It was a visibly confused professor Takaaki Kajita, the 2015 Nobel Prize winner in Physics, at the inaugural session of the Children's Science Congress in Tirupati on Wednesday.
The Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu's speech was to be followed by presentation of awards to selected children by Prof Kajita.
However, the chief minister along with other dignitaries on the dais left the venue, leaving professor Kajita alone on the stage.
As soon as the chief minister's speech got over, it was announced that the awards would be given to the school children. However, Naidu got up, went down the stage and left the venue suddenly. The other dignitaries, who were sitting on the stage, followed the CM and left the venue too.
Prof Kajita, who was clueless about what was happening, initially got up with his laptop in his hand, and started following the ones going down the dais steps.
However, all the dignitaries had already exited the venue by then and Prof Kajita went back and sat down at his seat on the stage. For a couple of minutes, he kept sitting there, all by himself, and kept looking here and there, perhaps still trying to figure out what was happening. It was only after some minutes had passed that a volunteer on stage approached him.
Ironically, during his speech, Naidu had told the students that they should aim for a Nobel Prize for the country and asked Prof Kajita to tell the students if there is any recipe behind winning a Nobel prize and give them tips on the same.Prof Kajita told the students, "You have to work hard".
"I want to see some of the students sitting here establishing themselves as leading scientists in India.So far, we don't have a Nobel Laureate in the country. That's the aim one should have: to win a Nobel for the country. And you will achieve it by working hard," Naidu had told the students.
