Aryabhatta was a great Indian mathematician. He was born in 476 BC in Kerala.

After completing his studies at the University of Nalanda, he wrote a book, Aryabhatiya in 499 BC. This book, written in verse, was the summary of Hindu mathematics up to that time. It covered astronomy, spherical trigonometry, arithmetic, algebra and plane trigonometry. Aryabhatta gave formulae for the areas of a triangle and a circle correctly, but the formulae for the volumes of a sphere and a pyramid given by him were wrong. His work was recognised as a masterpiece, and the then Gupta ruler, Buddhagupta, made him the Head of the University.

Aryabhatta was the first to deduce that the Earth is round and that it rotates on its own axis, creating day and night. He declared that the moon is dark and shines only because of sunlight. Solar and lunar eclipses, he believed, occured not because Rahu gobbled the sun and the moon, as the Hindu mythology claimed, but because of the shadows cast by the Earth and the moon.

He, however, believed in the geocentric concept of the universe that the Earth is the center of the universe.

In mathematics, Aryabhatta's contribution was equally valuable. He gave the value of pi as 3.1416 claiming, for the first time, that it was an approximation. He was the first mathematician to give what later came on to be called the 'table of the sines'.