247 items in this section. Displaying page 2 of 25
Bhagat Singh
March 23 is the death anniversary of one of the most heroic figures of the Indian freedom movement. Few people remembered it, though. Forget the rest of India, even the children of the village where he was born, do not know anything about him. And to think that the young man in question, Bhagat Singh, gave up his life for the ideal of a free and better India! Today, over 50 years after Independence, the people of his village still do not have access to drinking water and a tap, writes The Indian Express newspaper....
The Wooden God
Bablu hated the ritual of prayer and fast that his family had been observing for as long as he could remember. The entire family had to wake at dawn and have a dip in the village pond, even if it was in the middle of the bitterest winter. A chilly winter day would find a shivering Bablu trying hard not to think of the million ice-cold needles that would pierce him when he entered the pond to bathe....
The Story of Diwali
Deepavali or Diwali as it has come to be known as, means many things to many people. It means holidays from school, shopping expeditions for clothes, sweets, gifts and crackers to children. To the office-goer it means an annual bonus that can make all this happen. To the businessman Diwali means brisk business just as to the clay potter, Diwali is the occasion of the year when the bulk of his sales are made. Diwali has a special significance for the trading communities of India who usher in their new year and new accounting books (‘bahi khata’) during this time....
King of the Birds
The birds of the jungle had no king. It was a real embarrassment for them since everyone else in the jungle had kings. A king is someone who heads the flock and decides every thing for them. All the birds decided they too needed a king. The called a meeting to resolve the problem. But who will be the king? The Mynah had an idea. “Let the bird who can fly the highest be made king of the air,” she said....
The Desert Creature
This happened thousands of years ago. Life was hard as people had to do all the work by themselves. A large number of people were nomads – they would travel from one place to another in search of food and shelter. While travelling one day, a man arrived at the edge of a desert. He was walking in the sands, when suddenly, he came across a frightening creature – it had extremely long, thin legs, a giant hump and a long neck....
Srinivasa Aiyangar Ramanujan
Srinivasa Ramanujan was one of India’s mathematical geniuses. He made wonderful contributions to the field of advanced mathematics. Even today, his fascinating results and mathematical theories, and a number of unpublished notebooks filled with theorems, continue to baffle and enthrall mathematicians. Ramanujan was born in his grandmother’s house in Erode, a small village near Chennai in Tamil Nadu. While he was still a baby, his mother took him to Kumbakonam, near Chennai, where his father worked as a clerk in a cloth merchant’s shop....
Tenali Rama and the Brinjal
Clown, jester, poet…Tenali Rama, minister in the court of the ruler of Vijaynagar, Krishnadeva Rai (reign: 1509-30), was a lot of things. Stories, about Tenali Rama and his practical jokes on everyone around him including distinguished fellow poets and the emperor himself, abound in south India. His fame spread beyond Vijaynagar (present-day Andhra Pradesh), to areas that come in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka today. Tenali Rama was also a great scholar of several languages that included Marathi, Tamil and Kannada....
Why is the Mediterranean Sea Blue?
We know that about seventy one per cent of the earth’s surface is covered with water. The earth’s three main Oceans are the Atlantic, the Pacific and the Indian Ocean. The Atlantic Ocean is a great mass of water that separates Europe and Africa from America. It is shaped like a great hour-glass-with a ‘waist’ where Africa and South America bulge out towards each other. Although in area it is less than half the Pacific, it has many ‘secondary’ seas, such as the Arctic Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea....
Tail-cut Fox!
Every morning the fox strutted through the forest pretending to be king of the jungle. He would bully an animal here, chase another there and show a third one his fangs. He was an utter nuisance. One morning while chasing a hare, he got caught in a trap. Actually, it was his tail that got trapped. He pulled and pulled and huffed and puffed, but couldn’t get free. The tail stayed in the trap. Now the fox was very proud of his bushy tail, which he always kept in a good condition....
The Nine Nights of Navaratri
This year, the end of September marks the onset of Navaratri or “nine nights” in the Hindu calendar. With this begins one of the most festive phases in India, with Durga Puja in east India, Dussehra in north, central and west India, and Saraswati Puja in South India. It also sets the stage for Diwali in the near future. Navaratri literally means ‘nine nights’. This nine-day period, sacred to Durga, is celebrated sometime in the months of October and November....