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Sadhvi Pragya brought to Nashik court, 3 more arrested

2008-11-03T05:18:00.001-08:00

The Maharashtra ATS brought the prime accused Sadhvi Pragya Thakur to the Nashik court today, along with her co-accused Sahu , and Shivnarayan.

Meanwhile, the three accused were allowed to meet their siblings and the meetings happened with the lawyers in the court room.

Shiv Sena activists protested outside the court, to demonstrate their anger at the arrest and trial of the sadhvi.

Three other people too have been arrested in the Malegaon blasts case, that the ATF has arrested the sadhvi under.

She has already undergone several brain mapping tests in Mumbai. Reports say that a large number of activists from the Shiv Sena may gather outside the court as a show of support to the sadhvi.

On Sunday, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) joined the Shiv Sena and the BJP in saying that they would provide all legal help to the sadhvi.

They claim that the ATS had absolutely no evidence against her and that her arrest was just a larger part of a political ploy of the UPA government to tarnish the saffron outfits.

The editor of the party mouthpiece Saamana, Sanjay Raut had told CNN-IBN that the Sena is ready to provide legal aide to the accused, including sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur.

"If Dawood Ibrahim's brother was represented by eminent lawyers like Majeed Memon, shouldn't sadhvi Pragya, Ramesh Upadhyay and Sameer Kulkarni be represented by somebody?" said a previous editorial in Saamna.

"The government does not save Hindus from terrorists, and if Hindus defend themselves, they are maligned," it had said.

The Mumbai Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) has arrested Pragya Singh Thakur in the September 29 Malegaon bomb blast case in which five people were killed.

Shah Rukh to play his age in Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi

2008-11-03T05:17:00.001-08:00

Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan sheds his casanova image for a new film, basing his character on a middle-aged man he met while hosting a popular game show on Indian television.

Shah Rukh, who turned 43 on Sunday, has mostly played the young romantic lead in a career spanning nearly two decades and 60 films. But for filmmaker Aditya Chopra's Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, Shah Rukh casts off his designer suits and jeans to play a bespectacled government employee in ill-fitting trousers.

"I want to play the exact opposite of Raj and Rahul, the romantic hero that I have played all these days. I want to show that it is special to be ordinary, which is why I am doing this film," Khan said at a press conference on Sunday.

SRK, Bollywood's most bankable star, said the character was inspired by a "sweet, unassuming" contestant he met last year on the sets of Kaun Banega Crorepati, the Indian version of the worldwide hit TV show, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?.

"I want everyone who watches the film to realise that the person they love is the best romantic hero there could be," he added.

Not much is known about the storyline of Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi except that the film is a love story and it also features SRK in a younger role which is again inspired by a contestant in another TV show hosted by the actor.

SRK did not elaborate but said this second character was based on another contestant he met this year on Kya Aap Paanchvi Pass Se Tez Hain?, the Indian version of another American game show Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?. Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi opens in cinemas in December.

North Indian youths attack Maharashtra Sadan in Delhi

2008-11-03T05:16:00.001-08:00

The Maharashtrian-North Indian standoff in Mumbai has spilled on to the streets of Delhi.

A group of 20 youths, reportedly from Bihar, attacked Maharashtra Sadan in the capital on Monday.

The Rashtrawadi Sena has claimed responsibility for the attack.

The youths were protesting attacks on North Indians in Maharashtra. The mob ransacked the reception of the building and raised slogans against Maharashtra Navnirman Sena chief Raj Thackeray.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Anand Mohan said that the situation was brought under control soon. However, no one has been arrested.

A journalist, Balasaheb Ambekar working a regional language paper in Maharashtra, Jivhala, said that the guards couldn't stop the attackers.

"The security guards tried to stop them but couldn't. They all looked like bouncers and they went on a rampage," Ambekar said.

Student mistaken for a criminal, shot dead by cops

2008-11-03T05:13:00.000-08:00

Haryana Police gunned a student in Bhiwani late on Sunday night in a case of mistaken identity.

The 20-year-old student, Kuldeep Singh, was shot dead while he was returning back home after a party with his friends. The police were allegedly on the lookout for a criminal, Dara Singh, when the tragic incident occurred.

An FIR has been registered in the case and one policeman has been arrested. The main accused constable Karmbir Singh was arrested after the registration of a case against eight cops following the killing of Kuldeep, a student of a local Vaish College.

"There were four men in a jeep and two of them got out. The one in plain clothes shot my brother on the forehead. When they realised he had been shot the policemen ran away," the victim's brother said.

Bhiwani District Commissioner Satya Prakash clarified that the act was unintentional and a FIR has been registered.

"In a case of bank robbery the police had nabbed two people and there was search going on for the other two involved. They belonged to a village in Bhiwani. There was some information that the people would be coming to the same place. The police were waiting and at 0115 hrs IST and they saw three people coming and after repeated requests they did not stop," Prakash said.

"It was an unintentional act. An FIR has been filed. The victim was taken to hospital at 0415 hrs IST. We are investigating the policeman who fired. They went to the thana (police station) and confession was made," he added.

Prakash also said that the Sub Divisional Magistrate, Bhiwani Shiv Prasad Sharma has been asked to investigate the incident.

The SDM would complete his probe at the earliest and submit a report to the District Administration after which further action would be taken against the guilty.

Meanwhile, students went on a rampage in Bhiwani after the tragic incident.

Haryana Chief Minister Bhupender Singh Hooda said that the guilty will not be spared.

"The police are at fault. It is an unfortunate incident and a case has been registered. The guilty will be punished and we have given Rs 5 lakh to the victim's family," Hooda said.

However, Kuldeep's father said that he won't accept the compensation offered by the Chief Minister.

Meanwhile, former chief minister Bhajan Lal visited Kuldeep's home and demanded strict action against the guilty.

Abhay Chautala, the son of another former chief minister Om Prakash Chautala, accused the state police of orchestrating fake encounters.

"The Chief Minister and his government claim that they have chased away anti-social elements from the state. In reality the police are killing innocent people in fake encounters," Chautala said

Big Bang: First protons fired, world still safe

2008-09-10T01:52:00.000-07:00

Scientists at the world's largest particle collider have fired the first protons into a 17-mile-long tunnel in science's next great step to understand the makeup of the universe.

Project leader Lyn Evans gave the go-ahead to send the protons into the accelerator below the Swiss-French border early Wednesday.

The $3.8 billion Large Hadron Collider was under construction since 2003. Scientists hope it will provide the necessary power to smash the components of atoms so that they can see how they are made.

The startup has been eagerly awaited by 9,000 physicists around the world who will conduct experiments here.

Some skeptics have said they fear the collisions of protons could eventually imperil Earth.
'It's nonsense,'' said James Gillies, chief spokesman for CERN, the host European Organization for Nuclear Research.

CERN is backed by leading scientists like Britain's Stephen Hawking in dismissing the fears and declaring the experiments to be absolutely safe.

Gillies told the AP that the most dangerous thing that could happen would be if a beam at full power were to go out of control, and that would only damage the accelerator itself and burrow into the rock around the tunnel deep below the Swiss-French border.

And full power is probably a year away.

''On Wednesday we start small,'' said Gillies. ''What we're putting in to start with is one single low intensity bunch at low energy and we thread that around. We get experience with low energy things and then we ramp up as we get to know the machine better.''

He said a good result for Wednesday would be to have one beam going all the way around the tunnel in a counterclockwise direction. If that works, the scientists will then try to send a beam in the other direction.

''A really good result would be to have the other beam going around, too, because once you've got a beam around once in both directions you know that there is no show stopper,'' Gillies said. ''It's going to work.''

However, if there is some blockage in the machine, experts will have to go in and fix the problem, and that could take time.

The LHC, as the collider is known, will take scientists to within a split second of a laboratory recreation of the big bang, which they theorize was the massive explosion that created the universe.

The project organized by the 20 European member nations of CERN has attracted researchers of 80 nationalities. Some 1,200 are from the United States, an observer country which contributed $531 million. Japan, another observer, also is a major contributor.

The collider is designed to push the proton beam close to the speed of light, whizzing 11,000 times a second around the tunnel.

Smaller colliders have been used for decades to study the makeup of the atom. Less than 100 years ago scientists thought protons and neutrons were the smallest components of an atom's nucleus, but in stages since then experiments have shown they were made of still smaller quarks and gluons and that there were other forces and particles.

The CERN experiments could reveal more about ''dark matter,'' antimatter and possibly hidden dimensions of space and time. It could also find evidence of the hypothetical particle _ the Higgs boson _ believed to give mass to all other particles, and thus to matter that makes up the universe.

Some scientists have been waiting for 20 years to use the LHC. But even their younger colleagues are excited that startup has finally arrived.

''I think it's a very important project,'' said Katie McAlpine, 23, a Michigan State University graduate who made a rap video about the project.

''It's mostly out of scientific curiosity, what is the universe made of? How does it work? What are the rules? That's very exciting and it's important to advance our knowledge,'' she told Associated Press Television News.

She said she was surprised by the success of the video, which has had more than a million views on YouTube and which has received approval from CERN for its scientific accuracy, especially in its success with young people.

''I was really hoping that this would get taken into classrooms,'' McAlpine said. ''I don't imagine that elementary school and most middle school children will understand it very well, but a lot of parents have e-mailed me, saying I have a 9-year-old or a 7-year-old and showed them your rap and they really love it.

''If elementary kids can get excited about it, too, that's just great.''

India's condom ring tone a huge global hit

2008-09-10T00:48:00.000-07:00

Guess which Indian ring tone is being downloaded the most all over the world? No, it is not the latest Bollywood chartbuster, but a public health message that goes 'condom, condom'.

Its makers are amazed by the popularity of the ring tone that was launched last month and aims to promote safe sex, the use of condom and to thus tackle the growing HIV/AIDS epidemic in the country where about 2.5 million people are estimated to be living with it.

'It is a hit internationally. Nowhere in the world are we aware of a ring tone for a product,' said Yvonne MacPherson, country director of the BBC World Service Trust, the international charity of the BBC.

'The 'condom a cappella' ringtone is really innovative. What is amazing is that India has started the trend of a ring tone which carries a social health message. People are excited about this ring tone internationally and are looking to India for this,' MacPherson told IANS.

What has perhaps caught the imagination of the people is the fresh voice, sound and music, which are totally Indian.

'I think the ring tone has international appeal. It has quirky music and sound,' said MacPherson.

In the three weeks since its launch, the makers have already received 257,744 SMS requests for download and over two million hits on the website.

The ring tone can be downloaded by SMSing 'CONDOM' to 56887 (download charges apply) or free from anywhere worldwide on the website www.condomcondom.org. The ring tone has been composed by Rupert Fernandes and sung by Vijay Prakash, who is a professional singer, and has chanted the word condom more than 50 times.

'As it became international news, there has been demand for it from all corners of the globe,' said an excited MacPherson, who got calls from radio stations from across the US and Britain.

The ring tone marks the latest phase in the three-year intense mass media campaign to make condom use more socially acceptable. It was partially launched in Aug 8 but was nationally seen on television, cinema, radio and in print in Aug 22.

The campaign uses a multitude of youth friendly platforms such as website downloads, online games, mobile advertising and downloads, along with the TV and radio advertisements, MacPherson said, adding that the campaign is funded by a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

The National AIDS Control Organization (NACO) is also using the ad to support its condom promotion efforts.

The objective is to connect with all age groups and across the socio-economic strata, MacPherson added.

In the advertisement, a wedding is shown where a mobile rings with the sound of 'condom, condom'. An embarrassed man holds the phone and looks for others' reactions. Then he finds the reactions smart and responsible. The tagline is 'jo samjha wohi sikander' ('the one who understands is a winner').

MacPherson said the ring tone has also scored big time as many have sent messages to them.

One of the messages they have received on their website is from Denmark and it reads: 'I have just read an article about this latest ring tone from you, i have heard it and i love IT!! you are tearing down the walls around this taboo.'

Another one from the US said: 'I found this and my sons overwhelmed and they love it. ...opened up a new dialogue regarding sexual health. Thank you for such a fun way to open up with my kids about HIV and AIDS.'

It is getting accolades from Indians too. 'Awesome, from today onwards this will be my mobile ring tone, it's a good effort to spread awareness...' a message from a man in Karnataka said.

MacPherson said: 'The objective was to make condom socially acceptable and to remove the taboo around it. Condoms are a health product and a life saving device to protect a person from HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases.

'People feel embarrassed when it comes to protection so we have to first take care of this. This is how we would be able to check the epidemic nature of the disease. The shock value coupled with bringing the subject out in the open will also help in dispelling the myths,' MacPherson added.

According to Radharani Mitra, the creative director of the trust which is producing the advertisements, 'ring tones have become such personal statements that a specially created condom ring tone seemed just the right way of combining a health message in a fun way'.

How to live till 100

2008-09-10T00:46:00.000-07:00

Want to live till 100 years of age? Well, do regular exercises, be married, wash hands and brush your teeth everyday.

That's what a new book, 'The Long Life Equation', by Dr Trisha Macnair suggests.

In the book, the author has listed activities that add years to your life.

Macnair said washing your hands adds two years, and good dental hygiene can add six more years in your life.

But smoking, fast food, no exercise and a stressful life can strip away 20 years.

"There's no doubt younger people take life and health for granted - more than any generation before, they idle time away watching TV or playing computer games, ignoring the activities that keep them healthy or develop meaning in their lives," Courier Mail quoted Macnair, as saying.

"As we get older and start to feel the years slipping away, we suddenly realise how precious it is.

"But by then we may have already established habits (smoking, drinking, obesity, lack of exercise, stressful occupations) which take their toll and are difficult to reverse.

"Still, it's never too late to change. Also, our attitudes to older age are changing so there is more freedom now to do things later in life if we are healthy and able," she added.

A 2006 study from University of California in Los Angeles showed that men and women live healthier, wealthier, happier and longer lives when they are in a stable partnership

The study confirmed that married couples were more likely to live to an old age than their divorced, widowed or unmarried counterparts.

A stable partnership can actually add on seven years to life.

Regular exercise also adds as much as two or more years to your life.

A Harvard Alumni Study, which took into account more than 71,000 men who had graduated from Harvard University and the University of Pennsylvania between 1916 and 1954, found that those men who regularly burned 8400kJ a week while exercising lived, on average, two years longer than sedentary types.

But cigarette smoking can actually reduce 8 years from your life

Tobacco smoke contains more than 4000 chemicals, many of which are highly toxic.

A divorce can also strip away 3 years from your life, as it takes longer-lasting, emotional and physical toll on former spouses than virtually any other life stress.

ecent studies indicate that divorced adults have higher rates of emotional disturbance, accidental death and death from heart disease.

The divorced also have higher rates of admission to psychiatric facilities and make more visits to doctors than people who are married, single or widowed. (ANI)

Hyderabad Map

2008-09-08T07:42:00.000-07:00

Lord Shree Ganesh

2008-09-08T07:32:00.001-07:00

IE8 Surf the web without leaving a trace

2008-09-08T06:33:00.000-07:00

Doom-mongers worry: end of world on Big Bang test day

2008-09-08T06:01:00.000-07:00

If critics are to be believed, the end of the universe will begin coming Wednesday when a Welsh miner's son launches the world's biggest scientific experiment to know how the universe was born.

The well-known Welshman physicist, Lyn Evans, dubbed Evans the Atom, will this week switch on a giant particle accelerator designed to unlock the secrets of the Big Bang.

On Wednesday, Evans will fire up the Large Hadron Collider, a 17-mile-long doughnut-shaped tunnel that will smash sub-atomic particles together at nearly the speed of light.

Built by the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (CERN), the collider lies beneath the French-Swiss border, near the institution's headquarters in Geneva, at depths ranging from 170 feet to 600 feet.

The aim of the 4.4 billion-pound (over $7.7 billion) experiment is to recreate the conditions that existed a fraction of a second after the Big Bang — the birth of the universe — and provide vital clues to the building blocks of life.

It will track the spray of particles thrown out by collisions in a search for the elusive Higgs Boson, a theoretical entity that supposedly lends weight, or mass, to the elementary particles. So important is this mysterious substance that it has been called the "God Particle".

Scientists also hope to shed some light on the invisible material that exists between particles - dubbed "dark matter" as no one knows what it really is - which make up most of the universe.

But a handful of scientists believe that the experiment could create a shower of unstable black holes that could "eat" the planet from within, and they are launching last-ditch efforts to halt it in the courts.

One of them, Otto Rossler, a retired German chemist, said he feared the experiment may create a devastating quasar - a mass of energy fuelled by black holes - inside the earth. Jets emanating from it would grow and catastrophes such as earthquakes and tsunamis would occur at the points they emerged from the earth.

"The weather will change completely, wiping out life, and very soon the whole planet will be eaten in a magnificent scenario - if you could watch it from the moon. A Biblical Armageddon. Even cloud and fire will form, as it says in the Bible."

He said that attempts were still being made in the European Court of Human Rights to halt the experiment on the grounds that it violated the right to life. The court has, however, already rejected calls for a temporary delay in the project.

Walter Wagner, an American scientist who has been warning about the dangers of particle accelerators for 20 years, is awaiting a ruling on a lawsuit he filed a fortnight ago in his home state of Hawaii.

Evans, however, is dismissive of the "doom-mongers".

"There are thousands of scientists around the world who have been preparing this machine and they know what they are talking about, unlike these guys," he is quoted as saying in the British daily Daily Mail.

Secrets of successful flirting revealed

2008-09-08T05:56:00.000-07:00

Want to be a successful flirt? Well, then all you need to do is simply to let your prospective partner know that you find them attractive, according to a new research.

The University of Aberdeen study shows that telling the person "I really like you" is likely to push the chosen target to reciprocate the feelings. It also revealed that if a person shows someone their feelings, through eye contact, smiling - or simply telling them - they are more likely to return the sentiment.

The new study found that ‘social cues’ - someone's efforts to show how much they like a person - are of great importance in the blossoming of mutual attraction.

"Our latest research highlights how social cues, which signal the extent to which others are attracted to you, also play a crucial role in attraction," The Telegraph quoted psychologist Dr Ben Jones, co-authors of the study, as saying.

A total of 230 men and women took part in the study at the university's Face Research Laboratory. The researchers showed volunteers four flash cards, picturing a face with different expressions.
The face is shown making eye contact and not smiling; not making eye contact and not smiling; making eye contact and not smiling: and making eye contact and smiling.

"What we found was that the preference for the attractive face was much stronger when people were judging those faces that were looking at them and smiling," Jones said.

According to the study, attractiveness was how someone combined natural beauty and these ‘social cues’. The study, Integrating Facial Attractiveness And Cues Of Social Attractiveness, was published in the journal Psychological Science.

Nano to say tata to Singur, no truce likely | Shutters down at Tata plant

2008-09-08T05:54:00.001-07:00

It could be the end of the road for Tata Motor’s Nano project in West Bengal. Government sources told CNN-IBN that there is unlikely to be a solution to the Singur deadlock.

According to sources in the state government, the committee on land review was not likely to find a solution as the mother plant and ancillary units cannot be separated.

An accord was reached between the state government and the Opposition parties on Sunday night after a series of meetings mediated by Governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi.

However, in a strongly worded press statement, Tata Motors on Monday said it would not resume work in its small-car plant in Singur, claiming that the outcome of talks between the government and opposition parties to end protests against the project lacked clarity.

At the end of talks mediated by Gandhi, an official statement said that the government would respond to the demands of those farmers who have not received compensation and asked vendors of Tata Motors not to go ahead with construction of their respective facilities in the meantime.

The company said that it would review its stated position only if it was satisfied that the viability of the project was not being impinged.

Tata Motors' statement came a day after Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee suspended her indefinite dharna on Sunday night following an agreement with the state government.

Meanwhile, movement of traffic resumed on both lanes of the Durgapur Expressway on Monday morning with the Trinamool chief suspending her two-week long dharna near the Tata Motors' small car plant.

As per the agreement, the state government will form a committee to look into the demands of the affected farmers, and submit its report in seven days.

Till then, construction the ancillary units will be on hold.

Raj Thackeray 'bans' Bachchans, cops ban him

2008-09-08T05:51:00.000-07:00

The Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) has “banned” films of superstar Amitabh Bachchan and his family for a short remark his wife made two days ago.

“All Bachchan family movies and advertisements in Mumbai and Maharashtra are banned from today (Monday),” said MNS chief Raj Thackeray at a press conference.

He was angry with actress and Rajya Sabha MP Jaya Bachchan for a statement which the MNS perceives to be insulting to Maharashtrians. “We are from Uttar Pradesh and we will speak in Hindi—Maharashtrians will forgive us,” Jaya had said at an event in Mumbai to launch her son Abhishek’s movie Drona.

“This is an affront to the Marathi Manoos (Marathi-speaking people). All parties should unite and condemn what she said,” said Thackeray.

“Jaya Bachchan has to apologise or else no film of any member of the Bachchan family will be allowed to release in Mumbai and Maharshtra.” The party’s diktat applies to films starring Amitabh, Jaya, their son Abhishek and his wife Aishwarya.

“Jaya Bachchan’s comment is a direct affront to Maharshtra. Unless she apologises, no film by the Bachchan family will be allowed. If you are from Uttar Pradesh, go and release your movies there.”

Samajwadi Party leader Amar Singh, a friend of the Bachchan family, criticised Thackeray’s statement and said the country had a legal system and “jungle raj” would not be permitted.

Immediately after Thackeray’s statement, police banned from him making public appearance and making speeches. MNS workers tore up Amitabh’s posters and hoardings in Dadar, Mumbai.

On Sunday, Shiv Sena Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Raut had said: "people of Maharashtra will not tolerate such language. The Bachchans have been living here for so many years and saying that they do not know the local language is an insult to Marathi people."

The Congress condemned the MNS for 'politicising' the issue. "Leaders whose children study in elite English schools like Bombay Scottish have no business targeting others," said Congress leader Sanjay Nirupam.

Thackeray in February 2008 had accused Amitabh Bachchan of not doing enough for Maharashtra and favouring his home state of Uttar Pradesh.

The party has targeted North Indians in Maharashtra, accusing them of disrespecting the state’s culture and putting a strain on its resources.

'Britney started drinking at 13, lost virginity at 14'

2008-09-05T09:00:00.001-07:00

Britney Spears began drinking at the age of 13, lost virginity at 14 and then started drugs at the age of 15, according to the tell-all book by mum Lynne Spears.

Lynne has made some sensational revelations in her book due to release on September 16.

In her book Through the Storm, Lynne revealed that the 26-year-old singer began drinking at the age of 13, lost her virginity at 14, and then started taking drugs at 15.

The Toxic singer allegedly had her first drink after joining Disney’s squeaky-clean Mickey Mouse Club.

Lynne also claims that the 14-year-old Britney then had sex with an 18-year-old high school senior in her home town of Kentwood, Louisiana soon after she quit the TV show.
She said that she regrets handing over control of Britney’s career to managers and allowing her daughter to be promoted as a sex object in raunchy videos at such a young age.

As Britney pursued her career, Lynne let her 16-year-old daughter sleep with Justin Timberlake, despite claiming she was a virgin.

"Lynne thought Britney was in love and Justin was good for her,” the Sun quoted a source, as saying.

Britney was once caught with cocaine and cannabis on a private jet, when she was 16.

The book is set to deepen the rift between Britney and Lynne

Pankaj Advani wins World Billiards Championship

2008-09-05T08:58:00.000-07:00

Asserting his supremacy, Pankaj Advani on Friday annexed the ONGC IBSF World Billiards Championship (point format) with a comprehensive six games to one victory over Geet Sethi.

The 23-year-old Bangalorean delighted the home crowd at Karnataka State Billiards Association Hall with a superlative display, winning 150-90, 151-0, 150-24, 150-0, 86-150, 150-72, 150-12.

After a below-par semi-final outing on Thursday, Advani played with far more focus and swept the first four games in the morning session to gain a position of strength.

Though the veteran Sethi, with eight world billiards titles under his belt, won the first game in the next session, he could not get the momentum going, with his younger opponent dominating proceedings.

Advani said the "bad" semi-final had spurred him to come out with improved performance and it paid off.
"In sport, every day is a new day", he said after the match which promised to be an "epic" encounter before the start but turned out to be one-sided in the end.

He said every day throws up new challenges and it's different from the previous day.

Sethi said inclusion of billiards in the Asian Games inspired him to continue playing the game and expressed hope that it would figure in the Olympics as well. "I am still going strong, I still enjoy the game", he added.

Meanwhile, the time format of the ONGC IBSF World Billiards Championship gets underway in Bangalore from Saturday , with the final slated on September 10.

Paes-Black win US Open Mixed Doubles

2008-09-05T08:54:00.000-07:00

Tendulkar ignored medical advice

2008-09-05T08:53:00.000-07:00

Sachin Tendulkar would have missed the Champions Trophy had it been held in Pakistan on time.

Indian doctor Amod Harip, who first examined the master batsman for his latest elbow injury in Colombo's Apollo Hospital, said: "Sachin was brought to me after getting injured while fielding during the third Test between Sri Lanka and India. He has hemarthrosis of elbow (right hand)."

"Hemarthrosis is a bleeding into joint spaces. I wanted to insert a needle and remove the haematoma but team physio (Nitin Patel) didn't want this treatment to be performed over here," the Pune-born doctor, now settled in Sri Lanka, further said exclusively to Cricketnext.

A haematoma, is a collection of blood outside the blood vessels, generally the result of internal bleeding.

Sachin was also advised to take rest and not take the field later in the Test match but he still played the next day.

According to this orthopaedic surgeon, Sachin's surgery in 2005 (by England's Andrew Wallace) was not a 'tennis elbow' as it is widely believed. But it was a 'golfer's elbow'.

"I saw the scars on Sachin's elbow and it was not a surgery for tennis elbow but golfer's elbow."

The primary difference between the two is the location of the pain and the activity that leads to injury.

"Sachin may be able to play the series against Australia," Dr. Harip hoped.

India's master batsman Sachin Tendulkar is most likely to have had his recent elbow injury examined by an orthopaedic surgeon in Germany.

Obama's bombshell: Pak plotting war on India

2008-09-05T08:52:00.000-07:00

Accusing Pakistan of misusing the massive American aid to fight the war on terror, Democratic nominee for the US Presidential election Barack Obama, in a sensational comment, has said Islamabad was using these funds for "preparing for a war against India".

Senator Obama vowed to hold Islamabad accountable for the massive military aid it has received from Washington if he is elected to the White House. He said his administration will increase pressure on the Pakistan to come to terms with terrorist safe havens along its northern border with Afghanistan.

"What we can do is stay focused on Afghanistan and put more pressure on the Pakistanis," Senator Obama said in an interview with Fox News.

He noted that the US was providing Pakistan military aid "without having enough strings attached".

"So they're (Pakistan) using the military aid...Pakistan...they're preparing for a war against India," Senator Obama said.
Maintaining that he will follow the al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden to the "gates of hell", the Democratic nominee said that this could be accomplished without resorting to sending ground troops to Pakistan.

However, he said his future administration is not going to pullout from the war on terror and allow the fundamentalists to take over Pakistan.

"What we say is, look, we're going to provide them with additional military support, targeted at terrorists, and we're going to help build their democracy. We've wasted USD 10 billion with Musharraf without holding them accountable for knocking out those safe havens," Senator Obama said.

He stressed that "nobody talked about some full-blown invasion of Pakistan", but "we've got to put more pressure on Pakistan to do what they need to do".

On Teacher Day, Modi turns preacher on anti-terrorism

2008-09-05T08:51:00.001-07:00

In a Teacher's Day address made mandatory viewing in schools and colleges across Gujarat on Friday, Chief Minister Narendra Modi spoke out against terrorism and rooted for an anti-terror law in the state.

In a first, Modi’s 90-minute address was beamed live on national network Doordarshan and had the CM talking development with a clear focus on terrorism.

Modi also took questions from the students – who were gathered in Gandhinagar Town Hall to listen to him – one of whom asked him about his fight against terrorism.

“Keep a strict vigil on what is happening around us. Terrorists carry out their acts by being within the society. If we are vigilant, it would be difficult for them to carry their nefarious acts", he said.

Modi also said he wanted the Centre to clear Gujarat Control of Organised Crime Act (GUJCOCA), an anti-terror law that has been passed by the Gujarat Assembly and awaiting President’s approval.
“If there is a stringent law against terrorism, young boys from good families will not jump into terror activities”, he said.

"The pledge that they take need not be a big one. But, your small pledge will also help in development of the state," Modi said.

"If you take a pledge that you will not waste electricity or water or litter garbage on roads it will help the state a lot," he said.

Modi spoke in detail about various schemes that the state government has introduced for the welfare of children's and also improvement of education system in the country.

He told students about his "Kanya Kelavani Abhiyan", which aims at enrollment of all the girl students to the state for formal education.

Modi also said that his government aims to bring down the dropout rate to zero by the year 2010.

He stressed on the health of students and advised them to remain healthy and take part in government students' medical checkup scheme.

In fact, a circular issued by the state education department directed all the schools to make arrangements to show Modi's speech.

"All the students from class one to ten of our schools had gathered in the compound where television sets, with speakers were arranged by us," a principal of a school in Junagadh district said.

"Usually Teachers Day is celebrated with students conducting classes every year. But this tradition was suspended this year as the Chief Minister decided to address students of the state," he added.

Watch Ganesh visarjan in Salman Style Video

2008-09-05T07:50:00.000-07:00

Film body issues letter to Ram Gopal Varma

2008-09-05T07:44:00.001-07:00

Following a complaint filed by Bollywood producer Bharat Shah against filmmaker Ram Gopal Varma for alleged breach of contract by him, Indian Motion Pictures Producer's Association (IMPPA) has sent a letter to Varma to explain his stand on the matter.

"We have sent a letter Friday to Varma to explain his stand on the complaint file by Shah," said Sushmaa Shiromani, Vice President IMPPA.

Shah, who had filed a complaint against Varma on August 29, had urged for an immediate action by the association to settle his claim on the matter.

In his complaint, Shah stated that he had invested Rs.250 million in Varma's production company, Varma Corporation Limited. Varma had promise that he would give Shah shares worth Rs.100 million of his company when it is listed.

Shah alleged that Varma has not kept his promise and continued making false promises without any intention to fulfill them.
"We are investigating the papers filed by Shah and waiting for a reply from Varma after which we would be able to comment. IMPPA will take some time to come to any conclusion because first we will have to investigate the case thoroughly," Shiromani said in Mumbai on Friday.

Shah had financed Varma for films like "Satya", "Mast" and "Jungle".

Ranbir and Deepika scared of signing films together

2008-09-05T07:41:00.000-07:00

After Bachna Ae Haseeno, three big directors are trying to cast real-life couple Ranbir Kapoor and Deepika Padukone together, but the pair is reluctant.

"We decided to be open about our relationship and lived to regret it because the more open we were, the more our honesty was misconstrued. Our right to privacy was completely disregarded. So we've decided to be less public about our relationship. And we don't need to do films together to prove anything," Deepika said.

Ranbir debuted with Saawariya and Deepika forayed into films with Om Shanti Om last year. Bachna Ae Haseeno was the second film for both.

The directors who have offered them films together include Anees Bazmi, who is taking a break from Akshay Kumar and Katrina Kaif after Welcome and Singh Is Kinng, David Dhawan and Rajkumar Santoshi.

Santoshi is already doing a film with Ranbir. It is titled Ajab Prem Ki Gazab Kahani and Katrina is playing the female lead.
But Ranbir and Deepika are not showing any interest in doing films together after seeing what happened to Kareena Kapoor and Shahid Kapur in all their films until their break-up.

The two were seen together in films like Fida and 36 China Town before their break-up, but both the films bombed.

However their Jab We Met, which came after the two separated, was a huge success.

Recently Kareena featured with her current boyfriend Saif Ali Khan in Tashan and that bombed too.

"They've definitely been offered films by Bazmi, Dhawan and Santoshi and are considering taking up at least one of these. But Ranbir-Deepika are in no hurry to sign films together. Not after seeing what happened to Kareena and Shahid in all their films until their break-up and recently to Kareena and Saif Ali Khan in 'Tashan'," said a source.

"Ranbir-Deepika know the public gets satiated reading about real-life couples and seeing them constantly at events on television. The novelty factor is over. Deepika would rather be seen with Saif in Imtiaz Ali's film and Ranbir with Katrina and Konkona SenSharma in his forthcoming films rather than come together on screen repeatedly to entertain each other and bore the audience," added the source.

At the moment all the three major offers for Ranbir-Deepika are on hold.

"They might finally take up one of the offers. As for the much talked-about film by Ranbir's childhood friend Vicky Singh, that has three leading ladies in it and Deepika might or might not be one of them. And that project won't be shot until 2010. In fact, Ranbir hasn't even signed it as yet," a source said.

Nano impasse kindles new hope for used cars market

2008-09-05T07:37:00.000-07:00

The cloud of uncertainty over the Tata Nano roll-out from West Bengal is raising new hope far away in Uttar Pradesh for the used small car market.

The sale of second-hand small cars, which faced a slump this year, suddenly picked up last month.

Industry experts say the small car segment in the used car market has registered a sharp rise of 30 percent during the last 30 days. They expect the figure to touch 50 percent by October.

"With the present deadlock and confusion over the production and supply of Nano, we believe it will take another eight to 12 months for the car to hit the road," says a Lucknow based automobile consultant, Nazir Kazmi.

Car dealers here are excited with the current market trend. “The second hand car market, particularly small cars, was in a lull for the past six months but it has suddenly seen a rise," says, manager of the Maruti Suzuki true-value chain of second hand cars, Ajit Singh. "The most preferred second hand cars include Maruti 800, Maruti Alto, while there are a few buyers for Hyundai Santro also," he added.
While the sale of used Maruti 800 has doubled from an average 12 to 23 per month since August in Lucknow, other models have also seen a similar rise. Alto sales have risen from 12 to 25 and Santro from 13 to 17.

These are average figures of five leading used car dealers in Lucknow, out of the total 30 registered second hand car sellers. They estimate that there are as many as 120 unregistered sellers of second hand cars in the city.

According to the prevailing market rates, second hand small cars go for Rs.60, 000 to Rs.1, 60, 000.

Nano is to be priced at Rs.1, 00,000, but dealers say this does not include the registration fees and other post-production costs. The total price may touch Rs.1, 30, 000.

"Besides affordable prices, these used cars also have good exchange benefits and the buyer can upgrade to a higher model anytime by simply paying the difference," says Sanjiv Sahani of Rama Car Bazar .

Besides good resale value of second hand cars, a majority of the second hand car dealers are facilitating easy loans for the buyers, he added.

Meanwhile, the new small car segment in the state has also shown a marginal improvement in the past one month.

"Lower end models of Maruti 800 and Alto are available in a price range up to Rs.2,00, 000 and the difference with the expected price of Nano is only between Rs.60,000 and Rs.80,000," a senior executive of a Maruti Suzuki showroom TS Motors, explained, preferring anonymity.

"This is hardly a big amount and seeing the Nano delay, people are opting for other small cars," he added.

As against the 30 percent spurt in used car sales, the new small car market has witnessed a growth of nearly 15 percent in the past one month, he said.

Dealers of other car brands also shared a similar view.

"Nano has made no difference to the sale of big and premium cars but sales of small cars were affected. Now it has started picking up and we expect the trend to continue until Tata Motors announces the formal date of Nano launch," a senior manager of BEEAAR Motors, dealing in Hyundai cars, said.

New IITs are a disaster, says PM's scientific adviser

2008-09-05T07:36:00.001-07:00

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's initiative to establish eight new Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) has drawn flak from his own scientific adviser C.N.R. Rao, who said on Friday that the opening of so many new IITs is a “disaster”.

“Opening so may IITs in one year is a disaster. I had no idea that so many IITs have already come up in our country,” he told reporters on the sidelines of an event at the Federation of Indian Cambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).

Six new IITs - in Orissa, Bihar, Rajasthan, Punjab and Andhra Pradesh - have started operations from the current academic session. India now has 13 IITs.

“This is not a play. To open IITs, you need proper planning. There are makeshift campuses and some are even attending classes in old IITs,” said the renowned scientist.

“I came to know about this development after the institutes admitted students. This is sad and I have told the prime minister and even the human resource development minister (Arjun Singh) about this. I am dissatisfied with the developments,” said Rao, a visiting professor at Cambridge University.
ITs are premier engineering colleges of the country. Manmohan Singh has already announced that India will have eight new IITs, including the six opened this year, to boost engineering and technology education.

HAPPY VINAYAKA CHATHURTHY

2008-09-02T04:52:00.000-07:00

Symonds told to seek psychological help

2008-09-02T03:08:00.000-07:00

Embattled Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds has been urged to seek a psychologist's help as he deals with the uncertainty surrounding his international cricket career and a bitter fallout with teammates.

A disillusioned Symonds, whose commitment to the side was questioned after he missed a mandatory team meeting to go fishing, is certain to sit out of the upcoming tour of India in October.

The flamboyant all-rounder has also reportedly fallen out with his senior teammates, including one-time close pal Michael Clarke, who spoke out publicly against him.

"It is understood the strife-torn cricketer has been asked to go on a rehabilitation program, overseen by Cricket Australia medical staff, in which he would see counsellors about his state of mind," The 'Daily Telegraph' reported on Tuesday.

His teammates are reportedly feeling letdown by his actions after standing by him during the controversies that ranged from drunken brawls to frequent showdowns with opposition players.

"There is no time limit on these things," a source said.

"With an issue like this, it's important to ensure that duty of care and responsibility is used. Nobody wants to go any further unless they are comfortable things are where they need to be," he added.

All-rounder Cameron White said no one from the team has spoken to Symonds.

"I don't think the team really knows. Obviously no one's really spoken to Andrew over the last couple of days so only Andrew will know what his mental state is and he'll take the time and work it out for himself, I guess," White said.

SIMI core group chief held in Rajasthan

2008-09-02T03:03:00.000-07:00

Four people, including the chief of the core group of hardline SIMI, have been arrested by a Special Operation Group (SOG) from Kota in Rajasthan, police said on Tuesday.

Munwar Hussain, the chief of the core group of banned outfit, and three others were arrested by SOG yesterday, Additional Director General of Police (DGP), Crime Branch, A K Jain said.

He said Hussain has a tailoring shop in Kota.

The other three arrested were identified as Atiq alias Ath-ur-Rehman, Nadeem Akhtar, both from Kota, and Mohammed Illiyas of Baran district, Jain said.

All the arrested were produced in court, which remanded them to eleven days police custody, he said.

He said the four were not arrested in connection with the Jaipur blast but because of their association with SIMI activist Sajjid Mansuri, accused of playing a key role in the July 26 Ahmedabad blasts.

Trisha

2008-09-02T02:58:00.000-07:00

Review: Phoonk

2008-09-02T02:56:00.001-07:00

The lesson to be learned from Phoonk is: be very careful about whom you hire and be even more careful about firing them because you never know which disgruntled employee might turn out to be a black magic queen.

Phoonk is about Rajeev, an affluent, educated man who doesn't believe in God or superstitions. But after he fires two employees for cheating him, his life gets ferociously creepy.

For one, his young daughter starts to talk like a man and at one point, she even levitates off the bed. Eventually, Rajeev sees the error of his non-believing ways and goes to a blind baba, who armed with three prongs and a fierce silver ring, literally sniffs out the culprits and helps Rajeev to defeat them.

Director Ram Gopal Varma has effectively tackled horror before in Bhoot. In that film, he imbued everyday things like elevators and Mumbai high rises with a sense of dread so even the normal seemed scary.

Phoonk is the exact opposite. Varma strains to create dread by placing his camera at weird angles, repeatedly trying to make stuffed toys look ominous and he even goes for the horror film cliché of an evil crow as sentinel. It's cheap, B-grade horror, basically Ramsay with a bigger budget.

Varma doesn't use his lead actress very efficiently either. Children can be superbly scary because that's precisely what we least expect them to be.

In films like The Exorcist, The Omen and more recently, The Orphanage, little kids have successfully made us scream. But poor Ehsaas Channa, who plays the possessed kid here, is saddled with an infantile script.

Of course Varma propagates black magic and blind superstition in Phoonk but in my book, his worse offense is that he doesn't either scare or entertain us.

At the end of the film, the blind baba declares: Har cheez ka jawab nahin hota.

Indeed. So with every Ram Gopal Varma film, we are doomed to keep asking, what happened to the director who gave us Rangeela, Satya and Company.

Phoonk is tedious mumbo-jumbo. If you want a good fright, rent The Exorcist instead.

Review: Rock On

2008-09-02T02:54:00.000-07:00

Anupama Chopra, Consulting Editor, Films

The best thing about Rock On is that it's not about the music. So even if you've never ever been to a concert or harbored fantasies of being a rock star, you are immediately swept into this story of four friends and their rock band called Magic.

Rock On is about their relationships, their unfulfilled dreams and their gnawing grief that life has passed them by. The music is a metaphor.

Follow your bliss, writer-director Abhishek Kapoor tells us in a film that is sometimes derivative and often predictable but also so engaging and exhilarating that by the climactic concert you are blinking back tears and pumping your fist in the air.

What connects here are the details. Abhishek sets up his characters with a few deft strokes. So, Farhan Akhtar is Adi, former lead singer and current investment banker who mouths lines like: Your wealth is in safe hands, Jai Shri Krishna.

Arjun Rampal is Jo, former lead guitarist, now mostly unemployed and so haunted by his past that he seems hollow.

Purab Kholi is KD, once a kick-ass drummer and now sober Gujarati boy in pinstripes, selling jewelry. And Luke Kenny is Rob, the keyboard player, who now grits his teeth and creates music with Anu Mallik. Each one seethes with a quiet frustration, desperately aware that he has compromised with life.

Adi's wife, hoping to bring some cheer into her husband's mechanical existence, brings the friends together again.

Rock On suffers from a Dil Chahta Hai hangover - here too friends are driven apart and then reunited.

At times the pacing is slow. But these are minor quibbles. The film works because the performances enhance the fine writing.

Farhan Akhtar who has sung four songs, fills out his role nicely. As do Kholi and Kenny. But the real surprise is Arjun Rampal who is bent over with sadness and longing.

Shankar Ehsan and Loy's music is skillfully interwoven so it doesn't impede the narrative but advances it.

The high-octane concert sequences are especially infectious. Rock On is feel-good in the best sense of the word. I enjoyed it immensely and I strongly recommend that you see it too.

SRK at Golden Temple

2008-09-02T02:52:00.001-07:00

Bihar flood victims loot relief depot

2008-09-02T02:50:00.001-07:00

The desperation of the flood victims is getting from the bad to worse. In Madhepura, people waiting for food packets looted a storage depot after the officer guarding depot tried to impose some restriction in food distribution.

With flood-hit areas facing shortage of supplies, their patience is fast running out.

"We are all running around hungry and all we are facing are atrocities and beatings. How is a man supposed to deal with that?" said Kumar, a flood victim.

Officials at the camp say the people were just not willing to wait.

"Ration was stored here to distribute among the flood victims," said Ram Chandra Singh, a police official.

"Ration had come in for distribution which was stored away. The BDO made us incharge of making sure that people gathered in a queue. When we insisted that the ration be distributed or the people would get infuriated the BDO asked people to shift their position which just made things worse," said Singh.

The Centre has already announced a 1000 crore relief package and the Army is aiding rescue and relief operations. But political blame game has already begun.

Lalu Prasad Yadav says the Nitish Kumar government is slow in implementing relief measures and Mayawati is blaming the Centre for not taking up the Kosi dam issue with Nepal.

Did you know India won two gold medals at Beijing?

2008-09-02T02:46:00.001-07:00

Did you know that India won two gold medals and not one at the 2008 Beijing Olympics?

Sunita Lamba, a fine arts artist from Delhi, won a gold at the games for her sculpture, but so far she has received no felicitation from the government.

Lamba, the sister of late cricketer Raman Lamba, had sent her sculpture, Spirit of Unity, for Olympic Fine Arts 2008, an exhibition put up by the organising committee at Beijing, and it was selected for display.

"The chairman of the International Olympic Committee inaugurated the exhibition on August 11 and on the very same day they announced the gold medal for me," Lamba said.

"I was also given an Olympic torch besides the certificate of winning the gold medal," Lamba added. Shooter Abhinav Bindra is the only sportsperson to have fetched a gold for India at the games this time.

Lamba's gold medal will be given to her after the 40-day exhibition gets over. The show will run for a few months in different areas of China itself and after that it will move to countries across the world.

The stars in her eyes clearly spell the joy of winning the gold medal, but the pain of being ignored by the authorities shows just as much.

"Is 'art' a discipline which doesn't hold any importance for the country? More than 20 days have passed since I won the medal but no one has contacted me yet," Lamba, who is 40 plus, said.

"I am not against any reward for any sportspersons but it pinches when the authorities completely ignore you," she added.

"I belong to a sports family and I believe in sports. My aim is to move ahead in life," said Lamba, who works with The Oberoi hotels in the Capital and is a resident of west Delhi.

Before leaving for Beijing, she had even tried to contact Indian Olympic Association president Suresh Kalmadi and union Culture minister Ambika Soni to tell them about her participation.

"I have been making sculptures for the last 25 years and my work was selected from among 10,000 entries for the final 110. Before leaving for Beijing I tried to contact both of them, but didn't get any response from them," Lamba said.

After waiting for a long time, she finally decided to contact the government herself and called Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit last week. Sheila Dikshit asked her to come to the felicitation function of Olympic bronze medal winner in wrestling Sushil Kumar at her residence Monday.

"But even here, the CM just introduced me to the media and that was it," Lamba lamented. She was not even given a bouquet of flowers.

"Is 'art' not a discipline in itself?" she asked. "Everyone decorates their houses with costly art prices, but they are not ready to recognise it as a discipline," Lamba said.

The saving grace was a call from the father of boxer Vijender Singh, who won a bronze medal at the Beijing Olympics.

"He congratulated me and expressed his regret over people's ignorance. He said that art is also a sport and I really felt nice talking to him," she said.

The artist will be travelling to Beruit and US to showcase her work.

"I have also decided to organise an art show in India in which I will invite the international artists who took part in the Olympics art exhibition," she said.

Her elder brother, Rajan Lamba, was quite vocal in expressing his disappointment over her sister being ignored by officialdom.

Dhoni: India's future but still not a Ganguly

2008-09-02T02:42:00.000-07:00

Comparisons may be invidious, but when you have an Indian cricket captain doing well, it is no surprise to see him being weighed against the country’s best ever captain. Mahendra Dhoni has been successful as a leader of a young bunch of players, having brought certain freshness by backing his instincts.

He probably matches Sourav Ganguly on that front, but it is still too early to compare him to the Bengal stalwart.

Ganguly wore a heavy crown early in his tenure as captain. The team was still to come to terms with the match-fixing scandal that had shattered many a heart, having not just to win matches but also regain the confidence of people who followed the fortunes of the team.

Ganguly realised early on that he had to back some youngsters and give them the confidence of winning matches. Some like Harbhajan were smashing successes while others like Yuvraj, Zaheer and Kaif promised more than they performed, but the successes were still coming.

Records never give you the true picture and one can’t ignore the fact that there were some easy matches as well.

Under Ganguly, India won 43 per cent of the Tests. However, these included matches against Bangladesh and Zimbabwe, without which the figure falls to 30 per cent.

Outside India, he won 11 out of 28 Tests while losing 10. In other words, more than the number of victories, it was the trend of winning outside India that really made Ganguly different.

Leading in both Tests and ODIs with equal firmness, a high point was coming back undefeated from Australia in 2004, he himself setting the tone with a fighting century at Brisbane for a draw.

Google challenges Explorer, offers new browser

2008-09-02T02:40:00.000-07:00

Google Inc. is releasing its own Web browser in a long-anticipated move aimed at countering the dominance of Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer and ensuring easy access to its market-leading search engine.

The Mountain View, California-based company took the unusual step of announcing its latest product on the Labor Day holiday after it prematurely sent out a comic book drawn up to herald the new browser's arrival.

The free browser, called ''Chrome,'' is supposed to be available for downloading from Tuesday in more than 100 countries for computers running on Microsoft's Windows operating system. Google said it's still working on versions compatible with Apple Inc.'s Mac computer and the Linux operating system.

Google's browser is expected to hit the market a week after Microsoft's unveiling of a test version of its latest browser update, Internet Explorer 8. The tweaks include more tools for Web surfers to cloak their online preferences, creating a shield that could make it more difficult for Google and other marketing networks to figure out which ads are most likely to appeal to which individuals.

Although Google is using a cartoonish approach to promote Chrome, the new browser underscores the gravity of Google's rivalry with Microsoft, whose Internet Explorer is used by about 75 percent of Web surfers.

Google's lead in the lucrative Internet search market is nearly as commanding, with its engine processing nearly two-thirds of the Web's queries.

For the past few years, Google has been trying to take advantage of its search engine's popularity to loosen Microsoft's grip on how most people interact with personal computers.

The assault so far has been focused on a bundle of computer programs, including word processing and spreadsheet applications, that Google offers as an alternative to one of Microsoft's biggest money makers, its Office suite of products.

Google has tried to make its alternatives more appealing and accessible by hosting them for free over Internet connections instead of requiring users to pay a licensing fee to install them on individual computers, as Microsoft typically does.

Meanwhile, Microsoft has tried to thwart Google by investing billions in the development of its own search engine and making an unsuccessful attempt to buy Yahoo Inc. for $47.5 billion.

Pune MBA students get life for poisioning friend

2008-06-12T04:59:00.000-07:00

A Pune sessions court on Thursday convicted the two MBA students to life for the murder of a classmate.

Twenty-five-year-old Aditi Sharma and Praveen Khandelwal were convicted on Wednesday for murdering Udit Bharti by poisoning him.

The court had delayed the announcement of quantum of sentence till Thursday.

Additional Sessions Court Judge S S Phansalkar-Joshi, based on testimonies of the victim`s friend and the vicera report, held the two management students guilty.

The incident had shocked among students and college campuses in April last year.

The accused Aditi and Pravin, offered Shirdi Sai Baba`s Prasad (offering) laced with poison to Udit.

All three were residents of Jammu and were studying in Pune. According to the police Udit kept pestering Aditi with calls even after their alleged relationship ended.

That's when Aditi conspired with her boyfriend Pravin and poisoned Udit by giving him prasad laced with poison.

Defence lawyer Vijay Rao Mohitesays Aditi and Pravin will go in appeal against the judgement

Police exonerate Ronaldo, say he committed no crime

2008-05-06T05:12:00.000-07:00

Brazilian star Ronaldo has admitted he's embarrassed and ashamed about his highly publicized encounter with three cross-dressing prostitutes last week and has called it the biggest mistake of his life.

In an interview on Brazil's Globo TV, the AC Milan striker on Sunday denied claims by one of the prostitutes that he had sex with them and used drugs, but admitted the incident will haunt the rest of his career.

Ronaldo said he wasn't aware the prostitutes were cross-dressers until he got to a motel with them, discovered they were men and decided not to have sex with them because he is heterosexual.

"I'm completely heterosexual, I don't have any doubt on that. But, to be honest, I don't care what she (the transvestite) says or not. The important thing is that my mistake became very big, and took on international proportions," he said.

Police are investigating to determine whether an extortion attempt was made against Ronaldo, but have said he committed no crime.

Three dead infants found in freezer, mom arrested

2008-05-06T05:10:00.000-07:00

A 44-year-old woman was arrested on suspicion of killing three of her babies after their bodies were discovered in the family freezer by her grown children looking for pizza, police said Monday.

Police confirmed the grisly find Sunday night in the town of Wenden, near Olpe, in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia after the woman turned herself in, officials said.

The three infants are believed to have been born alive, but authorities were awaiting autopsy results to determine how they died, said Johannes Daheim, a spokesman for prosecutors investigating the case.

The woman, her 47-year-old husband and three adult children, two sons, aged 18 and 22, and a 24-year-old daughter have lived in the town in a single-family home since 1984.

The children discovered the frozen babies on Saturday afternoon while their parents were away for the weekend, investigator Martin Feldmann said.
The 18-year-old and his sister had been looking for a frozen pizza and came across a lot of expired food so decided to clean out the freezer.

The teenager then found three identical packets on the bottom of the freezer and opened one and saw the head and arm of an infant that was wrapped in a hand towel, police said.

The children confronted their parents when they returned home Sunday, and the couple and their daughter then went to police together to tell authorities, said Herbert Fingerhut, head of the police investigation, at a news conference.

The corpulent woman apparently concealed the three pregnancies, believed to have been in the 1980s, not only from neighbors but also her own family, Fingerhut said.

''It sounds unbelievable, but there are examples showing such things are possible,'' he said.

The news of the discovery took other residents aback.

''I've been mayor for 14 years, and this is definitely the worst day I've seen,'' said Peter Brueser. ''We will need a long time here to work through this.''

It was the latest in a string of similar cases in Germany.

In the worst case, a woman was convicted of manslaughter in 2006 and sentenced to the maximum 15 years in prison for killing eight of her newborn babies and burying them in flower pots and a fish tank in the garden of her parents' home near the German-Polish border.

More recently, police in February were called to a home in northern Germany where a dead infant was discovered in the cellar.

In January, a 28-year-old German woman was charged with manslaughter after the remains of three babies were discovered in her house and the home of a relative. That woman has denied killing the babies.

Cong MP quits, blames Rahul's coterie for party mess

2008-05-06T05:08:00.000-07:00

n the first revolt against the ascendancy of Rahul Gandhi in the Congress, Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament from Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Das, resigned from the party on Tuesday.

Das resigned saying Rahul Gandhi and his coterie was running the party. He also said that Rahul was the in-charge of the entire country.

"There is an unconstitutional power coterie. They don't have any knowledge, they are not Congressmen and they are all surrounding the 'Yuvraj' of the Congress party. It is unfortunate that only that coterie has an access to him, nobody else can tell him anything. He is controlling the entire Congress part and he is controlling the entire nation. If he is not happy with you, I mean specially if his coterie is not happy with you, you cannot be in party," Das claimed.

The senior Congress MP also alleged that the old leadership is being ignored.

He also resigned from the membership of the Rajya Sabha.
When the Rajya Sabha met in the morning, Das went up to Chairman Hamid Ansari and handed over his resignation letter saying, "I have no faith in the Congress party."

However, Minister of State (Independent Charge) of the Ministry of Women & Child Development Renuka Chowdhary said that there is no need for anyone to be feeling sidelined.

Das is known as the Congress party's Man Friday in Lucknow and has been one of the main fund-raiser of the party. He owns hotels and other businesses in the city.

He was miffed after he was replaced by Jitin Prasada as the Minister of State for Steel in the recent Cabinet reshuffle.

Who is Akhilesh Das

* Akhilesh Das is the son of former UP chief minister late Shri Banarsi Das and late Shrimati Vidyawati Devi and was born at Lucknow on March 31, 1962.

* Das made his political debut in early 90s. He upbringing in politics was largely under Congress leader Pramod Tiwari.

* He became Lucknow's youngest mayor in 1992.

* He was also the General-Secretary of UP Congress Committee.

* An international badminton player from 977-83, he was also the Vice-President of the Badminton Association of India and the chairman of UP Badminton Association.

BCCI panel 'shocked' to see Bhajji-Sree slap video

2008-05-06T05:07:00.001-07:00

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) appointed advocate Sudhir Nanavati Commission on Tuesday began the inquiry into Harbhajan Singh's slapping of S Sreesanth after an Indian Premier League Twenty20 match between Mumbai Indians and Punjab Kings XI in Mohali.

After seeing the video footage Nanavati said, "I saw the tape and I was shocked."

"A player who has a BCCI contract, is getting the match fee for the whole year and then he also gets paid for the IPL for a particular period in the year. So, if he is getting paid by both the IPL and the BCCI, then he should also be punished by both," said Nanavati.

Nanavati has reportedly summouned both the players and while Harbhajan will meet him on Friday, Sreesanth is yet to confirm a date.

He had earlier met Aleem Dar and Amish Saheba - the two umpires of the match - and recorded their statements.
Nanavati recorded match referee Farokh Engineer’s statement and will also speak to Mumbai Indians coach Lalchand Rajput, who was allegedly standing behind Harbhajan when he slapped Sreesanth after the match.

Harbhajan had slapped Sreesanth and was banned by the IPL for 11 matches.

The IPL inquiry was conducted by match referee Farokh Engineer and he found the slapping incident was completely unprovoked. Harbhajan was also fined 100 per cent of his match fee.

Soon after the verdict, BCCI’s Chief Administrative Officer Ratnakar Shetty told CNN-IBN, "His (Harbhajan) troubles are not over. He has a showcause notice pending against him with the BCCI and he has to answer to the BCCI independently."

"Harbahjan is a contracted player of BCCI and code of conduct for player is applicable to him also. This is a serious incident that has come up and BCCI cannot just say that there is non official complaint and since contracted player is involved, a showcause notice has been issued in his name and will be served to him when he arrives in Mumbai. There is a disciplinary committee, which will take necessary action as per code of conduct applicable in this matter. It is very unfortunate and this type of incident should be condemned in strong words and we should not think twice in dealing with such matters," Shetty said.

Bharti makes most expensive buyout bid for SA company

2008-05-06T05:06:00.001-07:00

In what is the most expensive bid for a buyout by an Indian company, Bharti Airtel has bid close to $19 billion for a 51 per cent stake in the South African telecom company MTN.

Bharti has secured $12 billion of financing from Goldman Sachs and Standard Chartered and the remaining funding will be through issue of equity to MTN shareholders.

The Financial Times, quoting sources, said Bharti's bid is at $21.8 a share but MTN is looking for $23.8 dollars a share.

MTN is a big player in Africa and the Middle-East.

The South African mobile company MTN released a statement on Monday evening, in which it said it was engaged in discussions with Bharti Artel.
"The discussions are exploratory in nature and may or may not lead to any transaction. Accordingly, shareholders are advised to exercise caution when dealing in the company's securities until a further announcement is made," the statement said.

Bharti executives had stoutly denied the company’s interest in MTN when initial reports had surfaced in April.

Bharti chief Sunil Bharti Mittal had cautiously told the Financial Times, "We're delighted that they've chosen to talk to us. It confirms Airtel's standing in global telecoms, but whether it will lead to anything, I don't know."

Sources say, though, that it is unlikely that the MTN board would sell 100 per cent of the company to foreign bidders.

Top IPL players likely to earn Rs 61 crore next yr

2008-05-06T05:03:00.000-07:00

The Indian Premier League has brought big money into cricket. Multi-million dollar auction of players were organised by the league with Indian ODI and Twenty20 skipper MS Dhoni getting the maximum bidding price of Rs 6 crore this season. That happened because the IPL had put a cap of $ 5 million for the franchises this year to prevent the rich team owners from splurging too much. But with the grand success of the inaugural edition of the IPL, the cap is all set to go. The move could see top cricketers earn as much as $15 million (Rs 61 crore approx) from next season.

Bangalore IT professionals cycle towards a green future

2007-09-14T04:31:00.001-07:00

Meet Nikhil Eldurkar, a cycling enthusiast who's pedaled his passion to new heights.
A software engineer by profession Nikhil cycles 17 km from his house in Jayanagar to his office in Marathhalli, and that too in the thick of Bangalore traffic.
That's not all, Nikhil along with fellow IT professional Rohan Kini, have started a website called bumsonthesaddle.com to bring about a cycling revolution in the city.
"This is for the sake of the environment, because in the long run, if your environment is good, it's easier to keep fit. I think by starting this we can bring together people with common ideas and thoughts and promote cycling," says he.
With more than 10 persons leaving their automobiles for these cycles within three months of the website's launch, the idea seems to be catching on.
And Nikhil believes cycling is not only the best way to reduce environmental pollution but also controls traffic jams.
Bangaloreans though have mixed reactions about this initiative. Some say that cycles are too slow and hamper the movement of traffic. Others insist that they would cycle if there were separate lanes provided for them. Still others think that it is a great way to reduce traffic jams in the city.
HG Wells once said that when I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race. And when you see what Rohan and Nikhil have accomplished, one tends to agree with that.

Govt in a fix over Ram Setu, withdraws affidavit

2007-09-14T04:27:00.000-07:00

In a damage control exercise, the Centre on Friday withdrew from the Supreme Court its two affidavits, including the controversial one filed by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) claiming there was no historical or scientific evidence to establish existence of Lord Ram and Rama Setu as a man-made bridge.
The Centre's action came in the wake of controversy sparked by the ASI affidavit on Thursday that forced the Government to backtrack on the issue.
A Bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balkrishnan, which allowed the Centre to withdraw the affidavits, said that the August 31 interim order putting on hold the construction in Rama Setu area will continue.
The Court in its interim order had allowed the dredging activity.
The government said it will examine the entire issue relating to the Sethusamudram project and sought three month's time from the court.
The Court posted the matter for hearing in the first week of January 2008.
The government said it wanted to resolve the matter in a "constructive and mutually acceptable manner".
"I have taken instructions from the Government at the highest level," Additional Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam told the Bench which included Justice R V Raveendran.
He said there was no intention to cast aspersion on religious faith or to divide the society.
Meanwhile, UPA partner DMK says ASI is right. “We fully agree with the ASI stand on Ram Setu. It is a natural structure. We are only looking at the economic point of it. It should not become a religious issue and DMK’s stand on religion is known to all,” DMK leader TKS Elangovan said.
The Opposition has been quick to seize upon the issue. BJP leader Narendra Modi fired his first salvo against Congress chief Sonia Gandhi over the Ram Setu issue saying, “Ram was born here. He wasn't born in Italy. We don't need any certificate from the Congress on Ram.”

League versus League: Can ICL survive?

2007-09-14T04:26:00.000-07:00

Before 1986, the big battles of Indian football among sides like East Bengal, Mohammadan Sporting and Mohun Bagan used to be the rage. At Delhi’s Ambedkar stadium - invariably full to the brim with spectators screaming at the top of their voices - even some below par football and average set of footballers from this holy trinity always threatened to acquire the aura reserved only for international stars.
That was till the World Cup featuring iconic Maradona, and over 50 live matches, was telecast in the summer of 86.
The quality of football took the whole generation of impressionable age by the storm. The attendance at domestic matches, in most parts of India, suddenly plummeted. They had seen real football!
One can expect similar thing when the Board of Control for Cricket in India’s brainchild Indian Premier League (and Champions League) take on the Indian Cricket League.
With top international stars and club teams vying with each other to be a part of the IPL, on paper, Zee’s Indian Cricket League stands no chance.
Surely, in Glenn McGrath versus Dinesh Mongia, or Ricky Ponting versus Rohan Gavaskar, the battle for the eyeball is always going to be one-sided. It will be naïve to expect anything else. While ICL may still attract some viewership due to local interest and DTH platform, it will be more or less a loss-making venture, and Subhash Chandra is a businessman who is as much interested in profit, as in cricket.
Saving ICL
After the latest development, only one route remains for the ICL. And that is to challenge the authority of ICC, not just the BCCI. It will desperately need to launch a different set of national teams, united by an apex international body along the lines of ICC. The latest development may have left it with no other alternative.
Nothing motivates people like watching their national teams in action, and domestic cricket is simply no good. Check out the attendance at Ranji matches even involving teams like Mumbai, Punjab, Delhi and Karnataka, and compare that with an ODI between India and Kenya! So ICL simply can’t survive without spreading the movement beyond India. If they do not expand, they will perish

Indian doc develops enzyme that can destroy HIV

2007-09-14T04:24:00.000-07:00

Dr Indrani Sarkar has has every reason to be excited. Her PhD thesis, which started in 2002 at the Max Planck Institute in Dresden, Germany, has thrown open the doors for developing enzymes that can destroy the dreaded Human Immuno-deficiency Virus or HIV within infected cells permanently.
Indrani and a team of scientists have developed an enzyme called Tre. Tre is a custom enzyme capable of detecting, recognising and destroying HIV, much like a pair of molecular scissors.
"In laymans terms, it's an engineered enzyme which recognises sequences in the HIV genome that is duplicated, integrated virus and by the process of recombination, it cuts out the virus from the genome," says she.
The biggest challenge with treating HIV today is that the virus becomes dormant and often develops resistance to HIV drugs.
The only way then to cure HIV is to get rid of the virus completely and Tre, the enzyme that Indrani constructed after a year and its 126 "cycles of mutation" totally deplete HIV in the human genome in three months in laboratory conditions.
It's a beautiful approach, but like any other drug, this one too will take a few years to reach clinics — anywhere between five and 20 years actually. A lot of research has to be done because since one is working with a novel enzyme, one has to engineer the enzyme," says she.
According to the latest statistics given out by UNAIDS and WHO, there are close to 39.5 million people living with HIV/AIDS in the world and though it will be a while before an imminent cure is likely, Dr Indrani Sarkar's findings certainly hold out hope for the millions who are battling the disease across the globe.

Face The Nation: Myth, legends and non-issues

2007-09-13T00:51:00.000-07:00

Did Lord Ram exist and did he build a bridge to Sri Lanka or not? The Government says Lord Ram and his bridge are a myth.
Traffic was held up across several North Indian cities on Wednesday as the VHP protested against the planned Sethusamudram Shipping Canal project in Tamil Nadu.
The Sangh Parivar says this project will destroy the sacred `Ramar Setu' or mythological bridge apparently built by Lord Ram and his vanar sena. However, there were no protests in any of the southern states.
But the government said there is no historical evidence that Lord Ram existed or that he built the Ram Setu. Pure blasphemy responds the Sangh Parivar. Ram existed and he built the Ram Setu with his vanar sena.
Building the Sethusamudram shipping canal project on the Tamil Nadu coast is nothing short of an insult to the Hindu faith. Today, the VHP held protests against the Sethusamudram shipping project across north Indian cities, from Chandigarh to Indore - traffic was brought to a halt.
The Centre on Monday asserted in the Supreme Court that Adam's Bridge 'Ramar Sethu' was not man made but a natural formation comprising a chain of seven shoals between India and Sri Lanka and is approximately 30 km long.
On August 31, the court restrained the Centre from causing any damage to 'Ramar Sethu' and asked it to file its reply to Janata Party president Subramanian Swamy's petition.
The Centre said his assertion that the respondents were drilling holes at the alleged 'Ramar Sethu' for planting explosives with a view to demolishing the structure was "entirely false and completely misleading.
In a substantial part of Adam's Bridge, the activity pertaining to the Sethusamudram Ship Canal Project is dredging of sand from the natural seabed to increase the depth by a few metres
The said activity cannot under any circumstance and by any stretch of imagination be construed as an act of demolishing of the entire Adam's Bridge.
Should issues like Ram Setu affect Government policy?
Senior journalist Saeed Naqvi, AR Venkatachalapathy Professor of History, Madras Institute of Development Studies and B P Singhal, Former MP, BJP debated the issue on Face The Nation with Sagarika Ghose.
The initial result of the poll suggested that 78 per cent of the people said yes issues like Ram Setu do affect Government policy while only 22 per cent people denied saying no.
In the name of religion
Project like Sethusamudram and Ship Canal project will be an innumerous economic and industrial boost to Tamil Nadu, why should BJP hold that up in the name of religion? Does it bother the party that no one in Tamil Nadu is supporting the struggle?
Strongly arguing the fact that the project will boost economic growth, Singhal said, “Who said that it is going to have innumerous economic benefit? It’s only from the west coast to east coast. And it does not bother us if anybody supporting us or not in Tamil Nadu because Tamil Nadu is headed by a chief minister who does not believe in any God or religious faith.”
What was the need of the Government to go to the court and declare that Ram is a myth or Ram Setu is a myth? Ram, whatever the historical prove may be, is also a focus of public faith.
Advocating the Government’s move, Natarajan said, “The fact of the matter is it was the NDA the BJP prime minister and government that first cleared this project with the same alignment. I think it’s the height of political hypocrisy for Singhal’s party to now question it just because the UPA Government is in power.”
When there is a shrine, which is accepted as a sacred monument by some sections of the community, should development efforts protect those monuments?
Naqvi said, “In a country like India we should not hurt any body’s faith. If somebody’s faith is involved I don’t think we should but between faith and blind belief there is a difference.”
Faith, blind belief or reality
Strongly reacting to Naqvi’s statement, Singhal said, “What is andhaviswas (blind belief). A viswas is viswas. We believe that there was Ram and there is Ram even today in everybody’s heart. The first chief of the ASI named this Ram Setu as Ramar Setu in 1788. In 1804 it was named as Adam's Bridge.”
Is it time that historians actually establish whether this is in fact something built by a character Ram of Ramayan or whether it is in fact the natural formation which is not man made.
“There is a fundamental confusion about faith in a God and in believing that certain structures have been built by a God. It’s impossible to argue with faith. There was no such response from the south during this VHP action and it shows that the faith is not shared across this country. So this is a new tradition that this Hinduvta forces are trying to create,” Venkatachalapathy said.
Ram Setu another Babri Masjid?
BJP is trying to gain milestone out of this issue. It is trying to divide South in the name of Ram. Is Ram Setu becoming another Babri Masjid?
“I hope the BJP know what they are playing with. In south India the entire Dravida movement came an unfortunate anti-Rama platform. BJP is creating divide in the South,” Naqvi answered.
There is national security at risk with this project, there is economic risk, there is environmental risk, why doesn’t BJP make these arguments why it is making religious argument?
Singhal replied, “Apart from scientific and security angle it has religious angle too.”
When the Government comes out and says this is a myth, there is no archeological evidence and there is no scientific proof, don’t you think that a Government must be little more sensitive to the faith and worship of people.
Clarifying what the Government is trying to say about the Setu, Naqvi said, “The Government has not said that the Ram does not exist, they didn’t say that Ram is not part of mythology or they did not say that Ram is not part of our culture but they said there is no archeological evidence to say that there was any Setu.”
Is Ram still a potent force in South?
In Tamil Nadu Ram has great importance as a literary figure because of the great Tamil epic. But there is hardly any temple for Ram in Tamil Nadu. There is a general belief that worshiping Ram will only bring sorrow and bad luck, Venkatachalapathy said.
When development works are embarked upon is it not part of the government to take in to consideration the feelings of the people and re-assure them that whatever they hold sacred will not be damaged or the Government will try to preserve.
Natarajan said, ”I have absolutely no doubt at all that the Government will take into consideration the genuine feelings of the people who are genuinely affected. Certainly that does not apply to the BJP or demonstrations, which was a flop show.”

'ISI agent' arrested in Hyderabad

2007-09-12T04:29:00.001-07:00

A suspected ISI agent was arrested on Tuesday by SIT probing the August 25 twin blasts. Police arrested Mohd Sohail, 21, a resident of Saleem Nagar in Malakpet, at RTC crossroads. He was reportedly found in possession of 'jehadi' literature. Sohail was reportedly in contact with HuJI leader Shahed alias 'Bilal', the prime accused in the several blast cases in the city. Sohail also reportedly went to Mumbai a week ago to discuss future operations in the city, sources said. "Sohail was planning to execute some more blasts in the city," a senior police officer said. Sohail reportedly confessed to police that they were planning to extend their operations outside India, particularly in Asia. Police officials claimed that Sohail confessed that he was having links with ISI activists. He was produced before court and sent to judicial remand. Police also filed a petition for his custody.

'Cracks' appear in flyover panel

2007-09-12T04:27:00.003-07:00

The seriousness of the government in probing into the collapse of the scaffoldings at the under-construction flyover at Punjagutta last Sunday is evidenced by the fact that the officer named to head the probe is yet to submit his report on an incident that took place in June this year. K Siva Reddy, engineer-in-chief, roads and buildings department, is the officer heading the five-member experts' committee that was asked to submit its report on the Punjagutta collapse by the coming Friday. However, till Tuesday night, none of the members had visited the mishap site. Siva Reddy, who is away in New Delhi, told TOI that he and his team would visit the flyover site on Wednesday. In fact, Siva Reddy was named as the inquiry officer to examine the Muslim Jung parallel bridge in Old City in which some cracks had developed in the third week of June. Inauguration of the bridge which was to be opened for public in July was put on hold because of the cracks. According to sources, Siva Reddy was directed to investigate the matter in August this year. "However, till date, no report is forthcoming. On the contrary, seven engineers who had been suspended for the cracks that appeared in the Muslim Jung Bridge have since been reinstated," an official told TOI. Interestingly, Mahesh Tandon, who is one of the consultants for the Punjagutta flyover and is alleged to have failed to conduct checks at the flyover site, was a member of the technical committee that was appointed before Siva Reddy to probe the cracks in the Muslim Jung Bridge. Sources said the seven engineers were reinstated in their jobs due to pressure from some quarters. Of these, five belong to the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation while two are on deputation. After the Punjagutta collapse, the government had suspended three GHMC engineers. If the Muslim Jung bridge incident is any indication, then both the appointment of experts' committee as well as suspension of the engineers will also end up as a mere eyewash.

Will consider India's request for Dawood's extradition: Bhutto

2007-09-12T04:27:00.001-07:00

Former Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto has said she will certainly look into India's request for extradition of Mumbai serial blasts accused Dawood Ibrahim, who is believed to be in Karachi. "We will certainly look into the request by the Indian government," she said in an interview. Bhutto was asked whether she would grant the extradition of Dawood if she is elected to power. "If he is living in Karachi, it is very wrong ... I do not want Pakistan should get a bad name and be seen as a country that harbours criminals from all parts of the world, including India," she said. Bhutto, who has been living in self-imposed exile in London, said that the militants Pakistan "nurtured" during the Afghan war against the Soviet Union had returned to haunt them. "Groups like Jaish-e-Mohammad and Lashkar-e-Tayyaba have unleashed suicide bombings in Pakistan," she said adding that it was time "Pakistan put its internal house into order". Backing the composite dialogue between India and Pakistan, Bhutto said the process "is setting a new pace, setting a new agenda and a new goal." The two-time premier said Kashmir was a core issue between the two countries but not the one that should be allowed to derail the Indo-Pak relationship or the dialogue.

Thailand denies top LTTE rebel's arrest

2007-09-12T04:25:00.000-07:00

Thai police said on Wednesday that there was no truth to reports triggered by an allegation on a Sri Lankan government website that a top Tamil Tiger leader had been arrested in Bangkok. "I've checked with related police bureaux -- the Immigration Police, the Metropolitan Police and the Special Branch. There has been no report of a Tiger rebel arrested in Bangkok," national police spokesman Lieutenant-General Ronnarong Youngyuen said. "If we'd arrested him, we would have made good publicity out of it," Ronnarong told reporters. The Sri Lankan Defence Ministry site said: "Reliable sources from Thailand reveal that LTTE's chief for cross border terrorist activities, Kumaran Padmanadan, alias "KP" has been arrested in Bangkok". KP was described as finance chief of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels. Ronnarong said Thai police did hand over three Tamil Tigers to Sri Lanka last month after the rebels served jail terms for arms smuggling following their arrest dour years ago.
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Govt says Ram Setu a myth; BJP up in arms

2007-09-12T04:23:00.000-07:00

The BJP on Wednesday accused the Congress-led UPA government of "blasphemy" by telling the Supreme Court that there was no historical evidence to establish the existence of Ram Setu in the epic Ramayana.
"This is sheer blasphemy," senior BJP leader Vijay Kumar Malhotra said reacting to an affidavit filed by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) rejecting the claim of the existence of the Ram Setu or Adam's bridge in the area where the Sethusamudram project was under construction.
"It's an insult to the Hindu faith. We also wonder why Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi have been going for the Dussehra festival if their government does not believe in Lord Ram's existence," he said.
The BJP and other constituents of the Sangh Parivar are opposing the Sethusamudram project saying it would damage an undersea bridge believed to be built by Lord Ram.
“Today, the government in its affidavit says there is no evidence to prove the bridge was built by Lord Rama or that Lord Ram ever existed. This is an attack on Hindu sentiments, a ferocious one,” Malhotra said.

Ram Setu, a historical monument?
Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) activists blocked rail and road traffic and clashed with police in many parts of the country on Wednesday morning, protesting the proposal for a navigational sea route between India and Sri Lanka that could damage Ram Setu.
The three-hour road blockade to protest the Sethusamudram Shipping Canal project threw traffic off gear in many parts of Mumbai, Delhi, north and north-west India. Schools were also closed in Indore in anticipation of violence.
But barring the arrest of 46 VHP supporters in Puducherry, there was hardly any protest across South India. However, BJP Leader ID Swami warned the UPA of dire consequences if they ignored these protests.
“This agitation is a warning to the UPA, if the Government doesn’t listen the results will be dangerous,” Swami said.
The Opposition says that project is not political but "Hindus are opposed to the demolition of Ram Setu.”
Earlier, General Secretary of VHP Orissa unit Gouri Prashad Rath had said that it was a mistake on part of the erstwhile NDA government to sanction the Sethusamudram project as it cannot be completed without demolishing the ancient Ram Setu.
The “sacred Setu” should not be touched as it is associated with sentiments of Hindus, he had said.

Quote of the day !!!!!!!!!!!!

2007-08-24T08:24:00.000-07:00

Who holds the Indian flag in the Kashmir valley?

2007-08-24T05:55:00.000-07:00

Last week, the nation celebrated the 60^th anniversary of India's freedom. Indians all over the globe attended Independence Day celebrations, be it the flag hoisting ceremony at Lal Qila, or the Indian Mela in London [Images] or India Day celebrations in Boston or the Independence Day parades in state capitals all around the country.

Indian television channels also celebrated by airing the shows focused on India's journey over the last 60 years. Some shows focused on 'what is going right for the country' whereas some focused on 'what has gone wrong and what could we do to right the wrongs.'

Once again, we pledged to do whatever it takes to make our nation strong, united and self-sufficient. We remembered and honoured our fallen soldiers. We honoured our best and encouraged our 'better ones' to be the best. We were upbeat. We were positive. We believed in our strengths and pledged to remain focused on our goals. We reflected upon the 'past' and talked about the 'future.'

But sadly, we forgot the 'present.'

While the nation was celebrating the freedom, there were many amongst us who could not do the same. For these unfortunate ones, freedom means much more than hoisting the national pride -- the tricolour. For them, freedom means freedom from fear, freedom from persecution, freedom from governmental apathy, freedom from unemployment, and above all freedom from the shackles of pseudo-democracy.

Yes, my friends, I am talking about 7,000 odd Kashmiri Hindus who are still in the Kashmir valley. These faceless and voiceless human beings stayed put in the valley because that is where their home is. These unfortunate souls decided to weather the terrorism because they cannot leave the place where their heart is. One might argue that why they didn't leave the valley like other 400,000+ folks of their community.

But then one might also want to argue that why should they leave their place of abode. Why should they leave the lands that their forefathers had tilled? Why should they? They are patriotic souls who believed in the tricolour and the nationhood of India. They believed in the Indian Constitution that is supposed to guarantee them the security, dignity, honour and freedom of expression.

They are brave souls who decided to weather any and every storm they might have to face. But their bravery does not mean that we, the rest of the nation, leave them alone at the mercy of hegemonic behaviour of the majority community in the valley and indifferent and apathetic state and central government.

You might argue that there are more pressing issues that India faces and needs to tackle than care for these 7,000 odd Kashmiri Hindus' fundamental rights and I would not dispute that. But I would strongly argue back that while their numbers might look small, the strategic consequences of losing them would result in losing Kashmir altogether.

It is these 7,000 odd human beings who are still keeping the Indian tricolour alive in the valley.

Isn't it shameful that while we were hoisting flags all over the globe, the only tricolours that were hoisted in the valley were hoisted by ministers at official ceremonies? No one would dare to hoist the Indian tricolour openly at any other place.

If you visit the valley today, you will not see a single tricolour flying at any place. It is only these 7,000 human beings who, while living in ground zero, still 'unconditionally' believe in the Indian Constitution and its sovereignty. If we lose them, we lose Kashmir. And if we lose Kashmir, that would be the beginning of the end of one Indian Nation.

If we lose Kashmir, that would be the beginning of the Balkanisation of India. After losing Kashmir, it would be just a matter of time before we start losing other limbs of our nation.

So please decide which issue is more important for India's future as a nation.

My dear friends, can we afford to ignore these 7,000 brave souls and leave them at the mercy of terrorists? Can we afford to lose Kashmir and then see India gradually disintegrate? No. We cannot and should not.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh [Images] in his address to the nation, from the ramparts of the Lal Qila, talked about his vision of a new caring India -- 'An India in which the weak and downtrodden are empowered, the disabled find support, the destitute find succour and every individual is touched by the hand of progress and development... An India in which every citizen can live a life of dignity, self-respect, decency and hope; where every citizen feels proud to say -- I am Indian!'

Mr Prime Minister, these 7,000 Kashmiri Hindu souls already feel proud to be Indian but they are not living the life of dignity, self-respect, decency and hope. They are being subjected to perpetual humiliation at the hands of the majority community. Would you please stand up and take notice? Would you please direct your Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad to take stock of their situation and provide relief and rehabilitation to them?

Would you please guarantee these minority citizens their fundamental rights? Would you, please?

Talking about industrialisation, agrarian change and the resultant displacement of rural masses, Dr Singh said, 'I agree that it is the responsibility of government to ensure that displacement does not lead to impoverishment; that those who lose land do not lose livelihoods; and, that those who have lost employment get better opportunities. We are, therefore, giving final shape to a National Policy for Rehabilitation and Resettlement for all those displaced by major projects.'

What about the people who are displaced due to the prevailing scourge of global terrorism? What about a National Policy for Rehabilitation and Resettlement for all those displaced by Islamic terrorism perpetrating in the state of Jammu & Kashmir? What about such a policy, Mr Prime Minister?

It is time that the Prime Minister's Office stops organising farcical round table conferences and working groups that do not produce any results. Those have been a total waste of time. It is a facade that the PMO creates to divert the attention and drag its feet.

It is about time that the PMO gets serious about Kashmir and implements initiatives and policies that protect the fundamental rights of its Kashmiri Hindu citizens in Jammu & Kashmir. It should seriously, with sincerity of purpose, look into the political, economic and social demands of these citizens who are the last bastion of hope within the valley.

These Kashmiri Hindus, refugees within their own state, need representation in the legislative bodies of the state so that their issues are properly represented in the corridors of power. It is first time since 1947 that there is no representation of Kashmiri Hindus in the state cabinet. Don't they deserve representation? Since these Kashmiri Hindus have lost their primary source of livelihood, they need to be provided with soft industrial loans and employment packages. They need proper secure environs where they can breathe freely without the fear of gun.

It should not come to a pass where these very Indian citizens, who day in and day out breath their Indian identity with pride, lose their last bit of hope from the Indian government and end up taking extreme measures.

I am afraid to say that if it did come to that, then those extreme measures will have serious long-term adverse consequences for the nation of India.

So, Mr Prime Minister: Are you listening? Would you take the lead, please?

HAPPY 60^th to all the readers!

Looking forward to even happier 70^th!

6 ways to find the PERFECT job

2007-08-24T05:52:00.000-07:00

Every professional dreams of landing that perfect job where the roles and responsibilities are in alignment with an individual's career aspirations and interests.

By starting early, planning intelligently, and making good use of your broad-based skills, especially those related to research, analysis and communication, it shouldn't be too hard to meet the challenges of choosing a career and be successful in the job search process.

Here are some tips on how to go about the process:

Do some research
During the job hunt, the first thing you want to do is research a particular industry to get an idea as to what type of job search will be most effective. Targeting your efforts and job search approach is an important first step for all job seekers.

How to SUCCEED at your first job

For instance, if the retail industry interests you, you should arm yourself with information like what skills and education are required for a job in the industry and how employers like to receive resumes and applications will give you an edge in your search. This kind of information can be obtained from the career section of any company's website or by observing the recruitment advertisements in the daily newspapers.

Prepare a professional resume and cover letter
Be honest but present your accomplishments in the most positive way in your resume. Do highlight your most recent accomplishments and qualifications that you may have gained. Make sure that the key skills that prospective employers are seeking are clearly highlighted.

If you don't have any experience in the prospective field that does not mean that you don't have the skills to do the job. Avoid redundant details like hobbies and personal interests unless they are directly linked to the job applied for.

Most employers prefer to receive resumes either by fax or email. Customise your resume along with a clear cover letter, outlining your interest in the field and that particular company. It is always worth mentioning in your cover letter that you would like the opportunity to come down for a one-on-one interaction. Meeting in person is a very effective way to ensure that you are remembered, and thus improves your chances of being hired.

Keep your eyes and ears open
Closely follow both the advertised and unadvertised job postings. Keep an eye on job supplements like Times Ascent, Power Jobs etc and employment journals and websites like Naukri.com, Timesjobs.com. Monster.com etc. Explore the unadvertised job market as well.

Keep searching jobs through friends and contacts before they are posted. Tap into the alumni of your institution who may be working in leading organisations.

Remember, your network determines your net-worth, so talk to as many people as possible who are in the jobs that you would like to be in, as these discussions often lead to valuable job leads and contacts.

Work with a recruiter or job consultant
Using a specialised recruiter can ease the pressure and help you target your efforts to only the best opportunities. Recruitment consultants would often be willing to help you for a fee.

Give your consultant as much information as possible like your background, experience and career aspirations. Are you interested in a large or a small company, are you open to relocation etc. A skilled consultant can help you find a good job faster and also open doors to new opportunities.

Consider project work or internships
In any career, the best way to establish yourself is to gain some experience. Seek out training, do some project-based work and find a company that will be interested in that project. Most employers will respect your efforts, and you'll also gain confidence in your abilities.

How to improve your soft skills at work

Apply for an internship in the same way you would apply for a job, send a cover letter and resume and clearly mention that you are looking at an internship.

Blow your own horn
You also need to learn the art of self-promotion. Start writing for various trade magazines/ websites etc and mention that in your resume. Join clubs and take an active interest in a variety of activities. More often than not, it's the active and visible professionals who get the maximum opportunities from prospective employers.

If you have worked on some interesting projects in your career, put a small portfolio together. Treat every project as a portfolio piece and use it to showcase your knowledge and exposure.

Research, knowledge, skills and a focused job search approach will increase your success rate and give you a headstart in your career. Best of luck for finding that 'perfect job'!

6 ways to be a great boss

2007-08-24T05:51:00.001-07:00

If you can't stand your boss and dislike your job because of it, you are just a small part of a large community who feels the same. But what if you have recently moved into the role of a teamleader, boss or people manager yourself?

While the 'perfect boss' is a utopian concept, here is a quick checklist that will save you the heartburn of dealing with attrition and unhappy employees.

Always meet your people with a great smile

A smile can make a lot of difference. Always be cheerful and energetic and spread the attitude within your team or organisation. It drives great results. A smile and a warm handshake can wear off the stress that most employees go through, not to mention that it adds to your desirability factor at work. Also, smiling is contagious, and most people will find it easy to forgive you even if you happen to be a bit demanding on occasions.

Five quick team building activities

Catch people doing things right

People make mistakes and sometimes they can repeat them, sometimes doing irreparable damage. But, have patience and let them grow. When they do things right, find them out and tell them it's a valuable contribution thay have made. Every interaction with your colleagues in the office is either a deposit or a withdrawal. As important as the Big Picture is, it will mean little if the boss shows little value for his team members' performance on a regular basis.

Appreciate generously

There is nothing more encouraging than appreciation for the smallest of difference one makes. For eg, when you enter the office after struggling hard with the traffic jam and the office looks clean or different, appreciate the person behind the effort and make him/ her "feel" how important the effort is to the organisation. Send your team emails, create a section where people can give compliments, etc. Positive feedback helps in building long-lasting habits. If you take certain positive behaviour for granted, you will be wasting time in reinforcing them later.

Be ready to say "I am sorry'"

If you erupt in a meeting, criticise a colleague's work or make ill-timed comments that you regret, how do you bounce back? Apologise immediately to the targeted person and to everyone around. Don't offer a long justification about the work pressure or a possible misunderstanding like most bosses do. Just say "I should not have reacted that way" and "I am sorry". This will show that you are professional and reflects positively on your character. It takes years to build up a reputation, and only seconds to destroy it. No matter what, don't snap or your people will think of you as a 'reactive boss'.

Help people prepare their goals and create a checklist

Be clear in communicating the desired goals from an individual in a team or the team as a whole. You should know your people, their strengths and opportunity areas. Team your people in a way where everyone learns and compliments each other's strengths.

Read your way to success

A good manager not only coaches an employee to develop a skill but also helps in conditioning it as a behavior. In simple words, become a mentor, ie, a wise and trusted counselor/ teacher/ trainer, who can act as a catalyst for growth and nurture potential and talent. Building teams is not a one-time effort but an everyday process. Good managers involve, engage and inspire their teams on a daily basis.

Stay sharp

Read industry publications, reports and magazines and be aware of market trends. Your knowledge will reflect when you communicate with your team and they will look to you for advice and information. They will also talk positively about you with other members of the team. There is nothing better than third party publicity as it establishes you as a thought leader within your team.

Happy Birthday India!

2007-08-24T05:47:00.000-07:00

A rickshaw puller coasts past a commemorative banner at the Red Fort, New Delhi, ahead of special celebrations for India's 60 years of Independence.

Is this Aamir's look in Ghajini?

2007-08-24T05:46:00.000-07:00

Aamir Khan has always been secretive about his movies, and his looks in upcoming films. But this time, he may not be as lucky!

Reader Anu mailed us a picture of the actor, taken when the star was in Bangalore for the shooting of his new film (which is as yet unnamed), a remake of the Tamil hit Ghajini.

Apparently, this is Aamir's look in the film.

He also has a bald look in this film, a first for him.

The film will be directed by 33-year-old A R Murugadoss, who has quite a few Tamil hits to his credit.

5 ways your money can make you rich

2007-08-24T05:45:00.000-07:00

Most of us believe that income and wealth are the same; we often loosely say that somebody is rich because s/he has an income of so much per year. That isn't strictly true. 'Rich' is about wealth, and income may have nothing to do with it.

For instance, if you have a high income but spend it all, you might have a high-spending lifestyle, but clearly your wealth won't grow.

Instead, you grow rich by making your money work harder and smarter for you.

First, count your money

Do you know how much money you have? I mean, really know; not vague ideas and notions but know how much you have, more or less on your fingertip?

Hopeful entrepreneurs approaching venture capitalists for funds to fuel their business dreams are advised to get their "elevator pitch" down pat. This means that they ought to be able to "sell" their business proposition within the 2 or 3 minutes that a typical elevator ride takes. To make a convincing elevator pitch, it's obvious you must know the pitch known as well as the back of your hand.

Similarly, before you can set your money to make more money for you, you must first know how much you have - and in what form. Sounds like common sense, right? But, do you really know?

Most of us don't. If you do, well, you are an important step ahead.

Activate lazy money

To take just one example, how much money is lying fallow in your bank savings account, for example? Earning the lowest of interest rates going? And, why? Chances are it's a result of simple inertia.

Anything more than a few months of your monthly expenses lying in savings accounts is lazy money. Repositioning any excess money even into a no-brainer such as bank FDs will smartly perk up your returns.

Moving up the ladder of higher returns

Having activated lazy money, you are then ready to tackle the adrenalin-rush question: How to get higher returns from your money?

Instead of bank FDs, for example, you could opt for equally safe but higher return options, such as post office savings schemes, saving certificates, and government securities and or fixed maturity plans of mutual funds.

The real leap in your quest for higher returns, however, comes from a move into the world of "risky" investments: equity and property, to name two popular avenues.

Typically, such a leap to equity would at least double your returns, say from 7 per cent to 19 per cent per year. (The Indian stock market returned about 19 per cent per year in price appreciation plus dividends when smoothed over the last 12-15 years.) Not impressed?

Well consider this: Rs 10 lakh (Rs 1 million) invested at 7 per cent will grow to less than Rs 20 lakh (Rs 2 million) in 10 years.

The same modest Rs 10 lakh invested at 19 per cent morphs into an unbelievably larger Rs 55 lakh (Rs 5.5 million)-plus - almost triple the amount from "safe" investments.

Sure, equity and property investments come with some risks that bank FDs, savings scheme, etc. don't.

But there are ways to keep such risks within your comfort zone. What is important to understand is that the road to making more money with your money passes, inevitably, through investing in higher earning avenues, typically, shares and equity mutual funds and property.

Tax smarts

In squaring the circle of higher returns, you also need to grasp some simple tax-smarts.

The big-bucks tax break currently available is from investing in shares or equity mutual funds, and holding these for at least 12 months. Any gains you make after selling them after 12 months qualifies as long term capital gains and are completely tax free.

This is perfect because the big returns from equity in any case come from price appreciation over a period of 3 to 5 years. When you hold shares for such a period, you don't have to pay any tax at all, irrespective of your capital gains, whether it's a few lakh or a few crore!

While investment in property isn't quite as tax-efficient but significant tax breaks are available for buying a residential house, for example.

Review, review, review

Finally, once a year, review all the first four steps, and do so year after year. You would be pleasantly surprised by the results.

Simple enough, no? But, then, simplicity is the inherent beauty of all fundamental principles.

Mother Teresa's legacy lives on

2007-08-24T05:43:00.000-07:00

Almost ten years after she died, Mother Teresa and her nuns continue to draw the world's leaders and their families to their humble home in Kolkata.

On August 23, Akie Abe, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's [Images] wife, visited Mother Teresa's home. She spent time with the sisters of the Missionaries of Charity, the worldwide Roman Catholic order founded by Mother Teresa.

The prime minister's wife also visited Shishu Bhavan, a home for abandoned children, also run by the Missionaries of Charity.

A congregation spread over 133 countries, the Missionaries of Charity have 4,500 nuns dedicated to the service of the poorest of the poor. The nuns of the order are expected to follow a vow providing wholehearted and free service to the poor.

Mother Teresa was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. In recognition of her work, the Indian government accorded her a State funeral after her death 10 years ago on September 5. She was awarded the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian honour, in 1980.

A Rs 300-cr golden temple in TN

2007-08-24T05:38:00.001-07:00

A 31-year old 'godman' has built a Rs300-crore 'golden temple' at Sripuram near Vellore in Tamil Nadu.

The temple, situated in scenic landscape on 100 acres of land, has been made with 1.5 tonne of pure gold. Hundreds of craftsmen and artisans took six years to build the temple.

The temple was conceived and designed by Sri Narayani Amma, fondly called as 'Sakthi Amma' (powerful mother) by his devotees.

"It is meant to be a marvel in gold, but it is a temple that offers wisdom to people who visit the place," he told mediapersons.

The godman, who heads the Sri Narayani Peedam, instituted near Vellore in 1992, said he built the temple, in which Goddess Mahalashmi is the main deity, out of unconditional love.

"If Shahjahan built Taj Mahal, it is out of love for Mumtaz. If Amma (referring to himself) builts Sripuram, it is out of unconditional love for mankind. That is for one, this is for everyone," he said.

With his devotees spread across the globe and his foundation registered in the United States, Canada [Images] and the United Kingdom, funds kept flowing in for the project launched in 2001.

More than 800 craftsmen, including those working for Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam, worked day and night for six years to make the godman's dream realise.

About 1.5 tonne of gold was purchased for the project through Minerals and Metal Trading Corporation in Chennai after getting clearance from the Reserve Bank of India [Get Quote], he said.

The lighting is arranged in such a way that the temple glitters even during night. With intricate carvings and sculptures, the entire structure, except the walking space, has been plated with gold.

It has a rajagopuram, resembling the Tirupati temple, with 36 pillars around. Even the central chandelier is made of gold.

Explaining the concept behind Sripuram, he said, "A mother administers sugar-coated pill to the child to heal. It's physical ailment. Likewise, I am offering this golden temple to people to impart wisdom. This golden temple is just a tool to attract the world's attention."

People can reach the temple only through a star-shaped pathway, laid to a distance of 1.5 km. On either side of the pathway, the messages of 'Amma' and quotes from Bhagavad Gita, Bible and Quran will be displayed.

Though the people's focus will be on the temple in gold, when they leave they cannot go without taking some messages and gaining some wisdom, he said.

"Some may ask why a golden temple for the mankind and why not a hospital? But in Sripuram, we bring about a change in people through messages like the nobleness of human birth and the need to serve the humanity. This will motivate them to built lakhs of hospitals across the globe," he said.

The Narayani Peedam has a school, hospital and college on its own. It has also been carrying out charitable activities in Vellore and nearby districts to the tune of Rs 50 crore.

Srisailam

2007-08-22T08:32:00.001-07:00

Distance Chart from Airport(s)
Hyderabad Airport	232 kms

The temple at Srisailam is dedicated to Lord Shiva and is considered as one of his twelve Jyotirlingas. Srisailam, also known as Sriparvata is situated in the Rishabgiri Hills on the Southern banks of the river Krishna in Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh. Mention of Srisailam as Sriparvata has been made in the immortal epic of the Hindus - the "Mahabharata".

Climate: (deg C)-Summer- 38 Deg.C. 30 Deg.C. Winter- 26 Deg.C. 20 Deg.C., Rainfall: seasonal, Best Season: September to February.

Places Of Interest:
Damsite, Hatekeswaram, Pathalaganga, Mallikarjuna Swamy Temple, Sakshi Ganapathi Sikharam.

Excursions:
Alampur- 27 kms, Dindi Reservoir- 64 kms, Kurnool- 180 kms, Nagarjunasagar- 180 kms, Papanasam- 2 kms, Sangameswar- 18 kms.

Reach -
By Air: Nearest airport is at Hyderabad- 232 kms linked with Bangalore, Bhubaneswar, Bombay, Calcutta, Delhi, Madras, Nagpur, Vishakapatnam.
By Rail: Nearest railhead is Markapur Road. Other railheads are Nandyal, Kurnool and Hyderabad- 232 kms.
By Road: Atmakur- 113 kms, Anantapur-?325 kms, Bangalore- 538 kms, Bombay- 971 kms, Calcutta- 1491 kms, Delhi- 1685 kms, Dornal- 49 kms, Hyderabad- 232 kms, Kurnool- 180 kms, Madras- 568 kms, Nagarjunasagar- 180 kms, Nandyal- 158 kms, Tirupati- 436 kms, Vijayawada- 248 kms, Visakhapatnam- 614 kms.

Nagarjunasagar

2007-08-22T08:27:00.000-07:00

Distance Chart from Airport(s)
Hyderabad Airport	-

Nagarjunasagar - the tallest and biggest masonry dam in the world accross the river Krishna, is about 150 kms, away from the metropolitan city of Hyderabad. It creates the third largest man-made lake in the world. Nearby Nagarjunakonda is known for its extensive ruins of Buddhist Stupas, Viharas and a university that flourished under Acharya Nagarjuna, the great Buddhist savant, scholar and philosopher who migrated to Nagarjunakonda from Amaravati to spread the message of the Buddha.
Interestingly excavations conducted here have also revealed Brahmanical temples, which reveal the friendship that existed here centuries ago between the two faiths. Now though the actual site of the excavations have been flooded with the waters of the migty river, the relies of the ruins have been reconstructed and kept in an Island Museum, the largest of its kind in the world and are in an excellent state of preservation-thanks to the efforts of the Archaeological Survey of India. Today Nagarjunakonda along with Nagarjunasagar attracts many tourists from South East Asian Countries and also from all over India.

Altitude: 244 meters, Area:39 sq. kms., Climate: (deg C) Summer- Max 39.4, Min 20, Winter- Max 22, Min 13.8., Rainfall: 89 cms., Best Season: July to March.

Places Of Interest:
Nagarjunasagar:
Left Canal (Lal Bahadur Canal), Model Dam, Pylon, Right Bank Tunnel (Jawahar Tunnel), View Point.

Nargarjunakonda:
Archaeological Museum, Mahastupa, Bodhisri Chaitya, Simhala Vihara, Mahisaka Vihara, Brahusutiya, Vihara, Ashwamedha and Royal Bath.

Excursions:
Ethipothala Waterfalls. A Very good picnic spot with deep valleys and cave temples.

Reach - By Air: Nearest airport- Hyderabad.
By Rail: Macherla- 27 kms.
By Road: Hyderabad- 149 kms, Amravati- 179 kms, Bangalore- 619 kms, Bombay- 888 kms, Calcutta- 1422 kms, Delhi- 1602 kms, Guntur- 145 kms, Kurnool- 261 kms, Macherla- 27 kms, Madras- 546 kms, Tirupati- 493 kms, Vijayawada- 177 kms, Vishakhapatnam- 543 kms.

historical sites

2007-08-22T08:24:00.000-07:00

Charminar, the edifice of four minarets, is the legendary masterpiece of the Qutb Shahis. The awesome rectangular structure was built upon four grand arches by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah in 1591 to commemorate the end of the plague.

The plan is a square, each side 20 meters long, while the four arches are 11 meters wide and rise 20 meters from the plinth. The four storied minarets rise 20 meters from the roof of the massive monument and measures 24 meters from the plinth. The western section of the roof contains a mosque with 45 prayer spaces with a large open space in front to accommodate more for Friday prayers. To the east of this space is a veranda with a large open arch in the centre, flanked by smaller ones both side.

Founded originally by the Kakatiyas in the 13th century, the existing structure was expanded by the Qutb Shahi kings into a massive fort of granite with walls and ramparts extending some 7kms in circumference. The fortress city within the walls was famous for the diamond trade and the Koh-i-noor diamond is said to have come from here.

This is the biggest mosque in Hyderabad and lies 100 yards south-west of Charminar. The name is derived from the Grand Mosque at Mecca on which it is patterned. The hall is 67 meters by 54 meters and 23 meters high. The roof is supported by 15 arches, five on each of the three sides. The western side is blocked by a high wall to provide the Mehrab. At each end are two huge octagonal columns made out of a single piece of granite each topped by an arched gallery that is crowned by a dome. The mosque is one of the largest in India and can accommodate ten thousand people at a time.

The tombs erected in the memory of the departed kings of Golconda are truly magnificent monuments that have stood the test of time and the vagaries of nature. They stand a kilometre north of Golconda fort's Banjara Darwaza.

Built by one of the Paigh nobles Sir Vicar ul Umra, and later bought by the Nizam, the Falaknuma Palace (meaning "Mirror in the Sky") is 5km south of the Charminar. This palace was designed by an Italian architect and houses some rare treasures collected by the Nizam.

the nizam's

2007-08-22T08:22:00.000-07:00

The seven rulers of the Asif Jahi Dynastry

In 1724 Nizam-ul-Mulk Asif Jah I founded the Asif Jahi Dynasty and seven generations of the family ruled the Deccan for 224 years up to 1948. During this period several buildings of archaeological and public importance were built. Notable among them are: Purani Haveli, Chow Mahalla Palace, Osmania University, Jubilee Hall, Assembly Building, Asifia Library, Osmania Hospital, High Court, and all the buildings in the Public Garden.

I	Nizam-ul-Mulk	1724 - 1748
II	Nizam Ali Khan	1762 - 1803
III	Sikander Jah	1803 - 1829
IV	Nasir-ud-Dowla	1829 - 1857
V	Afzal-ud-Dowla	1857 - 1869
VI	Mahboob Ali Pahsa	1869 - 1911
VII	Mir Osman Ali Khan	1911 - 1948

The origins of the Asif Jahi dynasty can be traced to Chin Qalich Khan who was the grandfather of the first Nizam and the commander of the Mughal army during Aurangzeb’s reign. Chin Qalich Khan led the attack of the Mughal army into the Deccan under his Emperor’s ambitious plans of expanding the Mughal empire. During Aurangzeb’s last siege of Golconda in 1687,

Chin Qalich Khan was wounded. He died in Atapur village near Himayath Sagar. Chin Qalich Khan’s son, Nawab Ghaziuddin Khan, married the daughter of Sadullah Khan, Prime Minister of Aurangzeb. A son was born, and the Emperor named him Mir Qumaruddin. At the age of six, Mir Qumaruddin accompanied his father to the Mughal court. Aurangzeb awarded him a mansab, and said to his father, "The star of destiny shines on the forehead of your son". Mir Qumaruddin displayed considerable skill as a warrior and at the age of nineteen, the Emperor bestowed on him the title "Chin Fateh Khan". At 26, he was appointed Commander in Chief and Viceroy, first at Bijapur, then Malwa and later of the Deccan.

Subsequently, the Mughal empire declined. There was much confusion after the death of Aurangzeb, and Mir Qumaruddin established his position as Viceroy Farukh Siar who was the Mughal Emperor for a brief tenure conferred on Mir Qumaruddin the title Fateh Jung. He thus became the first Nizam. A subsequent Emperor, Muhammad Shah bestowed on him the title Asif Jah. The dynasty of the Nizam's of Hyderabad thus came to be known as the Asif Jahi Dynasty.

Unrest and claims to the throne continued after the death of Aurangzeb, and amidst the general confusion, Asif Jah had little difficulty in asserting his independence from the weak occupants of the Delhi throne. At that time, Asif Jah was the Sudedar of Malwa. However, his independence was the cause of much jealousy, and the Delhi court secretly instructed Mubrez Khan, the Subedar of the Deccan, to oppose him. A battle was fought at Shakar-Khelda in the district of Berer in 1724, where Mubrez Khan was defeated and killed. This battle established Asif Jah's supremacy in the Deccan. After gaining independence, Asif Jah came to be known as Nizam-ul-Mulk. He first set up his capital at Auragabad but later moved to Hyderabad, which became the capital of the Asif Jahi dynasty.

Nizam-ul-Mulk's greatest achievement was the foundation of the Hyderabad Dominion. He attained his object by waging a struggle against the Marhattas and by the policy of non-involvement in the rivalry for power between the British and the French. His policy has been justified by later events as Hyderabad state survived right through the period of British rule up to the time of Indian independence.

Asif Jah ruled wisely and established an independent state in the Deccan. He was one of the ablest statesmen. However, his death at Burhanpur on 21st May 1748 at the age of 78, was followed by a struggle for the throne. By this time, foreign powers were spreading their tentacles. Asif Jah's second son Nasir Jung was supported by the British whereas Muzafar Jung, grandson of Asif Jah, was supported by the French. Nasir Jung succeeded; but after a brief rule he was slain in 1750 in an encounter with the French troops at Arcot. Thereupon, Muzafar Jung ascended the throne. In the following year he was murdered and his son Salabath Jung was put on the throne. In 1762 Salabeth Jung was dethroned by his brother Nizam Ali Khan, and confined at Bidar where he died in 1793.

Hence, Nasir Jung, Muzafar Jung and Salabath Jung, who were contestants for the sovereignty of the Deccan in the short span of thirteen years between the death of Asif Jah and accession of Nizam Ali Khan, have not been historically recognised as reigning Nizams. If they had been, Nizam Ali Khan would have been known as the fifth Nizam and not the second.

Nizam Ali Khan ascended the throne in 1763 and he ruled Hyderabad for almost forty years. This was one of the eventful periods in the history of India. Foremost among competitors for supremacy in the Deccan were the Marhattas and it was during this period that the famous French adventurer Monsieur Raymond was employed by Nizam Ali Khan.

Nizam Ali Khan died in August 1803 at the age of 72 years after a long and strenuous reign.

The succession of Sikandar Jah as Nizam was undisputed and he appointed Mir Alam as his Prime Minister. With the accession to the throne by Sikander Jah and end of war with the Marhattas, there commenced an entirely new era for Hyderabad. Unfortunately in 1808 the able Minister Mir Alam died and it was he who was responsible for maintaining good relations wit the British. In 1809, Mir Alam’s son Munir-ul-Mulk was appointed as Minister.

Sikander Jah died in May 1829 at the age of 62 after reigning for almost 26 years. Secunderbad was named after him. Sikander Jah was succeeded by his eldest son Nasir-ud-Dowla. It was during his reign that Salar Jung was appointed as the Minister in 1853. Salar Jung guided the affairs of the Deccan with great wisdom and introduced several reforms to improve the finances of the Dominion.

On 17 May 1857 Nasir-ud-Daula died and his son Afzal-ud-Daula became the fifth Nizam. This was the first time the first war of Indian Independence was fought in the North and there was general disorder in the Deccan.

After a reign of twelve years, Afzal-ud-Daula expired on 26 February 1869 at the young age of forty three years, leaving behind the infant prince Mir Mahboob Ali Khan who was hardly three years old.

Mir Mahboob Ali Khan, who was born on 18 August 1866, was the only son of Afzal-ud-Dowla. He was installed on the masnad by the British Resident and Sir Salar Jung, who also acted as the co-regent. Salar Jung died in 1883 and a provisional council, consisting of five members, with Mahboob Ali Khan as president and Mir Laiq Ali Khan, son of Salar Jung, as secretary was appointed for administrative purposes.

Special attention was paid to the education of Mahboob Ali Khan. With the concurrence of Salar Jung, Capt. John Clerk was appointed as his tutor. However, the personality of Salar Jung had a great influence on his life. Brought up under the guidance of this great statesman, Mahboob Ali Khan grew in his later years to be one of the greatest rulers of his time. He was a respected and dignified personality and was popularly know as ‘Mahboob Ali Pasha’. He died on Tuesday 31 August 1911.

Mir Osman Ali Khan, the seventh and the last Nizam of Hyderabad ruled for 37 years (1911 - 1948). His dominion was lager than England and Scotland put together, with an area of 86,000 Sq. miles.

The seventh Nizam led a very simple life, yet he was one of the richest men in the world. He donated generously to every cause in India as well as abroad irrespective of caste and religion. If it was the Muslim theological school at Deoband which received financial help, it was also the privilege of the Benaras Hindu University. His list of donations included Rabindranth Tagore’s Shantiniketan and several other institutions including hospitals, schools, for famine relief, etc. The golden temple in Amritsar also enjoyed an annual donation.

The Nizam’s rule saw the growth of Hyderabad economically and culturally. Electricity, railways, roads and airways developed. Huge reservoirs and irrigation projects such as the Tungabhadra, and Nizamsagar were completed. The early work on Nagarjunasagar was undertaken. The Osmania University, Colleges and Schools were founded throughout the state. Nearly all the public buildings currently in such as the Osmania General Hospital, High Court, Central State Library, Assembly Hall, Jubilee Hall and other buildings in the Public Garden were built during Osman Ali Khan’s reign.

Soon after India gained independence in 1947, all princely states were invited to join the Republic. Nizam VII was reluctant to do so; but in 1948, after the Police Action, his state was merged into the Indian Union. Mir Osman Ali Khan, the last Nizam, died on Friday 24 February 1967. It was the end of the princely era.

introduction to hyderabad

2007-08-22T08:18:00.000-07:00

The capital of the state of Andhra Pradesh, Hyderabad is the fifth largest city in India with an ancient civilisation and culture. Attached to the city is its twin , Secunderbad, which is part of Hyderabad. The twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderbad are separated by the Husain Sagar, an artificial lake constructed during the time of Ibrahim Quli Qutb Shah Wali in 1562 A.D.

The city is nearly 400 years old and is noted for its natural beauty, mosques and minarets, bazaars and bridges, hills and lakes. It is perched on the top of the Deccan Plateau, 1776ft., above sea level, and sprawls over an area of 100 Sq. miles.

A multitude of influences have shaped the character of the city. Its palaces and buildings, houses and tenements, gardens and streets have a history and an architectural individuality of their own, which makes Hyderabad a city of enchantment.

Hyderabad was founded on the River Musi five miles east of Golconda, in 1591-92 by Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah. In the 16th century the city grew spontaneously to accommodate the surplus population of Golconda, which was the capital of the Qutb Shahi rulers. Many buildings sprang up along the River Musi. Gradually the city grew.

The Qutb Shahi dynasty founded the Kingdom of Golconda, one of the five kingdoms that emerged after the break up of the Bahamani Kingdom. The Qutb Shahis ruled the Deccan for almost 171 years. All the seven rulers were patrons of learning and were great builders. They contributed to the growth and development of Indo-Persian and Indo-Islamic literature and culture in Hyderabad. During the Qutb Shahi reign Golconda became one of the leading markets in the world of diamonds, pearls, steel for arms, and also printed fabric.

The glory of the Golconda kingdom ended in 1687, after a valiant struggle. Aurangzeb, the last great Mughal ruler, captured Golconda after a siege that lasted eight months. Abul Hasan Tana Shah, the last king of Golconda, was imprisoned at Daulatabad, where he died after twelve years in captivity.

With the conquest of the Deccan and the South, Aurangzeb succeeded in expanding the Mughal Empire to cover the entire sub-continent. However, after his death in 1707, the Empire rapidly declined.

At that time , the Deccan was administered by a Subedar or viceroy of the Mughal Emperor. Mir Quamaruddin, the Governor of the Deccan, who bore the title of Nizam-ul-Mulk Feroze Jung Asif Jah, declared his independence from Mughal rule in 1724. He thus became the first Nizam and the founder of the Asif Jahi dynasty.

Asif Jah I continued to maintain Aruangabad, which had been founded by the Mughal rulers as the capital of his new state. In 1769, Nizam Ali Khan Asif Jah II, shifted the capital to Hyderabad. The seven Nizam's of the Asif Jahi dynasty ruled the Deccan for nearly 224 years, right up to 1948.

During the Asif Jahi period, Persian, Urdu, Telgu and Marathi developed simultaneously. The highest official positions were given to deserving persons irrespective of their religion. Persian was the official language up to 1893 and then Urdu up to 1948.

When the British and the French spread their hold over the country, the Nizam soon won their friendship without bequeathing his power. The title "Faithful. Ally of the British Government" was bestowed on Nizam VII. The British stationed a Resident at Hyderabad, but the state continued to be ruled by the Nizam.

The rule of the seven Nizam's saw the growth of Hyderabad both culturally and economically. Huge reservoirs, like the Nizam Sagar, Tungabadra, Osman Sagar, Himayath Sagar, and others were built. Survey work on Nagarjuna Sagar had also begun during this time.

Hyderabad, under the Nizam's, was the largest princely state in India. Area wise it was as big as England and Scotland put together. The State had its own currency, mint, railways, and postal system. There was no income tax.

Soon after India gained independence, Hyderabad State merged with the Union of India. On November 1, 1956 the map of India was redrawn into linguistic states, and Hyderabad became the capital of Andhra Pradesh.

Look at Hyderabad's best tourist attractions

2007-08-22T08:15:00.000-07:00

Qutb Shahi Tombs

These stately domes form an umbrella over the tombs underneath
which rest the majestic kings of the Qutb Shahi dynasty in peace,
thence the name. Located quite close to and in the vicinity of the
Golconda Fort, these tombs were ornamented with blue and green
tiles of which only a few can be seen now. The rooms inside the
smaller tombs are basically single-storied while the larger ones
have two-storied structures.

The tombs are a blend of large domes, minarets, terraces, arches, etc. Beautifully spread out carpet grass in the gardens around the different tombs welcomes the visitors. The hakims (royal physicians), the imams (religious leaders) and the favorite eunuchs of the royal household, apart from the rulers, were buried here. A crescent shaped structure atop the entrances of the tombs housing the burials of the royal kings marks the striking difference immediately. The tombs, which have been silent spectators to the many developments in Hyderabad over four centuries, are open to visitors on all days except Fridays.

Telugu star Chiranjeevi turns 52

2007-08-22T08:11:00.000-07:00

Telugu superstar Chiranjeevi, fondly called Chiru, turns 52 on Wednesday.

Chiranjeevi, who reigns over the Telugu film industry, holds the record for some of the biggest box office collections ever. Infact way back in 1992, his film Gharana Mogudu raked in over a crore at the box office, something unheard of then.

But there’s more to the superstar. He is one of the highest paid actors in India and has been felicitated with the Padmabhushan amongst other awards.

Fans of the versatile actor have given him the demi-God status.

“I like his acting and dance,” says one of his fans.

Another fan adds, “He is a megastar. I like his acting and his dance.”

Chiranjeevi also moved beyond the realm of the silver screen and set up blood and eye donation banks which helped him build a mass appeal, so much so, that the latest demand is not just about delivering a new super hit, but to contest the 2009 Assembly elections.

Though the mega star has taken a non-committal stand on the political front, if the grapevine is to be believed, he might just follow actor-turned-politician NTR's footsteps.

Chiranjeevi’s fans don't need a special reason to celebrate. And an occasion like his birthday can't be passed without pomp and fare. So as the megastar turns 52, his fans have planned a huge ceremony at the Gachi Bowli stadium. And the fact that Chiranjeevi is on a vacation to the United States and won't be present for the festivities isn't a dampener.

Nokia on damage control mode in India

2007-08-22T08:09:00.000-07:00

The world's largest handset manufacturer and one of the most trusted brands in India - Nokia is finding the right tune to control its battery recall crisis. The Finnish phone maker is going on a massive damage controlling in India.

The score so far is 26. That's how many handsets Nokia has successfully launched in India this year alone. Another 14 are in the pipeline before the year ends. After all, India is Nokia is the third largest handset market globally. But the battery recall controversy may have spoil those grand plans. So, Nokia is taking no chances.

"ICA pointed out that a warranty of batteries is only 6months in India, from that point of view, some people argue we shouldn’t have issued this advisory, but we disagree, anything concerning consumers, consumer has the right to know" says D Shivakumar, MD & VP - Mobile Phones, Nokia India.

And so, last week Nokia consumers across the world got to know that Nokia has recalled 4.6 crore BL-5C batteries used in a range of its handsets. In India alone, it has to recall close to 1.5 lakh batteries! And so it launched a damage control campaign using channels like advertisement, SMS and an online helpdesk. And its even roped in its dealers manage the crisis.

"We helped customers type SMS, fill forms online and basically help them check for faulty batteries. We have been guiding customers about the recall and explaining the procedure to them," adds Rakesh Tivrekar, Nokia Priority Dealer.

All that to retain its 67 per cent share in the Indian handset market. A product recall has traditionally been a logistical nightmare for all companies - but Nokia is confident that it may be out of the crisis sooner than expected. Company officials tell us that all the defected batteries in India will be replaced by early next week.

Indian brains helped US more than their money helped us

2007-08-22T08:07:00.000-07:00

India may have provided more in intellectual capital to the US just over the last decade than all of the financial aid the US has given to India over the last 60 years, says an Indian American entrepreneur researcher who has done a study on the immigration issue.

"So one may ask - who's helping who, here," said Delhi born Vivek Wadhwa, a technology entrepreneur currently working as Wertheim Fellow at Harvard Law School and executive in residence at Duke University on the release of the study Wednesday by Kauffman Foundation.

But for the first time in its history the US faces the prospect of a reverse brain drain because of its flawed immigration policies, says the study, the third in a series of studies focusing on immigrants' contributions to the competitiveness of the US economy.

The US should bring in highly skilled immigrants not as temporary workers but to stay if it does not want to lose them to countries like India and China, the study suggests.

The study is co-authored by Guillermina Jasso, professor of sociology at New York University, Ben Rissing and Gary Gereffi research scholars at Duke University and Richard Freeman, Herbert Asherman Chair in Economics at Harvard University.

Noting that the number of skilled workers waiting for visas is significantly larger than the number that can be admitted to the US, it says this imbalance creates the potential for a sizeable reverse brain-drain from America to the skilled workers' home countries.

The study estimated "there are more than one million individuals waiting in line for legal permanent resident status. The wait time for visas for countries with the largest populations, like India and China, ranged to four years in June - not counting visa processing time - and may be even higher when visas are again available in October.

This backlog is likely to increase substantially, given the limited number of visas available, it said. Evidence from the "New Immigrant Survey" indicates that approximately one in five new legal immigrants and about one in three employment principals either plan to leave the US or are uncertain about remaining.

Moreover, media reports suggest that increasing numbers of skilled workers have begun to return home to countries like India and China where the economies are booming, the study noted.

"So far, the US has the benefit of attracting the worlds best and brightest. They have typically come here for the freedom and economic opportunities that America offers," said Wadhwa.

"Now, because of our flawed immigration policies, we have not set the stage for the departure of hundreds of thousands of highly skilled professionals - who we have trained in our technology, techniques and markets and made even more valuable.

"This is lose-lose for the US. Our corporations lose key talent that is contributing to innovation and competitiveness, and we end up creating potential competitors," he said.

Gandhi in European business schools

2007-08-21T07:38:00.000-07:00

It is, indeed, a matter of great satisfaction and celebration that young Indians are taking interest in the life and works of the Father of the Nation - Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi has been voted the second most popular leader of the world of the century. In fact, he missed it marginally to Winston Churchill, who was voted for the first position. In the recent past, media i.e. electronic and print has played a significant role in creating awareness among masses about the philosophy of Mahtma Gandhi. In fact, films like "Lage Raho Munnabhai" and "Gandhi-My Father" have created awareness and have highlighted the philosophy of Gandhi with a different approach.

The "Gandhigiri" (non-violent protest) is being practiced all over the world. A recent example is of United States of America where the United Sates citizenship and immigration services office was sent flowers by individuals, who were legally in the United States, but caught in a green card backlog. There have been positive results of Gandhigiri as well. In India, non-violent protests are on the rise. For instance, in Vidarbha region, farmers staged a protest with flowers. Similarly, in Lucknow, a group of local citizens took the Gandhian path to lodge their protest against the continuation of a liquor shop in a residential area, by marching silently and offering flowers to the liquor shop owner.

Gandhi's theory of trusteeship is well known and widely accepted. Also, the concept of corporate social responsibility has its deep roots in Gandhi's theory of trusteeship. Tepco, Parmalat, and Enron- these names are synonymous with corporate irresponsibility. The issue of trust in business, government and media is a challenge of our times.

Corporate social responsibility basically refers to business practices characterised by extensive disclosure and transparency, which companies initiate to fulfil ethical responsibilities towards employee communities and the environment. Corporate social responsibility has growing connection to corporate governance, and thus, the young Indians, whether in the industries or in the business schools, must be exposed to the various nuances relating to business ethics, corporate governance and corporate social responsibility.

It is, indeed, a matter of great satisfaction that not only the Indian universities like Delhi University and Indira Gandhi Open University are offering courses on Gandhi but the business schools from all over the world, in particular, from Europe like EDHEC Business School in France, IAE Business school in France and Bergische Universitat Wuppertal, Germany have made ‘Gandhi & Management’ as part of the curriculum for their MBA students.

(The writer is an associate professor at MDI, Gurgaon and a visiting professor at Edhec Business School, France and IAE Business School, France)

Aishwarya's shocking performance

2007-08-21T07:34:00.001-07:00

For the first time in her career Aishwarya Bachchan has gone completely make-up free for Ram Gopal Varma’s Sarkar 2 and the director says he had the time of his life shooting with her.

Very frankly, I was wondering what she had in store as I had never worked with her before.

And considering the sequel to Sarkar is a dark, intense, raw and real film, I was apprehensive about how far Aishwarya would be able to shed her immense glamour, Varma told IANS.

But the Bachchan bahu took him by surprise. “She shocked me with her performance.

Without too many rehearsals and certainly without attending any pre-shoot workshop Aishwarya has stood up to Amitabh Bachchan and Abhishek in every scene.

Audiences will be shocked with her performance,” Varma said.

“I can’t see the film working without her. But to quote me as saying the film could have worked without Mr. Bachchan and Abhishek but not without Aishwarya is like saying the Godfather could do without Brando and Pacino,” he added

BCCI sacks Kapil Dev

2007-08-21T07:32:00.000-07:00

Rattled by the Indian Cricket League's massive recruitment drive, the BCCI on Tuesday retaliated by sacking Kapil Dev as Chairman of National Cricket Academy for aligning with the multi-million dollar breakaway league and announced hefty pay hikes for domestic cricketers to prevent a fresh exodus.

In an apparent bid to counter the challenge posed by the Subhash Chandra-owned Essel Group, the BCCI came out with a slew of financial measures to retain its players, while making it clear that the defectors would be barred from playing for India or at the domestic level.

The decision to sack Kapil Dev, who also heads the ICL's Executive Board, was taken at the Board's Special General Meeting, which deliberated at length on the contentious ICL issue.

Addressing a crowded press conference, BCCI Treasurer N Srinivasan put up a bold face, saying that the exodus of domestic players was not a problem.

NCA Vice Chairman Ajay Shirke has been appointed as the acting Chairman of the Bangalore-based academy and a decision on the new Chairman would be taken at BCCI's Annual General Meeting on September 28.

Srinivasan said that the match fees of the Ranji Trophy players would be increased to Rs 35,000 per day and the total prize money for domestic tournament would be hiked to Rs 4.2 crore.

Ranji Trophy players currently get a match fee of Rs 16,000 per day, which means that domestic players would get Rs 19,000 more from the current season.

"In line with what was decided in the Special General Body Meeting, Kapil Dev ceases to be the NCA Chairman," Srinivasan said.

Kapil's sacking was very much on the cards as the BCCI had made it clear that those who had aligned with the rebel league would not be associated with the Board activities.

Kapil's term as NCA Chairman was to end in September this year and the BCCI will now have to start the process for looking for a replacement for its Bangalore-based academy.

Srinivasan said the players were free to choose between the BCCI and the ICL but those who opted to play for the cash-rich league, should not expect any benefits from the Board.

The BCCI's retaliatory measures came a day after the ICL announced the initial list of 51 players, which has West Indies batting great Brian Lara, former Pakistan captain Inzamam-ul-Haq and three of his team-mates - Mohd. Yousuf, Imran Farhat and Abdul Razzaq - as star attractions.

South African cricketers Lance Klusener and Nicky Boje were among the seven overseas recruits who have been offered lucrative deals to turn out for the proposed Twenty20 tournament, expected to be held in September-October.

The Special General Meeting also decided to increase the expenditure on women's cricket to Rs 7 crore.

Setting up a zonal cricket academy in Kolkata and an indoor stadium in New Delhi were some of the other decisions taken at the meeting which was presided over by President Sharad Pawar.

The BCCI proposal to amend the constitution for appointing a President-elect has also been approved by the special meeting.

The BCCI and ICL have been engaged in a war of attrition ever since the league was announced in April but the developments really hotted up in the last two days with the ICL parading its players at a press conference here and having a dig at the cricket establishment.

Although the ICL has not managed to lure 44 Indian first class cricketers with whopping offers of Rs 30 lakhs per year, it has not succeeded in wooing current Indian Test players or even India A players.

Stem cell cure for diabetes in offing: Gujarat docs

2007-08-20T05:07:00.001-07:00

There is good news for diabetes patients as there may be a stem cell cure for the disease.

Dr H L Trivedi and his team from Ahmedabad claim that they have discovered a cell that is present in human fat that can produce insulin, when cultivated.

"If we could transplant stem cells which have the ability to cure diabetes, then it's the final of final and ultimate of ultimate as far as cure for diabetes is concerned,” says Dr Trivedi, who is the director of Institute of Kidney Diseases,

The miracle stem cell can be transplanted into the liver, where it not only multiplies, but produces insulin as well - much like the islet cells that produce insulin in the pancreas.

With the cells present in fat, it would side step the controversy associated with embryonic stem cells. In fact Trivedi feels this could be nature's way of countering insulin.

“There is a strong reason to believe that this is a back-up system generated by nature. Nature has stored these insulin producing cells in our adipose tissue,” says Dr Trivedi.

The discovery couldn't be more relevant today, with India considered the diabetes capital of the world.

However, if Dr Trivedi's team manages to develop this, it would mean treatment for a condition that is the 4th leading cause of death in the world.

So what is the next step?

To begin with, the team will now seek permission from the Internal Review Board of the institute to start using this technique on patients.

Says Dr Trivedi, “Once we get the permissions, we should be able to treat the first 10 patients in a month or so."

The institute has decided to use this technique to treat children with diabetes first.

The treatment will initially cost about one lakh rupees and doctors hope that this will mean the final word in diabetes treatment.

Watch what your child puts in the mouth

2007-08-20T04:59:00.000-07:00

Now for growing children glossy toys are their best friends. For five-year old Vividha, toys mean the world to her. But of course, what's making news now is the danger that lurks within.

Toxic chemicals in the paint, plastic and metal used in the toys are a real and present danger for children in India. The reason being - only a small fraction of the toys sold adhere to any safety standards. Mattel has just recalled some of its products from the market with safety concerns, but it's a hugely unregulated market in India flooded with cheap unbranded imports.

"The problem is these import toys don’t have their names and address so parents should avoid buying these,” says President, Toys Association of India, Paresh Chawla.

But it's not just lead in toys you need to worry about. Your children are exposed to other toxic chemicals like cadmium and mercury as well, from things lying around the house - like batteries, pencils, even metal.

"Basic diseases could affect the brain and the kidneys,” says Paediatrician, Max Hospital, Dr Nitin Verma.

Until minimal safety standards are enforced, matters lie in your hands. Watch out for what your child puts in the mouth. And if your child shows signs of anaemia and frequent headaches, get a blood test done and visit the doctor.

Dutt gets bail, sis gets 'Rakhi gift'; B'wood rejoices

2007-08-20T04:53:00.000-07:00

Supreme Court’s interim bail to Sanjay Dutt in the 1993 Mumbai blasts case came as a huge relief to the family and friends of the actor.

“I am relieved and happy and it’s only because of the help and support of the people around us. This is my Raksha Bandhan gift,” said Dutt’s sister Priya Dutt.

Filmmaker Mahesh Bhatt, who is currently shooting in Dubai, told CNN-IBN that he was confident justice would prevail and that the adverse verdict on the actor needed to be questioned.

“This is a delightful piece of information. The matter is in the hands of the lawyers and we are sure they will put up a formidable fight,” he said.

Supreme Court has made clear that all the accused who have been under bail before, under both TADA and Arms Act, will be given bail because they haven’t been given copies of their judgement. The court says once the copies of the judgement are given out, the accused will have to surrender before the police.

Dutt’s colleagues in the film industry rallied behind the actor and said they will stand by him. “We welcome the SC verdict. The Sanjay Dutt judgement needs to be re-looked into. I am going to cast him in my next film,” said veteran filmmaker Shyam Benegal.

Filmmaker Ashok Pandit said it was an emotionally positive moment for the industry. “He is our family member and we will stand by him,” he said.

Actor Rohit Roy, who has worked with Dutt in Plan, said he was overjoyed. “That’s the most stupendous piece of news. First reaction is that of joy. We are shooting for Alibaugh. But that is the least of our worries,” he said.

The political fraternity also reacted positively to the SC ruling. "I am very happy for Sanjay Dutt, he belongs to patriotic family," said Minister of Law and Justice, H R Bhardwaj.

Agreed Union Minister Kapil Sibal. “It’s great that Sanjay got the bail. It is unfair to put somebody behind bar without giving him judgement copy."

However, former IPS officer Y P Singh said there isn’t much reason for Dutt to rejoice because he hasn’t been granted bail on basis of merit. “This is just a procedural angle. They have been granted bail only on technical grounds,” says Singh.

Dutt is expected to be released from Yeravada jail on Tuesday after the Supreme Court order granting him bail reaches the prison authorities there.

Satish Mathur, IG Prisons, Maharashtra told PTI that the copy of the apex court order will be routed through the TADA court in Mumbai before it can be handed over.

Under these circumstances, the actor, who has served about three weeks of his six-year rigorous imprisonment sentence slapped by the TADA court in the Mumbai blasts case, is likely to walk out of jail only on Tuesday .

Dutt was imprisoned on the night of August 2 from Mumbai's Arthur Road jail which houses only under trial prisoners.

Dutt's lawyer in the Supreme Court - Mukul Rohtagi, explained the conditions on which the Supreme Court Granted bail to the actor along with 5 other accused in the 1993 blasts case.

“Court granted bail to all the six accused today on condition that they will report to CBI court in Bombay (sic) once a week, that they will not abuse their freedom, and that they will surrender the moment they get the copy of the (TADA court) judgement, where after they'll individually file separate appeals, raise their different grounds, and argue their case in the Supreme Court,” he said.

Dutt bailed out for 7 days, TADA court next stop

2007-08-20T04:50:00.000-07:00

The Supreme Court on Monday granted interim bail to actor Sanjay Dutt, who is serving a six-year prison term in Pune’s Yerawada jail.

A special TADA court in Mumbai had on July 31 sentenced Dutt to prison for illegal possession of weapons during the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts.

Yerawada jail officials will either release Dutt on Monday evening or on Tuesday depending on when they get a copy of the Supreme Court’s order. The bail is valid till the time the TADA court gives him a copy of its judgment.

The TADA court is expected to give a copy of its judgment by August 27—which will allow Dutt to spend seven days outside jail.

Dutt, after getting a copy of the TADA court’s judgment, will have to surrender before police. While on bail he has to appear once a week before a police station and cannot leave the country without the TADA court’s permission.

After getting a copy of the TADA court’s judgment, he will have to surrender before the same court for consideration of regular bail.

Dutt’s passport will remain with the TADA court. A bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan granted Dutt relief considering the fact that he was on bail from October 16, 1995 to July 31, 2007.

The Supreme Court ruled that all convicts in 1993 Mumbai blasts case who have not been given copies of the TADA’s court’s judgment must get bail. This applies to both those convicted under the TADA and Arms Act.

The court also granted interim bail to five other convicts: Sameer Hingora, Aziz Ahmed Mohammad Ahmed Sheikh, Ibrahim Musa Chauhan alias Baba Chauhan, Yusuf Mohsin Nulwalla and Zaibunnisa Anwar Kazi.

The court granted them bail while laying down the same conditions as put forth to Dutt.

Dutt’s lawyers had filed an appeal before the apex court challenging his conviction under the Arms Act on the ground that the gun, pistol and ammunition which he allegedly got from gangsters involved in the blasts were not recovered from him

Sanjay's Judgment Day

2007-08-20T04:42:00.001-07:00

Pompous Turns Pensive

Sanjay Dutt was awarded six years rigorous imprisonment for illegal possession of weapons, including an AK-56 rifle, in the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts by a special court in Mumbai on Tuesday

Bond With the Best

Sanjay Dutt hugs his sisters Namrata (right back facing camera) and Priya (centre left) before leaving his residence for the Tada court on July 31, 2007

Jadoo Ki Jhappi

Sanjay Dutt hugs sister Namrata as Priya (left) looks on before leaving his residence for court

Armed version of Dhruv chopper makes first flight

2007-08-16T10:00:00.001-07:00

An armed version of the home-grown Dhruv helicopter fitted with rockets and a 20mm gun and another version with a more powerful engine made their maiden flights here on Thursday.

The "weaponised" version of the Dhruv, built by state-run aviation major Hindustan Aeronautics Limited, is equipped with "fire and forget" air-to-air missiles, 70 mm rockets that can be fired in direct and indirect mode and a 20 mm gun turret.

The other Dhruv flew with the high-power Shakti engine that was jointly designed by HAL and France's Turbomeca. The Dhruv helicopters are currently powered by Turbomeca's TM 333-2B2 engines.

HAL officials said the Dhruv would also be equipped with "fire and forget" anti-tank guided missiles in the future. The military version of Dhruv would be capable of operating in day and night as well as in adverse weather conditions.

The Shakti engine was designed to meet the power requirements of the armed version of Dhruv at high altitudes. The new engine develops around 30 per cent more power than the 333-2B2 engine, which translates to a more than 150 per cent increase in payload capability.

Certification flight tests for the Dhruv powered by the Shakti engine would include tests in Bangalore, at sea level and at high altitudes. There will also be cold and hot weather and desert trials.

"The delivery of the first Dhruv with a Shakti engine should be made in the middle of 2009," HAL Chairman Ashok K Baweja told a press conference.

BMC mulls to ban all hoardings in Mumbai

2007-08-16T09:58:00.001-07:00

By March 2008, Mumbai's skyline will be more beautified with the municipal corporation planning to ban all hoardings in south Mumbai and regulating those in the suburbs, much on the lines of Singapore and New York.

The gigantic hoardings in Mumbai suburbs could soon be a thing of the past if the Mumbai municipal corporation's proposed ban on all hoardings in south Mumbai, from Colaba to Byculla, is cleared.

This buzzing metropolis known for its colourful skyline dotted with numerous hoardings may become hoarding-free from March 2008 and the civic body's logic for this regulation.

Additional Municipal Commissioner R A Rajeev said, "These areas are congested and have heritage buildings so we need to make it clutter-free."

In its effort to give the city's landscape an aesthetic look, the revised policy will not allow hoardings on municipal properties and existing ones will be pulled-down by March 2008, top-floor occupants of residential societies can veto large hoardings on their terraces and only one hoarding will be permitted on each building.

But officials are not too clear about what happens to the scores of political banners and hoardings that often seem to flout rules?

Municipal authorities also want to ensure that hoardings in suburbs are regulated as per standard sizes. Owners are clearly not pleased with this move.

Hoarding owners association joint secretary Mangesh Borse said, "Its a biased, conniving way. We are not involved in the process."

While advertisers and hoardings owners feel the civic body is hoarding trouble, Mumbaikars rooting for a beautified skyline will have to wait and see which way this debate turns.

Dalal Street loses Rs 1.7 trillion in market cras

2007-08-16T09:57:00.001-07:00

Stock market investors on Thursday saw a whopping Rs 1,70,000 crore being wiped off their portfolios, taking the total loss since the US subprime crisis first hit domestic bourses late last month to nearly Rs 3,30,000 crore.

The Bombay Stock Exchange's 30-share benchmark index Sensex plunged by 642.70 points, its second biggest one-day fall in absolute value terms.

The crash saw the cumulative market capitalisation of all the listed companies dropping to around Rs 42,77,000 crore, as against Rs 44,44,000 crore after the market close on August 14.

The total invested wealth in the stock market has seen a sharp erosion since July 27, when the crisis in the US subprime credit segment first reached the Indian market. Since then, the total market capitalisation on the Indian bourses has gone down by close to Rs 3,30,000 crore from more than Rs 46,00,000 crore on July 26.

The combined market value of the 30 blue chip firms on the benchmark BSE Sensex has fallen close to Rs 2,25,000 crore since July 27, including about Rs 90,000 crore on Thursday itself.

Among the Sensex blue chips, the country's most-valued firm Reliance Industries lost Rs 12,910 crore on Thursday, while the second-biggest firm in terms of market cap, ONGC, saw an erosion of Rs 7,518 crore. Both RIL and ONGC have lost close to Rs 28,000 crore each since July 27.

However, the biggest market cap loss in absolute value terms has been registered by state-run power equipments major BHEL, which has seen an erosion of more than Rs 37,000 crore since July 27.

Among other major losers, ICICI Bank and Reliance Communications have lost more than Rs 15,000 crore each, while Bharti Airtel has seen a loss of close to Rs 24,000 crore since July 27.

Infosys, TCS, Wipro, L&T, HDFC, HDFC Bank and Tata Steel have lost between Rs 5,000-10,000 crore, while NTPC and Ambuja Cement are the only two Sensex stocks that have actually registered an increase in their market value after July 26.

Besides, DLF, which is not present on the Sensex, but figures among the top ten most valued firms, has lost more than Rs 8,000 crore in the recent crash.

Budhia can't outrun poverty, returns to slum

2007-08-16T09:56:00.001-07:00

Child prodigy Budhia Singh became a marathon runner to escape from poverty but he couldn’t outrun destiny.

Budhia, 5, has returned to the slum where he was born and where his mother sold him to a coach for Rs 800. Budhia made international headlines when two years ago he began running record distances but now once again he is just another kid in the slums.

His mother, Sukanti Singh, washes utensils for a living and can barely feed Budhia and his siblings. “Where will Budhia stay? Where will he study and practise? The government needs to give Budhia a house and coach for him to become a champion. Budhia isn’t just mine, he's everybody’s child,” says Sukanti.

The Orissa State Judo Centre, where Budhia used to practise, has been deserted for the last week and Budhia's coach Biranchi Das is in jail for allegedly torturing him.

Fame had changed Budhia’s life: he got a regular and balanced diet, training and even massages in the morning. All that has changed now: the boy once touted as India’s Olympic hope does now plays with other children in the slum. But for all that, his dreams are still very much alive.

“I can't go to school because it's too far. If I get a new coach I will start running again,” he says. The Orissa government has promised to take over Budhia's education and training.

“The government is ready to take full responsibility for Budhia's studies and sports. We want to see him become a champion," says Pramilla Mallick, Minister for Women and Child Welfare.

Budhia has yet to see those promises fulfilled though and all he can hope for is that once again he will run

Landmarks of 60 yrs: Wow WWW | What is mobile number?

2007-08-16T04:44:00.001-07:00

A fly-over here, a Metro line there, farmlands to skyscrapers, farmers to millionaires, small cars to SUVs in multicolours… the face of India changes each time you blink your eyes. And slowly, over the 60 years since we gained Independence, the pace has been increasing.

What does ‘Independence’ mean to a generation – a majority of those logged in reading this – who were perhaps born in a free country?

It means in some ways,the freedom to choose which way that country wants to grow. We’ve had many invasions – cultural and technological – but we have always managed to take what we have wanted and discarded the rest. In the 60 years of us seeking, taking, learning, growing… here is a pick of the 10 things we chose to make our own and which in some way or the other, mark the birth and growth of a country with her own individuality.

The Landmarks of a Shining India

The Internet, since its first tentative steps in India, has become one of the country’s biggest employment exchanges and is rapidly recruiting even as I type. Well, for one, I have my job because of the Internet and you’re reading this thanks to the Net too.

In the 60 years of our Independence, it’s been a mere 15-odd years since the cyberspace began claiming Indian mind space. And to think it all started with excitement over e-mail and how easy it was to correspond globally, instantly. Today, the Internet is synonymous with convenience and even a separate lifestyle.

June 2002, I was doing a story on children being beaten in Delhi municipal schools and was talking to kids and parents in Govindpuri, one of South Delhi’s slum areas. The kids were dirty, underfed and hated school because they were beaten up there. Till an NGO called Project Why decided to help those children and take up the case of corporal punishment with the Delhi government.

Beyond tackling the child-beating, Project Why also set out to educate the children; and one of the tools they used was to install two computers in the one-room ‘school’ that the NGO set up. Where books had not helped, the kids - who had never seen a computer before - took to the instruments like play things. They learnt how to operate the computers; but the change was deeper. Today, the kids are confident, they are not shy of speaking to anyone or speaking out and they will even greet you in clear English.

One of the country’s major players in IT training, NIIT was instrumental in setting up in the regional language computer literacy programmes across India, to teach more people about computers. The idea being that more and more Indian should benefit from the technology…

Train ticket bookings, passport application, applications for LPG connections, bank transactions, email, billing at your local retail store, generation of your PAN number… the Internet and computers are the way ahead… for all of India.

Ask Suresh K* (name changed on request) from Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh, studying at one of India’s premiere MBA institutes in the capital today… He would perhaps be handling his father’s shop had he not been able to prepare for his entrance exams from online tutorials. He would have perhaps missed his seat — insurgent threats made it impossible for him to come down to Delhi — had he not been able to log on and check his results.

From dial-ups and waiting for the dial tone, to data cards for anywhere-anytime connectivity to broadband and Wi-fi… the road lies ahead and Indians — across the span of the country and economic divide — are logging on to the benefits.

A rejoinder: A Few Myths, Fewer Facts about Muslims

2007-08-16T04:42:00.000-07:00

When Zakir Hussain was sentenced to death by hanging for his part in planting the bombs during the “Bombay Blasts” of 1993, he shouted, “If a Hindu does something, a commission is set up. But if a Muslim does something, he is hanged.” This was in reference to the destruction of the Babri Masjid and the riots that had followed in December 1992 and January 1993.

The Srikrishna Commission, constituted to determine the causes of the riots in which approximately 900 people, predominantly Muslim, were killed, had stated that, “One common link between the riots of December 1992 and January 1993 and bomb blasts of 12th March 1993 appear to be that the former appear to have been a causative factor for the latter. There does appear to be a cause and effect relationship between the two riots and the serial bomb blasts.”

The recommendations of the Commission have never been brought into force. This has led to a number of people speculating whether justice is done to Muslims in India, whether they are being punished disproportionately, that, “Soon India's jails will be choc-a-block with Muslims.”

Indian Muslims in Jail

In such cases it is possibly best to check the facts. The prison statistics from the National Crimes Record Bureau indicate that the percentage of Muslims convicts in India is 19.1%, while the number of undertrials is 22.5%.

This is higher than the percentage of Muslims living in India, at 13.4% or thereabouts. It would be tempting to shout, “Aha! Proof of bias!” but a rigorous analysis would lead to a more nuanced view because of the geographic distribution of both prison population and Muslims. Over half of Indian Muslims live in the four states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal and Assam, which account for 21% of convicted prisoners and 42% of undertrials in Indian jails. In effect Indian Muslims live in geographic areas where more people are sent to jail, either as convicts or as undertrials.

A far more fascinating result is that the percentage of Muslims who are undertrials is slightly less than that of those convicted. In other words proportionately more Muslims are adjudged “innocent” than Hindus (whose undertrial to convict ratio is: 69.6% to 70.7% and even Christians (whose undertrial to convict ratio is 3.8% to 4.2%).

Indian Muslims and Crime

The question of bias could also be turned on its head, and it could be said that high proportionately of Muslims means more crime. The data does not support such a conclusion.

The two states where such high population of people are in jail, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, have a Muslim population of 18.5% and 16.5% respectively and contribute 6.7% and 5.4% of All-India crimes . West Bengal and Assam, in which the percentage of Muslims is at 25.2% and 30.9%, contribute only 3.6% and 2.3% of all-India crimes.

Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu all produce more than 8.5% of India’s crimes individually, making them the most crime-prone states in the country. In all of these high crime states Indian Muslims make up, at the most, 10.6% of the population, less than the Indian average.

The one state where Muslims constitute a majority of the population, at 67% in Jammu & Kashmir, which has been wracked by militancy and violence, contributes to only 1.1% of Indian crime, about the same as its population compared to all-India figures.

Indian Muslims as Citizens or as Muslims

Despite these statistics it would be idle to say that Indian Muslims do not, from time to time, face problems, as do most people that constitute a marginalised group in society. The recent Sachar Committee report by the Government of India cites very low levels of socio-economic indicators for Indian Muslims.

As a child I lived in the Oil & Natural Commission compound in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. It is a city that has faced many riots and we were the only Muslims in the compound. During times of tension when my father was working offshore on the oilrig, our manservant, Jumraati would assure my mother, “They’ll have to get through me first, behni”.

A decade or so later, my great-uncle, Major-General Afsir Karim, was asked to deploy troops in the same city to help the civilian administration keep the peace. In 2000, when he was with the National Security Advisory Board, he was questioned by a woman during a televised talk show about minorities. He interrupted her to say, “Ma’am, I am a citizen of India, and so are you. What minorities are you talking about?”

His response to state failure is strikingly different to that of the recently convicted Zakir Hussain. Whereas one tried to make sure that such failure did not recur, the other became a pawn used to kill innocents in a supposed act of “vengeance”. For me, between the words of a man of somebody who has put his life on the line many times in the defence of innocent civilians and those of somebody convicted of murdering them, there can only be one choice.

(Omair Ahmad works on issues of Security, Law & Strategic Affairs for PRS Legislative Research, an autonomous institute that provides research support for Indian Parliamentarians. He has previously worked for the British High Commission, New Delhi, and the Voice of America, Washington DC. His novel, "Encounters" on the radicalisation of two young men during the curfew days of the 90s was published in 2007.)

At 60, Pak in a low mood; India thinking positive

2007-08-16T04:38:00.000-07:00

Two siblings separated at birth and brought up in very different milieu, meet each other as adults and offer a study in contrast. This hackneyed storyline of Bombay cinema could well capture the political history of India and Pakistan as they complete sixty years of existence as independent political entities. The first ever Indo-Pak opinion poll, though confined to big cities on both sides of the border, brings out this stark contrast.

The Indian Express –Dawn News–CNN-IBN poll seems to have caught Pakistan in a rather low and negative mood, at least vis-à-vis its political leadership, in the last week of July and the first week of August. The urban Pakistanis are angry with the state of affairs. They are angry that they do not have access to basic rights and liberties, that they cannot speak their mind without fear, that they do not have the power to change their government. They are unhappy for they believe that things have deteriorated under the General: whether it is corruption or militancy or sectarian conflict, the proportion of those who believe things got worse is twice as much as those who think otherwise.

Events in the last couple of months have made matters worse for Musharraf. An overwhelming majority disapproves of the attempt to remove Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry and is happy with the decision of the Supreme Court to reinstate him.

The Lal Masjid action has also boomeranged, with less than one third of the urban Pakistanis willing to share the General’s reasoning. The rest either disapprove of the action or question the wisdom of even contemplating such an action inside a Masjid. All in all, it is bad news for General Musharraf.

For every one urban Pakistani who wants him to stay, there are two who want to see his back. This reflects in the ratings of the government and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz as well.

Pakistan looks more ready for democratic transition than it has ever since the General took over reigns in 1999. State of Democracy in South Asia, a major study in the five countries of the region carried out in 2005, found that Pakistanis too have a healthy appetite for democracy.

The Indian Express– Dawn News–CNN-IBN poll shows that their support for democracy has actually gone up in the last two years, as has their trust in the courts. Correspondingly, their tolerance of army’s role in politics has sharply declined since 2005. All this is good news for prospects of democracy. The only worrisome sign is that the level of trust in the Election Commission, an institution that may be called upon to play a crucial role in democratic transition, continues to be very low.

Patil leads the race amongst urban Indians
If people were to elect the President, they would have elected…	Urban India	UPA Voters	NDA Voters	Left Voters
Pratibha Patil	41	47	34	48
Bhairon Singh Shekhawat	16	10	25	12
None of them	20	18	23	21
Note: All figures in column percentages. Rest 'no opinion'.

Too early to comment on Patil's competence
Is Patil competent enough to be the President?	Urban India	UPA Voters	NDA Voters	Left Voters
No, she is not competent	17	15	18	19
Too early to judge her	58	55	63	72
Note: All figures in column percentages. Rest 'no opinion'.

Satisfaction with the UPA government's performance…	January 2007	August 2007
Satisfied	48	73
Dissatisfied	35	21
Satisfaction with Manmohan Singh's performance as PM…	January 2007	August 2007
Satisfied	57	77
Dissatisfied	26	17
Note: All figures in column percentages. Rest 'no opinion'.

People want the Musharraf to quit
Should Musharraf stay on?
No, he should quit	55
Yes, the country needs him	30
Note: All figures in column percentages. Rest 'no opinion'.

Kerala nuns to undergo truth tests in murder case

2007-08-16T04:36:00.000-07:00

Two nuns and a priest in Kottayam were on Thursday taken to Bangalore by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to undergo truth serum tests in connection with the mysterious death of a nun, Sister Abhaya, in 1992.

The CBI team had earlier got permission from Ernakulam Chief Judicial Magistrate P D Sarangadharan to conduct the tests on Father Jose Putarika - a former Malayalam professor at the college where Abhaya studied - and two nuns who were inmates of Abhaya's convent.

Abhaya, an inmate of Pious X hostel near Kottayam, was found dead in the well of the convent on March 27, 1992. The CBI concluded in November 1996 that the death was a homicide but the murderer remained untraced.

Thomas Kottor, the Diocesan chancellor of the Catholic Church Kottayam, was subjected to the truth serum test last month. Kottor was a professor of psychology in Abhaya's college.

V V Augustine, a former police official, also underwent the test along with Kottor.

The decision to conducts tests on Father Putarika and the two nuns was taken after the CBI claimed it got crucial information from the tests done on Kottor and Augustine.

Three former CBI teams have failed to crack the mystery behind Abhaya's death. The Kerala Police had earlier dismissed the case as suicide.

A new team was appointed in June after Joe Mon Puthenpurackal, a social activist who formed the Abhaya Action Committee in 1992, met the CBI director in May and demanded a fresh probe.

The 15-year-old case came back into the limelight in April after a newspaper reported that Abhaya's medical reports had been tampered with at the Chemical Examiners Laboratory in Thiruvananthapuram.

Two officials at the laboratory, who are alleged to have tampered with the report, are currently on bail. They had undergone a medical examination at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in Delhi last week under the supervision of CBI officials.

Sindh connection: Life after partition

2007-08-14T08:26:00.000-07:00

Sixty years after partition, NDTV brings you some of Partition's untold stories.

They came as refugees when Sindh became a part of newly created Pakistan. Many headed for Bombay and started their lives all over again. But their success over the last six decades has come at a price.

Every Sindhi wants to fit into the shoes of the czar of construction, Niranjan Hiranandani, who in many ways personifies the Sindhi success story.

Just 60 years ago, his community, mostly of rich landholders, came as refugees from Sindh in Pakistan.

''I think Sindhis as a community are very entrepreneurial. You find a Sindhi anywhere in the world who is able to be businesslike, thrive and adapt. They just put their noses to the ground and get to work. Beyond a point Sindhis didn't look back at all,'' said Niranjan Hiranandani. MD, Hiranandani Group.

Prosperous past

But for 75-year-old Anjana Tejwani, it is a different tale.

Barely 15, she was a child bride when her zamindar family fled overnight from Sakkur in Sindh leaving behind a three storey house and a lifetime of riches.

All that to start a new life as refugees in army barracks of Ulhasnagar, just outside Mumbai. Despite the hard work, the family has not been able to regain its prosperous past.

''The rich somehow got lost in the race when they came to India. We were ashamed to do hard work, unlike the poor who just did what they had to and are now more successful than us,'' said Anjana.

Her 32-year-old daughter Julie Tejwani desperately tries to keep alive pieces of Sindhi culture.

She is part of a young Sindhi theatre group that is struggling to revive interest in her mother tongue through drama.

''It is difficult to get a crowd. We barely manage 4 to 5 shows of one play, that also because it is totally sponsored. But no one is willing to buy a ticket for this kind of theatre,'' she said.

Many debate that this erosion of culture and tradition is natural because they do not have a state or even a piece of land to call their very own to preserve and nurture their distinctive identity.

Sindhis may have prospered in their many adopted countries and as the popular Sindhi saying goes ''have made gold out of ashes''. But this hardy and affluent community is slowly losing out on something even more precious- its distinctiveness, its culture, language and music.

India at 60 poll: Mahatma Gandhi still rules Indian hearts

2007-08-14T08:21:00.000-07:00

The campaign was spread across three platforms - an Opinion poll, SMS poll and a Web poll - and people were asked to mark their choices in the following nine categories:

India's Greatest Icon
India's Greatest Pride
India's Greatest/Worst Shame
One Event that Changed India
India's Greatest Political Blot
India's Greatest Sportsperson
India's Greatest Film
India's Greatest Song
What Best Describes India Abroad

As the voting ended, it was clear that from the people on the street to the software geeks, the one person who rules the hearts and minds of Indians today, according to the NDTV poll, is Mahatma Gandhi.

This is not surprising considering that his ideals of non-violence have found expression in 21st century India's popular idiom - Gandhigiri.

Thus, the Mahatma beat Indian stalwarts like industrialist JRD Tata, Infosys chief mentor NR Narayana Murthy and actor Amitabh Bachchan by a huge margin.

In fact, the only one who comes anywhere near the Mahatma's aura is Mother Teresa.

Furthermore, in a sign of the old giving way to the young, voters passed over Jawaharlal Nehru in their preference for his daughter Indira Gandhi.

Pak celebrates Independence Day

2007-08-14T08:19:00.000-07:00

Celebrations are under way across Pakistan to mark the 60th anniversary of independence from Britain and the creation of the country.

But as the people of Pakistan celebrate, one person who is worried is President General Pervez Musharraf.

He appeared on television admitting his popularity had taken a beating.

Fireworks and huge doses of patriotism marked 60 years of independence in the country.

Though under the surface there is a lot of restlessness. Up ahead are very controversial Presidential and general elections.

There are prohibitive security measures in place and many are asking whether there is any reason to celebrate.

''Our country has not progressed the way it should have. It has not gone the way Quaid-e-Azam had visualised it,'' said,'' said Ghulam Farid, stall holder.

Musharraf is now in a tight corner after the Supreme Court opened the floodgates to legal challenges after re-instating the dismissed Chief Justice.

Radical clerics

The campaign against radical clerics at the Lal Masjid has only spawned more militancy.

So faced with opposition to staying on as President in his uniform he dressed down on a popular television show to reach out to his people.

''This political year is an election year. It will bring political stability. This political stability will be a continuation of the progress which Pakistan is making now, and it will take us towards further improvements,'' said Musharraf.

''This is all for the benefit of the public. And all these things which we will achieve, God willing, will be for the benefit of the people. The welfare of the public is ultimately the responsibility of government,'' he added.

Yet the polls show few want Musharraf to stay on. According to The Dawn News survey, over half the people interviewed wanted him to quit his Presidency.

Forty per cent rated his performance as poor and only 29 per cent people want him to continue.

The only reason to celebrate is improving ties with neighbour India. At the Wagah border the pomp of ceremony was marked by a prisoner exchange.

Pakistan has allowed 134 Indian prisoners to return home. India will respond by releasing a 100 Pakistani prisoners.

No talking cheap now! Call, sms rates hiked

2007-08-14T08:17:00.000-07:00

Your mobile phone rates will go up as private GSM operators have hiked local SMS tariffs by a flat 20 per cent.

Hutch was the first to hike SMS tariffs but big boy Airtel followed suit just hours later. Infact, local call rates in the capital have also been hiked by 20 per cent. This hike in tariffs cannot be viewed in isolation as it comes on the back of a quiet increase in STD tariffs over the last 15 days.

Almost all the private GSM players have hiked STD tariffs by a little over 10 per cent. Airtel, Hutch and Idea hiked their STD tariffs for prepaid customer from Rs 2.40 per minute to Rs 2.65 per minute.

A couple of months ago all private GSM players decided not to cut roaming tariffs despite state owned BSNL and RCOM and Tata Tele doing so.

The regulator and the government are keeping a close watch. Telecom Minister Andimuthu Raja has gone on record to say there is room for tariffs to come down. But since it’s the domain of the regulator Raja says he will meet TRAI chairman Nripendra Misra to see how much headroom there is.
Telecom Operators say tariffs can come down only if the government brings down licence fees.

Kumar Mangalam to lead BK Birla empire in 3 years

2007-08-14T08:16:00.001-07:00

The Chairman of the Basant Kumar Birla Group, B K Birla has named his grandson Kumar Mangalam Birla as the successor of most of his companies. And like brother Krishna Kant, B K Birla, too, wants to retire, but can't because his grandson has so far refused to take over his companies.

"I spoke to Kumar Mangalam. But he was keen that I should continue as long as my health is all right. I am not in favour of that. I told him that I would like to enjoy my life,” says B K Birla.

But now, the Birla family patriarch has set a deadline. He has told his grandson he would retire in three years. And by then, he would have separated the ownership of his companies.

"I would like to complete when actually I reach 90 years. But I should say that plus minus another year. But it depends on Kumar Mangalam. In case he is prepared to cooperate, it will be faster,” says B K Birla.

The 87-year old industrialist has decided his grandson would inherit all his cement companies, including Kesoram Industries, which, he had earlier said, would go to his daughter Manjushree Khaitan. He told TV18 in an exclusive interview that Kesoram could be curved up so that Manjushree got a part of it, probably its tyre business.

"Jayshree will take Jayshree Tea, and part of Kesoram will go to Manjushree. The remaining things would all go to Kumar Manglam,” says the Birla patriarch.

The process of separating the ownership of companies in accordance with B K Birla’s succession plan has already begun, and the grand old man has decided that he would distribute his collection of paintings equally amongst his two daughters and grandson. After retirement, he says he would love to spend more time on his cultural pursuits.

Landmarks of 60 yrs: That's the Web to Go

2007-08-14T08:14:00.000-07:00

Thackeray lampooned, Shiv Sainiks in rage

2007-08-14T08:12:00.000-07:00

Shiv Sena workers on Tuesday ransacked the office of weekly magazine Outlook to protest an article which lampooned party chief Bal Thackeray as a villain.

Around 8-10 workers forcibly entered the magazine’s office on the sixth floor of Raheja Chambers in Nariman Point at around 1500 hours and asked for the editor. They damaged property in the office on being told that the editor wasn’t there, police said.

Eyewitnesses said some windows and office stationery were damaged in the incident. No one was hurt in the incident.

K L Prasad, Joint Commissioner of Police, Law and Order, said the group broke a phone, glass partitions and overturned some furniture. The group was out in 5-10 minutes, said Prasad.

Thackeray, Mahatma Gandhi’s killer Nathuram Godse, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and cricketer Mohammed Azharuddin and late Congress leader Sanjay Gandhi were listed as villains in a special edition of the magazine to commemorate India’s 60th year of independence.

A caricature in the article has Thackeray sporting a toothbrush moustache and Hitler-like uniform. The Shiv Sena activists alleged Thackeray had been portrayed in a negative light.

The magazine’s management says the police are confiscating copies of the magazine in Mumbai. Police has lodged a complaint against unknown persons for ransacking and damage to property.

Murthy didn't dishonour National Anthem: HC

2007-08-14T08:10:00.001-07:00

Infosys' chief mentor NR Narayana Murthy has been cleared of the charges of dishonouring the National Anthem by the Karnataka High Court on Tuesday.

The order was passed by Justice K Bhakthavatsala on a criminal petition filed by Narayana Murthy.

A Kannada rights group, Karnataka Rakshana Vakeelara Vedike, had filed a case against Narayana Murthy in a lower court over his alleged remarks on the singing of the National Anthem. The case was filed before the second additional city metropolitan magistrate in Bangalore, which passed the order on May 26, issuing summons to him.

Narayana Murthy had ordered an instrumental version of the National Anthem to be played at the Infosys campus in Mysore on April 8 and later defended his action saying that having if the Anthem had been sung live it would have embarrassed foreign guests.

The High Court ruled that there had been not been a violation of the National Honours Act. Another case is still pending in a Mysore court.

Murthy's advocate K Venugopal had contended that his client was not guilty of any offence and playing the instrumental version did not amount to any violation.

"The court has quashed the complaint filed against him for alleged offence under Section 3 of the Insult to National Honours Act saying that playing of instrumental music does not amount to an offence," another of Murthy's lawyer Shashi Kiran said.

SRK, Mayawati among 50 most influential Indians

2007-08-14T07:51:00.001-07:00

As India prepares to celebrate 60 years of independence, US-based BusinessWeek magazine feels IT is no longer the lone global face of the country- evident from its compilation of 50 powerful Indians leading change in politics, the economy and the society.

The list put together by BusinessWeek editors names industry tycoons Ratan Tata, Mukesh Ambani, Sunil Mittal, Commerce Minister Kamal Nath, Aviation Minister Praful Patel, UP Chief Minister Mayawati, Delhi Metro chief E Sreedharan, film stars Amitabh Bachchan, Rajnikant, Shahrukh Khan, Aishwarya Rai, sportspersons Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar as new leaders of India.

While acknowledging the role of IT wizards - Infosys' N R Narayana Murthy, Wipro's Azim Premji, and Tata Consultancy Services' (TCS) S Ramadorai - the magazine said: "There's more to India than just outsourcing."

Other business leaders who have made it to the list are Anand Mahindra and Anil Aggarwal, bankers K V Kamath and Deepak Parekh, Tata Steel Managing Director B Muthuraman and L&T Chairman A M Naik.

Politicians still carry the most clout with government controlling a major part of the economy, but in India's 60th year of independence, the names on the list are representative of changing times, BusinessWeek noted.

"There are politicians who actually work, corporates who think globally, athletes who aim high, and designers who ensure India is in season. And Bollywood is now teaming up with Hollywood for a whole new script," the publication said.

"Tech leaders used to dominate the show. But a booming economy has thrown up new sectors, new heroes, and new businesses. Telecom, financial services, retail, and many more industries are thriving," the magazine said.

Definite action will be taken on Srikrishna report: Sonia Gandhi

2007-08-14T07:48:00.001-07:00

Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday said definite action will be taken on the findings of the report of the Srikrishna Commission which went into the 1993 Mumbai riots.

She said this addressing the general body meeting of the Congress Parliamentary Party.

Gandhi's statement came close on the heels of Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh apprising her last week of the progress made in the matter, which has raised a controversy with several parties and organisations demanding stringent and early action and Shiv Sena warning of "serious consequences" if action is taken.

Deshmukh had then said that he himself was "not happy" with the implementation of the report and had detailed to her the steps taken to expedite it.

Referring to the Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation of Victims) Bill currently in Parliament, she said a few civil society groups have met her and given a number of suggestions on the Bill, which are being considered by the Government.

Chak De's... a winner all the way

2007-08-14T05:02:00.000-07:00

Cast: Shah Rukh Khan, Chitrashi Rawat, Tanya Abrol

Direction: Shimit Amin

Put your hands together for director Shimit Amin's Chak De India, this week's big new Bollywood release about a disgraced former national hockey player who, seven years after he was falsely accused of throwing away the game, shows up to coach the national women's hockey team.

The coach in question, Kabir Khan played by Shah Rukh Khan, succeeds in convincing a reluctant hockey association to give his team a chance. The team itself is made up of girls from across the length and breadth of the country, each a state champ in her own right.

But the first rule Mr Coach teaches his girls is to forget that they represent different states, he asks them to forget their regional identities. They're all playing for the country, they're all on the same team, and winning a hockey match is about teamwork and not about personal successes.

His methods may be unconventional and his team resists them at first, but soon enough you realise he's the only guy who can make them forget their differences and play as a team.

Chak De India, written by Jaideep Sahni, is not a pathbreaking film, far from it actually. It doesn't break new ground, it doesn't tell a dramatically different story and even in terms of technique, it's not exactly jaw-dropping. But what it does have is a very 'clean' screenplay with all the typical elements of a good sports film in place.

In fact, Chak De India is what I'd safely call a by-the-book sports film, it's got a perfect three-act structure and follows all the basic rules of storytelling quite faithfully.

There's a set-up, there's a build-up and there's a climax. But because it's done so neatly, and because all the elements come together so well, the film works perfectly.

In fact, the plot and the screenplay of Chak De India is a no-brainer, it's designed to be a crowd-pleaser from the very word go -- there's the basic underdog story at the core, there's a patriotic angle thrown in for good measure, the film even talks about gender equality.

How can you not root for an underdog team of female hockey players who're laughed at by their own families, who're ridiculed by the very association that's brought them together? How can your heart not go out to a bunch of gawky girls who're constantly bickering with each other? How can you not cheer for a man who vindicates himself finally, after being punished for a crime he didn't commit?

Despite its sluggish pace, Chak De India is a compelling film to watch and much of its charm lies in those wonderful scenes between the 16-odd girls who make up coach Kabir Khan's underdog team.

They're terrible actors most of them, but it's because the director falls on their natural instincts that they come off so lovable and endearing. Chitrashi Rawat who plays the pint-sized Komal and Tanya Abrol who plays the Punjaban-toughie Balbir are nothing short of excellent.

Meanwhile, Segarika Ghatge who plays the champ from Chandigarh Preeti Sabharwal leaves a lasting impression because she's possibly the only one of the lot who can really act. Even the smaller bit players are superbly cast, and even if they've got only a few lines in the whole film, they'e integral to the narrative.

Director Shimit Amin touches all the right chords when he constructs those excellent confrontation and disagreement scenes between the girls, and even though he throws around a bagful of cultural stereotypes, you don't grumble too much because these cliches aren't so much offensive as they are affectionate.

In the end, Chak De India keeps you glued to your seat because the hockey scenes are terrific. It's a sports film in the true spirit of sports films, and like me, even if you're not a fan of watching sports, it's unlikely the film will bore you because it's so dramatically shot.

The film's climax, the World Hockey Championship scenes, play out pretty much exactly as you expect them to, but that's the magic of sport, it engages you and involves you nonetheless.

And that leaves us to talk about Shah Rukh Khan who I must admit I haven't been the biggest fan of because I'm often bored by the films he chooses. But for the first time since Swades, Shah Rukh plays a role without any of his typical trappings, without any of his trademark quirks.

He sinks his teeth into the part of the determined coach and comes up with such a terrific performance. He's hopeful at times and despondent at others, he's humorous at times, and stern at others. He plays Kabir Khan like a real flesh-and-blood human being. Look at him in that scene where he's moving out of his house with his mother after being publicly shamed -- Shah Rukh has seldom been this good.

There you have it then, it's an immensely satisfying movie experience, I'm going to go with four out of five and two thumbs up for director Shimit Amin's Chak De India. It's got a predictable premise and you know exactly which way the story's going to go, but sometimes, when the characters win over your heart and you're rooting for them to win, that's all that really matters.

Rating: 4 / 5 (Very Good)

Captains agree the best team won the series

2007-08-14T04:50:00.000-07:00

India deserved their 1-0 series win against England [Images] after the third Test ended in a draw at The Oval on Monday, captains Michael Vaughan [Images] and Rahul Dravid [Images] said.

Kevin Pietersen [Images] cracked 101 for his 10th Test hundred that ensured England saw the fifth day out safely on 369 for six after being set a world record victory target of 500.

India were jubilant after stumps were drawn, not because they had failed to win the match but because they had managed their first Test series win in England for 21 years, emulating Kapil Dev's [Images] team in 1986.

"I think it's a fair result," Dravid told reporters. "England dominated the first Test match and we dominated the next two.

"We played the better cricket at the critical moments and to come away from home and beat England, who have been traditionally so strong for the last six or seven years, gives us a lot of satisfaction."

Vaughan still sounded frustrated by the first Test result at Lord's when rain prevented England from taking the 20th Indian wicket for a 1-0 lead but accepted India had finished on top.

"We did everything we could to win that game (Lord's) and there's not a lot you can do when the weather intervenes.

"But in the last two matches, India have put us under a lot of pressure and usually over a three-match series the team that plays the best cricket comes out on top. India have just pipped that because of the way they played in the last two games."

NO FOLLOW-ON

Dravid said he felt "very proud" of the achievement, adding that it meant more because it was only India's third series victory in England since 1932.

The India skipper still received some criticism from observers who felt he should have enforced the follow-on at The Oval on Sunday instead of batting again. Some pundits believe that decision cost India the chance to win the series 2-0.

"There will be different opinions on what was wise and what is not wise," Dravid said.

"But as captain of the team I know my players and the dressing room pretty well, I know the workload that my bowlers have had after playing all series.

"I know people might be disappointed that we didn't enforce the follow-on and maybe if I was sitting in a living room I would have thought the same but as captain I get a pulse for what is happening and I did what I thought was right."

Vaughan defended Dravid on the decision and said he would have made the same choice.

"They were 1-0 up and wanted to make sure they won the series," Vaughan said. "I would have done the same."

Viveik is sorry but Salman says no than

2007-08-14T04:46:00.000-07:00

It's one of Bollywood's oldest mantras – let bygones be bygones. And on Sunday, actor Viveik Oberoi decided to do just that, when he made an impromptu gesture of seeking forgiveness from actor Salman Khan. But it seems it didn't work!

After performing to the hit number Beedi Jalaile with Koena Mitra at the Rajiv Gandhi Awards function in Mumbai, Viveik turned towards Salman who was seated in the front row, folded his hands, then like an errant child bowed in front of him grabbing his ears in forgiveness.

Salman, for his part, was in no mood to forgive. Those present at the occasion say Salman just shook his head dismissively, and ignored not only Viveik's gesture, but also Shilpa Shetty's request to forgive him.

Shilpa was seated beside Salman in the front row. Both Salman and Shilpa received the Rajiv Gandhi Award for their contribution to cinema and entertainment.

Despite the snub from Salman, Viveik made it clear he was thrilled with the crowd's reaction to his performance. "I have nothing but love and respect for my seniors who were present in the auditorium. They cheered me on, everyone was very supportive,” Viveik said.

These diplomatic words aside, it is no secret that Salman and Viveik have been at loggerheads for the last five years. In April 2003, Viveik used the media to launch a verbal tirade against Salman for allegedly making repeated abusive calls to him.

Viveik alleged that Salman was insecure of Viveik's relationship with Aishwarya Rai. Although, Salman has never responded to Viveik's allegations, it is a well-known fact in Bollywood that Salman has been nursing a grudge against Viveik since that day.

After Aishwarya dumped Viveik for Abhishek Bachchan two years ago, Viveik made repeated attempts to make amends with Salman.

He even visited Salman's ailing mother in hospital with his parents, and has repeatedly said in interviews that he looks back at his behaviour with regret and remorse. But Salman has always had the last word. When asked to comment on Viveik, Salman has always responded with the very innocent, but very telling response, " Viveik who?"