The first Aeroplane flight in the world

Wright brothers

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Today, all of us know that the Wright brothers were the first to fly an airplane on 17 December 1903. Orville Wright piloted the first powered airplane 20 feet above a wind-swept beach in North Carolina. But were the Wright brothers the first to fly an airplane...?

The Controversy

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Research has found documents that state that an Indian was the first to fly a powered airplane. So the question arises - "Who exactly was the first to fly an airplane ?". Was it the Wright brothers or the Indian scholar - Shivkar Bapuji Talpade.

Shivkar Bapuji Talpade

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                  He was an Indian scholar who is said to have constructed and flown an unmanned airplane in 1895, 8 years before the experiments done by the Wright brothers. He was a scholar of Sanskrit literature and Vedas. 

                  During his school days he came to know about ancient Indian aeronautics through his teacher Chiranjilal Verma who lead Talpade to read Swami Dayanand Saraswati's works related to ancient aeronautics. Later he studied Maharshi Bharadwaj's work - "Vaimanika Shstra"(वैमानिक शास्त्र) which was written in early 20th century and gave detailed information about airplanes and ancient mythological flying objects. 

                 Talpade's first airplane was named "Marutsakha"(Translation - "Friend of wind"). In 1895, on Girgaum beach in Mumbai the "Marutsakha" made its first flight and changed the history of aeronautics. Mahadev Govind Ranade and Sayaji Rao Gaikwad were reportedly present at the time of the flight. 

Although this experiment went unnoticed, records of the first airplane flight have been found in some Indian newspapers like "Kesari".