The official Twitter handle of the Andhra Pradesh police shared a video of traffic cops from Vizianagaram, serving food and water to an orphaned elderly man and shifting him to hospital. On 18 January, 2022, two traffic constables, Suresh Kumar and Satyanarayana, found an elderly man lying near the Clock Tower Junction while on duty and served him ORS (Oral Rehydration Solutions) water. The traffic constables were also congratulated by DGP Gowtham Sawang through his official Twitter handle.
Mountaineer Suresh Babu from Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, created a new record by becoming the fastest solo-trekker to reach Mount Everest base camp in four days. Suresh Babu started his solo marathon trek from Lukla in Nepal on 20 December, 2021 and concluded it at the Everest base camp on 24 December, 2021. He also became the first Indian to achieve this feat in such a short duration, touching 5,364 meters above sea level.
Environmentalist and Padma Shri awardee Daripalli Ramaiah and his wife Janamma have been growing 50 sandalwood trees on their seven-acre land in Khammam district, Telangana, for the last 20 years. Though the Telangana government allowed them to sell the red sandalwood, they decided to donate 20 tonnes of the precious wood for the State’s Haritha Nidhi program.
Two minor boys from Alavandhipuram village in Thanjavur District, Tamil Nadu, were saved from drowning by a 60-year-old couple, on January 13, 2022. The three minor boys, Mohanraj, Ashwath, and Rahul, entered the river despite the heavy flow and got caught in a quicksand. The couple, Saroja and her husband Santhanan, heard their cries and rescued Mohanraj and Ashwath. Unfortunately, Rahul had already drowned before their arrival.
Errando, a hyperlocal delivery startup in Kerala, recently launched the world’s first WhatsApp API-powered delivery service. Customers can now use their WhatsApp to order food, grocery, medicine and also avail pick and drop services. According to Shameer Pathayakandi, the co-founder of Errando, customers can make payments and receive updates of their orders using the auto-generated links. The delivery startup, which started in 2016, is now expanding its business to six more cities in South India.
The newly set up hotel, Sign with Hands, in Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh, is quite different from other eateries in the city, as it is run by four hearing and speech impaired people. The owners started this place with an aim to achieve self-reliance and financial independence. In this unique place, various signs are displayed in the menu cards for customers to order food items and the food is served after taking orders through those signs.
On January 16, 2022, Para-athlete Kamalakanta Nayak, from Puri District, Odisha, entered the Guinness Book of World Records, by covering 213 km in 24 hours, on his manual wheelchair. Earlier, a similar feat was performed by Mario Trindade of Portugal, who covered 182.4 km in 24 hours by wheelchair, at the Vila Real Stadium in Vila Real, Portugal, on 3-4 December 2007.
83-year-old legendary Kathak dancer and Padma Vibhushan awardee Birju Maharaj, passed away in the early hours of January 17, 2022. Born as Brij Mohan Nath Mishra, on 4 February, 1937, he was known for his perfect rhythm, expressive abhinaya and for developing a unique dancing style. Birju Maharaj was the recipient of numerous awards in his lifetime, including the Padma Vibhushan in 1986.
In 1985, the Government of India marked January 12, the birth anniversary of Swami Vivekananda, as National Youth Day. The day is celebrated in India, to honour the great philosopher, who strongly believed that youth who were dedicated and hard working could transform the fate of India. Born as Narendranath Datta, in 1863 in Kolkata, Swami Vivekananda was known for his famous 1893 speech in Chicago, where he introduced the Indian philosophy of Vedanta to the western world.
In India, Rajmata Jijau Jayanti is celebrated every year on January 12. The day is marked to honour the birth anniversary of Jijabai Bhosale, the mother of Chhatrapati Shivaji. Born in 1598, Jijabai was the queen regent in her son’s kingdom and also a skilled administrator who would not bow down to the might of the Mughal Empire. She died in 1674 in the Pachad village near Rajgad Fort, twelve days after the coronation of Shivaji.
