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Recently, I saw a post on Facebook, of this image:

enter image description here

The caption is:

May 26 is celebrated as Science day in Switzerland in honour of Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, because on that day, Kalam visited the country

Dr Kalam is an acclaimed scientist, and a former President of India.

I tried to Google for sources, and couldn't find any that were definitely not Indian in origin:

Is this true?

muru
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    The second article you cite claims that Kalam visited CERN on May 26, 2005. One might think this would have been worth a public announcement from CERN, but I found [CERN's archive of press releases for 2005](http://press.web.cern.ch/press-releases/2005?date_filter[value][year]=2005) (note there are several pages), and none of them seem to be about Dr. Kalam nor a "Science Day" event. (And no press releases at all are listed for the month of May.) Of course, this is not definitive. – Nate Eldredge May 28 '15 at 14:00
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    The claim is not quite answerable: it is celebrated _by whom_ in Switzerland? declared _by whom?_ It is nowhere to be found on the Wikipedia's list of [Public Holidays in Switzerland](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_holidays_in_Switzerland), but then again I'd swear up and down that [Bacon Day](http://internationalbaconday.blogspot.com/) is a real holiday, despite not being included in [Wikipedia's U.S. list](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_holidays_in_the_United_States). – Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard May 28 '15 at 14:48
  • The point being that, while it doesn't seem to be an _official_ Swiss holiday (which is as close to answer as we might get), it may well be celebrated by Dr. Kalam, his friends, and the restaurant in Geneva he ate at that evening. – Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard May 28 '15 at 14:50
  • @iamnotmaynard Since both articles just say "Switzerland", I assumed the government of Switzerland, taking it as an instance of synecdoche. – muru May 28 '15 at 14:50
  • As I recall, he also visited EPFL in Lausanne, where I worked at the time. A lot of us had an unofficial holiday, but I think that was more for security reasons. In any case, it was a one-time event, not establishing an annual holiday. – jamesqf May 28 '15 at 18:43
  • They might be referring to [Abdus Salam](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdus_Salam) – Sklivvz May 28 '15 at 23:28
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    @Sklivvz who's they? The papers are unlikely to confuse the president of the country with a scientist from the county's biggest enemies. – muru May 29 '15 at 03:20
  • I think this question needs to start first with proof that a science day exists on the 26th of May, anywhere or in any form, in Switzerland. – Benjol May 29 '15 at 10:09
  • @Benjol if I had that proof, I wouldn't be asking this, would I? – muru May 29 '15 at 10:11
  • @Muru, what I mean is that the question of whether it is in honour of Dr Kalam is irrelevant if there is no science day. In that sense, you could just title your question: "Does Switzerland have a science day?". – Benjol May 29 '15 at 11:38
  • @Benjol well. I see it the other way around. The claim is proved false if (any of) 1. There is no science day at all, 2. There is a science day, and its not on May 26, 3. There is a science day, and it is on May 26, and it started before 2005. If any of these can be established, the question is answered. If not, then additional work needs to be done. – muru May 29 '15 at 12:02
  • @muru arguably one of the greatest physicists of the XX century, a part having won from innumerable prizes - including the Nobel - there's a road named after him at CERN in Switzerland: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdus_Salam#/media/File:Routeabdussalam.png – Sklivvz May 31 '15 at 22:33
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    @Sklivvz irrelevant. He might be the greatest scientist in Pakistan and there's still no chance that an Indian newspaper would mistake Kalam, who's probably the most famous scientist in India, for Salam. Unless, by some spectacular coincidence, a science day was declared in honour of Dr Salam, and it was declared on the same day that the president of India was to visit, and they were so incredibly tactless as to tell the Indians that they were celebrating a Pakistani on the day the Indian president was visiting, and then proceeded to make a typo in the announcement or missive sent to Indians. – muru Jun 01 '15 at 00:35

3 Answers3

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It doesn't look like it. Searching for "Kalam" on http://www.admin.ch (which purports to be the official site of the Swiss government) brings up one English result, "Indian President to visit Federal Institutes of Technology in Lausanne and Zurich". It is the press release for President Kalam's visit, dated 17 May 2005, nine days before the date in question. There is no mention of any "Science Day" in that article. Searching in French and German also returns one earlier, shorter press release (translated to each language), which also does not mention "Science Day". Searching the site for "science day" or "May 26" returns nothing. (Searching for "science" returns 250+ results, but since none of them mention Kalam, they are irrelevant.)

Furthermore, Science Day is not an official Swiss holiday. Per Wikipedia, there is only one federal holiday (i.e., declared by the Swiss national government): Swiss National Day, August 1. All other holidays are declared by the individual cantons. Wikipedia's list, which includes the holidays of the cantons, makes no mention of Science Day.

The claim is that Kalam visited CERN, so it might be asserted that the canton of Geneva, where CERN is located, declared the holiday (which would not be a Swiss holiday exactly, though it would still be true that it's celebrated in Switzerland); however, Geneva's own public holiday list has no mention of it. It seems unlikely that it would have been declared by one of the other cantons.

CERN has a list of official holidays, too. There is no Science Day, no mention of Kalam, no listing for May 26.

More circumstantial evidence is provided by TimeAndDate.com which has a list of all Swiss holidays and observances in 2005 and has no entry for March 26th.

Some light googling only comes up with repetitions of this claim, but no sources. If it were declared by Switzerland, we would expect Swiss record of someone declaring it; if it were celebrated, we would expect record of someone celebrating it. I have found none.

Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard
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    Which raises the question: do days like Literacy day, Earth day, AIDS day, etc. count as holidays? How would a government classify a "science day"? Though that's probably one for [english.se]. I'll just wait around a bit before accepting, if you don't mind. – muru May 28 '15 at 15:16
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    No problem. As I stated in a comment to the question, there is a Bacon Day in the U.S., I have celebrated it several times, and yet (contrary to all good sense) it is not an official holiday anywhere. There is also Talk Like a Pirate Day. There are probably a thousand holidays in the U.S. that are celebrated by someone, but are in no way "official". The fact that a holiday is not official doesn't mean it's not a holiday. – Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard May 28 '15 at 15:23
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    I don't know about Switzerland, but in the US there are many "days" that are proclaimed by official government action, yet are not official *holidays* (government offices do not close, etc). See for instance [National Day of Prayer](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Day_of_Prayer). So this falls somewhere between Independence Day and Talk Like a Pirate Day in "official-ness"; I assumed the purported "Science Day" would be of this intermediate kind. – Nate Eldredge May 28 '15 at 15:45
  • @NateEldredge True. However, science plays a big role in Switzerland (they do house CERN, after all). I would think that if they hadn't already declared Science Day in honor of, say, Einstein's or Euler's birthday, or the date of publication of one of their major papers, or Einstein's winning the Nobel Prize, or the birth of the Web, they would probably be saving it for something really big. Otherwise, they could declare a Science Day every week. It would be like declaring a Football Day in the U.S. – Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard May 28 '15 at 16:08
  • That comparison makes me sad. – Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard May 28 '15 at 16:08
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    It is also possible that May 26, 2005 was declared to be _a_ Science Day once (not every year), though I couldn't find any mention of that either. – Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard May 28 '15 at 16:11
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    @iamnotmaynard "Superbowl Sunday" pretty much is "Football Day" in the United States. If you work in the service sector you end up having to plan for it like any other major holiday. – Chuu May 28 '15 at 17:41
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    There are several ways a day can be (officially) proclaimed. This answer assumes public holiday, where the claim does not. – Oddthinking Jun 01 '15 at 00:07
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    @Oddthinking True. The claim is unclear about who declared the day and in what capacity (or whether it was declared at all; the main graphic only claims it is "celebrated"). As discussed in the comments above, it is possible that it's an official national observance, lists of which I haven't been able to find. "Public holiday" might have been too narrow a category in which to look for this. Nonetheless, the claim is that Science Day is declared and/or celebrated by (someone in) Switzerland, and there is no evidence to support this. I have edited my post to reflect that. – Reinstate Monica -- notmaynard Jun 01 '15 at 15:03
  • @Nagendra see last bullet point in the question "CERN Press cutting of an **apparently defunct website** - newindpress.com" – muru May 29 '17 at 08:27
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The Swiss Broadcasting Corporation explictly declares the statement as False.

The Swiss Broadcasting Corporation is the Swiss public broadcasting association.

They maintain and publish stories on the website Swissinfo.ch.

The following story was published on 27 July 2016 titled Kalam, not Modi, was the real rock star. The story was written on the first anniversary of Kalam's death to recount his 2005 visit, which was apparently the first visit to Switzerland by an Indian head of state since 1970.

The story includes a portion regarding his visit to various science-related landmarks in Switzerland, including CERN, during the visit.

As a renowned scientist himself, Kalam visited almost of all of Switzerland’s science-related attractions. The physicist president first visited Albert Einstein’s former home in Bern. It was exactly 100 years ago in this modest apartment that Einstein churned out some of his most significant physics papers. A nice coincidence that did not escape Kalam’s attention.

“Your country has always been a great seat of learning and the fertile minds Switzerland has nurtured is testimony to these credentials,” he said in a speech.

He also visited the world’s largest particle physics laboratory, CERN, in Geneva as well as the federal institutes of technology in Zurich and Lausanne to get a glimpse of Swiss innovation.

However, the article makes clear mention of the claim and declares it to be false, while explicitly linking to the source OP provided from The Hindu

However, contrary to some reports in the Indian media, Switzerland did not declare May 26 as Science Day in honour of his visit.

"Science was a important theme during his visit but no such day was declared," a spokesperson for the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs told swissinfo.ch.

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DenisS
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Dr. Kalam's state visit to Switzerland was originally planned for May 27-28, 2005. The original official media release (not available in English) emphasized a visit of the capital and the canton of Berne. It also mentioned visits to the Swiss Federal Institutes in Zurich and Lausanne during the president's stay, and referred to a more detailed program to be published later.

A second official media release did schedule the visits to the two Swiss Federal Institutes on May 26, "prior to his state visit to Switzerland". Dr. Kalam also visited CERN in Geneva on that day.

The official state visit was thus preceded by an unofficial visit to science institutions in Switzerland. Kalam signed agreements between India and CERN as a European institution, so his visit to CERN could not be part of a formal state visit to Switzerland.

Possibly some spokesperson mentioned that May 26 would be an unofficial "science day" preceding the official, formal state visit. Indian newspaper articles might have misinterpreted such a statement as an official declaration. No Swiss sources, neither official nor in newspapers, can be found on a formal declaration for that day.

pommy
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