This is a joint ICTS-RRI Discussion Meeting on the geometric phase and its applications in optics and condensed matter. There has been much interest from the Indian scientific community on the topic of geometric phase. Since the early days, this topic has had diverse applications in condensed matter physics and optics. The subject has broad appeal and brings the higher mathematics of differential geometry and topology to concrete experimental predictions. World wide interest in the geometric phase was sparked by a paper in 1984 by Michael Berry, who has had long standing links with India and Indian Science. The subsequent realisation that S. Pancharatnam had anticipated the geometric phase in the context of polarisation optics, was another trigger.There have since been several advances in the application of geometric and topological phases in the areas of optics and condensed matter. In fact, research in the area of condensed matter has also influenced topological quantum computation. ...
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