Radhanath, a student of the college since 1824, was one of the first two Indians to read Isaac Newton's "Principia" and by 1832; he had studied Euclid's "Elements", Thomas Jephson's "Fluxion" and Analytical Geometry and Astronomy by Windhouse. Taking inspiration from these prestigious papers, he devised a new method to draw a common tangent to two circles, when he was just a teenager. There was little doubt about Radhanath's proficiency in his subject, and he secured the job at the GTS on 19 December 1831 as a "computer" at a salary of thirty rupees per month.