A rare instance of a Shishya pointing out the error of the Guru and the Guru acknowledging it.

Rarely does one come across an instance when a Shishya points his Guru a mistake is the Guru’s work. Here is one such instance. Having beeng pointed the error, the Guru is gracious in accepting his error and thanks his Shishya for pointing it out.

Dr. Swamy the Shishya and Nobel Laureate Paul Samuelson, the Guru

I recently came across a treasure trove of correspondences between Nobel Laureate – Paul Samuelson and his genius student – Dr Swamy. It paints a vivid memory of academic rigour and gentleness that existed amongst the elites of world economics. During the correspondences we can see that Paul Samuelson treats Dr. Swamy as his own, looks for his welfare during the emergency and advises him to hold on to the academic chair as politics is a chancey trade.

Their correspondences extend for the period of 1965-2003 and cover various topics of development in the field of Economics, Harvard, India – China income measures, GDP measurements, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Indian elections etc.,

Amongst those correspondences, I found an interesting piece where Dr Swamy gets surprised by the claim made by his professor. (Ref, Mar 14, 1968, Harvard University, Department of Economics)

Caught by surprise, Paul Samuelson acknowledges Dr Swamy’s point and went to add on further and expresses that he is grateful for writing it to him.

Later in 1984, while writing on an economic journal, Paul Samuelson went to acknowledge the contribution of Dr. Swamy made in 1976 to an economic journal on the same area – Ref – Second Thoughts on Analytical Income Comparisons – Paul A Samuelson – https://www.jstor.org/stable/2232349

Not to forget, Paul Samuelson got the Nobel Prize in 1970 and upon achieving the rare feat and co-authored paper with his favourite student – Dr Swamy in 1974, Invariable Economic Index Numbers and Canonical duality, which is quoted as the Authority in the fields of Monetary policy.

Mentorship is a lasting gift and it is fortunate that Dr. Swamy got it from Paul Samuelson and we are fortunate to get it from Dr. Swamy as well.

Note:

1. The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of PGurus.