Odisha’s first ever football referee, centenarian Narottam Mohanty passed away . He was 100 years old when he breathed his last after a massive heart attack at his residence .Mohanty was also considered as the oldest citizen of Baripada town.
Mohanty earned the distinction of becoming the first qualified football referee of Odisha in pre-independence era. Many veteran sports persons paid their last tributes to the departed soul .
Facts and Trivias about Odisha
- Odisha is very ancient & the oldest rocks (from Mayurbhanj) date back to 3 billion years (Our planet is believed to be 4.5 billion years old)
- Chandragupta Maurya was hesitant for 60 long years to attack Kalinga (old name of Odisha) as the Kalinga army of 60,000 managed to annihilate one lakh enemy soldiers, a quarter of the empire’s army.
- Over 62 distinct tribal groups live in Odisha, each one with its own culture and traditions different from the other
- At Puri Jagannath temple kitchen, 7 pots are kept one on top of another and cooked on firewood. In this process the contents in the top pot get cooked first & then the bottom one.
- The Jagannath temple kitchen is reputed to be the largest kitchen in the world, with 400 cooks working around 200 hearths to feed over 10,000 people each day.
- Odisha became the first state to enact the Lokayukta Bill law after the central act was passed in Parliament.
- Rasagolla, famous sweet originated in Odisha
- The Chandipur Beach is a hide and seek beach of Odisha that appears and disappears with every high and low tide to approximately 5 kms.
- Bhubaneswar, the capital city was the home of over 600 magnificent temples in medieval times. It is called the “temple city” of India. The only city in the world with such highest number of temples inside
- World’s highest electrified track ( at a height of 7.45 metres for running of Double Stack Container (DSC) goods trains) is situated at Odisha in Jakhapura-Daitari section. Constructed by East Coast Railway of Odisha. Second to this is in China is 6.6 metre and 7.1 metre in USA.
- A 23-feet giant Estuarine crocodile in Odisha has been crowned the world’s largest.
