Baskadia

•BRITISH TAKE OVER BENGAL.

In the year of 1757, The Battle of Plassey culminated today with the victory of the British East India Company over Siraj - ud - Daulah, the Nawab of Bengal. at the banks of the Bhagirathi River in Palashi, Bengal. The proximate cause of the battle was the British offensive against the French town of Chandernagar, and it sparked the Nawab's fears of being overthrown by the British.

The betrayal, however, came from within: the conspiracy between Siraj - ud - Daulah's uncle Mir Jafar and Colonel Robert Clive was instrumental in the defeat of the Nawab. The Nawab's army, which consisted of 50,000 soilders, outnumbered the 2,950 - strong army of the British, but the British were far superior in terms of technology. The rainstorm around noon drenched the gunpower of the Nawab, greatly reducing the effectiveness of his guns. This resulted in the death of Nawab's confidant Mir Madan Khan and the retreat of the Nawab to Murshidabad The army that is left has been defeated, suffering substantial losses, and Mir Jafar has been acknowledged by Clive as the new Nawab of Bengal.

• Quaker Penn seeks peace with Indians

In the year of 1683 William Penn, the English Quaker and advocate of civil and religious liberty, signed a treaty with chiefs of the Lenni Lenape Tribe today in a bid to ensure the peace of his colony.

Penn was granted a huge tract of land in the New World by King Charles II, which he subsequently named "Pennsylvania" after his father. Since arriving from England in September 1682 Penn, author of No Cross, No Crown, has gone all out to establish friendly relations with the Indian tribes in the area. Today's solemn ceremony took place under an elm tree at Shakamaxon, Philadelphia.

•Dail gets tough with IRA

Since, in 1939 A series of IRA bombings in England has led the Dail, the Irish parliament, to take tough measures against the organization, including provision for internment without trial. The bombings are just one in a long line of terrorist activities going back to the IRA's beginnings in 1919, when they took over from the militant nationalist group, the Irish Volunteers.

The present IRA refuses to accept the division of Ireland or the Irish Free State, established after the war of independence of 1919-21 and contemptuously referred to as "the Six Counties". Its goal is a united Ireland, and it believes that the only way to achieve this is through armed struggle. Despite being declared illegal in 1931 and again in 1936, the IRA has defiantly continued to bomb, raid, ambush and sabotage in the blind pursuit of its dream.

•1985 An Air India Boeing 747

explodes off the Irish coast to day, killing the 329 people on board. The jet was en route from Canada, where it left Mon treal airport late, one hour and 33 minutes after its sched uled departure time. Although no group has yet claimed responsibility for the murders, it is believed that Sikh extremists planted the bomb that caused today's devastating disaster.