The Chinese army advances in India in 1962, to instigate Indo-China War

India had no idea China would launch an attack, but it did. On October 20, 1962, India was invaded in what became known as the Sino-India conflict of 1962. The Indian army was unable to prepare because it believed it would never be attacked by China, resulting in a standoff between 10,000-20,000 Indian forces and 80,000 Chinese troops. The conflict lasted nearly a month and concluded on November 21, when China proclaimed a cease-fire.
Related On This Day

Yash Chopra, an Indian director, died in 2012 at the age of 80 from dengue fever and multiple organ failure.

Kim Kardashian, an American television celebrity, was born in Los Angeles, California in 1980.

On the Greek island of Scorpios in 1968, Jacqueline Kennedy marries Greek shipping billionaire Aristotle Onassis.

Kamala Harris, an American lawyer and politician (Vice President of the United States from 2021 to the present; the first African-American and Asian-American attorney general of California, was born in Oakland, California in 1964.

Muammar Gaddafi, Libyan rebel, political thinker, and dictator, was killed in captivity in 2011 by a Misratan militia at the age of 68–71.

Alfred Nobel, the Swedish scientist who developed dynamite and established the Nobel Prizes, was born in Stockholm, Sweden in 1833.

Shammi Kapoor, regarded as the "Elvis Presley of India," was born in Bombay, India in 1931

In 1975, the Soviet spacecraft Venera 9 soft-lands on Venus, becoming the first lander to return photos from another planet's surface.

Robin Williams (60), an actor and comedian, married graphic designer Susan Schneider in 2011 at the luxury Meadow Wood Resort in the Napa Valley town of St. Helena, California.

Amit Shah, an Indian politician who was born on October 22, 1964, has been the country's first Minister of Co-operation since 2021