Sri Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya [15 September 1860 – 14 April 1962]

Father of INDIAN engineering…The great legend Visvesvaraya is again from south INDIA.

Sri Visvesvaraya was born in the state of Karnataka and is popularly known as Sir MV. He is a notable Indian engineer, scholar, statesman and the Diwan of Mysore during 1912 to 1918. He was a recipient of the Indian Republic's highest honour, the Bharat Ratna, in 1955. He was knighted as a Commander of the British Indian Empire by King George V for his myriad contributions to the public good. Every year, 15 September is celebrated as Engineer's Day in India in his memory. He is held in high regard pre-eminent engineer of India. He was the chief designer of the flood protection system for the city of Hyderabad, as well as the chief engineer responsible for the construction of the Krishna Raja Sagara dam in Mysore.

        Visvesvaraya was born on September 15th 1860,in a Telugu brahmin family to Mokshagundam Srinivasa Shastry and Venkatalakshmamma in Muddenahalli village, 40 miles from Bangalore, Mysore State (now Karnataka), India.

He earned his Bachelor of Arts from Central College, Bangalore and later studied civil engineering at the prestigious College of Engineering, Pune.

After his graduation, Visvesvaraya took up a job with the Public Works Department (PWD) of Mumbai and was later invited to join the Indian Irrigation Commission. He also designed and patented a system of automatic weir water floodgates that were first installed in 1903 at the Khadakvasla Reservoir near pune. These gates were employed to raise the flood supply level of storage in the reservoir to the highest level likely to be attained by a flood without causing any damage to the dam. Based on the success of these gates, the same system was installed at the Tigra Dam in Gwalior and the Krishna Raja Sagara (KRS) Dam in Mandya/ Mysore, Karnataka.

Career :

• Joined service as Assistant Engineer in Bombay, 1884; served in Nasik, Khandesh and Poona;
• Services lent to Municipality of Sukkur in Sind, 1894: designed and carried out the water works of that Municipality, 1895.
•  Executive Engineer, Surat, 1896;
• Assistant Superintending Engineer, Poona, 1897–99; visited China and Japan, 1898;
• Executive Engineer for Irrigation, Poona, 1899;
•  Sanitary Engineer, Bombay, and Member, Sanitary Board, 1901; gave evidence before the Indian Irrigation Commission, 1901;
• designed and constructed Automatic Gates patented by him at Lake Fife Storage Reservoir; introduced a new system of irrigation known as the "Block System", 1903; represented the Bombay Government at the Simla Irrigation Commission, 1904; on special duty, 1905;
•  Superintending Engineer, 1907; visited Egypt, Canada. United States of America and Russia, 1908;
• Services lent as Special Consulting Engineer, Hyderabad, to supervise and carry out engineering works in connection with the Musi floods, 1909;
• Chief Engineer and Secretary to the Government of Mysore, 1909;
• Dewan of Mysore, P. W. and Railway Department, 1913.

After taking a voluntary retirement in 1908, he took up a foreign tour to study industrialized nations and then after for a short period he worked for Nizams of Hyderabad

He had received many awards and recognition's for his contributions.