Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was an Indian scientist and politician who played a leading role in the development of India's missile and nuclear weapons programs. Come, through this article, Dr. A.P.J. Let us study about Abdul Kalam's early life, career, education, awards, etc.
Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam's involvement in nuclear energy in India earned him the title "Missile Man of India". Due to his contribution, the Government of India honored him with the highest civilian award.
Let us tell you that the Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Prakash Javadekar on 9 February 2020 in New Delhi, Dr. APJ. The first look of Abdul Kalam's biopic was released. The title of the movie is A.P.J. Abdul Kalam: The Missile Man (APJ Abdul Kalam: The Missile Man).
Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was born on 15 October 1931. His birth anniversary is celebrated as World Students Day. He was the President of India from 2002 to 2007. He was honored with several prestigious awards including the "Bharat Ratna", India's highest civilian honor in 1997. He was born in Dhanushkodi, Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu and studied physics and aerospace engineering.
Name: Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam (Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam)
Nationality: Indian
Occupation: Engineer, Scientist, Writer, Professor, Politician
Born: 15-Oct-1931
Place of Birth: Dhanushkodi, Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu, India
Died: 27 July 2015, Shillong, Meghalaya, India
Famous As: Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was the President from 2002 to 2007
Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was elected President in the year 2002 against Lakshmi Sehgal. Before becoming the President of India, he worked as an aerospace engineer with the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO).
He was nicknamed the 'Missile Man of India' for his important role in the country's space programme, launch vehicle and ballistic missile technology development. In addition, in 1998, he also contributed significantly to India's Pokhran-II nuclear tests.
Do you know that Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam started his career as a scientist in which Aeronautical Development Establishment of Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO)? He also served as a project director of India's first indigenous Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV-III) at ISRO.
In the 1990s, he served as the Chief Scientific Adviser to the Prime Minister before becoming the President of India in 2002. Come now, through this article, Dr. A.P.J. Let us study in detail about Abdul Kalam.
Family history and early life:
Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was born on 15 October 1931 in Rameswaram in a Tamil Muslim family. His father's name was Jainulabdeen, who was a sailor. His mother's name was Aseemma and she was a housewife. These were a total of five siblings, three elder brothers and one elder sister.
His eldest sister named Asim Zohra and three elder brothers, namely Qasim Mohammad, Mustafa Kamal, Mohd Muthu Meera Lebai Marikayar. He was close to his family and always helped them, although he remained a bachelor all his life.
Abdul Kalam's ancestors were wealthy merchants and landowners with many properties and large tracts of land. They traded groceries between the mainland and the island and to and from Sri Lanka, and ferrying pilgrims from the mainland to Pamban Island. So, his family came to be known as "Mara Kalam Iyakkivar" (wooden boatman) and later as "Marakier".
But by the 1920s, his family's businesses failed and by the time Abdul Kalam was born, he was struggling with poverty. To help the family, Kalam started selling newspapers at an early age.
During his school days, he was normal in studies, but was always ready and ready to learn new things. He wanted to learn things and used to concentrate on his studies for hours. His main interest was in mathematics.
He completed his matriculation from Schwartz Higher Secondary School, Ramanathapuram, Tamil Nadu and later joined St. Joseph's College and graduated in Physics in 1954. In 1955 he moved to Madras from where he studied Aerospace at the Institute of Technology. His dream of taking engineering education was to become a fighter pilot, but he secured ninth position in the examination, while the IAF had declared only eight results. So he could not succeed in that.
Education and career:
After completing his graduation in the year 1960, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam joined the Aeronautical Development Establishment of the Defense Research and Development Organization as a scientist.
He also worked with renowned scientist Vikram Sarabhai as part of the committee of INCOSPAR (National Committee of India). He started his career by designing a small hovercraft in DRDO. Early in his career, he designed a small helicopter for the Indian Army. From 1963 to 1964, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam visited Defense Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, Wallops Flight Efficiency on the East Coast of Virginia and NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.
He started working independently on an expandable rocket project at DRDO in 1965. He was not very satisfied with his work in DRDO and was happy when he got transfer orders to ISRO in 1969. There he served as the Project Director of SLV-III. In July 1980, his team was successful in placing the Rohini satellite near Earth's orbit. It is India's first indigenously designed and built satellite launch vehicle.
Abdul Kalam received the approval of the government in 1969 and expanded the program to include more engineers. In the 1970s, he made an effort to develop the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) so that India could launch its Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) satellite into Sun-Synchronous orbit, the PSLV project was successful and on 20 September On 1993, it was launched for the first time.
Dr Kalam's efforts in the development of projects of SLV-3 and Polar SLV from the year 1970 to 1990 proved to be quite successful. Dr Kalam directed Project Valiant and Project Devil which aimed to develop ballistic missiles using the technology of the SLV programme, which was also successful.
An Indian Defense Ministry managed by DRDO along with other government organizations launched the Integrated Guided Missile Development Program (IGMDP) in the early 1980s. Abdul Kalam was asked to lead the project and hence he returned to DRDO as the Chief Executive Officer of IGMDP. Due to his instructions, it was successful to make other missiles like Agni missile, Prithvi.
Under the leadership of Abdul Kalam, the project of IGMDP proved successful by producing missiles like the first Prithvi missile in 1988 and then Agni missile in 1989. Due to his contribution, he is known as the "Missile Man of India". He served as Secretary, Defense Research and Development Organization from July 1992 to December 1999, and was also the Chief Scientific Advisor to the Prime Minister.
Dr. Kalam played an important technical and political role in the Pokhran II nuclear test during this period and the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee declared India a full-fledged nuclear state.
Did you know that in 1998, Abdul Kalam ji along with cardiologist Dr. Soma Raju developed a low cost coronary stent? Which was later named as "Kalam-Raju Stent". Apart from this, both these people also designed tablet PC for health care in rural areas which was named "Kalam-Raju Tablet".
Term as President of India (2002 to 2007):
- On 10 June 2002, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government elected Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam's name was proposed to the Leader of the Opposition, Congress President Sonia Gandhi.
- Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam served as the President of India from 25 July 2002 to 25 July 2007. He was the first single and scientist to live in Rashtrapati Bhavan.
- Do you know that he got around 922,884 votes in the presidential election and won the election by defeating Laxmi Sehgal of the opposition?
- KR Narayanan was followed by Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam became the 11th President of India.
- He was the third President of India to receive the Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian award. Prior to this, Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan was conferred this honor in the year 1954 and Dr. Zakir Hussain in the year 1963.
- Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was also known as People's President.
- According to him, the most difficult decision taken by him as President was to sign the bill of Office of Profit.
- During his five-year tenure, he remained committed to his vision of transforming India into a developed nation.
- However, he was also criticized as a President for his inaction to decide the fate of the mercy petitions of 20 out of 21 people, including Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri terrorist who was convicted for the December 2001 Parliament attacks had gone.
- He decided not to contest the presidential election again in 2007 and stepped down as President on 25 July 2007.
The demise of great personality:
On 27 July 2015, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was delivering a lecture at IIM Shillong, where he suffered a heart attack and his condition became critical, therefore, he was shifted to Bethany Hospital, where he later died of a cardiac arrest. His last words to Shrijan Pal Singh were "Funny guy! Are you doing well?"
On 30 July 2015, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam's last rites took place near his ancestral village Rameshwaram. Did you know that around 350,000 people attended Kalam's funeral rites, including the Prime Minister of India, the Governor of Tamil Nadu and the Chief Ministers of Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh?
Awards and Achievements:
- In 1981, Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was awarded the Padma Bhushan by the Government of India.
In 1990, was awarded the Padma Vibhushan. - In 1997, was awarded the highest civilian award like Bharat Ratna.
- In 1998, was awarded the Veer Savarkar Award.
In 2000, Alvaras Research Centre, Chennai presented him with Ramanujan Award. - In 2007, Britain was awarded the King Charles II Medal by the Royal Society.
- In 2008, he was awarded the Doctor of Engineering (Honoris Causa) degree from Nanyang Technical University, Singapore.
- In 2009, awarded the Hoover Medal by the ASME Foundation of America
- In 2010, the University of Waterloo honored Dr. Kalam with a Doctor of Engineering.
- In 2011, he became an honorary member of the IEEE.
- In 2013, he was awarded the Von Braun Prize by the National Space Society.
- In 2014, he was awarded the Doctor of Science degree by the University of Edinburgh, UK.
- Dr. Kalam was the recipient of honorary doctorates from about 40 universities.
- In 2015, the United Nations recognized Dr. Kalam's birthday as "World Students' Day".
