Franz Beckenbauer — Franz Anton Beckenbauer was born on 11 September 1945 in Munich. He is a German football coach, manager, and former player, nicknamed Der Kaiser (“The Emperor”) because of his elegant style, his leadership, his first name “Franz” (reminiscent of the Austrian emperors), and his dominance on the football pitch. He is generally regarded as the greatest German …

Franck Ribery (born 7 April 1983) is a French football player who currently plays for Bundesliga club Bayern Munich. Ribery primarily plays as a winger, preferably on the left side, and is known for “pace, energy, skill and precise passing.” Ribery’s career began in 1989 as a youth player for local hometown club Conti Boulogne. He left the club after …

Evel Knievel — Robert Craig “Evel” Knievel, Jr was an American motorcycle daredevil, an entertainer famous in the US and elsewhere between the late 1960s and early 1980s. Knievel’s nationally televised motorcycle jumps, including his 1974 attempt to jump Snake River Canyon at Twin Falls, Idaho, represent four of the 20 mostwatched ABC’s Wide World of Sports events to date. …

Erik Weihenmayer (born September 23, 1968) is the first blind person to reach the summit of Mount Everest, on May 25, 2001. He also completed the Seven Summits in September 2002. His story was covered in a Time article in June 2001 titled Blind to Failure. He is the author of Touch the Top of the World: A Blind Man’s …

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was born on 29 October 1938, in Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, amongst the descendants of original colonists of Liberia. These descendants are known in Liberia as Americo-Liberians. Sirleaf’s father Jahmale Carney Johnson became the first Liberian from an indigenous ethnic group to sit in the country’s national legislature. Sirleaf studied economics and accounts from 1948 to …

Elie Wiesel — Eliezer “Elie” Wiesel was born on September 30, 1928. He is a writer, professor at Boston University, political activist, Nobel Laureate, and Holocaust survivor. He is the author of 57 books, the best known of which is Night, a work based on his experiences as a prisoner in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. His diverse range …

Dr. D Ashish — Kolkata, the City of Joy, is also the city that houses the sick, the starved and the homeless. But they aren’t the only ones scouring the slums and shanties of this metropolis. At least twice a week you might just bump into D Ashish and his troupe of volunteers walking through the streets collecting medicines which …

Diego Forlan — Diego Martin Forlan Corazo (born 19 May 1979 in Montevideo) is an Uruguayan footballer who currently plays for Atletico Madrid of La Liga. He is a two-time winner of both the Pichichi Trophy and the European Golden Shoe. He was born into a family of footballers. His father Pablo had played for the Uruguay national football team …

Dharnidhar Boro — Until the late 1990s, the national highway that connected Assam’s capital Guwahati with the Kaziranga National Park, around 215km away, was a dusty, choppy road, eroded by years of devastating floods. In the past decade, Assam has become a tourist-friendly state. The same highway is a cruise now. Beyond the smooth roads and the new tourist resorts …

Dhanraj Pillay has been one of the best all time Hockey players of India and also one of the most popular ones the game has ever produced in the nation. An extremely good forward with sharp attacking attitude, Dhanraj came from a very modest background and by dint of his sheer talent and charismatic skills rose to become one of …