Due to the encouragement and initiative of Late Prof. K.R. Ramanathan, the Trustees of the Vedhshala, Ahmedabad, notably Mr. Shukdevprasad G. Vyas, Mr. Manishankar Sharma & Secretary, Mr. Parmanand M. Desai promoted the idea of establishing a solar observatory and provided full support during the initial stages of the observatory. A large number of people have helped in various ways in starting this island observatory in September, 1975. It will be difficult to name all of them, but a few to mention are Late Prof. R.G. Giovanelli, Prof. R. V. Bhonsle, Late Prof. M.K. Vainu Bappu, Late Prof. K. O. Kiepenheuer, Prof. H. Zirin, Dale Vrabec, W.C. Livingston, John Cowley, Harrey Ramsey, Sara Martin, R.F. Howard, Murrey Dryer, Gary Heckman, K.C. Mohan, Prof. S.P. Pandya, Prof. J. Verma and Prof. R.K. Rai. The Director of the Physical Research Laboratory provided considerable support during the fabrication and installation of the telescope. The Physical Division of the CSIRO, Australia provided the Solar Spar and the island was given by the Rajasthan Government.

The Udaipur Solar Observatory was started by the Vedhshala Trust, through their own funds and research grants received from the Indian Space Research Organization and the Department of Science & Technology, Government of India. Prof. S. Dhawan, former chairman, Indian Space Research Organization, showed enormous interest in the growth of the solar observatory. On the request of the Vedhshala Trustees, the Department of Space took over the Solar Observatory in December 1981 for continuous support and a speedy progress.

Solar observations were made by A. Bhatnagar, G.M. Ballabh, Rajmal Jain, Sridhar Rao, D.B. Jadhav, Rajendra Shelke, S.P. Purohit and Ashok Ambastha at different periods since November 1975. The necessary technical help to establish the observatory and for taking observations were provided by Nirman Singh, B.L. Paneri, Laxmilal, Kanhaiyalal, Ramachandra, Dalchand, Jagdish Singh and Shankerlal. Dr.(Mrs.)Purobi Chakrabarty helped in the preparation and printing of this publication and we express our thanks to her.

Our thanks are also due to Hari Haran and Raju Koshy for typing the manuscript.