When he was four years old, he was missing from the house one day, and after an anxious search, he was traced to a neighbouring pial school, with a broken chip of slate.

This is how his informal schooling began and shows his thirst for learning at that early age of four. From his school days, his habit of deep concentration was characteristic of him. He was often found pouring over his books, while his companions were engaged in play and amusing themselves. Throughout his scholastic career, he was the 'top boy' in his class and carried away the First Prize, from the First Standard right up to the F.A.

The neatness and elegance with which V Ramaswami solved problems set in the class evoked his uncle's admiration.

While undergoing the graduate course at the Presidency College, his contributions to the Educational Times and other Mathematical journals, which were remarkable for their originality and elegance, attracted the attention of his Professors. The Editor of the Educational Times addressed him as "Professor Ramaswami", judging from his contributions that he should be a College Professor. This title of 'Professor' stuck to him ever afterwards.

M T Naraniengar and I became intimate friends. We were both deeply interested in Mathematics and in a modest way Geometry was our forte and curves our fancy; we discussed nothing but mathematics. Rouse Ball's 'Mathematical Recreations and Essays' had recently come out [it was published in 1892] and contained a lot to interest us. After Mr Venkataswami Naidu rejoined duty, I continued to remain in Bangalore, meeting Mr M T Naraniengar frequently. We had a special affinity as both of us were old boys of the Cambridge College.

The proceedings of the Society, which I received, gave me my first glimmer of hope that a Mathematical Society like the Edinburgh one could, perhaps, be formed in India.

Throughout his official life as Deputy Collector, his interest in mathematics never flagged. Stories are there of his absent mindedness while in the midst of trials of Criminal cases, as a magistrate. It appears that he would often be found lost in tackling the solution of a mathematical problem, completely forgetting the case before him, and after a time, as if awaking from a dream, would ask the Pleader to start his arguments afresh. This absent mindedness, or abstraction, was a habit with him even in his domestic life. When at dinner in the company of friends and relatives, he was often discovered lost in thought; he would abruptly get up without finishing his dinner, and would go to the table to note down a solution of a problem which had been engaging his attention all the time.

If any conic be inscribed in a given triangle and a confocal to it pass through the circumcentre, then the circle through the intersection of these two confocals touches the nine-points circle of the triangle.

The question stated above was, if I remember rightly, first suggested to me personally by Prof V Ramaswami Aiyar of Gooty, India, in a letter which I received from him a year of two ago.

... there was a feeling in India that it was the time of large awakening. There was considerable political agitation then, owing to the partition of Bengal. But men also saw that, before India could become great, we needed advancement in many different directions. Our great countryman, Sir J N Tata, had these problems in mind and laid the foundation of a considerable industrial and intellectual advancement. But his great scheme of a Central Research Institute for India made no provision for mathematical advancement. One day I put to myself the question "Can I not be of some help in advancing the interests of Mathematics in India?" The spirit of the times made me think seriously about the question. I wanted to form a Mathematical Society which might be something like the Edinburgh Mathematical Society. I obtained the Calendars of the Madras and the Bombay Universities and made a list of all men who had taken the M.A. degree, or a first class in B.A., or doing work as Professors and Assistant Professors in various colleges. The list was very encouraging. ... On perusal of the long list, it occurred to me that, if by some magic, I could only put all these names into a Society, then with Euclid, I might say, Q.E.F. (quod erat faciendum, what is required is now done). But I did not see my way for this magic. I was a Deputy Collector and not a Professor of a College who his fellow mathematicians would know. I sometimes thought that, if I were the great Asutosh Mukherji of Bengal, I could make a trumpet call, bringing all the mathematicians together at once. But I was unknown; and any call by me, I felt, would fall flat on the public ear. So, I was in a state of hesitation as to the action I should take.

In that year I saw a copy of the 'Quarterly Journal of Mathematics', sent to me by a friend. The matter which it contained was mostly beyond me but there was a little bit that delighted me. And I began to wonder how many such delightful bits, we in India, may be missing by not seeing the leading journals. This made me more eager than ever to try to form a Mathematical Society. At length came the Christmas Day of December 1906. I was put up in the village Chavidi, in Gooty Division, Anantpur District. Thinking calmly, I felt that God will prosper any earnest endeavour made in a selfless cause. I was able to see my plan clearly and I wrote a little letter asking friends to join and form a small Mathematical Society. The letter was simply conceived and had no ambitious programme. (Published in vol. XI of the journal of the Society; it is reproduced at THIS LINK.) I sent copies of the letter to one friend after another and I received an abundant response during three months. Then, on the 4th of April 1907, I was able to announce in the Madras dailies that the Society was formed, with a strength of 20 members, under the name "The Indian Mathematical Club," and I became one of its Joint Secretaries along with Mr Naraniengar and I continued so until 1910.

Poona itself was an auspicious choice - as the Society acknowledged in honouring the efforts of Ramaswami Aiyar in founding the Society: 'It may not be out of place to mention that with the true scholar's freedom from provincial bias, you, a Madrasi, arranged to locate the Headquarters of the Society at Poona, in the Bombay Presidency - a step which gave our Society the unique position of being an All-India.

When Ramaswami Aiyar was Deputy Collector in Tirtukkoilur in 1910, Ramanujan sought his patronage and asked to be appointed as a clerk in his office. Ramanujan's only recommendation was his 'Ponderous' Note-book, which has now become famous and is preserved in the Madras University Library. It was little known at that time that the notebook contained anything of value. On pursuing the contents of the Note-Book, Ramaswami Aiyar was struck by the extraordinary results recorded therein, and declining to smother his genius by an appointment in his department, recommended him to his mathematical friends in Madras holding high positions. The story is well-known how eventually Ramanujan was made a Research Student of the Madras University, was deputed to the Cambridge University and achieved distinction as the Greatest Indian Mathematician.

... those remarkable notebooks in which he had recorded the numerous results of his discoveries. There was little or no explanation given but the results were of a very striking character. I put to him some test questions in order to find out if his methods were really based on sound principles. ... [Ramanujan] said he was badly in need of employment and suggested that I might put him as a teacher in one of the elementary Schools belonging to the Taluk Board of which I was President. I told Ramanujan that it would be sacrilege on his talents to put him to teach in an Elementary Board School but that I had been thinking out if I could not be of help to him in a real manner.

He attended all the Conferences of the Indian Mathematical Society except one, and actively participated in their deliberations. His last trip to Delhi, in spite of the advice of friends to the contrary, in connection with the Conference held there, proved too tiring for him perhaps. Though he was seemingly all right, he took ill all of a sudden on the 20th January 1936. Cerebral haemorrhage followed and he expired on the 22nd January 1936 at 3.30 pm, in spite of the best medical treatment, at Chittoor.