Here are some lesser known facts about Shakuntala Devi, the late human calculator whom Vidya Balan Is Essaying In Biopic and one who made it to the Guinness Book Of World Records.
(4 November 1929 – 21 April 2013)
She was born in a Hindu Brahmin family in Bangalore on 4 November, 1929.
Her father joined a circus instead of becoming a temple priest, and worked as a trapeze artist, lion tamer, tightrope walker, and magician.
Her father discovered her ability to memorize numbers when she was just three-year-old.
Shakuntala's father left the circus and took his daughter on road shows where he showed off her ability at calculation.
At age six, she displayed her arithmetic abilities at the University of Mysore.
Shakuntala & her father moved to London in 1944.
After showing her talent on BBC channel, she was titled as "Human Calculator" on 5 October 1950, but she never liked this title. She said, it is not appropriate to compare human minds with computer.
Shakuntala Devi is also credited to pioneer the study of homosexuality in India. She authored the book ‘The World of Homosexuals’. Also, in the documentary 'For Straights Only', Shakuntala said that she got interested in the topic because she was married to a homosexual man which ended in 1979.
In 1977, at Southern Methodist University, she gave the 23rd root of a 201-digit number in 50 seconds. The answer—546,372,891—was confirmed at the US Bureau of Standards by the UNIVAC 1101 computer.
On June 18, 1980, she demonstrated the multiplication of two 13-digit numbers—7,686,369,774,870 × 2,465,099,745,779—picked at random by the Computer Department of Imperial College London. She correctly answered 18,947,668,177,995,426,462,773,730 in 28 seconds.
In 1980, she even contested in the Lok Sabha elections as an independent, from Mumbai South and from Medak in part of Telangana (presently). She had then said that she wanted to "defend the people of Medak from being fooled by Mrs Gandhi". But she stood ninth, with 6514 votes.
Her talents earned her a place in the Guinness Book of World Records in the year 1982.
It was said she could outperformed the fastest computers of her times.
Brain Facts
She wrote many books and novels about puzzles, mathematics, and astrology.
Shakuntala Devi was also an astrologer and author of several other cookbooks and novels.
The first woman mathematician in India, Shakuntala Devi died in Bangalore on 21 April 2013 at the age of 83 due to cardiac and respiratory problems.
She is survived by her daughter Anupama Banerjee.
In the biopic film of Shakuntala Devi Actress Vidya Balan is essaying the role of the genius Indian mathematician who was popularly known as the 'Human Computer'. The film is directed by Anu Menon and is set release online on 31 July on Amazon Prime Videos OTT platform.
For more information and full review about the Shakuntala Devi's biopic by Vidya Balan, you can visit www.reviewguys.in
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