Yol, India
Encyclopedia
Yol is a cantonment
Cantonment
A cantonment is a temporary or semi-permanent military or police quarters. The word cantonment is derived from the French word canton meaning corner or district, as is the name of the Cantons of Switzerland. In South Asia, the term cantonment also describes permanent military stations...

 town in Kangra district
Kangra district
Kangra is the most populous district of the state of Himachal Pradesh, India. Dharamsala is the administrative headquarters of the district.-Geography:Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh is situated in Western Himalayas between 31°2 to...

 in the India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

n state
States and territories of India
India is a federal union of states comprising twenty-eight states and seven union territories. The states and territories are further subdivided into districts and so on.-List of states and territories:...

 of Himachal Pradesh
Himachal Pradesh
Himachal Pradesh is a state in Northern India. It is spread over , and is bordered by the Indian states of Jammu and Kashmir on the north, Punjab on the west and south-west, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh on the south, Uttarakhand on the south-east and by the Tibet Autonomous Region on the east...

.

History

The town gets its name from YOL (Young Officers Leave camp), a small town established by British Indian Army
British Indian Army
The British Indian Army, officially simply the Indian Army, was the principal army of the British Raj in India before the partition of India in 1947...

 around 1849 is a cantonment area.The yol cantt was built in 1942. Formerly it was known as "majhaitha" village.Now yol is the headquarters of the 9th corps of indian military. The cantonment area is very beautiful and giving a picturesque view.

Geography

Yol is located at 32.17°N 76.2°E. It has an average elevation of 1221 metre
Metre
The metre , symbol m, is the base unit of length in the International System of Units . Originally intended to be one ten-millionth of the distance from the Earth's equator to the North Pole , its definition has been periodically refined to reflect growing knowledge of metrology...

s (4006 feet).

Demographics

India census
Census
A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring and recording information about the members of a given population. It is a regularly occurring and official count of a particular population. The term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common...

, Yol had a population of 10,772. Males constitute 52% of the population and females 48%. Yol has an average literacy rate of 77%, higher than the national average of 59.5%: male literacy is 80%, and female literacy is 74%. In Yol, 12% of the population is under 6 years of age.

Trivia

Yol was the location of a Prisoner-of-war camp
Prisoner-of-war camp
A prisoner-of-war camp is a site for the containment of combatants captured by their enemy in time of war, and is similar to an internment camp which is used for civilian populations. A prisoner of war is generally a soldier, sailor, or airman who is imprisoned by an enemy power during or...

 which hosted German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 soldiers in the First World War and Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 soldiers in the Second World War.
Frogman
Frogman
A frogman is someone who is trained to scuba diving or swim underwater in a military capacity which can include combat. Such personnel are also known by the more formal names of combat diver or combatant diver or combat swimmer....

 Elios Toschi, a member of the pre-Armistice Decima Flottiglia MAS
Decima Flottiglia MAS
The Decima Flottiglia MAS was an Italian commando frogman unit of the Regia Marina created during the Fascist regime.The acronym MAS also refers to various light torpedo boats used by the Regia Marina during World...

 and inventor of the "maiale" had been captured on 29 September 1940 following the sinking of the Italian submarine
Italian submarines of World War II
The Italian submarine fleet of World War II was one of the largest in the world at that time, second only to that of the Soviet Union. It saw action during the Second World War, serving mainly in the Mediterranean...

 Gondar and interned in Yol. He was one of the very few to escape from the camp, crossing India disguised as a local and reaching Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 from neutral Goa
Goa
Goa , a former Portuguese colony, is India's smallest state by area and the fourth smallest by population. Located in South West India in the region known as the Konkan, it is bounded by the state of Maharashtra to the north, and by Karnataka to the east and south, while the Arabian Sea forms its...

 (at the time a Portuguese colony).
After the war, the former POW facility hosted refugees from Chinese
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

-occupied Tibet
Tibet
Tibet is a plateau region in Asia, north-east of the Himalayas. It is the traditional homeland of the Tibetan people as well as some other ethnic groups such as Monpas, Qiang, and Lhobas, and is now also inhabited by considerable numbers of Han and Hui people...

.

External links

http://www.shipwrecksofegypt.com/images/shippages/gondar.html Site of the Gondar wreck off Alexandria harbour http://www.loccidentale.it/articolo/la+storia+dei+diecimila+soldati+italiani+prigionieri+in+india+%281a+parte%29.0085440 History of the 10,000 Italian POWs in Yol (part one) http://www.loccidentale.it/articolo/a.0085800 History of the 10,000 Italian POWs in Yol (part two) http://www.loccidentale.it/articolo/elenco+dei+prigionieri+italiani+a+yol+(india).0085514 List of the Italian POWs in Yol camp (may be subject to updates).
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