title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: In January 2020, lawyer James Gottstein published a book titled "The Zyprexa Papers" summarizing the legal activities surrounding Zyprexa, and their impact on the political landscape of psychiatry and antipsychiatry in the US. The book details of how he obtained the Zyprexa papers, including how Will Hall and a small group of psychiatric survivors untraceably spread the Zyprexa Papers on the Internet and his battles on behalf of Bill Bigley, the psychiatric patient whose ordeal made possible the exposure of the Zyprexa Papers.


title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: In March 2021, Eli Lilly and Company was accused of sex discrimination by a former lobbyist who claimed she was forced to work in a sexually hostile work environment. The parties involved settled for an undisclosed amount in June 2021.


title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: In September 2021, Eli Lilly and Company was accused in a federal court lawsuit of discriminating against older applicants for sales positions based on their implementation of hiring quotas for millennials.


title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: In September 2013, Eli Lilly sued Canada for violating its obligations to foreign investors under the North American Free Trade Agreement by allowing its courts to invalidate patents for Straterra and Zyprexa. Canadian courts found Straterra's seven-week long study of twenty-two patients, too short and too narrow in scope to qualify for the patent. The Zyprexa patent was invalidated because it had not achieved its promised utility. The company sought damages in the amount of $500 million for lost profits. They ultimately lost the case in 2017.


title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: In December 2005, Eli Lilly and Company agreed to plead guilty and pay $36 million in connection with the illegal promotion of the drug. Sales representatives were trained to promote Evista for breast cancer and cardiovascular disease, to prompt or bait questions by doctors, and to send them unsolicited letters promoting Evista for unapproved use. The company distributed a videotape in which a sales representative declared that "Evista truly is the best drug for the prevention of all these diseases." Some sales representatives had also been instructed to conceal the disclosure page which stated that the effectiveness of the drug in reducing breast cancer risks had not yet been established.


title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: In January 2019, lawmakers from the United States House of Representatives sent letters to Eli Lilly and other insulin manufacturers asking for explanations for their rapidly raising insulin prices. The annual cost of insulin for people with type 1 diabetes in the U.S. almost doubled from $2,900 to $5,700 over the period from 2012 to 2016.


title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: Renewed attention was brought to Eli Lilly's pricing of insulin on November 10, 2022, after a verified Twitter account impersonating Eli Lilly posted on Twitter that insulin would now be free. This would cost the company $15 billion in valuation.


title: Eli Lilly and Company

text: In response to the reversal of Roe v. Wade brought on by the Dobbs decision, the state of Indiana went on to pass a near total ban on abortion. Eli Lilly said that this move would make it difficult to attract talent to the state and that it would be forced to look for "more employment growth" elsewhere.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: The Lunar Gateway, or simply Gateway, is the first planned extraterrestrial space station in lunar orbit intended to serve as a solar-powered communication hub, science laboratory, and short-term habitation module for government-agency astronauts, as well as a holding area for rovers and other robots. It is a multinational collaborative project involving four of the International Space Station partner agencies: NASA, European Space Agency (ESA), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and Canadian Space Agency (CSA). It is planned to be both the first space station beyond low Earth orbit and the first space station to orbit the Moon.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Formerly known as the Deep Space Gateway (DSG), the station was renamed Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway (LOP-G) in NASA's 2018 proposal for the 2019 United States federal budget. When the budgeting process was complete, US$332 million had been committed by Congress to preliminary studies.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: The science disciplines to be studied on the Gateway are expected to include planetary science, astrophysics, Earth observation, heliophysics, fundamental space biology, and human health and performance. Construction is planned to take place in the 2020s. The International Space Exploration Coordination Group (ISECG), which is composed of more than 14 space agencies including all the major ones, has concluded that Gateway systems will be critical method in expanding human presence to the Moon, Mars, and deeper into the Solar System.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: The project is expected to play a major role in NASA's Artemis program, after 2024. While the project is led by NASA, the Gateway is meant to be developed, serviced, and utilized in collaboration with the CSA, ESA, JAXA, and commercial partners. It will serve as the staging point for both robotic and crewed exploration of the lunar south pole and is the proposed staging point for NASA's Deep Space Transport concept for transport to Mars.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: An earlier NASA proposal for a cislunar station had been made public in 2012 and was dubbed the Deep Space Habitat. That proposal led to funding in 2015 under the NextSTEP program to study the requirements of deep space habitats. In February 2018, it was announced that the NextSTEP studies and other ISS partner studies would help to guide the capabilities required of the Gateway's habitation modules. The solar electric Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) of the Gateway was originally a part of the now-canceled Asteroid Redirect Mission. On 7 November 2017, NASA asked the global science community to submit concepts for scientific studies that could take advantage of the Deep Space Gateway's location in cislunar space. The Deep Space Gateway Concept Science Workshop was held in Denver, Colorado, from 27 February to 1 March 2018. This three-day conference was a workshop where 196 presentations were given for possible scientific studies that could be advanced through the use of the Gateway.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: In 2018, NASA initiated the Revolutionary Aerospace Systems Concepts Academic Linkage (RASC-AL) competition for universities to develop concepts and capabilities for the Gateway. The competitors were asked to employ original engineering and analysis in one of four areas; "Gateway Uncrewed Utilization and Operations", "Gateway-Based Human Lunar Surface Access", "Gateway Logistics as a Science Platform", and "Design of a Gateway-Based Cislunar Tug". Teams of undergraduate and graduate students were asked to submit a response by 17 January 2019 addressing one of these four themes. NASA selected 20 teams to continue developing proposed concepts. Fourteen of the teams presented their projects in person in June 2019 at the RASC-AL Forum in Cocoa Beach, Florida, receiving a US$6,000 stipend to participate in the Forum. The "Lunar Exploration and Access to Polar Regions" from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez was the winning concept.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: NASA unveiled the name of the lunar-orbit space station in November 2019, and the Gateway with its name and logo associated with the American frontier symbol of the St. Louis Gateway Arch.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: On 27 September 2017, an informal joint statement on cooperation regarding the program between NASA and Russia's Roscosmos was announced. However, in October 2020 Dmitry Rogozin, director general of Roscosmos, said that the program is too “U.S.-centric” for Roscosmos to participate in, and in January 2021, Roscosmos announced that it would not participate in the program.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: By May 2020, the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) all planned to participate in the Gateway project, contributing a robotic arm, refueling and communications hardware, and habitation and research capacity. Those international elements are intended to launch after the initial NASA PPE and HALO elements are placed into lunar orbit.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: On 1 November 2017, NASA commissioned five studies lasting four months into affordable ways to develop the Power and Propulsion Element (PPE), leveraging private companies' plans. These studies had a combined budget of US$2.4 million. The companies performing the PPE studies were Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Orbital ATK, Sierra Nevada and Space Systems/Loral. These awards are in addition to the ongoing set of NextSTEP-2 awards made in 2016 to study development and make ground prototypes of habitat modules that could be used on the Gateway as well as other commercial applications, so the Gateway is likely to incorporate components developed under NextSTEP as well. The PPE will use four 6 kW BHT-6000 Busek Hall-effect thrusters and two 12.5 kW NASA/Aerojet Rocketdyne Advanced Electric Propulsion System (AEPS) Hall-effect thrusters for a total engine output fractionally under 50 kW. In 2019, the contract to manufacture the PPE was awarded to Maxar Technologies. After a one-year demonstration period, NASA would then "exercise a contract option to take over control of the spacecraft". Its expected service time is about 15 years.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: The Gateway is planned to be deployed in a highly elliptical seven-day near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO) around the Moon, which would bring the station within over the lunar north pole surface at closest approach and as far away as over the lunar south pole. Traveling to and from cislunar space (lunar orbit) is intended to develop the knowledge and experience necessary to venture beyond the Moon and into deep space. The proposed NRHO would allow lunar expeditions from the Gateway to reach a low polar orbit with a delta-v of 730 m/s and a half a day of transit time. Orbital station-keeping would require less than 10 m/s of delta-v per year, and the orbital inclination could be shifted with a relatively small delta-v expenditure, allowing access to most of the lunar surface. Spacecraft launched from Earth would perform a powered flyby of the Moon (delta-v ≈ 180 m/s) followed by a ≈240 m/s delta-v NRHO insertion burn to dock with the Gateway as it approaches the apoapsis point of its orbit. The total travel time would be 5 days; the return to Earth would be similar in terms of trip duration and delta-v requirement if the spacecraft spends 11 days at the Gateway. The crewed mission duration of 21 days and ≈840 m/s delta-v are limited by the capabilities of the Orion life support and propulsion systems.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Gateway will be the first modular space station to be both human-rated, and autonomously operating most of the time in its early years, as well as being the first deep-space station, far from low Earth orbit. This will be enabled by more sophisticated executive control software than on any prior space station, which will monitor and control all systems. The high-level architecture is provided by the Robotics and Intelligence for Human Spaceflight lab at NASA and implemented at NASA facilities. The Gateway could conceivably also support in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) development and testing from lunar and asteroid sources, and would offer the opportunity for a gradual buildup of capabilities for more complex missions over time.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: For supporting the first crewed mission to the station (Artemis 3) planned for 2025, the Gateway will be a minimalistic mini-space station composed of only two modules: the Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) and the Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO). Both PPE and HALO will be assembled on Earth and launched together on a Falcon Heavy in November 2024, and they are expected to reach lunar orbit after nine to ten months.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: The I-Hab module, a contribution from ESA and JAXA, is to be launched on the SLS Block 1B as a co-manifested payload on the Artemis 4 crewed Orion mission. All modules will be connected using the International Docking System Standard.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Crewed flights to the Gateway are expected to use Orion and SLS, while other missions are expected to be done by commercial launch providers. In March 2020, NASA announced SpaceX with its future spacecraft Dragon XL as the first commercial partner to deliver supplies to the Gateway (see GLS).


title: Lunar Gateway

text: The first two modules (PPE and HALO) will be launched together on the Falcon Heavy rocket in November 2024.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: NASA officials promote the Gateway as a "reusable command module" that could direct activities on the lunar surface. However, the Gateway has received both positive and negative reactions from space professionals.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Michael D. Griffin, a former NASA administrator, said that the Gateway could be useful only after there are facilities on the Moon producing propellant that could be transported to the Gateway. Griffin thinks that after that is achieved, the Gateway would then serve as a fuel depot.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Clive Neal, a Notre Dame geologist and advocate for the lunar exploration program, called the Gateway "a waste of money" and stated that NASA is "not fulfilling space policy by building an orbital space station around the Moon".


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Former NASA Associate Administrator Doug Cooke wrote in an article on "The Hill" stating, "NASA can significantly increase speed, simplicity, cost and probability of mission success by deferring Gateway, leveraging SLS, and reducing critical mission operations". He also wrote, "NASA should launch the lander elements (ascent and descent/transfer) on an SLS Block 1B. If an independent transfer element is required, it can be launched on a commercial launcher".


title: Lunar Gateway

text: George Abbey, a former director of NASA's Johnson Space Center, said, "The Gateway is, in essence, building a space station to orbit a natural space station, namely the Moon. [...] If we are going to return to the Moon, we should go directly there, not build a space station to orbit it".


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Former NASA astronaut Terry W. Virts, who was a pilot of STS-130 aboard and commander of the ISS on Expedition 43, wrote in an Op-ed on "Ars Technica" that the Gateway would "shackle human exploration, not enable it". He also said, "If we don't have the goal [of Gateway], we are putting the proverbial chicken before the egg by developing "Gemini" before we know what "Apollo" will look like. Regardless of a future destination, as someone who lived on the ISS for 200 days, I cannot envision a new technology that would be developed or validated by building another modular space station. Without a specific goal, we're unlikely to ever identify one". Terry further criticized NASA for abandoning its planned goal of separating crew from cargo, which was put in place following the Space Shuttle "Columbia" disaster in 2003. Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin stated that he is "quite opposed to the Gateway" and that "using the Gateway as a staging area for robotic or human missions to the lunar surface is absurd". Aldrin also questioned the benefit of the idea of sending "a crew to an intermediate point in space, pick up a lander there and go down". On the other hand, Aldrin expressed support for Robert Zubrin's Moon Direct concept which involves lunar landers traveling from Earth orbit to the lunar surface and back.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Pei Zhaoyu, deputy director of the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center of the China National Space Administration (CNSA), concluded that the Gateway would have "low cost-effectiveness". Pei said the Chinese plan is to focus on a national research station on the surface. In July 2019, Pei announced that China was holding discussions with Russia and the ESA on international co-operation and in August 2020 unveiled China's concept; the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) with co-operation from Russia and tentative agreement from ESA.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Mars advocacy and Mars Society founder Robert Zubrin called the Gateway "NASA's worst plan yet" in an article in the "National Review". He said, "We do not need a lunar-orbiting station to go to the Moon. We do not need such a station to go to Mars. We do not need it to go to near-Earth asteroids. We do not need it to go anywhere. Nor can we accomplish anything in such a station that we cannot do in the Earth-orbiting International Space Station, except to expose human subjects to irradiation – a form of medical research for which a number of Nazi doctors were hanged". Zubrin also stated, "If the goal is to build a Moon base, it should be built on the surface of the Moon. That is where the science is, that is where the shielding material is, and that is where the resources to make propellant and other useful things are to be found".


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Retired aerospace engineer Gerald Black stated that the Gateway is "useless for supporting human return to the lunar surface and a lunar base". He added that it was not planned to be used as a rocket fuel depot and that stopping at the Gateway on the way to or from the Moon would serve no useful purpose and cost propellant.


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Mark Whittington, who is a contributor to "The Hill" newspaper and an author of several space exploration studies, stated in an article that the "lunar orbit project doesn't help us get back to the Moon". Whittington also pointed out that a lunar orbiting space station was not utilized during the Apollo program and that a "reusable lunar lander could be refueled from a depot on the lunar surface and left in a parking orbit between missions without the need for a big, complex space station".


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Astrophysicist Ethan Siegel wrote an article in "Forbes" titled "NASA's Idea For A Space Station In Lunar Orbit Takes Humanity Nowhere". Siegel stated that "Orbiting the Moon represents barely incremental progress; the only scientific "advantages" to being in lunar orbit as opposed to low Earth orbit are twofold: 1. You're outside of the Van Allen belts. 2. You're closer to the lunar surface", reducing the time delay. His final opinion was that the Gateway is "a great way to spend a great deal of money, advancing science and humanity in no appreciable way".


title: Lunar Gateway

text: On 10 December 2018, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said at a presentation "There are people who say we need to get there, and we need to get there tomorrow", speaking of a crewed mission to the Moon, countering with "What we're doing here at NASA is following Space Policy Directive 1", speaking of the Gateway and following up with "I would argue that we got there in 1969. That race is over, and we won. The time now is to build a sustainable, reusable architecture. [...] The next time we go to the moon, we're going to have American boots on the moon with the American flag on their shoulders, and they're going to be standing side-by-side with our international partners who have never been to the moon before".


title: Lunar Gateway

text: Dan Hartman, the program manager for Gateway, on 30 March 2020, told "Ars Technica" that the benefits of using Gateway are extending the mission duration, buying down risk, providing research capability and the capability to re-use ascent modules.When you go single, I'll say direct mission to the Moon, you're limited on the supplies, either with the Lander or with Orion. With the Gateway, with just with one logistics module, we think we can extend to about twice the mission duration, so 30 days to 60 days. Obviously, the more crew time you have in lunar orbit helps us with research in the human aspects of living in deep space. The more duration we have, certainly that'll help us buy down significant risk with the extreme environments that we're going to be subjecting our crews to. Because we've got to go figure out how to operate in deep space. Obviously we'll demonstrate new hardware and offer that sustainable flexible path for our Lunar Lander system. With the Gateway, the thinking is we'll be able to reuse the ascent modules potentially multiple times. And again, if we can get mission duration beyond the 30 days, it's going to offer us some additional environmental capabilities. We think it's a tremendous risk buy down asset, not only to explore the Moon sustainably, but to prove out some things that we need to do to get to Mars.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William and later Bengal Province, was a subdivision of the British Empire in India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and Southeast Asia. Bengal proper covered the ethno-linguistic region of Bengal (present-day Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal). Calcutta, the city which grew around Fort William, was the capital of the Bengal Presidency. For many years, the Governor of Bengal was concurrently the Viceroy of India and Calcutta was the de facto capital of India until 1911.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal Presidency emerged from trading posts established in Mughal Bengal during the reign of Emperor Jahangir in 1612. The East India Company (HEIC), a British monopoly with a Royal Charter, competed with other European companies to gain influence in Bengal. After the decisive overthrow of the Nawab of Bengal in 1757 and the Battle of Buxar in 1764, the HEIC expanded its control over much of the Indian subcontinent. This marked the beginning of Company rule in India, when the HEIC emerged as the most powerful military force in the subcontinent. The British Parliament gradually withdrew the monopoly of the HEIC. By the 1850s, the HEIC struggled with finances. After the Indian Mutiny of 1857, the British government assumed direct administration of India. The Bengal Presidency was re-organized. In the early 20th century, Bengal emerged as a hotbed of the Indian independence movement, as well as the epicenter of the Bengali Renaissance.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Bengal was the economic, cultural and educational hub of the British Raj. During the period of proto-industrialization, Bengal significantly contributed directly to the Industrial revolution in Britain, although it was soon overtaken by the Kingdom of Mysore ruled by Tipu Sultan as South Asia's dominant economic power. When Bengal was reorganized, Penang, Singapore and Malacca were separated into the Straits Settlements in 1867. British Burma became a province of India and a later a Crown Colony in itself. Western areas, including the Ceded and Conquered Provinces and The Punjab, were further reorganized. Northeastern areas became Colonial Assam. The Partition of British India in 1947 resulted in Bengal's division on religious grounds.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In 1599, a Royal Charter was granted by Queen Elizabeth I to allow the creation of a trading company in London for the purposes of trade with the East Indies. The governance of the company was placed in the hands of a governor and a 24-member Court of Directors. The corporation became known as the Honourable East India Company (HEIC). It rose to account for half of the world's trade. The company was given a monopoly for British trade in the Indian Ocean.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In 1608, Mughal Emperor Jahangir allowed the English East India Company to establish a small trading post on the west coast of India. It was followed in 1611 by a factory on the Coromandel Coast in South India, and in 1612 the company joined other already established European trading companies to trade in the wealthy Bengal Subah in the east. However, the power of the Mughal Empire declined from 1707, as the Nawab of Bengal in Murshidabad became financially independent with the help of bankers such as the Jagat Seth. The Nawabs began entering into treaties with numerous European companies, including the French East India Company, the Dutch East India Company, and the Danish East India Company.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Mughal court in Delhi was weakened by Nader Shah's invasion from Persia (1739) and Ahmed Shah Durrani's invasion from Afghanistan (1761). While the Bengal Subah suffered a decade of Maratha raids, through bands of Bargir-giri light cavalry, directed to pillage the territory, between 1741 and 1751. In 1742 the Company chooses to spend Rs. 25  thousand on the construction of a 3 km Maratha ditch around Calcutta, to protect its facilities from the raiders. The Nawab of Bengal later electing to end the plunder of his territory, in 1751, though conceding the administration of Orrisa and agreeing to make Bengal a tributary state of the Marathas, paying Rs. 1.2 million annually as the "chauth" of Bengal and Bihar. The Nawab of Bengal also paid Rs. 3.2 million to the Marathas, towards the arrears of "chauth" for the preceding years.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In June 1756 the company's factories at Cossimbazar and Calcutta were besieged and captured by the forces of the Nawab of Bengal, with the company's goods, treasure and weapons seized. Calcutta being renamed Alinagar in honour of the Siraj ud-Daulah's predecessor. A Company force, led by Watson and Robert Clive, recaptured Fort William in January 1757, with the Nawab, Siraj ud-Daulah, agreeing the Treaty of Alinagar, reestablishing the company's right to trade in Bengal, and fortify Fort William. In parallel Robert Clive conspired with Jagat Seth, Omichand and Mir Jafar to install the latter on the musnud of Bengal, a plan that they would implement in June 1757.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The East India Company's victories at the Battle of Plassey (1757) and the Battle of Buxar (against the Nawabs of Bengal and Oudh in 1764) led to the abolition of local rule (Nizamat) in Bengal in 1793. The Company gradually began to formally expand its territories across India and Southeast Asia. By the mid-19th century, the East India Company had become the paramount political and military power in the Indian subcontinent. Its territory was held in trust for the British Crown. The company also issued coins in the name of the nominal Mughal Emperor (who was exiled in 1857).


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Under Warren Hastings, the consolidation of British imperial rule over Bengal was solidified, with the conversion of a trade area into an occupied territory under a military-civil government, while the formation of a regularised system of legislation was brought in under John Shore. Acting through Lord Cornwallis, then Governor-General, he ascertained and defined the rights of the landholders over the soil. These landholders under the previous system had started, for the most part, as collectors of the revenues, and gradually acquired certain prescriptive rights as quasi-proprietors of the estates entrusted to them by the government. In 1793 Lord Cornwallis declared their rights perpetual, and gave over the land of Bengal to the previous quasi-proprietors or "zamindars", on condition of the payment of a fixed land tax. This piece of legislation is known as the Permanent Settlement of the Land Revenue. It was designed to "introduce" ideas of property rights to India, and stimulate a market in land. The former aim misunderstood the nature of landholding in India, and the latter was an abject failure.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The "Cornwallis Code", while defining the rights of the proprietors, failed to give adequate recognition to the rights of the under-tenants and the cultivators. This remained a serious problem for the duration of British Rule, as throughout the Bengal Presidency "ryots" (peasants) found themselves oppressed by rack-renting landlords, who knew that every rupee they could squeeze from their tenants over and above the fixed revenue demanded from the Government represented pure profit. Furthermore, the Permanent Settlement took no account of inflation, meaning that the value of the revenue to Government declined year by year, whilst the heavy burden on the peasantry grew no less. This was compounded in the early 19th century by compulsory schemes for the cultivation of opium and indigo, the former by the state, and the latter by British planters. Peasants were forced to grow a certain area of these crops, which were then purchased at below market rates for export. This added greatly to rural poverty.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: So unsuccessful was the Permanent Settlement that it was not introduced in the North-Western Provinces (taken from the Marathas during the campaigns of Lord Lake and Arthur Wellesley) after 1831, in Punjab after its conquest in 1849, or in Oudh which was annexed in 1856. These regions were nominally part of the Bengal Presidency, but remained administratively distinct. The area of the Presidency under direct administration was sometimes referred to as Lower Bengal to distinguish it from the Presidency as a whole. Officially Punjab, Agra and Allahabad had Lieutenant-Governors subject to the authority of the Governor of Bengal in Calcutta, but in practice they were more or less independent. The only all-Presidency institutions which remained were the Bengal Army and the Civil Service. The Bengal Army was finally amalgamated into the new British-Indian Army in 1904–5, after a lengthy struggle over its reform between Lord Kitchener, the Commander-in-Chief, and Lord Curzon, the Viceroy.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In 1830, the British Straits Settlements on the coast of the Malacca Straits was made a residency of the Presidency of Bengal in Calcutta. The area included the erstwhile Prince of Wales Island and Province Wellesley, as well as the ports of Malacca and Singapore.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Under the administration of the East India Company, the Settlements were used as penal settlements for Indian civilian and military prisoners, earning them the title of the "Botany Bays of India". The years 1852 and 1853 saw minor uprisings by convicts in Singapore and Penang. Upset with East India Company rule, in 1857 the European population of the Settlements sent a petition to the British Parliament asking for direct rule.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In 1859, under the terms of the Queen's Proclamation issued by Queen Victoria, the Bengal Presidency, along with the rest of British India, came under the direct rule of the British Crown.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Governor's Council was reformed and expanded under the Indian Councils Act 1861, the Indian Councils Act 1892, the Indian Councils Act 1909, the Government of India Act 1919 and the Government of India Act 1935.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The partition of the large province of Bengal, which was decided upon by Lord Curzon, and Cayan Uddin Ahmet, the Chief Secretary of Bengal carried into execution in October 1905. The Chittagong, Dhaka and Rajshahi divisions, the Malda District and the States of Hill Tripura, Sylhet and Comilla were transferred from Bengal to a new province, Eastern Bengal and Assam; the five Hindi-speaking states of Chota Nagpur, namely Changbhakar, Korea, Surguja, Udaipur and Jashpur State, were transferred from Bengal to the Central Provinces; and Sambalpur State and the five Oriya states of Bamra, Rairakhol, Sonepur, Patna and Kalahandi were transferred from the Central Provinces to Bengal.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The province of West Bengal then consisted of the thirty-three districts of Burdwan, Birbhum, Bankura, Midnapur, Hughli, Howrah, Twenty-four Parganas, Calcutta, Nadia, Murshidabad, Jessore, Khulna, Patna, Gaya, Shahabad, Saran, Champaran, Muzaffarpur, Darbhanga, Monghyr, Bhagalpur, Purnea, Santhal Parganas, Cuttack, Balasore, Angul and Kandhmal, Puri, Sambalpur, Singhbhum, Hazaribagh, Ranchi, Palamau, and Manbhum. The princely states of Sikkim and the tributary states of Odisha and Chhota Nagpur were not part of Bengal, but British relations with them were managed by its government.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Indian Councils Act 1909 expanded the legislative councils of Bengal and Eastern Bengal and Assam provinces to include up to 50 nominated and elected members, in addition to three "ex officio" members from the executive council.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Bengal's legislative council included 22 nominated members, of which not more than 17 could be officials, and two nominated experts. Of the 26 elected members, one was elected by the Corporation of Calcutta, six by municipalities, six by district boards, one by the University of Calcutta, five by landholders, four by Muslims, two by the Bengal Chamber of Commerce, and one by the Calcutta Trades Association. Eastern Bengal and Assam's legislative council included 22 nominated members, of which not more than 17 be officials and one representing Indian commerce, and two nominated experts. Of the 18 elected members, three were elected by municipalities, five by district and local boards, two by landowners, four by Muslims, two by the tea interest, one by the jute interest, and one by the Commissioners of the Port of Chittagong.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The partition of Bengal proved highly controversial, as it resulted in a largely Hindu West Bengal and a largely Muslim East. Serious popular agitation followed the step, partly on the grounds that this was part of a cynical policy of divide and rule, and partly that the Bengali population, the centre of whose interests and prosperity was Calcutta, would now be divided under two governments, instead of being concentrated and numerically dominant under the one, while the bulk would be in the new division. In 1906–1909 the unrest developed to a considerable extent, requiring special attention from the Indian and Home governments, and this led to the decision being reversed in 1911.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: At the Delhi Durbar on 12 December 1911, King George V announced the transfer of the seat of the Government of India from Calcutta to Delhi, the reunification of the five predominantly Bengali-speaking divisions into a Presidency (or province) of Bengal under a Governor, the creation of a new province of Bihar and Orissa under a lieutenant-governor, and that Assam Province would be reconstituted under a chief commissioner. On 21 March 1912 Thomas Gibson-Carmichael was appointed Governor of Bengal; prior to that date the Governor-General of India had also served as the governor of Bengal Presidency. On 22 March the provinces of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa and Assam were constituted.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Government of India Act 1919 increased the number of nominated and elected members of the legislative council from 50 to 125, and the franchise was expanded. Bihar and Orissa became separate provinces in 1936. Bengal remained in its 1912 boundaries until Independence in 1947, when it was again partitioned between the dominions of India and Pakistan.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: On 8 May 1947, Viceroy Earl Mountbatten cabled the British government with a partition plan that made an exception for Bengal. It was the only province that would be allowed to remain independent should it choose to do so. On 23 May, the British Cabinet meeting also hoped that Bengal would remain united. British Prime Minister Clement Attlee informed the US Ambassador to the United Kingdom on 2 June 1947 that there was a "distinct possibility that Bengal might decide against partition and against joining either India or Pakistan". On 6 July 1947, the Sylhet referendum gave a mandate for the District of Sylhet to be re-united into Bengal. However, Hindu nationalist leaders in West Bengal and conservative East Bengali Muslim leaders were against the prospect.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: On 20 June 1947, the Bengal Legislative Assembly met to vote on partition plans. At the preliminary joint session, the assembly decided by 120 votes to 90 that it should remain united if it joined the new Constituent Assembly of Pakistan. Later, a separate meeting of legislators from West Bengal decided by 58 votes to 21 that the province should be partitioned and that West Bengal should join the existing Constituent Assembly of India. In another separate meeting of legislators from East Bengal, it was decided by 106 votes to 35 that the province should not be partitioned and 107 votes to 34 that East Bengal should join Pakistan in the event of partition. There was no vote held on the proposal for an independent United Bengal.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Presidency's principal maritime gateway was the Bay of Bengal. The following maps illustrate its territorial evolution.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Initially, Bengal was under the administration of the East India Company, which appointed chief agents/presidents/governors/lieutenant governors in Fort William. The governor of Bengal was concurrently the governor-general of India for many years. The East India Company maintained control with its private armies and administrative machinery. Nevertheless, the East India Company was a quasi-official entity, having received a Royal Charter from Queen Elizabeth I in 1600. The Indian Rebellion of 1857 caused the British government to assume direct control of India's administration under the Government of India Act 1858. The head of state became the British monarch, who was also given the title of Emperor of India/Empress of India. The monarch was represented through a viceroy. The Viceroy of India was based in the Bengal Presidency until 1911. The Secretary of State for India was also an important official. The Bengal Civil Service managed the provincial government. Modern scholars decry the colonial system as bureaucratic authoritarianism.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Established by Charter Act of 1833, the Governor-General in Council was subordinate to the Court of Directors of the East India Company and the British Crown. The Governor-General in Council in Fort William enacted legislation, such as the prohibition of Persian as an official language under Act no. XXIX of 1837 passed by the President of the Council of India in Council on 20 November 1837.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Calcutta High Court was set up in 1862. The building was designed on the model of Ypres Cloth Hall in Belgium. The Dacca High Court building was built during the early 20th century, with elements of a Roman pantheon. District courts were established in all district headquarters of the Bengal Presidency. At the district level, tax collectors and revenue officers acted with the power of magistrates. In 1829, magisterial power was given to all Collectors and Revenue Officers. The controversy regarding the lack of separation of powers continued until 1921.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The British government began to appoint legislative councils under the Indian Councils Act 1861. The Bengal Legislative Council was established in 1862. It was one of the largest and most important legislative councils in British India. Over the years, the council's powers were gradually expanded from an advisory role to debating government policies and enacting legislation. Under the Government of India Act 1935, the council became the upper chamber of the Bengali legislature.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: British India's Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms of 1919, enacted in 1921, expanded the Bengal Legislative Council to 140 members to include more elected Indian members. The reforms also introduced the principle of dyarchy, whereby certain responsibilities such as agriculture, health, education, and local government, were transferred to elected ministers. However, the important portfolios like finance, police and irrigation were reserved with members of the Governor's Executive Council. Some of the prominent ministers were Surendranath Banerjee (Local Self-government and Public Health 1921–1923), Sir Provash Chunder Mitter (Education 1921–1924, Local Self-government, Public Health, Agriculture and Public Works 1927–1928), Nawab Saiyid Nawab Ali Chaudhuri (Agriculture and Public Works) and A. K. Fazlul Huq (Education 1924). Bhupendra Nath Bose and Sir Abdur Rahim were Executive Members in the Governor's Council.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Government of India Act, 1935 established the Bengal Legislative Assembly as the lower chamber of the Bengali legislature. It was a 250-seat assembly where most members were elected by either the General Electorate or the Muslim Electorate (under the Communal Award). Other members were nominated. The separate electorate dividing Muslims from the general electorate was deeply controversial. The Prime Minister of Bengal was a member of the assembly.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In the 1937 election, the Congress emerged as the single largest party but short of an absolute majority. The second-largest party was the Bengal Provincial Muslim League (BPML), followed in third place by the Krishak Praja Party. The BPML, Krishak Praja Party and independent legislators formed a coalition government. A. K. Fazlul Huq, a founder of the BPML who later broke away to form the Krishak Praja Party, was elected as parliamentary leader and prime minister. Huq pursued a policy of Hindu–Muslim unity. His cabinet included leading Hindu and Muslim figures, including Nalini Ranjan Sarkar (finance), Bijoy Prasad Singha Roy (revenue), Maharaja Srish Chandra Nandy (communications and public works), Prasanna Deb Raikut (forest and excise), Mukunda Behari Mallick (cooperative credit and rural indebtedness), Sir Khwaja Nazimuddin (home), Nawab Khwaja Habibullah (agriculture and industry), Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy (commerce and labour), Nawab Musharraf Hussain (judicial and legislative affairs), and Syed Nausher Ali (public health and local self-government). Huq promoted financial and land reforms with the Bengal Agricultural Debtors' Act (1938), The Money Lenders' Act (1938), and the Bengal Tenancy (Amendment) Act (1938). He introduced the Primary Education Bill to make primary education free and compulsory. He established schools such as the Lady Brabourne College. In 1941, Prime Minister Huq joined the Viceroy's Defence Council in support of Allied war efforts. In a letter to Governor John Herbert, Huq called for the resurrection of a Bengal Army. He wrote "I want you to consent to the formation of a Bengali Army of a hundred thousand young Bengalis consisting of Hindu and Muslim youths on a fifty-fifty basis. There is an insistent demand for such a step being taken at once, and the people of Bengal will not be satisfied with any excuses. It is a national demand which must be immediately conceded". Huq supported the adoption of the Lahore Resolution in 1940. He envisaged Bengal as one of the "independent states" outlined by the resolution.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The first Huq cabinet dissolved after the BPML withdrew from his government. Huq then formed a second coalition with the Hindu Mahasabha led by Syama Prasad Mukherjee. This cabinet was known as the Shyama-Huq Coalition. The cabinet included Nawab Bahabur Khwaja Habibullah, Khan Bahadur Abdul Karim, Khan Bahadur Hashem Ali Khan, Shamsuddin Ahmed, Syama Prasad Mukherjee, Santosh Kumar Bose and Upendranath Barman. Huq's government fell in 1943 and a BPML government under Sir Khawaja Nazimuddin as Prime Minister was formed. Nazimuddin's tenure coincided with the Bengal famine of 1943. His government was replaced by Governor's rule. After the end of World War II, elections were held in 1946 in which the BPML won an overwhelming majority of 113 seats in the 250-seat assembly. A government under Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy was formed. Prime Minister Suhrawardy continued with the policy of power-sharing between Hindus and Muslims. He also advocated a plan for a Bengali sovereign state with a multiconfessionalist political system. The breakdown of Hindu-Muslim unity across India eventually upended Bengali power-sharing. Religious violence, including the Noakhali riots and Direct Action Day riots, contributed to the polarization. When the Bengal Assembly met to vote on Partition, most West Bengali legislators held a separate meeting and resolved to partition the province and join the Indian union. Most East Bengali legislators favored an undivided Bengal.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal Assembly was divided into the West Bengal Legislative Assembly and East Bengal Legislative Assembly during the Partition of British India.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: English common law was applied to Bengal. Local legislation was enacted by the Legislative Council and Legislative Assembly. Case law was also an important source of law. Many laws enacted in British Bengal are still in use today, including the Indian Penal Code. In 1919, the Rowlatt Act extended wartime powers under the Defence of India Act 1915, including arbitrary arrests and trial without juries. Press freedom was muzzled by the Indian Press Act 1910. The Seditious Meetings Act 1908 curtailed freedom of assembly. Regulation III of 1818 was also considered draconian. King George V granted a royal amnesty to free political prisoners. Some draconian laws were repealed, including the Rowlatt Act. Despite being a common law jurisdiction, British India did not enjoy the same level of protection for civil liberties as in the United Kingdom. It was only after independence in 1947 and the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, that human rights were clearly enshrined in law.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Princely states were autonomous principalities under the suzerainty of the British Crown in India. Initially, the Bengal Presidency managed the British government's relations with most princely states in the northern subcontinent, extending from Jammu and Kashmir in the north to Manipur in the northeast. An Agency was often formed to be the liaison between the government and the princely states. The largest of these agencies under Bengal once included the Rajputana Agency. Other agencies covered the Chota Nagpur Tributary States and the Orissa Tributary States. Agents were also appointed to deal with tribal chiefs, such as the three tribal kings in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. At the time of the partition of India in 1947, the jurisdiction of the Bengal States Agency included Cooch Behar State and Hill Tipperah.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Bengal was strategically important for the Himalayan regions of Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan and Sikkim. The Anglo-Nepalese War between the East India Company and the Kingdom of Nepal was concluded with the Treaty of Sugauli, which ended Gorkha territorial expansion. The Treaty of Titalia was signed in 1817 between the HEIC and the Kingdom of Sikkim to establish British hegemony over Sikkim. The Bhutan War in the 1860s saw the Kingdom of Bhutan lose control of the Bengal Duars to the British. The British expedition to Tibet took place between 1903 and 1904. It resulted in the Treaty of Lhasa which acknowledged Qing China's supremacy over Tibet.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The United States of America began sending envoys to Fort William in the 18th century. President George Washington nominated Benjamin Joy as the first Consul to Fort William on 19 November 1792. The nomination was supported by the erstwhile Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and approved by the U. S. Senate on 21 November 1792. Benjamin Joy reached Calcutta in 1794. The HEIC did not recognize Joy as an official consul but allowed him to be a Commercial Agent. The American Consulate General was established during formal British rule. A consular agency for Chittagong was created in the 1860s. Many other countries also set up consulates in Calcutta.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: British rule saw the establishment of liberal arts colleges in many districts of Bengal. There were only two full-fledged universities in Bengal during British rule, including the University of Calcutta and the University of Dacca. Both universities were represented in the Bengal Legislative Assembly under the Government of India Act, 1935.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Primary education was mandatory under the Compulsory Education Acts. Despite significant advances and the emergence of a large educated middle class, most of the population did not have access to a proper education. Some of the leading schools included the Oriental Seminary in Calcutta, the St. Gregory's High School in Dacca, the Rajshahi Collegiate School in Rajshahi and the Chittagong Collegiate School in Chittagong. European missionaries, Hindu philanthropists and Muslim aristocrats were influential promoters of education. Ethnic minorities maintained their own institutions, such as the Armenian Pogose School.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Each district of Bengal had a district school, which were the leading secondary institutions. Due to Calcutta being the colonial capital, the city had a large concentration of educational institutions. It was followed by Dacca, which served as a provincial capital between 1905 and 1912. Libraries were established in each district of Bengal by the colonial government and the Zamindars. In 1854, four major public libraries were opened, including the Bogra Woodburn Library, the Rangpur Public Library, the Jessore Institute Public Library and the Barisal Public Library. Northbrook Hall was established in 1882 in honor of Governor-General Lord Northbrook. Other libraries built include the Victoria Public Library, Natore (1901), the Sirajganj Public Library (1882), the Rajshahi Public Library (1884), the Comilla Birchandra Library (1885), the Shah Makhdum Institute Public Library, Rajshahi (1891), the Noakhali Town Hall Public Library (1896), the Prize Memorial Library, Sylhet (1897), the Chittagong Municipality Public Library (1904) and the Varendra Research Library (1910). In 1925, the Great Bengal Library Association was established.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Europeans played an important role in modernizing the Bengali language. The first book on Bengali grammar was compiled by a Portuguese missionary. English was the official language. The use of Persian as an official language was discontinued by Act no. XXIX of 1837 passed by the President of the Council of India in Council on 20 November 1837. However, Persian continued to be taught in some institutions. Several institutions had Sanskrit and Arabic faculties.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The following includes a partial list of notable colleges, universities and learned societies in the Bengal Presidency.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In Bengal, the British inherited from the Mughals the biggest revenue earnings in the Indian subcontinent. For example, the revenue of pre-colonial Dhaka alone was 1 million rupees in the 18th century (a high amount in that era). Mughal Bengal accounted for 12% of the world's GDP and was a major exporter of silk, cotton, saltpeter, and agricultural produce. With its proto-industrial economy, Bengal contributed to the first Industrial Revolution in Britain (particularly in textile manufacture during the Industrial Revolution). After 1757, the British placed Bengal under company rule (which led to Bengali deindustrialization). Other European powers in the region included the French East India Company, the Dutch East India Company, the Ostend Company and the Danish East India Company. Initially, the English East India Company promoted opium cultivation which caused the Opium Wars with Qing China. The East India Company's promotion of indigo farming caused the Indigo revolt. The British were much criticized for favoring textile imports and suppressing local muslin production. The chaos of the Company rule period culminated in the Indian Mutiny in 1857. In 1858, the British government gained direct control of Indian administration. Bengal was plugged into the market-driven economy and trade networks of the British Empire.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal Presidency had the largest gross domestic product in British India. The first British colonial banks in the Indian subcontinent were founded in Bengal. These included the General Bank of Bengal and Bihar (1733); Bank of Hindostan (1770), Bank of Bengal (1784); and the General Bank of India (1786). Other banks in Bengal included the Bank of Calcutta (1806), Union Bank (1829); Government Savings Bank (1833); The Bank of Mirzapore (c. 1835); Dacca Bank (1846); Kurigram Bank (1887), Kumarkhali Bank (1896), Mahaluxmi Bank, Chittagong (1910), Dinajpur Bank (1914), Comilla Banking Corporation (1914), Bengal Central Bank (1918), and Comilla Union Bank (1922). Loan offices were established in Faridpur (1865), Bogra (1872), Barisal (1873), Mymensingh (1873), Nasirabad (1875), Jessore (1876), Munshiganj (1876), Dacca (1878), Sylhet (1881), Pabna (1882), Kishoreganj (1883), Noakhali (1885), Khulna (1887), Madaripur (1887), Tangail (1887), Nilphamari (1894) and Rangpur (1894).


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The earliest records of securities dealings are the loan securities of the British East India Company. In 1830, bourse activities in Calcutta were conducted in the open air under a tree. The Calcutta Stock Exchange was incorporated in 1908. Some of the leading companies in British Bengal included Messrs. Alexander and Co, Waldies, Martin Burn, M. M. Ispahani Limited, James Finlay and Co., A K Khan & Company, the Calcutta Chemical Company, Bourne & Shepherd, the Indo-Burmah Petroleum Company, Orient Airways, Shaw Wallace, Carew & Co, Aditya Birla Group, Tata Group, Balmer Lawrie, Biecco Lawrie, Braithwaite, Burn & Jessop Construction Company, Braithwaite & Co., Bridge and Roof Company, Britannia Industries, Burn Standard Company and Andrew Yule and Company. Some of these enterprises were nationalized after the Partition of India.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Agricultural products included rice, sugarcane and vegetables. The main cash crops were jute and tea. The jute trade was central to the British Bengali economy. Bengal accounted for the bulk of the world's jute production and export. Raw jute was sourced from the hinterland of Eastern Bengal. The British government declared the Port of Narayanganj as a "Tax Free Port" in 1878. Rally Brothers & Co. was one of the earliest British companies in the jute business of Narayanganj. British firms used middlemen, called "beparis", to source raw jute from the hinterland. In 1907, 20 firms were engaged in the jute trade of Narayanganj, including 18 European firms. Hindu merchants opened several cotton mills in the 1920s, including the Dhakeshwari Cotton Mill, the Chittaranjan Cotton Mill and the Laxmi Narayan Cotton Mill. Other goods traded in Narayanganj included timber, salt, textiles, oil, cotton, tobacco, pottery, seeds and betel nut. Raw goods were processed by factories in Calcutta, especially jute mills. The Port of Chittagong was re-organized in 1887 under the Port Commissioners Act. Its busiest trade links were with British Burma, including the ports of Akyab and Rangoon; and other Bengali ports, including Calcutta, Dhaka and Narayanganj. In the fiscal year 1889–90, Chittagong handled exports totalling 125,000 tons. The Strand Road was built beside the port. In 1928, the British government declared Chittagong as a "Major Port" of British India. Chittagong's port was used by Allied Forces of World War II during the Burma Campaign.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Port of Calcutta was the largest seaport of British India. The port was constructed by the British East India Company. It was one of the busiest ports in the world during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Calcutta was a major trading port with links to ports across the British Empire. Its local hinterland spanned beyond Bengal to include north and northeast India, the Himalayan kingdoms and Tibet. The Bay of Bengal became one of the busiest shipping hubs in the world, rivaling the traffic of ports on the Atlantic. Calcutta was also an important naval base in World War II and was bombed by the Japanese.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Chambers of commerce were established. The Bengal Chamber of Commerce was established in 1853. The Narayanganj Chamber of Commerce was set up in 1904. The textile trade of Bengal enriched many merchants. For example, Panam City in Sonargaon saw many townhouses built for wealthy textile merchants.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Tea became a major export of Bengal. Northwestern Bengal became the center of Darjeeling tea cultivation in the foothills of the Himalayas. Darjeeling tea became one of the most reputed tea varieties in the world. The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway was constructed in the tea plantation zone. In eastern Bengal, the Sylhet and Chittagong hilly regions became hubs of tea production. Assam tea was produced in the northeastern part of the Bengal Presidency.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Aside from the British, the chief beneficiaries of the colonial economy were the Zamindars (landed gentry). The Permanent Settlement enforced a system in which peasants were indebted to the Zamindars. The peasants rented land from the Zamindars and became tenant farmers. Strong control of land by the Zamindars meant the British had few headaches in exploiting trade and business. However, Bengal received little attention for industrialization due to the entrenched peasant-zamindar relationship under the Permanent Settlement. The Zamindars of Bengal built mansions, lodges, modern bungalows, townhouses, and palaces on their estates. Some of the largest mansions include the Hazarduari Palace in Murshidabad, the Ahsan Manzil on the Nawab of Dhaka's estate, the Marble Palace in Calcutta, and the Cooch Behar Palace.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: After the invention of railways in Britain, British India became the first region in Asia to have a railway. The East Indian Railway Company introduced railways to Bengal. The company was established on 1 June 1845 in London by a deed of settlement with a capital of £4,000,000. Its first line connected Calcutta with towns in northern India. By 1859, there were 77 engines, 228 coaches and 848 freight wagons. Large quantities of sal tree wood were imported from Nepal to design the sleepers. In 1862, railways were introduced to eastern Bengal with the Eastern Bengal Railway. The first line connected Calcutta and Kushtia. By 1865, the railway was extended to Rajbari on the banks of the Padma River. By 1902, the railway was extended to Assam. The Assam Bengal Railway was established to serve the northeastern part of the Bengal Presidency, with its terminus in Chittagong.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal and North Western Railway was set up in 1882 to link towns in the Oudh region with Calcutta. Several railway bridges, such as the Hardinge Bridge, were built over rivers in Bengal. In 1999, UNESCO recognized the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway as a World Heritage Site.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In the 1830s the East India Company began to rebuild the ancient Grand Trunk Road into a paved highway. The company required the road for commercial and administrative purposes. It linked Calcutta to Peshawar in the North-West Frontier Province. For the project, the company founded a college to train and employ local surveyors, engineers, and overseers. In the east, the road extended to Sonargaon, Comilla and Chittagong. After the first partition of Bengal in 1905, newly built highways connected the inaccessible areas of Assam and the Chittagong Hill Tracts. All district towns were connected by an inter-district road network.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: A "ghat" in Bengal refers to a river port. The busiest river ports included the Port of Calcutta, the Port of Dhaka, the Port of Narayanganj and Goalundo Ghat.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: After the first partition of Bengal in 1905, a number of new ferry services were introduced connecting Chittagong, Dhaka, Bogra, Dinajpur, Rangpur, Jalpaiguri, Maldah and Rajshahi. This improved communication network boosted trade and commerce.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: An early attempt at manned flight in Bengal was by a young female balloonist named Jennette Rumary who at the time was associated with Park Van Tassel and took the stage name "Jennette Van Tassell". Invited to perform by the Nawab of Dhaka, at 6.20 pm on 16 March 1892, Jennette set off to fly from the southern bank of the River Buriganga. But a gusting wind carried her off to the gardens of Shahbag, where her balloon became stuck in a tree. During her rescue from the tree she fell and died two days later. Jennette is interred in the Christian graveyard at Narinda in Old Dhaka.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: An airfield opened next to a Royal Artillery station on the outskirts of Calcutta. The Governor of Bengal Sir Stanley Jackson opened the Bengal Flying Club in Calcutta's aerodrome in February 1929. In 1930, the airfield was upgraded into a full-fledged airport. It was popularly known as Dum Dum Airport. Imperial Airways began flights from London to Australia via Calcutta in 1933. Air Orient began scheduled stops as part of its Paris to Saigon route. KLM operated a route from Amsterdam to Batavia (Jakarta) via Calcutta. Calcutta emerged as a stopover for many airlines operating routes between Europe, Indochina and Australasia. The flight of Amelia Earhart and Fred Noonan, who attempted to circumnavigate the world, made a stopover in Calcutta in 1937. Local airlines included Tata Air Services and Orient Airways. Bengal played an important role for the air operations of the Allied forces of World War II. The Royal Air Force operated airfields across Bengal during the Burma Campaign. Aircraft of the United States Army Air Forces were also stationed in Bengal.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The following includes a partial list of airports and airfields established during British rule in Bengal. Airfields were used by Allied Forces during World War II.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal Army was one of the Presidency Armies of British India. It was formed by the East India Company. The Commander-in-Chief of the Bengal Army was concurrently the Commander-in-Chief, India from 1853 to 1895, as the Bengal Army was the largest of the Presidency Armies. Recruits initially included Europeans and soldiers of the former Nawabs' Armies. Many of the recruits were from Bihar and Oudh. The Gurkhas were also recruited under the Bengal Army. In 1895, the Bengal Army was merged into the British Indian Army. The British Indian Army had a Bengal Command between 1895 and 1908.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Major military engagements affecting British Bengal included the First Anglo-Burmese War, the Anglo-Nepalese War, the First Afghan War, the Opium Wars, the Bhutan War, the Second Anglo-Afghan War, World War I, and the Burma Campaign of World War II. The chief British base in Bengal was Fort William. Across the subcontinent, the British often converted Mughal forts into military bases, such as in Delhi and Dhaka. The British also built cantonments, including Dhaka Cantonment and Chittagong Cantonment. Many Allied soldiers killed in Burma were buried in cemeteries in Chittagong and Comilla. The graveyards include the Commonwealth War Cemetery, Chittagong and Mainamati War Cemetery, which are maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Colonial India as well as the Bengal Presidency suffered from the numerous famines and epidemics throughout the British Rule. The Great Bengal famine of 1770 lasted until 1773 and killed approximately 10 million Bengalis. The East India Company was heavily criticized for neglecting the population's food security. The repeated bouts of famine in India, coupled with other abuses against the population, caused the British Parliament to gradually remove the monopoly of the East India Company, curtail the company's powers and eventually replace it with crown rule. Warren Hastings, Governor of Bengal, was censured for the abuses of the company. Ironically, Hastings had set about to reform the company's practices and was later acquitted of any wrongdoing. During the trial of Hastings, Edmund Burke delivered a scathing indictment of malpractice by the company, condemning it for "injustice and treachery against the faith of nations". Burke stated "With various instances of extortion and other deeds of maladministration...With impoverishing and depopulating the whole country...with a wanton and unjust, pernicious, exercise of his powers...in overturning the ancient establishments of the country...With cruelties unheard of and devastations almost without name...Crimes which have their rise in the wicked dispositions of men- in avarice, rapacity, pride, cruelty, malignity, haughtiness, insolence, ferocity, treachery, cruelty, malignity of temper - in short, nothing that does not argue a total extinction of all moral principle, that does not manifest an inveterate blackness of heart, a heart blackened to the very blackest, a heart corrupted, gangrened to the core...We have brought before you the head (Hastings)...one in whom all the frauds, all the peculations, all the violence, all the tyranny in India are embodied".


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal Presidency endured a vast famine between 1873 and 1874. The Bengal famine of 1943 killed an estimated 3 million people during World War II. People died of starvation, malaria, or other diseases aggravated by malnutrition, population displacement, and lack of healthcare. Britain's wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill has been held responsible for the famine by prominent Indians, including politician Shashi Tharoor. When British civil servants sent letters to London regarding the famine situation, Churchill once responded by saying "Why hasn't Gandhi died yet?". Churchill's defenders, however, argue that it is an exaggeration to blame him for the wartime hunger crisis. The real cause was the fall of Burma to the Japanese, which cut off India's main supply of rice imports when domestic sources fell short, which they did in Eastern Bengal after a devastating cyclone in mid-October 1942". Lizzie Collingham holds the massive global dislocations of supplies caused by World War II virtually guaranteed that hunger would occur somewhere in the world, yet Churchill's racism toward the Indians decided the exact location where famine would fall.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The English language replaced Persian as the official language of administration. The use of Persian was prohibited by Act no. XXIX of 1837 passed by the President of the Council of India in Council on 20 November 1837, bringing an end to six centuries of Indo-Persian culture in Bengal. The Bengali language received increased attention. European missionaries produced the first modern books on Bengali grammar. In pre-colonial times, Hindus and Muslims would be highly attached to their liturgical languages, including Sanskrit and Arabic. Under British rule, the use of Bengali widened and it was strengthened as the "lingua franca" of the native population. Novels began to be written in Bengali. The literary polymath Rabindranath Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913. The cultural activist Kazi Nazrul Islam gained popularity as British India's "Rebel Poet". Jagadish Chandra Bose pioneered Bengali science fiction. Begum Rokeya, author of "Sultana's Dream", became an early feminist science fiction author.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Numerous newspapers were published in British Bengal since the 18th century. Many were in English. "Hicky's Bengal Gazette" was a major weekly publication. The first Bengali periodicals appeared in the 19th century. The "Calcutta Journal" became the first daily newspaper in British India. Other newspapers included the "Dacca News" and "The Bengal Times". Radio channels began transmitting in 1927.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Company School of Painting in Calcutta, Murshidabad, and Patna saw Mughal miniatures absorb images of British colonial officials in place of Mughal officials. European painters produced numerous works in Bengal since the 18th century. European photographers also worked in the region. The modernist Bengal school of painting evolved in the province. European sculptures were widely imported by wealthy Zamindars. In the 1940s, Zainul Abedin emerged as a modernist painter depicting poverty and the Bengal famine.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Calcutta Time was the time zone of the Bengal Presidency. It was established in 1884. It was one of the two time zones of British India. In the latter part of the 19th century, Calcutta Time was the most prevalent time used in the Indian part of the British Empire with records of astronomical and geological events recorded in it.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Royal Bioscope Company began producing Bengali cinema in 1898, producing scenes from the stage productions of a number of popular shows at the Crown Theatre in Dacca and the Star Theater, Minerva Theater, and Classic Theater in Calcutta.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Madan Theatre started making silent films in Calcutta in 1916. The first Bengali feature film, "Billwamangal", was produced and released in 1919 under the banner of the Madan Theatre. The movie was directed by Rustomji Dhotiwala and produced by Priyonath Ganguli. A Bengali film company called the Indo British Film Co was soon formed in Calcutta by Dhirendra Nath Ganguly. Ganguly directed and wrote "Bilat Ferat" in 1921, which was the first production of the Indo British Film Co. "Jamai Shashthi" (1931) was one of the earliest Bengali talkies.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: In 1927–28, the Dhaka Nawab Family produced a short film named "Sukumary" (The Good Girl). After the success of "Sukumary", the Nawab's family went for a bigger venture. To make a full-length silent film, a temporary studio was made in the gardens of the family's estate, and they produced a full-length silent film titled "The Last Kiss", released in 1931. The "East Bengal Cinematograph Society" was later established in Dacca.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Cricket started being played in the 1790s. The Calcutta Cricket Club was set up in 1792. For horse racing, the Royal Calcutta Turf Club was set up in 1847. It became British India's equivalent of the Jockey Club in England in terms of arbitrating matters related to racing. In addition to horse races, the club also launched polo matches among natives and colonialists. Races at the Calcutta Race Course were once among the most important social events of the calendar, opened by the Viceroy of India. During the 1930s the Calcutta Derby Sweeps was a leading sweepstake game in the world. A racecourse was also set up in Ramna by the Dacca Club. The Bengal Public Gaming (Amendment) Act (Act No. IV of 1913) excluded horse racing from the gambling law.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: The Bengal renaissance refers to social reform movements during the 19th and early 20th centuries in the region of Bengal in undivided India during the period of British rule. Historian Nitish Sengupta describes it as having started with reformer and humanitarian Raja Ram Mohan Roy (1775–1833), and ended with Asia's first Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941). This flowering of religious and social reformers, scholars, and writers is described by historian David Kopf as "one of the most creative periods in Indian history". These movements were most prevalent in Bengali Hindu society, such as through the Brahmo Samaj. There was a growing cultural awakening in Bengali Muslim society, including the emergence of Mir Mosharraf Hossain as the first Muslim novelist of Bengal; Kazi Nazrul Islam as a celebrated poet who merged Bengali and Hindustani influences; Begum Rokeya and Nawab Faizunnesa as feminist educators; Kaykobad as an epic poet; and members of the Freedom of Intellect Movement.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Bengal played a major role in the Indian independence movement and the Pakistan movement. The earliest organized anti-colonial groups appeared in Bengal. The region produced many of the subcontinent's political leaders during the early 20th century. Political parties and rebel groups were formed across the region.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Civic architecture began following European styles after the advent of the East India Company's authority. The Indo-Saracenic style, merging Gothic and Indo-Islamic architecture, was started by British architects in the late 19th-century. While cities such as Calcutta and Dacca featured more civic architecture, country houses were built in many towns and villages across Bengal. Art deco influences began in the 1930s. Wealthy Bengali families (especially zamindar estates) employed European firms to design houses and palaces.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: Bengali society remained deeply conservative during the colonial period with the exception of social reform movements. Historians have argued that the British used a policy of divide and rule among Hindus and Muslims. This meant favoring Hindus over Muslims and vice versa in certain sectors. For example, after the Permanent Settlement, Hindu merchants such as the Tagore family were awarded large land grants that previously belonged to the Mughal aristocracy. In Calcutta, where Hindus formed a majority, wealthy Muslims were often given favors over Hindus. One aspect that benefitted the Hindu community was increased literacy rates. Many Muslims, however, remained alienated from English education after the abolition of Persian. Bengali society continued to experience religious nationalism which led to the partition of Bengal in 1947.


title: Bengal Presidency

text: British Bengali cities included a cosmopolitan population, including Armenians and Jews. Anglo-Indians formed a prominent part of the urban population. Several Gentlemen's clubs were established, including the Bengal Club, Calcutta Club, Dacca Club, Chittagong Club, Tollygunge Club and Saturday Club.


title: Blood plasma

text: Blood plasma is a light amber-colored liquid component of blood in which blood cells are absent, but contains proteins and other constituents of whole blood in suspension. It makes up about 55% of the body's total blood volume. It is the intravascular part of extracellular fluid (all body fluid outside cells). It is mostly water (up to 95% by volume), and contains important dissolved proteins (6–8%; e.g., serum albumins, globulins, and fibrinogen), glucose, clotting factors, electrolytes (, , , , , etc.), hormones, carbon dioxide (plasma being the main medium for excretory product transportation), and oxygen. It plays a vital role in an intravascular osmotic effect that keeps electrolyte concentration balanced and protects the body from infection and other blood-related disorders.


title: Blood plasma

text: Blood plasma is separated from the blood by spinning a vessel of fresh blood containing an anticoagulant in a centrifuge until the blood cells fall to the bottom of the tube. The blood plasma is then poured or drawn off. For point-of-care testing applications, plasma can be extracted from whole blood via filtration or via agglutination to allow for rapid testing of specific biomarkers. Blood plasma has a density of approximately . Blood serum is blood plasma without clotting factors. Plasmapheresis is a medical therapy that involves blood plasma extraction, treatment, and reintegration.


title: Blood plasma

text: Fresh frozen plasma is on the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines, the most important medications needed in a basic health system. It is of critical importance in the treatment of many types of trauma which result in blood loss, and is therefore kept stocked universally in all medical facilities capable of treating trauma (e.g., trauma centers, hospitals, and ambulances) or that pose a risk of patient blood loss such as surgical suite facilities.


title: Blood plasma

text: Blood plasma volume may be expanded by or drained to extravascular fluid when there are changes in Starling forces across capillary walls. For example, when blood pressure drops in circulatory shock, Starling forces drive fluid into the interstitium, causing third spacing.


title: Blood plasma

text: Standing still for a prolonged period will cause an increase in transcapillary hydrostatic pressure. As a result, approximately 12% of blood plasma volume will cross into the extravascular compartment. This plasma shift causes an increase in hematocrit, serum total protein, blood viscosity and, as a result of increased concentration of coagulation factors, it causes orthostatic hypercoagulability.


title: Blood plasma

text: Serum albumins are the most common plasma proteins and they are responsible for maintaining the osmotic pressure of blood. Without albumins, the consistency of blood would be closer to that of water. The increased viscosity of blood prevents fluid from entering the bloodstream from outside the capillaries. Albumins are produced in the liver assuming the absence of a hepatocellular deficiency.


title: Blood plasma

text: The second most common type of protein in the blood plasma are globulins. Important globulins include immunoglobins which are important for the immune system and transport hormones and other compounds around the body. There are three main types of globulins. Alpha-1 and Alpha-2 globulins are formed in the liver and play an important role in mineral transport and the inhibition of blood coagulation. An example of beta globulin found in blood plasma includes low-density lipoproteins (LDL) which are responsible for transporting fat to the cells for steroid and membrane synthesis. Gamma globulin, better known as immunoglobulins, are produced by plasma B cells, and provides the human body with a defense system against invading pathogens and other immune diseases.


title: Blood plasma

text: Fibrinogen proteins make up most of the remaining proteins in the blood. Fibrinogens are responsible for clotting blood to help prevent blood loss.


title: Blood plasma

text: Plasma is normally yellow due to bilirubin, carotenoids, hemoglobin and transferrin. In abnormal cases, plasma can have varying shades of orange, green or brown. Green color can be due to ceruloplasmin or sulfhemoglobin. The latter may form due to medicines that are able to form sulfonamides once ingested. Dark brown or reddish color can appear due to hemolysis, in which methemoglobin is released from broken blood cells. Plasma is normally relatively transparent, but sometimes it can be opaque. Opaqueness is typically due to elevated content of lipids like cholesterol and triglycerides.


title: Blood plasma

text: Blood plasma and blood serum are often used in blood tests. Some tests can be done only on plasma and some only on serum. Some can be done on both, but depending on the test, use of either plasma or serum can be more practical. In addition, some tests have to be done with whole blood, such as the determination of the amount of blood cells in blood via flow cytometry.


title: Blood plasma

text: Plasma was already well known when described by William Harvey in "de Mortu Cordis" in 1628, but knowledge of it probably extends as far back as Vesalius (1514–1564). The discovery of fibrinogen by William Henson, c. 1770, made it easier to study plasma, as ordinarily, upon coming in contact with a foreign surface – something other than vascular endothelium – clotting factors become activated and clotting proceeds rapidly, trapping RBCs etc. in the plasma and preventing separation of plasma from the blood. Adding citrate and other anticoagulants is a relatively recent advance. Note that, upon formation of a clot, the remaining clear fluid (if any) is blood serum, which is essentially plasma without the clotting factors.


title: Blood plasma

text: The use of blood plasma as a substitute for whole blood and for transfusion purposes was proposed in March 1918, in the correspondence columns of the British Medical Journal, by Gordon R. Ward. "Dried plasmas" in powder or strips of material format were developed and first used in World War II. Prior to the United States' involvement in the war, liquid plasma and whole blood were used.


title: Blood plasma

text: Dr. José Antonio Grifols Lucas, a scientist from Vilanova i la Geltrú, Spain, founded Laboratorios Grifols in 1940. Dr. Grifols pioneered a first-of-its-kind technique called "plasmapheresis", where a donor's red blood cells would be returned to the donor's body almost immediately after the separation of the blood plasma. This technique is still in practice today, almost 80 years later. In 1945, Dr. Grifols opened the world's first plasma donation center. Thirteen years after the center's opening, Dr. Grifols unexpectedly died at the young age of 41 due to leukemia.


title: Blood plasma

text: The "Blood for Britain" program during the early 1940s was quite successful (and popular in the United States) based on Charles Drew's contribution. A large project began in August 1940 to collect blood in New York City hospitals for the export of plasma to Britain. Drew was appointed medical supervisor of the "Plasma for Britain" project. His notable contribution at this time was to transform the test tube methods of many blood researchers into the first successful mass production techniques.


title: Blood plasma

text: Nevertheless, the decision was made to develop a dried plasma package for the armed forces as it would reduce breakage and make the transportation, packaging, and storage much simpler. The resulting dried plasma package came in two tin cans containing 400 cc bottles. One bottle contained enough distilled water to reconstitute the dried plasma contained within the other bottle. In about three minutes, the plasma would be ready to use and could stay fresh for around four hours. The Blood for Britain program operated successfully for five months, with total collections of almost 15,000 people donating blood, and with over 5,500 vials of blood plasma.


title: Blood plasma

text: Following the Supplying Blood Plasma to England project, Drew was named director of the Red Cross blood bank and assistant director of the National Research Council, in charge of blood collection for the United States Army and Navy. Drew argued against the armed forces directive that blood/plasma was to be separated by the race of the donor. Drew insisted that there was no racial difference in human blood and that the policy would lead to needless deaths as soldiers and sailors were required to wait for "same race" blood.


title: Blood plasma

text: By the end of the war the American Red Cross had provided enough blood for over six million plasma packages. Most of the surplus plasma was returned to the United States for civilian use. Serum albumin replaced dried plasma for combat use during the Korean War.


title: Blood plasma

text: Plasma as a blood product prepared from blood donations is used in blood transfusions, typically as fresh frozen plasma (FFP) or Plasma Frozen within 24 hours after phlebotomy (PF24). When donating whole blood or packed red blood cell (PRBC) transfusions, O- is the most desirable and is considered a "universal donor," since it has neither A nor B antigens and can be safely transfused to most recipients. Type AB+ is the "universal recipient" type for PRBC donations. However, for plasma the situation is somewhat reversed. Blood donation centers will sometimes collect only plasma from AB donors through apheresis, as their plasma does not contain the antibodies that may cross react with recipient antigens. As such, AB is often considered the "universal donor" for plasma. Special programs exist just to cater to the male AB plasma donor, because of concerns about transfusion related acute lung injury (TRALI) and female donors who may have higher leukocyte antibodies. However, some studies show an increased risk of TRALI despite increased leukocyte antibodies in women who have been pregnant.


title: Blood plasma

text: Following fears of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD) being spread through the blood supply, the British government began to phase out blood plasma from U.K. donors and by the end of 1999 had imported all blood products made with plasma from the United States. In 2002, the British government purchased Life Resources Incorporated, an American blood supply company, to import plasma. The company became Plasma Resources UK (PRUK) which owned Bio Products Laboratory. In 2013, the British government sold an 80% stake in PRUK to American hedge fund Bain Capital, in a deal estimated to be worth £200 million. The sale was met with criticism in the UK. In 2009, the U.K. stopped importing plasma from the United States, as it was no longer a viable option due to regulatory and jurisdictional challenges.


title: Blood plasma

text: Currently, blood donated in the United Kingdom is used by UK Blood Services for the manufacture of plasma blood components (Fresh Frozen Plasma (FFP) and cryoprecipitate). However, plasma from UK donors is still not used for the commercial manufacture of fractionated plasma medicines.


title: Blood plasma

text: Simulated body fluid (SBF) is a solution having a similar ion concentration to that of human blood plasma. SBF is normally used for the surface modification of metallic implants, and more recently in gene delivery application.


title: Élan School

text: Élan School was a private, coeducational, and controversial residential behavior modification program and therapeutic boarding school in Poland, Androscoggin County, Maine. It was a full member of the National Association of Therapeutic Schools and Programs (NATSAP).


title: Élan School

text: The facility was closed down on April 1, 2011, due to reports of abuse, many from former students, dating back to its opening in 1970.


title: Élan School

text: Élan was located on a campus that was formerly a hunting lodge. There were also other campuses, such as the one on 424 Maplecrest Road in Parsonsfield, Maine, which was formerly a hotel and hospital before it was bought by Élan in 1975. This campus was known to have some of the worst abuse in the school's history, and has been said to have been put out of use sometime in the 1980s.


title: Élan School

text: The school acquired some notoriety during the 1990s and early 2000s when former classmates of Michael Skakel, who had attended Élan in the 1970s, testified against him in his trial for an unsolved murder that had occurred about two years before he enrolled at Élan. The school was also the subject of persistent allegations of abuse in their behavioral modification program.


title: Élan School

text: Élan School was founded in 1970 by psychiatrist Gerald Davidson, investor David Goldberg, and Joseph Ricci, a former heroin addict who had worked with young people in drug-treatment facilities (and who in 1979 would become owner of the Scarborough Downs racetrack). Ricci headed the school until his death in 2001, when his widow Sharon Terry took over. Maine politician Bill Diamond served as its Director of Governmental Relations.


title: Élan School

text: In the school's program, described as "controversial", 'humiliation' was identified as a therapeutic tool, as was following up on such intervention with encouragement and warm support. Students attended year-round. In 2002, a New Jersey educational consultant who had referred students to Élan for 22 years told "The New York Times" that he would refer only "the most serious cases" to the school, which he said would "take kids who haven't responded to other programs and who are really out of control."


title: Élan School

text: The school's treatment methods were based on the "TC" or therapeutic community modality popularized in the 1960s at facilities such as Synanon, and later at Daytop Village.


title: Élan School

text: In 2002, a New Jersey educational consultant told "The New York Times" that the school was "certainly not for the faint-hearted." He said "There's lots of confrontation, ... and yet there are lots of hugs." Accounts of former students include mentions of physical and mental abuse, including degrading tasks such as "[sessions] of cleaning urinals with a toothbrush that can last for hours" and up to the point of critical malnourishment.


title: Élan School

text: Throughout its history, the school was faced with numerous allegations of student maltreatment. In 2001, "Details" magazine cited Élan as "among the most controversial of the nation's residential therapeutic communities."


title: Élan School

text: In the late 1970s, Androscoggin County Sheriff's Office Lieutenant Max Ashburn visited the school after repeatedly hearing rumors of abuse, but the staff did not allow him entry into the school past the lobby. Following this, he began keeping a file in which he documented names and phone numbers related to Élan, as well as reported abuses.


title: Élan School

text: In 2002 during the trial of Michael Skakel, an Élan alumnus, witnesses testified that beatings and public humiliation were parts of life at Élan during the late 1970s. In trial testimony, former students also described the practice of placing a student in a "boxing ring" surrounded by classmates who confronted the student. "The New York Times" has reported that, at the school, "smiling without permission can lead to a session of cleaning urinals with a toothbrush that can last for hours."


title: Élan School

text: The New York State Education Department, which has paid tuition for special education students to attend Élan School, gave the school a favorable review in 2005. In 2007, however, New York education officials raised questions about the school's practices, alleging in a letter to the school and Maine education officials that Élan students were physically restraining their peers and being deprived of sleep. The allegations prompted the state of New York to threaten to withdraw tuition money for taxpayer-funded students. The school's lawyer contested the allegations.


title: Élan School

text: In March 2016, Maine State Police announced they had opened a cold case investigation into the death of former Élan resident Phil Williams, who died on December 27, 1982, after participating in Élan's "ring," where students were forced to fight each other as a means of behavior modification. The State Police later announced no charges would be filed as a result of their investigation, citing insufficient evidence.


title: Élan School

text: Students would occasionally run away from Élan. Former Androscoggin County Sheriff's Office Captain Ray Lafrance stated that Élan would send groups in vans to search for and return runaways, and noted that the school only called police to report missing students as a last resort. Lafrance said some runaways would be relieved to be found after spending nights in the woods, though others "were scared to death to go back to Élan. If we really felt they were really scared, we'd bring them into the department, call their parents and at least let them know what's going on. Then we'd call Élan and they'd come pick them up."


title: Élan School

text: In 1979, Lt. Max Ashburn was called by a local family to pick up a 16-year-old Élan runaway. The boy had been a student at Élan for several months, and said that his parents lived in another state. Ashburn recalled in 2016 that the boy "was crying, and he was begging me not to take him back"; rather than return him to the school, Ashburn, a former truck driver, took the boy to a local diner, and instructed him to hitch a ride with one of the truck drivers there.


title: Élan School

text: In July 1990, 15-year-old runaway Brad Glickman of Bedford, New York, visited the home of Todd and Audrey Blaylock in Norway, Maine, after meeting one of Audrey Blaylock's daughters. Glickman told those he met that his name was David Smith. Roy O'Hara, a resident at the house, was handling a revolver when it discharged, fatally shooting Glickman in the head. O'Hara was found guilty of manslaughter that November; however, the verdict would be partially overturned in 1993.


title: Élan School

text: On March 21, 1993, 17-year-old student Dawn Marie Birnbaum ran away from Élan during a school outing. On March 24, she was found dead in a snowbank near Interstate 80. 36-year-old James Robert Cruz Jr. was charged with the first-degree murder of Birnbaum, and sentenced to life in prison.


title: Élan School

text: On March 23, 2011, Élan School announced it would be closing on April 1, 2011. The school's owner, Sharon Terry, blamed "declining enrollment and resulting financial difficulties," as well as negative attacks on the school via the Internet. In a letter to the "Lewiston Sun-Journal", Terry said: "The school has been the target of harsh and false attacks spread over the Internet with the avowed purpose of forcing the school to close." She added that "the school has, unfortunately, been unable to survive the damage."


title: Élan School

text: Élan was featured in "Children of Darkness", a documentary film shot in 1983 that explored the experiences of emotionally troubled youth and the various residences and institutions that housed them.


title: Élan School

text: A documentary chronicling the school's history and impact titled "The Last Stop" was released in 2017. The film was directed by an Élan graduate and included interviews from various residents and professionals including Maia Szalavitz.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: Sulthan is a 2021 Indian Tamil-language action film written and directed by Bakkiyaraj Kannan, produced by S. R. Prakash Babu and S. R. Prabhu under the banner Dream Warrior Pictures. The film stars Karthi, Rashmika Mandanna, and Ramachandra Raju, both marking the latter's debut in Tamil cinema. Napoleon, Lal, Yogi Babu, and Nawab Shah play supporting roles. The film features the score by Yuvan Shankar Raja with songs composed by Vivek–Mervin. The cinematography and editing were handled by Sathyan Sooryan and Ruben respectively.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: The film was released on 2 April 2021. The film received mixed reviews from critics and audience, and became a "Average Hit" at the box office because of theatre close due to COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: 1986: Sethupathi is a gangster in Madras who has a gang of 100 goons, working as vigilantes. One day, Sethupathi's enemy's barge into their house to kill Sethupathi, but Annalakshmi goes into labour. The gang beat the intruders while Sethupathi is with his wife.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: Annalakshmi gives birth to a boy, but dies. Sethupathi goes to his wife and gives the boy to his gang member Mansoor, who names him Vikram aka Sulthan. The gang raises Sulthan with love and care, and Sulthan sees them as his brothers. Sulthan grows up and goes abroad to pursue Robotics Engineering.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: 2021: A village head meets Sethupathi with a request to kill a person named Jayaseelan. The head narrates about the village practices in agriculture. When Jayaseelan asks for their land, they refuse which enrages him, and he kills many farmers and burns their lands. Upon hearing this, Sethupathi promises to kill Jayaseelan.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: When asked by Mansoor, Sethupathi tells that they have done many crimes in their life and they can do something good with the case of the head. At the same time, Sulthan arrives at the village in great splendour. One day, the gang is attacked by a few people who pose as pizza delivery men. They injure Sethupathi and a member of the gang, who is critical and admitted to the hospital.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: The goon's mother is distraught, leaving Sulthan mentally tarnished. Sulthan angrily confronts Sethupathi and tells him that he is going to leave and never going to come back. Due to this, Sethupathi dies in his sleep. At Sethupathi's funeral, Sulthan finds out that the attackers that night are police officers sent by Commissioner Manickavel with the intent to kill Sethupathi. Sulthan meets him and asks for an opportunity to reform the gang.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: Manickavel gives Sulthan 6 months to reform them, but tells him that not a single case should be filed on them in that time. Mansoor gets a phone call from the village head reminding him of the promise made to them. Mansoor sends twenty of the men including Otta Lorry to kill Jayaseelan, but Sulthan forbids them. They try to sneak out to the village but Sulthan catches them. Otta Lorry comes up with a lie that he has a marriage proposal in the village.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: Sulthan decides to take the entire gang with him to the village, so they will be out of trouble. The entire village goes along with the lie with a promise made by Mansoor saying that they will kill Jayaseelan. The head's daughter Rukmani acts as the bride. Otta Lorry rejects her as an act, but Sulthan genuinely falls for her. He confesses his love for her to the family and asks for her hand in marriage but she rejects him.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: Sulthan tries to woo her but to no avail. The gang wants to leave, but Sulthan tells them that until Rukmani falls in love with her they will not leave. The gang secretly follows Jayaseelan planning to kill him, but their attempts are unsuccessful. The village finds out that Jayaseelan is not after their lands but rather for the iron in a mountain. The only way to stop Jayaseelan is to prove their lands are fertile and that crops can grow on the land, but they only have 6 months.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: Sulthan is reprimanded by Rukmani while Mansoor and the gang attempt to kill Jayaseelan at the market, but Sulthan who is in the market stops the attack and yells at the gang. As they prepare to leave, a villager informs the gang that Jayaseelan has taken over the city. Jayaseelan brutally beats all the villagers including Rukmani. An angered Sulthan severely beats up Jayaseelan and his men.


title: Sulthan (2021 film)

text: Meanwhile, the police force starts a sting operation to kill all the goons in the city in unofficial encounters to attain peace. Sulthan learns about the news and extends their stay in the village for 5 more months and in their stay, they will practice agriculture. They work day and night in the fields. A corporate businessman arrives at the village and asks Sulthan if he can buy the mountain, but Sulthan refuses.