Biography of Abdul Kalam

Abdul Kalam

"Difficulties in your life do not come to destroy 

you, but to help you realize 

your hidden potential and

power, let difficulties

know that you 

too are difficult."

-Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam.

His childhood

Abdul Kalam was born on 15 October 1931. His full name was "Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam". He was famous as "Missile Man of India". He was born at Rameswaram on Pamban Island.

Abdul Kalam has not belonged to a very rich and high-profile family. His father Jainulabdeen Marakayar was a boatman in Rameswaram. His mother Ashiamma Jainulabdiddin was a housewife. Abdul Kalam told that as he belongs from a coastal area once they had to suffer from a cyclone and his father's boat was completely destroyed. The last source of income of his family is also finished in this cyclone. Then he decided to sell the newspaper to help his family at a very small age. He studied from Schwartz High School in Ramanathapuram. His father was not rich from money but he was very rich from his thoughts. He always supported his child and motivated him. His father was a nobleman. He was influenced by two of his friends Ahmed Jalaluddin and cousin Samsuddin. They both were not very intelligent and literate but they always guided him to achieve his goals. Kalam was very calm from his nature.

As an adult

He completed his higher studies from St. Joseph in Tiruchirapalli. Due to his humble nature, he did friendship with the dean of his college. He studied BSc from Physics but he understood clearly that Physics was not his subject. He decided to do engineering. He applied to Madras Institute of Engineering and was selected but the fees were very high for him. So his sister Zohra sold her bangles for the study of his brother. Kalam felt very regretful and took an oath to do work hard. He dreamt to become a very good scientist and to give a return gift to all those who helped him in his success. He completed his engineering from MIT and worked at Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL) as a trainee.

His further career

He wanted to pursue his career in Airforce. He had two opportunities. One was a career in the Airforce and another was a job at the Directorate of Technical at the ministry of defense. He wanted to fly. In fact, in his college, he spends a lot of time seeing the two aircraft. He applied for both opportunities. But he was not selected in the airforce neither in the other one. He felt very disappointed. He wanted to join Airforce as a senior scientific assistant. He worked on a lot of projects and traveled all over India as well as NASA to explore himself and his projects.

Mission to launch the country's own satellite

After losing from China in 1962 in the Indo-China war, India needs to think about the defence system to be strong. At that time India was a defence importer. America is the no.1 country in terms of the export of destructive weapons. India needs a strong defence system to protect the country from China because China understood very well the weak point of India. A team built and organized by Professor Vikram Sarabhai and lead by Abdul Kalam. Vikram Sarabhai was very nobleman. He always laid ahead to Kalam. He gave a lot of opportunities for him. Kalam thought him as his ideal. Kalam was first appointed as a rocket engineer in INCOSPAR and did a successful rocket launch in 1963. Vikram Sarabhai had the support of the Government to launch their own satellite. From 1966 to 1971 about 22 scientists worked with Professor Sarabhai. They all decided to develop SLV-3 and Kalam lead the project.

A lot of failures come together

There was a failure in the mission. Vikram Sarabhai passed away in 1971 then Satish Dhawan took the place of Sarabhai who was also a very great leader as well as a very great person. After that, a gas tank was burst into the body of a scientist. It affects Kalam widely. Again when the mission was on the peak his brother-in-law passed away. After some days of it, his father passed away. Kalam was not a person who shows his emotions to everybody. But he was breakdown internally by all these incidents. And when he had a trip to France his mother died one day before the trip. He thought that success was very far away from him because each and every time he had to see failure. In 1989 his mission of launching Agni Path also fail and the whole nation made mocked of ISRO and Abdul Kalam. But he did not give up.

Nations fly with wings of fire

After a lot of failure Kalam and the team got their first success by launching Rohini on 18 July 1980. It was India's first satellite launch vehicle. ISRO wanted to upgrade the technology. GOI granted rupees390 crores fund to the team. On 22nd May 1989 AGNI was launched and it was a huge success for the IGDBM program as well as for the whole nation. Between 1981 to 1988 India developed a defence system named "Akash" and also developed the anti-tank missile project named Nag ("Cobra"). Prithvi was also launched on 25 February 1988. The launch of Agni was the biggest and the measured achievement. The whole nation praised Abdul Kalam. When Kalam entered the parliament all the members praised him by beating the desk.

Honors 

He was honored by "Padma Bhushan" in 1981. "Padma Vibhushan" in 1990 for all his work for the nation. He got the highest civilian award "Bharat Ratna" in 1997 for his contribution to the scientific research and great modernization in the defence. In 2013, he was the recipient of the "Von Braun Award" from the National Space Society "to recognize excellence in the management and leadership of management and leadership of a space-related project."

Death

On 27 July 2015, he was at Shillong delivering a lecture on "Creating a Livable Planet Earth" at the Indian Institute of Management Shillong. Around 7:45 pm Kalam was confirmed dead by a sudden cardiac arrest.

"In life, no one will

remember how you

looked, walked, talked

or what you did......

Everyone just remembers

you by the way you made

them feel when they

were with you......"

-APJ Abdul Kalam.