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Rodrigues
honours National Prade paricipants
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The
Punjab Governor and Administrator,
Union Territory, Chandigarh, Gen.
(Retd.) S.F. Rodrigues, PVSM VSM,
called upon the NCC Cadets to develop
leadership qualities, with the focus
on values and to move ahead with confidence
& commitment in the evolution of New
Resurgent India and the Country of
our dreams. He emphasized the need
to introspect and analyze our inadequacies
and weaknesses and take measures to
make our future path smooth and hassle
free for achieving the aims and objectives
enshrined in NCC charter. Addressing
the function, after honouring the
NCC Cadets and officers who took part
in Republic Day Parade and PM's Rally-
2008 at New Delhi, General Rodrigues
reminded the Cadets of the gigantic
effort involved in creating India
after amalgamation of various states
despite diversities of languages,
cultures, religions, customs and living
styles. He said that the goal of a
vibrant & dynamic India can be achieved
only with innovative ideas, bold initiatives
and a more positive and practical
approach. The NCC Cadets have the
correct motivation and value based
training and must come forward, with
confidence, to give a stimulus to
national life.
Courtesy:
www.punjabnewsline.com, January 31,
2008
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`BCCI
Inc` among India`s top 200 firms
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If
it were a corporate entity, the Board
of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI)
would have been among the country's
top 170 companies in terms of revenues
(2007) - much larger than Zee Entertainment
(Rs 1,515.88 crore) for which promoter
Subhash Chandra is waging a bitter
battle against the official cricket
board to develop 20:20 cricket in
India. In fact, BCCI would also surpass
FMCG company Colgate Palmolive (Rs
1,290.70 crore), consumer durables
giant Whirlpool of India (Rs 1,476
crore) and pharma major Glaxo SmithKline
(Rs 1,565.85 crore). All this is courtesy
the Rs 1,621 crore revenues that the
country's richest sports body will
be raking in every year for the next
three years just by selling broadcast
rights, domestic 20:20 cricket teams,
and team sponsorship rights amongst
others. To put it another way, BCCI
will earn Rs 4.43 crore everyday for
the next three years - irrespective
of whether cricket matches are being
played or not in some venue in India.
The revenues will only go up with
a bevy of rights coming up for re-bidding
in 2010. These include the broadcast
rights for domestic international
matches, the team sponsorship deal
(currently with Sahara) and the team
kit contract (currently with Nike).
The big revenue earners come from
selling broadcast rights for cricket
matches in a cricket-crazy country.
These include broadcasting revenues
from international cricket matches
within India and from neutral venues
in non-ICC countries that have been
bagged by Nimbus. BCCI has also sold
the TV rights of the Indian Premier
League (IPL) to a consortium led by
Sony TV. These two mega-contracts
account for over 70 per cent of the
board's revenues. To understand this
hyper-growth consider that BCCI's
2005-06 revenue was Rs 430 crore and
2006-07 revenue Rs 650 crore. The
major growth will now come from the
lucrative new revenue stream opened
up by the IPL 20:20 tournament. In
the last few weeks the sports body,
for instance, has raked in Rs 6996
crore from selling the broadcasting
and the team franchising rights of
IPL for the next ten years.
Courtesy:
www.business-standard.com, January
30, 2008
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Mahatma's
grandson quits US peace centre
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A
descendant of Mahatma Gandhi has resigned
from a peace institute after drawing
condemnation for comments he made
in an online forum that Israel and
Jews "are the biggest players" in
a global culture of violence. Arun
Gandhi, the fifth grandson of the
revered Indian pacifist, said on Friday
that the board of the MK Gandhi Institute
for Nonviolence had accepted his offer
a day earlier to step down as president.
Gandhi co-founded the institute with
his wife, Sunanda, at Christian Brothers
University in Memphis, Tennessee,
in 1991 and relocated it to the University
of Rochester campus in June, a few
months after her death at age 74.
"My intention was to generate a healthy
discussion on the proliferation of
violence," Gandhi said in a statement.
"Instead, unintentionally, my words
have resulted in pain, anger, confusion
and embarrassment. I deeply regret
these consequences."
Courtesy:
www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com, January
26, 2008
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NRIs
to adopt Punjab village
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That
Punjab has exported its cold-blooded,
anti-girl child bias to the Punjabi
communities settled abroad came home
cruelly, when a Canadian NRI slit
the throat of his two-year-old daughter
just because she happened to be the
third girl child in his house. But,
after Canada, where the sex ratio
in Punjabi communities is dipping
heavily against the girl child, there
are finally some glad tidings from
foreign shores. New Zealand-based
Shaheed Bhagat Singh Foundation, consisting
of members mainly of Punjabi origin,
has decided to adopt a Punjab village
and turn it into a model place for
promotion of girl child. One of its
members, Parminder Singh visited Punjab
in December last year and discussed
the modalities with Dr Harshindar
Kaur, the lone woman crusader from
Patiala, who has extensively surveyed
and documented the incidence of female
foeticide and infanticide. Parminder
carried back several of her studies
and broad outlines of the scheme for
a model village. The Foundation has
decided that it would be operating
in collaboration with this paediatrician
from Rajindra government medical college
and hospital, Auckland-based Gurinder
Singh Dhatt, president of the Foundation
informed TOI over phone. "At the birth
of a girl child, we would be investing
a particular amount in her name in
the bank which would be made available
to her when she attains the age of
18. The idea is to provide a respectable
amount of money when she is of marriageable
age so that dowry does not become
the cause of her death when she is
not even born yet," he said. Further,
any bright, intelligent girl student
from the model village would also
get financial support or sponsorship
to study abroad, which should again
work as an incentive for the foreign-crazed
Punjabi parents, the group members
revealed. The members would be visiting
the village atleast twice a year,
but the coordinator here, Dr Harshindar
would visit the village almost every
two months, giving awareness talks
and generally following up on the
health of the children. "The Union
government is also coming out with
a unique scheme for survival of girl
child, which sounds good and hopefully,
would bring the much-needed mind shift.
Now, we have to make the girls aware
of their own importance in the society,"
she said quoting one of her surveys
where girl students were themselves
not aware of the pitfalls of a dwindling
sex ratio or the growing exploitation
of females due to this trend. A recipient
of state award for her work, Harshindar,
who has also written extensively on
the subject, has already identified
four such villages and would be finalising
the nitty-gritty during her upcoming
trip to New Zealand, at the invitation
of the Foundation.
Courtesy:
www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com, January
22, 2008
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India-born
Om Malik among world's top 25 Web
celebrities
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Blogging
might be a leisure activity for many
famous personalities but it has brought
fame to people like India-born Om
Malik who has been named as one of
the global web celebrities by American
magazine Forbes. Ranked at the 12th
position for technology blogging on
the list of 'Web Celeb 25', he shares
the limelight not just with fellow
bloggers but also with video hosts
and gadget gurus. A chemistry graduate
from St Stephen's College in New Delhi,
Malik is the brain behind the website
'http://gigaom.Com/' and has also
served as a technology journalist
for various publications. "Om Malik
has a long history as a tech journalist,
writing for outlets including Business
2.0, Red Herring and The Wall Street
Journal (he was also one of the founding
staffers of Forbes.Com). But true
Web celebrity status didn't come for
the Indian-born writer until 2001,
when he started his own technology
blog, GigaOm," Forbes noted. On the
other hand, twenty nine-year-old Perez
Hilton alias Mario Lavandeira, who
runs the website 'http://perezhilton.Com/',
is at the top of the heap. "Hollywood
stars fear the wrath of Perez Hilton,
a controversial gossip blogger with
a poison pen... His blog is hugely
popular, despite recent missteps,
including erroneously reporting the
death of Fidel Castro," the magazine
said. Pointing out that Malik frequently
appears in the media on television
as a technology expert, Forbes added
that his popular website has received
funding from sources including San
Francisco-based venture firm True
Ventures. Meanwhile, according to
forty one-year-old Malik's website,
he has also been a venture capitalist
for a brief period. "... Few months
in the VC (venture capitalism) business
made me realise how much I missed
the world of writing and reportage,
and I went to work for Red Herring
where (at least I thought) I could
apply my extensive knowledge and insight
into the world of venture capitalism
and cutting-edge technologies," Malik's
website said.
Courtesy:
www.hindustantimes.com, January 22,
2008
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P.
K. Sethi, Inventor of the Low-Tech
Limb, Is Dead at 80
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The
Jaipur foot helped amputees in developing
nations. The cause was cardiac arrest,
his family said. The Jaipur foot,
which has never been patented, is
available in more than 25 countries,
most of them poor, many of them with
great numbers of land-mine victims.
Unlike many high-priced prostheses
in developed countries, it can be
made by traditional craftsmen, lasts
more than five years and costs about
$30, making it affordable for mass
distribution. Pramod Karan Sethi was
born on Nov. 28, 1927, in the ancient
northern Indian city of Benares (now
Varanasi), on the banks of the Ganges.
His father was a professor of physics
at Benares Hindu University. On completing
his medical education in India and
Britain, he became a lecturer in surgery
at Sawai Man Singh Medical College
and Hospital in Jaipur. He became
an orthopedic surgeon by default.
In 1958, his institution was about
to be inspected for accreditation,
and since there was no department
of orthopedics, he was asked to start
one at once. He always maintained
that not being a qualified orthopedic
surgeon helped him produce something
that was genuinely new. Dr. Sethi
came up with his invention after years
of extensive research. He was helped
by Ramachandra Sharma, a semiliterate
craftsman who had been teaching lepers
to make handicrafts and who became
his assistant. The two made a foot
of vulcanized rubber but found it
too heavy and stiff. So they filled
the shell with sponge rubber and modified
the design. They used a stiff piece
for the metatarsals and added microcellular
rubber for the heel, cutting wedges
at its upper end to make a universal
joint. Since 1971, when Dr. Sethi
presented the foot to British orthopedic
surgeons at Oxford, the Jaipur foot
has revolutionized lives in war-torn
countries. It is very flexible, allowing
the wearer to run, climb trees or
pedal bicycles. It is well suited
to the needs of many Asian countries
in which most people sit, eat, sleep
and pray on the floor. Using the Jaipur
foot, a Bollywood actor and dancer,
Sudha Chandra, was even able to perform
a demanding dance sequence in the
movie musical "Nache Mayuri." The
Jaipur foot was first used outside
India in Afghanistan, which had the
highest number of amputees in the
world after the Soviet invasion, when
Russian land mines caused thousands
of wounds. It is also in heavy demand
in Cambodia, Iraq, Kenya, Bangladesh
and Nicaragua. Dr. Sethi is survived
by his wife, Sulochana, one son and
three daughters. Relations between
Dr. Sethi and Mr. Sharma soured after
Dr. Seti won a major international
award. Mr. Sharma said he felt cheated
after getting neither a share of the
prize money nor any credit for its
design. Though they later mended their
relationship, the bond between them
was never the same. Mr. Sharma now
works for Bhagwan Mahaveer Viklang
Sahayata Samiti, a charity established
in 1975 in Jaipur, which manufactures
the foot on a large scale and provides
it free to thousands of poor people.
Courtesy:
www.nytimes.com, January 08, 2007
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