Dr. S B Rao (83), the first pharmacy graduate from Kerala and one among the veteran Indian pharmaceutical industry professionals, died last week in Kochi.
A recipient of the Prof. M L Schroff Memorial National Award for the Eminent pharmacist in the year 1997, he was technical advisor to various pharmaceutical companies like Unichem, Cipla, Hidustan Latex, Jyothi Laboratoies etc. For last five years, he was associated with Arjuna Natural Extracts, a Kochi-based hytopharmaceutical company as research consultant.
Born in an orthodox Brahmin family from Mattancherry, Kochi, Dr. S B Rao took B Pharm in 1943, and M Pharm in 1944 from Banaras Hindu University. He had the privilege of studying under Prof M.L. Schroff, regarded as father of pharmacy education in India, and worked along with pharma professionals like Professor Paul Karrer (Zurich) and Professor H Von Euler (Stockholm), who later won Nobel Prize for Chemistry. Dr. Rao earned his doctorate in the Chemistry of Natural Products from Munich, Germany in 1953.
Later, he started the Navaratna Pharmaceutical Laboratories at Kochi and developed novel process for the manufacture of several natural products like berberine strychinine, brucine, curcumin, bixin etc. and commercial syntheses of diazepam, INH, Thiacetazone, purazinamide, caffeine derivatives etc. He also developed the process for the manufacture of Lactic acid and Dextran by fermentation. In the regulation of pharmacy profession, he served as member of Pharmacy Council of India for two decades (1966-89) and was in its executive committee for fifteen years. He was also instrumental in framing the education regulation acts of PCI.
He served the Kerala State Pharmacy Council as its member for long period and became its president for a term. He was in the Drug Technical Advisory Board, Drug Development Council, Drug and Equipment Standard Council. As a member of sub-committee of Indian Pharmacopoeia, he prepared Supplement to IP (1960) and 1966 edition of IP. He was the president of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry for the period 1963-'64.
He is survived by his wife Prameela Rao, and daughter Dr. Rithu Khemani, Senior Economic consultant of International Monetary Funds (IMF), Washington DC.