india is birth place of rockets by president of india?

Question

Kalam wants to know how Tipu built rockets 200 years ago

Bangalore, July 21: A letter from a Mysore-based journalist was enough for President A P J Abdul Kalam to send a top defence scientist to Srirangapatna to study Tipu Sultan's efforts to use rockets against the British more than 200 years ago.

At the end of a visit to various sites associated with Tipu's rocket and missile launching activities at Srirangapatna, a sleepy town some 100 km from here and a short distance from Mysore, scientist A Sivathanu Pillai declared: "There is no doubt that this is the birthplace of rocketry."

Pillai, Chief Controller of Research and Development in the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), said his visit yesterday was at the instance of Kalam, who told him to "look at it".

"Now I will report to the president what I have seen here (Srirangapatna)," he said. "He (Kalam) is a rocket scientist. Naturally, he is interested to know.

"I don't say only Tipu (pioneered the rocket technology). There were some people with him at that time who were innovative in warfare technology. That's my impression," said Pillai, who was a core team member of slv-3, India's first satellite launch rocket, under Kalam's leadership.

"This is the birth place of rocketry. We want to tell the whole world that we are the father of rocket technology. This is the place from where rocketry has come".

It is not as if Tipu Sultan's exploits with rockets, which enabled him to defeat the British in the 1792 war, were not known before.

"It's just that not many in India know about that. Even Vikram Sarabhai, the father of Indian space programme, didn't know much about Tipu's exploits," said Pillai.

Now, he said, efforts would be made to build consensus in the community of rocket scientists that Srirangapatna was the birthplace of rocketry by holding seminars and other initiatives, perhaps jointly with the Astronomical Society of India, Aeronautical Society of India and Indian Space Research Organisation.

Recalling his visit to the royal artillery museum in London, Pillai said documents there showed Tipu's men defeating the British in 1792 with rockets.

"Tipu could simultaneously launch three rockets. He had a rocket force of 6,000 rocketeers. He used many of the rockets against the British, who could not withstand them and they were defeated. They lost the war, and while they were running away, they took away rocket pieces," he said.

Tipu's war weapons were innovative for the time and there was a need for more research to understand them, he said.

Bureau Report

Answer 1

every indian knows this information...WE ARE PROUD OF INDIA

Answer 2

Defeated the British in 1792? I think you need to study your history a little more closely. India was ruled by the British Empire for some 300 years which I believe ended after WW2 I am not sure of the exact date sometime in the 1940's if I am correct. Now on to your claim that India pioneered rocket technology. I recently spent six months in your country and must say that is indeed a very beautiful place when one overlooks the trash and general squalor of the cities. While there I heard a number of claims about the achievements of the great Indian people. I do not remember what all of them were so I can not possibly address them all here but I will offer you a little information that you really do need.
I think I saw another of your questions asking something about India being the "greatest democracy in the world", that is merely a matter of opinion and not necessarily true. India is the largest democracy in the world that is true, as to whether or not it is the greatest, that is not a statement that neither you or I could either prove or disprove as it is a subjective statement not based on fact.
The bas-relief sculpture depicting Aruna's penance and the Descent of the Ganges in Mahabalipuram is not the largest in the world. While it is a very fine example of the ancient artisans of your country the largest bas-relief sculpture in the world is actually Stone Mountain in the state of Georgia, here in the United States, the dimensions are 90 feet x 190 feet whereas Arunas penance is only 33 feet x 88 feet.
While there I was told that IIT (India Institute of Technology) was one of the finest universities in the world, on par with MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) here in the United States which has long been accepted as one of, if not the finest engineering college in the world. I work in a engineering field and was there to train some people to work on American projects. Let me say now that on a personal level I truly enjoyed being there and working with some of the kind and caring people that are a part of your culture.
Every single person I was working with there is a graduate of the the Indian educational system and an engineer. They all have degrees whereas I do not. Yet not a one of those engineers could even tell me how to vector the forces of a load in a design. This is a basic trigonometric function yet not even 1 out of 10 "engineers" could do it. I do have some college education but did not complete my degree and I do have years of experience in the field and the wisdom to realize I do not know everything and that I sometimes need to ask for help from someone with more knowledge than I. This is something that your entire country needs to learn. What is worse than not knowing how to do something properly is pretending you do and refusing to take instruction from someone that does.
I have only a little understanding of how your educational system there works and that is only from conjecture of what I saw while I was there. You are not taught critical thinking in your "universities", you are taught to memorize certain facts and methods to do things. When the problem they were given could not be solved in that manner they were lost and did not know how to devise a new solution.
So quit telling me how great your country is and all of the wonderfull contributions the Indian people have made to modern civilization. There is crime in your country. There were a number of murders, rapes and robberies reported in the news while I was there. There was even a report of a 14 year old girl living in a convent that had gotten pregnant. There are homosexuals and drug addicts as well. Any civilization is going to have its share of deviants. Do not preach to me about how good your country is and how terrible mine is. Especially when you along with nearly every other Indian is trying desperately to get a Visa and come here to the states. Stay there we don't want nor do we need you here.

Answer 3

The Chinese invented gunpowder during the Tang Dynasty, about 900 AD. And it was used for fireworks and military weapons.


Doug

Answer 4

thank you for the information and points