Ranjit Roy Chaudhury was born on April 11, 1930, and died on October 27, 2015.
Ranjit Roy Chaudhury was an Indian clinical pharmacologist, medical academic and health planner, who headed the National Committee for formulating the policy and guidelines on drugs and clinical trials in India.
He was the chairman of the joint programme of the World Health Organization and Government of India for Rational Use of Drugs in India.
Ranjit was the founder president of the Delhi Medical Council and the president of the Delhi Society for Promotion of Rational Use of Drugs.
A recipient of the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award and the Dr. B. C. Roy Award, Chaudhury was awarded the fourth highest civilian award of the Padma Shri by the Government of India, in 1998.
Ranjit’s graduate studies in medicine were at the Prince of Wales Medical College, Patna.
Later, he secured the doctoral degree of DPhil from Oxford University and joined the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Delhi in 1958 and served as an assistant professor till 1960, when he moved to Ciba-Geigy Research Center, Mumbai as a professor of pharmacology.
In 1964, Ranjit was appointed as the Head of the Department of Pharmacology at the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh.
Ranjit served the institution as its Dean and superannuated in 1980 as its Director, during which time he started a DM course in Clinical Pharmacology, a first time for India.
Ranjit passed away at age 85 in October 2015.