Shaheed Bhagat Singh

Born: September 27, 1907
Died: March 23, 1931

Bhagat Singh was born in a Sikh family in village Banga in Layalpur district of Punjab (now in Pakistan). He was the third son of Sardar Kishan Singh and Vidyavati. Bhagat Singh's family was actively involved in freedom struggle. His father Kishan Singh and uncle Ajit Singh were members of Ghadr Party founded in the U.S to oust British rule from India. Family atmosphere had a great effect on the mind of young Bhagat Singh and patriotism flowed in his veins from childhood.

While studying at the local D.A.V. School in Lahore, in 1916, young Bhagat Singh came into contact with some well-known political leaders like Lala Lajpat Rai and Ras Bihari Bose. Punjab was politically very charged in those days. In 1919, when Jalianwala Bagh massacre took place, Bhagat Singh was only 12 years old. The massacre deeply disturbed him. On the next day of massacre Bhagat Singh went to Jalianwala Bagh and collected soil from the spot and kept it as a memento for the rest of his life. The massacre strengthened his resolve to drive British out from India.

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CHHATRAPATI SHIVAJI MAHARAJ

He founded the Hindu kingdom in the Deccan against all odds , fighting against the mighty Mughals.He inspired and united the common man to fight against the tyranny of Mughal ruler Aurangjeb, by inculcating a sense of pride and nationality in them.

At the age of 16, he took a pledge to establish a sovereign Hindu state.He clearly outstands all the rulers and generals of India by the exemplary life he lived and is thus respected by the entire cross section of Indians. Shivaji's military skills could be compared to those of Napolean.

He raised a strong army and navy, constructed and repaired forts, used gureilla warfare tactics,developed a strong intelligence network,gave equal treatment to the people from all religions and castes based on merit, and functioned like a seasoned Statesman and General. He appointed ministers with specific functions such as Internal security,Foreign affairs,Finance,Law and Justice,Religious matters,Defence etc.

He introduced systems in revenue collection and warned the officials against harassment of subjects.He thought ahead of times and was a true visionary.In his private life, his moral virtues were exceptionally high.His thoughts and deeds were inspired by the teachings of his mother Jijabai,teacher Dadaji Konddev,great saints like Dnyaneshwar & Tukaram and the valiancy and ideals of the Lords Rama and Krishna.

The tiny kingdom established by Chhatrapati Shivaji known as "Hindavi Swaraja" (Sovereign Hindu state) grew and spread beyond Attock in Northwest India (now in Pakistan)and beyond Cuttack in East India in course of time, to become the strongest power in India. After the death of Chhatrapati Shivaji & his son Sambhaji, their prime ministers or ‘the Peshwas' became the defacto rulers. The Peshwas and the Maratha Sardars (Chieftans) like Shindes of Gwalior, Gaekwads of Baroda & Holkars of Indore contributed to the growth of the Maratha Confederacy.

The history of India is incomplete without the history of Marathas and Shivaji is the nucleus of Maratha history. Shivaji has been a source of inspiration and pride to the past generations and will continue to inspire generations in future. We salute this legend.

P. L. Deshpande

Purushottam Laxman Deshpande (Marathi: पुरुषोत्तम लक्ष्मण देशपांडे) (8 November 1919 – 12 June 2000) was a distinguished Marathi writer from the state of Maharashtra, India. He was popularly known by just his initials as पु. ल. ("Pu. La.") and was also given the affectionate title of Maharashtraache laadake vyaktimattva (Maharashtra's most beloved personality).

Apart from his writing, P. L. Deshpande was well-known for his all-round achievements as an accomplished film and stage actor, music composer, harmonium player, singer and orator.

Born in Mumbai (Bombay) to Laxman and Lakshmibai Deshpande, P. L. Deshpande received his college education at Fergusson College in Pune and Willingdon College in Sangli.

For some years, he worked as a college professor and a school teacher before embarking on his career in writing and in the multiple fields of acting, directing, and composing music in the world of movies. In 1946, he married Sunita Thakur, who is an accomplished author herself and has acted in some plays in the past. Wit was a hallmark of the writings of Deshpande. He wrote plays, essays, life sketches, short stories, novels, travelogues, screenplays for films, and movie lyrics. Deshpande took lessons in playing harmonium from Dattopant Rajopadhye of Bhaskar Sangitalaya. He was proficient in Hindustani classical music and deep interest in Marathi musical theater. He was an accomplished music director and a singer.

He was also an admirer of Rabindranath Tagore, and learnt Bengali just so that he could read Tagore's Gitanjali in its original form.

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Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

Albert Einstein was born in Ulm in southwest Germany on 14 March 1879. His family later moved to Italy after his father's electrical equipment business failed. Einstein studied at the Institute of Technology in Zurich and received his doctorate in 1905 from the University of Zurich. In the same year he published four groundbreaking scientific papers. One introduced his special theory of relativity and another his equation E = mc2 which related mass and energy.

Within a short time Einstein's work was recognised as original and important. In 1909 he became Associate Professor of Theoretical Physics at Zurich, in 1911 Professor of Theoretical Physics at the German University in Prague and then returned to the Institute of Technology in Zurich the following year. In 1914 he was appointed director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Physics in Berlin. He became a German citizen in the same year. In 1916 he published his theory of general relativity.

Einstein received the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect and his work in the field of theoretical physics.

During the 1920's Einstein lectured in Europe, North and South America and Palestine, where he was involved in the establishment of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Born into a Jewish family and a supporter of pacifism and Zionism, Einstein increasingly became the focus of hostile Nazi propaganda. In 1933, the year the Nazis took power in Germany, Einstein emigrated to America. He accepted a position at the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton and took US citizenship.

Einstein retired from the Institute in 1945 but worked for the rest of his life towards a unified field theory to establish a merger between quantum theory and his general theory of relativity. He continued to be active in the peace movement and in support of Zionist causes and in 1952 he was offered the presidency of Israel, which he declined.

Einstein died on 18 April 1955 in Princeton, New Jersey.

Alexander the Great (356 - 323 BC)

Alexander was born in the northern Greek kingdom of Macedonia in July 356 BC. His parents were Philip II, King of Macedon, and his wife Olympias. Alexander was educated by the philosopher Aristotle. Philip was assassinated in 336 BC and Alexander inherited a powerful yet volatile kingdom. He quickly dealt with his enemies at home and reasserted Macedonian power within Greece. He then set out to conquer the massive Persian Empire.

Against overwhelming odds, he led his army to victories across the Persian territories of Asia Minor, Syria and Egypt without suffering a single defeat. His greatest victory was at the Battle of Gaugamela, in what is now northern Iraq, in 331 BC. The young king of Macedonia, leader of the Greeks, overlord of Asia Minor and pharaoh of Egypt became Great King of Persia at the age of 25.

Over the next eight years in his capacity as king, commander, politician, scholar and explorer, Alexander led his army a further 11,000 miles, founding over 70 cities and creating an empire that stretched across three continents and covered around two million square miles. The entire area from Greece in the west, north to the Danube, south into Egypt and as far to the east as the Indian Punjab, was linked together in a vast international network of trade and commerce. This was united by a common Greek language and culture, whilst the king himself adopted foreign customs in order to rule his millions of ethnically diverse subjects.

Alexander was acknowledged as a military genius who always led by example, although his belief in his own indestructibility meant he was often reckless with his own life and those of his soldiers. The fact that his army only refused to follow him once in 13 years of a reign during which there was constant fighting, indicates the loyalty he inspired.

He died of a fever in Babylon in June 323 BC.

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Vasco da Gama (explorer of Asia and Africa)

Vasco de Gama was a Portuguese navigator, famed for leading an expedition which opened the sea route from Europe via the Cape of Good Hope to India.

Vasco was born, circa 1469, to a noble family (his father was Estêvão da Gama and his mother was Isabel Sodré) in Sines, Province of Alemtejo, Portugal.

Da Gama’s father had originally been chosen by King João II to make this historic voyage, but both passed away before the project could be carried into execution. De Gama was serving as a gentleman at court when he was chosen to lead the expedition to India, in January 1497. This expedition followed the pioneering expedition of Bartholomeu Dias who rounded the Cape of Good Hope in 1488.

On the 8th July 1497 four ships left Lisbon - the Sao Gabriel, on which da Gama sailed, the Sao Rafael, the Berrio, and a storeship. At the beginning of November 1497 the fleet anchored in St. Helena Bay. They reached the Cape of Good Hope region on the 7th November 1497, and rounded the Cape on the 22nd November 1497. On the 25th of November they anchored in Mossel Bay. On 16 December 1497 the fleet arrived at the furthest landing point of Dias, gave the Natal-part of the name of the KwaZulu-Natal province on Christmas Day, and reached by the end of January, 1498, the month of the Zambesi, which was in the territory controlled by the Arabian maritime commercial association.

On the 20th May 1498 they reached Calicut and docked on the coast of Keraka, becoming the first Europeans to set foot in India. On setting his foot on South Asian soils on the dawn of May 21, 1498 Vasco de Gama shouted, "For Christ and spices!"

Having loaded up with spices Da Gama returned and finally reached Lisbon on the 9th September 1499.

Vasco da Gama died in (Cochin) India on the 24th December 1524. He was buried in a Franciscan monastery near the Old Fort.

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Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln, the 16th president of the United States, guided his country through the most devastating experience in its national history--the CIVIL WAR. He is considered by many historians to have been the greatest American president.

Lincoln was born on Feb. 12, 1809, in a log cabin in Hardin (now Larue) County, Ky. Indians had killed his grandfather, Lincoln wrote, "when he was laboring to open a farm in the forest" in 1786; this tragedy left his father, Thomas Lincoln, "a wandering laboring boy" who "grew up, literally without education." Thomas, nevertheless, became a skilled carpenter and purchased three farms in Kentucky before the Lincolns left the state. Little is known about Lincoln's mother, Nancy Hanks Lincoln. Abraham had an older sister, Sarah, and a younger brother, Thomas, who died in infancy.

In 1816 the Lincolns moved to Indiana, "partly on account of slavery," Abraham recalled, "but chiefly on account of difficulty in land titles in Kentucky." Land ownership was more secure in Indiana because the Land Ordinance of 1785 provided for surveys by the federal government; moreover, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 forbade slavery in the area. Lincoln's parents belonged to a faction of the Baptist church that disapproved of slavery, and this affiliation may account for Abraham's later statement that he was "naturally anti-slavery" and could not remember when he "did not so think, and feel."

Indiana was a "wild region, with many bears and other wild animals still in the woods." The Lincolns' life near Little Pigeon Creek, in Perry (now Spencer) County, was not easy. Lincoln "was raised to farm work" and recalled life in this "unbroken forest" as a fight "with trees and logs and grubs." "There was absolutely nothing to excite ambition for education," Lincoln later recalled; he attended "some schools, so called," but for less than a year altogether. "Still, somehow," he remembered, "I could read, write, and cipher to the Rule of Three; but that was all."

Lincoln's mother died in 1818, and the following year his father married a Kentucky widow, Sarah Bush Johnston. She "proved a good and kind mother." In later years Lincoln could fondly and poetically recall memories of his "childhood home." In 1828 he was able to make a flatboat trip to New Orleans. His sister died in childbirth the same year.

In 1830 the Lincolns left Indiana for Illinois. Abraham made a second flatboat trip to New Orleans, and in 1831 he left home for New Salem, in Sangamon County near Springfield. The separation may have been made easier by Lincoln's estrangement from his father, of whom he spoke little in his mature life. In New Salem, Lincoln tried various occupations and served briefly in the Black Hawk War (1832). This military interlude was uneventful except for the fact that he was elected captain of his volunteer company, a distinction that gave him "much satisfaction." It opened new avenues for his life.

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Detective Conan

Detective Conan is about an elementary school boy named Conan Edogawa. He solves mysteries and crimes through reasoning and logic and with the help of friends and nifty gadgets. Conan is really a 17-year-old famous high school detective, Shinichi Kudo. While investigating some suspicious activity, Shinichi was knocked over the head by a man dressed in black. During his semi-conscious state, an experimental drug was forced down his throat that was meant to kill him. Instead, Shinichi was shrunk into a little kid. In order to prevent the men who did this to him from hurting his friends and family, Shinichi changed his name to Conan Edogawa and now lives with his girlfriend, Ran and her dad.

Mr. Bean

Best known to American audiences as the Black Adder and Mr. Bean, black-haired, bug-eyed, and weak-chinned comedian Rowan Atkinson is one of the most popular funnymen in England whose keen, often black humor and knack for physical comedy has earned him a huge international following. Born in Newcastle, Atkinson was educated at Newcastle University and Oxford. While at the latter, he teamed up with budding screenwriter Richard Curtis to write comedy reviews for the Oxford Playhouse. Shortly thereafter, the two created material for the Edinburgh Fringe. By 1978, Atkinson's humor had earned him a devoted fan base and he was offered leading roles in two British television comedies. Instead, Atkinson chose to get involved in the internationally acclaimed comedy series Not the Nine O'Clock News as a writer and a performer. His performances in the oft-distinguished show earned Atkinson a British Academy Award and got him designated "BBC Personality of the Year" in 1980. His stage performances also continued to significantly increase his popularity.

Shin-chan

Shin Chan goes to Happy Bunny Kindergarten. His homeroom is called the Sunflower room. His friends are Cosmo, Ni-Ni, Bo, and Max.

The Cheeky Chappy has a dance called the "Bare Butt Boogie" which annoys his mom, Mittsy. His dad, Harry, seems to not mind, up until the episode "dad looses his eyebrows" when Shin-Chan tries to help out his dad shave his beard. Shin-chan also has a dog called Lucky.

Crayon Shin-chan is a Japanese manga and anime series written by Yoshito Usui. The title is commonly transliterated as either "Crayon Shin Chan" or "Crayon Shin-Chan" and is sold worldwide. The series follows the antics of five-year-old Shinnosuke Nohara and his parents, neighbors, friends, etc., and is set in Kasukabe, Saitama Prefecture, Japan. It is called "Crayon Shin-chan" because "crayon" signifies the fact that Shin-chan goes to kindergarten. "Shin-chan" is the affectionate name for the main character.