Vadodara, Oct 7 (IANS) As Venkatraman Ramakrishnan was awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry along with two others Wednesday, the Maharaja Sayajirao University (MSU) in this Gujarat city - where he did graduation in physics - reacted with pride and joy.

'We knew one day he will win a Nobel prize,' said J.S. Bandukwala, a retired professor of nuclear physics and civil rights activist as he recalled the Tamil boy who grew up in Vadodara, graduated in physics from here and then went to the US for further studies.

While the honour for Venky - as his classmates used to call him - was a matter of pride for students, there were few in the present lot on the campus who could have heard of him.

He last visited the university to deliver a lecture Jan 31, 2005, leaving students and teachers impressed.

'A very simple person of high intellectual calibre,' remembered N. Singh as he talked about the interaction he had at the meet.

Born to academician parents in Chidambaram in Tamil Nadu in 1951, Venkatraman studied in the Rosary High School before graduating in physics in 1971.

His father was a well-known teacher in the science faculty and his mother taught home science in the same university. They both retired in 1985 and left to join their son and daughter, who was doing medical research, in the US.