title: Miss America

text: In January 2018, Gretchen Carlson, who won the Miss America pageant in 1989, was elected as the new chairwoman of the organization, becoming the first former Miss America to serve as its leader. Katherine Shindle, Miss America 1998, was also appointed to the board alongside fellow Miss America winners, Heather French Henry (2000) and Laura Kaeppeler (2012). This move led to a number of changes. In June 2018, there was an announcement that Miss America contestants would no longer be judged based on their physical appearance. Thus, the national Miss America event would be considered a competition, rather than a beauty pageant, and the titleholders would now be candidates, rather than contestants. The swimsuit competition was replaced with state titleholders participating in a live interactive session with the judges. The evening gown competition was dropped; the contestants chose clothing "that makes them feel confident, expresses their personal style, and shows how they hope to advance the role of Miss America." In interviews, Carlson emphasized the organization's desire to be more welcoming, "open, transparent, [and] inclusive to women," and to prioritize displaying the talent and scholarship in the contestants. The new board of directors increased the maximum age of titleholders to 25 years old, from 24. Therefore, contestants cannot be older than 25 years old on December 31 in the calendar year of their state competition.


title: Miss America

text: In August 2018, Miss America 2018 Cara Mund gave an interview to The Press of Atlantic City in which she stated that it had "been a tough year." She then wrote an open letter to former Miss Americas a few weeks later, in order to explain her comments. In the letter she states that the current leadership had "silenced me, reduced me, marginalized me, and essentially erased me in my role as Miss America." She also stated that her "voice is not heard nor wanted by our current leadership …nor do they have any interest in knowing who I am and how my experiences relate to positioning the organization for the future." Carlson denied Mund's claims. However, at the time the Miss America 2019 competition began, 46 of 51 state organizations (as well as 23 former Miss America winners) had signed a petition calling for the resignation of Carlson and CEO, Regina Hopper, from the Miss America Organization.<ref name="USATD 9/18"></ref> The states who had not signed were Arkansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Nevada, and Vermont.


title: Miss America

text: On September 5, 2018, Fox Rothschild LLP, a law firm based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, filed a breach-of-contract suit against the MAO for failing to pay nearly $100,000 for legal services. Court fillings from October 26, 2018 ordered MAO to pay Fox Rothschild LLP $98,206.90 with interest for their unpaid legal bills. The Miss America Organization reported in December 2018 that a settlement had been made with Fox Rothschild LLP. From 2011 to 2016 (with the exception of 2014), MAO's tax fillings reveal that the organization was operating with a negative net income.


title: Miss America

text: In the fall of 2018, MAO terminated licenses from Florida, Georgia, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and West Virginia. The leadership of the Miss Colorado organization quit in protest. With license termination the state organization cannot "claim to be affiliated with the Miss America Organization and must...turn over bank accounts with scholarship money to the national organization." On December 22, 2018; MAO awarded the license for the Miss Georgia organization to Trina Pruitt. On December 26, 2018; MAO also reinstated the license for the Miss New Jersey organization for one year, contingent on leadership changes and recruitment of new sponsors and board members.


title: Miss America

text: In December 2018, state organizations from Georgia, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and West Virginia, along with Jennifer Vaden Barth (former titleholder and former MAO board member), filed a lawsuit requesting the actions of Carlson and Hopper be voided, citing an "illegal and bad-faith takeover of the MAO, beginning in January 2018." The court date for this suit is set for January 25, 2019.


title: Miss America

text: On June 5, 2019, Miss South Dakota 1997 and former South Dakota Secretary of State, Shantel Krebs, was unanimously elected to chairwoman of the Miss America Organization Board of Directors, succeeding Carlson. Krebs had been a member of the organization's board since October 2018. Carlson will "remain involved as an advisor to the Miss America Organization Board."


title: Miss America

text: In Summer 2019, Miss America announced the contest would move out of Atlantic City. The December 19, 2019 event took place at Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut. The broadcast moved from ABC to NBC, and was live streamed for the first time. On May 8, 2020, the organization announced its next competition, originally slated for December 2020, was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The postponement will also include revised eligibility to be coordinated with state qualifying organizations to allow competitors who would usually age out to remain in consideration.


title: Dale Winton

text: Dale Jonathan Winton (22 May 1955 – 18 April 2018) was an English radio DJ and television presenter. He presented the shows "Dale's Supermarket Sweep" from 1993 until 2001 and again in 2007, the National Lottery game show "" between 2002 and 2016 and the 2008 series of "Hole in the Wall". Winton also presented "Pets Win Prizes" (1995–96) and "The Other Half" (1997–2002).


title: Dale Winton

text: Winton was born on 22 May 1955 to a Jewish father, Gary Winton, and actress Sheree Winton, a Jewish convert. Winton's father died on the day of his bar mitzvah and so he was brought up by his mother. Winton's mother died by suicide in 1976 while suffering from depression.


title: Dale Winton

text: Winton started DJing in clubs in Richmond in 1972, where he met Steve Allen, the LBC radio presenter. The two remained friends thereafter, and lived together for a period as well as going on holiday together. From there he had a selection of jobs including selling timeshares. In 1982, Winton moved to London and began his entertainment career on the London club circuit, where he DJ'd at weekends. This led him to the United Biscuits Radio Network where he did a variety of jobs working for Adrian Love, before getting his own morning show. From here he joined Radio Trent in Nottingham, where he presented a weekend show, moving to the weekday mid-morning show, before leaving in 1985, and going on to work at a number of other local radio stations including Chiltern Radio, Beacon Radio (in Wolverhampton, for 3 years) as well as Blue Danube Radio in Vienna, Austria.


title: Dale Winton

text: In 2000, Winton took over from Alan Freeman to present "Pick of the Pops" on BBC Radio 2, and hosted the show until 30 October 2010, when Tony Blackburn replaced him. Winton sat in for Steve Wright and Liza Tarbuck on BBC Radio 2, covering the latter's Saturday show in September 2013 and November/December 2016.


title: Dale Winton

text: Winton began his television career in 1986 on "Pet Watch", before working for Channel 4, Lifestyle Channel and ITV. From 1993 to 2000, he hosted "Dale's Supermarket Sweep" during the daytime TV period on ITV. In 2007, "Supermarket Sweep" was revived after a -year absence. Winton portrayed himself as an irritating game show presenter in Danny Boyle's 1996 film "Trainspotting".


title: Dale Winton

text: In 1995–96, Winton presented BBC's Saturday night game show "Pets Win Prizes". In 1997, he presented the final of "The Great British Song Contest", the UK's national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest, due to a tie-in with the lottery programme. Between that year and 2002, he also presented a dating show called "The Other Half". In 1999, he appeared on the sitcom "Gimme Gimme Gimme" with Kathy Burke in the episode "Do They Take Sugar?".


title: Dale Winton

text: In 2000 he presented "Barbara Windsor - Hall Of Fame 2000 TV Special", the induction of Barbara Windsor as the first artist to be inducted into the newly created BBC Hall of Fame.


title: Dale Winton

text: He was the subject of "This Is Your Life" in 2000 when he was surprised by Michael Aspel. In 2001, he presented Channel 5's endurance show "Touch the Truck". In 2002, Winton began presenting the National Lottery game show "". In 2003, he appeared in the BBC Three mockumentary, "Dale's Wedding", in which he supposedly married the UK celebrity Nell McAndrew.


title: Dale Winton

text: From 2003–04, he hosted two series of "Stars Reunited" where the casts of popular British television series were reunited after many years. Between 2004 and 2006, he presented three series of the celebrity weight loss "boot camp" programme, "Celebrity Fit Club" on ITV.


title: Dale Winton

text: Winton presented BBC One's Saturday night entertainment programme "Hole In The Wall" in 2008, based on the Japanese original, where contestants in skin-tight lycra costumes contorted themselves to fit through oddly-shaped holes in a moving wall. The show returned for a second series in 2009 but Anton du Beke replaced Winton as host. Winton began appearing in television advertisements for cashmygold.co.uk in 2010. Winton appeared on Matt Lucas and David Walliams' BBC comedy series "Come Fly With Me". He appeared in the last episode of the series, playing himself. In 2012, he hosted one-off ITV game show "Dale's Great Getaway" and in February 2018, Winton hosted travelogue series "Dale Winton's Florida Fly Drive" aired on Channel 5.


title: Dale Winton

text: In 2002, Winton released his autobiography in which he wrote about his rise to fame and his actress mother's suicide, and came out as homosexual. Winton endorsed US Presidential candidate Donald Trump during the 2016 US Presidential election. On 18 April 2018, Jan Kennedy, Winton's long-term agent, announced that he had died at his home. On 19 April a spokesman for Scotland Yard said that police were treating the death as "unexplained" but did not believe it to be suspicious.


title: Dale Winton

text: According to his friend Gloria Hunniford: "Dale had a lot of things going wrong, he had pain with arthritis, he had a heart complaint, he had a chest infection, and we all know how the winter affected that. He had asthma as well." The coroner concluded that Winton died of natural causes. Winton had recently moved from a £2.9 million apartment in Regent's Park to a property in Whetstone, North London. Winton's friends celebrated his life with a non-religious humanist funeral ceremony from Humanists UK on 22 May 2018, his birthday. His eulogy was preserved as part of a public historical archive of humanist funerals.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Felipe Drugovich Roncato (born 23 May 2000) is a Brazilian-Italian racing driver of Austrian descent who last competed in FIA Formula 2 Championship with MP Motorsport. He is the 2018 Euroformula Open champion and the 2022 Formula 2 champion.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Born in Maringá, Drugovich competed in numerous karting championships across Brazil and Europe, taking major championship victories.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich made his single-seaters debut in 2016, joining Neuhauser Racing in ADAC Formula 4. He achieved his first and only podium of the season in third place at the Zandvoort round. He ended the season finished fourth in the rookie standings and twelfth overall, with 79.5 points. The following season, Drugovich switched to Van Amersfoort Racing, and also made his debut in Italian F4 with the team. Drugovich claimed seven wins — the most of any driver throughout the season. Ultimately, he finished 3rd in the standings with 236.5 points, missing out by nine points to champion Jüri Vips as a technical issue in the final round at the Hockenheimring potentially costing Drugovich the title.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich also competed in the MRF Challenge, claiming his maiden single-seater victory in the second race of round two and finishing fourth overall. The following year, Drugovich won the title by taking 10 wins out of the 16 races held that season with two races left.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich stepped up to the FIA Formula 3 European Championship with Van Amersfoort Racing for the 2017 season finale at the Hockenheimring.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich made his debut in the final round of the 2017 season as a guest driver with RP Motorsport, scoring a pole. Despite a mistake in the first race, Drugovich managed to take his first Euroformula Open win in the second. The following year, Drugovich reunited with RP to contest the championship full-time. He proceeded to dominate the championship finishing on the podium at all races, claiming a record fourteen wins and taking the title at Monza with two rounds to spare. In an article by Motorsport.com, Drugovich was ranked 18th in the top 20 junior single-seater drivers of 2018.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Following the injuries sustained by Harrison Scott in Toronto, Drugovich was drafted in by RP to replace him for the 2018 Pro Mazda round at Mid-Ohio.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: In November 2018, Drugovich partook in the post-season test at Yas Marina with ART Grand Prix. He would go to set the 11th and 17th fastest times on Day 1 and Day 2 respectively.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: In February 2019, Carlin Buzz Racing confirmed that Drugovich would race with them in the inaugural championship, alongside Logan Sargeant and Teppei Natori. His season would be tough, scoring his only points with sixth place in race one of the Hungary round. He was set for another points finish in race two, but suffered a puncture after contact with Robert Shwartzman while battling over third place, both ultimately retiring from the race. He scored eight points and finished the season in 16th place, also scoring more points than both of his teammates combined.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: After testing with them in post-season testing at Yas Marina, Drugovich was signed to MP Motorsport for the 2020 season, partnering Nobuharu Matsushita. The season was set to start in March, but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Drugovich impressed in his debut round of Formula 2 at the Red Bull Ring, qualifying 2nd behind Guanyu Zhou at the Red Bull Ring. Drugovich dropped to fourth on the opening lap, being overtaken by Callum Ilott and Mick Schumacher. He could not keep his pace up, eventually finishing 8th. However, his result gave him reverse pole for the feature race. He stayed clear of the pack, eventually winning the race, leading every lap. In an interview after the race, the Brazilian commented that "it was certainly not [comfortable] and it was really hard" due to three safety car restarts during the race. Drugovich had a poor weekend in the second Red Bull Ring round, qualifying 10th and finishing 13th in both the feature and sprint races.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich qualified in 18th at Hungaroring for the feature race. He attempted a tire strategy different from the front-runners. Drugovich had better tyre management and rapidly climbed up the order, eventually finishing fifth. During the sprint race, he had a shocking start falling towards the back on the opening lap. He could not recover, and finished the race in 16th. Drugovich recorded his maiden pole position at the next race in Silverstone beating out Ilott. He described his pole as "amazing" and "perfect". He was unable to convert it to a victory, slipping to seventh place. Drugovich lined up second for the sprint race, but was passed by Christian Lundgaard and Louis Delétraz on the first lap, eventually ending up in sixth. In the second Silverstone weekend, Drugovich only managed to claim a point, by finishing tenth in the feature race from twelfth on the grid. Drugovich qualified fourth but fell to fifth after being passed by Schumacher at the start of the Barcelona feature race. On lap 24, following a good pit stop strategy, Drugovich passed Robert Shwartzman for the net second place, but a lap later Giuliano Alesi brought out the safety car which would change the race. Drugovich pitted for fresher tyres, but was unable to recover the positions lost. He eventually finished seventh. He had better fortunes in the sprint race. Starting second, he had a better start to pass Luca Ghiotto before turn 1. His pace was dominant, winning by 9.5 seconds. Drugovich then stated that the victory "makes up for missed opportunity" in the feature race.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich qualified fifth at Spa-Francorchamps, but would turn out to have a tough weekend there. On lap 4, while battling for seventh place, Drugovich collided with teammate Matsushita, the Japanese driver slamming into the barrier and retiring on the spot. Drugovich meanwhile, damaged his front wing in the incident. He eventually finished the race in 20th, albeit last. However, after the race, Drugovich was disqualified for pitting on the last lap which violated the rules. He finished the sprint in 13th. Another poor weekend in Monza followed. He finished 16th after a poor start in the feature race and retired in the sprint race, after Roy Nissany hit Drugovich at the back while running just outside the top ten. Drugovich had a solid weekend at Mugello improving a place on the first lap of the feature race after qualifying 5th. When Alesi brought out the safety car, Drugovich pitted for fresher tyres that left him down in 13th. However, he managed to fight back to fight to third on lap 31. Unfortunately, on the last lap, Delétraz snatched away the podium place from him, and so Drugovich was classified fourth. Drugovich was comfortably running in the top 8 for most of the sprint race, however he encountered a car issue. He was quickly overtaken during the later stages and finished 15th.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich had another point-less weekend in Sochi. He was hit from behind on lap 1 in the feature race, and with too much damage sustained, was unable to continue. His sprint race would be just as horrible, finishing last in a red-flagged sprint race after Drugovich had problems with pedal shifts in his steering wheel. Drugovich qualified second for the first Bahrain round, but passed polesitter Callum Ilott into the first corner. Despite being undercut by Ilott during the pit stops, Drugovich managed to pass him again on lap 20. He would therefore go on to win his first feature race by a dominant 14 seconds describing his win as "surprising". He started eighth for the sprint race, which was where he finished. For the second Bahrain round, Drugovich qualified fifth and would be in a battle for the lead for most part of the feature race. Eventually, he finished fourth. However, Nikita Mazepin was penalised for track limits while defending against Yuki Tsunoda and Drugovich, which promoted the Brazilian driver to third. Drugovich capped off the season with a point in eighth at the sprint race. Overall, Drugovich finished his maiden campaign in 9th with 121 points. He achieved a total of three wins, a pole and a fastest lap each, and four podiums.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich topped free practice for the opening race at the Bahrain International Circuit. He would follow it up with an impressive third place in qualifying. For the first sprint race, Drugovich initially ran in the top ten for the first two laps until he was forced to pit due to front wing damage. He finished in 16th. Drugovich made up nine positions to fifth during the opening four laps of the second sprint. Unfortunately, a late safety car brought out by Liam Lawson thwarted his efforts though, as drivers on new tyres passed him and dropped Drugovich down to 14th. In the feature race, Drugovich made up a place on teammate Zhou on the first lap but was back down in third after Oscar Piastri overtook him. After a safety car restart, Drugovich slowly dropped and finished in 8th, but was demoted a place due to a safety car infringement. Drugovich qualified ninth at Monaco but he would start second for the first sprint. He was passed by Christian Lundgaard at the start of the race but halfway through the race, he was back in second as the Danish driver retired with an engine problem. Drugovich would then go on to finish in that position, while taking his first podium of the season. For the second sprint race, on lap 11, a virtual safety car was deployed and Drugovich along with Zhou, made a gamble to put on slick tyres during mixed conditions. It did not pay off, and just a few laps later Drugovich pitted back for wet tyres. He would finish in 14th position. During the feature race, Drugovich pitted early on lap 10 attempting an alternative strategy. This would be a successful strategy and following mishaps from Robert Shwartzman and Dan Ticktum, he was up to third place and would end in that position. Over the radio, he declared that "it was the best race of [his] life".


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich qualified eleventh for the race at Baku. On the opening lap of the first sprint, Drugovich thumped Piastri, who in turn put Lawson in the wall. The stewards deemed Drugovich responsible of the incident, and he was handed a ten-second time penalty. He originally finished ninth but was demoted to 14th. Drugovich made up positions to seventh before the safety car was called out. He slowly was overtaken by quicker drivers and eventually finished tenth. Drugovich made up four positions to seventh on the opening lap, thanks to an incident. He made a comeback drive, overtaking Ralph Boschung during the later stages to finish fourth. Drugovich qualified sixth for the Silverstone weekend. He made up a place on a retirement from Roy Nissany on the opening lap of the first sprint. The rest of his race would be quiet and he would finish in fourth. He finished sixth in the second sprint after pressuring Jüri Vips in the closing stages. In the feature race, Drugovich finished in sixth, the same place where started after passing Théo Pourchaire at the start but eventually being undercut by Shwartzman.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich qualified fifth at Monza, but would turn out to have a poor weekend. Making up a place on Boschung on the opening lap of the first sprint, he clipped Ticktum and spun him out of the race. Drugovich then pitted for a new nose and dropped to 19th. It was not to last however, as on lap 5 he spun out of the race at the Ascari corner. Drugovich only made up three places during the second sprint to finish in 17th. During the feature race, he was running in a net sixth place when he was told to pit once again on lap 15, due to a confusion on front wing damage. He would complete the race in 12th, ending the weekend without points. Drugovich set the fastest time during practice at Sochi, and qualified 13th. However, on the way to the starting grid for the sprint, he crashed heavily into the wall and was taken to hospital. Thankfully, he emerged unscathed but was declared not fit to take part in the feature race.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich qualified fifth at the Jeddah Corniche Circuit. Starting sixth for the first sprint, he concluded the race in fourth after an opening lap pass on Pourchaire and passing Boschung later. Drugovich looked like he was going to finish in the top ten of sprint race 2, but he sustained damaged after Jüri Vips tagged him from behind, dropping Drugovich to tenth at the flag with multiple penalties from other drivers applied. Drugovich finished the red-flagged feature race in fifth. At the final round at Yas Marina, Drugovich qualified eighth. He made a good start on the first sprint, to pass Ticktum and improve to second on the opening lap. Drugovich pressurised Daruvala for most of the race; nearly taking the lead on lap 12, but as the race end drew closer, his challenge faded and Daruvala eventually won. Drugovich finished fifth in the second sprint, nearly overtaking Ticktum on the last lap. In the feature race, Drugovich along with Pourchaire went on the alternative strategy by pitting later in the race. A slightly slow stop for Pourchaire saw Drugovich make a timely overtake on him just before the virtual safety car was called out. On the penultimate lap, Drugovich passed Shwartzman for third and seal off the season with another podium. His clean performance in Abu Dhabi saw him jump Liam Lawson to eighth in the standings, with 105 points and help UNI-Virtuosi leapfrog Carlin as vice-champions. Compared to teammate Zhou, his season was rather frustrating taking four podiums but no wins.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich re-joined MP Motorsport for 2022, this time partnering FIA Formula 3 graduate Clément Novalak. Upon his return to the Dutch outfit, Drugovich stated that he "felt like home".


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich set the fastest time of pre-season testing at the Bahrain International Circuit. He would follow it up by topping practice of the first round in Bahrain. However he only qualified tenth but despite that, he would start on reverse pole for the sprint race. He had a shocking start, falling to sixth. He soon overtook Jake Hughes on the third lap to move up and finish fifth. Drugovich fell to 15th at the start of the feature race, and pitted early for softer tyres. He was soon promoted to second place behind Ayumu Iwasa who was yet to pit, but on lap 17 was overtaken by Théo Pourchaire. Drugovich was overtaken by a few more drivers on fresher tyres and he eventually finished sixth. Drugovich took his second pole position in the series and first of the season at Jeddah, having topped practice as well. Drugovich improved up the order in the sprint race to finish fourth on the road, but was promoted to third after Hughes was disqualified. Drugovich dominated the feature race winning by two seconds despite Richard Verschoor catching up to him during the last few laps. This allowed him to take the championship lead for the first time ever, leading by 11 points, and stated that he had "all the confidence [I] want".


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich qualified a lowly 12th in Imola. However in the sprint race, he made a quick start, passing five cars to take seventh on the opening lap. He then passed Ralph Boschung retiring and then on the final lap, passed Logan Sargeant to take fifth. Drugovich attempted a strategy by starting on the hards. Unfortunately, a safety car on lap 8 rather ruined it, and Drugovich was unable to pull away quickly from the other runners. Drugovich managed to pit under the safety car right at the end, and rescued a point finishing in 10th. However, since Pourchaire won the feature race, Drugovich lost the championship lead and fell to second place, trailing the Frenchman by two points. In Barcelona, having topped practice yet again, he qualified in tenth place. He was set to start in pole position for the sprint race, but was penalised three places for impeding another driver. With reverse polesitter Calan Williams stalling, Drugovich stormed from third to first into the first corner, and led lights-to-flag for his second win of the year. In the feature race, Drugovich did a lengthy stint on his soft tyres, reaching half-race distance before pitting. Following that, he quickly overtook second-placed Frederik Vesti. On lap 27, he passed race leader Jack Doohan and eventually won by five seconds. In doing so, Drugovich became the first F2 driver to win all races in an F2 weekend, which according to him "really showed [their] potential". With that result, Drugovich moved back into the championship lead by 26 points.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: In Monaco, despite crashing, Drugovich qualified on pole after previous polesitter Liam Lawson was penalised for disobeying yellow flag conditions. In the sprint race, he suffered a puncture on the opening lap and after pitting a few times he retired for good on lap 20. In the feature race, Drugovich had a slow pit stop but since second-placed Pourchaire's pit stop was equally slow, Drugovich managed to exit ahead of the Frenchman. For the rest of the race, Pourchaire pressured Drugovich within a second but to no avail, and Drugovich was able to take his fourth win of the season. In Baku, he qualified fifth. He finished in fifth during a chaotic sprint race, having dropped two positions at the start. In the feature race, having sat in fifth until the lap 15 safety car restart when Marcus Armstrong ahead suffered front wing damage which promoted Drugovich to fourth. A late crash for leader Jüri Vips meant Drugovich was able to inherit a position and take third place. His result meant he moved 51 points clear of second-placed Pourchaire.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: In Silverstone, Drugovich qualified third coincidentally setting the same lap as Pourchaire but the former was given position ahead having ended his lap earlier. For the sprint race, he made a few overtakes to take fifth place. For the feature race, a slow start saw him drop back to fifth. His race was relatively quiet until the final lap, where he passed Frederik Vesti to snatch fourth place. At the Red Bull Ring he managed fifth in qualifying, and fourth in the sprint race. However the choice to start on wet tyres on a drying track during the feature race did not pay off, and was second last before he made his pit stop. He was unable to progress much and despite a few penalties for others, he finished 11th overall in the race. Following Austria, Drugovich's lead was cut to 39 points.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: In France, he qualified second, but his lap time was deleted and his next-best lap time was used, dropping him to sixth. In the sprint race, Drugovich capitalised on Pourchaire forcing Armstrong wide late in the race, which saw him take fourth place, but was promoted to the podium after Pourchaire was penalised. In the feature race, he fell to eighth in the early stages but was back up to fifth following the pit stops. He secured fourth place after making a late overtake on Doohan with four laps to go. In Budapest, he qualified third. Having finished fourth in the sprint race, Drugovich had a much tougher feature race. He was jumped by Pourchaire at the start, and decided to pit early. Drugovich made an undercut on Armstrong but the New Zealander would repass him on lap 19. With degrading tyres, Drugovich was passed by cars on fresher tyres which dropped him to ninth at the flag. By Pourchaire winning at the same time, Drugovich's lead was slashed to 21 points heading into the summer break.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: In Spa-Francorchamps, Drugovich took his third pole of the year. In the sprint race, he moved into sixth at the start, remaining there until Sargeant brought out the safety car while Drugovich opted to pit for fresher tyres. Rejoining in 12th, he made up eight positions to claim fourth place in only four laps. In the feature race, he ended in second place after eventual winner Doohan made a successful undercut during the pit stops, leaving Drugovich coming up short by two seconds. In Zandvoort, he took consecutive poles for the first time, stating that his flying laps up until his pole lap "didn't have full confidence". Having finished tenth in the sprint race, Drugovich returned to winning ways in the feature race, which gave him one hand on the championship title. With Pourchaire only scoring two points in the two rounds, Drugovich extended his lead over him to 69 points.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Heading into Monza, Drugovich qualified fourth, but was penalised five places to 12th for the sprint race for breaching yellow flags. He would seal the title in the sprint race if Pourchaire finished sixth or lower. Drugovich retired early on the last lap after making contact with Amaury Cordeel, damaging his suspension. With Pourchaire finishing only 17th, it meant that Drugovich was crowned 2022 Formula 2 champion. Following the race, Drugovich described his title as "not how [I] expected it". In the feature race, Drugovich ran third before a lap 7 safety car, which he pitted two laps later and came out down in 13th place. He had little pace, passing Cordeel late in the race to take seventh, later a post-race disqualification promoted Drugovich to sixth place.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: On 12 September 2022, two days after winning the 2022 Formula 2 Championship, Drugovich was announced as the first member of the newly formed AMF1 Driver Development Programme, as well as joining Aston Martin's reserve driver roster. He had his first contact with a Formula One car testing the AMR21 at Silverstone at the beginning of November, thanks to which he met the necessary requirements to obtain the FIA Super Licence and drive in free practice at the 2022 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. Drugovich also took part in the post-season tests in Abu Dhabi, driving the Aston Martin.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich was born in Maringá, Paraná, Brazil. He has Eastern European, Austrian and Italian ancestry, as well as having dual Brazilian and Italian citizenship.


title: Felipe Drugovich

text: Drugovich did not compete in the required number of rounds to be eligible for a championship position.


title: Anna Freud

text: Anna Freud (3 December 1895 – 9 October 1982) was a British psychoanalyst of Austrian-Jewish descent. She was born in Vienna, the sixth and youngest child of Sigmund Freud and Martha Bernays. She followed the path of her father and contributed to the field of psychoanalysis. Alongside Hermine Hug-Hellmuth and Melanie Klein, she may be considered the founder of psychoanalytic child psychology.


title: Anna Freud

text: Compared to her father, her work emphasized the importance of the ego and its normal "developmental lines" as well as incorporating a distinctive emphasis on collaborative work across a range of analytical and observational contexts.


title: Anna Freud

text: After the Freud family were forced to leave Vienna in 1938 with the advent of the Nazi regime in Austria, she resumed her psychoanalytic practice and her pioneering work in child psychology in London, establishing the Hampstead Child Therapy Course and Clinic in 1952 (now the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families) as a centre for therapy, training and research work.


title: Anna Freud

text: Anna Freud was born in Vienna, Austria-Hungary, on 3 December 1895. She was the youngest daughter of Sigmund Freud and Martha Bernays. She grew up in "comfortable bourgeois circumstances." Anna Freud appears to have had a comparatively unhappy childhood, in which she "never made a close or pleasurable relationship with her mother, and was instead nurtured by their Catholic nurse Josephine". She found it particularly difficult to get along with her eldest sister, Sophie, "the two young Freuds developed their version of a common sisterly division of territories, 'beauty' and 'brains', and their father once spoke of her "age-old jealousy of Sophie." As well as this rivalry between the two sisters, Anna had become "a somewhat troubled youngster who complained to her father in candid letters how all sorts of unreasonable thoughts and feelings plagued her". She may have had depression which caused eating disorders and "she ... was repeatedly sent to health farms for thorough rest, salutary walks, and some extra pounds to fill out her all too slender shape".


title: Anna Freud

text: The close relationship between Anna and her father was different from the rest of her family. She was a lively child with a reputation for mischief. Freud wrote to his friend Wilhelm Fliess in 1899: "Anna has become downright beautiful through naughtiness." In adolescence, she took a precocious interest in her father's work and was allowed to sit in on the meetings of the newly established Vienna Psychoanalytical Society which Freud convened at his home.


title: Anna Freud

text: Enrolled at the Cottage Lyceum, a secondary school for girls in Vienna, Anna made good progress in most subjects. The steady flow of foreign visitors to the Freud household inspired Anna to emulate her father by becoming proficient in different languages and she soon mastered English and French and acquired some basic Italian. The positive experience she had at the Lyceum led to her initial choice of teaching as a career. After she left the Lyceum in 1912, she took an extended vacation over the winter months in Italy. This proved to be, for a period, a time of self-doubt, anxiety, and uncertainty about her future. She shared these concerns in correspondence with her father whose writings she had begun reading. In response, he provided reassurance and in the spring of 1913, he joined her for a tour of Verona, Venice and Trieste.


title: Anna Freud

text: A visit to Britain in the autumn of 1914, chaperoned by her father's colleague Ernest Jones, became of concern to Freud when he learned of the latter's romantic interest. His advice to Jones, in a letter of 22 July 1914, was that his daughter "... does not claim to be treated as a woman, being still far away from sexual longings and rather refusing man. There is an outspoken understanding between me and her that she should not consider marriage or the preliminaries before she gets two or three years older".


title: Anna Freud

text: In 1914 she passed her teaching examination and began work as a teaching apprentice at her old school, the Cottage Lyceum. From 1915 to 1917, she worked as a teaching apprentice for third, fourth, and fifth graders. For the school year 1917–18, she began "her first venture as Klassenlehrerin (head teacher) for the second grade". For her performance during the school years 1915-18 she was highly praised by her superior, Salka Goldman who wrote that she showed "great zeal for all her responsibilities", but she was particularly appreciated for her "conscientious preparations" and for her "gift for teaching", being such a success that she was invited to stay on with a regular four-year contract starting in the fall of 1918.


title: Anna Freud

text: With the encouragement and assistance of her father she pursued her exploration of psychoanalytic literature and in the summer of 1915 she undertook her first translation work for the Vienna Psychoanalytical Society, translating papers by James Jackson Putnam (into German) and Hermine Hug-Hellmuth (into English). During 1916 and 1917 she attended the lectures on psychoanalysis her father gave at the University of Vienna. By 1918 she had gained his support to pursue a training in psychoanalysis and she went into analysis with him in October of that year. Having contracted tuberculosis during 1918, and thereafter experiencing multiple episodes of illness, she resigned her teaching post in 1920.


title: Anna Freud

text: As well as in the periods of analysis she had with her father (from 1918 to 1921 and from 1924 to 1929), their filial bond became further strengthened after Freud was diagnosed with cancer of the jaw in 1923, for which he would need numerous operations and the long-term nursing assistance which Anna provided. She also acted as his secretary and spokesperson, notably at the bi-annual congresses of the International Psychoanalytical Association which Freud was unable to attend after 1922.


title: Anna Freud

text: At the outset of her psychoanalytic practice Anna found an important friend and mentor in the person of her father’s friend and colleague Lou Andreas-Salome. After she came to stay with the Freuds in Vienna in 1921, they began a series of consultations and discussions which continued both in Vienna and in visits Anna made to Salome’s home in Germany.


title: Anna Freud

text: In 1922 Anna Freud presented her paper "Beating Fantasies and Daydreams" to the Vienna Psychoanalytical Society and became a member of the society. In 1923, she began her own psychoanalytical practice with children and by 1925 she was teaching at the Vienna Psychoanalytic Training Institute on the technique of child analysis, her approach to which she set out in her first book, "An Introduction to the Technique of Child Analysis", published in 1927.


title: Anna Freud

text: Among the first children Anna Freud took into analysis were those of Dorothy Burlingham. In 1925 Burlingham, heiress to the Tiffany luxury jewellery retailer, had arrived in Vienna from New York with her four children and entered analysis firstly with Theodore Reik and then, with a view to training in child analysis, with Freud himself. Anna and Dorothy soon developed "intimate relations that closely resembled those of lesbians", though Anna "categorically denied the existence of a sexual relationship". After the Burlinghams moved into the same apartment block as the Freuds in 1929 she became, in effect, the children's stepparent.


title: Anna Freud

text: In 1927 Anna Freud and Burlingham set up a new school in collaboration with a family friend, Eva Rosenfeld, who ran a foster care home in the Hietzing district of Vienna. Rosenfeld provided the space in the grounds of her house and Burlingham funded the building and equipping of the premises. The objective was to provide a psychoanalytically informed education and Anna contributed to the teaching. Most pupils were either in analysis or children of analysands or practitioners. Peter Blos and Erik Erikson joined the staff of the Hietzing school at the beginning of their psychoanalytic careers, Erikson entering into a training analysis with Anna. The school closed in 1932.


title: Anna Freud

text: Anna’s first clinical case was that of her nephew Ernst, the eldest of the two sons of Sophie and Max Halberstadt. Sophie, Anna’s elder sister, had died of influenza in 1920 at her Hamburg home. Heinz (known as Heinele), aged two, was adopted in an informal arrangement by Anna’s elder sister, Mathilde, and her husband Robert Hollitscher. Anna became heavily involved in the care of eight year old Ernst and also considered adoption. She was dissuaded by her father over concerns for his wife’s health. Anna made regular trips to Hamburg for analytical work with Ernst who was in the care of his father’s extended family. She also arranged Ernst’s transfer to a school more appropriate to his needs, provided respite for her brother-in-law’s family and arranged for him to join the Freud-Burlingham extended family for their summer holidays. Eventually, in 1928, Anna persuaded the parties concerned that a permanent move to Vienna was in Ernst’s best interests, not least because he could resume analysis with her on a more regular basis. Ernst went into the foster care of Eva Rosenfeld, attended the Hietzing school and became part of the Freud-Burlingham extended family. In 1930 he spent a year at Berggasse 19, where the Freuds and Burlinghams had apartments, staying with the Burlinghams.


title: Anna Freud

text: In 1937 Freud and Burlingham launched a new project, establishing a nursery for children under the age of two. The aim was to meet the social needs of children from impoverished families and to enhance psychoanalytic research into early childhood development. Funding was provided by Edith Jackson, a wealthy American analysand of Anna’s father who had also been trained in child analysis by Anna at the Vienna Insitiute. Though the Jackson Nursery was short-lived, with the Anschluss imminent, the systematic record keeping and reporting provided important models for Anna’s future work with nursery children.


title: Anna Freud

text: From 1925 until 1934, Anna was the Secretary of the International Psychoanalytical Association while she continued her child analysis practice and contributed to seminars and conferences on the subject. In 1935, she became director of the Vienna Psychoanalytical Training Institute and the following year she published her influential study of the "ways and means by which the ego wards off depression, displeasure and anxiety", "The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defence". It became a founding work of ego psychology and established Freud's reputation as a pioneering theoretician.


title: Anna Freud

text: In 1938, following the Anschluss in which Nazi Germany occupied Austria, Anna was taken to Gestapo headquarters in Vienna for questioning on the activities of the International Psychoanalytical Association. Unknown to her father, she and her brother Martin had obtained Veronal from Max Schur, the family doctor, in sufficient quantities to commit suicide if faced with torture or internment. However, she survived her interrogation ordeal and returned to the family home. After her father had reluctantly accepted the urgent need to leave Vienna, she set about organizing the complex immigration process for the family in liaison with Ernest Jones, the then President of the International Psychoanalytical Association, who secured the immigration permits that eventually led to the family establishing their new home in London at 20 Maresfield Gardens, Hampstead.


title: Anna Freud

text: In 1941 Freud and Burlingham collaborated in establishing the Hampstead War Nursery for children whose lives had been disrupted by the war. Premises were acquired in Hampstead, North London and in Essex to provide education and residential care with mothers encouraged to visit as often as practicable. Many for the staff were recruited from the exiled Austro-German diaspora. Lectures and seminars on psychoanalytic theory and practice were regular features of staff training. Freud and Burlingham went on to publish a series of observational studies on child development based on the work of the Nursery with a focus on the impact of stress on children and their capacity to find substitute affections among peers in the absence of their parents. The Bulldog Banks Home, run on similar lines to the Nursery, was established after the war for a group of children who had survived the concentration camps. Building on and developing their war-time work with children, Freud and Burlingham established the Hampstead Child Therapy Course and Clinic (now the Anna Freud National Centre for Children and Families) in 1952 as a centre for therapy, training and research work.


title: Anna Freud

text: During the war years the hostility between Anna Freud and Melanie Klein and their respective followers in the British Psychoanalytic Society (BPS) grew more intense. Their disagreements, which dated back to the 1920s, centered around the theory of the genesis of the super-ego and the consequent clinical approach to the pre-Oedipal child; Klein argued for play as an equivalent to free association in adult analyses. Anna Freud opposed any such equivalence, proposing an educative intervention with the child until an appropriate level of ego development was reached at the Oedipal stage. Klein held this to be a collusive inhibition of analytical work with the child. To avoid a terminal split in the BPS Ernest Jones, its president, chaired a number of "extraordinary business meetings" with the aim of defusing the conflict, and these continued during the war years. The meetings, which became known as the Controversial Discussions, were established on a more regular basis from 1942. In 1944 there finally emerged a compromise agreement which established parallel training courses, providing options to satisfy the concerns of the rival groups that had formed which by then, in addition to the followers of Freud and Klein, included a non-aligned group of Middle or Independent Group analysts. It was agreed further that all the key policy-making committees of the BPS should have representatives from the three groups.


title: Anna Freud

text: From the 1950s until the end of her life Freud travelled regularly to the United States to lecture, teach and visit friends. During the 1970s she was concerned with the problems of emotionally deprived and socially disadvantaged children, and she studied deviations and delays in development. At Yale Law School, she taught seminars on crime and the family: this led to a transatlantic collaboration with Joseph Goldstein and Albert J. Solnit on children's needs and the law, published in three volumes as "Beyond the Best Interests of the Child" (1973), "Before the Best Interests of the Child" (1979), and "In the Best Interests of the Child" (1986).


title: Anna Freud

text: The 1970s were also a time of emotional stress for Freud as she endured a number of bereavements involving family members and close colleagues. Her favourite brother, Ernst, died in April 1970 while she was in America. In the following months she lost two of her American cousins, Henry Freud and Rosie Waldinger, and colleagues Heinz Hartmann and Max Schur. She had further distress following the deaths of her partner Dorothy Burlingham's eldest son and daughter, both of whom had had extensive period of analysis with her as children in Vienna and as adults in London. Robert Burlingham died in February 1970 of heart disease after a long period of depression. In 1974 Burlingham's daughter Mabbie arrived in London from her New York home seeking further analysis with Anna, notwithstanding the latter's advice to continue in analysis with her New York analyst. Whilst at the family home in Hampstead she took an overdose of sleeping pills, and died in hospital three days later.


title: Anna Freud

text: Freud was naturalised as a British subject on 22 July 1946. She was elected as a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1959 and in 1973 she was made an Honorary President of the International Psychoanalytic Association. In 1967 she was awarded the CBE.


title: Anna Freud

text: Freud died in London on 9 October 1982. She was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium and her ashes placed in the "Freud Corner" next to her parents' ancient Greek funeral urn. Her life-partner Dorothy Burlingham and several other members of the Freud family also rest there. In 1986 her London home of forty years was transformed, according to her wishes, into the Freud Museum, dedicated to the memory of her father.


title: Anna Freud

text: Anna Freud was a prolific writer, contributing articles on psychoanalysis to many different publications throughout her lifetime. Her first publication was titled, "An Introduction to Psychoanalysis: Lectures for Child Analysts and Teachers 1922–1935", and was the result of four different lectures she was delivering at the time, to teachers and caretakers of young children in Vienna. "


title: Anna Freud

text: Anna Freud's first article "Beating Fantasies and Daydreams" (1922), "drew in part on her own inner life, but th[at] ... made her contribution no less scientific". In it she explained how, "Daydreaming, which consciously may be designed to suppress masturbation, is mainly unconsciously an elaboration of the original masturbatory fantasies". Her father, Sigmund Freud, had earlier covered very similar ground in "A Child is Being Beaten" – "they both used material from her analysis as clinical illustration in their sometimes complementary papers" – in which he highlighted a female case where "an elaborate superstructure of day-dreams, which was of great significance for the life of the person concerned, had grown up over the masochistic beating-phantasy ... [one] which almost rose to the level of a work of art".


title: Anna Freud

text: Her views on child development, which she expounded in 1927 in her first book, "An Introduction to the Technique of Child Analysis", clashed with those of Melanie Klein, "[who] was departing from the developmental schedule that Freud, and his analyst daughter, found most plausible". In particular, Anna Freud's belief that "In children's analysis, the transference plays a different role ... and the analyst not only 'represents mother' but is still an original second mother in the life of the child". became something of an orthodoxy over much of the psychoanalytic world.


title: Anna Freud

text: For her next major work in 1936, "The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defence", a classic monograph on ego psychology and defense mechanisms, Anna Freud drew on her own clinical experience, but relied on her father's writings as the principal and authoritative source of her theoretical insights. Here her "cataloguing of regression, repression, reaction formation, isolation, undoing, projection, introjection, turning against the self, reversal and sublimation" helped establish the importance of the ego functions and the concept of defence mechanisms, continuing the greater emphasis on the ego than that to be found in the work of her father – "We should like to learn more about the ego" – during his final decades.


title: Anna Freud

text: Special attention was paid in it to later childhood and adolescent developments – "I have always been more attracted to the latency period than the pre-Oedipal phases" – emphasizing how the "increased intellectual, scientific, and philosophical interests of this period represent attempts at mastering the drives". The problem posed in adolescence by physiological maturation has been stated forcefully by Anna Freud: "Aggressive impulses are intensified to the point of complete unruliness, hunger becomes voracity... The reaction-formations, which seemed to be firmly established in the structure of the ego, threaten to fall to pieces".


title: Anna Freud

text: Selma Fraiberg's tribute of 1959 that "The writings of Anna Freud on ego psychology and her studies in early child development have illuminated the world of childhood for workers in the most varied professions and have been for me my introduction and most valuable guide" spoke at that time for most of psychoanalysis outside the Kleinian heartland.


title: Anna Freud

text: Arguably, however, it was in Anna Freud's London years "that she wrote her most distinguished psychoanalytic papers – including 'About Losing and Being Lost', which everyone should read regardless of their interest in psychoanalysis". Her description therein of "simultaneous urges to remain loyal to the dead and to turn towards new ties with the living" may perhaps reflect her own mourning process after her father's recent death.


title: Anna Freud

text: Focusing thereafter on research, observation and treatment of children, Anna Freud established a group of prominent child developmental analysts (which included Erik Erikson, Elisabeth Geleerd, Edith Jacobson and Margaret Mahler) who noticed that children's symptoms were ultimately analogue to personality disorders among adults and thus often related to developmental stages. Her book "Normality and Pathology in Childhood" (1965) summarised "the use of developmental lines charting theoretical normal growth 'from dependency to emotional self-reliance'". Through these then revolutionary ideas Anna provided us with a comprehensive developmental theory and the concept of developmental lines, which combined her father's important drive model with more recent object relations theories emphasizing the importance of parents in child development processes.


title: Anna Freud

text: Nevertheless, her basic loyalty to her father's work remained unimpaired, and it might indeed be said that "she devoted her life to protecting her father's legacy". In her theoretical work there would be little criticism of him, and she would make what is still the finest contribution to the psychoanalytic understanding of passivity, or what she termed "altruistic surrender, excessive concern and anxiety for the lives of his love objects".


title: Anna Freud

text: Sigmund Freud's biographer Louis Breger observed that Anna Freud's publications "contain few original ideas and are, for the most part, a slavish application of her father's theories."


title: Anna Freud

text: Jacques Lacan called Anna Freud "the plumb line of psychoanalysis". He stated that "the plumb line doesn't make a building, [but] it allows us to gauge the vertical of certain problems."


title: Anna Freud

text: According to her principal biographer, with psychoanalysis continuing to move away from classical Freudianism to other concerns, it may still be salutary to heed Anna Freud's warning about the potential loss of her father's "emphasis on conflict within the individual person, the aims, ideas and ideals battling with the drives to keep the individual within a civilized community. It has become modern to water this down to every individual's longing for perfect unity with his mother ... There is an enormous amount that gets lost this way".


title: Anna Freud

text: In 2002, Freud was honoured with a blue plaque, by English Heritage, at 20 Maresfield Gardens, Hampstead in London, her home between 1938 and 1982.


title: Anna Freud

text: The final track on the 2001 eponymous debut album of indie-rock band The National is titled "Anna Freud".


title: Anna Freud

text: The novel "Hysterical: Anna Freud's Story" by Rebecca Coffey was published by She Writes Press in 2014.


title: Mulch

text: A mulch is a layer of material applied to the surface of soil. Reasons for applying mulch include conservation of soil moisture, improving fertility and health of the soil, reducing weed growth and enhancing the visual appeal of the area.


title: Mulch

text: A mulch is usually, but not exclusively, organic in nature. It may be permanent (e.g. plastic sheeting) or temporary (e.g. bark chips). It may be applied to bare soil or around existing plants. Mulches of manure or compost will be incorporated naturally into the soil by the activity of worms and other organisms. The process is used both in commercial crop production and in gardening, and when applied correctly, can improve soil productivity.


title: Mulch

text: Many materials are used as mulches, which are used to retain soil moisture, regulate soil temperature, suppress weed growth, and for aesthetics. They are applied to the soil surface, around trees, paths, flower beds, to prevent soil erosion on slopes, and in production areas for flower and vegetable crops. Mulch layers are normally or more deep when applied.


title: Mulch

text: Although mulch can be applied around established plants at any time, they may be applied at various times of the year depending on the purpose. Towards the beginning of the growing season, mulches serve initially to warm the soil by helping it retain heat which is otherwise lost during the night. This allows early seeding and transplanting of certain crops, and encourages faster growth. Mulch acts as an insulator. As the season progresses, mulch stabilizes the soil temperature and moisture, and prevents the growing of weeds from seeds.


title: Mulch

text: In temperate climates, the effects of mulches depend upon the time of year in which they are applied. When applied in fall and winter, mulches delay the growth of perennial plants in the spring and prevent growth in winter during warm spells, thus limiting freeze–thaw damage.


title: Mulch

text: The effect of mulch upon soil moisture content is complex. Mulch forms a layer between the soil and the atmosphere reducing evaporation. However, mulch can also prevent water from reaching the soil by absorbing or blocking water from light rains and overly thick layers of mulch can reduce oxygen in the soil.


title: Mulch

text: In order to maximise the benefits of mulch, while minimizing its negative influences, it is often applied in late spring/early summer when soil temperatures have risen sufficiently, but soil moisture content is still relatively high. However, permanent mulch is also widely used and valued for its simplicity, as popularized by author Ruth Stout, who said, "My way is simply to keep a thick mulch of any vegetable matter that rots on both sides of my vegetable and flower garden all year long. As it decays and enriches the soils, I add more."


title: Mulch

text: Materials used as mulches vary and depend on a number of factors. Use takes into consideration availability, cost, appearance, the effect it has on the soil—including chemical reactions and pH, durability, combustibility, rate of decomposition, how clean it is—some can contain weed seeds or plant pathogens.


title: Mulch

text: In some areas of the United States, such as central Pennsylvania and northern California, mulch is often referred to as "tanbark", even by manufacturers and distributors. In these areas, the word "mulch" is used specifically to refer to very fine tanbark or peat moss.


title: Mulch

text: Organic mulches decay over time and are temporary. The way a particular organic mulch decomposes and reacts to wetting by rain and dew affects its usefulness. Some mulches such as straw, peat, sawdust and other wood products may for a while negatively affect plant growth because of their wide carbon to nitrogen ratio, because bacteria and fungi that decompose the materials remove nitrogen from the surrounding soil for growth. Organic mulches can mat down, forming a barrier that blocks water and air flow between the soil and the atmosphere. Vertically applied organic mulches can wick water from the soil to the surface, which can dry out the soil. Mulch made with wood can contain or feed termites, so care must be taken about not placing mulch too close to houses or building that can be damaged by those insects. Mulches placed too close to plant stems and tree trunks can contribute to their failure. Some mulch manufacturers recommend putting mulch several inches away from buildings.


title: Mulch

text: Leaves from deciduous trees, which drop their foliage in the autumn/fall. They tend to be dry and blow around in the wind, so are often chopped or shredded before application. As they decompose they adhere to each other but also allow water and moisture to seep down to the soil surface. Thick layers of entire leaves, especially of maples and oaks, can form a soggy mat in winter and spring which can impede the new growth of lawn grass and other plants. Dry leaves are used as winter mulches to protect plants from freezing and thawing in areas with cold winters; they are normally removed during spring.


title: Mulch

text: Grass clippings, from mowed lawns are sometimes collected and used elsewhere as mulch. Grass clippings are dense and tend to mat down, so are mixed with tree leaves or rough compost to provide aeration and to facilitate their decomposition without smelly putrefaction. Rotting fresh grass clippings can damage plants; their rotting often produces a damaging buildup of trapped heat. Grass clippings are often dried thoroughly before application, which militates against rapid decomposition and excessive heat generation. Fresh green grass clippings are relatively high in nitrate content, and when used as a mulch, much of the nitrate is returned to the soil, conversely the routine removal of grass clippings from the lawn results in nitrogen deficiency for the lawn.


title: Mulch

text: Peat moss, or sphagnum peat, is long lasting and packaged, making it convenient and popular as a mulch. When wetted and dried, it can form a dense crust that does not allow water to soak in. When dry it can also burn, producing a smoldering fire. It is sometimes mixed with pine needles to produce a mulch that is friable. It can also lower the pH of the soil surface, making it useful as a mulch under acid loving plants.


title: Mulch

text: However, peat bogs are a valuable wildlife habitat, and peat is also one of the largest stores of carbon (in Britain, out of a total estimated 9952 million tonnes of carbon in British vegetation and soils, 6948 million tonnes carbon are estimated to be in Scottish, mostly peatland, soils)


title: Mulch

text: Wood chips are a byproduct of the pruning of trees by arborists, utilities and parks; they are used to dispose of bulky waste. Tree branches and large stems are rather coarse after chipping and tend to be used as a mulch at least three inches thick. The chips are used to conserve soil moisture, moderate soil temperature and suppress weed growth. Wood chip mulches on the top of the soil increase nutrient levels in soils and associated plant foliage, contrary to the myth that wood chip mulch tie up nitrogen. Wood chips are most often used under trees and shrubs. When used around soft stemmed plants, an unmulched zone is left around the plant stems to prevent stem rot or other possible diseases. They are often used to mulch trails, because they are readily produced with little additional cost outside of the normal disposal cost of tree maintenance. Wood chips come in various colors.


title: Mulch

text: Woodchip mulch is a byproduct of reprocessing used (untreated) timber (usually packaging pallets), to dispose of wood waste. The chips are used to conserve soil moisture, moderate soil temperature and suppress weed growth. Woodchip mulch is often used under trees, shrubs or large planting areas and can last much longer than arborist mulch. In addition, many consider woodchip mulch to be visually appealing, as it comes in various colors. Woodchips can also be reprocessed into playground woodchip to be used as an impact-attenuating playground surfacing.


title: Mulch

text: Bark chips of various grades are produced from the outer corky bark layer of timber trees. Sizes vary from thin shredded strands to large coarse blocks. The finer types are very attractive but have a large exposed surface area that leads to quicker decay. Layers two or three inches deep are usually used, bark is relativity inert and its decay does not demand soil nitrates. Bark chips are also available in various colors.


title: Mulch

text: Straw mulch or field hay or salt hay are lightweight and normally sold in compressed bales. They have an unkempt look and are used in vegetable gardens and as a winter covering. They are biodegradable and neutral in pH. They have good moisture retention and weed controlling properties but also are more likely to be contaminated with weed seeds. Salt hay is less likely to have weed seeds than field hay. Straw mulch is also available in various colors.


title: Mulch

text: Needles that drop from pine trees are termed "pine straw". It is available in bales. Pine straw has an attractive look and is used in landscape and garden settings. On application pine needles tend to weave together, a characteristic that helps the mulch hold stormwater on steeper slopes. This interlocking tendency combined with a resistance to floating gives it further advantages in maintaining cover and preventing soil erosion. The interlocking tendency also helps keep the mulch structure from collapsing and forming a barrier to infiltration. Pine straw is reputed to create ideal conditions for acid-loving plants. Pine straw may help to acidify soils but studies indicate this effect is often too small to be measurable.


title: Mulch

text: Biodegradable mulches are made out of plant starches and sugars or polyester fibers. These starches can come from plants such as wheat and maize. These mulch films may be a bit more permeable allowing more water into the soil. This mulch can prevent soil erosion, reduce weeding, conserve soil moisture, and increase temperature of the soil. Ultimately this can reduce the amount of herbicides used and manual labor farmers may have to do throughout the growing season. At the end of the season these mulches will start to break down from heat. Microorganisms in the soil break down the mulch into two components, water and carbon dioxide, leaving no toxic residues behind. This source of mulch requires less manual labor since it does not need to be removed at the end of the season and can actually be tilled into the soil. With this mulch it is important to take into consideration that it is much more delicate than other kinds. It should be placed on a day which is not too hot and with less tension than other synthetic mulches. These also can be placed by machine or hand but it is ideal to have a more starchy mulch that will allow it to stick to the soil better.


title: Mulch

text: Cardboard or newspaper can be used as semi-organic mulches. These are best used as a base layer upon which a heavier mulch such as compost is placed to prevent the lighter cardboard/newspaper layer from blowing away. By incorporating a layer of cardboard/newspaper into a mulch, the quantity of heavier mulch can be reduced, whilst improving the weed suppressant and moisture retaining properties of the mulch. However, additional labour is expended when planting through a mulch containing a cardboard/newspaper layer, as holes must be cut for each plant. Sowing seed through mulches containing a cardboard/newspaper layer is impractical. Application of newspaper mulch in windy weather can be facilitated by briefly pre-soaking the newspaper in water to increase its weight.


title: Mulch

text: Plastic mulch used in large-scale commercial production is laid down with a tractor-drawn or standalone layer of plastic mulch. This is usually part of a sophisticated mechanical process, where raised beds are formed, plastic is rolled out on top, and seedlings are transplanted through it. Drip irrigation is often required, with drip tape laid under the plastic, as plastic mulch is impermeable to water.


title: Mulch

text: Polypropylene mulch is made up of polypropylene polymers where polyethylene mulch is made up of polyethylene polymers. These mulches are commonly used in many plastics. Polyethylene is used mainly for weed reduction, whereas polypropylene is used mainly on perennials. This mulch is placed on top of the soil and can be done by machine or hand with pegs to keep the mulch tight against the soil. This mulch can prevent soil erosion, reduce weeding, conserve soil moisture, and increase temperature of the soil. Ultimately this can reduce the amount of work a farmer may have to do, and the amount of herbicides applied during the growing period. The black and clear mulches capture sunlight and warm the soil increasing the growth rate. White and other reflective colours will also warm the soil, but they do not suppress weeds as well. This mulch may require other sources of obtaining water such as drip irrigation since it can reduce the amount of water that reaches the soil. This mulch needs to be manually removed at the end of the season since when it starts to break down it breaks down into smaller pieces. If the mulch is not removed before it starts to break down eventually it will break down into ketones and aldehydes polluting the soil. This mulch is technically biodegradable but does not break down into the same materials the more natural biodegradable mulch does.


title: Mulch

text: Some organic mulches are colored red, brown, black, and other colors using synthetic additives. Isopropanolamine, specifically 1-Amino-2-propanol or monoisopropanolamine, may be used as a pigment dispersant and color fastener in these mulches. Types of mulch which can be dyed include: wood chips, bark chips (barkdust) and pine straw. Colored mulch is made by dyeing the mulch in a water-based solution of colorant and chemical binder.


title: Mulch

text: When colored mulch first entered the market, most formulas were suspected to contain toxic substances, heavy metals and other contaminates. Today, "current investigations indicate that mulch colorants pose no threat to people, pets or the environment. The dyes currently used by the mulch and soil industry are similar to those used in the cosmetic and other manufacturing industries (i.e., iron oxide)", as stated by the Mulch and Soil Council.


title: Mulch

text: According to colorant manufacturer Colorbiotics, independent laboratory studies show that the colorants used in colored mulch are safer than table salt or baking soda.


title: Mulch

text: Colored mulch can be applied anywhere non-colored mulch is used (such as large bedded areas or around plants) and features many of the same gardening benefits as traditional mulch, such as improving soil productivity and retaining moisture. As mulch decomposes, just as with non-colored mulch, more mulch may need to be added to continue providing benefits to the soil and plants. However, if mulch is faded, spraying dye to previously spread mulch in order to restore color is an option.


title: Mulch

text: Organic mulches often smell like freshly cut wood but sometimes they start to smell like vinegar, ammonia, sulfur or silage. This happens when material with ample nitrogen content is not rotated often enough and it forms pockets of increased decomposition. When this occurs, the process may become anaerobic and produce phytotoxic materials in small quantities. Once exposed to the air, the process quickly reverts to an aerobic process, but the anaerobic metabolites may be present for a period of time. Plants low to the ground or freshly planted are the most susceptible, and phytotoxicity from the produced chemicals may prevent germination of some seeds.


title: Mulch

text: Groundcovers are plants which grow close to the ground, under the main crop, to slow the development of weeds and provide other benefits of mulch. They are usually fast-growing plants that continue growing with the main crops. By contrast, cover crops are incorporated into the soil or killed with herbicides. However, live mulches also may need to be mechanically or chemically killed eventually to prevent competition with the main crop.


title: Mulch

text: Some groundcovers can perform additional roles in the garden such as nitrogen fixation in the case of clovers, dynamic accumulation of nutrients from the subsoil in the case of creeping comfrey ("Symphytum ibericum"), and even food production in the case of "Rubus tricolor".


title: Mulch

text: Owing to the great bulk of mulch which is often required on a site, it is often impractical and expensive to source and import sufficient mulch materials. An alternative to importing mulch materials is to grow them on site in a "mulch garden" – an area of the site dedicated entirely to the production of mulch which is then transferred to the growing area. Mulch gardens should be sited as close as possible to the growing area so as to facilitate transfer of mulch materials.


title: Chakram

text: Chakram (; ) is a throwing weapon from the Indian subcontinent. One of its major purposes is to protect the turban and the head from sword/melee attacks. It is circular with a sharpened outer edge and a diameter of . It is also known as chalikar meaning "circle", and was sometimes referred to in English writings as a "war-quoit". The Chakram is primarily a throwing weapon but can also be used hand-to-hand. A smaller variant called "chakri" is worn on the wrist. A related weapon is the "chakri dong", a bamboo staff with a chakri attached at one end.


title: Chakram

text: The earliest references to the chakram come from the 5th century BCE Indian epics "Mahabharata" and "Ramayana" where the Sudarshana Chakra is the weapon of the god Vishnu. Contemporaneous Tamil poems from the 2nd century BCE record it as "thikiri" (திகிரி). Chakra-dhāri ("chakram-wielder" or "disc-bearer") is a name for Krishna. The chakram was later used extensively by the Sikhs at least until the days of Ranjit Singh. Even in present days the Nihangs wear chakkar on their damalaas and is also in the uniform of Sikh Regiment worn on turban. It came to be associated with Sikhs because of the Nihang practice of wearing chakram on their arms, around the neck and even tied in tiers on high turbans. The Portuguese chronicler Duarte Barbosa writes () of the chakram being used in the Delhi Sultanate.


title: Chakram

text: The people of the kingdom ... are very good fighting men and good knights, armed with many kinds of weapons; they are great bowmen, and very strong men; they have very good lances, swords, daggers, steel maces, and battle-axes, with which they fight; and they have some steel wheels, which they call chakarani, two fingers broad, sharp outside like knives, and without edge inside; and the surface of these is of the size of a small plate. And they carry seven or eight of these each, put on the left arm; and they take one and put it on the finger of the right hand, and make it spin round many times, and so they hurl it at their enemies, and if they hit anyone on the arm or leg or neck, it cuts through all. And with these they carry on much fighting, and are very dexterous with them.


title: Chakram

text: From its native India, variations of the Chakram spread to other Asian countries. In Tibet and Malaysia, the chakram was not flat but torus-like. Mongol cavalry used a similar throwing weapon with spiked edges.


title: Chakram

text: Chakarani is a name for flat steel throwing ring similar to the chakram and used by the Jubba tribe of central Africa.


title: Chakram

text: Chakram are traditionally made from steel or brass which is beaten into a circular shape against an anvil with an indentation for the curvature. Two ends are connected with a piece of brass and then heated, forming a complete circle before the brass is removed. Some chakram, even those used in combat, were ornately engraved, or inlaid with brass, silver or gold.


title: Chakram

text: The chakram is wide and is typically in diameter. The smaller variations are known as "chakri" while the larger ones are called "vada chakra" which were as large as a shield.


title: Chakram

text: The chakram's combat application is largely dependent on its size. Regular-sized (diameter of or more) steel chakram could be thrown , while brass chakram, due to their better airfoil design, could be thrown in excess of . If properly constructed, it should be a perfect circle. Warriors trained by throwing chakram at lengths of green bamboo. In single combat, the chakram could be thrown underarm like a modern Aerobie. In battles, it was usually thrown vertically so as to avoid accidentally hitting an ally on the left or right side. A stack of chakram could be quickly thrown one at a time like shuriken. On elephant or horseback, chakram could be more easily thrown than spears or arrows. Because of its aerodynamic circular shape it is not easily deflected by wind.


title: Chakram

text: The most iconic method of throwing a chakram is "tajani", wherein the weapon is twirled on the index finger of an upraised hand and thrown with a timed flick of the wrist. The spin is meant to add power and range to the throw, while also avoiding the risk of cutting oneself on the sharp outer edge. An adept user can twirl the chakram while using another weapon with the other hand. The use of tajani in battle was perfected by the Nihang who employed a particular formation to protect the chakram-wielder from harm. Although variants of the chakram would make their way to neighbouring parts of the region, the tajani technique appears to have remained unique to Indian martial arts.


title: Chakram

text: The smaller chakri could also be worn on the arms or wrists and used like knuckledusters. When worn on the arms the chakri could be used to break or cut the opponent's arms while grappling. The larger "vada chakra" were worn around the neck and thrown or dropped down on the opponent vertically. In the turban, it could be raked across an enemy's face or eyes while fighting.


title: Chakram

text: In the 1970s, the American inventor Alan Adler began attempting to improve upon a flying toy disc by considering its design characteristics. He tried streamlining the shape of the disc to reduce drag, but this resulted in a disc that was more unstable in flight. Eventually, inspired by British accounts of deadly Indian weaponry and martial arts, he turned his attention to the ring shape of the chakram. This led to the development of the predecessor of the Aerobie, which was called the "Skyro".


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri, ) is a major city in West Bengal that forms "Twin Cities" with the neighboring district capital of Jalpaiguri. The city spans areas of the Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri districts in the Indian state of West Bengal. Known as the ""Gateway of Northeast India"", Siliguri is popular for three Ts - tea, timber and tourism. It is located on the banks of the Mahananda River and the Teesta River at the foothills of the Himalayas. Siliguri is the third largest urban agglomeration in West Bengal, after Kolkata and Asansol.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri has great strategic importance in West Bengal. It is located conveniently, connecting four international borders i.e. China, Nepal, Bangladesh and Bhutan. It also connects the North-East with mainland India. Located at the foothills of Eastern Himalayas, Siliguri is a significant trading and transportation hub.


title: Siliguri

text: According to Sailen Debnath, "Siliguri" means a stack of pebbles or stones. Until the 19th century this region was called as "Shilchaguri" when there was dense Dolka forest covering the region. Siliguri was a small agricultural village in the Kingdom of Sikkim. It was captured by the Kingdom of Nepal in 1788, after which Kirati and Nepali Lepchas came to settle in this region.


title: Siliguri

text: At that time a river port on Mahananda, South of Siliguri in Phansidewa had an important role in having trade bond with Malda, Bengal and Bihar. This riverine trade line was thus used by the Bhutanese and Sikkimese to bring goods into their mainland.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri started as a small area i.e. now Saktigarh, southern part of city, on the bank of Mahananda River. Treaty of Sugauli in 1815 signed between Britain-Nepal, changed the prospect of Siliguri. As it became a point of transit with Darjeeling hills and Nepal mainland. 1815 onwards, Siliguri started growing rapidly as a small city due to its strategic convenience of trade. In 1865, the British captured Darjeeling and the entire Dooars region to build tea plantations and export the produce to England. For easy exportation they introduced the Siliguri Town railway station which stands to this day, and introduced the Toy train from the station to Darjeeling in 1880. This helped Siliguri gain sub-divisional town status in 1907.


title: Siliguri

text: The "Siliguri Corridor" was formed when Bengal was divided into West Bengal and East Pakistan (later Bangladesh) in 1947, with Sikkim later merging with India in 1975. At this point many immigrants came to settle here for better facilities which led to an increased population. Later in 1950 Siliguri achieved municipal status. Keeping in mind the importance of Siliguri, in 1951, the Assam rail link was established with newly made (1949) Meter gauge Siliguri Junction railway station. After few years in 1961 all these stations were connected with broad gauge New Jalpaiguri Junction railway station which later became the most important railway station in Northeast India.


title: Siliguri

text: Due to tremendous growth, Siliguri is now far away from its past outlook, becoming the largest and fastest growing city in eastern India after Guwahati. The growth rate of Siliguri was 57.8% during 1971- 1981, considering this growth, Siliguri came under Integrated Urban Development Project program in 1981. Siliguri touched 46.83% of population growth rate in 1981–1991. A treaty between India and China for trade through Nathu La Pass, has expedited development and prospects of Siliguri as an international transportation and logistics hub. Later in 1994 Siliguri built a Municipal corporation which has been responsible for the civic infrastructure and administration of the city of Siliguri. Siliguri has now achieved the status of becoming the 3rd largest city in West Bengal, after Kolkata.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri located at the foothills of the eastern Himalayas at a location of . This city is spread over an area of 260 km within the Siliguri Corridor, also known as the "Chicken's neck". The city is surrounded by dense forests towards north and lifeline of Siliguri, Mahananda River flows through the city thereby bisecting it into two-halves. Also Teesta river is not so far from the city. Siliguri has an average elevation of 122 metres (400 feet). As Siliguri is located in the Terai region, the soil is sandy in nature i.e. the ratio of sand and silt is much higher than clay. This region is very prone to earthquake as there are several fault lines nearby.


title: Siliguri

text: The Siliguri subdivision is surrounded by Himalayan ranges towards north and towards south by the country Bangladesh, Uttar Dinajpur district of West Bengal and the Indian state of Bihar. On the east lies Jalpaiguri district and Kalimpong district and bounded on the west by the country of Nepal, thus strategically so important.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri falls under the humid subtropical climate ("Cwa"), when using the Köppen climate classification. Warm summer, cool winter and a severe monsoon defines Siliguri's climate.


title: Siliguri

text: The average annual temperature in Siliguri is 23.7 °C. In summer, the temperature varies from a minimum of 18-22 °C to a maximum of 26-32 °C. The temperature of the hottest month, August is 28.5 °C. The temperature in summer sometimes exceeds 35 °C. On the other hand, the winter maximum temperature hovers around 20-24 °C, and the minimum drops 6-9 °C. January is the coldest month with an average temperature of 16.1 °C. The minimum temperature in winter season sometimes drops 5 °C or below. The highest temperature ever recorded in Siliguri is 41.7 °C, was recorded on 15 April 1952, while the lowest was recorded on 8 January 2018, when the mercury plummeted to 1.9 °C.


title: Siliguri

text: On an average, Siliguri gets 3340 mm per year. Winters are mostly dry, with the summers being rainy. About 80% of the annual rainfall is felt between June to September, this period is known as monsoons or rainy season in the season cycle. Heavy showers are often felt in May, June, July, August and September. July is the wettest month (804 mm) and January is the driest month (12 mm). The average rainy days in July is 27 and for December and January it is 1. The humidity in air is high throughout the year.


title: Siliguri

text: Based on Census data of 2011, the population of Siliguri UA/Metropolitan (including Siliguri municipal corporation and Dabagram municipality) is 701,489, while the population in the Municipal corporation area is 5,13,264. Males constitute 51.44% of the population and females 48.55%. Population shares of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe category persons in Siliguri municipal area are 8.84% and 1.25% respectively. The literacy rate in Siliguri is 77.64%. There are 154 notified and 31 non-notified slums in Siliguri, with 32% of Siliguri's population staying in them.


title: Siliguri

text: In the municipal corporation at the time of the 2011 census, 60.88% of the population spoke Bengali, 25.24% Hindi, 4.66% Nepali, 2.39% Bhojpuri, 1.58% Marwari and 1.24% Urdu as their first language.


title: Siliguri

text: Bengalis form the majority linguistic group in the city, followed by Biharis, Marwaris, Punjabis, Nepalis, Odias, and Tribals. According to a 2001 thesis, Bengali speakers had a percentage of 64.25% out of the total population. Of the 30 wards in 2001, their population varied between 11.71% to 98.96%.


title: Siliguri

text: The most commonly followed religion in Siliguri is Hinduism, with Islam being the largest minority religion, followed by small percentage of adherents of Christianity and Buddhism.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri saw rapid urbanisation under the British rule and that was reflected in its local governance as well. The earliest form of local urban governance as a Sanitation Committee set up in 1915. Its function was to dispose off night soil. Till 1921, most aspects of local governance in Darjeeling district, including Siliguri, was looked after by the Darjeeling Improvement Fund. In 1922, Siliguri Local Board with nominated members was created under the Bengal Local Self Government Act, 1885. In 1938, the Union Board was set up in Siliguri under the Bengal Village Self-Government Act, 1919 and it provided public utilities in the city.


title: Siliguri

text: The Municipal Council was set up in 1949 under the Bengal Municipal Act of 1932 with 8 wards. The first chairperson of the municipality was the Sub Divisional Officer and the local councilors, called 'commissioners' in the then municipal act in effect, were nominated by the state government. After the amendment of the act in 1956, 3/4 of the local representatives were elected, while the remaining nominated by the Deputy Commissioner. Thus, the first elected chairperson of Siliguri was Jagdish Chandra Bhattacharya.


title: Siliguri

text: In 1994, the municipal council was upgraded to the Siliguri Municipal Corporation with 47 wards. It had five departments then: General Administration, Collection, License, Public Works and Sanitation and Public Health. The corporation now has 23 departments. It has 47 wards, of which 14 wards are in Jalpaiguri district, while the remaining 33 wards are in Darjeeling district. The last municipal elections was in 2015, when Communist Party of India (Marxist) won 23 seats, All India Trinamool Congress won 17 seats, Indian National Congress won 5 seats, Bharatiya Janata Party won 2 seats, while an independent candidate won 1 seat. The mayor of Siliguri for the 5-year term of 2015-20 was Ashok Bhattacharya from CPIM, who was later elected as the local Member of Legislative Assembly as well.


title: Siliguri

text: The term of the last elected body of Siliguri Municipal Corporation got over on 7 May, but municipal elections could not be held because of the COVID-19 pandemic. A Board of Administrators was established with the outgoing mayor, Ashok Bhattacharya, as the chairperson. This board will take care of the civic utilities of the city till the new municipal body is elected. This follows the establishment of similar boards first in state capital Kolkata and then the rest of the state.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri is part of the Darjeeling Lok Sabha constituency. The last elections for the Lok Sabha took place in 2019, when Raju Bista from Bharatiya Janta Party won the seat. The last elections to the West Bengal Vidhan Sabha took place in 2021. The Member of Legislative Assembly representing Siliguri Vidhan Sabha Constituency is Sankar Ghosh.


title: Siliguri

text: Building plans in Siliguri are approved by Siliguri Municipal corporation; for building up to 3 storeys including parking, the Borough Offices give clearance, while for buildings with more than 3 storeys, the Building Department gives the approval. The present City Development Plan 2041 for Siliguri was developed in 2015 as part of the Capacity Building for Urban Development project under the then Ministry of Urban Development by the private consultancy, CRISIL Risk and Infrastructure Solutions Limited. Siliguri City comes under Siliguri Jalpaiguri Planning Area and the responsibility of planning and development of the city lies with Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority.


title: Siliguri

text: The Public Health Engineering Department of the state government is responsible for developing and maintaining the infrastructure for water supply, while the Water Supply department of the corporation provides new connections, supplies water, and collects the user charges. The Conservancy Environment Department of the corporation provides Solid Waste Management services in the city. Each ward in the city has its own Solid Waste Management committee that takes care of cleanliness at the ward level. The Public Works Department of the corporation and Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority are both responsible for the construction and maintenance of roads in Siliguri. Siliguri Jalpaiguri Development Authority also prepared the Traffic & Transportation Master Plan 2030 and the Comprehensive Mobility Plan for Siliguri Jalpaiguri Planning Area.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri and surrounding Sub-Himalayan forests are rich in fauna diversity, the plains of North Bengal (Siliguri, Jalpaiguri, Cooch Behar etc.) are surrounded by deep forests. These forests are home of various rare and common species of plants. The forest here is moist Tropical and characterised by dense growth of tall Sal i.e. Shorea robusta. Sal occupies about 80% of all vegetation in these tropical forest.


title: Siliguri

text: These forests are categorised by their dominating plant species such as 1) East Himalayan Sal Forest present on the lower slopes of Mahananda Wildlife Sanctuary contains Sal, Khair, Simul, Sissoo, Riverine grasslands and various rare species of plants like Orchids 2) East Himalayan Upper Bhabar Sal mainly present at Jalpaiguri district which is characterised by dense population of Microstegium chiliatum, Sal i.e. Shorea robusta. Others are Terminalia tomentosa, Schima wallichii And the 3) Eastern Tarai Sal Forest generally found in lower altitudes compared to other two types of forest. This type of forest characterised by various species of bamboos, ferns, and Sal which is found in Baikunthapur Forest, near Siliguri city.


title: Siliguri

text: Rapid growth of city causing deforestation, making Siliguri warmer day by day and unbalancing the ecosystem.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri is located in the Terai region ("moist land"), a belt of marshy grasslands and dense tropical deciduous moist forests at the base of Himalaya range which is rich in biodiversity, containing numerous rare species of flora and fauna. These forests are characterised by their distinct wildlife variety. Mahananda Wildlife Sanctuary near Siliguri is famous for elephants. Sukna is the gateway to this sanctuary, which is 12 km from Siliguri.


title: Siliguri

text: These sub-Himalayan forests are the home of various types of wild animals like the elephant, tiger, Indian bison, barking deer, wild pig, monkey, civet, snake, lizard, mountain goat, sambar, chital and fishing cat. These forests are also home of about 243 different bird species like the pied hornbill, egret, kingfisher, drongo, fly catcher, woodpecker and others. Another common sight is migratory water birds.


title: Siliguri

text: NH 27 crosses through the heart of the city which is now a part of AH2 project. Siliguri originates the century-old Hill Cart Road that is NH 110 which connects Siliguri and Darjeeling (77 km) made in British period. Siliguri also originates NH 10 which connects Gangtok, NH 12 which connects Pankhabari-Mirik. The highways NH 327, that connects Siliguri — Panitanki and NH 327B connecting Panitanki - Mechi Bridg, are also part of AH2.


title: Siliguri

text: Being a transportation hub, Siliguri is well connected through railway with almost all parts of the country. There are seven stations that serve the city.


title: Siliguri

text: Bagdogra International Airport is an international airport located towards the west of Siliguri city, operated as a civil enclave at AFS Bagdogra of the Indian Air Force. This airport is a major transport hub in the region with flights connecting Kolkata, New Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Guwahati, Dibrugarh and has international connectivity with Paro and Bangkok. The airport also has regular helicopter services to Gangtok. Due to its location near Darjeeling hills and Sikkim, Bagdogra international airport sees thousands of tourists annually.


title: Siliguri

text: Central government of India confirmed international airport status to this airport in 2002 with limited international operations. This is one of the few airports in India with zero sales tax on aviation turbine fuel.


title: Siliguri

text: Siliguri hosts numerous sporting events and matches to influence and build up young athletes from the city. Some of the important sports enthusiast local clubs in Siliguri organise several cricket, football, volleyball, swimming competition, TT matches etc. S.A.I or Sports Authority of India in Kanchenjunga Stadium conducts football and athletics. With the provision for an international outdoor and indoor stadium, Siliguri has enough opportunities to host national level matches. This has also led to Siliguri being a prominent city to produce national champions like Mantu Ghosh, the gold medalist winner in the bi-annual South Asian Games (SAF) for table tennis, Ankita Das, Nandita Saha and Soumyajit Ghosh another internationally acclaimed table tennis player and Wriddhiman Saha – Indian international cricketer who plays Test matches for Indian national team. Siliguri has done a tremendous job for Indian table tennis. Bikash Ghosh Memorial Swimming Pool is beside Kanchanjunga stadium in the city, which conducts swimming competitions. White water rafting is done nearby in the Teesta river.


title: Siliguri

text: This is the main stadium in Siliguri, a multipurpose stadium, mainly used for football matches, although it has also hosted several cricket matches. It has a capacity of 30,000 people at a time. Recently this stadium is all set to get a facelift.


title: Siliguri

text: Indoor sports including table tennis, badminton, taekwon-do, lawn tennis and chess are being played here. Siliguri is renowned for being the training grounds of table tennis players. This stadium can hold 5000 people at a time. The Senior National Table Tennis Championship was recently organised here. Sports festival, 2017 was also held in this indoor stadium.


title: Siliguri

text: Darjeeling Himalayan Railway toy train runs between New Jalpaiguri, Siliguri and Darjeeling. It was built between 1879 and 1881 and has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Coronation Bridge, also known as Sevoke Bridge, is situated on lower Himalaya about 20 km from Siliguri and was made in 1930 This bridge spans across Teesta River. Gajoldoba view point is 28 km from Siliguri, famous for the huge reservoir formed by Teesta barrage. This reservoir is home for variety of migratory birds (like river lapwing, great crested grebe, Indian cormorant, purple heron, Eurasian wigeon, common shelduck, cotton teal, tufted duck, little ringed plover, great cormorant). Due to shuttling of migratory birds, the Pakhibitan sanctuary was established here. A boating facility is available.


title: Siliguri

text: North Bengal Wild Animals Park, about away from the city, offers visitors the 'Bengal Safari' to experience sub-Himalayan wildlife closely, such as jungle fowl, sambar deer, royal bengal tiger, wild boars, spotted deer, wild bear, and rhinoceros. It is fundamentally a part of the Mahananda Wildlife Sanctuary, spread over an area of 700 acres. The park conducts herbivore safaris, carnivore safaris, and elephant safaris. The Mahananda Wildlife Sanctuary is located away from Siliguri on the foothills of the Himalayas, between Teesta and Mahananda.The sanctuary spans over of reserve forest. In 1959, it received the status of a sanctuary mainly to protect the Indian bison and royal bengal tiger. This sanctuary is home to rare mountain goat, chital, barking dear, fishing cat, sambar deer, tiger, elephant and Indian bison and migratory birds. It offers mild to medium trekking challenges at some points.