Meera Sanyal, Indian banker, Died at 57

Meera Sanyal (née Hiranandani) was born on October on 1961 and died on January 11, 2019.

She was a CEO and chairperson of the Royal Bank of Scotland in India. 

Meera was the daughter of a highly decorated Naval officer, Vice Admiral Gulab Mohanlal Hiranandani.

Meera Sanyal was involved in banking for over 3 decades before stepping down from RBS to stand as the Aam Aadmi Party candidate in South Mumbai in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, which she lost.

Earlier,  Sanyal contested as an independent candidate in the 2009 Lok Sabha elections from the Mumbai South constituency.

Sanyal was appointed as a non-executive Director on the board of Pradan, an Indian NGO that works to empower women through entrepreneurship and on the international board of Right to Play, a global organisation that has helped over 1 million children through the transformative power of play.

Sanyal  was also on the boards of Jaihind College and the Indian Liberal Group.

Sanyal was a member of various national committees at the CII and FICCI.

Sanyal was the former Chairperson of the Indian Advisory Board of AIESEC, the world's largest student organisation. 

Meera Sanyal passed away at 57 years old due to cancer.

George Brady, Czech-Canadian Holocaust survivor and businessman, Died at 90

George Brady was born as Jiří Brady was on February 9, 1928, and died on January 12, 2019.

He was a Holocaust survivor of both Theresienstadt (Terezin) and Auschwitz (Oswiecim, Poland).

He was a Canadian businessman and was awarded the Order of Ontario, in 2008, and the Cxech State Medal in 2016.

He was the son of Markéta and Karel Brady, and brother of Hana Brady.

During 1942, his mother and father had been separated from their children and sent to prisons and Nazi concentration camps.

George was sent to Theresienstadt a ghetto-camp not far from Prague with one sibling, he was lucky to escape, after sharing a small space with over 40 other young boys including Petr Ginz, Yehuda Bacon and Kurt Kotouc. 

His sister Hana Brady was given a gas chamber execution.

He escaped during a death march to Germany during January 1945, the same month Auschwitz was liberated.

George Brady passed away in Toronto, Canada, at 90 years old.

Jo Andres, American filmmaker, Died at 65

Jo Andres was born on May 21, 1954 and died on January 7, 2019.

She was an American filmmaker, choreographer and artist.

 

She first became known on the kinetic downtown New York performance scene of the 1980s for her film/dance/light performances, shown at the Performing Garage, La Mama E.T.C., P.S. 122, St. Marks Danspace, and the Collective for Living Cinema.

During her filmmaker, she drew acclaim and awards for the 1996 film, Black Kites which aired on PBS and played several film festivals, including Sundance, Berlin, Toronto, London and Human Rights Watch Film Festivals. 

She directed music and art videos, as well as her own film performance works. 

She was a dance consultant to the acclaimed Wooster Group.

Andres was an artist in residence at leading universities, museums and art colonies, including Yaddo, and The Rockefeller Study Center in Bellagio, Italy. 

She was the creater of a series of cyanotype photographs which can be seen on her website.

Andres  and her husband, actor Steve Buscemi, have one son, Lucian, born in 1990.

Jo Andres passed away 65 years old.

Sir Michael Atiyah, British mathematician, Died at 89

Sir Michael Francis Atiyah was born on April 22, 1929, and died on January 11, 2019.

 

He was a British-Lebanese mathematician specializing in geometry.

He was raised in Sudan and Egypt but spent most of his learning life in the United Kingdom at University of Oxford and University of Cambridge, and in the United States at the Institute for Advanced Study.

He served as the President of the Royal Society (1990–1995), master of Trinity College, Cambridge (1990 to 1997), chancellor of the University of Leicester (1995–2005), and the President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (2005–2008). 

From 1997 until his death, Atiyah was an honorary professor at the University of Edinburgh.

His mathematical joint works included Raoul Bott, Friedrich Hirzebruch and Isadore Singer, and his students included Graeme Segal, Nigel Hitchin and Simon Donaldson. 

Together with Hirzebruch, he laid the foundations for topological K-theory, an important tool in algebraic topology, which, informally speaking, describes ways in which spaces can be twisted. 

Sir Michael Atiyah was awarded the Fields Medal in 1966 and the Abel Prize in 2004. 

Sir Michael Atiyah passed away at 89 years old.

Gus Ganakas, American college basketball coach, Died at 92

Gus G. Ganakas was born on July 3, 1926, in Mount Morris, New York. and died on January 11, 2019.

He was an American sports broadcaster and Michigan State Spartans men's basketball coach. Ganakas served as the head coach there from 1969 to 1976.

Gus Ganakas studied at the Michigan State University (MSU) from 1946 to 1950 after serving in the U.S. Marine Corps. 

Ruth his wife died in 2014. He resided in the Lansing area.

He became the sixth recipient of the Men's Basketball Distinguished Alumnus Award, in 2002.

Gus Ganakas passed away at 92 years old.

Dimitris Sioufas, Greek politician, Died at 75

Dimitris Sioufas was born on August 15, 1944, in Ellinopyrgos, Karditsa and died on January 11, 2019.

He was a Greek lawyer and New Democracy politician.

Sioufas rearned a degree in political science and public administration at the Panteion University of Athens as well as in law from the University of Thessaloniki.

Dimitris Sioufas was first elected to the Greek Parliament for the Karditsa constituency in the 1981 general election, and has been reelected at every election since.

Sioufas was Deputy Minister of Social Security from August 1991 to December 1992 and Minister of Health, Welfare and Social Services from December 1992 to October 1993.

Following the 2004 parliamentary election, which was won by New Democracy,  he became Minister for Development in the government of Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis on 10 March 2004.

He left this seat when a new government was sworn in on September 19, 2007 and was instead nominated as Speaker of Parliament.

Sioufas has been a member of New Democracy's Central Committee since 1997;  before  he was a member of the Central Committee from 1979 to 1985 and from 1994 to 1997. 

He was also a member of the party's Executive Committee from 1997 to 2001 and a member of its Political Council from 2001 to March 2004.

Sioufas was Secretary General of the New Democracy Parliamentary GroupFrom April 2000 to March 2004.

He was married to Kaity Anagnostaki and had two sons and a daughter.

Dimitris Sioufas passed away at 75 years old.

Alfredo del Mazo González, Mexican politician, Died at 75

Alfredo Hilario Isidro del Mazo González was born on December 31, 1943, and died on January 10, 2019.

He was a Mexican politician González was connected with the Institutional Revolutionary Party.

González was the Governor of the State of Mexico from 1981 to 1986 and as Secretary of Energy during part of Miguel de la Madrid's government.

González represented the PRI in the first election for the Head of Government of the Federal District in 1997 but lost to Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas of the Party of the Democratic Revolution.

González also served briefly as Deputy of the LIX Legislature of the Mexican Congress as a plurinominal representative in 2003.

Alfredo del Mazo González passed away at 75 years old.