List of firsts in India.html

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This is a list of firsts in India.

1 Awards and Titles
- 1.1 Nobel Prize
2 Defence
3 Exploration
4 Film and TV
5 Governance
6 Science
7 Sport
8 Minorities
9 Women
- 9.1 Administration and Politics
10 Places
11 Others
12 See also

Awards and Titles

Miss World: Reita Faria in 1966
Miss Universe: Sushmita Sen in 1994
Booker Prize: Arundhati Roy for The God of Small Things in 1997
Bharat Ratna: Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, C. Rajagopalachari, and Dr C.V. Raman in 1954
Chevalier: Sivaji Ganesan
Dadasaheb Phalke Award: Devika Rani in 1969
Ashoka Chakra Award to a civilian (posthumous) : D.K. Jatar, captain of the sabotaged plane Kashmir Princess, for "most conspicuous bravery, daring and self-sacrifice"
Magsaysay Award: Vinoba Bhave, 1958
Winner of a major literary award in the United States: Dhan Gopal Mukerji
Ford Supermodel of the World (contest): Bipasha Basu, 1996^{citation needed}

Nobel Prize

Nobel Prize winner: Rabindranath Tagore for the Nobel Prize in Literature, 1913. He was also the first Asian to get the prize.
Nobel Prize in Physics: C. V. Raman in 1930.
Nobel Prize in Medicine: Har Gobind Khorana in 1968. (India born US citizen)
Nobel Peace Prize: Mother Teresa in 1979 (Albania born Indian citizen)
Nobel Prize in Economics: Amartya Sen in 1998

Defence

Commander-in-Chief of Free India: General Sir Roy Bucher
Indian Commander-in-Chief of Free India: General Kodandera Madappa Cariappa, 1949
Chief of Air Staff: Air Marshal Sir Thomas Elmhirst
Indian Chief of Staff: General Kodandera Madappa Cariappa, 1947
Commander-in-Chief, IAF: Air Marshal Subroto Mukerjee, 1954
Chief of Naval Staff: Vice Admiral R D Katari
Cosmonaut: Sqn Ldr Rakesh Sharma, 1984

Exploration

Person to reach the South Pole: Col Jatinder Kumar Bajaj
Woman to scale Mount Everest: Bachendri Pal on May 23, 1984. She was the 5th woman in the world to scale the peak.

Film and TV

Sound film: Alam Ara, 1931
Oscar winner: Bhanu Athaiya for Best Costume Design for Gandhi (film) in 1982
Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film: Mother India in 1957
National Film Award for cinema: Shyamchi Aai in 1954
Colorized film: Mughal-e-Azam in 2004 (the original black-and-white version was released in 1960)
Sponsored TV serial: Hum Log, started in 1984, was also the first soap opera of India
Actor to enact 10 roles: Kamal Haasan
3D film: My Dear Kuttichathan, a Malayalam film, produced in 1984
70 mm film: Padayottam, a Malayalam film, produced in 1982
Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (officer of the order of arts and letters): Shahrukh Khan in 2007

Governance

President: Rajendra Prasad (1950-1962)
Prime Minister: Jawaharlal Nehru (1947-1964). The first term lasted till 1952 after which he was re-elected
Deputy Prime Minister: Vallabhbhai Patel (1947-1950)
Prime Minister to be voted out of office: Indira Gandhi (1977) when the Indian National Congress lost to the Janata Party
Non-Congress government: by Janata Party with Morarji Desai as the Prime Minister (1977-1980)
Prime Minister to lead a minority government for a full term (five years): P. V. Narasimha Rao, June 21, 1991 – May 16, 1996
Person outside the Nehru-Gandhi family to serve as Prime Minister for a full term (five years): P. V. Narasimha Rao, June 21, 1991 – May 16, 1996
Prime Minister from South India: P. V. Narasimha Rao, 1991
Governor-General: Warren Hastings
Governor General of Independent India: Lord Mountbatten, 1947
Indian Governor-General of Indian Union: C Rajagopalachari, 1948
Chief Justice of India: H. J. Kania (1947-1951)
Indian ICS Officer: Satyendranath Tagore, 1863
Speaker of Lok Sabha: G.V. Mavlankar (1952-1956)
Finance Minister of Independent India: R.K. Shanmukhan Chetty (1947-1949)
Presentation of First Budget after India's Independence : R.K. Shanmukhan Chetty on Nov 26, 1947

Science

Hydroelectric plant: On the Gaganachukki waterfall of the Sivasamudram Falls, Karnataka. Built in 1902.
City to have electricity: Bangalore, in 1906 (it was in fact the first city in Asia to have electricity)
Man in space: Rakesh Sharma aboard Salyut 7, on April 03, 1984. He was the 138th man in space world-wide.
Woman in space: Kalpana Chawla aboard Space Shuttle Columbia flight STS-87, on November 19, 1997. She was a naturalized United States citizen, and represented the US during the event.
Test-tube baby: Durga Agarwal, born 1978
Scientific Expedition to Antarctica: 1981
Nuclear Reactor: CIRUS, Mumbai, Maharashtra
First Genetically Modified Food Product in India : Bt. Egg plant Hybrid (Bt. -- Bacilius Thuringiensis)
Satellite : Aryabhatta, launched on April 19, 1975
Satellite dedicated exclusively for educational services : EDUSET
Successfully indigenous Launch Vehicle : SLV-3
Prospective space tourist: Santhosh George Kulangara, proposed in 2009 aboard Virgin Galactic

Sport

Person to swim across the English Channel: Mihir Sen, 1958
Woman to swim across the English Channel: Arati Saha, 1959
Formula 1 race driver: Narain Karthikeyan
Formula 1 team: Force India F1
A1 GP race victory: Narain Karthikeyan, Zhuhai, China, 2007

Olympics

Olympic team medal: Gold for Hockey at the 1928 Summer Olympics Amsterdam, beating the Netherlands.
Olympic individual medal (in British India): Silver by Norman Pritchard for 200 metres races at the 1900 Summer Olympics, Paris. (This is disputed however. The IOC claims he participated for India. The IAAF records him as participant for Great Britain.)
Olympic individual medal: Bronze by K. D. Jadhav for wrestling at the 1952 Summer Olympics Helsinki.
Olympic individual medal by a woman: Bronze by Karnam Malleswari for weightlifting 54 kg class, at the 2000 Summer Olympics Sydney.
Olympic silver medal: Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore for Men's Double Trap at the 2004 Summer Olympics Athens.
Olympic individual gold medal: Abhinav Bindra for 10 m Air Rifle at the 2008 Summer Olympics Beijing.
Olympic medal in Boxing: Vijeyendra Kumar at the 2008 Summer Olympics Beijing.

Chess

Chess Grandmaster: Viswanathan Anand in 1988, at the age of 18.
FIDE World Chess Champion: Viswanathan Anand in December 2000.
Undisputed World Chess Champion: Viswanathan Anand in September 2007.
Woman Chess Grandmaster: Koneru Humpy, 2002. She was also the youngest woman to become a grandmaster at 15 years old.

Tennis

Grand Slam title: Mahesh Bhupathi (partnering with Japanese Rika Hiraki) in the Mixed Doubles category of the 1997 French Open.
Woman to win 1st round match in a Grand Slam event: Nirupama Vaidyanathan beat Italian Gloria Pizzichini in the first round of the 1998 Australian Open
Woman to reach 4th round (highest as of 2008) of a Grand Slam event: Sania Mirza in the Singles category of the 2005 US Open.
Grand Slam junior title: Leander Paes in the Singles category of the 1990 Wimbledon Championship.
Grand Slam junior title by a woman: Sania Mirza (partnering with Russian Alisa Kleybanova) in the Doubles category of the 2003 Wimbledon Championships.

Cricket

Cricket tournament: The Bombay Triangular which later became the Bombay Quadrangular (1912-1936)
Cricket test match: Against England at Lord's, June 25, 1932
Cricket captain: C. K. Nayudu for the 1932 tour of England
Cricketer to score a century: Lala Amarnath in 1933 against England in South Bombay
Cricketer to score a double century: Polly Umrigar, 223 against New Zealand at Hyderabad in 1955-56
Cricketer to score a triple century: Virender Sehwag, 309 against Pakistan in Multan in 2004.
ODI cricket hat-trick: Chetan Sharma in Reliance World Cup against New Zealand in 1987.
Test cricket hat-trick: Harbhajan Singh against Australia in March 2001
Cricket World Cup championship win: At the 1983 Cricket World Cup, England beating West Indies.
Batsman to complete 10,000 runs in Test cricket: Sunil Gavaskar (he was first in the world to achieve this feat)
Batsman to complete 10,000 runs in ODI cricket: Sachin Tendulkar (he was first in the world to achieve this feat)
Cricket Twenty20 world cup winner : 2007
Cricketer to score 75 centuries in Test and ODIs combined: Sachin Tendulkar

Minorities

First Sikh Prime Minister : Manmohan Singh
First Muslim President : Zakir Hussain (1967-1969)
First Sikh President : Giani Zail Singh
First Parsi Army Chief: Field Marshall Sam Manekshaw
First Christian Army Chief: General Sunith Francis Rodrigues
First Sikh Army Chief: General Joginder Jaswant Singh
First Parsi Air Force Chief: Air Marshal Aspy Engineer
First Sikh Air Force Chief: Air Marshal Arjan Singh
First Muslim Air Force Chief: Air Marshal Idris Hasan Latif
First Parsi Navy Chief: Admiral J L Cursetji
First Christian Navy Chief: Admiral R L Pereira

Women

Graduates: Kadambini Ganguly and Chandramukhi Basu, 1883
Head of an Undergraduate Academic Institution: Chandramukhi Basu, 1888
Honours Graduate: Kamini Roy (1886)
Lawyer: Cornelia Sorabjee
Supreme Court Judge (also the first in the world): Anna Chandy
Physician: Kadambini Ganguly, 1886
Airline Pilot: Durga Banerjee
In space: Kalpana Chawla aboard Space Shuttle Columbia flight STS-87, on November 19, 1997. She was a naturalized United States citizen, and represented the US during the event.
Olympic medal winner: Karnam Malleswari, 2000
Asian Games gold medal winner: Kamlijit Sandhu
To swim across the English Channel: Arati Saha, 1959
Chess Grandmaster: Koneru Humpy, 2002. She was also the youngest woman in the world to become a grandmaster at 15 years old.
To win 1st round match in a Grand Slam event: Nirupama Vaidyanathan beat Italian Gloria Pizzichini in the first round of the 1998 Australian Open
To reach 4th round (highest as of 2008) of a Grand Slam event: Sania Mirza in the Singles category of the 2005 US Open.
Grand Slam junior title: Sania Mirza (partnering with Russian Alisa Kleybanova) in the Doubles category of the 2003 Wimbledon Championships.
IPS Officer: Kiran Bedi
Nobel Prize winner: Mother Teresa in 1979 (Albanian born Indian citizen)

Administration and Politics

Prime Minister: Indira Gandhi, 1966
Minister in a government: Rajkumari Amrit Kaur in the Ministry of Health
Chief Minister of a State: Sucheta Kripalani, Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh

1963-1967

Governor: Sarojini Naidu, Governor of Uttar Pradesh, 1947-1949
Central Minister (in pre-independent India): Vijayalakshmi Pandit, minister of local self-government and public health, 1937
Speaker of a State Assembly: Shanno Devi
Indian National Congress President: Annie Besant
President: Pratibha Patil, 2007

Places

City to have electricity: Bangalore, in 1906 (it was in fact the first city in Asia to have electricity)
District to achieve 100% literacy rate: Ernakulam district, Kerala , 1990
City/town to achieve 100% literacy rate: Kottayam, Kerala, 1989
District to achieve 100% literacy rate and lowest population growth rate: Pathanamthitta district, Kerala
District to be polio-free: Pathanamthitta district, Kerala
District to achieve tobacco free: Kottayam district, Kerala, 27 September 2008

Others

Wax statue of a living Indian: Mahatma Gandhi at Madame Tussaud's in 1939
Exclusive internet magazine: Bharat Samachar^{citation needed}
Miss India to participate in Miss Universe: Indrani Rahman in the Miss Universe 1952 Pageant at Long Beach, California
President of the Indian National Congress: W C Bonnerjee, 1885
Graduate in Medicine: Soorjo Coomar Goodeve Chuckerbutty