The bicentenary celebrations of Poona Horse regiment were celebrated with full zeal on Sunday. A Poona Horse stamp of Rs 5 was released along with a regimental history book. While the tank mounted parade took place, sky diving event had to be cancelled due to the venue’s close proximity to the railway line.
Major S. Praveen, media coordinator, said, “The bicentenary celebrations of the Poona Horse regiment started from February 10 and ended on February 13. Sunday was marked with a tank mounted parade – which is done to mark historic occasions and have been performed only four times in the past. There were 32 tanks in parade, which moved in a synchronized manner.”
The regiment has a composition of Rajputs, Jats and Sikhs, and being martial clans they are very religious. Therefore, the functions are very important for Poona Horsemen as it is believed that they don’t fight just by their training, grit or determination, but they take god as the witness of their deeds and decide their fate.
Lt Gen Ajai Singh, ex colonel of the regiment released the Poona Horse stamp for Rs 5 and the regimental history book, with a few more chapters added with relevance to recent times, was unveiled as well.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Meerut News / by Ishita Bhatia / TNN / February 13th, 2017
When the entire nation is paying homage to martyrs Ram Prasad Bismil, Ashfaqullah Khan, Rajendra Lahiri and Thakur Roshan Singh, who were hanged on December 19, 1927, for the Kakori incident, the district authorities have failed to conserve a historic site associated with Roshan Singh in the heart of the city.
Singh, who was kept in Malaka Jail, which presently houses SRN Hospital of MNL Medical College, was hanged in one of the barracks. The jail building has been demolished and a new building for super-specialty facility is being constructed at the site.
Singh was a member of the organisation founded by Chandra Shekhar Azad. he was punished by the Britishers for his role in Kakori incident when a train from Shahjahanpur to Lucknow was looted in Kakori. Despite protests by the defence com mittee, which was chaired by Motilal Nehru, Bismil, Ashfaqullah, Rajendra Lahiri and Thakur Roshan Singh were sentenced to death.
“We feel ashamed that despite our efforts, we failed to have a memorial. There is a memorial at Faizabad jail where Ashfaqullah was hanged and in Gorakhpur where Bismil was hanged,” Raju Jaiswal, son of a freedom fighter, said.
Principal of MNL Medical College, Dr SP Singh said “We have approached the administration for installing a statute in the new building.”
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Allahabad News / by Rajeev Mani / TNN / December 20th, 2016
Sangam city had been witness to a historic occasion when the world’s first official airmail delivery took place on February 18, 1911. French pilot Henri Pequet took off on a bi-plane from Parade ground with 6,500 letters for the satellite town of Naini to raise funds for charity. The plane covered five miles in around 13 minutes to land at Naini. It was later termed as the world’s first official airmail
“The chaplain of Holy Trinity Church (presently situated on Sarojini Naidu Marg) required money to raise funds for a new hostel. In a unique coincidence, British commander Walter G Windham was in the city with airplane related machines and an imported aeroplane to participate in a cultural and handicraft exhibition on Parade Ground,” said R N Yadav, senior post master, Allahabad region.
“Later, fate brought the clergyman to Windham. He persuaded Windham to perform an aerial show to raise fund for the construction of a hostel. Windham later conceived the aerial show as as an airmail delivery event, which became historic due to its importance,” Yadav said adding that it was the world’s first officially documented airmal delivery.
“Windham felt that it could be advertisement for the exhibition as well as a demonstration of rapid and safe transportation of mails. Thus, the idea of the world’s first official airplane mail was born. Those interested in availing the service were asked to send their mail addressed and stamped to the chaplain of the Holy Trinity Church,” Yadav told TOI.
Philatelist Suryakant Awasthi said, “The clergyman had asked nominal sum of six annas per letter as a contribution for building the new hostel building. Only cards or letters weighing under one ounce in weight were accepted. A large number of people participated as the occasion was unique and letters addressed to people all over the globe were received.”
The letters include those addressed to Jawaharlal Nehru, King George V and several maharajas.
He said pilot Pequet was entrusted with the task of flying the Sommer bi-plane, which had a rotary Gnome engine of 50 horsepower. Pequet started at 5 pm and the landing took place after 13 minutes near Naini junction. When Pequet descended, there was no crowd to greet him. He merely handed over the mail bag to the only post department official present there and returned to Allahabad.
Pequet flew the plane at the speed of 60 miles per hour at a height of 120-150 feet.
The postal department, alongwith the Air Force, enacted the flying of world’s first air-mail as part of centenary celebrations on February 18, 2011, with equal number of letters but from Bamrauli airport to Naini.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City News> Allahabad / Vinod Khanal / TNN / October 15th, 2016
Bhagwat Prasad Bhartiya will blow the simple brass bugle Pt Jawaharlal Nehru gifted him. (HT Photo)
The old man’s hands tremble when he holds the bugle with his shrivelled hands, but the musical blow continues to bear a steady air of pride.
No official function with a patriotic theme is complete in Allahabad without Bhagwat Prasad Bhartiya. Braving the vagaries of age and weather, the 90-year-old freedom fighter is once again readying to blow the simple brass instrument he received as a gift from Pt Jawaharlal Nehru. For, Monday is the country’s 70th Independence Day.
The nonagenarian was 15 years old—and extremely thrilled—when he received the bugle from the freedom-fighter stalwart who was to become independent India’s first prime minister. Nehru gave him the instrument on his birthday at the family’s famed residence Anand Bhavan on November 14, 1941.
Since then, Bhartiya has been blowing the bugle. Initially, it was to rouse freedom fighters. Post 1947, he blew it to remind his compatriots of the great sacrifices made to win freedom.
“I started visiting Anand Bhavan as a kid. Out of curiosity,” he winds back. “I would accompany my classmate, whose father was a gardener there.”
The two-storey mansion with a dome, constructed in the 1930s by Jawaharlal’s father Pt Motilal Nehru who was a lawyer and leader, was a vital centre for the fight for Independence.
“That provided me opportunities to meet national leaders and listen to their inspirational speeches,” recalls Bhartiya at his home in Ashok Nagar. “They encouraged me to take part in social activities and rallies—all aimed at winning freedom.”
(HT Photo)
Pleased with the boy’s commitment to the cause of an Independent India, Nehru, then 37, presented Bhartiya with the bugle in the presence of national leaders, including Mahatma Gandhi, Lal Bahadur Shastri, Vijay Laxmi Pandit and Chunnan Guru (Chandra Mohiley).
“That was a great moment for me,” Bhartiya notes. “Nehruji chose me among other five youngsters for blowing the bugle during rallies.”
The aim was to spread anti-imperialistic messages such as ‘Bharat Bachao, Angrez Bhagao’, ‘Apne Desh Mein Apna Raaz’ and ‘Sab Ek Samaan’.
“For doing that, I was sent to Malaka jail (located in the premises where now SRN Hospital stands),” says Bhartiya. “I was kept there for a few months for participating in a mass rally taken out in Civil Lines in support of Quit India Movement of 1942.”
Since then, Bhartiya has kept blowing the bugle on momentous days in his country’s calendar: Republic Day, Independence Day and Children’s Day, besides at functions of patriotic fervour.
This year, too, will be no different even after over 75 years.
The old freedom fighter, though, is sad about one thing. Neither the district administration nor the state government has come forward to provide financial assistance the Sangam City’s only surviving freedom fighter.
“In 1978, I requested (late prime minister) Indira Gandhi for monetary help. That proved to be in vain,” Bhartiya says.
Even as recently as in February this year, he wrote to President Pranab Mukherjee for pension. The letter was forwarded to the district magistrate office through the state government and he was asked to approach the official with documents. “I have not been able to meet him,” adds Bhartiya.
His two sons work as newspaper hawkers to earn a living for the seven-member family.
source: http://www.hindustantimes.com / Hindustan Times / by Rajesh Srivastava, Hindustan Times,Allahabad / August 14th, 2016
Kakori Train Action Smarak will be developed as a tourist place with auditorium, library and cafeteria on a PPP (public-private partnership) model.
District Tourism Promotion Parishad has sanctioned Rs 50 lakh for development of Kakori Smarak and work will begin in October 2016 to be completed by March 2017.
District magistrate Raj Shekhar said, “Lucknow district administration has submitted a proposal of nearly Rs 4.5 crore to the tourism department for the overall development of the Kakori Smarak area as tourism destination.
“The proposed library at the Kakori Smarak will have most of the books dedicated to the freedom struggle, including the Kakori Train Action and other prominent historical incidents,” said the DM.
He added that apart from history books, literature pertaining to tourist places in Lucknow will also find place in the library.
The auditorium will be used for screening 10-minute documentary films in English and Hindi on Kakori Train Action showing the glorious revolutionaries of the freedom struggle.
Lucknow district administration is celebrating the ‘Festival of Freedom’ titled ‘Swadheenta Saptah’. In the celebrations there will be a series of eventsbased on freedom. The events began on Tuesday and will conclude on August 15.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Lucknow / TNN / August 10th, 2016
Much is said and written about the role of Nehru-Gandhi in the freedom movement of Allahabad but less is known about the unsung heroes of that era, without whom the Independence movement would not have gained momentum.
In once such case, the city was booked under Section 144 after people defied the then Bristish government order in 1932. To throw light on this aspect of freedom struggle, the regional archive office has come out with 470 cases of hundreds of unsung revolutionaries, who were caught and against whom cases were lodged in police stations of the city.
The rare documents were kept in dark and dingy rooms of the judicial record room of the Collectorate with other criminal cases for past 68 years. The records will soon be made public. A study revealed that a maximum number of 52 cases were registered under Defence of India Rule (DIR) against freedom fighters with the Kotwali police, followed by the Handia police (38) and 25 cases with Paschim Sharira.
The freedom fighters publishing material were used to be persecuted under Press Act since 1913 in Allahabad, much before Rowlatt Act came into force in 1919.
Regional archive officer Amit Agnihotri said, “It has been seen that historians do not keep a track of thousands of people who were lodged in jails or tried. The Allahabad University students used to take active part in freedom movement and many of them had lost their lives in doing so.”
The record shows that rural people had actively participated in Quit India Movement from August 9, 1942.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Allahabad / TNN / August 10th, 2016
With government agencies and scientists concerned about the damage caused by earthquakes worldwide, there have been many attempts to identify the signals nature sends out before such occurrences.
In this backdrop, a manuscript, which is the conversation between Parasara and Gautama Rishi (sage) on laksana (symptoms) of Bhukampa (tremors) as mentioned in Matsya Puran (epic), is kept in the galleries of National Mission for Manuscript Delhi. The rare manuscript, if deciphered, could be of vital importance.
Titled ‘Bhukampalaksana’, this 8-page book was first found in the shelves of a library in Kashmir.
Talking about the manuscript, N C Kara, coordinator at the mission who was in the city for a 21-day workshop organised by Central Library of Allahabad University, said this manuscript was preserved in the department of municipal cooperation, Karnanagar, Kashmir.
He said the material of this rare manuscript is handmade paper and is written in Sharada script, the language of the manuscript being Sanskrit. Till today, however, the 8 pages of this book are waiting to be deciphered by a scholar well-versed in the Sharda script.
Beginning of the manuscript is missing as it could have got mixed with other manuscripts. “We would be initiating the process of search for the remaining parts of this rare manuscript and also for finding a scholar who could decipher this,” said Kar.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Allahabad / by Rajeev Mani / TNN / June 16th, 2016
Contrary to the popular belief – both of Indian and foreign historians – that ‘Brahmi’ is the oldest Indian script as the same is used in the pillars and other inscriptions of emperor Ashoka, a young assistant professor from the University of Pune, Anirban Dash, claims that the script used in Ashokan pillars is infact ‘dhammlipi’ (script), very much similar to ‘prakrit’.
Dash, who has a long experience of working with national mission for manuscripts, Delhi was talking to media at the workshop organised by the central library on manuscripts. He further said that it is the western historian, Gorge Buhler who claimed that these inscriptions are written in Bhramhi, the fact which is distorted.
“Starting from ‘Kilakshar’ script of the Mesopotamian rule, script has travelled a long way but continued to follow three bases including pictographic, ideographic and phonetic scripts. In India we have phonetic script”, said Dash. In terms of India, the inscriptions of Ashoka are the first proof of usage of any script i.e. Brahmi and it is here that the script of Ashoka (Dhammlipi) bears significance.
Brahmi is generally believed to be attested from the 3rd century BCE during the reign of Ashoka, who used the script for imperial edicts. Br?hm? alphabet is also believed to be the ancestor of most of the 40 or so modern Indian alphabets, and of a number of other alphabets, such as Khmer and Tibetan. It is thought to have been modelled on the Aramaic or Phoenician alphabets, he explained.
Substantiating his notion that the scripts used in Ashoka inscription is infact Dhammlipi and not Brahmi, the exprt said, “Lalitavistara, (a detailed narration of the legendary life of the Gautama Buddha), is written in a combination of Sanskrit and a vernacular mentions 64 scripts, Brahmi being the first in the list of these 64 scripts”.
Those who termed the script of Ashoka’s inscriptions as Bhramhi could have just picked up the first script in the list of scripts in Lalitavistara because Ashoka has himself mentioned that ‘eyam dhamm lipi’, which leaves no doubts that it is Dhammlipi (script) which was used prior to Brahmi, said Dash. He also informed that a pot found in Dwarika is written in a script, around 30% of which is Brahmi, rest being another script.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Allahabad / Rajiv Mani / TNN / May 25th, 2016
There is an urgent need for preservation and conservation of manuscripts, said former vice-chancellor of Central University of Orissa, Prof Surabhi Banerjee.
She was speaking during the inaugural session of the three-week workshop on manuscriptology & palaeography, organised by Central Library of Allahabad University and National Manuscript Mission, New Delhi, on Friday.
She shared her experience about the ignorance of the value of manuscripts in our society. She urged the AU administration to start a course in library and information science with thrust on manuscriptology & palaeography.
AU VC, Prof RL Hangloo, while delivering the presidential address, enlightened the audience by narrating the contribution of great scholars of Sanskrit and said that the Vedas, which we get to read today was first of all written by Vasuki, a scholar from Kashmir.
Dr NC Kar from National Mission for Manuscripts, Delhi, said that the mission seeks to unearth and preserve the vast manuscript wealth of India.
India possesses an estimate of five million manuscripts, probably the largest collection in the world. These cover a variety of themes, textures and aesthetics, scripts, languages, calligraphies, illuminations and illustrations. Together, they constitute the memory of India’s history, heritage and thought.
For the first time in history of AU, its annual calendar was released during the session. Dr BK Singh, coordinator of the workshop, proposed the vote of thanks.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Allahabad / TNN / May 20th, 2016
Acute drinking water crisis adversely affecting common life across the country has prompted scientists to formulate principles on surface water management and activists to push ‘save water’ campaigns. Historians in UP, on the other hand, offer lessons on water conservation from parched Bundelkhand.
“Bundelkhand has had a strong tradition of water conservation. Water bodies in Mahoba are a classic example,” said Navratna Kumar Pathak, chief of Archaeological Survey of India’s Lucknow circle.”Based on the principle of rainwater harvesting, these water bodies were built by the Chandela kings about 800 years ago in public interest,” Pathak added.
“The success of the simple effort can be guaged from the fact that one of the five main ponds, the Madan Sagar, supplies drinking water to entire population of Mahoba even today,” Pathak said. Some of these bodies are spread across several kilometres and have a huge catchment area to trap every drop of water in its range. Pathak said that to spread awareness on rainwater harvesting, ASI held several events along a pond named Kirat Sagar on the occasion of World Heritage Day on April 18.
Chief patron, Indian Journal of Archaeology, Vijay Kumar said, “Water Sructures in Ajaigarh, Kalinjar Fort, Jhansi” were a perennial source of inspiration for water conservation. Prof Vinod Kumar Singh, archaeologist at Centre for Advance Studies, department of history, Aligarh Muslim University, who has brought out more than 50 publications on water conservation in Bundelkhand, said the ponds amaze researchers in hydrology and history.
“Locals find the ponds miraculous but there is simple science behind the secret. The biggest reason for their perennial character are the extensive topographical studies done before selection of spot for the pond,” he said.
Citing an example, he said, “The natural flow of water is driven towards a depression from where it is stored.”
He added that the Chandela kings promoted conservation and harvesting by associating it with religion. “Temples were constructed to prevent people from misusing the place,” he said.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Lucknow / Shailvee Sharda / TNN / April 19th, 2016
