ON THE BRINK

It was to be retribution for the demolition of the Babri Masjid just months ago, and Dawood Ibrahim insisted on a sense of poetic justice. So on March 12, they had their bloody revenge as 12 bomb blasts, timed over a span of two hours, left over 300 dead and 1,500 injured in Bombay. The city, barely calm after the carnage of the post-Babri riots, would have been expected to explode into flames. But Bombay, a metaphor of modern India in its better days, was now in its fortitude, an example, if not a metaphor, for the country.

ONE TOUGH GUY
K.P. S. Gill

For K.P.S. Gill, director-general of Punjab Police, an iron fist worked best in dealing with terrorism. And while his human rights record may not have been immaculate, his results were beyond reproach—from 3,000-plus deaths a year in 1991, he was counting in double digits. In Punjab, Gill broke the norm when he replaced the Army with the police on the frontline, turning the local-outsider fight in to one between Jat Sikh vs Jat Sikh, and winning the support of the people in the process.

FIRST CUT

India’s first private air carrier, Jet Airways, began operations on May 5, with a fleet of four Boeing 737-300 aircraft. The first flights were from Bombay to Delhi and Madras and ten other destinations. Naresh Goyal’s maiden venture, though, had its share of adventure, when one of his planes landed at the Air Force base at Coimbatore, instead of the civilian airport.

DID YOU KNOW

Following his smashing debut with the soundtrack for Mani Ratnam’s superhit, Roja, which sold over 25 lakh copies, composer A.R. Rahman’s soundtrack for Bombay was already sold for Rs 80 lakh.

Arms and the Shrine

In April, the army cordoned off a mosque in the Hazratbal area of Srinagar, where 40-50 militants were holed up. But the month-long seige began only on October 15. The government remained indecisive, but in the end, the militants left the shrine “unconditionally”.

“NOTHING CAN HAPPEN TO SANJAY NOW.”
SUNIL DUTT after Khalnayak’s release

To have a film release with one is playing a terrorist at a time when one is in jail accused of the same is an ironic twist of fate. But for that reason, Khalnayak, was remembered more for Ballu Balram, played by Sanjay Dutt than it was for Jackie Shroff or Madhuri Dixit. Subhash Ghai rode the post-Roja fascination for terrorism themes to box-office success. And Choli ke Peeche helped.

JOLT FROM THE BLUE

The earthquake, which struck Latur and Osmanabad districts of Maharashtra on September 30, measured 6.5 on the Richter Scale. But it made seismic history for other reasons. Its epicentre lay in an area considered the least vulnerable, where one could take comfort in the impossibilities of probability. Yet, when the earth quaked for those three minutes, it left over 15,000 dead and many more homeless. Property worth crores was destroyed.

ELSEWHERE...

The Great Blizzard of 1993 struck eastern United States, bringing record snowfall all the way from Cuba to Québec, killing 184.

A Tamil Tigers suicide bomber assassinated Sri Lankan President Ranasinghe Premadasa.

In New York City, a van bomb parked below the North Tower of the World Trade Center (above) went off, killing six and leaving over 1,000 injured.

The Maastricht Treaty came into effect, formally establishing the European Union, after protracted talks, and later the euro.

50 was India’s defence expenditure as a percentage of GDP, compared to China’s. India’s expenditure is also one-third of Pakistan’s in the same measure.

1994: INDIA AT 60

CLEAN SLATE

REWIND

The ancient scourge of bubonic plague laid its deathly grip on Surat in Gujarat and Beed in Maharashtra in September and October. The panic was widespread—within four days of the outbreak, over four lakh people, or 12 per cent of the city’s population, fled the city carrying with them the disease. A case of the plague was reported from Bangalore within a day of the outbreak in Surat. Modern medicine kept the death toll to 54, but only just, considering 1,500 people were infected within the first week itself.

CELEBRATED ABROAD

Kiran Bedi, India’s first woman IPS officer and a former all-Asian tennis champion, won the Magsaysay Award for her efforts in rehabilitating criminals in Tihar Jail. But that didn’t prevent her being shunted from one insignificant posting to another.

FIRST CUT

On October 15, the PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) made a successful launch. It became a workhorse launch vehicle for ISRO, and since then has put eight Indian remote sensing satellies and six satellites for foreign customers in orbit.

“What is the Essence of Being a Woman?”

That was the final question. Sushmita Sens’s answer, “A gift of God we must all appreciate”, clinched the Miss Universe crown for her on May 21, while Aishwarya Rai followed it by winning the Miss World pageant later in the year.

20,000 Kashmiri militants were said to have been trained in 105 terrorist camps, both private and isi-sponsored, between 1991 and 1994.

“THIS IS MY FINEST HOUR.”
Kapil Dev

That’s what Kapil Dev said in 2002 when he was crowned Wisden’s Indian Cricketer of the Century. Its roots lay in 1994. More than a decade after that unforgettable World Cup day on the Lords’ balcony, Kapil basked in that king-of-the-world feeling again when he took his 432nd Test wicket, against Sri Lanka in Ahmedabad on February 8 to become Test cricket’s most prolific wicket-taker. Then in March, he became the first to take 250 wickets in one-day internationals. Kapil retired that year, playing his last Test in Hamilton, New Zealand, in March and his last one-day against the West Indies in Faridabad later that year.

ELSEWHERE...

Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundi President Cyprien Ntaryamira died when a missile shot down their jet near Kigali, Rwanda.

Formula 1 driver Ayrton Senna (right) died in an accident during San Marino Grand Prix. Another racer, Roland Ratzenberger, was killed on the previous day at the same track during qualifying.

Nelson Mandela became South Africa’s first Black president. The anti-apartheid activist had spent 27 years in prison.

DID YOU KNOW

On December 30, India ratified the pact that brought the World Trade Organisation into existence, ushering in an era of reforms in tarrifs, subsidies and intellectual property rights.

1995: INDIA AT 60

HAIR-TRIGGER

REWIND

When the flames died down, reducing the Sufi shrine of Charar-e-Sharif and some 200 buildings near it to a smouldering heap, it was 3 a.m. on May 11. Soon, under the cover of darkness, the 40 militants holed up in the shrine, including Pakistani commander ‘Major’ Mast Gul, escaped into town. In the close-quarter fighting that followed, 27 militants were killed with no civilian dead, but the incident set back the leadership by many steps on the hard road to normalcy.

RAIL OF BLOOD

On August 20, the superfast Purushottam Express, travelling at over 100 kmph, collided with the stationary Kalindi Express near Ferozabad, killing 348 people, in the second worst rail disaster in the country’s history. The accident once again put the spotlight on the Railways’ shocking disregard for basic safety norms.

FIRST CUT

Mayawati, then a member of the Rajya Sabha, became Uttar Pradesh’s first Dalit chief minister on June 3. But she rode roughshod over the bureaucracy and the BJP, transferring officials placing Dalits in key posts, and accumulating corruption charges, until BJP withdrew support to bring her tumultuous 136-day rule to an end.

FUTURE CALLS

The mobile phone revolution came to India on September 27 as Hutchison Max Telecom became the first service provider to begin operations in the country.

DID YOU KNOW

On December 23, over 400—mostly children—died in a fire incident in the midst of a school function in Dabwali, Haryana. The shocking incident raised questions about fire safety conditions in India.

“YES, I AM THE REMOTE CONTROL. WE NEED IT.”
Bal Thackeray

Hindutva rode to power in Maharashtra as Shiv Sena and the BJP formed a coalition government. The man behind it all was Balasaheb Thackeray, forever enshrined in Salman Rushdie’s words as Raman Fielding aka Mainduck, who wanted a golden age when “good Hindu men and women could roam free”. He ran the government by remote control and things began to change soon enough, with Bombay becoming Mumbai and the media subjected to cultural censorship.

COLOURFUL MOVES

For Urmila Matondkar, Rangeela was a case of real becoming reel and vice versa. A.R. Rahman’s slick soundtrack, Manish Malhotra’s new fashion sense, and Matondkar’s moves enthrallled audiences as she announced herself to the world. She had found her makeover mantra and as a spate of copycats, flouncing peroxide curls and lycra twirls prowled the screens, Bollywood found a new definition of cool.

SHAH RUKH KHAN about competition in the Mumbai film industry
“In my opinion… I am the best.”

And the World Went Dark

A complete solar eclipse was seen over India on October 24 and was visible from Rajasthan to West Bengal. Some hailed the spectacle of astronomy, others hid away in superstition. The last total eclipse was in 1980.

ELSEWHERE...

168 people, including eight federal marshals and 19 children, were killed at the Murrah Federal Building in the Oklahoma City bombing. Timothy McVeigh and one of his accomplices, Terry Nichols, set off the bomb.

Members of the Aum Shinrikyo religious cult released sarin nerve gas on five separate railway trains in Tokyo, killing 12 and injuring hundreds. Cult leader Shoko Asahara was arrested May 16.

For the first time in 26 years, British soldiers stayed off the streets of Belfast, Northern Ireland.

Rs 1,500 crore was the estimated market worth of the exquisite jewels of the seventh Nizam of Hyderabad. After a protracted battle, the Indian Government finally acquired them for a paltry sum of Rs 218 crore.

Index