Famous Personalities of Madhya Pradesh: Names and Places

Madhya Pradesh sits at the centre of the country and its list of famous names reads like a cross-section of Indian history. The man who chaired the Drafting Committee of the Constitution was born in a cantonment of the state, a Prime Minister in Gwalior, a President in Bhopal and the singer whose voice defined Hindi film music in Indore. Before them came the Paramara king of Dhar, the Gond queen of Garha-Katanga, the ruler who governed Malwa from a town on the Narmada and the musician of Akbar's court. MPPSC, MPESB, MP Police and SSC papers ask for a name with a place and one achievement, so the chapter is arranged in that form.

Rulers and resistance

Raja Bhoj, the Paramara king of Malwa in the eleventh century, ruled from Dhar, built the temple town of Bhojpur and the hall of learning remembered as the Bhojshala; the name of Bhopal is traced to his Bhojpal. Rani Durgavati, the Gond queen of Garha-Katanga, fought the army of Akbar's general Asaf Khan in 1564 and died rather than surrender; the university at Jabalpur carries her name. Devi Ahilyabai Holkar governed the Malwa territory of the Holkars from Maheshwar on the Narmada in the eighteenth century, built ghats and temples across north India, including the rebuilding of the Kashi Vishwanath temple at Varanasi in 1780, and gave her name to the airport at Indore. In the Revolt of 1857 Rani Avantibai Lodhi of Ramgarh led the resistance in the Mandla tract, and Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi fell in battle at Gwalior in 1858, where her samadhi stands. Tantya Bhil, the tribal rebel of the Nimar region who was hanged in 1889, is remembered in the state as the Indian Robin Hood.

National leaders of the state

Uma Bharti became the first woman Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh in December 2003, and Kailash Nath Katju, who headed the state government in the late 1950s, had earlier been a Union minister, which makes his name a frequent distractor in questions about the first Chief Minister.

Music, art and literature

Tansen, one of the nine jewels of Akbar's court, was born at Behat near Gwalior; his tomb is at Gwalior and the Tansen Samaroh is held there every year. Kalidasa, the Sanskrit poet of Abhijnanashakuntalam and Meghaduta, is associated with Ujjain, where the Kalidasa Samaroh is celebrated. The Maihar gharana grew around Ustad Alauddin Khan, who served at the Maihar court and founded the Maihar band; Ustad Amir Khan, born at Indore, gave his name to the Indore gharana of khayal; and Kumar Gandharva made Dewas his home. Lata Mangeshkar was born at Indore on 28 September 1929 and received the Bharat Ratna in 2001, and Kishore Kumar was born at Khandwa on 4 August 1929. In literature Makhanlal Chaturvedi of Babai in the Narmadapuram district wrote Pushp ki Abhilasha and was the first writer to receive the Sahitya Akademi Award in Hindi, in 1955, for Him Taringini. Harishankar Parsai of Jamani is the best known Hindi satirist, Bhavani Prasad Mishra of Tigaria wrote Geet Farosh, and Gajanan Madhav Muktibodh, born in the Gwalior region, is read for Chand ka Munh Tedha Hai. Subhadra Kumari Chauhan, who wrote the ballad of the Rani of Jhansi, settled at Jabalpur. Tribal art has carried Padma honours to Bhuri Bai, the Bhil painter of the Jhabua belt, and to Jodhaiya Bai Baiga of the Umaria region.

Sport

Hockey gives the state its oldest sporting names. Shankar Laxman, born at Mhow, kept goal for India in the Olympic teams of 1956, 1960 and 1964, winning gold in 1956 and 1964 and silver in 1960. Captain Roop Singh, the brother of Dhyan Chand, played in the Olympic teams of the 1930s and the stadium at Gwalior is named after him. Among later names Vivek Sagar Prasad of Itarsi was in the Indian team that won the bronze medal in hockey at the Tokyo Olympics held in 2021, and Aishwary Pratap Singh Tomar of Ratlam has won rifle medals for India at the world level. The state's sports academies at Bhopal, which train shooting, sailing and hockey, are the reason these names now come from several districts rather than one.