Dr. Ajai Kumar Sonkar

Dr. Ajai Kumar Sonkar

Dr. Ajai Kumar Sonkar receives the Padma Shri award from President Kovind for science and engineering. He is a self-employed researcher in the area of marine aquaculture. He is a renowned scientist who invented methods for manufacturing pearls using cutting-edge tissue culture.

Who is Dr. Ajai Kumar Sonkar ?

Dr. Sonkar is the head of the Pearl Aquaculture Study Foundation and the primary investigator for this research objective. His work in creating pearl-making methods employing cutting-edge tissue culture has won him international acclaim.

Dr. Sonkar attended Allahabad University as an adolescent and majored in physics, chemistry, and mathematics with the goal of becoming an engineer. But it was a segment of an afternoon TV program on Doordarshan that sparked his interest in pearl culture.

Dr. Sonkar wanted to make pearls from oysters in freshwater, the way the Japanese did. While he realised soon that this would prove to be a strenuous task, he didn’t give up.

He successfully invented a technique to grow black pearls in freshwater in 1993, and as a result, he was given an invitation to the inaugural international conference on pearl culture. The expert has delivered lectures about pearl culture in at least 68 countries and has dozens of research articles to his credit that have been published in international journals.