This letter is a beautiful piece of modern Indian scientific history. It captures a moment of deep negotiation, personal humility & institutional building involving 1 of India’s greatest minds: Satyendra Nath Bose. The recipient of this letter is Sir Syama Prasad Mookerjee, who in 1938 was serving as the Vice-Chancellor of Calcutta University. Syama Prasad was actively trying to poach the absolute best Indian scientific minds from across the country to bring them back to their Alma Mater in Calcutta. He had written to S.N. Bose, who was then making waves at Dacca University, offering him a prestigious position under the Palit Trust (Palit Professorship of Physics). What makes this letter beautiful is how it balances profound emotional devotion with absolute, unvarnished pragmatism. Bose admits that the call of his Alma Mater is almost impossible to resist. But then, he negotiates like a true realist. He asks for a permanent tenure, matching pay & an additional house allowance of ₹150, dryly noting: "I fear Calcutta will be a very much more expensive place to live in than Dacca." Even the geniuses who redefined the fundamental laws of quantum physics had to calculate the cost-of-living index before switching jobs!🙏🙏