Maharashtra Remote Sensing Application Centre (MRSAC) was established by the Government of Maharashtra under the administrative control of Planning Department in the year 1988.
Dr. Ramaswamy Seshadri Ayyangar was appointed as the first (founder) Director by the Govt. of Maharashtra on deputation from erstwhile National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA), Department of Space, Govt. of India. Dr. Ayyangar developed the Centre right from its scratch. The temporary set-up of the office was located at small place in Electrical Department of erstwhile Visveswaraya Regional college of Engineering (VRCE) with very limited scientific and support staff. From this small location, Dr. Ayyangar started building the Centre brick-by-brick. A building of its was constructed in the premises of VRCE in a period of 3-4 years. While construction activities were going on, Dr. Ayyangar started scientific work in remote sensing from the small lab and in no time major state and central level projects such as IMSD, S-IMSD, NRIS, CAPE, CACA, DMIS, etc. were undertaken and executed successfully. The progress of the Centre and its activities were applauded by the Government of Maharashtra as well as the Governing Body in its meetings held from time to time.

On administrative front, he developed the Centre by preparing the Service Rules of the Centre, recruitment policy, etc. In a span of 5-6 years, major scientific and administrative recruitment were made, and Centre became manpower of highly qualified and resourceful scientific staff. In his tenure and under his leadership, a project titled “Geo-referencing of Village Maps (GVMP)” was envisaged and the same was approved by the Government of Maharashtra and assigned the task to MRSAC, which was one of unique project in India. The project was later accomplished successfully by MRSAC. With the era of Geographical Information System (GIS) began in MRSAC and he was pioneer in setting up a strong base of Remote Sensing and GIS based activities in the Centre and Maharashtra State.

During his tenure, the Centre became one of the excellent Remote Sensing Centre’s in India. The activities of the Centre were highly appreciated at Centre, particularly at NRSA and ISRO and at State level in Maharashtra. With his interest in the activities and doing more and more for the State, he got absorbed himself in MRSAC as permanent and regular Director of the Centre leaving the job at NRSA, Department of Space, Govt. of India in the year October, 1992 and served the Centre till his sad demise in the year June, 2000 while serving.