Shakuntala Devi: A Human Computer

This great personality known as the Human Computer has made a great contribution to the world. She was born on 4th November 1929 in a brahmin family in the city of Bangalore. Her extraordinary mathematical skills made her world famous at an early age. She inspired millions of students across the world. As her family's financial situation was not good, she had to drop out of school but she was a born genius and she did not give up on practicing and solving difficult maths problems without proper education. She used to participate in many maths related talent shows. She also used to visit different universities to give public performances. She brilliantly answered all the questions.

She was becoming famous over the period of time and started to earn bigger money even as a child. Slowly she started making her appearance overseas on larger platforms across the world. In 1950 she got fame in London with media with the BBC where she was awarded the title of Human-computer. She was known to be faster than computers in speed and accuracy.

Shakuntala Devi’s Contribution to Maths

Shakuntala Devi's contribution to Mathematics was Massive. She was a born Math Genius and millions of students across the world learned from her with her workshops in schools and colleges. She was known as Human-Computer.

In Dallas at Southern Methodist College, she calculated the 23rd cube root of 201digit number in 50 seconds giving the answer 546,372,891 in comparison to a UNIVAC 1101 computer which took more time to around 12 more seconds to do the same calculation.

At Imperial College London, 1980 she multiplied 7686369774870 and 2465099745779 calculating the 26-digit answer in 28 seconds. She holds Guinness Book of World Record for this fastest human computation.

At Stanford University US, 1988,

She calculated cube root of 95443993 as 457 in 2 seconds

As per New York Times “She could give you the cube root of 188,132,517 — or almost any other number — in the time it took to ask the question. If you gave her any date in the last century, she would tell you what day of the week it fell on”

The secret behind Shakuntala Devi’s learning, mathematical skills 

Shakuntala Devi was a born genius. She was totally a self-learner.  They used to travel a lot. Her contribution to Mathematics was huge. Card trick has helped her a lot to develop her calculation skills. When she was a teenager, she started travelling around the world.

Selected Writings of Shakuntala Devi

More Puzzles to Puzzle

Astrology for You

Book of Numbers 

Figuring: The Joy of Numbers

In the Wonderland of Numbers

Perfect Murder

Puzzles to Puzzle You

Super Memory: It Can Be Yours

Few interesting facts about Shakuntala Devi

Shakuntala Devi was given the title of Human Computer but she never liked it.

Her parents were poor; therefore she did not receive any proper schooling.

On her 84th birth anniversary, she was honoured with a Google Doodle.

She had fought Lok Sabha elections in 1980 against Indra Gandhi.

She was married to Paritosh Bannerjee who was  an IAS officer in 1960

She was also known for her astrological skills and wrote a book on astrology even.

Shakuntla Devi died at the age of 83 on 21 April 2013 in Bangalore. She had respiratory problems. 

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