Robert Oppenheimer: 'father of atom bomb' who turned to Bhagvad Gita

Robert Oppenheimer is called the ‘father of the atom bomb’ for leading the team of scientists who developed the lethal weapon and tested it in 1945.

The man behind the ‘bomb to end all wars’, however, struggled to come to terms with the dangers he had helped unleash.

The first atom bomb was tested on July 16, 1945, in a New Mexico desert and less than a month later, two of them were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

In 1965, during an interview, Oppenheimer revealed that a line from Gita – ‘Now I am become death’ - had come to his mind when he saw the mushroom of smoke and gas after the Trinity Test explosion in New Mexico.

Oppenheimer had a keen interest in Hindu religious scriptures and had even learnt Sanskrit. He had read not just the Gita but also the Vedas.

Sylvan Schweber, a physicist who wrote a book on Oppenheimer said that he always kept a copy of Gita in his office and also gifted it to his friends.

'Inside the Centre', a biography of Oppenheimer, records that the scientist had once remarked he had not been able to find comfort from the consequences of his actions even in Krishna’s words on detachment in Gita.