The Nobel Prize recognises individuals whose work has profoundly advanced our understanding of humanity across science, literature, peace and economics.
Established through Swedish chemist, engineer, inventor Alfred Nobel's will, each Laureate receives a medal, a formal citation and a monetary award decided by the Nobel Foundation.
Who have been India's Laureates, winners from India or of Indian-origin?
Mahatma Gandhi never received a Nobel.
Writer Rudyard Kipling and Dr Ronald Ross, who worked on malaria, do not make it to our list, although they were born in Bombay and Almora respectively in British India.
1. Rabindranath Tagore, 1913, Literature
A poet who dissolved borders with profound words like:
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth.
Tagore's verses carried emotion, philosophy and quiet rebellion, opening Western literature to the soul of the East, in English, yet unmistakably Indian.
2. C V Raman, 1930, Physics
A split moment of light became a lifetime of discovery.
Raman revealed how light transforms when it travels through matter, a breakthrough so fundamental, the phenomenon now carries his name.
3. Har Gobind Khorana, 1968, Medicine
Khorana was a Raipur-born Indian-American biochemist, specialised in field of genetics and molecular biology, whose research decoded how genetic sequences control protein formation, earning him the 1968 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Dr Khorana was awarded jointly with Robert W Holley and Marshall W Nirenberg 'for their interpretation of the genetic code and its function in protein synthesis'.
4. Mother Teresa, 1979, Peace
The Albanian-born nun, who became an Indian citizen, was recognised for her lifelong devotion to society's most vulnerable and marginalised.
She harnessed compassion, transforming it into action by offering dignity, care, love and hope to those living in extreme hardship.
5. Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, 1983, Physics
An Indian-American theoretical physicist, who was born in Lahore in British India, his work reshaped our understanding of how stars are born, how they change over time and how black holes form.
His exceptional research earned him the 1983 Nobel Prize in Physics, which he shared with William A Fowler.
6. Amartya Sen, 1998, Economics
Professor Sen shifted the global lens from income to human capability, making freedom, health and dignity the true measures of development.
An economist and a philosopher, with a staunch belief in welfare economics, Santiniketan-raised Sen has lived, worked and taught in both England and the US.
7. Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul, 2001, Literature
Indian-origin V S Naipaul won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2001 'for having united perceptive narrative and incorruptible scrutiny in works that compel us to see the presence of suppressed histories'.
Naipaul has published more than 30 books, both of fiction and nonfiction, over some 50 years. Born in Chaguanas, Trinidad, his grandparents migrated to the Caribbean from British India.
8. Kailash Satyarthi, 2014, Peace
Commended for his courageous fight against child exploitation, the Vidisha-born activist is crusader against child labour.
His efforts through a large and impactful movement restored freedom to countless young lives and reinforced education as a universal right.
9. Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, 2009, Chemistry
Honoured for revealing the inner workings of the ribosome -- both structure and functions.
The British-American scientist, who was born in Chidambaram, is a structural biologist.
Read an interview with him here: 'It would have been difficult to pursue research had I remained in India'
10. Abhijit Banerjee, 2019, Economics
Honoured for reshaping development economics, the Mumbai-born Indian-American economist, using evidence-based methods, offered practical solutions to reduce deprivation and improve lives across the developing world.
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