Moulana Abdul Kalam Azad

Moulana Abdul Kalam Muhiyuddin Ahmed :
(Birth:11th Nov.1888- Death:22nd Feb.1958)

Moulana Abdul Kalam Azad is remembered as an enthusiastic leader of the freedom struggle of India, a great politician, a scholar and an orator. He was scholar of Urdu, Persian and Arabic languages. He was born in the family of a Muslim preacher in Mecca. Two years after the birth their family came to Calcutta. Abdul Kalam was trained according to olden methods and started studying Koran at the early age of fourteen. He received the title of 'Moulana' in his youth and changed his original name 'Muhiyuddin' to 'Azad' (free).

Abdul Kalam Azad came into contact with Shyamsunder Chakraborty and Aurobindo Ghose and became person of revolutionary thoughts. He entered politics and started a revolutionary nationalist Urdu weekly ' Al Halal' from Calcutta at the age of twenty-four only. He started criticizing the British and the sale of his weekly shots up to 25,000 copies per issue. The Government demanded bail from him and compelled to stop ' Al Halal'. After this, he started another periodic called ' Alba lag' and he was detained at Ranchi in 1916.
After Abdul Kalam Azad was freed from Ranchi in Jan. of 1920, he joined Mahatma Gandhi and Indian National Congress (I. N. C.). Since then, Abdul Kalam participated in every movement against British government. He participated in the movements like non-cooperation, Khilafat, the 1942 movement and suffered eleven years imprisonment.

Abdul Kalam was elected as president of the 1923 special session of the Congress and at 35 years of age, was the youngest man to be elected the President of the Congress. He became President of the Ramgadh Congress in 1940 and held the post for two years. In the meantime, he was imprisoned in the Ahmednagar fort for three years.

Abdul Kalam was included in the first cabinet of the Free India. He was minister of education for eleven years. Abdul Kalam's commentary on the Koran is famous as well as his book ' Ghubar-e-Khatir' is famous in Urdu literature.

The great leader of Nationalist Indian Muslims and a freedom lover Abdul Kalam Azad died at the age of seventy.

Swami Vivekanand

Swami Vivekananda :
(Birth: 7th Jan.1863 - Death: 4th July,1902)

Swami Vivekananda was the first person to introduce Indian Culture and Hindu religion to the Western nations. He became internationally famous because of his speeches in the Congress of Religions held at Chicago, U.S.A.

Swami Vivekananda was born in Kayastha family named Dutta in Shimla Pally, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. His father was Viswanath Dutta, who was an attorney general and mother was Bhuvaneswari Devi. Vivekanand was called as Veereshwar or Narendra in his childhood. He passed the B.A. examination from the Dutta College, Kolkata. While in college, Oriental and Western philosophy were his favorite subject of study.

For some period, Swami Vivekananda adopted the Brahmo Samaj, but when he met Ramakrishna Paramhansa, in 1882, his life was revolutionised. He took sanyas for studying the Vedas and lived in Himalayas for six years. He meditated there for the attainment of the Truth. Then, he studied Buddhism in Tibet for one year.

At last, he attained realization while meditating on the rock near Kanyakumari. The rock went on to become the Vivekananda memorial at Kanyakumari.

In 1892, after he completed the pilgrimage of India, he came to know about the Congress of Religion to be held at Chicago. The Raja of Ramnad, who was originally invited for the conference, promoted Vivekananda as the right person to represent the views of Hinduism in the Parliament. Thus, helped by his friends at Chennai, Bhaskara Sethupathi, Raja of Ramnad and Maharajas of Mysore and Khetri, Vivekananda set out on his journey to the USA. He left for America on 31st may 1893 , after collecting the amount necessary for his travel. He had to face many hardships during his journey and his first day in America. One Miss Kate Sanborn introduced him and he was admitted as an authorized representative of the Hindu religion. His personality and eloquence impressed the people so much that he soon became well-known around the world as the Hindu Sanyasi. After completing his two year's lecture tour in America, he went to England. The British also were impressed by him.

After returning from tours of America & England, Swami Vivekananda founded an institution in the name of guru Shri Ramakrishna Paramhansa i.e. ' Ramakrishna Mission'

On July 4, 1902 at Belur Math near Kolkata, he taught Vedanta philosophy to some pupils in the morning. He had a walk with Swami Premananda, a brother-disciple and gave him instructions concerning the future of the Ramakrishna Math. The same day, Vivekananda left his mortal body at the young age of 39. The Vivekananda Rock Memorial built at Kanyakumari still reminds us of him and his guru.