Chandra Shekhar (17 April 1927 – 8 July 2007) was an Indian politician who served as the 8th Prime Minister of India, between 10 November 1990 and 21 June 1991. He headed a minority government of a breakaway faction of the Janata Dal with outside support from the Indian National Congress. He was the first Indian Prime Minister who had never held any prior government office.

His government was formed with the fewest party MPs in the Lok Sabha. His government could not pass the budget at a crucial time when Moody had downgraded India, and it further went down after the budget was not passed, and global credit-rating agencies further downgraded India from investment grade, making it impossible to even get short-term loans, and in no position to give any commitment to reform, the World Bank and IMF stopped their assistance. Shekhar had to authorise mortgaging of gold to avoid default of payment, and this action came in for particular criticism, as it was done secretly in the midst of the election. The 1991 Indian economic crisis and the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi plunged his government into crisis. But according to Subramanian Swamy, finance minister Yashwant Sinha mortgaged gold reserves without informing the Commerce Ministry (which was headed by Swamy). But granting the permission for US military planes to refuel in Indian airports during the Gulf War improved the Prime Minister's image with the West.

Personal life

Early years and Education
Chandra Shekhar was born on 17 April 1927 in a Rajput family at Ibrahimpatti, a village in Ballia, Uttar Pradesh. He came from a farming family. He was awarded a Bachelor of Arts (graduate) degree at Satish Chandra P.G. College. He attended Allahabad University, obtaining his master's degree in political science in 1950. He was known as a firebrand in student politics and started his political career with Dr. Ram Manohar Lohia. After completing his graduation, he became active in socialist politics.

Family
Chandra Shekhar married Duja Devi. Duja Devi Degree College, a college founded in 1999 in Ballia district, Uttar Pradesh is named after her.

He had two sons with her, Pankaj Shekhar Singh and Neeraj Shekhar.

Political life

Start of career
He joined the socialist movement and was elected secretary of the district Praja Socialist Party (PSP), Ballia. Within a year, he was elected joint secretary of the PSP's State unit in Uttar Pradesh. In 1955–56, he took over as general secretary of the party in the State. His career as a parliamentarian began with his election to the Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh in 1962. He came under the spell of Acharya Narendra Dev, a fiery Socialist leader at the beginning of his political career. From 1962 to 1977, Shekhar was a member of Rajya Sabha, the Upper house of the Parliament of India. He was elected to Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh on 3 April 1962 as an independent candidate and completed his tenure on 2 April 1968. After this, he was re-elected twice to Rajya Sabha from Uttar Pradesh as an INC candidate from 3 April 1968 to 2 April 1974 and from 3 April 1974 to 2 April 1980. He resigned from Rajya Sabha on 2 March 1977 after he had been elected to Lok Sabha from Ballia. When the emergency was declared, even though he was a Congress party politician, he was arrested and sent to Patiala jail.

Join Congress
Chandra Shekhar was a prominent leader of the socialists. He joined Congress in 1964. From 1962 to 1967, he was a member of the Rajya Sabha. He first entered the Lok Sabha in 1977. He came to be known as a 'young Turk' for his conviction and courage in the fight against the vested interests. The other 'young Turks', who formed the 'ginger group' in the Congress in the fight for egalitarian policies, included leaders like Feroze Gandhi, Satyendra Narayan Sinha, Mohan Dharia and Ram Dhan. As a member of the Congress Party, he vehemently criticised Indira Gandhi for her declaration of emergency in 1975. Chandrashekhar was arrested during the emergency and sent to prison along with other "young turks".

Bharat Yatra (1983)
Chandra Shekhar went on a nationwide padayatra in 1983 from Kanyakumari to New Delhi, to know the country better, which he claimed gave jitters to Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. He was called a "Young Turk". He travelled nearly 4,260 km and nearly six months. Chandra Shekhar started his Bharat Yatra from Kanyakumari on 6, the same day that his party, Janata Party was swept to power in Karnataka. He finished his march at Rajghat in New Delhi on 25 June, the eighth anniversary of the declaration of the Emergency and also the day India won the Cricket World Cup.

Chandra Shekhar established Bharat Yatra Centres in various parts of the country and set up a Bharat Yatra Trust in Bhondsi village in Haryana's Gurgaon to focus on rural development.  "Bharat Yatra Kendra" "Bhondsi ashram" was set up by the Chandra Shekhar in 1983 on 600 acre of panchayat land, where godman Chandraswami and godman's associate Adnan Khashoggi (a Saudi Arabian billionaire international arms dealer embroiled in various scandals) use to visit him. Before 2002, some of the government land of the ashram was taken back by the Government of Haryana on the instructions of then Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala (in office 1989-91 and 1999-2004). In 2002, Supreme Court of India returned most of the land, barring some land, to the Bhondsi gram panchayat.

In Janata Party
Chandrasekhar was jailed during the emergency and after, he became the President of Janata Party. In the parliamentary elections, Janata Party  formed the government after the 1977 Indian general election headed by Morarji Desai. However the party lost the 1980 elections and were routed in 1984 Indian general election winning just 10 seats and Chandrasekhar losing his own Ballia seat to Jagannath Chowdhary.

In May 1988, he resigned from Janata Party's President post when Lok Dal (A) was merged with Janata Party. Ajit Singh was made president of Janata Party. George Fernandes, Biju Patnaik, Madhu Dandavate and Ramakrishna Hegde opposed this merger with Lok Dal (A) but Subramanian Swamy, Yashwant Sinha and Suryadeo Singh supported this move.

In 1988, his party merged with other parties and formed the government under the leadership of V.P. Singh. Again his relationship with the coalition deteriorated and he formed another party, Janata Dal (Socialist) faction. With the support of Congress (I) headed by Rajiv Gandhi, he replaced V.P. Singh as the Prime Minister of India in November 1990. After 1977, he was elected to Lok Sabha in all the elections, except in 1984 when the Congress swept the polls after Indira Gandhi's assassination. The post of Prime Minister, which he thought he genuinely deserved, eluded him in 1989 when V. P. Singh pipped him at the post and was chosen to head the first coalition government at the centre.

Deposing V. P. Singh
Chandra Shekhar seized the moment and left the Janata Dal with several of his own supporters to form the Samajwadi Janata Party/Janata Dal (Socialist). He won a confidence motion with the support of his 64 MPs and Rajiv Gandhi, the leader of the Opposition, and was sworn in as Prime Minister. Eight Janata Dal MPs who voted for this motion were disqualified by the speaker Rabi Ray.

In Parliament
Chandra Shekhar was a member of Rajya Sabha from 1962 to 1977, 1962 to 1968 as an independent supported by Socialist Party and later as member of Congress. He was jailed during the Emergency. After his release from jail in 1977, he joined Janata Party. He was elected to Lok Sabha from Ballia as a member of various incarnations of Janata Party in 1977, 1980, 1989, 1991, 1996, 1998, 1999, and 2004. He lost that seat only once in that span, in 1984 election. After his death, his son Neeraj Shekhar won the ensuing by-poll in 2008.

Other Ministries

Minister of Information and Broadcasting (1990-1991)
Chandra Shekhar remained the Minister of Information and Broadcasting from 21 November 1990 to 21 June 1991 from Samajwadi Janata Party (Rashtriya) and at that time he was himself the Prime Minister of India. He was preceded by V. P. Singh and succeeded by P. V. Narasimha Rao to the position after he resigned from the position of Prime Minister due to loss of support of the alliances.

Minister of Home Affairs (1990-1991)
Like the Minister of I and B, he remained Minister of Home Affairs for the time period of 7 months. He was himself the Prime Minister at that time and was preceded by Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and succeeded by Shankarrao Chavan of Indian National Congress.

Minister of Defence (1990-1991)
Along with Ministry of Home Affairs and Information and Broadcasting, he also handled Ministry of Defence under him as the Prime Minister of India. He was Minister of Defence for a very short time of 7 months and didn't present the Defence budget. He was preceded by V. P. Singh and succeeded by P. V. Narasimha Rao as the Minister of Defence.

Prime Minister

Chandra Shekhar was prime minister for seven months, the second shortest period after that of Charan Singh. Subramanian Swamy was instrumental in forming this government with the support of Congress.  He also handled the portfolios of Defence and Home Affairs during this period. However, his government could not introduce a full budget because on 6 March 1991 Congress withdrew support during its formulation. As a result, Chandra Shekhar resigned the office of the prime minister after 15 days on 21 June.

Manmohan Singh was his Economic Advisor. Subramanian Swamy along with Manmohan Singh and Montek Singh Ahluwalia prepared a series of documents on economic liberalization but could not pass in parliament because Congress withdrew support. Jairam Ramesh in his book To the Brink and Back: India's 1991 Story has written that "Chandrashekhar's Cabinet Committee on Trade and Investment (CCTI) itself had on 11 March 1991 approved the new export strategy which contained the main elements of the 4 July package".

Post-premiership
After handing the premiership to P. V. Narasimha Rao, Chandra Shekar's political importance was reduced, although he was able to retain his seat in the Lok Sabha for many years afterward.

Death

Chandra Shekhar died on 8 July 2007. He had been suffering with multiple myeloma for some time and had been in the Apollo Hospital at New Delhi since May. He was survived by two sons.

Politicians from across the spectrum of Indian parties paid tribute to him and the government of India declared seven days of state mourning. He was cremated with full state honours on a traditional funeral pyre at Jannayak Sthal, on the banks of the river Yamuna, on 10 July. In August, his ashes were immersed in the river Siruvani.

See also
 Pradhanmantri Sangrahalaya

References

Further reading

 "The State As Charade: V.P. Singh, Chandr Shekhar and the Rest" by Arun Shourie, Publisher: South Asia Books

External links

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Chandra Shekhar


Rafting is an outdoor sport in which a person uses an inflatable raft to navigate a river or other body of water. This is often done on rough water. This usually requires teamwork. Rafting is a dangerous sport. People can die while rafting. Rafting is also a competitive sport.

History
Rafting goes back to 1811 when the first attempt to go on the Snake River was planned. With no training, the river was too difficult and dangerous.

Classes of water
The International Scale of River Difficulty use six grades of difficulty to describe rivers for white water rafting. The scale ranges from simple to very dangerous and potential death or serious injuries.

Class 1: Very small rough areas, might require slight maneuvering. (Skill level: Very basic)
Class 2: Some rough water, maybe some rocks, might require some maneuvering. (Skill level: Basic paddling skill)
Class 3: Small waves, maybe a small drop, but no very dangerous. May require significant maneuvering. (Skill level: Some experience in rafting)
Class 4: Whitewater, medium waves, maybe rocks, maybe a considerable drop, sharp maneuvers may be needed.(Skill level: Exceptional rafting experience)
Class 5: Whitewater, large waves, large volume, possibility of large rocks and hazards, possibility of a large drop, requires precise maneuvering. (Skill level: Full mastery of rafting)
Class 6: Class 6 rapids are considered to be so dangerous that they are effectively unnavigable on a reliably safe basis. Rafters can expect a lot of whitewater, huge waves, huge rocks and hazards, and/or substantial drops that will have severe impacts beyond the structural capacities and impact ratings of almost all rafting equipment. Traversing a Class 6 rapid has a dramatically increased likelihood of ending in serious injury or death compared to lesser classes. (Skill level: Full mastery of rafting, and even then it may not be safe

References

Water sports

Rafting


The Staffordshire Brigade (later 137th Brigade) was a volunteer infantry brigade formation of the British Army from 1888 to 1936. It saw active service on the Western Front in World War I, including the attacks on the Hohenzollern Redoubt and the Gommecourt Salient, and the assault crossing of the St Quentin Canal, 'a most remarkable feat of arms'.

Origins
The Staffordshire Brigade had its origin in the Stanhope Memorandum of 1888. This proposed a Mobilisation Scheme for units of the Volunteer Force, which would assemble by brigades at key points in case of war. In peacetime the brigades provided a structure for collective training. Under this scheme the Volunteer Battalions of the South Staffordshire Regiment and the Prince of Wales's (North Staffordshire Regiment) would assemble at Wolverhampton. The brigade commander and his Aide-de-Camp were retired Regular officers on the Reserve list, while the other staff were Volunteer officers drawn from the constituent battalions. The Staffordshire Brigade was organised as follows:
 Brigade Headquarters at Wolverhampton, later at The Friary, Lichfield
 1st Volunteer Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment at Handsworth
 2nd Volunteer Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment at Walsall
 3rd Volunteer Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment at Wolverhampton
 1st Volunteer Battalion, North Staffordshire Regiment at Stoke-on-Trent
 2nd Volunteer Battalion, North Staffordshire Regiment at Burton-upon-Trent
 Supply Detachment, later designated an Army Service Corps Company
 Bearer Company, later part of the Royal Army Medical Corps

The brigade formed part of Northern Command, and was commanded by the following officers:
 Colonel (Hon Maj-Gen) Frederick Edward Sotheby, a  retired former officer in the Rifle Brigade, was appointed Brigade Commander on 11 July 1888. He had seen active service in the Crimea,  Indian Mutiny, China War and Ashanti War.
 Col Hon Francis Bridgeman, MP, retired former officer in the Scots Guards, appointed 17 Aug 1892.
 Charles Pierrepont, Viscount Newark (later 4th Earl of Manvers), a former officer in the Grenadier Guards and later Major in the 4th VB of the Sherwood Foresters, was appointed on 15 January 1899, and reappointed on the reorganisation of the brigades in 1906.

Territorial Force
Under the Haldane Reforms, the former Volunteers were subsumed into the Territorial Force (TF) in 1908. The 1st VB of the South Staffordshires was converted into the North Midland Divisional Engineers, the remainder  of the brigade were renumbered 5th and 6th battalions in sequence after the Regular and Special Reserve battalions of their parent regiments. The Staffordshire Brigade was assigned to the North Midland Division of the TF.

World War I
On the outbreak of World War I, the North Midland Division mobilised immediately, and soon afterwards the men were invited to volunteer for foreign service. This was accepted by the majority, and the division moved to Luton to train for deployment overseas. It began landing in France in late February 1915 and by 8 March had completed its concentration – the first complete TF formation to arrive on the Western Front. Shortly afterwards the TF formations were numbered, the North Midland Division becoming the 46th (North Midland) Division, and the Staffordshire Brigade was designated 137th (Staffordshire) Brigade on 12 May 1915.

Meanwhile, duplicate or 2nd-Line TF forces were being organised in the United Kingdom from Home Service personnel and new recruits who came flooding in, with 176th (2/1st Staffordshire) Brigade forming in 59th (2nd North Midland) Division, after which the original units were distinguished by a '1/' prefix.

The 137th Brigade served on the Western Front for the whole of the war, with the exception of a few weeks in Egypt.

Order of Battle
During World War I the brigade had the following composition:
 1/5th Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment
 1/6th Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment
 1/5th Battalion, Prince of Wales's (North Staffordshire Regiment) – broken up between 2/5th, 1/6th, 2/6th and 9th North Staffords on 29–30 March 1918
 1/6th Battalion, Prince of Wales's (North Staffordshire Regiment)
 4th (Extra Reserve) Battalion, King's (Liverpool Regiment) – attached from 10 November to 3 December 1915
 1/4th Battalion, Suffolk Regiment – attached from 10 to 15 November 1915
 1/4th Battalion, Seaforth Highlanders (Ross-shire Buffs, The Duke of Albany's) – attached from 6 to 16 November 1915
 1/4th (City of London) Battalion, London Regiment – attached from 11 to 15 November 1915
 137th Brigade Machine Gun Company, Machine Gun Corps – formed 7 March 1916 – joined 46th Battalion Machine Gun Corps 28 February 1918
 423 Trench Mortar Battery – joined 2 March 1916 – became 137/1 TMB
 137/2 Trench Mortar Battery – joined 22 April 1916
 137th Trench Mortar Battery – 137/1 and 137/2 TMBs amalgamated 6 June 1916

Operations

Hohenzollern Redoubt
The brigade was not involved in the 46th Division's first action (the German flamethrower attack at Hooge in the Ypres Salient on 30–31 July 1915), but was  in the forefront of the attack on the Hohenzollern Redoubt on 13–15 October that year. This was an attempt to restart the failed Battle of Loos, and the division was moved down from Ypres on 1 October for the purpose. The Germans recaptured the Hohenzollern trench system on 3 October, and the new attack was aimed at this point, the actual objective for 137th Brigade being to clear 'Big Willie' trench followed by 'The Dump' behind the Hohenzollern trenches. It went in at 14.00 on 13 October behind a gas cloud, two companies each of 1/5th North Staffs and 1/5th South Staffs in the lead, the other two of each battalion in the second line, followed by bombing parties to clear enemy dugouts. Things did not go according to plan: Brig-Gen Freetham found it almost impossible to deploy his troops, and they jumped off partly from Big Willie (2 companies 1/5th South Staffs) and partly from the old front line 300 yards from the rest of Big Willie.

The British bombardment had been ineffective while the German artillery brought down a barrage on the division's jumping-off trenches. The attacking battalions came under enfilade fire and lost hundreds of casualties within a few yards of their own line. Only a handful of 1/5th North Staffs got as far as Big Willie, while the attack of the 1/5th South Staffs never got going. The British attack was hurriedly called off.

To Egypt
In December 1915 the division was ordered to Egypt, and 137th Brigade arrived there by 13 January. A week later the move was countermanded and the troops re-embarked for France, concentrating near Amiens by mid-February. The only result of this move was an outbreak of infectious disease (Paratyphoid fever and Diphtheria) that weakened units and men for months to come.

Gommecourt
The 46th Division went back into the line in the Vimy sector, suffering a steady trickle of casualties over the coming months. In May, however, it began to move south to take part in the forthcoming offensive on the Somme. The division was ordered to assault the north side of the Gommecourt Salient on 1 July 1916. The operation, in conjunction with the 56th (1/1st London) Division attacking from the south, aimed at cutting off the salient, but was in fact a diversion for the main attack a few miles south that opened the Battle of the Somme.

1/6th South Staffs and 1/6th North Staffs were to form the first waves, with 1/5th South Staffs and 1/5th North Staffs supporting the attack with bombing parties and forming the rear waves setting off from the Support Line carrying heavy loads of trench equipment for consolidating the anticipated captures. But the attack was another disaster, the first wave being cut down almost on the start line. The jumping-off and communication trenches were completely inadequate, and the following waves were badly delayed, completely mixed up, and suffering casualties from German shellfire. The brigadier tried to organise a second attack by 1/5th North Staffs and 1/5th South Staffs, but after several delays they were told to 'sit tight' and abandon an attack that the Official History says 'would have been a mere waste of life'.

Bocquoy
Early 1917 saw the 46th Division still holding the line in the Gommecourt area. However, at the beginning of March, patrols found that the Germans were beginning to retreat from the Gommecourt defences. The division followed up slowly and cautiously, but on the night of 14 March an attack on Bucquoy Graben (trench) by the 1/5th North Staffs and 1/6th South Staffs led to heavy casualties. The rushed attack had been ordered by V Corps headquarters despite the protests of the divisional commander. The battalions had been on the training grounds practising for the attack when it was brought forward. Although 'the assault was gallantly pressed' (Official History) it was a complete failure, with heavy casualties.

Lens
After rest and training, 46th Division returned to the line in the coal-mining sector around Lens in April. Late in May, the division began small-scale operations against Hill 65. On 8 June, 138th Brigade attacked, with 137th Brigade providing a diversion using dummies representing an advancing battalion. 46th Division was now ordered to capture Lens itself, beginning on 28 June. The attack by 137th Brigade gained its objectives with few casualties. Another divisional attack on 1 July aimed at capturing more houses and trenches. The troops were held up in severe house-to-house fighting before a second push cleared the cellars and caused heavy casualties to the defenders. But in the afternoon a German counter-attacks drove the attackers back to their start line.

After Lens, the division was withdrawn into reserve, and did not engage in major operations again during 1917. On 29–30 January 1918 the 1/5th North Staffs was broken up to provide replacements to other North Staffs battalions, including the 1/6th Battalion in 137th Brigade.

St Quentin Canal

After its previous failures, the 46th Division 'had widely been considered a "dud",' but it was largely untouched by the battles of the German Army's Spring Offensive, and was well rested and thoroughly trained when it took part in the Allied attacks on the Hindenburg Line of late September 1918. It was assigned a key role in the Battle of the St Quentin Canal, being ordered to cross the canal itself between the Bellicourt and Bellenglise tunnels. In this section the canal runs through a deep cutting, both sides of which were covered in barbed wire and concrete pillboxes. 137th Brigade under Brigadier-General John Campbell, VC, was to spearhead this extremely hazardous attack, on a section of line that the Germans considered impregnable. The brigade prepared thoroughly for this amphibious operation, with petrol-tin rafts, collapsible boats, 'mud mats', lifelines and scaling ladders, together with 3000 lifebelts 'scrounged' from cross-Channel leave boats After two days of bombardment and preliminary attacks, there was no chance of surprise, but 29 September dawned with a thick ground fog to help the attackers' smokescreen.

The plan was for 137th Brigade to capture the crossings and advance as far as the 'Brown Line', after which 138th and 139th brigades would pass through and continue to the 'Yellow' and 'Green Lines'. At 05.50 the Staffords set off, with almost a mile to go before they reached the canal, following a fast-moving rolling barrage of field guns and machine-guns firing overhead. The canal defences had mostly been destroyed by the heavy artillery, which maintained fire until the last possible moment. The Staffords quickly stormed the outposts and the western trench line, and reached the canal bank on time, with few casualties, and having already taken 120 prisoners. There were 1000 German dead in the trenches, mainly from MG bullets. German reports after the battle complained that their 'SOS barrage' was late, but in fact it came down only five minutes after Zero – indiscriminately on British and Germans alike – yet the Staffords were advancing faster than anyone had predicted. The leading parties went over the canal with their improvised kit and by a single plank bridge left by the Germans. The mist protected the attackers from enfilade fire by MGs along the canal, and they seized the Bellenglise tunnel galleries, trapping hundreds of Germans inside.

At Riqueval they got an even bigger prize: the Germans had left the concrete bridge standing as the main supply route for their troops on the western bank. The bridge had been prepared for demolition, but the Germans considered the sector impregnable. A company of 6th North Staffs was detailed to rush the bridge before the Germans could blow it. Captain A.H. Charlton and nine men dashed out of the fog, bayoneted the machine-gunners guarding the west end, and ran across the bridge in a race with the demolition party emerging from a bunker at the east end (where a memorial erected by the Western Front Association now stands). The Staffords won the race, shooting the Germans and cutting the leads to the demolition charges.

The Staffords reorganised on the east bank protected by a standing barrage before moving on at 07.30. Platoon commanders used compasses to maintain direction in the fog. By 0820 all three battalions had reached the Brown line, capturing a German battery before it could pull out. Meanwhile, the engineers and divisional pioneers were laying footbridges, and the supporting brigades crossed the canal dryshod to pass through 137th Brigade and head off towards the Yellow Line at 11.20. The battle as a whole was a triumph, described as 'one of the greatest successes of the war on the Western Front'.

Final advance
The Stafford Brigade played a full part in the final advances of the war. On 3 October it again led 46th Division's assault on the Beaurevoir Line, but on 11 and 12 October it was held up in Riquerval Wood. On 17 October, the 6th North Staffords, holding an enormous frontage in the wood, made a feint attack that allowed the rest of the division to clear Andigny les Fermes. By November, trench warfare had ended, and the brigade was in the forefront of the pursuit up to the Armistice with Germany.

On 11 November 1918, 137th Brigade was at Sains-du-Nord, near Avesnes. It remained at Landrecies and later Le Cateau during the winter of 1918–19, clearing the battlefields as demobilisation proceeded. The last cadres returned home in June 1919.

Commanders
The following officers commanded 137th Brigade during World War I:
 Col (later Brig-Gen) W. Bromilow (10 October 1912 to 25 March 1915 (sick))
 Brig-Gen E. Feetham (2 April to 18 May 1916 (sick))
 Lt-Col R.R. Raymer (acting, 18 May to 5 June 1916)
 Brig-Gen H.B. Williams (5 June to 9 November 1916)
 Lt-Col W.A. Odling (acting, 9 to 17 November 1916)
 Brig-Gen J.V. Campbell, VC (17 November 1916 to 10 November 1918)
 Brig-Gen M.L. Hornby (from 10 November 1918)

Interwar years
The brigade was reconstituted in the renamed Territorial Army (TA) in 1920 with the same four battalions with which it had entered World War I. Its headquarters was at Whittington Barracks, Lichfield, and later at Fair Oaks House, Rugeley. The following officers commanded the brigade in the interwar years:
 Col L. Holland appointed 1 June 1920.
 Col T.W. Stansfield appointed 26 Mar 1924.
 Col C.J.C. Grant appointed 17 Nov 1925.
 Col H. Clive appointed 21 Nov 1927.
 Col W.J. Cranston appointed 21 Nov1931.
 Col H.H. Stoney appointed 10 Feb 1934.

In December 1936 the 46th (North Midland) Division was disbanded and its headquarters was reconstituted as 2nd Anti-Aircraft Division. The 5th North Staffords was transferred to the Royal Engineers and converted into 41st (The North Staffordshire Regiment) Anti-Aircraft Battalion, Royal Engineers. The 5th and 6th South Staffords and 6th North Staffs of 137th Brigade were transferred to the 166th (South Lancashire and Cheshire) Infantry Brigade of the 55th (West Lancashire) Infantry Division and were later incorporated into a reconstituted 59th (Staffordshire) Motor Division, in the 176th and 177th Infantry brigades.

World War II
A new 137th Infantry Brigade was organised as part of the expansion of the Territorial Army in the spring and summer months just before World War II, but both this and the new 46th Infantry Division formed in October 1939 were 2nd-Line duplicates of the 49th (North Midland and West Riding) Infantry Division and had no Staffordshire connection, with the new 137th Brigade having 2/5th West Yorkshire Regiment, 2/6th and 2/7th Duke of Wellington's Regiment.

Notes

References
 Army List (various dates).
 Maj A.F. Becke,History of the Great War: Order of Battle of Divisions, Part 2a: The Territorial Force Mounted Divisions and the 1st-Line Territorial Force Divisions (42–56), London: HM Stationery Office, 1935/Uckfield: Naval & Military Press, 2007, .
 Maj A.F. Becke,History of the Great War: Order of Battle of Divisions, Part 2b: The 2nd-Line Territorial Force Divisions (57th–69th), with the Home-Service Divisions (71st–73rd) and 74th and 75th Divisions, London: HM Stationery Office, 1937/Uckfield: Naval & Military Press, 2007, .
 Ian F.W. Beckett, Riflemen Form: A study of the Rifle Volunteer Movement 1859–1908, Aldershot: Ogilby Trusts, 1982, .
 Gregory Blaxland, Amiens: 1918, London: Frederick Muller, 1968/Star, 1918, .
 Malcolm Brown, The Imperial war Museum Book of the Western Front, London: IWM/Sidgwick & Jackson, 1993. ISBN 0-283-06140 -5.
 Burke's Peerage, Baronetage and Knightage, (various dates).
 Lt P.S.C. Campbell-Johnson, The 46th (North Midland) Division at Lens in 1917, London: Fisher Unwin, 1919/Raleigh, NC:Poacher Books/Lulu Publishing, 2011, .
 Niall Cherry, Most Unfavourable Ground: The Battle of Loos 1915, Solihull: Helion, 2005, .
 Brig-Gen Sir James E. Edmonds, History of the Great War: Military Operations, France and Belgium, 1916, Vol I, London: Macmillan,1932/Woking: Shearer, 1986, .
 Brig-Gen Sir James E. Edmonds & Lt-Col R. Maxwell-Hyslop, History of the Great War: Military Operations, France and Belgium 1918, Vol V, 26th September–11th November, The Advance to Victory, London: HM Stationery Office, 1947/Imperial War Museum and Battery Press, 1993, .
 Col John K. Dunlop, The Development of the British Army 1899–1914, London: Methuen, 1938.
 Paddy Griffith, Battle Tactics of the Western Front: The British Army's Art of Attack 1916–18, Newhaven, CT, & London: Yale University Press, 1994, .
 Hart's Army List (various dates).

 Alan MacDonald, A Lack of Offensive Spirit? The 46th (North Midland) Division at Gommecourt, 1st July 1916, West Wickham: Iona Books, 2008, .
 Martin Middlebrook, The First Day on the Somme, 1 July 1916, London: Allen Lane 1971/Fontana, 1975.

 Andrew Rawson, Battleground Europe: Loos – 1915: Hohenzollern Redoubt, Barnsley: Leo Cooper, 2003, .
 Titles and Designations of Formations and Units of the Territorial Army, London: War Office, 7 November 1927.
 Ray Westlake, Tracing the Rifle Volunteers, Barnsley: Pen and Sword, 2010, .
 Andrew Wiest, The History of World War I: The Western Front 1917–1918, from Vimy Ridge to Amiens and the Armistice, London: Amber Books, 2008, .

Online sources
 British Military History
 Orders of Battle at Patriot Files
 The Long, Long Trail
 The Regimental Warpath 1914–1918
 Richard Stevenson, 'Breaking the Hindenburg Line', Military Illustrated, Issue 277.

Military units and formations in Staffordshire
Infantry brigades of the British Army in World War I
Volunteer Infantry Brigades of the British Army
Military units and formations established in 1888
Military units and formations disestablished in 1936

Staffordshire Brigade


Mattiwilda Dobbs (July 11, 1925 – December 8, 2015) was an American coloratura soprano and was one of the first black singers to enjoy a major international career in opera. She was the first black singer to perform at La Scala in Italy, the first black woman to receive a long-term performance contract and to sing a lead role at the Metropolitan Opera, New York and the first black singer to play a lead role at the San Francisco Opera.

Biography
Dobbs was born in Atlanta, Georgia, one of six daughters of John and Irene Dobbs, who were leaders in the state's African-American community. She began piano lessons at the age of seven, and sang in community and church choirs.

Education
Dobbs attended Spelman College where she studied home economics and considered becoming a fashion designer. Her teachers encouraged her to study music, however, and she began to study voice, graduating with a degree in Spanish and music in 1946. Following her graduation, she moved to New York City and studied with German soprano Lotte Leonard while completing a Master's degree in Spanish at Columbia University.

Dobbs won a number of scholarships, including the Marian Anderson Award in 1947, and a John Hay Whitney Fellowship. The funds from these awards enabled her to move to Europe in 1950 and pursue her studies there, notably with Pierre Bernac.

Performance career in Europe
Dobbs initially performed in Europe as a concert recitalist; however, after winning the International Music Competition in Geneva, Switzerland, in 1951, she went on to sing at the major festivals and opera houses throughout the continent. She made her professional operatic debut at the Holland Festival, as the Nightingale in Stravinsky's The Nightingale, in 1952. She made her debut at the Glyndebourne Festival, as Zerbinetta in Ariadne auf Naxos, in 1953. Her success at this festival led to a performance contract at London's Covent Garden from 1953 to 1958.

Her La Scala debut in 1953 was at the invitation of conductor Herbert von Karajan. Dobbs performed the role of Elvira in L'italiana in Algeri, which also marked the first time a black artist sang in that opera house. In a review of her performance, the British magazine Opera called her "the outstanding coloratura of her generation".

She made her debut at the Royal Opera House in London, as the Woodbird in Siegfried, in 1953. She also appeared at the Paris Opéra, the Vienna State Opera, and at the opera houses of Hamburg and Stockholm. In 1954, she sang before Queen Elizabeth II and the King and Queen of Sweden at Covent Garden Theatre and performed at the Edinburgh International Festival

In the 1960s Dobbs continued to perform in Europe, particularly in Sweden, where she lived with her husband. Her successful, high-profile European career is considered significant in setting an example to younger black female singers such as Leontyne Price, Shirley Verrett, Jessye Norman and Kathleen Battle.

Performance career in the United States

Her American debut was a recital with the Little Orchestra Society, in New York City, in 1954. She made her Metropolitan Opera debut, as Gilda in Rigoletto, on November 9, 1956. In a review of her performance, Carl Van Vechten wrote that Dobbs' was "glorious ... a warm and brilliant coloratura, and the best Gilda in my experience." Although African-American singer Marian Anderson had performed at the Met the previous year, Dobbs was the first African-American to be offered a long-term contract by the Met. In eight seasons, she performed 29 times, including Zerbinetta, Zerlina in Don Giovanni, Olympia in The Tales of Hoffmann, Lucia in Lucia di Lammermoor, and Oscar in Un ballo in maschera. She also appeared at the San Francisco Opera in 1955, where she was the first African-American to play a lead role.

Following the example set by other African-American performers, Dobbs refused to perform for segregated audiences. She later stated that this hurt her career as she declined offers of work in the southern states. When the Atlanta Municipal Auditorium was de-segregated in 1961, Dobbs was the first person to sing to an integrated audience in the city. After de-segregation, she performed in Atlanta in a series of operas produced by Blanche Thebom.

Retirement
Dobbs retired from performing in 1974, and began teaching at the University of Texas, where she was the first African-American on the faculty. She continued her teaching career as professor of voice at Howard University in Washington, D.C., before retiring to Arlington County, Virginia.

In 1989 Dobbs was elected to the board of directors of the Metropolitan Opera.

Recordings
Dobbs's coloratura soprano was praised for its freshness and agility, as well as tonal beauty, and was considered an ideal voice for sound recording. However, she can be heard in relatively few recordings, as she spent her early career in Europe. When she returned to the United States in 1954 Roberta Peters had become a top soprano recording artist.

Dobbs's notable recordings include Die Entführung aus dem Serail (in English), opposite Nicolai Gedda (who was born the same day as she was, July 11, 1925), and conducted by Yehudi Menuhin, Les pêcheurs de perles conducted by René Leibowitz, and a recital of opera arias and songs, released in 1998 by Testament Records. She sang both Olympia and Antonia in a complete recording of The Tales of Hoffmann featuring Leopold Simoneau and Heinz Rehfuss, and conducted by Pierre-Michel Le Conte, which was issued in 1958 by Epic in stereo in the USA and by Concert Hall in Europe, and reissued on CD in 2008. She also recorded the title role of Zaide under Leibowitz in Paris in 1952, and excerpts from Rigoletto alongside Rolando Panerai.

Recognition
In 1954, the King and Queen of Sweden awarded Dobbs the Order of the North Star.

In 1979, Dobbs received an honorary doctorate of fine arts from Spelman College.

In 1980, the Library of Congress held an exhibition on her life.

In 1983, Dobbs received the James Weldon Johnson Award in Fine Arts from the Atlanta National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

Personal life
Martin Luther King Sr. wanted his son, Martin Luther King Jr., to marry Dobbs, as her father was an active civil rights activist and a friend of his.

Dobbs was married twice. Her first husband, Spaniard Luis Rodriguez, died of a liver ailment in June 1954, fourteen months after their wedding. In late 1957, she married Bengt Janzon, a Swedish newspaperman and public relations executive. Janzon died in 1997. Dobbs was the aunt of the first black Mayor of Atlanta, Maynard Jackson, and sang at his inauguration in January 1978.

Dobbs died from cancer on December 8, 2015, at her home in Atlanta at the age of 90.

References

Further reading
 The Metropolitan Opera Encyclopedia, edited by David Hamilton,  (Simon and Schuster, New York 1987).
 Elizabeth Forbes: "Mattiwilda Dobbs ", Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy; accessed November 13, 2008.

External links
Bruce Duffie, Interview with Mattiwilda Dobbs, March 28, 1994
Mattiwilda Dobbs sings Caro nome, recorded late 1950s

1925 births
2015 deaths
American operatic sopranos
20th-century African-American women singers
20th-century American women opera singers
African-American women opera singers
Singers from Atlanta
Spelman College alumni
Howard University faculty
University of Texas faculty
Deaths from cancer in Georgia (U.S. state)
Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni
Burials at South-View Cemetery

Mattiwilda Dobbs


Appanage is important to the history of France during the Middle Ages. The law said that when a king dies, his oldest son becomes the next king. Kings who wanted to give a younger son some land too sometimes created an appanage. Appanage was one way to keep a civil war from happening, if two or more sons wanted to fight each other to be the next king.

The younger son controlled the appanage as a duke and ruled almost like a king, except he could not sell the land. The ruler of an appanage could give it to his sons and grandsons, but eventually that part of the family would run out of sons and the land would go back to the king.

History of France

Appanage


Parqués is the Colombian board game. The game is similar to those in the Cross and Circle family (the category that includes Pachisi). The game is described as a "random thinking" one: the moves depend on the roll of the dice but players must consider possible strategies before executing their move. The objective of the game is to advance all the pieces to the end.

Colombian origin

Parqués is the Colombian version of Pachisi, which originated in India. Although it could be argued that the game comes from Spain (exactly as a derivation from Parchís) due to the similarity between both games, there is wide agreement in Colombia that the game is completely Colombian. Parqués stems directly from Pachisi in the same way as Parcheesi, Parchís or Ludo. There is no proof to the claim that it stems from a country other than India. Moreover, no Parqués game is played in any other Latin American countries, neither the world.

Parqués is a mixture of the original Indian game and the influences of local Colombian culture. Other Colombian variations also exist.

In Colombia, people from all parts of the country play the game; it is very popular, played by both children and adults. Adults usually play the game by betting money on the first piece, on capturing pieces, or on winning the game, to make gameplay more interesting. There are boards for 4, 6 and 8 players. The boards usually contain pictures of soccer teams, singers, actors, or other cultural figures on the jail boxes.

The board itself is usually placed on a box covered by glass. The use of glass is to allow dice to be thrown more easily. There are versions of the board that are made from paper to make it portable.

Gameplay
Parqués is played with two dice; two to eight players can compete in the same match, depending on what type of game board is used. Each player is given four pieces and uses a specific colour. The most common colours are red, blue, yellow and green, usually arranged in that order.  The game can also be played with fewer than four pieces

The jail box is where the pieces are placed at the beginning of the match and is where they go whenever an opponent "captures" them. The player throws the dice three times and attempts to get a pair in order to "free" the pieces. Rolling different pairs or "doubles" allows more pieces to be "freed":

1-1 or 6-6: the player can free all his pieces
2-2, 3-3, 4-4, 5-5: the player can free 2 only pieces

When the pieces are freed, they are placed in a special box next to the jail. This box is called "Home", or "Salida" (literally, "exit" in Spanish).

If a player does not roll any pairs during his turn, he passes the dice to the player on his right. Otherwise, he frees the pieces and wins an extra turn to move them. He throws again and must move the values of the dice with his pieces.

For example:

The player rolls 5-3
He can move 8 squares forward with one piece          or
He can move 5 squares with one piece and 3 with another

After he makes his move, he must pass his turn to the player on the right.

The pieces cannot advance backwards and they cannot be in any of the four boxes before their "Home" box.

Throws and turns

Each player can throw the dice once. There are some exceptions to this rule:

If the player has all his pieces in jail, he can throw up to three times until he frees them with a pair. If doubles are not rolled in the three tries, he passes the turn.
If the player throws a pair during any turn, he wins an extra turn. One comes up to the player out in jail

Capturing pieces

The player can capture an opponent's piece by placing his own piece on the same box as the other player's piece. However, he cannot capture a piece that is on a SAFE or a HOME box. Capturing in Colombia is called "eating" ("comer" in Spanish).

However, the player can capture pieces on his HOME box. When he frees any piece from jail, the pieces placed on his HOME are captured, that is, sent to its jail, losing all their advances.

The player can avoid capturing the piece. On that case, an opponent has to accuse him and the piece that did not capture must go to jail. If nobody notices, nothing happens.

Special boxes

There are three types of special boxes.

 Home: where the pieces are placed when freed.
 Safe: the pieces cannot be captured on this box
 Arrival: A player must move his pieces through nine boxes to progress in the game. The boxes are usually of the same color as that player's pieces. The ninth box is the last box in the game for each person. If a piece reaches the ninth box, it is removed from the game. When all of a player's pieces are out of the game, the player wins.

Other websites
Cyber Parqués, a game program based on Parqués

Board games

de:Parqués

Parqués


Winston Walter Davis (born 18 September 1958) is a West Indian former cricketer.

Domestic career
Davis gradually established himself as a bowler, taking 5–42 against Trinidad and Tobago in the 1981/82 Shell Shield, and he was signed by Glamorgan for the 1982 English season to replace the injured Ezra Moseley. Despite sending down rather too many no-balls at times, Davis finished the season with 42 first-class wickets and was retained for the following season.

Returning to Glamorgan after World Cup, Davis had another successful season, taking 52 wickets at 26.71 from 15 first-class matches, including three five-wicket innings hauls. 1984 was a successful season for Davis: he took 62 first-class wickets at 27.82 apiece and was unlucky not to be retained by Glamorgan for the following season; they decided instead to employ a certain Javed Miandad.

In 1985/86 Davis played Sheffield Shield cricket in Australia for Tasmania with moderate success.

In 1987 he returned to English county cricket with Northamptonshire. For three years he found considerable success, taking a total of 195 wickets at 25.46; his career-best first-class bowling figures of 7-52 came in 1988 in the first innings of the County Championship game against Sussex – noteworthy also for the fact that Davis and David Capel (3-59) bowled unchanged throughout the 32.5 overs of that innings.

Davis endured a final, less than happy, season with Northamptonshire in 1990: he averaged above 60 with the ball in both first-class and one-day cricket, and went for more than five an over in the latter form of the game. His final bowling spell for his county, in the Championship game against Essex, was a disastrous 5-0-37-0 as Graham Gooch and John Stephenson ran riot. With that, Davis bowed out of county cricket for good, and in 1990/91 he went to play for Wellington in New Zealand. It proved a shrewd choice as Davis took 20 first-class wickets at 19.50 in just five matches. After that, there were a couple of exhibition matches against his old county of Glamorgan in 1991, and 54 not out for a World XI against the West Indians at Scarborough, before he returned to the Caribbean for three final domestic games. He did little in any of them, and retired from cricket.

International career

Early days
Davis played his first representative match for West Indies Young Cricketers against their English counterparts at Port-of-Spain in August 1976, making an immediate impact by taking 4–35 in his first innings, including the wickets of future Test cricketers David Gower, Mike Gatting and Paul Downton. In 1978 he went to England for the return matches, but it was not until 1979/80 that he made his first-class debut, for Windward Islands against Leeward Islands at St John's.

In the meantime in 1982, he had made his Test and One Day International debuts for in the 1982/83 series against India, his first wicket in Test cricket being that of Mohinder Amarnath.

Success
In 1983 Davis was selected for West Indies' World Cup squad, and when brought into the side for the second group match against Australia at Headingley, immediately hit the headlines by taking 7-51, at the time a world record return in ODIs. He was retained for the other four group matches, but took only one more wicket in total and was not selected for the semi-final or final – perhaps unsurprising when one considers that players of the calibre of Marshall, Garner, Holding and Roberts were all in West Indies' squad for the tournament.

He played in all six Tests in India that winter, taking 14 wickets, but when Australia visited the West Indies in the spring of 1984, Davis was selected for only one Test and one ODI, and despite his experience of English conditions he was at first left out of the party to play England that summer, although when Milton Small was ruled out by a knee injury part-way through the series Davis was drafted into the squad. He played in the fourth Test at Old Trafford, and though he was not particularly effectual with the ball beyond managing to fracture Paul Terry's ulna he did score 77, his highest first-class innings, coming in as nightwatchman on the first day.

In 1984/85 Davis performed well on home soil after being selected for the last two Tests of the four-game series against New Zealand, taking 10 wickets at 18.80 including a career-best 4–19 at Kingston, and took part in no less than 15 ODIs in Australia.

Late career
In 1986, Davis had fallen away from the Test side as West Indies' fast-bowling production line continued to churn out high-quality pacemen.

During success in 1987 county tournament, he was recalled to international duties for one last time in India in 1987/88, taking 13 wickets at exactly 30 in four Tests but only three in his three ODIs, and captained the Windward Islands team in the same season.

Beyond cricket
In 1998 Davis, a committed Christian, became a tetraplegic after having spinal injuries as a result of a fall from a tree in St Vincent, whilst helping clear land for a new church. He was flown to England for treatment unavailable on the island, and now lives in Worcestershire, England. He has appeared in a film, Because of You, made by Worcestershire County Council's Social Services department; he said of this film, "People with a disability can often be seen as just takers and so for me, starring in this film gave me the opportunity to give something back to the community". Several benefit matches have been held with the object of raising money to help him live a more comfortable life, and have featured a number of high-profile cricketers: in 2005 a Lashings Cricket Club side beat a Winston Davis XI by 87 runs in a match graced by such names as Chris Cairns, V. V. S. Laxman and Alvin Kallicharran.

References

External links

 A glittering affair – Because of you..

1958 births
Living people
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines cricketers
Glamorgan cricketers
Northamptonshire cricketers
Tasmania cricketers
Wellington cricketers
West Indies One Day International cricketers
West Indies Test cricketers
People from Kingstown
People with tetraplegia
Cricketers at the 1983 Cricket World Cup
Windward Islands cricketers
Combined Islands cricketers

Winston Davis


Henri Delaunay (15 June 1883 – 9 November 1955) was a French football administrator.

Biography

After playing for the Paris team Étoile des Deux Lacs, he became a referee. He retired following an incident during a match between AF Garenne-Doves and ES Benevolence, when he swallowed his whistle and broke two teeth on being struck full in the face by the ball.

He started his career as an administrator in 1905 when he became president of Étoile des Deux Lacs, then secretary-general of the Comité français interfédéral (CFI), the ancestor of the French Football Federation. When the CFI became the French Football Federation in 1919, he remained as secretary-general.

As a member of FIFA, he sat on its board as deputy from 1924 until 1928. Along with Jules Rimet, he was an early architect of the FIFA World Cup. He was also a very early proponent of the European Champions Cup, as early as the 1920s.

Together with Jules Rimet, he was largely responsible for the creation of the European Football Championship, the trophy of which is named after him, having first proposed it in 1927. The first tournament took place in 1960.

He was General Secretary of UEFA from its foundation on 15 June 1954 until his death. When he died in 1955, he was succeeded as head of UEFA by his son Pierre Delaunay.

References

External links
 .
 .
 .

French football referees
UEFA officials
1883 births
1955 deaths

Henri Delaunay


The Coptic Catholic Church is a church in full communion with the Pope in Rome instead of the Pope of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria. The church has about 162,000 members (as of 2007). Most of the members are in Egypt. Coptic Catholics are seen as a schism from the Coptic Orthodox Church. They left that church in order to come into full communion with the Catholic Church. The current Coptic Catholic Patriarch of Alexandria is Archbishop Antonios Naguib.

In 1990, Coptic Catholic sources estimated that there were about 10,000 followers in countries other than Egypt. These followers are under the care of local Latin Rite bishops. There are Coptic Catholic parishes in: Paris, Montréal, New York City, Los Angeles, Sydney, and Melbourne.

History
In 1741, a Coptic bishop in Jerusalem named Anba Athanasius became a Catholic. Pope Benedict XIV appointed him Vicar Apostolic of the small community (approximately 2,000 people) who also became Catholics. Although Athanasius returned to the Coptic Orthodox Church later, a line of Catholic Vicars Apostolic continued after him.

Sources

Other websites
 Coptic Catholic Church
 http://www.coptcatholic.com (Arabic)
 Article on "Life in a Coptic Catholic Village"

Eastern Catholicism
Copts
Organizations based in Egypt

Coptic Catholic Church


Dewdney, originally named Johnson's Landing from 1884–1892, is an unincorporated community in the Central Fraser Valley of British Columbia, Canada, about 15 km east of the city of Mission. It was incorporated as a district municipality on April 17, 1892, including adjoining areas of Hatzic and Hatzic Island but the anticipated real estate boom on that island didn't pan out and economic damage from the Great Fraser Flood of 1894 led to the municipality's disincorporation on March 12, 1906. Another municipality eastwards, Nicomen, was incorporated in the same year but similarly later disincorporated.  Though in the same school district as Mission, it and other adjoining rural areas did not join that municipality when offered. It is now represented as part of Electoral Area 'G' in the regional district government, which currently is the Fraser Valley Regional District.

Dewdney is located at the western end of Nicomen Island, one of the larger settled islands in the Fraser, and at the southeast corner of Hatzic Prairie, a lowland floodplain at the south end of which is Hatzic Lake, an oxbow lake with a community of the same name on the island in its centre.

Downtown Dewdney spans the Nicomen Slough, which is fed by Norrish Creek (aka Suicide Creek), one of the main water supplies for the District of Mission.  Running east on the north side of the slough is the famous Hawkins Pickle Road (famous mostly for its name). Dewdney has a couple of stores, a post office, the Historic Dewdney Pub (aka "Church of the Blues"), the Dewdney Elementary School featuring a Community Outdoor Recreation Education program, and other businesses and is a service centre for other nearby communities, most of which are more rural in character.  Though situated in rich farmland Dewdney also has a history and continuing economic presence in lumbering and milling community, and also in relation to the fishery and shipping on the river.

Dewdney was the destination of the Dewdney Trunk Road, one of the Fraser Valley's earliest main roads, which ran from Port Moody to Dewdney.  The Dewdney Trunk Road, or Dewdney Trunk as it is often called, should not be confused with the Dewdney Trail, which is a colonial-era route from Hope to the East Kootenay region built by Edgar Dewdney.  He had been in charge of surveying the site of New Westminster during colonial times and had served on the Legislative Council, the colony's governing body, and as Member of Parliament. The community of Dewdney was named in 1892 when he was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia and who had been Lieutenant-Governor of the Northwest Territories from 1881, and federal Minister of the Interior from 1888–1892.

Associated names
The community is the namesake of the historical Dewdney provincial electoral district and also of the now-dismantled Dewdney-Alouette Regional District (DARD).  Dewdney Peak (locally referred to as Hatzic Mountain) immediately to the community's north was named for the community in 1939, rather than for Edgar Dewdney.

See also

Deroche, British Columbia
Durieu, British Columbia

References

Further reading
"Dewdney Community", HeritagePlaces.com website (Mission Museum & Community Archives)

Designated places in British Columbia
Unincorporated settlements in British Columbia
Populated places on the Fraser River
Lower Mainland
Populated places in the Fraser Valley Regional District
Former municipalities in British Columbia

Dewdney, British Columbia


Jing Chunhua (; born February 1956) is a former Chinese politician who spent most of his career in Hebei province. Beginning in 2008, Jing served as the Secretary-General of the Hebei Provincial Communist Party Committee, in charge of coordination and implementation. Prior to that, Jing served as party chief of Hengshui, a prefecture-level city. He was investigated in March 2015 by the Communist Party's anti-graft agency, suspected of corruption.

Biography
Si was born and raised in Guangrao, Shandong province in 1956. Jing joined the Communist Party in 1976. He began work in 1973 as a labourer in a mine and a team leader of the youth group. He entered the mine's management office in 1978. In 1983, he became deputy head, then head of the organization department of the mine, in charge of human resources. He also earned a diploma part-time at Hebei Broadcasting and Television College in Chinese language. In 1987 he began heading the Communist Youth League (CYL) organization in the city, a position he stayed on for the next five years. He was then made deputy CYL Secretary in Hebei province while studying economics at the Central Party School.

In 1995 he was again elevated to lead the CYL organization in the province, earning the rank equivalent to a provincial department director. He again took up part-time studies, this time studying global economics at Hebei University. In 1997 he was named deputy party chief of Chengde while maintaining his department director rank. He engaged in yet another study stint, this time in "scientific socialism."

In July 2001, he was named acting mayor of Chengde, and confirmed as mayor formally in March 2002. He served until 2006, during which time he attended Tianjin University to engage in further studies in "management science and engineering". He finally earned a full-fledged executive position as head of the party (the highest political office) in Hengshui in July 2006, at age 50.

In October 2008 he became Secretary-General of the Hebei Provincial Party Committee. The position is in charge of coordinating different individuals and organizations to implement party policy in the province. In January 2011 he entered the top ranks of the province by earning a seat on the provincial Party Standing Committee. After Xi Jinping became the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in November 2012, a large campaign began emphasizing the "mass line". As part of this campaign, officials were expected to criticize themselves.  Jing took part in democratic life meetings of the provincial party leadership. Jing said he "did not pay enough attention to detail," and did not "uphold democratic centralism" because he didn't speak too often during standing committee meetings. In September 2013, Jing attended a democratic life meeting presided over by Xi Jinping himself, during which Jing said he had become "too pretentious and too prideful" over the years and often forgot that he was still a civil servant.

In April 2014, Jing became the head of the provincial reform office, overseeing major reform initiatives, ostensibly a position of high responsibility, as "deepening reform" was high on the agenda of the Xi-Li Administration. On March 3, 2015, prior the opening of the annual "two sessions" conference in Beijing, state media announced Jing was undergoing investigation by the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection. Jing was the second official of provincial-level rank from Hebei province to fall from grace in Xi Jinping's anti-corruption drive, after provincial party organization chief Liang Bin, who was detained in 2014. However, Liang's case is believed to be related to his term in office in Shanxi province, where he served prior to coming to Hebei. Jing, on the other hand, spent his entire political career in Hebei. The announcement to investigate Jing also broke an unspoken rule that investigations of high-ranking officials would not be announced during the annual convening of the Chinese legislature in March.

On May 8, 2015, at the conclusion of the investigation by the CCDI, Jing was expelled from the Communist Party. The investigation concluded that Jing used his position of power to further the interests of others and promote associates in exchange for bribes, and that he committed "adultery." He was indicted on charges of bribery and transferred to judicial authorities for prosecution.

On December 23, 2016, Jing was sentenced to 18 years in prison.

References

1956 births
Living people
Chinese Communist Party politicians from Shandong
People's Republic of China politicians from Shandong
Expelled members of the Chinese Communist Party
Chinese politicians convicted of corruption

Jing Chunhua


Erika Weinzierl (6 June 1925 – 28 October 2014) was an Austrian historian, gender researcher, and historian of Nazism. A member of the Austrian People's Party and the Curatorium of the Austrian Mauthausen Committee, she was the second director of the Department of Contemporary History of the University of Vienna, succeeding Ludwig Jedlicka. Weinzierl was a recipient of the Austrian Decoration for Science and Art, the Preis der Stadt Wien für Geisteswissenschaften, the Benemerenti medal, and the Theodor Körner Prize.

Biography
Erika Fischer was born on 6 June 1925 in Vienna, Austria. She graduated from the University of Vienna.

She headed the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for the History of Social Sciences and was a full professor at the University of Salzburg and the University of Vienna. For a long time, she was one of the few women in the German-speaking world and the only one in Austria on a history ordinariate. She received many awards for her critical examination of civil society under National Socialism. For many years, she stood up to the "Anti-Semitism Campaign in Austria", of which she later became honorary president.

The author of books and numerous articles, Weinzierl published about 700 titles. She was also editor or co-editor of 30 books, including the monthly or bi-monthly zeitgeschichte ("Journal of Contemporary History") from 1973. She also edited a series of publications of the Institute for Ecclesiastical History, the Historical Institute of University of Salzburg, the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for the History of Social Sciences (with Wolfgang Huber), and materials on contemporary history (with Rudolf G. Ardelt and Karl Stuhlpfarrer).

She died on 28 October 2014 in Vienna.

Awards
1952, Pontifical Medal of Merit Benemerenti
1979, Premio Adelaide Ristori of the Centro Culturale Italiano in Rome
1985, Austrian Cross of Honor for Science and Art I. Class
1985, Silver medal of the state of Salzburg
1985, Medal of Honor of the Federal Capital Vienna in gold
1988, Austrian State Prize for Cultural Journalism
1992, Dr. Hertha Firnberg State Prize for special achievements in the field of science and research
1994, Prize of the City of Vienna for the humanities
1995, Bruno Kreisky Prize for the political book of the Dr. Karl Renner Institute (for her complete works)
1996, Joseph Samuel Bloch Medal of Action Against Anti-Semitism in Austria
1998, Wilhelm Hartel Prize of the Austrian Academy of Sciences
1999, Golden Doctorate of the GWF of the University of Vienna
2000, Prize of the city of Vienna for public education
2000, Great Silver Medal for Services to the Republic of Austria
2002, Ring of Honor of the City of Vienna (for her commitment to the fight against anti-Semitism)
2003, non-fiction book "danubius" of the book club Donauland and the ORF (for her life's work)
2006, Viennese E. Chargaff Prize of the Research Center for Ethics and Science in Dialogue
2008, Honorary Prize of the Press Club Concordia (for her life's work, especially for her fight against anti-Semitism)
2010, Women's Lifetime Achievement Award of the Federal Minister for Women and Public Service

Movies
 Erika Weinzierl – A portrait. Film by Peter Grundei and Ronald P. Vaughan [for the 85th birthday]. ORF, Austria 2010.

References

1925 births
2014 deaths
Recipients of the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art, 1st class
Recipients of the Benemerenti medal
Austrian People's Party politicians
German non-fiction writers
20th-century German writers
20th-century German women writers
21st-century German writers
21st-century German women writers

Erika Weinzierl


Nicolas Fouché (1653–1733) was a French painter.

Fouché was born in Troyes, the son of the painter Léonard Fouché. He was received into the Académie de Saint-Luc on 15 March 1679. The abbé de Monville, biographer of Pierre Mignard, called Fouché one of his students. Cardinal Melchior de Polignac owned a series of paintings of the eight liberal arts by Fouché, inventorised by his heir, in 1738.  He died in Paris.

Works
 Budapest, Fine Arts Museum, Pomona, oil on canvas, 1, 475 by 1,145 m.

 Tours, musée des Beaux-arts, La Poèsie, at the château de Chanteloup prior to the revolution, oil on canvas, 1,10 by 0,81 m.

Engravers of his work
 Louis Desplaces (1682–1739)
 Audran family
 Gérard Edelinck
 James Johnson

Bibliography
 Wildenstein, "Nicolas Fouché peintre de l'Académie de Saint-Luc vers 1650-1733", Gazette des Beaux-Arts, novembre 1964, n° 3.
 David Brouzet, "La Poésie du Musée des Beaux-Arts de Tours attribuée à Nicolas Fouché", Les Cahiers d'histoire de l'art, 2007.

1653 births
1733 deaths
People from Troyes
17th-century French painters
French male painters
18th-century French painters
18th-century French male artists

Nicolas Fouché


Business interruption insurance (also known as business income insurance) is a type of insurance that covers the loss of income that a business suffers after a disaster. The income loss covered may be due to disaster-related closing of the business facility or due to the rebuilding process after a disaster.

It differs from property insurance in that a property insurance policy only covers the physical damage to the business, while the additional coverage allotted by the business interruption policy covers the profits that would have been earned. This extra policy provision is applicable to all types of businesses, as it is designed to put a business in the same financial position it would have been in if no loss had occurred.

This type of coverage can be added onto the business's property insurance policy or comprehensive package policy such as a business owner's policy (BOP) or as part of a standalone policy in some jurisdictions.  Since business interruption is included as part of the business's primary policy, it only pays out if the cause of the loss is covered by the overarching policy or a defined event in the case of a standalone.

Coverage
The following are typically covered under a business interruption insurance policy:
 Profits. Profits that would have been earned (based on prior months' financial statements).
 Fixed costs. Operating expenses and other costs still being incurred by the property (based on historical costs).
 Temporary location. Some policies cover the extra expenses for moving to, and operating from, a temporary location.
 Commission and training cost. Business Interruption (BI) policy essentially covers the cost of providing training to the operators of the machinery replaced by the insurer following the insured events.
 Extra expenses. Reimbursement for reasonable expenses (beyond the fixed costs) that allow the business to continue operation while the property is being repaired.
 Civil authority ingress / egress. Government-mandated closure of business premises that directly causes loss of revenue. Examples include forced business closures because of government-issued curfews or street closures related to a covered event.

This coverage extends until the end of the business interruption period determined by the insurance policy. Most insurance policies define this period as starting on the date of the covered peril and the damaged property is physically repaired and returned to operations under the same condition that existed prior to the disaster.

In addition, businesses can purchase contingent business interruption coverage, which pays out when a business is unable to operate because of an event (such as a natural disaster) that damages the business premises of one of its suppliers or customers, thus preventing it from engaging in normal trade.

References

External links
Airmic Property Damage and Business Interruption Benchmarking Report 2012

P&C Insurance: The Conundrum of Business Interruption Coverage during the Coronavirus Pandemic

Types of insurance
Business continuity

Business interruption insurance


The , in the past known as , is part of the Japanese football club system.

J1 League is the top grouping of the .

It is one of the three major titles in Japan, along with J. League Cup and Emperor's Cup.

The second tier is represented by the J2 League.

Champions

Split-season era (2015–present)

League Format
As of the 2015 season, and continuing through at least the 2019 season, the league uses a multi-stage format.

The regular season is split into two stages. In each stage, each team plays one match against every other team. As in almost all association football leagues worldwide, teams receive 3 points in the standings for a win, 1 point for a draw, and none for a loss, and teams are ranked by points earned.

After the second stage of the regular season, an overall table is calculated. The champions of each stage of the regular season, plus any team finishing in the top three of the overall table, advance to a championship playoff. The team that finishes on top of the overall table receives a place in the championship final, while the other teams play off for the other spot in the final.

Related pages
 Sports in Japan
 J2 League
 Japan Football League
 Japanese Regional Leagues
 List of J. League players

References

Other websites
  J-League at NHK.or.jp

1993 establishments in Asia
1990s establishments in Japan
Football leagues in Japan

J1 League


Luther Burbank (March 7, 1849 – April 11, 1926) was an American botanist, horticulturist and pioneer in agricultural science. He developed more than 800 strains and varieties of plants over his 55-year career. Burbank's varied creations included fruits, flowers, grains, grasses, and vegetables. He developed (but did not create) a spineless cactus (useful for cattle-feed) and the plumcot.

References

1849 births
1926 deaths
American botanists

Luther Burbank


Mia Farrow (born Maria de Lourdes Villiers Farrow; February 9, 1945) is an American singer, actress and humanitarian worker. She has won many awards, including a Golden Globe. She has been in almost 50 movies. Farrow is also known for her extensive humanitarian work. Time magazine named Farrow one of the most influential people in the world. She gained further recognition for her subsequent short-lived marriage to Frank Sinatra. She later married André Previn after she became pregnant with his child. She has dated Woody Allen.

Career
Farrow's first main role in a movie was as Rosemary Woodhouse in Rosemary's Baby and starred in the television series Peyton Place. It was released in 1968. She won several awards for it. She became the first American actress to join the Royal Shakespeare Company. In the 1980s and early 1990s Farrow acted in nearly all of the movies released by her boyfriend Woody Allen. She last acted in the 2011 movie Dark Horse.

Personal life
Farrow married singer Frank Sinatra on July 19, 1966. He divorced Farrow in 1969.

In 1980 Farrow started dating Woody Allen. In 1992 Farrow found naked pictures of her adopted daughter Soon-Yi Previn in Allen's house. Farrow and Allen broke up after this.

Children
She has thirteen living children and nine grandchildren. Two of her daughters have died. Farrow has seven adopted children.

In 2014, Dylan Farrow wrote an open letter in the New York Times, saying that her adoptive father Woody Allen had sexually abused her when she was a child. Allen wrote a response in which he quoted Moses Farrow, "My mother drummed it into me to hate my father for tearing apart the family and sexually molesting my sister."

References

Actors from Los Angeles
American human rights activists
American movie actors
Golden Globe Award winning actors
Singers from Los Angeles
1945 births
Living people
Frank Sinatra

Mia Farrow


The Battle of Nan'ao island (Nan'ao Dao, 南澳岛) was a battle fought between the nationalists (Kuomintang) and the communists. Nan'ao Island (Nan'ao Dao, 南澳岛) of Swatow (now known as Shantou) remained in the nationalist hands after Guangdong fell into communist hands.  On February 23, 1950, the 121st division of the 41st Army of the People's Liberation Army attacked the island.  Faced with such overwhelming enemy, the defenders stood no chance and after eight hours of fighting, the communists succeeded in wiping out the entire nationalist garrison and thus taking the island.  27 nationalist troops were killed, and 1348 were captured, including the  nationalist local commander, the deputy commander-in-chief of the 1st Cantonese Column Wu Chaojun (吴超骏), and the deputy commander of the nationalist 58th division Guo Mengxiong (郭梦熊).  A total of 1304 firearms were also captured.

The nationalist defeat proved that it was impractical to hold on to the outlying islands that were at the doorstep of the enemy but far away from any friendly bases, just like the Wanshan Archipelago Campaign would have done later.  As the battle had shown, once the defenders learned that it was impossible to have any reinforcement, the morale completely collapsed and most of the defenders abandoned their weapons and attempted to hide after merely suffering 27 fatalities, and the enemy spent most of the 8 hours fighting in mop-up operations to round up the demoralized defenders.  Although holding on to a distant island may have propaganda value, any initial political and psychological gains would be negated by the fallout after the inevitable defeat and the loss.

See also
List of Battles of Chinese Civil War
National Revolutionary Army
History of the People's Liberation Army
Chinese Civil War
Battle of Nanpēng Archipelago (on smaller islands in the same county)

References
Zhu, Zongzhen and Wang, Chaoguang, Liberation War History, 1st Edition, Social Scientific Literary Publishing House in Beijing, 2000,  (set)
Zhang, Ping, History of the Liberation War, 1st Edition, Chinese Youth Publishing House in Beijing, 1987,  (pbk.)
Jie, Lifu, Records of the Liberation War: The Decisive Battle of Two Kinds of Fates, 1st Edition, Hebei People's Publishing House in Shijiazhuang, 1990,  (set)
Literary and Historical Research Committee of the Anhui Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Liberation War, 1st Edition, Anhui People's Publishing House in Hefei, 1987,
Li, Zuomin, Heroic Division and Iron Horse: Records of the Liberation War, 1st Edition, Chinese Communist Party History Publishing House in Beijing, 2004,
Wang, Xingsheng, and Zhang, Jingshan, Chinese Liberation War, 1st Edition, People's Liberation Army Literature and Art Publishing House in Beijing, 2001,  (set)
Huang, Youlan, History of the Chinese People's Liberation War, 1st Edition, Archives Publishing House in Beijing, 1992,
Liu Wusheng, From Yan'an to Beijing: A Collection of Military Records and Research Publications of Important Campaigns in the Liberation War, 1st Edition, Central Literary Publishing House in Beijing, 1993,
Tang, Yilu and Bi, Jianzhong, History of Chinese People's Liberation Army in Chinese Liberation War, 1st Edition, Military Scientific Publishing House in Beijing, 1993 – 1997,  (Volum 1),  (Volum 2),  (Volum 3),  (Volum 4), and  (Volum 5)

Conflicts in 1950
Nan'ao
1950 in China
Military history of Guangdong
Shantou

Battle of Nan'ao Island


A sniggle is a type of fish hook used for catching eels (known as snigs), using the method of sniggling.

A typical method of sniggling is to tie a fishing line to the middle of a large needle or fish hook.  The needle is then inserted along the body of an earthworm which is used as bait.  The needle is then stuck into a slender sniggling pole such as a hazel wand, eight to ten feet long.  This is used to insert the bait into promising holes or crannies in which eels tend to lurk.  When an eel takes the bait then, after a minute or two, the bait will have been swallowed whole and the line is then pulled to rotate the needle or hook within the body of the eel so snagging and catching it.  Eels of two or three pounds weight may be caught by this method but may require a protracted tug of war to pull them from their hole.  This provides better sport and amusement than the use of traps or clod-fishing and is a good alternative for the angler when game fish such as trout will not rise.

References

Eels
Fishing equipment

Sniggle


Optical braille recognition is technology to capture and process images of braille characters into natural language characters. It is used to convert braille documents for people who cannot read them into text, and for preservation and reproduction of the documents.

History
In 1984, a group of researchers at the Delft University of Technology designed a braille reading tablet, in which a reading head with photosensitive cells was moved along set of rulers to capture braille text line-by-line. In 1988, a group of French researchers at the Lille University of Science and Technology developed an algorithm, called Lectobraille, which converted braille documents into plain text. The system photographed the braille text with a low-resolution CCD camera, and used spatial filtering techniques, median filtering, erosion, and dilation to extract the braille. The braille characters were then converted to natural language using adaptive recognition. The Lectobraille technique had an error rate of 1%, and took an average processing time of seven seconds per line. In 1993, a group of researchers from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven developed a system to recognize braille that had been scanned with a commercially available scanner. The system, however, was unable to handle deformities in the braille grid, so well-formed braille documents were required. In 1999, a group at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University implemented an optical braille recognition technique using edge detection to translate braille into English or Chinese text. In 2001, Murray and Dais created a handheld recognition system, that scanned small sections of a document at once. Because of the small area scanned at once, grid deformation was less of an issue, and a simpler, more efficient algorithm was employed. In 2003, Morgavi and Morando designed a system to recognize braille characters using artificial neural networks. This system was noted for its ability to handle image degradation more successfully than other approaches.

Challenges
Many of the challenges to successfully processing braille text arise from the nature of braille documents. Braille is generally printed on solid-color paper, with no ink to produce contrast between the raised characters and the background paper. However, imperfections in the page can appear in a scan or image of the page.

Many documents are printed inter-point, meaning they are double-sided. As such, the depressions of the braille of one side appear interlaid with the protruding braille of the other side.

Techniques
Some optical braille recognition techniques attempt to use oblique lighting and a camera to reveal the shadows of the depressions and protrusions of the braille. Others make use of commercially available document scanners.

See also
Optical character recognition

References

Optical character recognition
Applications of artificial intelligence
Applications of computer vision
Automatic identification and data capture
Computational linguistics
Braille technology
Machine translation
Disability software

Optical braille recognition


Espasa-Calpe was a Spanish publisher which existed during the 20th century. It was created in 1925, by the union of Editorial Calpe, founded by Nicolás María de Urgoiti in 1918, and Editorial Espasa, founded by José and Pau Espasa i Anguera in 1860.

The publisher, named Espasa-Calpe, was owned by Papelera Española. It became one of the most important publishers in Spain. The publisher later founded the Enciclopedia Espasa.

Espasa-Calpe opened Casa del Libro in Gran Vía, Madrid, which continued with the direction of Enciclopedia Espasa. In addition, it established a headquarters in Buenos Aires, where it was extended into Chile, Uruguay, Perú, Mexico and Cuba.

In 1991, Espasa-Calpe was acquired by Grupo Planeta, which paid 15.000 million Spanish pesetas.

References

Publishing companies of Spain
Publishing companies established in 1925
Organizations disestablished in 1991
Planeta Group

Espasa-Calpe


Tuas West Road MRT Station (EW32) is a MRT station along the East West Line in Tuas, Singapore. This station is to provide rail connection to the western part of Tuas and Tuas South from the rest of the island, and vice versa. It was formerly W17 before the opening.

History
It was first announced on 11 January 2011 by Transport Minister Mr Raymond Lim in a speech while visiting Bedok when new platform screen doors opened there. It was expected to be completed by 2016 and would benefit an estimated 100,000 commuters daily.

Mass Rapid Transit (Singapore) stations

Tuas West Road MRT station


Cheema (Shahmukhi: چیمہ, : ਚੀਮਾ) (also spelled Chima) is a typical group of people of the Jaat clan confederation found in India and Pakistan (In the world any family of Cheema they must be connected to the Sialkot sub-city Sahowala, Balochak Because this is the beginning place of Jutt Cheemas) who are also known as warriors. Jaat's are a large and important group in Punjab. Cheema's are one of the few major subclans of Jats. They speak Punjabi, and usually own vast farmlands. The majority of Cheema clans who are Muslims are found in West Punjab (Pakistan), and many who are Sikhs are found in East Punjab (India).

History
The Cheema tribe was called "Shaka" in India, from the name Saka used by the Persians. From the time of the Mahabharata wars (1500-500 BC) Shakas were mentioned many times in texts like the Puranas, the Manusmriti, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Mahabhasiya of Patanjali, the Brhat Samhita of Vraha Mihira, the Kavyamimamsa, the Brihat-Katha-Manjari, the Katha-Saritsagara, and many other old texts. it is believed that there are three Royal Families of Jatt in every Punjab. In Indian Punjab, there are the (Cheema, Grewal, and Gill) "Sikh Jatts" And the Royal Families of the Pakistani Punjab are (Chattha, Cheema, and Warraich) "Muslim Jutts".

Invasion of India (180 BC onward)
The Vanaparava of the Mahabharata has a prophecy saying that the kings of the Shakas, Yavanas, Kambojas, Bahlikas, and Abhiras shall rule unrighteously in Kaliyuga (MBH 3/188/34-36).

Alexander's invasion of Punjab
Alexander overran the Achaemenid Empire in 331 BC and marched into what is now Afghanistan with an army of 50,000. His scribes do not mention Gandhara or Kamboja; instead, they name twelve small countries in those territories. This means that Gandhara and/or Kamboja must not have been very great kingdoms in the late 4th century BC. In 326 BC, most of these twelve or so countries that used to be in the Gandhara Kamboja Mahajanapadas were conquered by the Macedonian conqueror.

Alexander invited all the chieftains of the former satrapy of Gandhara to come to him and submit to his authority. Ambhi, ruler of Taxila, whose kingdom extended from the Indus to the Hydaspes (Jhelum), complied. After confirming him in his satrapy, Alexander marched against the Sakas (Cheemas are considered to be decadents of the Sakas) and Kamboja highlanders of the Kunar also Swat valleys known in Greek texts as Aspasios and Assakenois (q.v.) and in Indian texts as Ashvayana and Ashvakayana (names referring to their equestrian nature), who had refused to submit to Alexander. The Ashvayan, Ashvakayan, Kamboja and allied Saka  clans offered tough resistance to the invader and fought him to a man. When worse came to worst, even the Ashvakayan women took up arms and joined their menfolk on the field, thus preferring " a glorious death to a life of dishonor".

Thereafter, Alexander marched east to the Hydaspes, where Porus, ruler of the kingdom between the Hydaspes (Jhelum) and the Akesines (Chenab) refused to submit to him. The two armies fought the historic Battle of the Hydaspes River on the riverbank outside the town of Nikaia (near the modern city of Jhelum). Porus's army fought bravely but was no match for Alexander's. When the defiant Raja (though wounded and having lost his sons) was brought before Alexander, a legendary conversation took place in which Alexander inquired of Porus, "How should I treat you?", the brave Porus shot back, "The way a king treats another king." Alexander was struck by his spirit. He not only returned the conquered kingdom to Porus but added the land lying between the Akesines (Chenab) and the Hydraotis (Ravi), whose ruler had fled. Alexander's army crossed the Hydraotis and marched east to the Hesidros (Beas), but there his troops refused to march further east, and Alexander turned back, following the Jhelum and the Indus to the Arabian Sea, and sailing to Babylon.

In the middle of the 2nd century BC, the Yuezhi tribe of modern China moved westward into Central Asia, which, in turn, caused the Sakas (Scythians) to move west and south. The Northern Sakas, also known as the Indo-Scythians, moved first into Bactria, and later crossed the Hindu Kush into India, successfully wresting power from the Indo-Greeks. They were followed by the Yuezhi, who was known in India as the Kushans or Kushanas. The Kushanas founded a kingdom in the 1st century that lasted for several centuries. Both the Indo-Scythians and the Kushans embraced Buddhism, and absorbed elements of Indo-Greek art and culture into their own. Another Central Asiatic people to make Punjab their home were the Hephthalites (White Huns), who engaged in continuous campaigns from across the Hindu Kush, finally establishing their rule in India in the fifth century.

Muhammed Bin Qasim's invasion of Punjab
The Chach Nama is a romantic work influenced by the 13th-century history, not a historical text of the 8th-century, states Asif, a historian and professor at Columbia University in New York City of Pakistani origin.

Many Jatt/Cheema were oppressed by Hindu king Raja Dahir who ruled over Punjab where the majority of the population followed Buddhism (Ram Swarup Joon: History of the Jats, Rohtak, India (1938, 1967)). The Jat made strong alliances with the Muslim Arabs and hailed the conquest of Muhammad bin Qasim an Arab general. Muhammad bin Qasim defeated the Hindu Raja Dahir in alliance with Jats and other Buddhist Rajas. On his arrival at the town of Brahmanabad, between six and sixteen thousand men died in the ensuing battle. Buddhists and the Jat, Meds and Bhutto tribes hailed him as a rescuer from tyranny at the hands of Chach and his kin (regarded as Cusurpers of the Rai Dynasty).

Historian Baladhuri records the local sentiments upon Qasim's recall,

"people of Hind wept for Qasim and preserved his likeness at Karaj".

While the "Chach-Nama" notes the following as highlights of Qasim's rule:
 He permitted all to practice their religion freely
 Hindus were included in the Ahl al Kitab
 the status of Dhimmis (protected people) was conferred upon Hindus and Buddhists
 Property destroyed during hostilities was compensated for.
 As a sign of respect to his Hindu populace an edict was issued banning cow slaughter in Sindh and Multan.

As the Chach-Nama is a non-reliable and non-contemporary source of history, it has no authenticity and it holds no historical value (According to Pakistani Origin historian Dr. Asif)

Oppression of the Jats
The rulers before Islam were: Siharus, Sahasi II, Chach, Dahir. The first two were Buddhist Jatt, and the last two were Hindu jatt. The new Brahmin rulers were not friendly to the many Buddhists in Sind at that time, and they were cruel to the Jats and Meds, who were most of the peasants. Bad conditions were put on the Jats and they lost many civil rights. "When Chach, the Brahmin chamberlain who usurped the throne of Chach King went to Brahmanabad, he enjoined upon the Jats and Lohanas not to carry swords, avoid velvet or silken cloth, ride horses without saddles and walk about bare-headed and bare-footed". It was because of this background that Muhammad bin Qasim received cooperation from the Buddhists as well as the Jats and Meds during his campaign in Sind (An advanced history of India by Ramesh Chandra Majumdar; Hemchandra Raychaudhuri; Kalikinkar Datta Delhi: Macmillan India, 1973).

In fact, he was hailed as a deliverer by several sections of the local population. The position of the Buddhists in Sind seeking support from outside can be read in the Chach Nama.

Mohammad Bin Qasim came as a deliverer for the ancient tribes of Jats and Meds and he defeated the oppressing King of Sindh. From then the war between Buddhists and Hindus saw another contender whose future followers of the monotheistic Islamic faith would change the history of India forever.

Cheemas Today
The Cheema clan hold the largest number of Political seats in the National Assembly of Pakistan and Senate of Pakistan in Punjab,

This Cheema family has had a large number of Civil servants, Judges, Police officials, Federal Ministers, and Provincial Ministers, and even a President of Pakistan. Many Cheemas have immigrated, establishing successful careers in aid agencies, and armies amongst other professionals. Cheema has a very strong political control in many districts such as Gujranwala. Cheema is the owner of many rice and floor mills such as Ghulam Haider Cheema from Aroop used to have the biggest rice and floor business in Pakistan.

Late Sardar (Captain) Autar Singh Cheema was first Pakistan-born but an Indian national to climb the highest peak of the world Mount Everest on 20th May 1965. He belonged to and after retiring from active service in the Indian army lived in his ancestral village at Chak Sri Ganganagar in Rajasthan India.

Many Cheemas have now settled in England after participating in both WW1 and WW2 Indian army for British forces. Mostly misled for thinking they would get the freedom of India at the end of the war. Approximately 1.3 million Indian soldiers served in World War One - and more than 74,000 of them died.

The Cheema Clan located in Nurmahal (Cheema Kalan and Cheema Kurd) is situated on the lands of former Noor Jahan (The Persian Queen) the twentieth and last wife of the Mughal emperor Jahangir. The Queen's secret underground passageways are located on the Cheema land now. Most of the Cheema lands located in Nurmahal were gifted to the Cheema clan for their bravery, hard work, and centuries of dedication in the Indian Armed forces and Navy.

Cheema Clans are found World Wide now including; America, Canada, England, and Australia

Hindu scriptures

In the Mahabharata
The Udyogaparava of the Mahabharata (5/19/21-23) tells us that the composite army of the Kambojas, Yavanas, and Shakas participated in the Mahabharata war under the command of Sudakshina Kamboja. The epic repeatedly says this composite army was very fierce and wrathful.

Mahabharata, too similarly groups the Shakas with the Kambojas and Yavanas and states that they were original noble Kshatriyas but got degraded to vrishala status on account of their non-observance of the sacred Brahmanical codes.
 See main article: Kshatriya

 In the Manusmiriti
Manusmriti places the Shakas with the Kambojas, Yavanas, Pahlavas, Paradas and labels them all as degraded Kshatriyas (Holy Warriors) defying the Brahmanical codes and rituals.

 In the Puranas
In the "Puranas Darada" the Jatt sub-tribes have been called degrading terms such as Rakshasas (demons) not having darshan of the Brahmin.

 Geography

Cheema is most numerous in the Amritsar district. There are also 42 villages in the Patiala district. According to Cunningham, this area used to be called "Chima des" ("Des" or "Desh," in the Hindustani language and Punjabi language, which means "country"). Many people settled in Montgomery (Sahiwal) and Sandal Bar when the British ruled Punjab because of the construction of a large canal network in these areas. The Cheema also have few villages scattered across Rawalpindi, Bhawalpur, Amritsar, Gurdaspur, Jalandhar, NurMahal or Noor Mahal, Moga, Ludhiana, and Sangrur.

In the western Punjab plains, Cheema communities are not generally found past Chaj Doab. In the eastern Punjab plains, they are not were found past the Sangrur district, until 1947, when many Sikh Cheemas moved from Sialkot and Gujranwala to settle in Village Chak 4e Sri Ganganagar in Rajasthan Patiala, Karnal, and Sirsa after the partition of the Punjab. Some families also moved afterward Udhamsingh nagar(Uttrakhand), Pilibhit, Puranpur, and Rampur (Utter Pradesh). This region is called Mini Punjab and the Terai Region.

In Pakistan, Sialkot and Gujranwal districts both have large Cheema populations with many Cheema villages, such as Chak 4e in Sri Ganganagar (Raj) Begowal, Verowala Cheema Jamke Cheema, Tajokay Cheema, Adamkay Cheema, Bhopalwala, Nishterabad,(Nishterabad village have only one family of Cheema Named Nazar Mohamad Cheema) Sahowala, Kamalpur, Manpur, and Lodikay Cheema, and in Gujranwal, Baddokey Cheema,chak beg, Kot Inayat Khan,Delawar Cheema, Saroki Cheema, Bharoki Cheema,Varoki Cheema,Mansorwali Cheema, Ratti Thatt, Bankay Cheema, Kathor, Kalay Wala, Kheway Wali, Wadala Cheema, Phaloki Cheema, Marday Ki, and Chabba Cheema. In Rawalpindi district, there is a village near Gujar Khan which is named Sui Cheemian and it has a substantial population of Cheema's.

In southern Punjab, Bahawalpur and Yazman have considerable numbers of Cheema families, in great enough numbers that the area elects more than a dozen cabinet members.

In India, the Rupnagar and Mohali districts of the Punjab state have large Cheema populations with many Cheema villages, such as Salora.

 References

Further reading
 The Chach-Nama. English translation by Mirza Kalichbeg Fredunbeg. Delhi Reprint, 1979.
 40 Families of Pakistan 1947
 Sir Denzil Ibbetson, Delhi 2002, p115 (Panjab Castes)
 Ram Swarup Joon - History of the Jatt Arabian historian Ahmad Ibn Yahya al-Baladhuri
 Annals, James Todd; History of Sikhs, Alexander Cunningham; Glossary of Tribes and Castes of the Punjab and NWFP H A Rose - Glossary of the tribes and castes of Punjab and NWFP, ''

Ethnic groups in India
Pakistani tribes
Ethnic groups in Pakistan
Punjabi people

Cheema


Henry (Acosta) Cruz  (born February 27, 1952 in Christiansted, United States Virgin Islands) is a former professional baseball outfielder who currently works as the director of the Los Angeles Dodgers Dominican baseball academy.

Career
Cruz was signed as an undrafted free agent by the Los Angeles Dodgers on January 1, 1971.  He made his major league debut, as a pinch hitter, on April 18, 1975 against the San Francisco Giants. He recorded his first hit on April 20 against the Giants.

Cruz played parts of the 1975 and 1976 seasons with the Dodgers. He was claimed off waivers by the Chicago White Sox near the end of the 1977 season while hitting .353 for the AAA Albuquerque Dukes.

Cruz was signed off waivers by the Chicago White Sox in September 1977. He played 16 games for the Sox in 77 and another 53 games in 1978. He remained in the Sox minor league system through 1980, when he was picked up off waivers by the Detroit Tigers.

Cruz retired after playing for the Evansville Triplets in 1981.  However, he then went on to play in the Mexican League for the following 4 years: 1982 played for Reynosa Broncos; 1983 played for Leon, Guanahuato; and 1984–85 played for the Saltillo Seraperos.  He ended his playing career after the 1985 season.

He was also one of the most consistent hitters for the Arecibo Wolves in the Puerto Rico Winter Baseball League during this period.

Cruz spent 10 seasons as a scout for the Cleveland Indians following his playing days. In 2007, the Dodgers hired him to be the hitting instructor for Class-A Ogden Raptors. He was moved to the Inland Empire 66ers in 2008.

References

External links

1952 births
Living people
Albuquerque Dukes players
Bakersfield Dodgers players
Bravos de León players
Broncos de Reynosa players
Chicago White Sox players
El Paso Dodgers players
Evansville Triplets players
Iowa Oaks players
Los Angeles Dodgers players
Minor league baseball coaches
Major League Baseball outfielders
Major League Baseball players from the United States Virgin Islands
People from Saint Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands
Saraperos de Saltillo players
Waterbury Dodgers players
United States Virgin Islands expatriate baseball players in Mexico

Henry Cruz