On this Day in History

“The language and culture of an area have an undoubted importance as they represent a pattern of living which is common in that area.” ~ Resolution of the Government of India relating to the State Reorganization Commission, 1953 The struggle for independence from the British Raj was an extremely significant battle India fought. However, post-1947, India had another major struggle... Read More →

Jessica Lal, an Indian model, was shot and killed in an unlicensed bar in south Delhi during the intervening nights of 29 April and 30 April 1999. The killing sparked outrage in the Indian middle class and spurred the media into donning an activist role. The anger was magnified as it soon became clear that Lal was simply doing her... Read More →

Zubin Mehta, a world-famous conductor of Western classical music, was born on 29 April 1936 to a Parsi family in Mumbai. His father was a conductor of the Bombay Symphony Orchestra.  Mehta’s father, Mehli, taught him how to appreciate music from the age of six or seven. Mehli would put on a record, open a score and show the little... Read More →

Bhanu Athaiya, India’s first Oscar winner and the Hindi film industry’s most renowned costume designer whose work spans over five decades, was born on 28 April 1929 in Kolhapur (in present day Maharashtra), which was then a princely state.  Her father, Anna Saheb, an artist, died when she was nine years old. Recalling her childhood, she told The Telegraph in... Read More →

Zohra Sehgal, a respected Indian film and theatre actress, choreographer and dancer, was born on 27 April 1912 in Saharanpur, Uttar Pradesh, to Mumtazullah Khan and Natiqua Begum. She had six siblings.   She studied at Lahore’s Queen Mary College. After finishing college, she went to Europe and, unusual for her time, enrolled at Germany’s Mary Wigman’s ballet school. In... Read More →

Shankar Singh Raghuvanshi was born on 15 October 1922. Together with Jaikishan Dayabhai Panchal, he was one half of the duo Shankar-Jaikishan, a leading music director pair of the Hindi film industry in the 1950s and 1960s. Even after Jaikishan’s death at a rather young age in 1971, Shankar continued to use the name of Shankar-Jaikishan in films. He died... Read More →

In a country obsessed with cricket, talented sportspersons from other fields often find it hard to get the recognition that even very ordinary cricketers get. Some exceptions to this unfortunate trend include Viswanathan Anand in chess, Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi in tennis, P.T. Usha and Milkha Singh in athletics, Dhanraj Pillay and Dhyan Chand in hockey, and Baichung Bhutia... Read More →

One of the greatest batsmen of the modern era and India’s most adored sportsperson, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar was born on 24 April 1973 in Mumbai. His father, Ramesh Tendulkar, was a college professor, and his mother, Rajni, was employed in an insurance firm. Sachin Tendulkar was introduced to cricket by his older brother, Ajit, who was also responsible for the... Read More →

“Not to have seen the cinema of Ray means existing in a world without seeing the sun or the moon.” — Akira Kurosawa It was a tribute from one artiste to another, both giants of cinema. Their styles of filmmaking were quite different, but just like the Japanese genius is regarded by many critics as the greatest film director from... Read More →

Kanan Devi, a popular singer and actress and the earliest female star of Bengali cinema, was born on 22 April 1916 in Bengal.  Since her family’s finances were not good, Kanan had to enter the world of cinema—then still called bioscope in some quarters—when she was just 10, at a time when it was highly unusual for females to be... Read More →