October 8
*Image Credit: Azri Zainul The Indian Air Force was established on 8 October 1932. Between 1945 and 1950 it was called the Royal Indian Air Force. After India became a republic, the prefix ‘Royal’ was dropped, and it began to be known as the Indian Air Force (IAF). The President of India is the ex-officio commander-in-chief of the IAF. The... Read More →
October 7
It was on 7 October 1950 that Mother Teresa received the permission of the Vatican to start the Missionaries of Charity. Beginning in Calcutta as a small order with only 13 members, it had grown by the turn of the century into a congregation of thousands of sisters running orphanages, AIDS hospices and charity centres worldwide. Mother Teresa: A Short Biography Mother Teresa... Read More →
October 6
Indian astrophysicist, institution builder and parliamentarian Meghnad Saha, who developed the ‘ionization theory’ and its application to the interpretation of stellar spectra, was born on 6 October 1893 in a village near Dhaka (now in Bangladesh). The fifth child of Jagannath, a grocer, and Bhubneshwari Devi, Saha studied at a village school and then joined the Government Collegiate School in... Read More →
October 5
Aakash, a low-cost tablet computer produced by British company Datawind, was launched on 5 October 2011 in New Delhi. Initially marketed as a $35 tablet, it was slated to be distributed to Indian students by the union Human Resource Development (HRD) ministry as part of an ongoing effort to make affordable computers easily available to educational institutes and boost the... Read More →
October 4
On 4 October 1977, a day after she was dramatically placed under arrest on charges of political corruption by the Janata Party government, Congress leader Indira Gandhi was released unconditionally by a judicial magistrate, marking the beginning of the road that would take her back to the prime minister’s chair. The daughter and only surviving child of India’s first prime... Read More →
October 3
Padma Shri and Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna awardee Geet Siriram Sethi won the 1992 World Professional Billiards Championship on 3 October, achieving a world-record English billiards break of 1276 under the three-pot rule, giving India a new sporting hero. One of the greatest sporting talents India has ever produced, he won the title again four times — in 1993, 1995, 1998,... Read More →
October 2
One of the greatest Indians of the 20th century, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi — known as the ‘Mahatma’ to the rest of the world and ‘Bapu’ to millions of his followers and admirers — was born on 2 October 1869 at Porbandar in coastal Gujarat. For someone who led India to freedom on the principles of truth and non-violence, Gandhi,... Read More →
October 1
On October 1, 1906, iconic music composer Sachin Dev Burman was born in Comilla district of the erstwhile Bengal Presidency (now in Bangladesh). Born into the royal family of Tripura, his father was Nabadwipchandra Dev Burman, the heir to the Tripura throne, and his mother, Nirmala Devi, was from the royal family of Manipur. Lovingly called Sachin Karta... Read More →
September 30
The surface of the Earth is made up of tectonic plates which are slowly but continuously in motion. When they move against each other the pressure builds up until it is released at a point called the epicentre. The resulting stress is transmitted in the form of seismic waves, or what is commonly called an earthquake. As the surface... Read More →
September 29
Swimming across the the English Channel is also known as scaling the “Mount Everest of Swimming” because of length of the crossing, its choppy waters, cold temperatures and the dangers of the journey. Undeterred by all these Arati Saha, aged 19, became the first Asian woman to swim across the English Channel on 29th September 1959. Arati Saha... Read More →
