Team Members
Dr.Prakasam Tata, Ph.D., BCES, QEP (Emeritus)
President
Dr. Prakasam Tata was born in Vizianagaram on January 5, 1936. Up until 1953, his early education was in Vizianagaram, where he received his Bachelor’s degree in Science from M. R. College, Viziangaram.
After receiving his Masters degree in 1955 from Nagpur University, Dr. Prakash Tata worked in rural areas of West Bengal and Maharashtra on Rural Water Supply and sanitation problems for 7 years until 1962. In 1966, Dr. Tata after receiving his Ph.D. from Rutgers University, NJ, joined the faculty of Cornell University and worked on water quality and animal waste management problems and published several papers and reports. In 1974 he joined the Research and Development Department of the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago. In 2002 Dr. Tata retired as the Assistant Director and Head of the Environmental Monitoring and Research Division and managed a group of 85 persons including 12 Ph.Ds, many postgraduate scientists and engineers and 7 secretarial staff members.
He presented numerous papers at regional, national, and international meetings, and published more than 150 papers and reports. He coauthor- ed four books, and received several awards. Dr. Tata led various committees of the Water Environment Federation, and organized seminars, workshops, and conferences on topical subject areas related to environmental pollution (air, water, and land) and water quality. He also served as an Adjunct and Research Professor at the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago. He served as an advisor and consultant to the National Academy of Sciences, USAID, UNDP, World Bank and several industries. During his advisory missions he visited Egypt, Tunisia, Iraq, Kuwait, Japan, India, Honduras, and Thailand. In June 2013, 2014 and 2015, he went to Lisbon, Portugal, Sydney, Australia, and Sao Paulo, Brazil to attend the Rotary International Conventions and to participate in the Water and Sanitation Rotary Activity Group (WASRAG) Workshops. Also, on other lectures and tours, he visited Germany, Italy, England, Greece, and Australia. He speaks fluently in four different languages, i.e., English, Telugu, Hindi, and Bengali.
Dr. Tata is nominated and is accepted as a Board Certified Environmental Scientist (BCES) by Eminence by the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists (AAEES). Also, he is voted as a Qualified Environmental Professional (QEP -Emeritus) by the Institute of Professional Environmental Practice. He was also the Chair of the Board of Editorial Review of Water Environment Research, an international journal published by the Water Environment Federation.
Dr. Tata is currently serving as Distinguished Professor of Environmental Sciences and Health in the Department of Community Medicine at the Maharajah Institute of Medical Sciences, Nellimarla, Viziangaram District, Andhra Pradesh, India. Currently he is also serving as the Executive Director of the Center for Waste Transformation Technology, Wheaton, IL, which is a nonprofit organization and works on projects related to environmental education and awareness and use of wastes as resources. Dr. Tata is currently serving as the President, Bharathi Theertha, Naperville, IL USA and Vice President, Bharathi Theertha, Vizianagaram, A.P. India.
Although Dr. Tata has been living in the USA for more than five decades, he visited India and other developing countries numerous times. Under the banner of Bharathi Theertha, he is currently working on issues relating to the education, environment and health of poor children and adults alike and on issues related to air, water, and land pollution.
Dr. Tata designed a wastewater treatment system to remediate the pollution of a man-made lake of 170 acres located in Vizianagaram, and got it built by the local administration.
As a Rotarian, Dr. Tata has completed in 2010 a project on water-sanitation in a village near Vizianagaram to provide safe water supply and hygienic sanitation facilities on a 24/7 basis to 400 poor villagers. He also implemented a solar light project in 2011 in the homes of eight poor villages in Uttar Pradesh, India, which do not have electricity. During 2013, another project is completed in the homes of the same eight villages by providing smokeless stoves. Briquettes made with agricultural residues and animal manures with a hand and electrically operated briquetting machines will be used as fuel in these stoves.
In August 2014, Dr. Tata went to Honduras on a Rotary International Foundation mission to evaluate the water-sanitation of the communities living in Merendon mountainous region of San Pedro Sula. Hopefully, the recommendations made will materialize in a Global Grant of the Rotary International Foundation to construct water-sanitation facilities for the poor of 65 communities.
In 2015, a computer training school was started in Vizianagaram under the auspices of Bharathi Theertha, a nonprofit organization registered both in Viziangaram, India and Naperville, IL USA to educate poor boys and girls, who do not have access to computers. New computers and terminals were put in place.
The Rotary Club of Naperville named Dr. Tata as the Rotarian of the Year in 2010 and 2012. He also led a Group Study Exchange Team from Rotary District 6450 to Rotary District 3060, India in 2012. The American Telugu Association honored Dr. Tata for scientific eminence in the field of wastewater treatment and allied fields at its annual conference in 2008. During 2008 he also sponsored the visit of the Principal of the M R Music College, Vizianagaram, A.P. India along with two other artists to accompany him on violin and mridangam. Under the auspices of Bharathi Theertha, he also sponsored the visit of Ms. SaiPadma Bellana, victim of polio from her birth, to study how the physically challenged people are served in the USA under the Americans with Disability Act of the US government. The Chicago Telugu Association honored Dr. Tata as the Outstanding Telugu Person at its annual conference held in 2009 for his voluntary service.
Dr. Tata has given his ancestral home in Vizianagaram, A.P. India rent-free to a music and dance school, where 5 to 16 year-old boys and girls are taught classical music and dance. Although students pay the Director of the school a paltry sum of about $1.75 per student per month as the tuition fee, the Director and her staff teach about 70 students gratis as they cannot afford to pay even this amount.
Dr. Tata is reviving a cultural and educational institution, Bharathi Theertha, a non-profit organization which was established in 1924 in Vizianagaram, A.P. In 2006, Bharathi Theertha was also registered as a 501 C 3 Corporation in Illinois to improve the education, environment and health of the poor in Andhra Pradesh and to support charitable and community activities in DuPage County, IL USA.
Bharathi Theertha has recently (July 2015), adopted Devada, a village in Kotthavalasa Mandalam of Vizianagaram District, Andhra Pradesh, India. It is its first village for adoption under the Smart A.P. program, Sectoral Category.