Revision as of 15:05, 6 March 2014

Mobility of people

Sprightly Kerala

Mahesh Vyas

Financial Times Mar 06 2014

Summary: Kerala state outranks others when it comes to mobility of people

Air travel mobility

Delhi is the most mobile state in the country. Its Indira Gandhi International airport is the busiest in the country with a traffic of 34 million passengers in 2012-13. Mumbai comes next with a traffic of 30 million passengers. The rest don't even have half this traffic. Delhi also has the highest teledensity—91%, according to the Census 2011 data.

An appropriate measure of the air travel mobility of a region would be the number of air passengers per million population. However, the available statistics need to be used with some caveats as the mobility could be of outsiders into the region as tourists rather than the local population being mobile. For example, Andaman & Nicobar has a mobility of 1.3 million per million population and Goa has an even better 1.9 million air passengers per million population. The natives of the island would probably not be amused and the Goans may raise a toast to the business prospects of this traffic. But, both are not as mobile as the data suggests. At least not as mobile as is evident at international airports.

Typically, at a Western international airport, one sees people from West Bengal, Gujarat, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. Bengalis and Gujaratis are probably the most tourism-oriented people among us.

People from the South are more likely to be found as professionals working overseas, or their families visiting them. But, if you find an Indian gawking at the Colosseum in Rome, tiptoeing along aisles of the Louvre or screaming down those crazy rides in Disney World, she is likely to be a Bengali or a Gujarati.

Our air travel infrastructure seems to be favouring our business interests rather than our outbound tourists. It is possible that the Bengalis and Gujaratis travel from Delhi and Mumbai than from their respective states. Air passengers from West Bengal were 118,000 per million population and those from Gujarat were 85,000 per million population. In comparison, Maharashtra had a traffic of 304,000 per million population and Kerala was 285,000 per million. Even Jammu & Kashmir, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka had higher air passenger traffic compared to those from West Bengal and Gujarat.

If one were to somehow rank all states using a summary measure of the mobility of people, the southern states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala would be close contenders for the top slots. Delhi would be high up, too. But then, Delhi is a small state.

Kerala's rail and road density is among the top-three state-wise figures in the country. Its air passenger traffic, at 285,000 per million population, is more than twice the all-India average of 130,000. It ranks sixth out of 23 states and union territories for which such data is available in this respect, but, the five that rank higher than Kerala include Andaman & Nicobar Islands, the city-states of Goa, Delhi and Chandigarh. The only large state that beats Kerala is therefore Maharashtra, that too because of Mumbai.

Kerala has a teledensity of 96%. This is much higher than the all-India figure of 73%. The state ranks fifth in teledensity. Kerala's high ranks in rail and road density, in air traffic and in teledensity makes it the contender for the most mobile state in the country. This statistical nugget sits well with the image of the hardworking, global Malayali who decides to hang her boots in God's Own Country, but possibly keeps working her phone. Its not an idle connection with the average Malayali in Kerala. The state ranks third among all states in terms of average revenue per user.

Tamil Nadu ranks second in terms of teledensity after Delhi. So, among the large states, Tamil Nadu is the top ranker in terms of teledensity. The good quality of its roads offsets partly its not-so-impressive surface transport density. And, its air traffic is also quite impressive at 227,000 per million population compared to the all-India average of 130,000 per million population.

Both these southern states fare much better on mobility statistics compared to the more famous Gujarat or the more touristy Gujarat and West Bengal. Gujarat's passenger air traffic, at 85,000 per million population, is lower than the all-India average, and it is ranked 14th in the list of 23 big states. West Bengal ranks 12th. Gujarat ranks 8th in a list of 18 states in teledensity, while West Bengal ranks 12th, again.

Inter-state comparisons are often dicey. And, comparing mobility across states is a complicated affair. Different modes of transport compete, terrains differ and mere mobility may also be a reflection of poor spatial planning. Independent of how the states stack up on these rankings, there is no doubt that there has been an all-round improvement in transport facilities and therefore of the mobility of Indians. But, this is far from enough to improve the quality of life.

Perhaps, there is one facility for mobility that greatly reflects the quality of public infrastructure and even the quality of life in a city better than anything else. This is the length of sidewalks in a city. We have a new facility in the urban maze of some cities—the skywalk! I find these to be ugly, clunky structures that only further mar the breathing spaces, adding to the space for screaming hoardings in a city. But, that is a different issue. What is pertinent is that it is difficult to find sidewalks in most cities. It is challenging to cross a street unless you are willing to be a nonchalant jaywalker, ears plugged firmly into your mobile phone, scowling menacingly at any vehicle that dares to cross your path and disturb your musical escapade. Mobility has moved far ahead of civility. Good sidewalks and other facilities for easier pedestrian mobility on streets could help correct that to some extent.

All data sourced from statesofindia.cmie.com

The author is CEO and managing director, Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy P Ltd

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MMS scandals in Filmistan

Top 5 MMS scandals in Bollywood

The Times of India

Mona Singh A name who charmed many on the small screen, Mona Singh shocked one and all with her alleged MMS which got leaked online. The actress has reportedly filed a complaint. Mona is known for her bahu image and has been a successful actress on the small screen.

Sherlyn Chopra, who thrilled one and all with her Playboy act and later with her film Kamasutra, got trapped in an MMS scandal as the video of her changing in the changing room was leaked. Sherlyn is known for her bold image and hot avatar on Twitter too.

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Manipuri film to break state barriers With dubbing & subtitles, Pal hopes to be screened across the region

KHELEN THOKCHOM

Bala Hijam in Pal

TelegraphIndia

Imphal, Oct. 16: A Manipuri feature film, Pal (Barrier), is set to weave silver screen magic across the region. Vravura Films’ debut production will storm cinemas in other states of the Northeast next year with producer Sunita K. and director Ningthouja Lancha planning to dub the film in the major languages of the region like Assamese, Nagamese, Khasi and Kokborok and subtitle it in other languages.

The shooting will start in the first week of February and the release target is in the middle of next year. “We are negotiating with film people in other states of the Northeast and if all goes well, the new film will be screened in cinemas of the Northeast,” Lancha told The Telegraph. He said Assamese singer Zubeen Garg had agreed to sing at least two songs in the film when the dubbing is done in Assamese. “Our plan is to dub the film in all major languages and subtitle it in languages of the Northeast. This is to take Manipuri films to other parts of the region,” Lancha said. Manipuri films have a limited audience as these are only confined to the state. Sunita said, “I have been outside the state for quite some time and have always thought of taking Manipuri films outside the state. I established Vravura Films with the hope of turning my dream into reality.” Pal will be shot in digital format. Manipuri cinemas have been screening only digital Manipuri films since Hindi films were banned more than a decade ago. Hall owners also stopped screening English movies as they changed the projectors from celluloid to digital. Manipur has more than 40 cinemas. Pal is a romantic film, a love triangle. It will depict the inner conflict of the protagonist, a former militant, played by well-known singer and actor Haomam Sadananda. His love interest will be played by popular Manipuri actress Hijam Bala. She will play the role of a divorcee. This is Lancha’s third directorial venture. His first feature film, Mami Sami (Blurred Shadow), 2008, got rave reviews. The film depicts the crisis in the state due to armed conflict and how it traumatises people. His second venture, Mapi Lairik, also a full-length feature film which focuses on child labour in the state, is ready for release. In 1995, Lancha had directed and edited Anadrita, a three-part documentary series in Assamese under the commissioned category of Doordarshan Kendra, Guwahati. Speaking of Pal, the director said, “This will be a new challenge for me. To connect my film with audiences of not only Manipur but also other ethnic communities of the Northeast is not an easy task.”

Indian univs second-grade? 89% Of NAAC-Accredited Institutes Are ‘Average’ Or Worse Manash Pratim Gohain TNN

The Times of India

New Delhi: If rankings and grading are any indicator of quality, Indian institutes of higher learning have a long way to go — both locally and globally. An astonishing 89% of India’s accredited colleges and universities are graded either ‘average’ or ‘below average’, raising serious doubtsabout their quality.

   While globally India’s top rated institute — Panjab University — ranks between 226 and 250, the National Assessment and Accreditation Council’s (NAAC) assessment is no better, with 62% of universities accredited rated average or below average. Moreover, the actual picture on the ground is likely to be even worse since only 179 varsities and 5,224 colleges have valid accreditation out of a total of 630 varsities and 33,000 colleges. 
   NAAC director A N Rai said, “Only 11% of our accredited institutions are ‘A’ grade, while 71% are ‘B’ grade. The remaining 18% are in the lowest ‘C’ grade. This definitely shows the quality of the institutions. But we have to consider various parameters. As most institutions are government-run, there is a serious financial and infrastructure crunch which adversely affects the assessment. But we have to appreciate the fact that despite being voluntary they came for the assessment.” 
   From this year, however, accreditation has been made mandatory and linked to funding under Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan. 
   NAAC officials, however, believe the real picture will be revealed only after these institutes which have so far shied away from accreditation are assessed. 
   “While there is no doubt that a lot needs to be done to improve the quality of our institutions, things could be even worse. Only time will tell,” said Rai. 

Kajal Agarwal topless

Is Tollywood ready to cross the Sandra line The Telegraph Samo — The Equals (directed by the actress Chandreyee Ghosh): The film is about same-sex relationships: man-man and woman-woman. This was Chandreyee’s debut as a director and led to rumours about her sexual preferences.

She responded by telling The Telegraph, ‘Well, I am single for the past two-and-a-half years. I have had very long relationships with men. But to me a woman-woman relationship is very normal. ... I won’t say I don’t believe in the concept of marriage but I am not sure if I want to get married.’

When Chandreyee decided that her first film would be about gay relationships the rumours got fuelled.

Chha-E-Chhuti (dir: Aniket Chattopadhyay): In the film Locket Chatterjee plays a lesbian TV actress.

Nil Nirjane (2003, dir: Subrata Sen)

When Nil Nirjane was made it could only give hints of lesbianism between two characters because the audience was not ready to see it in a Bengali film. In an international film they would have had no problems with the same subject.

Rii on her bisexuality:

Rii told The Telegraph, 'I am bisexual. I am in a relationship with Q [who directed Bishh] but I have fallen in love with women too. I was in love with my cousin sister. I may fall in love with a woman on a bus or a tram. Sometimes I am attracted to the way they dress, or their bindi or their sari...I want to play lesbian characters ... but nobody has offered me a role like that yet. My question is can our filmmakers show intimacy on screen beyond just a kiss?'

Indeed, most of the actresses interviewed by The Telegraph said that they would like to do lesbian roles.

Paromitar Ekdin

The Telegraph suggested that there were lesbian undertones in Paromitar Ekdin, between the mother-in-law (Aparna Sen) and her daughter-in-law (Rituparna Sengupta). Rituparna, however, did not think there were any lesbian or sexual undertones there.

Mallika Majumdar, actress

Mallika, who played a lesbian in Samo — The Equals, told The Telegraph that for her, locking lips with a female co-star is as natural as kissing a male star! She, too, had to contend with rumours about her sexual preference. She responded, 'I have many male friends and an equal number of female friends, and to them whether I’m heterosexual or homosexual doesn’t matter at all. And I don’t care what the rest of the world thinks about me.'

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Rii, film and TV actress, gets candid about her bisexuality I am bisexual. I am in a relationship with Q (who directed Bishh) but I have fallen in love with women too. I was in love with my cousin sister. I may fall in love with a woman on a bus or a tram. Sometimes I am attracted to the way they dress, or their bindi or their sari. I want to play lesbian characters because I would love to play something off-beat but nobody has offered me a role like that yet. Man-man and woman-woman relationships are as natural and proper as any other relationship. That needs to be explored. But I don’t think there’s any point in our directors trying this subject because they shy away from love scenes. If you can’t show a gay or a lesbian relationship blossom like a man-woman relationship, then what’s the point? My question is can our filmmakers show intimacy on screen beyond just a kiss? Also, I don’t think the Tollywood audience is ready for films on same-sex relationships. People are not even ready to accept nudity on screen. But when they see the same in European or Asian films, they go ‘wow!’. In the West, people are so open about it. Sandra Bullock kissed Meryl Streep and announced that they could be cast as lovers in a film!

Rituparna Sengupta On playing a lesbian character... I haven’t really thought about it. Even if a renowned director approaches me with a lesbian character, I would go through the script, understand why he wants that angle in the film and how he intends to portray the whole thing. After considering all three factors, I might give it a thought. But as of now, I don’t see myself playing a lesbian on screen. What about the lesbian undertones in Paromitar Ekdin? I don’t think there was any lesbian undertone there. It was about the bond between a mother-in-law (Aparna Sen) and a daughter-in-law. But relationships are entitled to different interpretations and some may think that there was a sexual undertone.

Subrata Sen, whose Nil Nirjane had a hint of same-sex relationship Is there more awareness on the topic in Tollywood since the Nil Nirjane days? Nil Nirjane was made in 2003 and it had only a hint of lesbianism between two characters. See, our industry does not have problems with actors and actresses who are homosexual, and it’s an open thing. We all know which stars (in Tollywood) are gay. I have never seen anybody from the industry being uncomfortable working with gay people. The problem is that people are still scared to address alternative sexuality because they are not sure if the audience is ready. Besides, where are the producers who will back such subjects? But let’s wait for Kaushik Ganguly’s Aarekti Premer Galpo (here, characters played by Rituparno Ghosh and Indraneil Sengupta are in a gay relationship).

Ananya Chatterjee Would you be comfortable playing a lesbian on screen? I am an actress and I would surely appreciate the director’s vision and my sensitivity about the character. Do you think it’s time Tollywood made films on same-sex relationships? Sexuality is a way of life. Sexual intimacy between a gay or a lesbian couple works on the same instincts as a straight couple. Gay/lesbian relationships have very sensitive dimensions and maybe we can educate the section of society that is ruthless and “insensitive” to it through films. Films need to tactfully handle this subject rather than position it as a vulgar act. Filmmakers and marketing strategies have to be different for such films.

Mallika Majumdar, who plays a lesbian in Samo — The Equals Are you comfortable playing lesbian characters? I have already played a lesbian in Samo, but the film is yet to release. I am an actress and if I’m comfortable playing a domestic help then I’m comfortable playing a gay character as well. For me, locking lips with a female co-star is as natural as kissing a male star! If I’m not able to do that, then I am not honest to my job. There’s a buzz about your sexual preference... What’s the buzz? That I am gay, a lesbian? Well, I couldn’t care less. I think nobody has the right to speculate on my sexual orientation. I have many male friends and an equal number of female friends, and to them whether I’m heterosexual or homosexual doesn’t matter at all. And I don’t care what the rest of the world thinks about me. If you really want to find out, then find the person I’m in love with! Do you feel it’s time Tollywood took up lesbian/gay relationship issues in films? Yes, why not? Isn’t cinema inspired from life? Then why should we shy away from portraying what’s happening around us? Lesbians and gays are as much a part of our society.

Lesb Rituparna Sengupta & Unnati Davara lusive pictures of the two actors Unnati Davara and Rituparna Sengupta looking happy and gay in a shoot for their next film ‘Teen Kanya’

See more of : Unnati Davara, Teen Ka

Unnati Davara (Miss India East 2010) and actress Rituparna Sengupta: ‘Teen Kanya’

Locket Chatterjee lesbian

Dola Mitra/ Outlook Hemchhaya De/ Telegraph

Swastika Mukherjee posing for a photoshoot

Paoli and Anubrata in Chatrak

Swastika Mukherjee

Locket Chatterjee in Streetlight

Simi in blackface and black bodypaint in Aranyer Din Ratri

Swastika Mukherjee If I ever go nude for a film, I would do it in such a way that people would relish it instead of loathing it. I would check whether the scene is really important, how it’s going to be shot and whether it’s going to be a part of the film and not edited out and only be seen on YouTube! Locket Chatterjee Are you game for dare-bare scenes and skin show now? I am very comfortable. I am totally inhibition-free. Locket Chatterjee, who played a lesbian actress trying to seduce a wannabe actress in Aniket Chattopadhyay’s Chha E Chhuti.

Locket Chatterjee

Actress Churni Ganguly, who earned plaudits for portraying the travails of a flat-chested woman in Shunyo E Buke (2005), stresses that intimate scenes never stand in the way when she decides about signing films. “In some cases, the physical proximity between actors has actually carried the film forward,” she says.

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[1] Story Line : Aparna (Rituparna Sengupta ), the scribe, suspects her husband of having an affair with Damini, an IPS officer (Unnati Davara ). When Aparna's husband gets kidnapped, she meets Damini and thus, begins a mesmerizing relationship between the two women. Aparna tries to question if Damini is more beautiful than her and if that drew her husband towards the other woman. This question is the trigger for her obsession for Damini that soon turns into a relationship.

Outlook ilms: bold bengal What Bimala Does Now Bengali films explore sexuality in all its purple hues, played by uninhibited actors Dola Mitra In Shukno Lanka, Gaurav Pandey’s acclaimed 2010 film that deals with the struggles of an ageing, yet junior, artiste, veteran Bengali actress Debashree Roy plays a filmmaker’s wife who is envious of his young mistress, tries to win him back, and has a scene with co-actor Sabyasachi Chakraborty that is charged with sexual tension. She acts with such eclat that audiences watching the film with their families had no reason to squirm even a whit.

Aparajita Tumi The film deals with infidelity and contemporary sexual mores Fade to 1981. “No, no, I will not do these scenes. Please don’t make me do them, Rinadi,” Debashree Roy remembers pleading with Aparna Sen when she was to shoot her first love-making scene in a bedroom at the age of 16 for Sen’s directorial debut, the award-winning 36 Chowringhee Lane. “I was extremely nervous before the shoot,” recalls Roy. The scenes between her and co-actor Dhritiman Chatterjee—whom Roy recalls meeting for the first time and thinking, “Oh my God, I have to get intimate with this complete stranger?”—were to become iconic because it was probably the first time in Bengali cinema that love-making between a man and woman was depicted, as Roy describes, “realistically, as it happens in real life”. The scene had Roy’s Nandita and Chatterjee’s Samaresh make love passionately, with the camera exploring as much the sensuality of their expressions as capturing the physicality of their movements. “I was so inhibited partly because at that time such scenes were not common at all in Bengali cinema,” says Roy.

‘Pretending sex doesn’t exist is to do injustice to a story, because then one leaves that aspect of the script incomplete.’Gaurav Pandey, Director

Thirty-one years later, they are. Almost all Bengali releases in these recent years, whether arthouse or mainstream, either have sexual content, that is, at least one love-making or intimate scene, or have themes that revolve around eroticism or sexuality. It is also refreshing that none of it looks deliberately grafted on. And unlike Debashree during 36 Chowringhee Lane, scenes depicting sexuality don’t make today’s actors cringe and plead with their directors to spare them an ordeal. Shooting a scene for Charulata 2011, which deals with the theme of a woman’s loneliness, both psychological and physical, actress Rituparna Sengupta didn’t bat an eyelid when she was asked by director Agnidev Chatterjee to get up close and personal with co-actor Dibyendu Mukherjee. Their scenes together involved pretty much the whole range of actions, right from foreplay—caressing and kissing—leading to fervent love-making, and all shot aesthetically. “Shooting such scenes do demand a great deal of enactment in which physical proximity is required. We are not only expected not to shy away from them, but we willingly don’t, because we actors know it is usually necessary for the denouement of the story,” says Rituparna matter-of-factly. So what has made this change to come about in the past few years in a cinematic tradition that otherwise had been progressive, yet prudish (many didn’t like the kissing scene in Ray’s Ghare Baire) when it came to depicting physical intimacy? “Bengali cinema has come of age,” replies Rituparna.

Shukno Lanka A story of filmdom, has a sexually charged scene Like Charulata 2011, which revolves around a woman’s quest for her own identity, linked intrinsically and unabashedly to her sexuality, many films released in the last two or three years deal with adult themes. In Bedroom, Mainak Bhoumik deals with complicated relationships; the filmmaker delineates the sexual behaviour of a set of urban individuals in Calcutta. In the movies of Rituparno Ghosh—from Dohon to Doshor—the aberrations of sexuality are integral themes, as are ‘alternate sexual identities’ the themes of his more recent films like Chitrangada. In the latter, actors Jisshu Sengupta and Rituparno himself—playing gay lovers—have intimate love-making scenes.

Antarmahal Explores sexual aggression, its links with masculinity

‘We are expected not to, and we willingly do not shy away from bold scenes, as they advance the film’s story.’Rituparna Sengupta, Actress

Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury, who won the national award for best film with Antaheen, too delves into the theme of love and sexuality with Aparajita Tumi, in which infidelity and sexuality is treated with aestheticism. “There comes a moment in the script when if you don’t place a certain scene at a specific place it would seem something is missing. It is a natural progression. Just like in life, when you have the desire to hold someone’s hand or kiss someone, you don’t need to plan it. Likewise, in cinema, love-making sequences should be spontaneous. Otherwise, they would appear unnecessary,” says Roy Chowdhury. Gaurav Pandey’s next film Hanuman.com is an exploration of virtual love. He says such themes are now an inseparable part of Bengali films. “You have to remember that love and sex are an integral part of life and to pretend that it does not exist is to do grave injustice to your own story and script, because then you are leaving that aspect of the story and script incomplete. It has to be shown as it is. Eroticism is more abstract and exists in the realm of desire. Sexuality is more manifest and physical.”

Ranjana Ami Aar Ashbona An ageing rockstar has a crush on his protege So, how was it this time for Debashree Roy to get ‘intimate’ before the camera with co-actor Sabyasachi Chakraborty, all those years after 36 Chowringhee Lane? Did she feel any trepidation like she did before those scenes for Rinadi’s film? “No, Bengali cinema has come of age. And so have I,” she laughs.

Grin and bare it

 Paoli and Anubrata 

“What’s the big deal,” asks Bidita Bag, 22, whose recent film Icche was a box office success. “I did almost-nude shots during my modelling days.” Bag, however, adds that she was initially “scared” about the scene — where her “passionate” kiss arouses sexual jealousy in her boyfriend’s mother. “But now I think I am more open to sex scenes if I feel they are necessary for a film.” zxc Dam, who has never shied away from intimate scenes, be it in Gautam Ghose’s Kaalbela (2009), Sharon Datta’s Thana Theke Aschhi (2010) or Bappaditya Bandyopadhyay’s Kagojer Bou (2011), seems to have raised the bar in Tollywood. Bengali actresses, and even actors, are stripping without batting an eye. Not surprisingly, the number of Bengali feature films with an ‘A’ or adults only certificate is shooting up. From 9 per cent in 2008, it went up to 13.6 per cent in 2010. More and more young Tollywood actresses believe sexuality is an intrinsic part of Bengal’s multiplex cinema, pointing out that if the film demands sex, they are open to it. “Whether I bare or not depends on a film’s script and director,” says Ushashie, whose forthcoming film Bedroom is already drawing attention for her sex scenes (not in the nude though) with actor Rudranil Ghosh. Ushashie is a journalist in the film directed by Mainak Bhaumik, who made Bengal’s first sex comedy Aamra in 2006. “But what also matters to me is whether a film truly reflects contemporary times and its problems, be it corruption, terrorism or sexuality.” Bidita and Ushashie are not alone. Swastika Mukherjee will be seen — up, close and very personal — in films such as Saugata Ray Barman’s Tabe Tai Hok and Maach, Mishti ’N’ More. Parno Mitra, who plays a muse to an ageing singer enacted by Anjan Dutta in Ranjana Ami Aar Ashbona (2011), features in Bedroom and Ekla Akash, where she plays a married woman attracted to an older professor. “A script can tell us if sex scenes have been inserted as an extraneous or an integral aspect in the film,” says Debleena Datta, who will soon be seen as having sex with a married man in Ekla Akash. “If a sex scene or even nudity is shot realistically and aesthetically, I will consider it.”

BOLD BRIGADE: Debleena Datta with a co-star in Ekla Akash and (left) Paoli Dam of Chhatrak fame One reason actresses are opening up to sex scenes is the advent of a new breed of professional directors. “Many young directors are making middle-of-the-road or art-house films and seem to be more conversant with world cinema than their predecessors,” reasons filmmaker Raja Dasgupta, whose sons Birsa and Ribhu are a part of the new brigade. Filmmakers stress that contemporary Bengali directors are exploring psycho-social dramas or the human mind. “And sexuality is an integral part of it,” says Atanu Ghosh, who made Angshumaner Chhobi (2009) and Takhan Teish (2011) which dealt with complex urban relationships. “Audiences too are maturing. They don’t get agitated about adult content.” The censor board — now more open to adult themes than ever before — has done its bit too. “In the past, directors had to be more subtle with portraying sexuality on screen because of stricter censorship rules,” says Dasgupta. Though sex scenes are becoming more and more daring, they are not new to Tollywood either. “We didn’t have to be overtly sexual,” says Locket Chatterjee, who played a lesbian actress trying to seduce a wannabe actress in Aniket Chattopadhyay’s Chha E Chhuti. Actress Churni Ganguly, who earned plaudits for portraying the travails of a flat-chested woman in Shunyo E Buke (2005), stresses that intimate scenes never stand in the way when she decides about signing films. “In some cases, the physical proximity between actors has actually carried the film forward,” she says. In the earlier films, however, sex cropped up differently. Ace photographer Nemai Ghosh, who worked closely with Satyajit Ray, points out that Bengali filmmakers — and stars — ably dealt with sexuality. “In Ray’s Ghaire Baire, the protagonists kissed on screen foretelling a dangerous liaison,” says Ghosh. “Samit Bhanja and Simi Garewal had explicit scenes in Aranyer Din Ratri.” But these films, he points out, didn’t go piggybacking on sex. The difference between yesterday and today is that cinematic sex is more radical now. For instance, even actors are ready to do the Full Monty if a script demands so. “Acting should not have a moral guardian. If my calling demands that I get cosy with my co-star in a fictional set-up, I am free to do so,” says Rudranil Ghosh. “If I can play the role of a thief or a policeman, why can’t I take off clothes in front of the camera?” Anubrata, who has a theatre background, is yet another actor who’s making his presence felt with films such as Chhatrak and Qaushik Mukherjee’s Gandu. While Chhatrak is expected to hit the theatres after the Pujas, Gandu is awaiting a censor board verdict, mainly because of scenes showing frontal nudity and masturbation. Filmmaker Mukherjee — better known as Q — however stresses that he feels he’s in a minority. “In my films, I am actually challenging the commodification of sex and patriarchal attitude towards sexuality,” says Q, whose 2009 feature film Bish was about three Bengali women going on a sexual rampage one night. There’s another factor at work in the sudden surge of candid scenes. Sex titillates — and some films tend to use sex to lure audiences. “There will always be a class of audience which will go to film festivals to watch nudity — even Satyajit Ray took potshots at such people in his film Pratidwandi,” says Moinak Biswas, professor, film studies, Jadavpur University. But film watchers stress that a film can’t hit the jackpot on the premise that sex sells. “While audiences can be attracted to films with overt sexuality, they can be put off by it too. You cannot force titillation,” says Biswas. Others argue that commercial films cannot always ride on adult content. “Commercial films bring in sexuality through item numbers while art-house filmmakers use it as a weapon,” says actress Rituparna Sengupta. “Some of them create controversies with bold scenes. And let’s face it, these controversies help to create an initial interest in the film. Whether or not that translates into box office collection comes later.” Some films have been financially successful. “There is a huge overseas market for bold Bengali films such as Memories in March, which explores alternative sexuality, or Urochithi (the 2011 film is a hit in Calcutta),” says Devashis Ray, executive director, Databazaar Media Ventures, which distributes Bengali films in North America. However, producers of even multiplex films want to exercise caution. “Sometimes I chop and change my films if I feel some scenes may fetch us an ‘A’ certificate,” says Joy Ganguly, producer of films such as The Bong Connection. “I’d like to get U/A certificates because I don’t want to alienate a larger audience comprising mashimas and pishimas (aunts).” Adds Vinod Lahoti, city-based businessman and producer of Chhatrak: “I’ll support only art-house Bengali cinema of international standards, not the potboilers.” But film watchers stress that in the final analysis it’s the content of a film that matters — not the sex. “A film’s actors can run around naked for hours. But its fate will ultimately be decided by its substance and style,” sums up Shyamal Karmakar, filmmaker and professor, Satyajit Ray Film & Television Institute, Calcutta. Either way, adds Nemai Ghosh — almost echoing Dam — sex in cinema doesn’t deserve a hue and cry. “We all know what couples do when they are together in a room. If you show it on screen, that’s fine. Just don’t talk about it incessantly,” he says.

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http://en.cyclopaedia.net/wiki/Parvez-Dewan http://archive.is/GfcrU Archana Galrani Kannada: ಅರ್ಚನಾ ಗಲ್ರಾಣಿ, (born October 10, 1989)[1] better known by her stage name Sanjjanaa brought up in Bengaluru. She is of Sindhi origin.[ Ganda Hendathi, a remake of the Hindi film Murder (2004), itself an adaptation of the Hollywood film Unfaithful (2002),[7] was also panned by critics.[8][9] Sanjjanaa's performance drew mixed reviews, with a reviewer from Nowrunning.com claiming that she "utterly fails to deliver" in the emotional sequences, while Sify wrote "Sanjana has made a decent debut and she is extremely daring and does justice to her role" Then 17 years old

Sex as an act of martyrdom

Paoli Dam...See, the film is much more than the oral sex scene. It has a political, romantic and social angle.

That's for sure, as Anubrata, who has acted in "Gandu", is also part of "Chatrak". He shot for the latter six-seven months after completing "Gandu".

Padma Awards Announced

The President of India has approved conferment of 127 Padma Awards including one duo case (counted as one) as per the list below. The list comprises two Padma Vibhushan, 24 Padma Bhushan and 101 Padma Shri Awardees. 27 of the Awardees are women and the list also includes 10 persons from the category of foreigners, NRIs, PIOs and Posthumous Awardees. Padma Awards, the country’s highest civilian awards, are conferred in three categories, namely, Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri. The Awards are given in various disciplines/ fields of activities, viz- art, social work, public affairs, science and engineering, trade and industry, medicine, literature and education, sports, civil service, etc. ‘Padma Vibhushan’ is awarded for exceptional and distinguished service; ‘Padma Bhushan’ for distinguished service of high order and ‘Padma Shri’ for distinguished service in any field. The awards are announced on the occasion of Republic Day every year. The awards are conferred by the President of India at a function held at Rashtrapati Bhawan sometime around March/ April. Padma Vibhushan Sl No. Name Discipline State/ Domicile 1. Dr. Raghunath A. Mashelkar Science and Engineering Maharashtra 2. Shri B.K.S. Iyengar Others-Yoga Maharashtra Padma Bhushan Sl No. Name Discipline State/ Domicile 1. Prof. Gulam Mohammed Sheikh Art - Painting Gujarat 2. Begum Parveen Sultana Art - Classical Singing Maharashtra 3. Shri T.H. Vinayakram Art - Ghatam Artist Tamil Nadu 4. Shri Kamala Haasan Art-Cinema Tamil Nadu 5. Justice Dalveer Bhandari Public Affairs Delhi 6. Prof. Padmanabhan Balaram Science and Engineering Karnataka 7. Prof. Jyeshtharaj Joshi Science and Engineering Maharashtra 8. Dr. Madappa Mahadevappa Science and Engineering Karnataka 9. Dr. Thirumalachari Ramasami Science and Engineering Delhi 10. Dr. Vinod Prakash Sharma Science and Engineering Delhi 11. Dr. Radhakrishnan Koppillil Science and Engineering Karnataka 12. Dr. Mrityunjay Athreya Literature and Education Delhi 13. Ms. Anita Desai Literature and Education Delhi 14. Dr. Dhirubhai Thaker Literature and Education Gujarat 15. Shri Vairamuthu Ramasamy Thevar Literature and Education Tamil Nadu 16. Shri Ruskin Bond Literature and Education Uttarakhand 17. Shri Pullela Gopichand Sports - Badminton Andhra Pradesh 18. Shri Leander Paes Sports - Tennis Maharashtra 19. Shri Vijayendra Nath Kaul Civil Service Delhi 20. Late Justice Jagdish Sharan Verma Public Affairs Uttar Pradesh # 21. Late Dr. Anumolu Ramakrishna Science and Engineering Andhra Pradesh # 22. Prof. Anisuzzaman Literature and Education Bangladesh* 23. Prof. Lloyd I. Rudolph Literature and Education USA*$ Prof. Susanne H. Rudolph Literature and Education USA*$ 24. Dr. (Smt.) Neelam Kler Medicine - Neonatology Delhi Padma Shri Sl No. Name Discipline State/ Domicile 1. Shri Mohammad Ali Baig Art - Theatre Andhra Pradesh 2. Ms. Nayana Apte Joshi Art - Maharashtra 3. Shri Musafir Ram Bhardwaj Art - Instrumental Music - Pauna Manjha Himachal Pradesh 4. Ms. Sabitri Chatterjee Art - Film West Bengal 5. Prof. Biman Bihari Das Art - Sculptor Delhi 6. Shri Sunil Das Art - Painting West Bengal 7. Smt. Elam Endira Devi Art - Manipuri Dance Manipur 8. Shri Vijay Ghate Art - Instrumental Music - Tabla Maharashtra 9. Smt Rani Karnaa Art - Kathak West Bengal 10. Shri Bansi Kaul Art - Theatre Jammu & Kashmir 11. Ustad Moinuddin Khan Art - Instrumental Music-Sarangi Player Rajasthan 12. Ms. Geeta Mahalik Art - Odishi Dance Delhi 13. Shri Paresh Maity Art - Painting Delhi 14. Shri Ram Mohan Art - Film Animation Maharashtra 15. Shri Sudarsan Pattnaik Art - Sand Artist Orissa 16. Shri Paresh Rawal Art - Cinema and Theatre Maharashtra 17. Shri Wendell Augustine Rodricks Art - Fashion Designing Goa 18. Prof. Kalamandalam Sathyabhama Art – Mohini Attam Kerala 19. Shri Anuj (Ramanuj) Sharma Art - Performing Art Chhattisgarh 20. Shri Santosh Sivan Art - Film Tamil Nadu 21. Ms. Supriya Devi Art-Bengali Cinema West Bengal 22. Ms. Sooni Taraporevala Art- Script Writing Maharashtra 23. Ms. Vidya Balan Art-Cinema Maharashtra 24. Smt. Durga Jain Social Work Maharashtra 25. Dr. Rama Rao Anumolu Social Work Andhra Pradesh 26. Dr. Brahm Dutt Social Work Haryana 27. Shri Mukul Chandra Goswami Social Work Assam 28. Shri J.L. Kaul Social Work Delhi 29. Shri Mathurbhai Madhabhai Savani Social Work Gujarat 30. Shri Tashi Tondup Public Affairs Jammu and Kashmir 31. Dr. Hasmukh Chamanlal Shah Public Affairs Gujarat 32. Shri Sekhar Basu Science and Engineering Maharashtra 33. Shri Madhavan Chandradathan Science and Engineering Kerala 34. Prof. Sushanta Kumar Dattagupta Science and Engineering West Bengal 35. Dr. Ravi Bhushan Grover Science and Engineering Maharashtra 36. Prof. Eluvathingal Devassy Jemmis Science and Engineering Karnataka 37. Shri Ramkrishna V. Hosur Science and Engineering Maharashtra 38. Dr. Ajay Kumar Parida Science and Engineering Tamil Nadu 39. Dr. Malapaka Yajneswara Satyanarayana Prasad Science and Engineering Andhra Pradesh 40. Shri Kiran Kumar Alur Seelin Science and Engineering Gujarat 41. Dr. Brahma Singh Science and Engineering Delhi 42. Prof. Vinod Kumar Singh Science and Engineering Madhya Pradesh 43. Dr. Govindan Sundararajan Science and Engineering Andhra Pradesh 44. Ramaswamy R. Iyer Science and Engineering Delhi 45. Dr. Jayanta Kumar Ghosh Science and Engineering West Bengal 46. Shri Ravi Kumar Narra Trade and Industry Andhra Pradesh 47. Shri Rajesh Saraiya Trade and Industry Maharashtra 48. Ms. Mallika Srinivasan Trade and Industry Tamil Nadu 49. Shri Pratap Govindrao Pawar Trade and Industry Maharashtra 50. Dr. Kiritkumar Mansukhlal Acharya Medicine - Dermatology Gujarat 51. Dr. Balram Bhargava Medicine - Cardiology Uttar Pradesh 52. Prof. (Dr.) Indra Chakravarty Medicine - Health & Hygiene West Bengal 53. Dr. Ramakant Krishnaji Deshpande Medicine - Oncology Maharashtra 54. Prof. (Dr.) Pawan Raj Goyal Medicine - Chest Disease Haryana 55. Prof. Amod Gupta Medicine - Opthalmology Haryana 56. Prof. (Dr.) Daya Kishore Hazra Medicine Uttar Pradesh 57. Prof. (Dr.) Thenumgal Poulose Jacob Medicine - Vascular Surgery Tamil Nadu 58. Prof. (Dr.) Shashank R. Joshi Medicine - Endocrinology Maharashtra 59. Prof. Hakim Syed Khaleefathullah Medicine - Unani Medicine Tamil Nadu 60. Dr. Milind Vasant Kirtane Medicine - ENT Surgeory Maharashtra 61. Dr. Lalit Kumar Medicine - oncology Delhi 62. Dr. Mohan Mishra Medicine Bihar 63. Dr. M. Subhadra Nair Medicine - Gyneacology Kerala 64. Dr. Ashok Panagariya Medicine - Neurology Rajasthan 65. Dr. Narendra Kumar Pandey Medicine - Surgery Haryana 66. Dr. Sunil Pradhan Medicine - Neurology Uttar Pradesh 67. Dr. Ashok Rajgopal Medicine - Orthopaedics Delhi 68. Dr. Kamini A. Rao Medicine - Reproductive Medicine Karnataka 69. Dr. Sarbeswar Sahariah Medicine - Surgery Andhra Pradesh 70. Prof. Om Prakash Upadhyaya Medicine - Punjab 71. Prof. (Dr.) Mahesh Verma Medicine - Dental Science Delhi 72. Dr. J.S. Titiyal Medicine- Opthalmology Delhi 73. Dr. Nitish Naik Medicine- Cardiology Delhi 74. Dr. Surbrat Kumar Acharya Medicine- Gastroentrology Delhi 75. Dr. Rajesh Kumar Grover Medicine-Oncology Delhi 76. Dr. Naheed Abidi Literature and Education Uttar Pradesh 77. Prof. Ashok Chakradhar Literature and Education Delhi 78. Shri Chhakchhuak Chhuanvawra Literature and Education Mizoram 79. Shri Keki N. Daruwalla Literature and Education Delhi 80. Prof. Ganesh Narayandas Devi Literature and Education Gujarat 81. Prof. Kolakaluri Enoch Literature and Education Andhra Pradesh 82. Prof. (Dr.) Ved Kumari Ghai Literature and Education Jammu and Kashmir 83. Smt. Manorama Jafa Literature and Education Delhi 84. Prof. Rehana Khatoon Literature and Education Delhi 85. Dr. Waikhom Gojen Meeitei Literature and Education Manipur 86. Shri Vishnu Narayanan Namboothiri Literature and Education Kerala 87. Prof. Dinesh Singh Literature and Education Delhi 88. Dr. (Mrs.) P. Kilemsungla Literature and Education Nagaland 89. Ms. Anjum Chopra Sports - Cricket Delhi 90. Ms. Sunil Dabas Sports - Kabbadi Haryana 91. Shri Love Raj Singh Dharmshaktu Sports - Mountaineering Delhi 92. Ms. Dipika Rebecca Pallikal Sports - Squash Tamil Nadu 93. Shri H. Boniface Prabhu Sports - Wheelchair Tennis Karnataka 94. Shri Yuvraj Singh Sports - Cricket Haryana 95. Smt. Mamta Sodha Sports - Mountaineering Haryana 96. Ms Parveen Talha Civil Service Uttar Pradesh 97. Late Dr. Narendra Achyut Dabholkar Social Work Maharashtra# 98. Shri Ashok Kumar Mago Trade and Industry USA* 99. Dr. Siddharth Mukherjee Medicine-Oncology USA* 100. Dr. Vamsi Mootha Medicine - Biomedical Research USA* 101. Dr. Sengaku Mayeda Literature and Education Japan*

Note: * indicates awardees in the category of Foreigners / NRIs/ PIOs. # indicates awardees in the posthumous category. $ indicates one duo case. (treated as one award.)

===============

ndian cinema and indianness (1) Article paru dans Le Mauricien | 29 juillet, 2011 - 18:00 | Par CHIT DUKHIRA

By 1926, Fatma Begum had released her I-Bulbule Paristan in which she acted together with her three daughters (Zubeida, Sultana and Sahazadi). Ardeshir B. Irani’s Alam Ara was the first talkie, projected in Bombay, now renowned for its cinema industry Bollywood. In 1931, as many as 26 other talkies were released – Hindi (21), Bengali (3), Tamil (1) and Telugu. After the Calcutta Probhat Studio’s Sairindri, coloured in Germany (1931), Sohrab Modi’s Jhansi ki Rani (1951) was the first totally Indian coloured film, preceded by V. Shantaram’s hand tinted Shakuntala.

V. Shantaram (1901-1993) –; he was famous for pioneering in India a colour film, Sairandhri (1933) ;

Mangama Sabatham vasuntharadevi's debut film (vaijayanthimala's mother) 1943

Chit Dukhira, LeMauricien Hindu Saalivaahanan 1945 produced by Bhaskar Pictures and directed by noted filmmaker B.N. Rao,A romantic scene between Ranjan and Rajakumari was shown in colour, with the process of ‘Hand Tinting.' In this process, each frame of the positive print is coloured by hand by a specialist, a laborious process. An advocate of Madras had a company undertaking ‘Hand Tinting,' and a technician Murugesan was expert at doing such sequences. It was done before colour entered Tamil Cinema, with the T. R. Sundaram-Modern Theatres' hit Ali Babavum 40 Thirudargalum (1956). (Such hand tinting was done earlier in films such as Bhaktha Chetha K. Subramanyam's mythological Bhaktha Chetha (1940), Vethala Ulagam and Haridas.)

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Pakistani Cinema’s New Wave JAN. 14, 2014

Bina Shah KARACHI, Pakistan — After years of economic doldrums and creative drought, Pakistani movies are pulling in crowds at home and garnering awards at international film festivals. It’s a miraculous restart for an industry that has seen more highs and lows than a three-hour Bollywood blockbuster. Taking the power of storytelling into their own hands, Pakistani filmmakers are fashioning much-needed, nuanced portraits of their country — and cultivating a degree of national pride that hasn’t been felt for a long time. In 2012, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy’s “Saving Face,” about victims of acid attacks in Pakistan, earned the country its first Academy Award, in the best short documentary category. For local film buffs, the win was a harbinger of good things to come. In preparation for this year’s Oscars, for the first time in half a century Pakistan submitted a film for consideration in the best foreign-language film category. While the entry, “Zinda Bhaag” (“Run For Your Life”), failed to make the short list for nomination, “the very fact that we could select a movie that would represent us at the Oscars makes us proud,” says Ms. Obaid-Chinoy. The director believes that 2013 will “go down in history as the year that Pakistani cinema was reborn.” Pakistani cinema thrived in the 1960s, with political and romantic films like “Bombay-Wallah” (1961), “Shaheed” (“Martyr,” 1962) and “Armaan” (“Desire,” 1966), featuring the screen legends Waheed Murad, Nadeem Baig and the actress Shabnam, among others. It survived the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, and went on to peak in the early 1970s with classics like “Umrao Jaan Ada” (“The Courtesan of Lucknow,” 1972) and “Aina” (“The Mirror,” 1977). At the height of the glory days, by conservative estimates, Pakistani studios released more than 100 films a year and some 700 cinemas were operating. In the 1980s, Mohammad Zia ul-Haq’s military dictatorship censored any films that tried to address weighty issues. That decade’s ultraconservative mores discouraged the participation of talented Pakistanis, especially women. The collapse was swift: “Lollywood,” Pakistan’s affectionate nickname for its Lahore-based film industry, churned out tasteless films replete with violence, choreographed disco numbers, melodramatic plotlines and poor acting. By the end of the 1990s, production had slowed to about 50 films each year. Hundreds of cinemas across the country were torn down. In 2006, Pervez Musharraf, as president, began to ease restrictions on the importation of Indian films, which had been banned in Pakistan since the war between the countries in 1965. The newly available Bollywood productions drew so many viewers that multiplexes were built to meet the demand. The new capacity, in turn, gave a new generation of Pakistanis, either trained abroad or already working in television and advertising, an incentive to start making movies of their own. With advances in digital filmmaking permitting lower budgets and an audience already exposed to high-quality international cinema, Pakistanis began to produce bold works. Eight years later, high import taxes on equipment and lack of government support still impede industry growth, and financial investment by wealthy producers remains difficult to find. But Ms. Obaid-Chinoy is optimistic. The approximately 100 cinemas now operating in Pakistan (for a population of over 180 million) are “more than I’ve seen in my entire life,” she says. Tired of the one-dimensionality of the portrayal of Pakistanis on Western screens (as terrorists, bombers, victims or collaborators), independent Pakistani filmmakers are telling other, more sophisticated, stories. With more than 20 films released in 2013, production is rising. One of last year’s releases, “Main Hoon Shahid Afridi” (“I Am Shahid Afridi”), about a small-time cricket league in the northeastern city of Sialkot, sends a powerful message of religious tolerance. “Josh” (“Against the Grain”), in which an upper-class woman investigates the kidnapping of her maid, imagines a world where social justice isn’t beyond the reach of the poor. In the deceptively quiet “Lamha” (“Seedlings”), the son of a wealthy couple is accidentally killed by a rickshaw driver. The film looks evenhandedly and with compassion at the different griefs suffered by the couple and the driver. “Zinda Bhaag,” the country’s 2014 Oscar entry, pays loving tribute to Lahore and 1970s Lollywood. The directors, Meenu Gaur and Farjad Nabi, enlisted real Lahoris in the depiction of the grim realities faced by Pakistanis who attempt to escape economic hardship through illegal emigration. Equally unconventional were decisions to cast the Bollywood legend Naseeruddin Shah in a lead role, and to take postproduction to India instead of Malaysia or Thailand. These fresh approaches augur well for greater Indo-Pakistani cooperation, and have jump-started an industry declared all but dead a few years ago. Last year, Lollywood, too, stepped up its game. In “Waar” (“Strike”), an English-language thriller inspired by the 2009 Taliban attack on a police training center near Lahore, Pakistan is rived by the pressures of the “war on terror.” The film’s unabashed patriotism attracted huge audiences nationwide. “Waar,” which was Pakistan’s first big-budget film, earned some $1.9 million in just over one month, making it also the country’s highest-grossing film to date. Its success signals the eagerness of Pakistanis to discuss terrorism on their own terms. “We want to have the right to represent and choose our own narrative,” Ms. Obaid-Chinoy says, “rather than a narrative that is imposed on us.” Gloria Steinem has said that “every social justice movement that I know of” started with people “telling their life stories.” By this formulation, Pakistani cinema’s new wave hints at a country on the cusp of a major shift. Each film is at once a window into a dynamic country going through difficult times, and a blueprint for how its people might find their way to better days ahead. Bina Shah is the author of several novels, including “Slum Child,” and short-story collections.

z

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Assamese theatre

List of most popular top 5 plays of Mobile Theatre for the year 2011-2012 till date are:

1)Somok-Hengool Theatre(6 shows at a plot)

2)Raktabidyut Pathak B.A-Bhagyadevi Theatre(6 shows at a plot)

3)Bodnam-Brindaban Theatre(4 shows at a plot)

4)Maya Matho Maya-Rajtilak Theatre(3 shows at a plot)

5)Bhal Pao Buli Nokoba-Kohinoor Theatre(3 shows at a plot)

2012 YEAR END POLL ::

MOBILE THEATRE - FAVOURITE THEATRE GROUP 2012: ---- Hengool Theatre ----

MOBILE THEATRE - FAVOURITE PLAY:: Abhijeet Bhattacharya's "Hiyat Epahi Golap" ::

from Kohinoor Theatre 2012-2013.

2012 YEAR END POLL - FAVOURITE SONG

-- from Rowd; singer Angaraag and Rupjyoti -

Jahnu Barua's masterpiece "Baandhon" as the FAVOURITE FILM of this year.

FAVOURITE DIRECTOR

none other than Jahnu Barua for his masterpiece "Baandhon"

"FAVOURITE ACTOR" between Bishnu Khargharia and Utpal Das. In the end you have choosen UTPAL DAS as the favourite hero in our 2012 YEAR END POLL. Utpal has given us two wonderful movies this year, "Borolar Ghor" and "Rowd." Congrats Utpal.

"FAVOURITE ACTRESS" in our 2012 YEAR END POLL. Battle among Angoorlata Deka, Moonmi Phukan and Prastuti Porasor for the crown was intense, but atlast Emon from Rowd stands out. So the title for viewers favourite actress goes to Moonmi Phukan for portraying the character Emon in Rowd. Congrats Moonmi.

"Favourite New-Face (Female)."

You have decided your favourite female new-face, and the winner is Bengali girl Debasmita Banerjee for her role in "Borolar Ghor." Congratulation Debasmita. We want to see you more in Assamese films.

top 6 Songs as the nominee for this category. Inrerestingly 5 out of 6 songs are from Rowd and the remaining one is from Bakor Putek. Now its time to vote for the "FAVOURITE SONG" of the year 2012 in our YEAR END POLL's last category.

1. Bilore Parote Amar Ai Gaon Khan (Bakor Putek)

2. Asilu Kotenu Lukai... Tumiyei je Taajmahal (Rowd)

3. Pokhi Pokhi Mon Mur (Rowd)

4. Toofani Hoi Aha (Rowd)

5. Surujmukhi (Rowd)

6. Kinu Jadu Aji Bukur Majat (Rowd)

In this year 10 films have been released. From mainstream to parallel films, this was a successful year for Assamese Film industry. Now its time to choose your favourite among these film. Vote for your fovourite film in AFT 2012 YEAR END POLL, category "FAVOURITE FILM."

2012 YEAR END POLL

Vote for your "FAVOURITE ACTRESS"

1. Nishita Goswami (Rishang)

2. Angoorlata (Bakor Putek)

3. Moonmi Phukan (Rowd)

4. Zerifa Wahid (Baandhon)

5. Geetawali Rajkumari (Tula aru Teja)

6. Prastuti Parashar (Me & My Sister)..

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Assamese cinema

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http://missbangladesh.info

[2]

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The Miss Bangladesh Contest was first organized in 1994, but that event was never able to attract national media because of conservative and orthodox society system at that time. Chitra represented Bangladesh at the Miss World 1996 which was held in Bangalore, India In 1996.Anika Taher first represented Bangladesh at the beauty pageant Miss World 1994 held in Sun City, South Africa where Aishwarya Rai made her cut as second Miss World from India since Reita Faria became Miss World 1966.

Miss Bangladesh 1998, Shaila Simi (RJ in Radio today fm89.6) has also hosted RTV-"Tarokalap" which is a live talk show. Now, Simi is visiting the UK, and is also visiting Canada to help autistic and mentally challenged people. Miss Bangladesh 1999, Tania Rahman Tonni also participated in the Miss World 1999.

Sonia Gazi (who was Miss Bangladesh 2000) got media attention, but was not among the 10 in the Miss World contest held in London. Priyianka Chopra of India won the crown of Miss World 2000. Tabassum Ferdous Shaon,who participated at Miss World 2001 held at South Africa was the last face from Bangladesh, and there had been no Miss Bangladesh World taken place in Bangladesh since after 2001. Though after that there was some national beauty pageants held but winners from none participated in Miss World again. Although view of people are changing yet it is slower but due to security issues sponsors can not rely on organizers about reality of Miss Bangladesh.

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Court etiquette: India

Calling judges lord, lordship, your honour not mandatory: Supreme Court

PTI | [3] Jan 6, 2014

NEW DELHI: Judges should be addressed in courts in a respectful and dignified manner and it is not compulsory to call them "my lord", "your lordship" or "your honour", the Supreme Court today said.

"When did we say it is compulsory. You can only call us in a dignified manner," a bench comprising justices H L Dattu and S A Bobde observed during the hearing of a petition which said addressing judges as "my lord or your lordship" in courts is a relic of colonial era and a sign of slavery.

"To address the court what do we want. Only a respectable way of addressing. You call (judges) sir, it is accepted. You call it your honour, it is accepted. You call lordship it is accepted.These are some of the appropriate way of expression which are accepted," it said while refusing to entertain the PIL filed by 75-year-old advocate Shiv Sagar Tiwari.

The bench said his plea for banning the use of such terms and directing the courts that the judges should not be addressed in such a traditional manner cannot be accepted.

"How can this negative prayer be accepted by us," the bench asked, adding "Don't address us as lordship. We don't say anything. We only say address us respectfully."

"Can we direct the high courts on your prayers? It is obnoxious," the bench further said while making it clear that "It is for you to say Sir, Your Lordship or Your Honour. We can't direct how you have to address the court."

"It is the choice of the lawyer to address the court. Why should we say that brother judges should not accept being addressed as lordship. We have not taken exception when you call as sir," the bench said.

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Hrithik Roshan

End of a love story

Vickey Lalwani & Mehul S Thakkar,Mumbai Mirror | Dec 14, 2013

The Times of India

The love story

Hrithik (born 1974) once told The Times of India that he had known since he was twelve that Sussanne was the girl for him. They moved among the same circle of friends while they were growing up in Juhu , but at the time Hrithik was too shy to confess his feelings for her and was simply content to adore her from a distance.

Eventually Sussanne went abroad and Hrithik stayed back to chase his celluloid dreams. Then one day, while waiting at a traffic signal, he turned and locked eyes with a pretty girl at the wheel of the car next to him. It was Sussane. So thunderstruck was the young man by this momentous development in his life that he insisted it be recreated on screen in his debut film, Kaho Naa... Pyaar Hai.

Older and more confident, especially after the film's humongous success, he now started pursuing Sussane in earnest. On Valentine's Day, he told her of his love and exactly a year later he went down on his knees on Juhu beach and proposed to Sussane in true schmaltzy Valentine Day spirit.

First signs of trouble

The couple had two sons and seemed well on their way to being that rarity in Bollywood: a happy couple. In 2011 even as newspapers were buzzing about a certain Mexican seductress, Sussane Roshan publicly declared her love for Hrithik on stage at an awards ceremony in Singapore leaving Hrithik look misty-eyed.

He was again overwhelmed when he stepped into her interiors shop one month later, on February 27, tears visible. "For 15 years, she has supported me in my career. Now I want to be her pillar and punching board," he was quoted as saying in an interview then.

In Dec 2013 Bollywood's golden couple Hrithik and Sussanne Roshan have decided to end their 17-year-long relationship. Hrithik announced the split from his wife in a terse statement released from Los Angeles where the star was vacationing solo. It left no ambiguity about who had left whom.

"Sussanne has decided to separate from me and end our 17-year-long relationship," he wrote about the end of his fairytale marriage before assuring his fans that he still had "faith in the institution of marriage."

While the announcement came as a shock to his legions of fans, Bollywood insiders were not exactly unaware of the trouble brewing in the relationship. Sussanne had moved out of the family home in Juhu with their two sons about four months ago but the separation was kept a secret as the Roshans did not want anything to divert attention from Krissh 3, the child-friendly family franchise.

Sources cite several reasons why a reconciliation does not seem possible, one of which is Sussanne's terminal boredom with her husband who, she felt, had become obsessed with his career and his undeniable good looks. The wife felt neglected.

While rumours of an open marriage has been dodging the couple for some time with names of other equally beautiful people like Barbara Mori and Arjun Rampal adding to a sizzling narrative of a marriage unraveling, the final nail comes in the form of a rather mundane familial trouble: saas-bahu friction.

Friends of the couple close to the development told this newspaper that Sussanne wanted Hrithik to move out of the family home Palazzio in Juhu but the star was not keen to leave his parents and his divorced sister. Not that Sussanne had to share a small flat with caviling in-laws. The couple had their own independent floor but the escalating tensions between the bahu and the in-laws would not be contained in that building, and culminated with a blazing row between Sussane and Pinky Mum-in-law Roshan some days ago leading to this denouncement.

The Times of India's source says, "The marriage has had it's share of ups and downs in the past when Hrithik was linked to his Kites costar Barbara Mori. Sussanne had moved into a plush five-star hotel in the vicinity saying that their home was infested with termites. But she went back home that time after Barbara returned to Mexico. But this time the cracks went deeper, particularly after their friendship with another star couple turned sour."

================

Ruskin Bond

Nongthombam Neebendra Singh

The Sangai Express

A light shining bright: The life of Ruskin Bond

The well-known Anglo-Indian literary wizard, the much loved writer, Mr. Ruskin Bond was born in the year 1934 in Kasauli, Himachal Pradesh, erstwhile British India. The early years of his life were a mixture of joy and sorrow, at different intervals, in varying degrees. Even a slight glance at the pages of his personal history, serves as an evidence enough that his highway to fame and success, have never been the bed of roses sort. By age ten, through his father’s recommendations, Bond was already well-versed in a good collection of the Children’s Classics. As an adolescent, he had already decided that he wanted to be a writer, like the writer-protagonists of Dickens’ David Copperfield and Hugh Walpole’s Fortitude. At some point in his schooldays he had happily read John Ruskin’s The King of the Golden River, and many years later, his mother told that he was indeed named after the great Victorian, by his late father.

Born eldest son to Aubrey Alexander Bond, a Royal Air Force pilot serving the Queen in India, Bond grew up a shy and lonely boy. His was a boarding-school life, a shifting life, growing up in more than one place including Shimla, Jamnagar, Dehra Dun and Delhi. As a child, he hated to see his parents quarrel, time and again, until they separated. His father looked after him in extremely trying circumstances: in rents, Air Force tents and Shimla boarding houses, until he died of cerebral malaria in 1944. Bond later said that it was a cruel blow of fate, his father was only forty-six, he had just completed ten.

A seriously lonely aspect began to develop in his personality since then, the traumatic experience left an indelible mark upon him, in his later development as a writer. To him, it was so because Aubrey Alexander had been closest to his son; during the last two or three years of his life. And his untimely death sent the future writer much more deeper into his “cocoon of loneliness”. Ruskin Bond was slow to make friends and was to remain so for the first thirty years of his life. Throughout his life he has been accustomed to solitary walks and periods of spiritual withdrawal. Even so, he may be said to be the kind of introvert, who believes that he would not have been half the writer he is today if he had not learnt to live with, and for, others.

Readers can experience a touching account of the father-son relationship, of happier days and otherwise, in the beautifully portrayed, and memorable short-stories such as The Room of Many Colours, My Father’s Trees in Dehra and The Funeral et cetera. Bond began writing very early in life, his earliest attempt being that of Nine Months, while still in school. He said that it filled two school exercise books and had laid in his desk for a couple of months, before it disappeared altogether. It had nothing to do with a pregnancy; it merely referred to the length of the school term from March to November, detailing his friendships, escapades, ambitions and the foibles of some of his masters. His first short story, Untouchable, was written at the age of sixteen in 1950, then came the novellas, The Room on the Roof and Vagrants in the Valley, both written in his teens. The famous Ruskin Bond character, almost synonymous with himself on certain quarters, is Rusty, which we find in a plethora of his stories; first came with The Room on the Roof in 1956, and makes his way through Vagrants in the Valley; and several decades later, in The Adventures of Rusty, most recently published. Rusty, a sixteen-year old Anglo-Indian boy, is dissatisfied with life in the declining European community at Dehra Dun, he runs away from home to live with Indian friends, plunging for the first time into the dream-bright world of the bazaar, Hindu festivals and aspects of Indian life. He is enthralled and is lost to the proprieties of the European community.

The Room on the Roof won the prestigious John Llewellyn Rhys Memorial Prize, for the best children’s writing, in 1957. Vagrants... picks up from where The Room... leaves off. Both books have been treasured for over half a century by now, and are still read by youngsters and adults alike, and with taste. Delhi Is Not Far, A Flight of Pigeons, The Sensualist, The Blue Umbrella, and A Handful of Nuts are other good and readable novellas that cannot go without mention.

An avid reader from the start, Ruskin Bond owed a lot to his school library and to that librarian, who left him in complete charge of it, for he had the keys and went there, ostensibly to catalogue the books but in reality to pore through them and get acquainted with both the famous and the less. Thus, in stolen moments over three years, he read all the works of Dickens, Stevenson, Jack london, Hugh Walpole, J.B. Priestley, the Bronte sisters, the complete plays of J.M. Barrie, Bernard Shaw, A.A. Milne, Somerset Maugham and Ben Travers, and the essays of A.G. Gardiner, Robert lynd, Priestley, H. Belloc, Chesterton and many others including the humorous writers, namely, Mark Twain, Thurber, Wodehouse, Stephen leacock, Jerome K. Jerome, W.W. Jacobs, Barry Pain, H.G. Wells, and Damon Runyon. later in his twenties, he made forays into the worlds of R.K. Narayan, Mulk Raj Anand, Rabindranath Tagore, Sudhin Ghose, William Saroyan, Andre Gide, and the poetry of Walter de la Mare.

With such a massive literary culture accumulated as early as his twenties, Bond became naturally inclined to literary ambitions himself, and he never looked back. At school, he was not a particularly brilliant student, even though he became gifted with a penchant for writing. His greatest teacher, undoubtedly, had been his father, who taught him the art of reading and writing, early in life. As a young man, he spent four years in the Channel Islands and london, working as a clerk in a firm. He returned to India in 1955 and has never left his adopted family of Prem, Rakesh and their children, and precisely, his beloved India, the land of his source of inspiration for writing: The Himalayan foothills - his Malgudi, his Wessex!

He is one of the charismatic and celebrated personalities in India, who have remained bachelors throughout their lives. As previously mentioned, he, later in life, has been living with his adopted family in landour, Mussoorie. He was infatuated, once in london, with lIa very sweet and Vietnamese girl”, Vu-Phuong, who promised him her hand until she met a rich American and” found his signature more attractive than” his own. We can find a heart-rending love story in Bond’s classic short story, A Love of Long Ago, even though it is not based on his Vu-Phuong memoir. Besides his type writer that has served him for more than fifty years, Ruskin Bond has no calling for material wealth and other worldly finesses. Ever since his return from England, he started freelancing in order to sustain the sort of life he liked to lead “...unhurried, even paced, sensual, in step with the natural world, most at home with humble people...”. He have never aspired to cars, houses, and even furniture. Property is for the superstitious, he once claimed. He have no assets except the books he had authored, and the few that might still be lurking in the innermost recesses of his mind, they should outlast the furniture, he wrote.

His bibliography is immense, touching on the realms of novels, short-stories, essays, poems and children’s books. In a writing career spanning over six decades, Ruskin Bond has written more than 500 short-stories, several articles have appeared in newspapers, international journals, magazines and anthologies. Many of his books find publications in Penguin. Some of his tales have already been termed as ‘Classicsll including the likes of A Face in the Dark, The Room of Many Colours, The Kite maker, Our Trees Still Grow in Dehra, The Tunnel, Time Stops at ShamJi, Dust on the Mountain, The Garlands on His Brow, Panther’s Moon, The Playing Fields of Shimla, When Darkness Falls, Wilson’s Bridge, Susanna’s Seven Husbands, A Love of Long Ago, From Small Beginnings, and The Night Train at DeoJi. Besides Ruskin Bond’s Book of Verse, Landour Days, Notes From a Small Room, The Little Book of Comfort and Rain in the Mountains ( all non-fiction), two well-received volumes of autobiographies, Scenes from a Writer’s Life and The Lamp is Lit were published in the late 90s, among others.

Ruskin Bond received the Sahitya Akademi Award for English writing in India for 1992, for Our Trees Still Grow in Dehra. The Government of India awarded him with the Padma Shri in 1999. Considered as one of the Nation’s most important contemporary writers, and one of the best loved, Ruskin Bond is a living legend today, a sublime exponent of great human values and simplicity in living life. How could so famous a person be so full of simplicity? The answer lies within the man’s humanity and greatness. Every Ruskin Bond fan will get the general gist of what this little essay tries to purport. From small beginnings, he struggled hard to make a flame, defeating unfavourable circumstances, and the lamp has been lit. It will keep on shining bright and long. Ruskin Bond is someone from whom to learn and emulate about life in the big picture. Glory to the old gentleman. Kudos to all his admirers.

Courtesy: Biographical details from Rain in the Mountains

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Water supply: India

22 of India's 32 big cities face water crisis

Dipak Kumar Dash, TNN | Sep 9, 2013

The Times of India

Experts say that population of cities such as Jamshedpur, Dhanbad and Kanpur have increased manifold, resulting in increased demand for water. (TOI photo by Balish Ahuja)

NEW DELHI: Water scarcity is fast becoming urban India's number one woe, with government's own data revealing that residents in 22 out of 32 major cities have to deal with daily shortages.

The worst-hit city is Jamshedpur, where the gap between demand and supply is a yawning 70%. The crisis is acute in Kanpur, Asansol, Dhanbad, Meerut, Faridabad, Visakhapatnam, Madurai and Hyderabad — where supply fails to meet almost 30% of the demand — according to data provided by states which was placed in the Lok Sabha during the recently-concluded Parliament session by the urban development ministry.

The figures reveal that in Greater Mumbai and Delhi — which have the highest water demand among all cities — the gap between demand and supply is comparatively less. The shortfall is 24% for Delhi and 17% for Mumbai. However, the situation is worse than that.

For example, in Delhi, 3,156 million litres of water (MLD) is supplied against the requirement of 4,158. But around 40% of the supply is lost in distribution resulting in a much wider gap between demand and supply than what's recorded.

"In official records, many cities might be getting adequate water. But because of faulty engineering and poor maintenance, the actual availability is much less," said Dilip Fouzdar, a water resource management professional.

He added that though Mumbai gets good rains in comparison to many other big cities, very little of this is actually harvested. "A robust system to recharge ground water can make the city avoid any water shortage," Fouzdar said.

Experts say that population of cities such as Jamshedpur, Dhanbad and Kanpur have increased manifold, resulting in increased demand for water. But the deeper problem is one of short-sightedness, they said — governments wake up to water demand in a city after the situation has become acute. One such example is Gurgaon, where a major water channel was built almost 15-20 years after large-scale development happened.

The government records show 10 major cities in the country either meet daily water requirements or have surplus supply. Nagpur tops this list, reporting 52% extra supply while Punjab's industrial city, Ludhiana, has 26% surplus supply. Other cities managing to meet their water demand include Vadodara, Rajkot, Kolkata, Allahabad and Nasik.

What's also a cause for concern is that majority of the cities are depending on water sources from outside.

In Kochi, the daily water demand is 274 MLD while the supply is 250 MLD per day. Officially, daily water supply in the city is enough to meet almost 90% of the demand provided there is no loss or leakage in distribution.

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Dolphins

Dolphins in the Beas/ Harike

For the first time, a dozen dolphins spotted in Beas

Yudhvir Rana, TNN | Sep 9, 2013

The Times of India

The monthly monitoring of the dolphins is conducted jointly by teams of World [Wildlife] Fund for Nature and Harike wildlife sanctuary

AMRITSAR: For the first time, the officials of Harike wildlife sanctuary, 60km from Amritsar, have spotted 12 Indus dolphins, an endangered species, in a single sighting.

Divisional forest officer M Sudhagar told TOI on Sunday that during the monthly monitoring, they spotted a dozen Indus freshwater dolphins in three groups. "With this single sighting, we can estimate that their number could be around two dozen in and around the sanctuary," the officer said.

The monthly monitoring of the dolphins is conducted jointly by teams of World Wide Fund for Nature and Harike wildlife sanctuary.

The endangered freshwater Indus dolphin (Platanista minor) is found only in this stretch of India. Around six years ago, the Harike wildlife sanctuary officials had spotted a pair of freshwater dolphins for the first time in the country at the confluence of Beas and Satluj rivers.

As the word spread, the government had announced to launch a conservation project for dolphins and develop the area as a major tourist spot, but nothing happened till now.

Indus dolphin is one of the world's rarest mammals and most endangered cetaceans.

Karmowal village as tourist destination

Indus dolphin is one of the world's rarest mammals and most endangered cetaceans. Only about 1,100 such unique species exist today in the lower reaches of the Indus in Pakistan. Their number had drastically declined since the construction of dams on the river.

The dolphins were found in the 75km stretch of the Beas, which also includes around 3km stretch of the Harike wildlfe sanctuary. Divisional forest officer M Sudhagar told TOI on Sunda that besides monthly monitoring of dolphins, no project for their conservation or protection had been launched so far.

The officer added that the department had chalked out a plan to develop Karmowal village as a tourist destination by taking some rented accommodation but that project also didn't take wings.

Sources said the state government had not sent any proposal to the Centre in this regard and the government had not shown any interest in declaring the sight as conservation reserve to protect the dolphins. The officer added that the department had chalked out a plan to develop Karmowal village as a tourist destination by taking some rented accommodation but that project also didn't take wings.

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Flat (apartment), purchase of: India

‘Can’t charge flat buyer extra for parking slot’

Rebecca Samervel, TNN | Sep 11, 2013

The Times of India

MUMBAI: Emphasising that a flat buyer cannot be charged extra for a car parking space, a consumer forum has fined a developer that committed this "unfair trade practice".

The Central Mumbai District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum last week directed Tata Housing Development Company to refund Rs 50,000 to Ghatkopar-based Suresh Mehta and pay him compensation of around Rs 20,000.

"Car parking area is the common area of the society. Therefore, the opponent (the developer) had no right to charge any amount for the sale or use of the parking space," observed the forum. It took into consideration a Supreme Court judgment which held that a developer can only sell a flat and has no right to sell a parking space.

In his complaint, filed with the consumer forum last year, Mehta had said that he purchased on June 30, 2010, an apartment and car parking space at Betegaon, Palghar, for Rs 17.4 lakh. He maintained that Rs 50,000 was taken from him for car parking and another Rs 50,000 as clubhouse development charges.

Mehta said he came across a judgment in August 2010 that held that a builder or developer cannot sell stilt or open parking as the space is part of society common area. The verdict also held that, once the occupation certificate is issued and the society formed, the developer ceases to have any title on the open space.

Through a letter dated December 23, 2010, Mehta demanded a refund from the developer. He was told in response that the car parking was not sold; the developer said he was issued a right to use the space. Aggrieved, Mehta filed a complaint with the forum. The developer repeated its stand in the forum.

The forum said the agreement showed that the total amount paid by Mehta included charges for the parking space. "The documents on record corroborate the contention of the complainant that the flat's price was Rs 16.44 lakh and that he was required to pay Rs 50,000 for car parking space." The forum held that this amounted to an unfair trade practice.

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Solar power: India

Tamil Nadu takes India's solar power capacity up 30%

Sushma U N, TNN | Sep 17, 2013

The Times of India

Tamil Nadu takes India's solar power capacity up 30%

India has 1,759.43MW of grid-connected solar power, with close to 800MW coming from Gujarat. The projects are expected to be ready for commissioning next year.

CHENNAI: India's installed solar power capacity is poised to jump 30% with the Tamil Nadu government close to signing power purchase agreements for 700 megawatts (MW) by the end of October.

Once the plants are up and running, Tamil Nadu will have the second largest solar power capacity in India after Gujarat, the pioneer in such projects in the country.

India has 1,759.43MW of grid-connecte

d solar power, with close to 800MW coming from Gujarat. The projects are expected to be ready for commissioning next year.

As part of TN's solar power policy, which aims at installing 3,000MW of capacity by 2015, a total of 52 companies will sign agreements with the Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation (Tangedco) for capacity totalling 698MW at a tariff of 6.48 per unit (with a 5% increase annually for 10 years).

This comes at a time when the country's national solar policy is tottering. The second phase of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM) has been delayed by over five months with no sign of the programme being kick-started any time soon.

Solar power is the most expensive form of renewable energy and rupee depreciation has added to the woes of companies importing high-end photo voltaic panels.

"There has been a lot of uncertainty over solar power companies and negativity had set in. But now there are projects in the pipeline and activity for players across the board will go up," said Madhavan Nampoothiri, founder and director of RESolve Energy Consultants, an energy consultancy firm.

In 2013 Tangedco held individual meetings with solar power developers asking them to submit documents for proof of land ownership and bank guarantees for financing. "Thirty companies are yet to submit the documents and we have given time till October 30. Once this is in place, power purchase agreements will be signed," a senior official from Tangedco said.

Companies that have the documents in place have started working on the project. "The meeting with the Tangedco chairman and other members was a manner of assurance of support and we have started progress on our project. The team is on the site and we are in talks with banks for financing," said T R Kishor Nair, President, Welspun Energy, which is setting up a 60 MW plant in Trichy district. Solar policies in other states haven't made as much progress and capacities also aren't as large as in Tamil Nadu. While Andhra Pradesh has a target of 1,000 MW, tariff is a deterrent for investors as it is fixed at Rs 6.49 with no annual hike. The programmes in states like Punjab (300 MW) and Karnataka (130 MW) are on a smaller scale and are in the nascent stage. What adds to Tamil Nadu's attractiveness is that the state has high solar radiation of 5.6 - 6.0 kWh per square meter with around 300 clear sunny days in a year, the third highest in India.

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Education Development Index (EDI): 2012-13

Education index shows growing north-south chasm

Akshaya Mukul,TNN | Dec 5, 2013

The Times of India

Among the southern states the biggest decline has been of Kerala, once among the best performers.

NEW DELHI: The annual Education Development Index (EDI) for 2012-13 is out and like previous years the narrative has not changed. There is a civilizational difference between the south and the north as the Hindi heartland states continue to languish at the bottom of the heap.

The EDI is also an indicator that while the southern states are improving in leaps and bounds after the enactment of the Right to Education (RTE) Act, states like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and others despite their best efforts are proving to be no match. States were judged on four parameters: access, infrastructure, teachers and outcomes.

EDI, done by the National University of Educational Planning and Administration on the basis of mammoth District Information of School Education (DISE) data, has ranked Lakshadweep on top after evaluating its primary and upper primary education performance. Puducherry is ranked second, followed by Tamil Nadu, Sikkim and Karnataka.

Tamil Nadu's high ranking also exposes the flawed ranking system that the HRD ministry had adopted in ranking states on the basis of their performance in the midday meal scheme. The southern state was poorly ranked above 20 and touted as a laggard. The state government had protested. One of the parameter used in DISE ranking takes into account infrastructure as an important component like the availability of kitchen sheds.

Among the northern states, Punjab has recovered a lot of ground occupying the sixth position, a remarkable recovery from its 13th rank in 2011-12.

Among the southern states the biggest decline has been of Kerala, once among the best performers. It is now languishing at 14th position. In 2011-12 it was ranked seventh. What led to Kerala's overall poor ranking is the loss in primary education. In primary education, the state's rank went down to 20th from sixth in 2011-12.

While Delhi has also slipped from sixth to 11th in overall ranking, Maharashtra has shown consistency retaining its eighth position.

As for the perpetual laggards, Bihar has recovered a bit. It is now ranked 30th from 33rd in 2011-12. UP's downward slide continues, from 32nd to 34th. Rajasthan is in the same league: 25th from 23rd position. West Bengal is yet to witness CM Mamata Banerjee's much promised winds of change in school education. The state has slipped to 31st rank from 29th in the previous EDI ranking. Madhya Pradesh, likely to give another term to Shivraj Singh Chauhan, is also among the worst performers, occupying 28th slot.

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Nagulachavithi festival

Andhra festival turns into death trap for snakes every year

Sulogna Mehta, TNN | Nov 5, 2013

[4]

VISAKHAPATNAM: Nagulachavithi may be a festival aimed at worshipping the snake god but it heralds a torturous time for hundreds of snakes, many of whom die or are rescued half dead after the festival as they are treated in violation of Wildlife Protection Act in the name of worship.

In 2013, animal rights organizations in collaboration with the forest department, kicked off awareness campaigns in advance and are promoting snake idols among devotees for the upcoming festival on November 7. They have also planned raids early on the morning of November 7 to rescue the captured and starving snakes.

According to animal experts, every year, about a fortnight prior to the festival, snake charmers confine the snakes in baskets and keep them without food and water. They also pull out the fangs and slit open the venom sacs unscientifically, due to which the reptiles suffer from ulcers in the mouth, septicemia infections and die. The snake charmers then collect money from devotees by brandishing the half-dead snake, which swallows the milk offered by devotees as it is dehydrated and starving.

Visakha Society for Protection and Care of Animals (VSPCA) secretary Pradeep Nath said, "Every year, hundreds of snakes suffer and die after Nagulachavithi. A few years ago, we rescued 243 snakes during the festival. As part of the festival, milk and eggs are offered to the starving snakes. Snakes are captured around 10 days prior to the festival. Their fangs are taken out and on the festival day they are offered eggs and milk amidst bursting of crackers, smoke and vermilion. The starving snakes develop severe health problems and mouth ulcers."

"People resent when they are asked not to worship snakes as it pertains to religious sentiments. So, we are promoting worshipping of snake idols and pictures instead of real snakes and in some temples and snake pits, clay idols or silver idols of snakes are now being used," averred Nath.

City based snake catcher Rokkam Kiran Kumar said, "Last year, I rescued seven snakes from the city, including cobras, vipers as well as non-venomous ones, on Nagulachavithi. Besides trying to create awareness among people about not worshipping real snakes and not feeding them milk, we will also try to control the sale of eggs to roadside eateries after these are offered to the snakes." According to the forest department, every month around 20-30 snakes are rescued and during festive occasions like Nagulachavithi, 40-50 snakes are rescued from different areas in the district. "In order to protect the snakes, we have kept a striking force ready. Teams have been formed in different forested mandals, each comprising five tribal members and led by one forest section officer. A vehicle has been provided to each team," said Vizag divisional forest officer (DFO) Md Thayyab.

"The teams will work on tip-offs as well as their own information to rescue tortured or captured wild animals and snakes and release them into forest. According to the Wildlife Protection Act, capturing or harming wild, endangered animals protected under Schedule 1 and 2 are punishable offences for which violators can be prosecuted. We will also conduct raids on the morning of the festival at various places of worship," he added.

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Yeti (abominable snowman)

Himalayan mystery solved? The Yeti existed, finds British geneticist

Kounteya Sinha, TNN | Oct 17, 2013

The Times of India

LONDON: One of the greatest mysteries of the Himalayas may have finally been solved.

Genetic testing has led scientists to believe that the abominable snowman - the Yeti, actually existed but it was actually a cross between an ancient polar bear and brown bear.

Hair samples from what is believed to be that of the Yeti have been found to genetically match that of an ancient polar bear dating back 120,000 years.

Bryan Sykes, professor of human genetics at Oxford University, conducted the research.

Dr Sykes has over many years assembled substantial physical evidence, which he has subjected to the most sophisticated DNA tests available, to answer scientifically the mystery of Bigfoot.

The professor said "This is an exciting and completely unexpected result".

Dr Sykes however said the finding does not mean ancient polar bears are still wandering around the Himalayas.

"But it could mean there is a sub species of brown bear in the high Himalayas which descended from the bear that was the ancestor of the polar bear. Or it could mean there has been more recent hybridisation between the brown bear and the descendent of the ancient polar bear," Dr Sykes said.

Bone chilling stories of the horrifying Yeti have been synonymous to the Himalayas for centuries with local people and some of the world's greatest mountaineers including legendary mountaineer Reinhold Messner, who became the first man to climb Everest without oxygen, claiming to have had a terrifying encounter with a large hairy, ape-like creature.

Himalayan folk lore is rife with tales of an elusive beast that have hardly been photographed.

Professor Sykes has collected and tested hair samples of several animals found in the Himalayas.

He tested two ancient hair samples which locals of high Himalayan villages claimed were that of the Yeti. One of the samples was that of an animal found in Ladakh (India) and the other from Bhutan, 800 miles away.

The DNA tests then compared the results to other animals' genomes stored on the GenBank database. Professor Sykes to his amazement found a 100% match with a sample from an ancient polar bear jawbone found in Svalbard, Norway, that dates back at least 40,000 years - and probably around 120,000 years.

This has made professor Sykes believe that the most likely explanation is that the Yeti is actually a hybrid between polar bears and brown bears.

A Yeti footprint on the base of Mount Everest taken by British climber Eric Shipton sparked a global interest in the abominable snowman post 1951.

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Rajnikanth

Why Rajnikanth is India's most loved superhero

Rajnikanth beats Krrish!

Purva Desai, TNN | Nov 11, 2013

The Times of India

Here's a list of reasons that make Rajnikanth a superhero and that too, India's most loved!

Style- Like every superhero (Superman's red underwear, Spiderman's web costume, Batman's black mask, to name a few), our very own Rajnikanth aka Thalaivaa aka Boss has a style or rather styles that are unique to him. For generations, he has inspired Tamil and Bollywood actors. From the famous cigarette flipping act to lighting it with his revolver, Rajnikanth entertains like no other. Another peculiar act he does on screen is the way he wears his goggles. Normal humans being will have to try hard to flip it the Rajni way. He flips the glasses from his elbows before they turn up in the air and magically sit on his face. And to get the Rajni look, the man does not even use a comb. His hands suffice. And of course, Rajnikanth never warns the villains in his films. He just throws a powerful dialogue that seems to work! Another trademark of Rajnikanth is his white Thundu or large stole that is always draped neatly and rests on his shoulder. He comes second to none!

Popularity- He is a larger than life figure in films and in reality too. A villain who became a hero by default, he is one of the highest paid Indian actors. From being mentioned in a school syllabus to being popular in Japan (so much so that Prime Minster Manmohan Singh spoke about the latter's film as an example to highlight indo-Japanese relations), Rajnikanth is unbeatable. Even the badhshah of Bollywood, SRK dedicated a song to the Thalaivaa in his record breaking film , Chennai Express.

So popular is the actor and cultural icon that Rajnikanth jokes are perhaps the most popular that exist! A few examples of such jokes: "When Rajnikanth stares at the sun in anger, the sun hides behind the moon and this phenomenon is knows as a Solar Eclipse!" "Before Tom Cruise, Rajnikanth was approached to do Mission Impossible. He refused, because he found the title insulting!" "Rajnikanth's next project is the Titanic in Tamil. However, Rajni has twisted the climax. Both the lead actors survive. Rajni swims across the Atlantic Ocean with the heroine in one hand and... the Titanic in the other!" Rajnikanth was, is and will always be a sensation!

Charity & social work- Humility and generosity are words that capture the mega star's spirit. According to a report carried in IBN Live, the actor donates 50% of his income to charity, according to his best friend Raja Badhar. Rajnikanth also lent his support to Gandhian Anna Hazare in 2011 for his anti corruption movement. Furthermore, the actor also apparently offered his marriage hall in Chennai to the India Against Corruption members to hold their fast, free of cost! In 2002, the actor protested against the Government of Karnataka for not letting the river Kaveri to not flow into Tamil Nadu. For this, he took a day long fast. He further declared that he would contribute Rs 1 crore for a project that would interlink Indian rivers. According to reports in certain sections of the media, Rajnikanth apparently donated money to the victims of the 2011 Tsunami and earthquake that struck Japan. The list seems endless!

Demi god- Rajnikanth has a cult status and following in India. While super stars in South are immortalized, Rajnikanth perhaps tops the list. It is not unusual for a star like Rajnikanth to have a temple built for him where he is worshipped and idolized. He's given the same respect that gods are given in India.