Today’s Motto: ‘If you have spare advice to give, first use it !’

This is Your Day-TODAY: Take a Determined Step Forward and Make History!

On this day, 01 Aug ….
(National Girlfriends Day to encourage women across the globe to get together and celebrate their special bond of friendship).

1619 – 1st black Americans (20) land at Jamestown, Virginia, US.
1774 – Joseph Priestley, British Presbyterian minister and chemist, identified a gas which he called “dephlogisticated air” — later known as Oxygen.
1794 – Whiskey Rebellion begins. (It was a protest against the first tax imposed on a domestic Whiskey by the newly formed US federal government aimed at generating revenue to help reduce the national debt).
1873 – Cable car was introduced in San Fransisco by English inventor/manufacturer Andrew Smith Hallidie. It was already in use in mines ( pic credit-Gatty Images).

1905 – Horse drawn tram cars were closed down in Bombay. This service was started on May 9, 1874 with 20 tram cars and 200 horses. The very first day of its run, the number of passengers carried was 451 and the amount earned was Rs. 85/- on the last day it had 1360 horses and carried 71,947 passengers and earned Rs.4,260/).

1941 – Jeep was praised by General Swight D Eisenhower, “America couldn’t have won World War II without it”. (Many explanations of the origin of the word jeep have proved difficult to verify. The most widely held theory is that the military designation GP (for Government Purposes or General Purpose) was slurred into the word Jeep. A counter to the slurred GP theory was that the vehicle was designed for specific duties, and was never referred to as “General Purpose”. It is also suggested that soldiers at the time were so impressed with the new vehicles that they informally named it after Eugene the Jeep, a character in the Popeye comic strip and cartoons that could solve any problem. The word jeep, however, was used as early as 1914 by US Army mechanics assigned to test new vehicles. In 1937, tractors which were supplied to the US Army were called jeeps. A precursor of the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress was also referred to as the jeep).

1944 – Anne Frank’s last diary entry; 3 days later she is arrested.

1947 – Partition of India into India and Pakistan. Power transferred. Lord Mountbatten becomes Governor General of India and Muhammed Ali Jinnah, Governor General of Pakistan.
1957 – The Solar Building (Bridgers and Paxton Office Building), Albuquerque, US, was the first commercial building to be heated by the sun’s energy.

1974 – The People’s Liberation Army Navy put into service their first nuclear-powered submarine, designed and built in China. Russia had refused to share nuclear propulsion technology with China, so Mao Tse-tung resolved to develop their own nuclear submarine building programme. As China’s first-generation design, its performance was generally inferior to American or Russian vessels of the time. It was decommissioned in 2000.

1986 – Amnesty scheme for evaders of taxes in India announced.

2000 – 27 yatris die after militants attack a ‘langar’ in a Pahalgam health resort en route to the Amarnath cave shrine.

2000 – A man in Israel become the first recipient of the Jarvik 2000, the first total artificial heart that can maintain blood flow in addition to generating a pulse.

2000 – The Lok Sabha adopts Uttar Pradesh State Reorganisation Bill paving the way for the creation of Uttaranchal the 27th State.

2020 – Egypt tells Elon Musk its pyramids were not built by aliens after Musk tweets in support of a conspiracy theory that they were.

Born…. 1882 – Purushottamdas Tandon, great leader and editor. Also called Rajrishi for his  writings, statesmanship and popularity. He opposed Partition of India. Congress and other Congress leaders considered him as pro-Hinduism. He was honpoured with Bharat Ratna in 1961.

1932 – Meena Kumari, legendary  film actress, poet and singer. also called TRagedy Queen of Indian cinema for her sad and tragic roles in  Baiju Bawra, Saheb Bibi aur Ghulam, Dil Ek Mandir, Pakeezah, Phool Aur Pather, Kaagaz Ke Phool,  Kaajal, Patrineeta, Mein Chup Rahungi, Mere Apne etc. She won 4 Filmfare, 3 BFJA awards. She remained Filmfare best actress for 13 years.

1955 – Arun Lal, Delhi cricketer  and opening  batsman mid-80’s who shifted to Bengal and stayed there for long. Arun played 16 Tests and scored 729 runs. He was also President of Bengal Cricket Association.  He was in the news recently, when he married his girlfriend Bulbul Saha (28 year younger to him).
RIP….  1920 – Bal Gangadhar Tilak, a prominent national leader. Freedom gighter and one of the members of Trioka Bal-Gopal and Lal.  (more on him in July 23 issue, as it was his 169th Birthday).

1999 – Nirad C. Chaudhuri, Indian-born writer. (He authored numerous works in English and Bengali. His oeuvre provides a magisterial appraisal of the histories and cultures of India, especially in the context of British colonialism in the 19th and 20th centuries. Chaudhuri is best known for The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian, published in 1951).

2008 – Harkishan Singh Surjeet, veteran Communist Party of India  leader.  He was President of CPI(M)M for several years when Jyoti Basu was the CM of Bengal.  (more in the  March 23 issue as it was his  109th Birthday)

Titbits…. 1976 – Liz Taylor’s 6th divorce. She re-divorces Richard Burton. (pic credit-cheatsheet.com).

You may have known…. India’s average literacy rate is around 73%. Specifically, the 2011 Census reported a literacy rate of 72.98%. This figure includes both male and female literacy rates, with males at 80.9% and females at 64.6%. While this represents a significant increase from previous decades, there are still disparities between urban and rural areas, as well as between male and female literacy rates.

{Compiled by Lt. Gen. (R) Raj Kadyan}