Sankar Kumar Pal (born 1950) is an Indian computer scientist. He has served as Director and is currently the president of the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), Kolkata. He is an ANRF Prime Minister Professor of the Government of India, currently hosted at IIIT Bhubaneswar. His research includes pattern recognition, image processing, fuzzy neural networks, rough fuzzy hybridization, soft computing, granular mining, and machine intelligence. His work focuses on fuzzy set theory, neuro-fuzzy systems, and rough-fuzzy computing for uncertainty modelling, with applications in pattern recognition, image processing, machine learning, knowledge-based systems, and data mining. He founded the Machine Intelligence Unit in 1993 and the Center for Soft Computing Research in 2004, both at ISI. He received the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Prize in 1990. In 2013, he was awarded the Padma Shri in Science and Engineering by the President of India for his contributions in machine intelligence.
Education and career Pal studied at the University of Calcutta, earning a BSc in physics (1969), a BTech (1972), and an MTech (1974) in radio physics and electronics. He received a PhD in radio physics and electronics from Rajabazar Science College, University of Calcutta in 1979 as a student of Indian Statistical Institute and another PhD in electrical engineering along with the Diploma of Imperial College from Imperial College London in 1982. His first PhD focused on pattern recognition, and the second on image processing. After his PhD at Imperial College London as a Commonwealth Scholar, he was a postdoctoral fellow (1982–1983) as a UK Medical Research Council Fellow. Pal worked at the University of California, Berkeley and University of Maryland, College Park (1986–1987) as a Fulbright Fellow, and at the NASA Johnson Space Center (1990–1992 and 1994) as a US National Research Council Senior Resident Research Associate. He also held visiting positions at the US Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, D.C., and several universities in Australia, Poland, Italy, France, New Zealand, Japan, and Hong Kong. He established collaborations with institutions such as University of Warsaw (1997–2017), University of Naples Federico II (2004–2020), INSEAD (2001–2013), and Hong Kong Polytechnic University (1999–2008). Pal joined Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), Kolkata, as a CSIR senior research fellow in 1975, became professor in 1987, distinguished scientist in 1998, director (2005–2010), and President (2022–2026). He retired from ISI as a distinguished scientist in 2015. He was the first computer scientist to serve as ISI director and the first former employee elected as ISI president. He has co-authored over 500 publications, 21 books, and 20 conference proceedings, holds two U.S. patents, and has served as editor for more than 20 journals in computer science and engineering. His book, Fuzzy Mathematical Approach to Pattern Recognition, published by John Wiley & Sons (Halsted Press), has been translated into Indonesian and Chinese. Pal introduced Soft Computing research in India in the mid-1990s. The Department of Science and Technology established the Center for Soft Computing Research (CSCR) in 2004 at ISI, with Pal as Principal Investigator. CSCR became an Associate Institute of ISI in 2010. During his directorship (2005–2010), ISI established the Chennai and North Eastern Centers and implemented revised pay scales for faculty. ISI also celebrated P.C. Mahalanobis’s birthday as National Statistics Day from 2006. Pal has served as founding president of the Indian National Academy of Engineering, Kolkata Chapter. The Biennial International Conference on Pattern Recognition and Machine Intelligence (PReMI) originated from the Machine Intelligence Unit of ISI, Kolkata in 2005 under his guidance.
Family Pal was born on 13 September 1950 to Sunity Kumar Pal and Parul Bala Pal. He is the second of five siblings and has two sons, Dhiman Sankar Pal and Anshuman Sankar Pal, with his wife, Amita Pal.
Awards and recognition Pal has received numerous awards, including:
… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.
