DR.A. P. J. Abdul Kalam,Former President of India passes away

Shyamotpal Biswas,News Correspondant,Agartala,Tripura,India,27 July – While delivering a lecture on Livable Planet Earth at Indian Institute of Management Shillong on 27 July 2015, Kalam suffered a severe heart attack at around 6:30 p.m IST. He was rushed to the Bethany Hospital in a critical condition; despite efforts to revive him, he died of cardiac arrest at 7:45 p.m IST. Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam (15 October 1931 – 27 July 2015) was the 11th President of India from 2002 to 2007. A career scientist turned reluctant politician, Kalam was born and raised in Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu and studied physics and aerospace engineering. He spent the next four decades as a scientist and science administrator, mainly at the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and was intimately involved in India’s civilian space program and military missile development efforts. He thus came to be known as the Missile Man of India for his work on the development of ballistic missile and launch vehicle technology. Kalam was elected President of India in 2002 with the support of both the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and the opposition Indian National Congress. After serving a term of five years, he returned to his civilian life of education, writing and public service. He received several prestigious awards, including the Bharat Ratna, India’s highest civilian honour. In his book India 2020, Kalam strongly advocated an action plan to develop India into a “knowledge superpower” and a developed nation by the year 2020. He regarded his work on India’s nuclear weapons programme as a way to assert India’s place as a future superpower. He was falicited by Doctor of Science Edinburgh University,UK, International von Kármán Wings Award California Institute of Technology, USA, Doctor of Engineering (Honoris Causa) Nanyang Technological University, Singapore and many other.