In 1903, in the  small town of Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu, a 16 year old boy borrowed a book from a  friend titled A Synopsis of Elementary Results in Pure and Applied Mathematics.  It was a collection of 5000 theorems. He absorbed the book in such detail, that  a year later he had independently developed and investigated the Bernoulli  numbers and had calculated the Euler-Mascheroni constant up to 15 decimal  places. 

This genius of a  lad went on to become the mathematical genius that India is so proud of.  Srinivasa Ramanujan Iyengar. Life was not a bed of roses for this guru of  numbers. From suffering illness to failing in exams (yes, his obsession with  math didn't give him time to look at other subjects), living in unemployment to  hovering on the brink of starvation... Ramanujan had seen it all. 

Then he was  discovered. His talent shone and he headed to Cambridge where his collaboration  with English Mathematician G.H Hardy became a famous one. In the peak of his  career, Ramanujan's health deteriorated and at the young age of 32 he passed  away. 

Till today, his  home state of Tamil Nadu celebrates 22 December (his birthday) as 'State IT  Day' and a stamp picturing Ramanujan was released by the Government of Indian  in 1962 honoring his 75^th birth anniversary.  IIT Madras also celebrates his birthday by  organizing a National Symposium on Mathematical Methods and Applications by  inviting eminent Indian and foreign scholars. In 2011, December 22^nd  was christened National Mathematics Day by then Prime Minister Dr Manmohan  Singh.

Almost a century  after Ramanujan discoveries, his outstanding contribution to mathematical  analysis, number theory, infinite series and continued fractions is still  respected in the number fraternity. 

This is a SoulPrints tribute to Srinivasa Ramanujan Iyengar.