‘Need stronger child labour laws’

Nobel Laureate Kailash Satyarthi feels that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Make in India’ programme will prove to be a “big disaster” if child labour laws are not strengthened.

In a letter to the Prime Minister, Mr. Satyarthi has said, “If investors are coming from foreign countries to manufacture in India and if your laws are so weak in child labour in comparison to international standards then it will become a big disaster.”

He says that the ‘Make in India’ programme is a great move, but it also exposes a serious weakness of the country. “Make in India” cannot be successful on the toil, miseries and abuses of young children in the manufacturing sector,” the 62-year-old founder of ‘Bachpan Bachao Andolan’ told PTI.

“In India, child labour is working because your law allows it. These big brands will be dependent on local producers who are free to employ children. But the international media and human rights organisations are not going to spare us,” said the child rights activist. — PTI

If your laws are so weak in child labour in comparison to international standards then it will become a big disaster

Source:- The Hindu, 14-Mar-2016

Magnetic chips to enhance energy efficiency of computers

In a breakthrough for energy-efficient computing, engineers at the University of California-Berkeley have shown for the first time that magnetic chips can operate with the lowest fundamental level of energy dissipation possible under the laws of thermodynamics.

The findings mean that dramatic reductions in power consumption are possible — as much as one-millionth the amount of energy per operation used by transistors in modern computers.

This is critical for mobile devices, which demand powerful processors that can run for a day or more on small, lightweight batteries.

Data centres

On a larger industrial scale, as computing increasingly moves into ‘the cloud’, the electricity demands of the giant cloud data centres are multiplying, collectively taking an increasing share of the country’s — and world’s — electrical grid.

Reducing energy needed

“We wanted to know how small we could shrink the amount of energy needed for computing,” said senior author Jeffrey Bokor, a UC Berkeley professor of electrical engineering and computer sciences.

“The biggest challenge in designing computers and, in fact, all our electronics today is reducing their energy consumption,” he added in a paper appeared in the peer-reviewed journal Science Advances . Lowering energy use is a relatively recent shift in focus in chip manufacturing after decades of emphasis on packing greater numbers of increasingly tiny and faster transistors onto chips.

“Making transistors go faster was requiring too much energy,” said Bokor, who is also the deputy director the Centre for Energy Efficient Electronics Science, a Science and Technology Centre at UC Berkeley funded by the National Science Foundation. “The chips were getting so hot they’d just melt.”

Magnetic computing emerged as a promising candidate because the magnetic bits can be differentiated by direction, and it takes just as much energy to get the magnet to point left as it does to point right. — IANS

The findings mean that dramatic reductions in power consumption are possible

Source:- The Hindu, 14-Mar-2016

ExoMars: ‘giant nose’ to sniff out life on Mars

Space engineers are making final preparations for the launch of a robot spacecraft designed to sniff out signs of life on Mars.

The probe, ExoMars 2016 — the first of a two-phase exploration of the Red Planet by European and Russian scientists — is scheduled to be blasted into space on a Proton rocket from Baikonour cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 0931 GMT on Monday.

The spacecraft consists of a module called Schiaparelli that will test heat shields and parachutes in preparation for future probe landings on Mars and a second main component, the Trace Gas Orbiter or TGO, that will analyse the planet’s atmosphere. In particular it will seek out the presence of the gas methane which, on Earth, is produced by living organisms.

“Essentially our spacecraft is a giant nose in the sky,” said Jorge Vago, an ExoMars project scientist based with the European Space Agency (Esa).

“We are going to use it to sniff out the presence of methane on Mars and determine if it is being produced by biological processes.” Methane is normally destroyed by ultraviolet radiation within a few hundred years of its creation. Its presence on Mars would therefore suggest life had recently been active there.

The U.S. robot rover Curiosity, which landed on Mars in 2012, initially found no sign of methane. Subsequent analyses in 2014 did report the presence of methane in the Martian atmosphere in one area. However, some scientists have argued that it may have been created by non—biological means.

On Earth most methane is generated biologically, but it can be made by chemical processes under the surface. To differentiate between these two processes, the ExoMars trace gas detector will not only analyse methane levels in more detail than any previous mission but also study other gases that will provide information about its likely source. “If methane is found in the presence of other complex hydroc

arbon gases, such as propane or ethane, that will be a strong indication that biological processes are involved,” said another project scientist, Manish Patel, of the Open University.

“However, if we find methane in the presence of gases such as sulphur dioxide, a chemical strongly associated with volcanic activity on Earth, that will be a pretty sure sign that we are dealing with methane that has come from the ground and is a byproduct of geological processes.”

ExoMars is expected to arrive at the Red Planet on 19 October after a journey of 496m km across space, and will be followed by a second ExoMars mission, a Mars rover, scheduled for launch in 2018. — © Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2016

Go champ scores surprise victory over Google AI

A South Korean Go grandmaster on Sunday scored his first win over a Google-developed supercomputer, in a surprise victory after three humiliating defeats in a high-profile showdown between man and machine.

Lee Se-dol thrashed AlphaGo after a nail-biting match that lasted for nearly five hours — the fourth of the best-of-five series in which the computer clinched a 3-0 victory on Saturday.

Lee struggled in the early phase of the fourth match but gained a lead towards the end, eventually prompting AlphaGo to resign.

The 33-year-old is one of the greatest players in modern history of the ancient board game, with 18 international titles to his name — the second most in the world. “I couldn’t be happier today...this victory is priceless. I wouldn’t trade it for the world,” a smiling Lee said after the match to cheers and applause from the audience.

“I can’t say I wasn’t hurt by the past three defeats...but I still enjoyed every moment of playing so it really didn’t damage me greatly,” he said.

Lee earlier predicted a landslide victory over Artificial Intelligence (AI) but was later forced to concede that the AlphaGo was “too strong.”

Lee had vowed to try his best to win at least one game after his second defeat. Described as the “match of the century” by local media, the game was closely watched by tens of millions of Go fans mostly in East Asia as well as AI scientists.

The most famous AI victory to date came in 1997, when the IBM-developed supercomputer Deep Blue beat the then-world class chess champion Garry Kasparov.

But Go, played for centuries mostly in Korea, Japan and China, had long remained the holy grail for AI developers due to its complexity and near-infinite number of potential configurations.

Demis Hassabis, the head of the AlphaGo developer Google DeepMind, has described Go as the “Mount Everest” for AI scientists.

“Lee Se-dol was an incredible player and was too strong for AlphaGo,” Hassabis said after Sunday’s match.

“It was doing well...but then, because of Lee’s fantastic play, it was pressurised into some mistakes,” he said, describing the loss as a “valuable” way to fix the problems with the supercomputer.

“Actually we are very happy because this is why we came here, to test AlphaGo and its limit and find out what its weaknesses were,” he said.

Lee said those weaknesses included a difficulty in responding to certain unexpected plays by an opponent, which led to more mistakes.

Go involves two players alternately laying black and white stones on a chequerboard-like grid of 19 lines by 19 lines. The winner is the player who manages to seal off more territory.

On the 78th move, Lee placed a stone unexpectedly in the middle section of the board, stunning many experts and confusing the AlphaGo.

Hassabis later tweeted that the AlphaGo made a “mistake” on the following 79th move and only realised it several moves later. AlphaGo uses two sets of “deep neural networks” that allow it to crunch data in a more human-like fashion — dumping millions of potential moves that human players would instinctively know were pointless. — AFP

Source:- The Hindu, 14-Mar-2016

Govt. hopes to pass Bankruptcy, GST Bills

The National Democratic Alliance government hopes to press the accelerator on reforms and pass the landmark Constitution (122nd Amendment) Bill for a national Goods and Services Tax (GST) and a separate Bill for Bankruptcy and Insolvency Code, 2015, in the second half of the Budget session beginning April 20, Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said on Sunday.

The current session of Parliament has already seen the passage of one landmark legislation two days ago, Mr. Jaitley said, referring to the Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and other Subsidies and Services) Bill, 2016.

The legislation meant to provide statutory backing to the unique identification number was passed last week.

“I do hope to see another two being passed in the second part of the session with regard to the bankruptcy and insolvency laws and GST,” he said, addressing the Advancing Asia Conference.

The passage of the GST and the bankruptcy and insolvency laws, he said, would give a major fillip to India’s reforms process.

Data that may be helpful:

Important Points:

• The Goods and Services Tax Bill or GST Bill, officially known as The Constitution (One Hundred and Twenty-Second Amendment) Bill, 2014, proposes a national Value added Tax to be implemented in India from June 2016. "Goods and Services Tax" would be a comprehensive indirect tax on manufacture, sale and consumption of goods and services throughout India, to replace taxes levied by the Central and State governments. Goods and services tax would be levied and collected at each stage of sale or purchase of goods or services based on the input tax credit method.

 Source:- The Hindu,  14-Mar-2016

Bravery award for Richa Singh

Allahabad student leader Richa Singh, whose ordeal was raised in Parliament on Tuesday, received support both from the ruling Samajwadi Party government and the Opposition Bahujan Samaj Party in Uttar Pradesh.

In a last minute decision, the Akhilesh Yadav government included Ms. Singh’s name in the list of women to be conferred the Rani Laxmi Bai bravery award on International Women’s Day. Her name was not in the original list and she was surprised to receive a call from the government on the eve of the ceremony.

The award was presented to her by Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav in Lucknow on Tuesday. “He has assured me his full support. I also received assurances from the SP. In this fight against saffronisation of educational institutions and harassment of a woman student leader, we are reaching out to all parties,” Ms. Singh told The Hindu .

BSP chief Mayawati also extended support to the student leader, who has complained of harassment at the hands of the Allahabad University administration and the ABVP. She said the SP government and the university had not learnt any “lesson” from the death of Dalit scholar Rohith Vemula.

The BSP chief said the first woman president of the Allahabad University Students’ Union since Independence must be provided with adequate security by the State government. She called Ms. Singh a victim of oppression. “Her only crime was that she opposed the entry of Yogi Adityanath, who is known for vitiating the atmosphere with his communal speeches, into the campus.

Ms. Singh has also been in the limelight for taking on the ABVP and raising issues of gender insensitivity. She now faces the prospect of having her admission cancelled and a case against her election is pending in the Allahabad High Court. Ms. Singh has said the administration was targeting her to “settle scores.”

Source:- The Hindu, 09-Feb-2016

Foreign Secretaries to meet first in Kathmandu rather than Islamabad?

The Foreign Secretaries of India and Pakistan may meet for the first time after the Pathankot attack in Kathmandu, instead of Islamabad, official sources suggested on Wednesday.

The meeting, put off from January 14 this year, is yet to be rescheduled. Officials say it is unlikely to be scheduled in the next week. As a result, S. Jaishankar and his Pakistani counterpart could meet, for the first time, at the SAARC meeting for senior officials on March 15.

Calling reports of a proposed meeting in Islamabad “all in the realm of speculation,” a senior official told The Hindu that the Foreign Secretary was expected to attend the SAARC standing committee meeting, while External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj would attend the SAARC Council of Ministers meeting on March 17, where she is expected to meet Pakistan Foreign Affairs Adviser Sartaj Aziz. However, officials said no bilateral meeting was scheduled yet.

The status of the talks was discussed by India’s new High Commissioner to Pakistan Gautam Bhambawale and Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif on Wednesday.

Data that may be helpful:

Important Points:

• The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is an economic and geopolitical organisation of eight countries that are primarily located in South Asia or the Indian subcontinent.^[4] The SAARC Secretariat is based in Kathmandu, Nepal.
• Pakistan will host the 19th summit of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) in Islamabad in 2016. 
• The 18th SAARC Summit was held at the Nepalese capital Kathmandu from November 26 to November 27, 2014 and was attended by the prime ministers of Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Pakistan, the presidents of the Afghanistan, Maldives and Sri Lanka. The motto was ‘Deeper Integration for Peace and Prosperity’

Source:- The Hindu,  25-Feb-2016

Massachusetts plans rattlesnake colony on uninhabited island

In this Sept. 2008 handout file photograph from the Mass. Div. of Wildlife and Fisheries, a timber rattlesnake slithers across a flat rock in Western Massachusetts. A plan by the state to start a colony of venomous timber rattlesnakes on an off-limits island in Massachusetts’ largest drinking water supply is under fire.

The state Department of Fisheries and Wildlife has offered assurances that a small island full of rattlesnakes would pose no threat.

The US state of Massachusetts is planning to set up a colony of venomous rattlesnakes on an uninhabited island, sparking fears that the dangerous serpents could escape and attack people.

The Department of Fisheries and Wildlife wants to make a Quabbin Reservoir island home to the venomous timber rattlesnake, which is indigenous to the state.

Governor Charlie Baker is on board for using the unpopulated island for that purpose. He calls the project

“fairly short money” at a few hundred thousand dollars, and said he thinks it is important to preserve indigenous species.

“By creating a colony on an island like that, they are far less likely to run into people who are on the trails and working their way around Quabbin reservoir than they would be if we did nothing,” Mr. Baker was quoted as saying by CBS News.

He downplayed safety concerns among locals, some of whom are worried the snakes could get off the island and attack people in the area.

“If they swim off the island, first of all, it’s a long way from the islands being discussed to get to shoreline anyway. And secondly, if they do, their likelihood of survival is pretty small,” Mr. Baker said.

The state’s plan to revive a native endangered species on a remote island, however, does sound like a horror movie —— breed and raise 150 venomous timber rattlesnakes until they are good and strong, then turn them loose on protected land in the middle of the Quabbin Reservoir.

“Well, they [the snakes] swim,” Peter Mallett, president of the Millers River Fishermen’s Association, who opposes the plan, was quoted as saying by the Boston Globe.

The state Department of Fisheries and Wildlife has offered assurances that a small island full of rattlesnakes would pose no threat.

Any that escape the island will die during the following winter, unable to make it back to their nest, said Tom French, assistant director of the department.

And in reality, rattlesnakes are shy creatures which bite people only when threatened, he said.

“People are afraid that we’re going to put snakes in a place of public use and that they are going to breed like rabbits and spread over the countryside and kill everybody,” he said while representing the state at a public meeting Tuesday to address the concerns.

Timber rattlesnakes once slithered through forests and feasted on mice and chipmunks all over Massachusetts. But deforestation over the last two centuries left little habitat that allowed for their deep underground nests in winter.

Today, only a few isolated populations remain in the Blue Hills, the Connecticut River valley, and Berkshire County.

Keywords: Snakes island, Massachusetts, rattlesnake colony, on uninhabited island

Source: the hindu

Defeat of the Left in JNU

A number of students and teachers feel that the Left parties should have challenged the BJP govt

As the arrest of Kanhaiya Kumar, a 28-year-old student leader at Jawaharlal Nehru University, mobilised a massive crowd of demonstrators on the streets of Delhi on Wednesday, the left parties construed it as a victory against the BJP government. But back in the campus, there is a sense of resentment brewing against the leaders of left-leaning politics. Several teachers and students at JNU feel the right-wing political forces have “bullied” the left front to accept its narrative of nationalism.

A significant number of students and teachers feel that instead of resisting Kumar’s arrest, the left-parties should have challenged the BJP government over the root of the controversy — the anti-India sloganeering chanted at a commemorative meeting to protest the hanging of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru that became the basis of the police crackdown on the campus.

Ever since Guru was executed in 2013, the students said that the left-leaning groups have hosted several events to debate legal, political and sociological grounds of his hanging. “A large section of the left-leaning students still doubts his guilt in the parliament attack. Their views are quite similar to Arundhati Roy’s and Nandita Haksar’s who have publicly questioned the hanging,” said a student.

“There has been radical slogan chanting in the past as well, but the university administration never intervened because they knew that it’s nothing more than a campus idealism, a JNU utopia, where everyone dreams about the revolution,” the student added.

The student community is troubled to see All India Students Federation (AISF) having put up posters across the campus with a message —“Kanhaiya Kumar who stood up against anti-nationals has been arrested for sedition while real anti-national elements are scot free.”

Does that mean, says a history professor at JNU, that the other accused in the controversy, including Umar Khalid, against whom the media ran a malicious campaign, are the ones who should be arrested?

“It was a crowd,” said the professor. “The crowd doesn’t have any authority. If you ask me who had the authority in that situation, I would say Kanhaiya had the authority to tell the cops to arrest the slogan chanting people right there. But he did not do that because it was JNU as usual. He, in fact, used the same platform and gave a strong speech against the Modi government.”

The professor said that it’s a “flawed reasoning” to demand Kumar’s release and approve the arrests of whoever the State finds guilty in the same breath. Instead, he said, the left-leaning and all the “sane people” should pressure the government to drop sedition charges against all the six students, who have been “forced” to be on the run.

“Unless we speak on behalf all the students, it’s a moral victory for the rightwing ideologues,” the professor said. “Otherwise, the BJP government is going to frame our bright students to shove its version of nationalism down our throats.”

The government and a dominant section of news channels may have mobilised a negative opinion against Jawaharlal Nehru University, its student leader Kanhaiya Kumar and his companions, particularly, Umar Khalid, against whom source-based news reports keep pouring in, either accusing him of having links with Jaish-e-Muhammad or establishing his contact with Kashmiris by digging up the phone calls he has made to the valley and make him suspicious, but inside the JNU, students are well aware about the back story that has brought the campus in loggerheads with the State.

Since they are aware of the context, they feel the left parties have led them down.

For them, the anti-India sloganeering was a “knee jerk” reaction to the “life threatening” slogans that were chanted by the students of Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP).

As per several students who’d witnessed the controversial event for Guru, the trouble began when ABVP activists encircled the members of the meeting and chanted slogans such as — “Maa khoon sey tilak karo, gooliyon sey aarti.”

On the other end, a student said, the meeting went on with its members displaying artwork and reading the poetic verses of Agha Shahid Ali, a Kashmiri-American poet whose work is largely inspired by the events of the 1990s, when armed insurgency was at its peak in the valley. “One performance artist walked in circles with a black shawl wrapped around his body to suggest Guru’s hanging was a travesty of justice,” the student said. “It was unsettling but I guess art does that you. I don’t know why people should go to jail for that.”

Jat stir: situation remains tense in Haryana

Buses set on fire as the Jat agitation for reservation intensifies in Sonipat on Saturday

Haryana government has sought additional companies of CRPF and more columns of Army to be deployed in the state.

Situation on Sunday continued to remain tense in several parts of Haryana, which was hit by Jat quota stir after it turned violent even as security personnel staged flag marches in affected areas.

Despite various political leaders including Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar appealing protesting Jats to maintain calm and peace, the incidents of violence and arson continued during the night in various parts of the state, crippling the normal life in worst affected places like Rohtak, Jind, Bhiwani, Jhajjar, Sonipat, Hisar.

Protesters on Saturday night set on fire an ATM of a bank and burnt official records of a cooperative bank in Loharu of Bhiwani district.

As violence and arson spread to several parts of Haryana state, the Haryana government has sought additional companies of Central Reserve Police Force and more columns of Army to be deployed in the state to control the ongoing agitation in the state.

As many as 15 companies of India Reserve Battalion and Haryana Armed Police, three companies of paramilitary forces and two columns of Army have already been deployed.

So far six persons have been killed in firing by security personnel “to quell arson and firing” by the protesters while 154 First Information Reports have been registered.

As Haryana remained on the boil, curfew had been clamped in Rohtak, Bhiwani , Jhajjar, Jind, Hisar, Hansi, Sonipat , Gohana towns of Sonipat district.

The road and rail traffic through Haryana and destined to neighboring states, including Delhi, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan and Chandigarh remained disrupted with authorities cancelling bus and train services on most routes in the wake of continuing blockade.

The Jat stir has severely hit the movement of more than 800 trains, and seven stations including in the state were set on fire by the agitators.

Jhajjar, Buddha Khera, Julana and Pillu Kheda were among the seven stations which were set afire.

The country’s largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki India suspended operations at its two plants in Gurgaon and Manesar as component supplies have been hit by the agitation of Jats demanding job reservation.

Appealing to protesters to end their stir, Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar on Saturday asked agitators to “return to their homes as the Government has accepted their demands”, but did not elaborate.

But several Jat leaders refused to call off the pro-quota agitation unless the government promulgated an ordinance to include the community in the OBC category.

The Jat stir has severely hit the movement of more than 800 trains, and seven stations were set on fire by the agitators.

Jhajjar, Buddha Khera, Julana and Pillu Kheda were among the seven stations which were set afire.

The country’s largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki India suspended operations at its two plants in Gurgaon and Manesar as component supplies have been hit by the agitation of Jats demanding job reservation.

Appealing to protesters to end their stir, Mr. Khattar had on Saturday asked the agitators to “return to their homes as the Government has accepted their demands”.

But several Jat leaders refused to call off the pro-quota agitation unless the government promulgated an ordinance to include the community in the OBC category. 

source: the hindu

Keywords: Jat quota stir, Jat stir, Haryana situation, OBC category, Jat leaders, CRPF, Jat protestors

So Einstein was right after all, and here’s why

The gravitational wave detected on September 14, 2015 was due to tyhe merger of two black holes of mass 36 and 29 times the mass of our Sun.

The chirp attests dispersionless nature of gravity waves

After the much-discussed, many-author paper in Physical Review Lettersrevealed the detection of a gravitational wave (denoted GW150914), the LIGO Scientific Collaboration is submitting another paper on how the characteristics of the signal detected vouch for Einstein’s general theory of relativity.

The gravitational wave detected on September 14, 2015 was due to the merger of two black holes of mass 36 and 29 times the mass of our Sun. According to Newtonian dynamics, if the black holes had been orbiting around each other, they would have been in a circular or an elliptical orbit. Einstein however said that they would spiral inwards towards each other (the inspiral phases) and when they came close would lock in a circular orbit, where, in a jiffy, they would merge (merger and ringdown phase). The energy lost in this process would be emitted as gravitational waves which bore the signature of the inspiral, merger and ringdown stages.

There have been many tests of General Theory of Relativity at low speeds, that is, in the order of 0.001 times the speed of light. The specialty of GW150914 was that it was emitted due to a high-speed event, the black hole merger described above.

Here are a few of the ways in which it was shown that the equations of General Theory of Relativity stood the test at the high speeds: first, the spin and mass of the merged entity, as predicted by the part of the signal representing the inspiral phase, matched with what was calculated using the part of the signal representing the merger and ringdown phases.

Second, during the inspiral phase, when the black holes are far apart, they are moving at about 0.1-0.4 times the speed of light. This is, relatively speaking, a low speed, and the system may be treated as a perturbation, or correction, to the Newtonian description. In Newton’s theory, the black holes are just orbiting each other in a circular or elliptical orbit and there is no energy lost by way of gravitational waves which causes them to spiral towards each other (fall inwards).

In other words, the black hole pair can be described by an equation of motion based on Newtonian dynamics with appropriate correction terms which come in at higher orders. Using this approach, when one calculates the so-called post-Newtonian coefficients, they are found to match with what has been inferred from the experimentally detected signal.

Lastly, according to the General Theory of Relativity, gravitational waves must be “dispersionless” that is, the field particle associated with gravity, the graviton, must have a zero mass. This means different wavelength components of the wave would travel at the same speed. This was also verified by the form of the wave. ‘The famous “chirp” that was heard attests the dispersionless character of the component waves. Dispersion will introduce a characteristic change in the shape of the observed signal. If they had had a strong dispersion, what would have been heard is an “inverted chirp”’, says Dr. P. Ajith of the International Centre for Theoretical Sciences, Bengaluru.

Keywords: LIGO, Physical Review Letters

Committed to provide stability: New Arunachal CM

Itanagar, Feb 20:  "We are committed to providing stability," said new Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Kalikho Pul after a combined Congress-BJP government was sworn in late on Friday following 24 days of president's rule. The step comes after the Supreme Court on Thursday cleared the decks for the revocation of president's rule in the state as it vacated its order of maintaining status quo passed on Wednesday.

The central government had on Wednesday recommended that president's rule be lifted from the state. The decision was, however, held back in the wake of the apex court's status quo order. "We are committed to providing stability and working for the overall development of Arunachal Pradesh with utmost sincerity," Pul told IANS after being sworn in as the ninth chief minister. Governor J.P. Rajkhowa administered the oath of office and secrecy to the 47-year-old Pul at a ceremony at the Raj Bhavan, marking the historic coalition government involving the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The BJP, which has 11 members in the 60-member House Arunachal assembly, is extending outside support to Pul. Two Independent legislators are also supporting the 19 rebel Congress legislators. But sources close to the rebel Congress camp claimed that nine Tuki's loyalists are also set to shift their allegiance to Pul. While former chief minister Mukut Mithi, also a Rajya Sabha member from Arunachal, was present in the ceremony, Nabam Tuki and his loyalists skipped the event. However, Congress general secretary in-charge V. Narayanasamy described the formation of the new government as "highly illegal" and "unconstitutional" since Pul had not been elected as leader of the Congress Legislature Party. "This political development in Arunachal Pradesh has proven that the BJP government was involved in destabilising the Congress government which has the mandate of the people," the veteran Congress leader told IANS. "The Congress cannot take the support of the BJP in forming a government. We don't subscribe to the BJP's ideology and therefore, the new government cannot be a Congress government," he said. However, Pasang Dorjee Sona, one of the 19 rebel Congress legislators, held Narayanasamy responsible for the political mess in the state. "It was Congress leader Narayanasamy, in-charge of party affairs in the state, who is responsible for the political mess in the state. He never allowed us to meet and share our grievances with Congress president and vice-president," Pasang told IANS. "We have to work with the BJP in the interest of the people of the state and governance has nothing to do with political ideology. Good governance and the development of the state come first," Pasang said. Arunachal Pradesh BJP President Tai Tagak told IANS: "We have been playing a constructive role in the opposition and our duty is to protect the interest of the people and development of the state. "We are extending outside support to the rebel Congress since we wanted a popular government to be in place and to serve our people and to ensure development." The BJP leader also blamed the Congress leaders in New Delhi for the political mess that forced the central government to enforced the president's rule in the state. "It is their own legislators who have revolted against Tuki for his FINANCIALmismanagement and corruption. They (congress leaders) should have resolved their internal problem but when the situation goes out of their hand how can they blamed the BJP for it," Tagak said

IANS

Source: India One

Multiple videos of Kanhaiya Kumar raising incendiary slogans unspool a mystery

As it emerged that a video showing Jawaharlal Nehru University Student Union president Kanhaiya Kumar raising incendiary slogans was allegedly a doctored one, larger questions are being asked of television channels and their decision to broadcast it without verifying the content.

At last count, four videos are in circulation. The News Broadcasting Authority of India, headed by retired judge K.T. Raveendran, says its members would look into the matter and if necessary, take action.

An FIR registered by the Delhi Police on February 11 says the Zee News channel broadcast a video on February 10 showing some JNU students raising anti-India and pro-Pakistan slogans. However, the FIR nowhere mentions Kanhaiya’s involvement. Later, the Delhi Police, in a status report to the Home Ministry, accused the activists of the Democratic Students’ Front, the All India Students’ Federation, of which Kanhaiya is a member, the Students’ Federation of India and the All India Students Union of being part of the gathering where seditious slogans were raised.

A week later, on February 17, in another channel, BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra showed a video playing on his iPad, as proof of anti-India slogans raised on the JNU campus.

Three more channels aired the video.

Times Now clarified that it had aired the video and Mr. Patra’s claim and had added caveats about the need for verifying the contents of the video. “Arnab Goswami [anchor] is heard telling Sambit that the video needs to be verified,” channel sources said.

The emergence of a new video clip on Thursday morning on some news channels challenged the authenticity of one aired on February 10.

Keywords: JNU, Kanhaiya Kumar

Source: The hindu 

Supreme Court vacates status quo in Arunachal

The Supreme Court on Thursday vacated its order to maintain status quo in crisis-ridden Arunachal Pradesh, which may pave the way for government formation by rebel Congress MLAs with the support of BJP lawmakers.

Referring to the Gauhati High Court order staying the disqualification of 14 rebel MLAs, a five-judge Constitution Bench headed by Justice J.S. Khehar said, “It does not call for any interference.”

The Bench, which also perused the records summoned from Gauhati High Court pertaining to disqualification of the rebel legislators, said it was “prima facie” satisfied with the High Court order and not inclined to interfere with it.

“Prima facie we are not inclined to interfere with the High Court order, we are satisfied with it. Having seen the original records which are put before us by the Registrar-General of the Gauhati High Court, the order of January 7 calls for no interference at this stage.”

“Accordingly, the ad-interim order passed is vacated,” the Bench also comprising Justices Dipak Misra, M.B. Lokur, P.C. Ghose and N.V. Ramana said.

Senior Advocate Fali S Nariman opposed the order and said until the Gauhati High Court decided the matter, some conditions might be imposed.

Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi opposed the contention of Mr. Nariman and said the matter was settled and no conditions should be imposed.

Mr. Nariman opposed his presence in the matter and asked “what is Union government doing in this case.”

To this, Mr. Rohatgi said “I will explain everything. I am here because the injunction had come in between the revocation of President’s rule in the State.”

The Bench then said the injunction of status quo was consciously passed by it to prevent the situation from going out of hand till it was satisfied by the facts of the case.

The Bench also transferred the case regarding disqualification of the 14 rebel MLAs from the single judge to the Division Bench of the High Court and asked it to expeditiously decide the matter within two weeks. — PTI

Source:- The Hindu, 19-Feb-2016

Website issues plague Ringing Bells' Rs 251 Freedom 251 smartphone launch

New Delhi: On Wednesday, Indian Telecom company Ringing Bells launched its new smartphone - Freedom 251 - which is touted as the world's cheapest phone with a price of just Rs 251.

Other than its iPhone-like similarities nothing seems to be well with the ridiculously inexpensive smartphone.

Although the company says that the phone's delivery will be completed four months later - by June 30, 2016 - the pre-booking, in this case, is still inaccessible to users.

The phone can be booked online through a dedicated website freedom251.com by Ringing Bells between 6 am and 8 pm from February 18 to February 21. Upon clicking the 'Buy Now' option on the homepage, the site asks users to fill in the quantity and give out the shipping address and other related details. The company is charging Rs 40 per unit for shipping the device taking the total cost to Rs 291.

However, once the user fills in the details and hits 'Pay Now', the site redirects the user to the same buy now page with blank columns for shipping address or a completely blank page.

Although the company says that the phone's delivery will be completed four months later - by June 30, 2016 - the pre-booking, in this case, is still inaccessible to users.

Prior to the launch of the Rs 251 smartphone, the mobile industry body ICA expressed serious concerns over the launch of the smartphone and have written to Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad to get into depth of the issue, saying the rate could not be below Rs 3,500 even after a subsidised sale.

The phone comes with a 4-inch WVGA (480x800) IPS display, 3.2 megapixel auto-focus rear camera, 0.3 megapixel front camera, 1.3 GHz quad-core processor, 1 GB RAM, 8 GB of internal storage with SD card support, 1450 mAh battery, and Android 5.1 Lollipop OS.

To book your phone : http://freedom251.com

Sedition charge against Kanhaiya Kumar may be dropped

Police do not have evidence to back their claim that the JNU student leader was shouting anti-national slogans, says a senior official.

A lawyer, who supported the JNU student leader Kanhaiya Kumar, is being attacked by other lawyers outside a Delhi court on Wednesday.

A senior Home Ministry official indicated on Wednesday that the Delhi Police may have to drop the sedition charges against Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union president Kanhaiya Kumar because they did not have evidence to back their claim that he was shouting anti-national slogans.

Though Delhi Police Commissioner B.S Bassi claimed they did have enough evidence, the Home Ministry official said the Delhi Police had once again written to television channels seeking raw footage of the event on February 9.

“There is some video footage available with the police, but the audio component is missing. It is not clear whether Kanhaiya actually shouted anti-national slogans. If there is no evidence, then the Delhi Police will have to drop the sedition charge when the charge sheet is filed,” the official said.

According to officials, the video footage of the event was made available to news channels by certain students.

Only a couple of TV channels were present at the event.

The FIR filed by the Delhi Police says a police team was present when two groups of students were leading a march at the JNU. According to the standard operating procedure, it is mandatory for the police to record any protest or gathering where they perceive trouble.

The official said the metropolitan magistrate did not have the power to grant bail in cases of sedition. If Kanhaiya wants to apply for bail, his lawyer would have to approach the sessions court.

Jadavpur varsity incident

Union Home Secretary Rajiv Mehrishi said on Wednesday that a report had been sought from the West Bengal government after a similar incident was reported at Jadavpur University in Kolkata.

On Wednesday’s violence at the Patiala House Courts, Mr. Mehrishi said action would be taken against anyone violating the law.

“I have spoken to the Delhi Police Commissioner and asked him to send a detailed report today itself,” he said.

As for the attack on media persons on Monday, Mr. Mehrishi said an investigation was on and two FIRs had been registered.

Source: The Hindu

Keywords: JNU, Sedition, Kanhaiya Kumar

Swift’s 1989 reigns at 2016 Grammys

The 58th annual Grammy Awards on Monday celebrated a young generation of chart-dominating pop stars, with Taylor Swift winning album of the year for “1989” and Kendrick Lamar sweeping the rap categories, even as the show devoted much of its airtime to lionizing musical heroes of decades past.

Although Swift had been nominated for all of the most prestigious categories, the top awards were split fairly evenly among a crop of young stars. Mark Ronson won record of the year for “Uptown Funk,” the upbeat, retro dance song featuring Bruno Mars that dominated radio last year and that they played at the Super Bowl. Ed Sheeran, the cherubic British singer-songwriter, won song of the year for his soul-inflected ballad “Thinking Out Loud,” sharing the prize with his co-writer, Amy Wadge.

And Kendrick Lamar, the rapper whose complex songs about black identity and racial strife have dazzled critics and become touchstones of the Black Lives Matter movement, took a total of five prizes and delivered a confrontational medley of his songs “The Blacker the Berry” and “Alright.”

Accepting her trophy for album of the year, Swift said she was the first woman to win the prize twice and made a statement that was a firm affirmation of her own celebrity, as well as what many viewers interpreted as a response to Kanye West, who recently released lyrics referencing their on-and-off feud.

“All the young women out there,” she said, “there are going to be people along the way who will try to undercut your success or take credit for your accomplishments or your fame.” “If you just focus on the work,” Swift continued, “and don’t let those people sidetrack you, someday you will get where you are going. You’ll look around, and you will know that it was you and the people who love you who put you there, and that will be the greatest feeling in the world.”

Source:- The Hindu, 17-Feb-2016

8.8% interest proposed on EPF

Even as the Finance Ministry decided to pare interest rates on several small savings schemes to foster a lower interest rate regime, the board of trustees of the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation (EPFO) on Tuesday recommended an 8.80 per cent rate of return on Rs.10 lakh crore of retirement savings under its watch for 2015-16.

Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya who announced the decision on Tuesday after a meeting of the EPFO board in Chennai, however, said this rate was meant as “interim relief” for workers and the board would meet again later to discuss the possibility of a further interest rate hike.

Trade unions not happy

Although the rate for this year is a notch higher than the 8.75 per cent paid out in 2014-15, trade unions were disappointed as the Finance and Investment panel of the EPFO board had earlier recommended a higher interest of 8.95 per cent on EPF savings.

The EPFO had earlier proposed 8.90 per cent as rate of interest to the Labour Ministry and suggested taking an in-principle approval from the Finance Ministry.

However, the Finance Ministry that has decided to moderate the returns on small savings instruments from April 1, 2016, wanted the EPF rate to fall in tandem. The EPFO Board’s proposal would be vetted and ratified by the Finance Ministry, so it could still overrule the 8.80 per cent rate recommendation.

“We had last time given 8.75 per cent and this time, seeing the situation, we are declaring 8.8 per cent for the workers,” he told reporters after the meeting. There are as many as 8.5 crore EPF accounts.

“We have strongly protested the move to declare the rate of interest at 8.80 per cent in the board meeting today. The Board’s Financial and Investment panel had recommended 8.95 per cent interest that would have left a surplus of Rs. 91 crore,” said Prabhakar Banasure, a member of the Financial, Investment and Audit Committee (FIAC) of the EPFO who was present in the board meeting.

“This is unacceptable. In the past, the Board always adopted the recommendations of the FIAC. We asked the Minister to wait for the audit of the 2015-16 balance sheet before declaring the interest rates. However, he didn’t agree,” he added.

Data that may be helpful:

Important Points:

•  The Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (abbreviated to EPFO), is a statutory body of the Government of India under the Ministry of Labour and Employment. It administers a compulsory contributory Provident Fund Scheme, Pension Scheme and an Insurance Scheme

Source:- The Hindu, 17-Feb-2016

SC asks RBI to give list of defaulters of over Rs. 500 cr.

The Supreme Court today directed the RBI to provide a list of companies, which had defaulted bank loans of over Rs. 500 crore while expressing serious concern over the rise in bad loans.

A bench headed by Chief Justice T.S. Thakur asked for the list of loan defaulters to be placed before it in a sealed cover within six weeks.

The bench, also comprising Justices U.U. Lalit and R. Banumathi, wanted to know how the state-owned banks and financial institutions were advancing large-scale loans without proper guidelines and whether there was adequate mechanism to recover them.

The court made RBI party to a PIL filed in 2005 by an NGO Centre for Public Interest Litigation, in which it has raised the issue of loans advanced to some companies by state-owned HUDCO.

Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for CPIL, submitted that about Rs. 40,000 crore of corporate debt was written off in 2015.

His submission evoked response from the bench which said that bad debts were plaguing the public sector banks. — PTI

Source:- the Hindu, 17-Feb-2016