Ebrahim Alkazi

Ebrahim Alkazi is a famous Indian theatre director, who was the founding head of the India's premier theatre training institute, National School of Drama, New Delhi. He was associated with training many well-known film and theatre actors including Om Shivpuri, Om Puri, Naseeruddin Shah, Manohar Singh, Uttara Baokar, Jyoti Subhash, Suhas Joshi, B. Jayashree, Jayadev and Rohini Hattangadi.
He has directed over 50 plays, including famous productions of: Girish Karnad's "Thuglaq", Mohan Rakesh's "Ashadh Ka Ek Din" and Dharmvir Bharati's "Andha Yug".
As the director of the National School of Drama (NSD), Alkazi revolutionised Hindi theatre by the magnificence of his vision, and the meticulousness of his technical discipline.
He was the first recipient of Roopwedh Pratishtan's the Tanvir Award (2004) for lifetime contribution to the theatre. He has received awards including the Padma Shree, Padma Bhushan, Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship for his contribution to theatre.

Salim Ali

Sálim Ali, born Salim Moizuddin Abdul Ali, (November 12, 1896 - July 27, 1987), was an Indian ornithologist and naturalist. Known as the "Birdman of India", Salim Ali was among the first Indians to conduct systematic bird surveys in India and his books have contributed enormously to the development of professional and amateur ornithology in India.
Salim Ali was born into a Sulaimani Mustali Ismaili (Sulaimani Bohra) Muslim family of Bombay, the tenth and youngest child. He was orphaned at the age of ten, and brought up by his maternal uncle, Amiruddin Tyabji, and childless aunt, Hamida Begum, in a middle-class household in Khetwadi, Mumbai. Another uncle was Abbas Tyabji, well known Indian freedom fighter. Salim Ali was introduced to the serious study of birds by W. S. Millard, secretary of the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) who helped him identify an unusually coloured sparrow that he had shot for sport. Millard identified it as a Yellow-throated Sparrow, and showed him around the Society's collection of stuffed birds. This was a key event in his life and led to Salim's pursuit of a career in ornithology, an unusual career choice in those days. Salim Ali's cousin Humayun Abdulali also became an ornithologist.
Salim Ali's early education was at St. Xavier's College, Mumbai. Following a difficult first year in college, he dropped out and went to Tavoy, Burma to look after the family Wolfram (Tungsten) mining and timber interests there. The forests surrounding this area provided an opportunity for Ali to hone his naturalist (and hunting) skills. On his return to India in 1917, he resumed his education, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (Honors) degree in Zoology. He married a distant relation, Tehmina in 1918.Ali failed to get an ornithologist's position at the Zoological Survey of India due to lack of sufficient academic qualifications. He however decided to study further after he was hired as guide lecturer in 1926 at the newly opened natural history section in the Prince of Wales Museum in Mumbai. He went on study leave in 1928 to Germany, where he trained under Professor Erwin Stresemann at the Zoological Museum of Berlin University.
On his return to India in 1930, he discovered that the guide lecturer position had been eliminated due to lack of funds. Unable to find a suitable job, Salim Ali and Tehmina moved to Kihim, a coastal village near Mumbai, where he began making his first observations of the Baya Weaver. The publication of his findings on the bird in 1930 brought him recognition in the field of ornithology.Ali undertook systematic bird surveys of the princely states, Hyderabad, Cochin, Travancore, Gwalior, Indore and Bhopal, under the sponsorship of the rulers of those states. He was aided in his surveys by advice from Hugh Whistler. Salim wrote "My chief interest in bird study has always been its ecology, its life history under natural conditions and not in a laboratory under a microscope. By travelling to these remote, uninhabited places, I could study the birds as they lived and behaved in their habitats."Hugh Whistler also introduced Salim to Richard Meinertzhagen and the two made an expedition into Afghanistan. Although Meinertzhagen had very critical views of him, they continued to remain good friends. Salim Ali found nothing amiss in Meinertzhagen's bird works but later studies have shown many of his studies to be fraudulent. Meinertzhagen later made his diary entries available to Salim and reproduced in his autobiographical Fall of a Sparrow.
Although recognition came late, he received numerous awards, some of which are
Awards

Padma Bhushan (1958)

Union Medal of the British Ornithologists' Union, a rarity for non-British citizens (1967)

The John C. Phillips Medal for Distinguished Service in International Conservation, from the World Conservation Union (1969)

Padma Vibhushan (1976)

J. Paul Getty Wildlife Conservation Prize of the World Wildlife Fund (1976)

Commander of the Netherlands Order of the Golden Ark (1986)

He was elected Fellow of the Indian National Science Academy in 1958. He also received three honorary doctorates and was nominated to the Rajya Sabha in 1985.
Dr. Salim Ali died in 1987 at the age of 91 after a prolonged battle with prostate cancer.

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Aruna Asaf Ali

Aruna Asaf Ali, who has died aged 86, was a legendary heroine of India's freedom struggle. She was first a member of the Socialist Party and then of the Communist Party of India, with a seat on its central committee. Although she drifted apart from the Communists, she remained a committed leftist. Even in later years of declining health, she remained a respected figure on the Indian political firmament, which explains the outpouring of grief over her death.
Remarkably, until the 1942 Quit India Movement launched by Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of the Indian nation, Aruna Asaf Ali was entirely apolitical, though she was married to a prominent Congress leader of undivided India, who subsequently served as Nehru's ambassador to the United States and as governor of Orissa state. The summer of 1942 changed all that.

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Horace Gundry Alexander

Born :July 30, 1889(1889-07-30)Croydon, England
Died: September 30, 1989 (aged 100)Pennsylvania, USA
Occupation: Pacifist, ornithologist
Nationality: British
Genres : Non-fiction
Subjects Ornithology, Quakerism, Gandhi, India

He was born in Croydon, England and studied at King's College, Cambridge University, and taught at Woodbrooke, a Quaker college in Birmingham from 1919 to 1944. His first wife, Olive Graham, died in 1942, and in 1958 he married Rebecca Bradbeer, an American Quaker. After ten years they moved to Pennsylvania, United States where he spent the remaining twenty years of his life. He was also, for the first ten years, a Governor of Leighton Park School, a leading Quaker school in England. He died of a gastrointestinal illness at Crosslands, a Quaker retirement community in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania.
Alexander was a life-long dedicated and gifted birdwatcher, keenly involved in the twentieth century movements for the protection and observation of birds. Along with his two younger brothers, Wilfred and Christopher, he took a keen interest in nature. Growing up in a Quaker home devoid of any other forms of entertainment, he found an interest in birds starting at the age of eight when his older brother Gilbert presented him a book on natural history. It was not until he was 20 that he obtained his first pair of binoculars. He was one of a small group of amateur birdwatchers who developed the skills and set new standards for combining the pleasures of birdwatching with the satisfaction of contributing to ornithological science. He made many significant observations, mainly in Britain but also in India and the United States, and was well respected for his work.
Horace spent most of his time in India and became interested in its birds in 1927. Ornithology at that time was not popular among Indians in India and when Horace informed Gandhi of an expedition, Gandhi commented, "That is a good hobby, provided you don't shoot them." Horace demonstrated the use of binoculars as an acceptable alternative to the gun and carried them at most times. Horace Alexander joined Sidney Dillon Ripley on an expedition to the Naga hills in 1950. He also associated himself with a group of birdwatchers in New Delhi and encouraged Indian ornithologists such as Usha Ganguli. Many of his notes were lost when one of his suitcases was lost in India in 1946.
He was also a founder member of the West Midland Bird Club, and its president, during his long residence in Birmingham, England.
Bird related notes
(1974): What leads to increases in the range of certain birds? JBNHS. 71(3), 571-576.
(1952): Birds attacking their reflections. JBNHS. 50(3), 674-675.
(1948): The status of the Dusky Willow-Warbler Phylloscopus fuscatus (Blyth)] in India. JBNHS. 47(4), 736-739.
(1948): White-winged Wood-Duck Asarcornis scutulatus (Mueller) on the Padma River, East Bengal. JBNHS. 47(4), 749.
(1949): The Great Crested Grebe Podiceps cristatus (Linn.) in Orissa. JBNHS. 48(2), 367-368. (1949): Whitecapped Redstart Chaimarrhornis leucocephalus (Vigors) feeding on berries. JBNHS. 48(4), 806.
(1950): Some notes on the genus Phylloscopus in Kashmir. JBNHS. 49(1), 9-13.
(1950): Possible occurrence of the Black Tern Chlidonias niger (L.) near Delhi. JBNHS. 49(1), 120-121.
(1950): Field identification of birds. JBNHS. 49(1), 123-124.
(1950): Kentish Plovers Leucopolius alexandrinus (Linn.) at Bombay. JBNHS. 49(2), 311. (1950): Large Grey Babbler attacking metal hub-cap of wheel of car. JBNHS. 49(3), 550. (1953): Rednecked Phalarope near Delhi. JBNHS. 51(2), 507-508.
(1957): Bird life of Madhya Pradesh. JBNHS. 54(3), 768-769.
(1949): The birds of Delhi and District. JBNHS. 48(2), 370-372.
(1951): Some notes on birds in Lahul. JBNHS. 49(4), 608-613.
(1972): On revisiting Delhi. NLBW. 12(9), 1-3.
(1972): Nest building of the Baya Weaver Bird. NLBW. 12(9), 12.
(1964): Return to Delhi. NLBW. 4(1), 1-3.
(1929): Some birds seen in the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean. Ibis, 12 5(1), 41-53. (1952): Identifying birds of prey in the field. BBOC 72, 55-61.
(1931): Shearwaters in the Arabian Sea. Ibis, 13 1(3), 579-581.
(1955): Field notes on some Asian leaf warblers. British Birds. 48, 293-299,349-356.
(1952): Letter to the Editor. Ibis 94(2), 369-370.
(1969): Some Notes on Asian Leaf-Warblers (Genus Phylloscopus). Private/TRUEXpress, Oxford. 31 pages.
(1952): with Abdulali,H Ardeidae with red legs. Ibis 94, 363.

Alexander's father-in-law John William Graham believed that Gandhi was a subversive and that the Indians were unprepared for self-government. However at an annual Quaker meeting in 1930, the Nobel prize winning poet Rabindranath Tagore attacked the British rule in India. The Quakers were disturbed by the address and John Graham was particularly outraged. After the meeting, it was agreed that a representative would be sent to India to attempt a reconciliation of the Viceroy, Lord Irwin and Gandhi. This task was assigned to Horace Alexander. He later became a close friend of Gandhi (who, in 1942, described Alexander as "one of the best English friends India has") and wrote extensively about his philosophy.
He was consulted by Richard Attenborough in the making of the film Gandhi, but felt that the scripts did not do justice to the people around Gandhi.
In 1984 he was awarded the Padma Bhushan medal, the highest honour given to a non-Indian civilian.