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Hugh & Colleen Ganzter watched entranced as the raths of Lord Jagannath, Subhadra and Balabhadra began their annual journey in Puri. On a humid monsoon day, you can experience Puri's epiphany. So did a million other people.

They streamed down side streets and lanes and little winding alleys, poured into the broad Grand Road till it became a flowing river of humanity. And still more surged in, packed tighter and tighter till all we could see from our grandstand in the terrace of the palace was a sea of heads streaked with snaking currents of saffron, red and white as sects and cults merged with flood of devotees.

In the morning the frisson of festivity had been electric. The huge raths may have been shifted to the far end of Grand Road where zestful crowds clanged cymbals, thudded drums, danced and sang. A street-side langar got ready to serve steaming poori-bhaji to eager pilgrims. After breakfast, the police cleared a path for hurrying heralds lofting standards and banners, stopped at the gate of the palace.

The Gajapati Maharaja, dressed in white robes with a plumed and jewelled turban, and the sash and cummerbund of office, emerged accompanied by the head priest. He stepped into a silver palanquin as his Ganga dynasty ancestors had done ever since they had built the great temple by the shore of the Bay of Bengal a thousand years ago.

The flags and standards tracked his passage through the jubilant crowd. Then, using a golden broom, he carefully and ceremonially swept the forecourt of the huge raths, signalling the start of the divine trio's annual yatra from their temple on the second day of the shukla pakshya (waxing moon) in the month of Ashadh, to the Gundicha temple, at the end of the Grand Road.

A red fire tanker may spray a plume of water over the crowd as pilgrims danced in ecstatic devotion. Slowly, ponderously, the black and red chariot of Subhadra rolled into view. It was crammed with saffron-clad servitors clanging gongs, waving cheerily. The chariot moved on, the crowd flowed in behind it. Cameras clicked and flared around.

Two young pandas sat astride the white, wooden, horses. Worshippers on our terrace joined their hands and bowed deeply in obeisance till this, the last and most powerful ratha, had passed. The three chariots began to shrink with distance as they drew closer to Gundicha temple where the deities would rest for eight days before making the return journey to the main temple.

The great cacophony of celebration began to subside as the crowds dispersed in the soft light of sunset, laughing and clapping, charged by their twelve-hour close encounter with their gods. Even we felt unusually vitalized by it all.

Source: The Indian Times

Jalal-ud-Din Muhammad Akbar , also known as Shahanshah Akbar-e-Azam or Akbar the Great (15 October 1542  – 27 October 1605), was the third Mughal Emperor.

He was of Timurid descent; the son of Emperor Humayun, and the grandson of the Mughal Emperor Zaheeruddin Muhammad Babur, the ruler who founded the Mughal dynasty in India. At the end of his reign in 1605 the Mughal empire covered most of northern and central India.

He is most appreciated for having a liberal outlook on all faiths and beliefs and during his era, culture and art reached a zenith as compared to his predecessors.

Akbar was 13 years old when he ascended the Mughal throne in Delhi (February 1556), following the death of his father Humayun. During his reign, he eliminated military threats from the powerful Pashtun descendants of Sher Shah Suri, and at the Second Battle of Panipat he decisively defeated the newly self-declared Hindu king Hemu.

It took him nearly two more decades to consolidate his power and bring all the parts of northern and central India into his direct realm. He influenced the whole of the Indian Subcontinent as he ruled a greater part of it as an emperor. As an emperor, Akbar solidified his rule by pursuing diplomacy with the powerful Hindu Rajput caste, and by marrying a Rajput princess.

Akbar's reign significantly influenced art and culture in the country. He was a great patron of art and architecture He took a great interest in painting, and had the walls of his palaces adorned with murals.

Besides encouraging the development of the Mughal school, he also patronised the European style of painting. He was fond of literature, and had several Sanskrit works translated into Persian and Persian scriptures translated in Sanskrit apart from getting many Persian works illustrated by painters from his court.

During the early years of his reign, he showed intolerant attitude towards Hindus and other religions, but later exercised tolerance towards non-Islamic faiths by rolling back some of the strict sharia laws.His administration included numerous Hindu landlords, courtiers and military generals.

He began a series of religious debates where Muslim scholars would debate religious matters with Hindus, Jains, Zoroastrians and Portuguese Roman Catholic Jesuits. He treated these religious leaders with great consideration, irrespective of their faith, and revered them.

He not only granted lands and money for the mosques but the list of the recipients included a huge number Hindu temples in north and central India, Christian churches in Goa.

Source: Wikipedia

The attack on Pearl Harbor (called Hawaii Operation or Operation AI by the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters (Operation Z in planning) and the Battle of Pearl Harbor) was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941 (December 8 in Japan).

The attack was intended as a preventive action in order to keep the U.S. Pacific Fleet from interfering with military actions the Empire of Japan was planning in Southeast Asia against overseas territories of the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and the United States.

The base was attacked by 353 Japanese fighters, bombers and torpedo planes in two waves, launched from six aircraft carriers.All eight U.S. Navy battleships were damaged, with four being sunk. Of these eight damaged, two were raised, and with four repaired, six battleships returned to service later in the war.

The Japanese also sank or damaged three cruisers, three destroyers, an anti-aircraft training ship,and one minelayer. 188 U.S. aircraft were destroyed; 2,402 Americans were killed and 1,282 wounded.

Important base installations such as the power station, shipyard, maintenance, and fuel and torpedo storage facilities, as well as the submarine piers and headquarters building (also home of the intelligence section) were not attacked. Japanese losses were light: 29 aircraft and five midget submarines lost, and 65 servicemen killed or wounded. One Japanese sailor was captured.

The attack came as a profound shock to the American people and led directly to the American entry into World War II in both the Pacific and European theaters.

The following day (December 8), the United States declared war on Japan. Domestic support for non-interventionism, which had been strong,disappeared. Clandestine support of Britain (for example the Neutrality Patrol) was replaced by active alliance. Subsequent operations by the U.S. prompted Germany and Italy to declare war on the U.S. on December 11, which was reciprocated by the U.S. the same day.

There were numerous historical precedents for unannounced military action by Japan. However, the lack of any formal warning, particularly while negotiations were still apparently ongoing, led President Franklin D. Roosevelt to proclaim December 7, 1941, "a date which will live in infamy".

Source: Wikipedia