar, kurta and chappal that went with her demeanour. Yet, the kind professor rarely minced words such as when it came to taking science beyond glass ceilings.

Pokharel’s recollection will resonate with many students who knew Rohini Godbole, pioneering particle physicist who passed away recently in Pune. Prof. Godbole joined the IISc in 1995 and retired as professor in 2018, as a teacher and faculty-mentor.

One of the issues that Prof. Godbole was personally invested in was how women often dealt with careers. “She was passionate about supporting women who had taken a break to come back to science and do research,” recalls Professor Annapoorni Subramaniam, who was a junior faculty at the now WISE-KIRAN committee with Prof. Godbole. Subramaniam is now Director of the Indian Institute of Astrophysics.

Prof. Godbole found the right balance when convincing both the student and the administrative side of the institute to help finish the research quickly.  “She would make sure to tell the women candidates that they have a mentor for a purpose, but they had to carry out their own research and carry forward their own ideas,” Subramaniam recalls.

Ritesh Kumar Singh, the first PhD student of Prof. Godbole in IISc, vividly remembers that Prof. Godbole always insisted on accepting one’s ignorance rather than being in denial about the situation when one was stuck midway through their research. According to Singh, this acceptance is the first step to finding a solution. “You have to acknowledge that there is a problem, not just in our understanding of physics but also society in general,” says Singh, now an associate professor in the Physics Department at the Indian Institute of Science, Kolkata. 

Singh, as a PhD student with Prof. Godbole, interacted with the accomplished physicist in 1999. He felt it was his good fortune that he could have sessions one-on-one with her in which Prof. Godbole generously shared her vast knowledge and wisdom. “We sat across the table, and I had to show what calculations I had done on paper. And then she’ll say you made a mistake, and write out the entire solution on that same piece of paper,” Singh remembers. 

Sandeep Chatterjee, now an assistant professor at the Department of Physics, IISER Berhampur, recalls the first occasion he met Prof. Godbole during his PhD interview at IISc. He was stuck midway through answering a fundamental question on differential equations. “Prof. Godbole came to my rescue. She asked if I could talk about how the solution will look like without getting into the nitty gritty. I could readily do that, and that saved my day. I eventually got admitted,” says Chatterjee. 

“When I first began to pursue high-energy physics, I was more mathematically inclined. But over time, I learned something important from her: in physics, we’re dealing with natural phenomena, so there’s always an essential component of observation and experimentation,” Chatterjee said. He learned from Prof. Godbole that the understanding of experimentation, detection methods, the latest data, confidence levels, and which data supports which theories are essential. This expertise doesn’t come quickly; it requires years of hard work and can’t be taught directly. “She showed me the importance of recognizing when data supports one theory or another and where tensions exist between competing data points for any theory to hold up.”

The phenomenologist’s insights

“In high-energy physics, we have a term for experts like her. We call them ‘phenomenologists’ who can combine the knowledge gained from theoretical and experimental studies leading to insightful results. She was by far one of the best I’ve come across.” This insight, Chatterjee believes, comes from Godbole’s trait of being meticulous. “I remember once, in the early days, she showed me her diary from an international visit. She had meticulously recorded each detail — who she met with, at what time, and the ideas they discussed. It was impressive to see how organized her approach was, with every thought and interaction noted. It reminded me that there really are no shortcuts to mastery,” says Chatterjee 

As Pokharel, Singh, and Subramaniam put it, Prof. Godbole’s energy and enthusiasm helped her put her heart and soul into everything she engaged with. “Even until recently, she was still traveling. I could see that she was struggling compared to how she was 24 years ago. But she would say, ‘What can I do? People ask me to do small things, and if I can manage, I say yes,’” says Singh

“When our department and institute requested her to be the chief guest at the convocation in June, she agreed and travelled all the way from Bengaluru to be here,” he recalls.

During the awards ceremony, Singh clearly remembers, she stood to honour every student, even though Singh encouraged her to sit and assured her that not every award needed to be presented with her standing. “Still, she insisted. She wanted to maintain the decorum and tradition of the event.”