Eugene Lafont

Eugene Lafont (26 March 1837, Mons, Hainaut, Belgium - 10 May 1908, Darjeeling, India) was a Belgian Jesuit, Missionary in Bengal, scientist and founder of the first Scientific Society in India.

Formation and early years

After secondary studies in the Jesuit High School of Mons, Lafont entered the novitiate of the Society of Jesus in Ghent (1854). He then went through the usual Jesuit formation, with period of pedagogical experiences as teacher in Ghent (1857-59) and Liège (1862-63) and years of philosophical formation (Tournai) and a degree in natural sciences in Namur (1863-65). In Namur he showed already a particular aptitude for physical experimentation. In 1865 Lafont left for India where he arrived, in Calcutta the 4 December 1865.

Meteorology at St. Xavier's College, Calcutta

Soon after arriving in the capital city of British India Lafont was appointed to teach science. St. Xavier's College, Calcutta, was hardly 5 years old and everything had to be done. However he could not think of teaching science without practical experiments; he promptly installed a laboratory in the college, probably the first such science laboratory of modern India. Within two years he made headlines in the local press: in November 1867, thanks to a makeshift observatory set on the roof of the college he recorded daily meteorological observations which allowed him to anticipate with much accuracy the arrival of a devastating cyclone. The government authorities were informed and took immediate measures that prevented the loss of many human lives. From that day meteorological forecasts of Lafont were regularly published in the widely read weekly paper of Calcutta: the "Indo-European Correspondence".

cientific Lectures

As soon as he was at ease in English (1870) Lafont began to give scientific lectures for the general public: he had a particular gift in popularizing scientific knowledge. All the new scientific discoveries and inventions of the second half of the 19th century were thus made known, always with empirical evidence. So was it of the magic lantern, the telephone, phonograph, the X-rays, photography, etc. Through contacts the science enthusiast had brought from Europe the most modern scientific tools, such as the meteograph of Angelo Secchi (Meteorology remained his favourite field of activity). The lectures had a huge success and came to an end only with the departure of Lafont for Darjeeling, a few months before his death of Lafont, in 1908.

A the time Lafont was rector of St. Xavier’s College (1874) a high level international scientific expedition visited Calcutta on its way to Midnapore (a town south-west of Calcutta) in order to observe a very rare astronomical phenomenon: the passage of planet Venus before the Sun. Lafont joined the group. His perspicacious observations made him known internationally and he obtained without difficulty the financial help needed in order to build on the college’s premises an astronomical observatory equipped with the most modern telescope (1875).

The Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science

With the financial support of philanthropist Mahendra Lal Sircar, whose friend he was since 1869, Lafont founded in 1876 the "Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science". The first aim of the association was to disseminate scientific knowledge and keep the general public abreast with the latest scientific progresses. From its early days the Thursday evening lectures of Eugene Lafont were one of the Association’s main activities. Later it developed into a center of research which supported, among others, the spectrographic investigations of C.V. Raman (1930 Nobel Prize in Physics) and of K.S. Krishnan.

Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858-1937) was another student, and later friend, of Lafont. When Bose discovered the ‘wireless telegraphy’ (at the source of radiophonic inventions) it is Lafont who made in Calcutta (1897) a public demonstration of this discovery. For Lafont there was no doubt that Bose had preceded the Italian Guglielmo Marconi in this discovery. He never failed to give due credit to his former student.

In fact Lafont was more of a genial pedagogue than a research scholar or inventor. His competence and multifarious activities gave him a place in the University of Calcutta of which he was a Senate member for many years. Thanks to him the importance of the study of science in the University was acknowledged: he prepared the science syllabus and in 1903 obtained from the ‘Indian Universities Commission’ more substantial means for the setting up of laboratories and the improvement of the science courses. In 1908, a few months before his death, he received a Doctorate in Sciences "Honoris Causa" from the University of Calcutta.

Evaluation

Lafont was an extraordinary science enthusiast. He was also a man of faith. As the Catholic Church at that time had a very negative image in the world of science, Lafont had to give an account of himself before scientists who expressed surprise. "Though Catholic and priest, I may well tell you that I receive with profound joy, and even love, every progress made in science". He was not blind to the dangers of the widespread ‘scientism' of his times and what he said when radium was discovered may well be premonitory: "These discoveries must make us cautious. We shouldn’t easily believe that we are in possession of a final certainty in what concerns Matter and the forces of nature in general. It is a noble and wonderful to say: ‘I do not know’".

References

*VERSTRAETEN, Achille: "A Jesuit physicist and Astronomer", in Jesuit profiles, Anand, 1991.