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F R I E N D S O F I N D I A |
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F A M O U S I N D I A N S
Mohandas K. Gandhi
Back in India, it was not long before he was taking the lead in the long struggle for independence from Britain. He never wavered in his unshakable belief in nonviolent protest and religious tolerance. Independence, when it came in 1947, was not a military victory, but a triumph of human will. In January 1948, at the age of 79, he was killed by an assassin as he walked through a crowed garden in New Delhi to take evening prayers.
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Jawaharlal Nehru
In 1929 Jawaharlal Nehru was elected President of the All India Congress Committee. As the Civil Disobedience movement began, Jawaharlal spent long periods in jail. Jawaharlal remained at the forefront of the National movement and became the Chief Negotiator of the Congress for the Transfer of power. A close friend of Lord Mountbatten, Nehru became the P.M. of the Interim government and on 15th August 1947, became the first Prime Minister of Independent India.
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Sardar Patel
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Swami Vivekananda
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Subhash Chandra Bose
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Rabindranath Tagore
Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore was a creative epoch in whose wake great legions of inspired writers, poets, singers, musicians, linguists, historians, artists and philosophers emerged in India. Tagore, despite the fact that he wrote mainly in Bengali, was the voice of India. For more information, visit:
Sri Aurobindo
Sri Aurobindo was a poet, freedom fighter and a Yogi. His poem Savitri is the longest poem in English literature. His yoga is unique, the aim being "the realization of human unity through the awakening in all and the manifestation by all of the inner Divinity, which is One…" For more information, visit:
Shrinivas Ramanujan
Shrinivas Ramanujan in his short life-span, proved to be a mathematical genius comparable to the likes of Karl Jacobi and Leonhaed Euler. Despite lack of formal higher education and battling against heavy odds like poverty and ill health, his mathematical genius flowed unhindered. His contribution in the fields of elliptic functions, infinite series and the analytical theory of numbers is immeasurable. Even after his death at the young age of 32, his notes continued to be a subject of research and a source of further mathematical theorems, formulae and solutions. For more information, visit:
Amartya Sen
Amartya Sen, the 1998-Nobel Laureate in Economics, was born on November 3, 1933 at Shantiniketan, West Bengal, India. He is the sixth Indian to get the Nobel and the first Asian winner of the Economics Prize. He became the youngest chairman of the Department of Economics, Jadavpur University, at the age of 23. He has been the President of the Econometric Society (1984), the International Economic Association (1986-89), the Indian Economic Association (1989) and the American Economic Association (1994). He has taught at Calcutta, Delhi, Oxford, Cambridge, the London School of Economics, and Harvard. He has been honored with Honorary D.Litt degrees and fellowships of a large number of Indian and Foreign Universities and Institutes of repute. Sen was awarded Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian award in India. For more information, visit:
Chanakya
Chanakya was a master strategist, astute statesman and a shrewd political administrator. He was well versed in the Vedas and was a man of action. A man of foresight, he was always prepared for the worst. Fearlessness, compassion towards the poor and evil to deceit when needed, were some of his legendary traits. He was supposed to be extremely secretive. He was an uncrowned kingmaker who held the reigns of the Magadha Empire and looked upon the emperor more as a beloved pupil than as a master. For more information, visit:
Sarojini Naidu
Sarojini Naidu, also known as the Nightingale of India, lived a purposeful life. A devoted freedom fighter, a principled politician, a progressive activist, a radical reformer, an inspirational poet - woman of varied talents and high caliber, Sarojini Naidu lived life to its fullest. Her sincerity and zeal in speeches, poems and conversation reflect devotion and loyalty towards her motherland. For more information, visit:
Jayprakash Narayan
Jayprakash Narayan worked for the upliftment of the downtrodden. He wanted the villages to be self-sufficient. He did not take up politics for vested interest. He worked at the grassroots level to improve the lot of the farmers. He was greatly influenced by Vinoba Bhave's Sarvodaya Movement. He took active part in all the protests that were organized by the Congress. He was imprisoned many a time for voicing his opinions without mincing words against the British rule. He was regarded as the best Prime Minister, which India did not have. He was supposed to possess "Nehru's administrative and diplomatic skills and Gandhi's vision and commitment to the multitude." For more information, visit:
Dr. Jagdish Chandra Bose
This great son of India, worked under the most trying circumstances under the tyrannical British rule. He invented several devices like the Crescograph, Resonate Recorder among others having wide and present-day applications in the fields of Botany and Physics. He also established the first indigenous research institute of India, Bose Bigyan Mandir or Bose Research Institute, in Calcutta. For more information, visit:
Dr. C.V Raman
C.V. Raman, the great Indian physicist, was the first Asian Scientist to be awarded the Nobel Prize in 1930 for his work on the Scattering of Light and Raman Effect. He also carried out research in acoustics, optics, crystallographic dynamics, colors and their perception. He established the Indian Academy of Sciences (I.A.Sc.), and also became the director of Indian Institute of Sciences, Bangalore, considered to be the premier research institutes encouraging and nurturing young scientific talent of India. For more information, visit:
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Mohandas K. Gandhi was born in 1869 to Hindu parents in the state of Gujarat in Western India. His family sent him to London to study law, and in 1891 he was admitted to the Inner Temple, and called to the bar. In Southern Africa he worked ceaselessly to improve the rights of the immigrant Indians. It was there that he developed his creed of passive resistance against injustice, satyagraha, meaning truth force, and was frequently jailed as a result of the protests that he led.
Jawaharlal Nehru was born on 14th November 1889, the first child of Motilal and Swarup Rani Nehru. By 1900, the family had moved to Allahabad. He entered Harrow, one of England's leading schools. Jawaharlal went on to get a degree in natural science from Trinity College, Cambridge and a law degree from the Inner Temple.
Vallabhbhai Patel was born on October 31, 1875 at Nadiad in the Kheda district of Gujarat. Vallabhbhai Patel was a self made man who had worked with his father in the fields. After early education, his family could not finance his college education. Vallabhbhai was keen on going to England and studying for the bar and saved money for the purpose. He passed his final Bar at Law examination with first position and distinction and returned to India in 1913. He played a unique and unparalleled role in the freedom struggle of our country. Nation is highly indebted to his devotion as the Architect of the United India.
SWAMI VIVEKANANDA'S inspiring personality was well known both in India and in America during the last decade of the nineteenth century and the first decade of the twentieth. The unknown monk of India suddenly leapt into fame at the Parliament of Religions held in Chicago in 1893, at which he represented Hinduism. His vast knowledge of Eastern and Western culture as well as his deep spiritual insight, fervid eloquence, brilliant conversation, broad human sympathy, colourful personality, and handsome figure made an irresistible appeal to the many types of Americans who came in contact with him. People who saw or heard Vivekananda even once still cherish his memory after a lapse of more than half a century.
"Patriot of Patriots", this is what Mahatma Gandhi described Subhash Chandra Bose. Subhash Chandra Bose was a brilliant young man set for a glittering future in the Indian Civil Services when he chose to dedicate himself to the Indian National movement instead. Beginning as youth Congressman, Bose tired of Gandhian politics and organised the Azad Hind Fauj to defeat the British during World War II. Inspite of the defeat of the Azad Hind Fauj, Subhash Chandra Bose won an immortal place in Indian History. "Jai-Hind" was his battle cry and he roused the nation to a great patriotic heights.