education 2017new.pmd 103 29-03-2017, 14:57premchand’s home, now a museum in 2005, moved by the...

education 2017new.pmd 29-03-2017, 14:57103

Oldest to appear for PG examRaj Kumar Vaish (b April 1, 1920) of Patna, Biharenrolled for MA in Economics from Nalanda

Open University, Bihar, on Sept 9, 2015,more than 77 years after graduating

from Agra University in 1938.At 96+ years of age, he is

the oldest person to takeadmission for a postgraduatecourse. University officialsrelaxed norms to provide himhis identity card and course

material in English.In April 2016, he also became

the oldest man to appear for the MA(Part1) exam conducted by the University. For anexamination spanning 3 hours, Raj Kumar took23 answer sheets.

Couple receives PhD degrees within twodays of each otherDr A Ramachandra Murthy (b July 2, 1970)obtained his PhD degree from Indian Institute ofScience, Bangalore on Dec 16, 2011. Two dayslater, his wife Dr P Rajasulochana acquired herPhD degree from Bharath University, Chennai onDec 18, 2011.

A hat trick by three sistersThe three daughters of Vijay Shankar and Girija Mishra from Rewa (MP) wereawarded PhD degrees in 2014 at the same Convocation conducted by AwadeshPratap Singh University, Rewa: Dr Archana Mishra (b Jan 1, 1977) in History,Dr Anjana Mishra (b. June 15, 1982) and Dr Ashu Mishra (b July 12, 1985) both inEnvironmental Biology.

Oldest to be awarded PG degreeA Gopalan (b Nov 21, 1934) was awarded the degree ofM Sc in Value Education and Spirituality by AnnamalaiUniversity (Annamalainagar, Tamil Nadu) in June 2015. At81 years of age (in June 2015) he is the oldest person toclear the post-graduation examination, 35 years afterpassing his BCom examinations in 1980.

Five PhD holders in one familyThe five children of Rekha and Bhagwan Das Ahirwar from Barwasagar of Jhansi Distt (UP) are all PhDholders: Dr Mukesh Kumar in Business Administration (2013); Dr Ragini Ahirwar in Zoology (2006);and Dr Mohini Ahirwar in Botany (2007) all from Bundelkhand University, Jhansi; Dr Anil Kumar inPublic Administration from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi (2016) and Dr Sohini Ahirwar inSociology from Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee (2015).

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Most PG degrees by a womanVandana Agrawal (b Nov 12, 1954) fromAlwar, Rajasthan has 10 MA degrees, thehighest number of Postgraduate degrees by awoman. She has cleared MSc (Math1975)from Meerut University; MEd from AllahabadUniversity (1978); from the University ofRajasthan: MA (Eco 1990), MA (English1996), MA (Pub Adm 1998), MA (Socio2009), MA (Pol Sc 2011), MA (Hindi 2013),MA (Hist 2015); and MCom(2015) fromVardhman Mahaveer Open University, Kota.

First student to pass ‘Kathakali’ in CBSEexamsMrinalini Nair (b June 10, 1996), a student ofRamjas School, RK Puram, New Delhi is the firststudent to pass ‘Kathakali’ exam as an additionalsubject in the All India Senior School Certificate(Class 12) Exam 2014 conducted by CBSEpassing with 97% marks. Mrinalini has been adisciple of Guru Thiruvattar Jagadeeshan, of TheInternational Centre for Kathakali, QutubInstitutional Area, New Delhi since 2008.Kathakali is a stylized classical dance form ofKerala, normally dominated by male artists.

Odissi dance as a courseTen students have enrolled in the first batch of Odissi dance which is an elective course for the B Techstudents at IIT Bhubaneshwar, the first IIT to introduce Odissi dance in its curriculum.

First container schoolSafeducate Container School, launched bySafeducate, the education and training arm ofSafexpress Pvt Ltd was inaugurated by PrimeMinister Narendra Modi in the presence of RajivPratap Rudy, Minister of State for SkillDevelopment and Entrepreneurship at VigyanBhawan, New Delhi on July 15, 2015. Launchedunder the aegis of Pradhan Mantri Kaushal VikasYojana, the community outreach initiative aims toprovide quality training in skill developmentespecially in the field of supply chain and logistics.The beautifully designed container schools havethe advantage that they can be set up anywhere,even in remote areas of the country in a shorttime.

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A postgraduate who has never been to aschool or collegeKiran Jariwal (b August 30, 1994) of Churu,Rajasthan cleared her MA (Rajasthani) exams as anon-collegiate student from Maharaja Ganga SinghUniversity, Bikaner in 2015. She has passed all herBoard and University examinations as a privatestudent without ever being admitted to any schoolor college. She studied under the guidance of herprivate tutor father, Sanwar Sangamanand, whokept her away from institutional education as hethought she would miss her mother who hadpassed away when she was only six months old.

First ACP person to complete graduationBhavna Botta who was born with Athetoid Cerebral Palsy (ACP) cannot walk, talk or write. Yet thisgritty young woman scored 70% in her final B Com examination in 2011 from Ethiraj College, Chennaiby using the Unique Eye Pointing Technique which helps the person to scroll with his or her glance acomputer monitor that displays alphabets, letters or words and make selections by looking at the signsfor ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ Alternatively, an assistant can read their gaze direction and enter the text manually.

First differently-abled woman to top Civil Services ExamsIra Singhal (b August 31, 1983) is the first differently-abled womanto have topped the Civil Services Exam (CSE) conducted by UPSCin the general category in 2014 in which women took the top fourpositions. She suffers from scoliosis, a spine-related disorder, alongwith disrupted arm movement. She had earlier passed the CSE in2010 with a slot with the Indian Revenue Services (IRS). But aposting was denied because of her disability even though shefulfilled all the physical requirements of the job. She filed a case inthe Civil Administrative Tribunal (CAT) and won in early 2014.During this period she appeared and cleared the UPSC examstwice more but yet again postings were denied to her. She toppedthe exams in her fourth attempt.

Only Hebrew teacherDr Khurshid Imam, Assistant Professor of Hebrewat the Centre for Arabic and African Studies,School of Language, Literature and CultureStudies, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), NewDelhi is the only teacher of Hebrew to hold atenured position in Indian academia. Scholarshipsfrom the Israeli government and funds dedicated

to former PrimeMinister Golda

Meir supportedhis education atthe HebrewUniversity,Jerusalemduring 1998-

2000. Hespecialised in

Hebrew Language andCulture, Hebrew Studies and Semitic languagesand has been teaching Hebrew in differentcapacities for over 10 years at JNU.

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Longest tenure in academicsDr Dhani Ram Agarwal (b Nov 4, 1941) has

completed over 55 years of teaching inthe formal sector without any break.

He started teaching Mathematics at acollege in Ghaziabad on July 26,1961 and is currently posted asProfessor Emeritus in the School ofManagement, The NorthcapUniversity, Gurgaon.

Premchand’s home, now a museumIn 2005, moved by the deplorable conditionof Munshi Premchand’s ancestral home atLamhi in Varanasi, Dr Vinay Kumar Yadav, Profof Hindi from Bishop Cotton Women’sCollege, Bengaluru decided that somethingmust be done to preserve it for posterity. Asignature campaign which began in the classroom soon snowballed into over one lakhsignatures. A letter drafted to Akilesh Yadav,Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, resulted in agrant of Rs1.5 crore.

By 2014, Prof Yadav and his students hadtransformed the dilapidated home intoPremchand Museum. On display isPremchand’s Saraswati printing press, the cothe slept on, the pen with which he wrotesome celebrated works. The museum houses300 novels and is a research centre.

First Social Science Cyber LibraryThe Social Science Cyber Library(www.socsccybraryamu.ac.in) at Aligarh MuslimUniversity (AMU) is the first library that collectsand updates daily the web-based e-resources inpublic domain available in the form of e-books,ejournals, in-house lectures, websites, databases,subject gateways, video lectures of eminentscholars and a host of software pertaining toSocial Sciences. The Cybrary is presently beingaccessed in 133 countries for research andscholarship. Set up under the leadership of ProfShabahat Husain as Dean, Faculty of SocialSciences, the Cybrary was inaugurated by ShriPranab Mukherjee, the President of India, onDec 27, 2013. It was awarded ISO 9001:2008and is registered in the Directories of OpenAccess Repositories of U.K. called DOAR andROAR.

Largest free website for Urdu languageRekhta Foundation, an irrevocable publiccharitable trust, was instituted on May 18, 2012.Founded by Sanjiv Saraf, www.rekhta.org is thelargest free website and resource for Urdulanguage and literature. With 4.4 million followersacross 225 countries, it presents over 2,100 poetsand 25,000 poetical compositions from the 13th

century to the present day. The library of over20,000 e-books, 4,500 audios and 4,600 videos,has a website featuring poets reciting their worksand experts rendering them with remarkablecompetence, thus offering unique experience ofreading, listening and viewing.

Rekhta Foundation showcases acomprehensive dictionary with meaning of Urduwords at a click to facilitate reading of texts inPersian, Devanagari, and Roman scripts. It alsoorganises its annual festival called Jashn-e-Rekhtawhich had 85,000 footfalls in 2016.

Educational apps in Google Play StoreEducational Innovator, Dr DheerajMehrotra (b Oct 25, 1971) fromLucknow has put up at least 150educational apps for free for theAndroid Google Play Store. TheseApps are purely educational and aretargeted towards teachers, studentsand parents.


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http://www.socsccybraryamu.ac.in

http://www.rekhta.org

Longest running science education programmeNational Council of Science Museum (NCSM), an autonomous bodyunder the Ministry of Culture, Govt of India, has conducted the largestand longest running science education programme by travelling14,88,297 km in 72,823 exhibition days. It has reached out to6,45,19,367 people through a fleet of 23 NCSM MUSEOBUSES(specially designed buses) over a period of 50 years. The scienceeducation programme began on Nov17, 1965 at Ram Krishna MissionSchool, Narendrapur, West Bengal has continued through exhibitions andfilm shows all across the country reaching out to millions of people livingin remote areas.

Gender sensitisation in higher technical educationJawaharlal Nehru Technological University, Hyderabad (JNTUH)is the first Technological University to introduce ‘GenderSensitisation’ as a compulsory subject in 2nd year in BTech and BPharmacy for the constituent and affiliated colleges of JNTUHincluding autonomous colleges. The paper carries 2 credit points.Students must score at least 40% in both written and internalexams to pass.

Most workshops conducted in different schoolsDhaval Bathia (b June 26, 1983) has conducted free educationalworkshops on memory skills and mathematics in over 345 schools in Indiaand abroad to students from Std 5 to Std 10. His first workshop wasconducted at Sardar Vallabhai Patel School, Mumbai on April 2, 2000. His345th workshop was at Vidya Mandir School in Dahisar on Aug 21, 2015.The two hour workshops deal with topics like how to make Math easy,how to memorize, stress free studies, etc.

Students experience virtual solar journeyKOMPANIONS, a Gurgaon based Edu-Tech-Sciorganisation, enabled 850 students in the age group of6-16 years of St Xavier’s School, Jaipur, to experiencethe Solar System journey through Virtual Reality (VR)on May 10, 2016. The students ‘boarded a space shipin the school auditorium and ‘visited’ all the planets asthey are in reality, just like an astronaut. It opened tothem the world of asteroids, stars, galaxies and muchmore. This was made possible through the use of amobile handset and a VR kit provided byKOMPANIONS. Virtual Reality is a computertechnology that replicates an environment, real orimagined, and simulates a user’s physical presence toallow user interaction.

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Library set up in a police stationWhen the Assistant Commissioner of Police(ACP) of North Police Station Tirupuraccepted the offer of his India-bornphilanthropist friend for a donation of booksfor a children’s library as with the advent ofthe internet and e-books printed books are ofno value anywhere now, little did he realizethat there would be a bonanza. More than5,000 books from various school libraries inthe US were transported to India. Right awayalmost 2,000 books were gifted to the RotaryClub. The rest of the books were numberedand sorted under various categories by thepolicemen. These were then stacked inshelves set up in the middle of a large hall inthe police station. Principals of local schoolswere informed about the opening of thelibrary and very soon school children startedborrowing the books for a period of 15 days.The Police Station Library follows theworking hours of North Police Station!

Most participants in science exhibitionMontessori English Medium School, Ullamparru, West GodavariDist, held Edufest 2016, which had 479 science projects, themost number executed by 5-15 year old students. The exhibitioninitially was for three days but extended by demand from visitorsfrom Feb 26-29, 2016. Conducted in their campus, it was alsothe longest science exhibit which was 0.5 km long. Around 620student orators explained to the visitors the importance of theproject.


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Longest running senior citizens computer classR V Institute of Management, Bengaluru has been conducting a freeadult education platform ‘Computer Literacy Programme for SeniorCitizens’ since 2006. Over 1,000 senior citizens aged between 60-90 years in 24 batches have been taught to use the computer likesending emails, sending photographs to their children andgrandchildren, on-line booking tickets, payment of bills, bankingremittances, digital India awareness, social media communicationand many more. Each batch consists of 40 members. Classes areheld in the evenings and each session is of three months duration.The 25th batch concluded its session in May 2016.

Course for compassion towards animalsKendriya Vidyalayas across the country introduced ‘Compassionate Citizen’, a humane educationprogramme designed to teach compassion towards animals to 8 – 12 year old children in a May 2016notification.

Prepared by animal rights advocacy group People for Ethical Treatment for Animals (PETA), it wasintegrated into the official curriculum via languages, social sciences, environmental and value educationcurricula. The course has been endorsed by the Animal Welfare Board and the Central Board of SecondaryEducation (CBSE).

Most seafarers trained in one yearB P Marine Academy in Belapur, Navi Mumbai, established on Dec 5, 1997, has trained the highest numberof seafarers (in the private sector) over the past 15 years. The Academy has trained 41,597 seafarers in onecalendar year, that is, January to December 2015.

Teaching over 1.5 lakh studentsBengaluru-based Roshni Mukherjee, a Master’sdegree holder in Physics, quit her full-time job tolaunch ExamFear.com in 2011, an online platformon You Tube Channel, to teach Science and Mathfor free to students from classes 6 to 12. She hasover 1.5 lakh subscribers and has made

approximately 5,000 videos which covera wide range of topics in Physics,

Chemistry, Math and Biology andmany more are in the making.ExamFear.com recently launchedpractical video series wherestudents can perform Science

experiments at home. It provides acomplete education package with 4-

step learning process: watch videos, askquestions, refer to notes and take a test.

In January 2016, Roshni was recognized as ‘100Women Achievers’ by the Ministry of Women andChild Development, Govt of India and felicitatedby the President of India.

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First quiz in AntarcticaWalnut Knowledge Solutions (WKS), a Bengaluru-based education company set up by formercorporate lawyers Raghav Chakravarthy (27) and Sachin Ravi (25) in 2014 to stimulate curiositythrough quiz programmes, organised the first quiz in the Antarctic continent on board the AuroraLounge in MV Ocean Endeavour in the Antarctic Peninsula on March 18, 2016. The 30 min quizprogramme conducted by WKS representative Subhodeep Jash (28) featured questions on Antarctica,climate change, environmental conservation and other such topics as part of the International AntarcticExpedition 2016 organised by the 2041 Foundation. Founded by Robert Swan, the 2041 Foundation

organises Antarcticexpeditions annually andis attended by chosenyoung leaders who areeducated about theirecological responsibilities,sustainability and climatechange. About 40-50expedition members ofthe 2016 delegation fromdifferent countriesattended the quiz.

Largest distribution of stationery kitsUnder its flagship project ‘Promote Education –Ek kadam ujjwalbhavishya ki aur’, Umang Foundation, Mumbai with the help of257 participating volunteers distributed stationery kits to 12,893financially weak students from Class 1 to 10 on the same day fromthe same venue (Matoshri Ramabai Ambedkar Vidyalaya,Ulhasnagar, Dist Thane, Maharashtra) in 6 hr 30 min on June 25,2016. Each kit contained a school bag, a set of long books /notebooks, pencils, pens, eraser, sharpener, scale, pencil box, lunchbox, water bottle coloring book, multi-activity book, a set ofcrayons, geometry box and a pack of biscuits to munch. UmangFoundation, a public charitable trust started in July 2008 hasprovided educational material to 70,000+ less fortunate childrensince inception under the guidance of Ashish Goyal, Founder andManaging Trustee.


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Cyber pledgeAs tribute to Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, One Library Per Village in association with IT@School, Kerala ITMission and Kerala Union Working Journalists conducted Cyber Sureskha Pledge or ‘Internet SafetyPledge’ in 15,000 schools across Kerala to restrain from any illegal online activities and drug abuse onOct 15, 2015, Dr Kalam’s birthday. All Schools in Kerala were instructed to read out a pledge inmorning Assembly between 9.00 - 11.00 am and students signed the pledge in the classrooms. Threemillion school children took the pledge on Oct 15, 2015.

Highest registration for an education programme (private university)VIT University, Vellore, Tamil Nadu registered 2,12,238 applications for its VIT Engineering EntranceExamination (VITEEE) in 2016, seeking admission to 5,500 seats in the B Tech programmes of theuniversity. It was the highest number of such applications received for a single programme in a privateuniversity. The exam was conducted at 145 centres in 118 cities across the country and overseas fromApril 6-17, 2016.

First 3D interactive museumA 3D interactive trick art museum named Click ArtMuseum, inaugurated in Chennai in May 2016 isknown as Tompe-l’oeil in French. It means ‘to deceivethe eye’, a 3 dimensional trick art that has 2dimensions but tricks one into believing there is athird. In the optical art museum, 24 trick art paintingsare printed on the wall. Viewers have to stand on themarkings on the floor in front of them in order to bea part of the paintings and enter the frame to makethe piece of art come alive. More than 47,000 peoplehave visited this museum in the first six monthsArtist AP Shreethar drew inspiration from similargalleries in Singapore, Malaysia, Phuket and HongKong, working for almost four years to make thisamazing museum possible.

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