|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
WHEN the Limca Book of Records turned 20 last month, the invitations sent out were as refreshingly different as the bounteous collection of unusual records mentioned in the book. It was the longest invitation ever received — just 6.35 cm wide but 700 cm long — and it came neatly rolled in a nifty packing. As the invitation uncoiled like a snake, one could see that it carried some 10,000 records. In fact that is the number of records each Limca Book of Records has been carrying since its inception in 1990. The ‘long’ invite was the contribution of the advertising agency that got its staff to think about a fitting memento for the two decades of celebrating India at her best through the record book. Each year record holders have been scaling new heights, setting new standards of excellence. In fact, what is different about the Limca records is the range of issues in which human endeavour has excelled. It catalogues achievements in adventure, education, communication, radio, television, literature, painting, dance and music, cinema and theatre, government, transport, medical sciences, development, nature and agriculture, animal welfare and sports. It has two wonderful chapters titled "The human story" and "This India". The section called "This India" captures the most unusual events of the country like a son, who has turned a priest in Kerala, solemnising the second marriage of his 64-year-old father, K Anthony, at Sebastian's church in Valappad, near Thissur in 2008. As the wedding vows were being exchanged, Anthony kept addressing his son as "father". In this age of high technology, digitalisation and computer networks, Limca chronicles the story of Mussalman, an Urdu evening newspaper from Chennai, which has been handwritten for the last 81 years without missing a single edition. What is more not a single employee has quit the paper. The chief katib or copywriter, who took charge of writing the front page, had worked as an accountant for 20 years and then learnt calligraphy and took on the responsibility of writing the news. The daily has just four pages and there is a small section reserved for "breaking news". For this section the news has to come in by 3 pm so that it can be handwritten and printed. The paper is sold on the streets for 75 paise a copy. Among the 20 persons honoured this year as the "People of the Year" is Abdul Kareem who has grown a lush green forest of 32 acres with 300 varieties of trees, herbs and medicinal plants. Today Kareem lives in the forest that he has created between Kasaragod and Payyannur in Kerala, along with birds, butterflies, insects and a profusion of wild flowers. Returning from the Gulf to Kerala in 1970, he bought five acres of barren land and later another 27 acres. He started planting seedlings on rocky terrain. After three years of nurturing, the saplings started growing. With the trees, there was regeneration of water. Harvested rainwater began seeping into dry wells. Once water came, the land bloomed. First the birds, butterflies and honeybees came to the forest. Then small animals, too, took shelter in it. Abdul Kareem knows every twig and creeper in the forest and hopes that this track of lush green will strengthen the bond between man and Nature. If growing a forest was Abdul Kareem’s mission in life, for Sant Balbir Singh Seechewal of Kapurthala, Punjab, it is the revival of the 175-km-long Kali Bein rivulet that had dried up and become a garbage dump. In 1988, Seechewal began his community work in Kapurthala by constructing the rural link roads with support from the villagers. From rural roads, the sewadars (volunteers) moved on to cleaning the Kali Bein and now it is perhaps the cleanest of all the rivers of Punjab. The cleanup operation had an ecological and economic spin off that benefited more than 100 villages of the area. Waterlogging stopped and the ground water was recharged. His environment message is drawn from the Guru Granth Sahib "pavan guru, pani pita, mata dhart mahat" (air is guru, water is father and the great earth is mother.) While Kareem and Seechewal are in the record book because their actions are inspiring, Prof Dr S. Ramesh Babu of Bangalore, an engineer by profession, has been in the book of records since 1993 because he loves setting records. He has 43 records to his name and each time it is a different record. Among his many records is kneading dough and rolling out and frying 132 purees in 59 minutes and 50 seconds. Another record is cutting a single cucumber into 1,20,060 pieces in two hours. Honoured with the "People of the Year" award, Ramesh Babu recalls that he was helping his daughter fly a kite when someone showed him the entry of a kite that had made it to the book of records. He was then inspired to set records and he has not stopped since then. He spends a lot of his personal money trying to set these records. Having set enough Indian records, he now wants to take a shot at an international record. At a time when young people are forgetting Mahatma Gandhi, Akshinthala Seshu Babu of New Delhi, dressed as the Father of the Nation and stood motionless at the Andhra Pradesh Bhavan in New Delhi from 2.30 pm on Feb 21, 2003 till 8.40 pm the next day, a total of 30 hours and 10 minutes. He was at the release of the book this year too, standing at the entrance to the auditorium, covered in silver and looking every inch a statue. Michael Raja Thitan of Mumbai is also a Gandhi follower. His way of honouring the Father of the Nation is by collecting Mahatma Gandhi stamps issued by countries across the world. With 425 different stamps of Gandhi issued by 95 countries, Michael is now trying to get into the Guinness Book of Records. He started his collection of Gandhi stamps in 1980. The value of the collection has not been mentioned but it would be significant. Further it shows the global respect for our Gandhi. However, the man who has been in the Limca Book... since its inception is Kishor Gordhandas of Mumbai. He has the largest collection of playing cards — 3,975 assorted packs in alphabetical order from animals, birds, cats to zebra and 1950 countrywise packs. He has more than 150 sets of Ganjifa cards and the oldest is a Ganjifa set from Kurnool (C. 1840). He also has over 500 tarot and fortune-telling cards from more than 70 countries and hand-painted playing cards from the same artist who makes Ganjifa. His Indian Ganjifa card collection is the largest and the finest in the world. Vijaya Ghose, who has been the editor of the Limca Book of Records since its inception, says it was Ramesh Chavan of Parle Drinks who conceptualised a book of Indian records. He felt Indians suffered from an inferiority complex and needed a platform to showcase their talent. He had an enormous data bank of individual achievements and records that needed to be brought out as a collection. The first volume was a slim one with just 240 pages. Ever since, Limca Book`85 has been growing steadily. More and more people are clamouring to get their achievements listed and recorded. The latest volume is 480 pages. Limca`85 now comes out in three languages — English, Hindi and Malyalam. Each Book has 10,000 records of which 60 per cent are new and 40 per cent are old — people like Kishor Gordhandas and Ramesh Babu. The youngest to memorise the Bhagvadagita, Shraddha Vajpayee (born December, 1999) of Lucknow, was also in the book when at a little under the three years she could recite Panini's Ashtadhyayi fluently. Her current entry is for memorising the 700 shlokas of the 18 chapters of the Bhagvadagita in 33 days (from May 18 to June 20, 2008) and reciting it without a break on August 8, 2008. The section on animal welfare brings out the compassionate side of Indians. While Bharati Sharma of Delhi has enabled her 14-year-old pet dog, with paralysed hind legs and dislocated hips, to enjoy his morning walk with the help of a specially designed contraption that is a mix of a walker used by the disabled and a chariot, Shirin and Junaid Merchants who started the Canines Can Care (CCC) in 1995, train dogs to help the physically challenged. These dogs can retrieve objects, open heavy doors, switch lights on and off and pull wheelchairs. CCC has trained and provided therapy dogs to a couple of schools for the hearing impaired and spastic children in Mumbai. A trained black Labrador, Magic, assists her owner who is paralysed waist downwards. A truly inspiring book of records that is spurring young and old to rise to new heights of caring, giving and achieving.
|
||
|
|
||
