Ramanujan was an Indian mathematician. With almost no formal training in pure mathematics, he made substantial contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series, and continued fractions, including solutions to mathematical problems then considered unsolvable. English mathematician G. H. Hardy at the University of Cambridge, England. Recognizing Ramanujan's work as extraordinary, Hardy arranged for him to travel to Cambridge. In his notes, Ramanujan had produced groundbreaking new theorems, including some that Hardy said had "defeated him and his colleagues completely in addition to rediscovering recently proven but highly advanced results. Ramanujan independently compiled nearly 3,900 results (mostly identities and equations) which were completely novel; his original and highly unconventional results, such as the Ramanujan prime, the Ramanujan theta function, partition formulae and mock theta functions. The year after his death, Nature listed Ramanujan among other distinguished scientists and mathematicians on a "Calendar of Scientific Pioneers" who had achieved eminence. In 2011, on the 125th anniversary of his birth, the Indian government declared that 22 December will be celebrated every year as National Mathematics Day.

Meghnad Saha was an Indian astrophysicist. He gained global prominence for his development of the Saha Ionization Equation. He used to describe chemical and physical conditions in stars. His work allowed astronomers to accurately relate the spectral classes of stars to their actual temperatures. He earned his Indian School Certificate from Dhaka College. He was also a student at the Presidency College, Kolkata; a professor at Allahabad University from 1923 to 1938, and thereafter a professor and Dean of the Faculty of Science at the University of Calcutta. He became Fellow of the Royal Society in 1927. He was president of the 21st session of the Indian Science Congress in 1934. Saha's study of the thermal ionization of elements led him to formulate what is known as the Saha equation. This equation is one of the basic tools for interpretation of the spectra of stars in astrophysics. Saha was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Physics for 1930. He was the Director at Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science during 1953-1956. The Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, founded in 1943 in Kolkata, is named after him. Saha was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Physics for 1930. The Nobel Committee evaluated Saha's work. It was seen as a useful application, but not a "discovery." Thus he was not awarded the Prize. Saha was nominated again for the Prize in 1937 and 1940 and in 1939, 1951 and 1955. The Committee held to its previous decision and thus Saha was not awarded the prize.