The India Plate or Indian Plate is a tectonic plate that was originally a part of the ancient continent of Gondwanaland from which it split off, eventually becoming a major plate. About 50 to 55 million years ago (contested), it fused with the adjacent Australian Plate. It is today part of the major Indo-Australian Plate, and includes the Indian subcontinent and a portion of the basin under the Indian Ocean.

In the late Cretaceous Period about 90 million years ago, subsequent to the splitting off from Gondwanaland of conjoined Madagascar and India, the Indian Plate split from Madagascar. It began moving north, at about 20 cm/yr (8 in/yr), and is believed to have begun colliding with Asia between 50 and 55 million years ago, in the Eocene epoch of the Cenozoic Era, although this is contested, with some authors suggesting it was much later at around 35 million years ago. If the collision occurred between 50 and 55 Ma, the Indian Plate would have covered a distance of 2,000 to 3,000 km (1,200 to 1,900 mi), moving faster than any other known plate. In 2007, German geologists suggested that the reason the Indian Plate moved so quickly is that it is only half as thick as the other plates which formerly constituted Gondwanaland.

The collision with the Eurasian Plate along the boundary between India and Nepal formed the orogenic belt that created the Tibetan Plateau and the Himalaya Mountains, as sediment bunched up like earth before a plow.

The Indian Plate is currently moving northeast at 5 cm/yr (2 in/yr), while the Eurasian Plate is moving north at only 2 cm/yr (0.8 in/yr). This is causing the Eurasian Plate to deform, and the India Plate to compress at a rate of 4 mm/yr (0.15 in/yr).

2004 Indian Ocean earthquake

Like all similarly large earthquakes, the December 26, 2004 event was caused by thrust-faulting. A 100 km (60 mi) rupture caused about 1,600 km (994 mi) of the interface to slip, which moved the fault 15 m (50 ft) and lifted the sea floor several meters (yards), creating the great tsunami.

2005 Kashmir earthquake

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External links

Category:Tectonic plates Category:Geology of India Category:Geology of Pakistan Category:Geology of the Indian Ocean

Early years

In 1912, he entered Hangchow University (later its major part merged into Zhejiang University) preparatory through examination. He was there only for a short period before he was expelled for participation in a student strike.

He then moved to Japan, where he studied economics at the Tokyo Imperial University between 1913 and 1922, where he met other Chinese intellectuals (namely, Guo Moruo, Zhang Ziping and Tian Han). Together, in 1921 they founded the ''Chuangzao she'' 創造社 ("Creation Society"), which promoted vernacular and modern literature. One of his earlier works ''Chenlun'' 沉淪, also his most famous, published in Japan in 1921. The work had gained immense popularity in China, shocking the world of Chinese literature with its frank dealing with sex, as well as grievances directed at the incompetence of Chinese government at the time.

In 1922, he returned to China as a literary celebrity and worked as the editor of ''Creation Quarterly'', editing journals and writing short stories. In 1923, after an attack of tuberculosis, Yu Dafu directed his attention to the welfare of the masses.

In 1927, he worked as an editor of the ''Hongshui'' literary magazine. He later came in conflict with the Communist Party of China and fled back to Japan.

Second Sino-Japanese war

In 1942 when the Imperial Japanese Army invaded Singapore, he was forced to flee to Sumatra. Known under a different identity, he settled there among other overseas Chinese and began a brewery business with the help of the locals. Later he was forced to help the Japanese military police as an interpreter when it was discovered that he was one of the few "locals" in the area who could speak Japanese.

In 1945, he was arrested by the Kempeitai when his true identity was finally discovered. It is believed that he was executed by the Japanese shortly after the surrender of Japan.

Works

His most popular work, breaking all Chinese sales records, was ''Jih-chi chiu-chung'' "''Nine Diaries''", which detailed his affair with the writer Wang Ying-hsin. The most critically acclaimed work is ''Kuo-ch'u'' or "''The Past''", written in 1927.

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External links

Category:1896 births Category:1945 deaths Category:Chinese expatriates in Japan Category:Hangzhou High School alumni Category:People from Hangzhou Category:Republic of China poets Category:University of Tokyo alumni Category:Zhejiang University alumni

Ashwin Kumar Batish Hindi: अशविन कुमार बातिश(born 1951 in Bombay, India) is a sitar and tabla player best known for rekindling interest in the sitar among young Indians.

Childhood and Training

When Ashwin's father took him to see his friend Ashok, the son of the great music director and harmonium wizard Pandit Bhagatram (Hindi: पन्डित भगतराम), Ashwin fell in love with the sitar. Ashok was only 2 years older than Ashwin and seeing his friend perform made Ashwin think that he could too.

In 1964, Ashwin's father left India to visit one of his daughters in England. Ashwin turned to his mother and shared with her his secret wish to play the sitar. She bought him a student model sitar and started teaching him herself, as she had played the sitar when young. His mother had also presented him with some sitar albums by Ravi Shankar (Hindi: पन्डित रवि शन्कर). Ashwin would listen and copy all the songs to the best of his abilities. At the same time, he was also a great fan of the Beatles, Cliff Richards, Pat Boone and other pop singers of the 50's era. Ashwin wasted no time in whipping out the songs he heard from these Western artists.

It was when Ashwin joined his father in England at around age 14 that he started receiving training from him on the intricacies of North Indian classical music. Ashwin also started learning compositions in various ragas. His father would often sing and have Ashwin copy the musical phrases. He also taught Ashwin many songs based in various ragas he had studied with his Guruji Shri Chandan Ram Charan (Hindi: श्रि चन्दन राम चरन). By age 16, Ashwin had started to accompany his father on various programs. He also started getting calls to play for college nights for which a local tabla player would accompany him. One such memorable event was when he performed for an OXFAM benefit in England.

Soloing in front of a live audience, without his father by his side, made Ashwin realize how much more he needed to learn, and he became an earnest disciple of his father. Ashwin was put on a rigorous practice schedule. The cold English weather meant that there was only one warm room in the house where all his family would gather. To Ashwin's advantage and delight, his father would always give his playing the preference to the dismay of Ashwin's brothers and sisters. While his siblings strained to enjoy the British movies and serials on the TV, Ashwin started to show improvement in his playing. On one such day, Ashwin was practicing. When he stopped playing, there was silence in the room. All his family members were looking at him and he saw his siblings nodding and showing appreciation at what he had just played. Ashwin learnt from this experience and started to tune in to this new sense of expressive musical attraction. He fine-tuned this ability in his live performances.

Career

Ashwin is presently teaching Indian music at his music school in Santa Cruz, California. His website is sitarpower.com. Ashwin was one of the pioneers on the World Wide Web credited with some of the very first Indian music-related websites which he ran on the Gopher platform via the early University of California, Santa Cruz system . He also publishes an online magazine that is mostly educational in nature called RagaNet. It provides regular lessons on sitar, tabla, Dilruba, History of India music, etc. Articles on musical instruments of India are also a regular feature.

Although his training has been in North Indian classical music, Ashwin Batish has been equally at home with Western music often performing with jazz and rock musicians. His 80s fling with fusion music he self-titled ''Sitar Power'' was instrumental in garnering him serious airplay including a recording contract with Shanachie Records of New Jersey. He did not last long at Shanachie due to disappointing sales reports and lack of support. Ashwin soon formed his own record label, Batish Records to publish all his family's works.

Ashwin continues to be active in the field of Indian music and is currently teaching at the Batish Institute of Indian Music and Fine Arts in Santa Cruz. His father passing in the year 2006 dealt a severe blow to Ashwin's energies and after a long period of inactivity Ashwin has found a new direction. In remembrance and as a dedication to his father's memory and contribution to the music world, Ashwin has embarked upon a very special venture into broadcasting. This has given a voice to over 50 years of archived audio and video content. The web site www.ragmala.com - Ragmala Radio and Television Streams media, audio and video 24/7 providing a glimpse into the rich musical heritage of the Batish family. It is also intended to be highly educational in nature thus fulfilling the intent of Ashwin's father to help spread this wealth of musical knowledge to the rest of the world.

Ashwin has been actively spreading his brand of classical and fusion music by creating portals on social networks such as Myspace and Facebook. His music can be heard on the music portal called Reverbnation where his music is charting in the top 20 in the in the World Music category (as of date: 10/21/2010).

References