Newsletters
@Evening: 😔 19 January — Not A Day To Forget
1. 🆕 What's New: 📰 Catch-up
India is reportedly taking steps to counter any potential misadventures by China in the Brahmaputra River.
PM Modi will distribute around 71,000 appointment letters to new hires in government departments and organisations tomorrow.
The Centre told SC that it was looking into the issue pertaining to declaring the Ram Sethu as a national heritage monument.
Regions around northern Bay of Bengal have received higher precipitation than other parts of India in the last 10,200 years.
Jacinda Ardern steps down as the prime minister of New Zealand.
2. 🤔 Twitter Think: 🎗️ A day in Indian history never to forget
Thirty-three years of exile from Kashmir began today.
On 19 January 1990, over 500,000 Kashmiri Pandits were forced to flee the Valley — their homeland — almost overnight because of a genocidal campaign unleashed by jihadis.
An entire community was forced to leave Kashmir amid calls of "cheliv, galiv, ya raliv (leave, die, or mix)."
This day kicked off the complete exodus of the aboriginal indigenous people that represented a civilisation more than 5,000 years old.
According to Kashmiri Pandits, over 300 Hindus were killed in 1989-90.
Displaced Kashmiri Hindus still long to return to their homeland. Sadly, despite the sands of time, it still feels like a distant dream.
"Today was the day when they became refugees in their own land. Today was the day. Never forget. NEVER," author and scientist Anand Ranganathan said in a tweet today.
3. 📚 Word Watch: 🕉️ Jaggi's guide for every Hindu today
Swarajya editorial director R Jagannathan's newest book, Dharmic Nation, "is a pithy and practical guide on how to approach life as a Sanatani in Bharatvarsha," Gautam R Desiraju and Deekhit Bhattacharya write in their review of the book, published on Swarajya today.
Dharmic Nation describes India's challenge in the twenty-first century, where it's facing a battle between dharma and adharma.
The most novel idea in the book is "Hinduism lite," among others.
"This futuristic approach in the book is combined with a clinical view of our past, which is a refreshing relief," the reviewers write.
Read the book review.
The author, R Jagannathan, is a veteran journalist with over four decades of professional experience.
He received the Shriram Sanlam Lifetime Achievement Award in 2016.
His first book was titled — relating directly to its subject matter — The Jobs Crisis in India.
🎧 Swarajya audiobook: 🗣️ The author speaks on the Bravehearts of Bharat
We've told you about Vikram Sampath's newest book before — once on this email, plus via a review on Swarajya. Now hear from the author himself.
In conversation with Swarajya's Sharan Setty, Sampath talks about the book, which presents the life stories of 16 great warriors of India.
The author delves briefly into the lives of some of these heroes and heroines of India he has written about, as well as his reflections, on our audiobook.
"Somewhere, all these characters of the past who have not received their due, they probably come looking for redemption from my pen, and I feel so fortunate and blessed to be chosen as the medium..." Sampath says.
Sampath is a historian and the author of seven acclaimed books, including the two-volume biography Savarkar: Echoes from a Forgotten Past and Savarkar: A Contested Legacy, 1924-1966.
4. 📷 Picture Speaks: 🛰️ Spot the International Space Station?
An exquisite photograph, taken by Samil Cabrera and shared on Twitter by the Canadian Space Agency, shows the Moon, Jupiter, and the International Space Station (ISS). Can you see the station?
The ISS goes around Earth 16 times every day.
The distance it covers in a day roughly amounts to a lunar round trip.
The orbital outpost is the third-brightest object in the sky and visible with the naked eye if you know when to look up.
A bonus catch: the three moons of Jupiter.
The ISS is an orbital lab with human presence in low-Earth orbit that came about as a result of a multination consortium comprising the United States, Russia, Japan, Europe, and Canada.
It was launched in low-Earth orbit in installments.
The first piece went up on a Russian rocket in 1998. Further parts were added to the station until it was said to be finished in 2011.
The 420-tonne space station took 10 years and more than 30 missions to assemble.
The ISS had become ready to receive astronauts two years after its first launch in 1998. The first crew arrived on 2 November 2000.
After having served the planet for over two decades, the ISS was looking at a 2024 wind-down with a possible extension time frame of four years.
However, it appears now that the ISS will be kept in orbit until 2030.
5. 📔 Culture Cutlet: 🆙 Fortress Gabba fell on this day in 2021
On this day in 2021, a historic win at the Gabba helped the Indian cricket team seal the series against Australia 2-1 in their backyard.
Not just any backyard, Gabba was a "fortress" for Team Australia as they had never lost a test match at that venue in over three decades.
India's Gabba special wasn't a one-off either. It had come on the heels of an incredibly resilient show in Sydney to save a test match, enabling an iconic series win for the ages in the fourth and final test match.
India won what's called the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2-1.
The 2021 Gabba win is widely considered to be one of India's best wins in test cricket ever.
Today is the second anniversary of that win. Happy Gabba Day.
By the way... Australia is coming to India for a four-test series starting 9 February 2023.
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