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UPA comes down heavily on BJP-RSS campaign against Pratibha
New Delhi, Jun 28 (PTI) The UPA today came down heavily on the BJP-led opposition accusing it of indulging in a "malicious, unsubstantiated and deliberate" attempt to malign UPA-Left presidential nominee Pratibha Patil.
"A beating about the bush campaign is being orchestrated by the BJP and RSS. But I can only say these are malicious, unsubstantiated and deliberate attempt to malign a lady candidate. These things have never happened in the past," Information and Broadcasting Minister P R Dasmunsi told reporters.
Dasmunsi, who is the official representative of the UPA-Left candidate, was replying to a question whether Patil has given loan to her people when she was heading a cooperative bank.
Strongly refuting the opposition charges, he said at no point of time neither an RBI nor an Audit Bureau report mentioned her name. PTI
Red Fort now a world heritage site
New Delhi, Jun 28 (PTI) Red Fort, the 17th century Mughal marvel, has been given the world heritage status by UNESCO today.
Pitted against 45 other sites from across the globe, the Red Fort is among the four cultural sites that was selected by UNESCO's World Heritage Committee, which is currently meeting in New Zealand to choose the next heritage sites.
Japan's Iwami Ginzan Silver Mine, Turkmenistan's Parthian Fortresses of Nisa and Australia's Sydney Opera are the other sites that will now be inscribed in the UNESCO's World Heritage List.
Red Fort is considered to represent the zenith of Mughal creativity, which under emperor Shah Jahan was brought to a new level of refinement.
The planning of the palace is based on Islamic prototypes, but each pavilion reveals architectural elements typical of Mughal building, reflecting a fusion of Persian, Timurid and Hindu traditions, UNESCO said in a statement.
The palace was designed as an imitation of paradise as described in the Koran; a couplet inscribed in the palace reads "if there be a paradise on earth, it is here, it is here." The Red Fort's innovative planning and architectural style, including its garden design, strongly influenced later buildings and garden in Rajasthan, Delhi, Agra and further afield.
Through, its fabric, the complex reflects all phases of Indian history from the Mughal period to independence, it said. PTI
BJP has not levelled any charges against Pratibha: Advani
Jabalpur, Jun 28 (PTI) Voicing concern over allegations levelled against UPA's presidential candidate Pratibha Patil, the BJP today refuted charges of opposition parties being behind them and asked the Congress-led alliance to reconsider her candidature.
"It is for the first time that serious allegations have been levelled against a presidential candidate. We have asked the UPA to reconsider its candidate," Leader of Opposition L K Advani told reporters at the airport here.
"The UPA has over 15-20 options, the maximum number of prospective candidates who have come forth in any election (for the post of President). Yet a lightweight was selected, ignoring other heavyweights," he said.
Referring to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's reported statement about opposition parties levelling "false" allegations against Patil, Advani said: "We have not levelled any charges.
"The allegations drew strength from RBI reports, high court rulings and media investigations." Advani said he had asked BJP workers to gather details about a CD possessed by a TV reporter in Nagpur on a murder allegedly involving Patil's kin.
Asked whether the BJP is contemplating breaking its ties with the Shiv Sena after its leaders decided to back Patil, Advani said: "It is for the BJP to decide.
"The Shiv Sena and its parliamentary board have not announced a decision (to back the UPA candidate). It was only an opinion voiced by Shiv Sena's state (Maharashtra) unit," he said. "We are concentrating on the Presidential polls and any decision can be taken afterwards." PTI
Punjab assembly adjourns over Dera issue
Chandigarh, Jun 28 (PTI) The Punjab government's sanction to the state police to arrest Dera Sacha Sauda chief Baba Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh today rocked the assembly with opposition Congress forcing an adjournment for the day.
Soon after the question hour ended, opposition leader Rajinder Kaur Bhattal sought to raise the issue, saying her party had moved an adjournment motion seeking debate on the law and order situation in the state.
"Yesterday's development is a serious issue and it has further aggravated fear psychosis among the people of the state," Bhattal said, indirectly referring to the Dera row. "The opposition wanted to raise the serious issue of law and order," she said.
However, the speaker Nirmal Singh Kahlon ruled that there was "no urgency" to raise the issue. He told the protesting Congress MLAs that the motion was under his consideration and he had yet to "look into the notice." Refusing to budge, the opposition demanded immediate ruling from the speaker on the motion moved by it.
Noticing indifference from the Speaker to their demand, the members of the opposition started anti-government sloganeering. They went into the well and staged a vociferous protest forcing the speaker to adjourn the house for an hour.
When the house re-assembled, the opposition members again trooped into the well and disrupted the proceedings, forcing the speaker to adjourn the house for the second time.
However, during the second adjournment, the opposition members squatted onto the well and started making speeches on law and order situation and the Dera row.
The speaker's repeated request to the opposition leader Bhattal to have a control over her flock was ignored, which compelled him to adjourn the house till Friday morning. PTI
SBI to tweak home loans instalments, NPAs may increase
Mumbai, Jun 28 (PTI) State Bank of India today said that equated monthly instalments (EMIs) on its home loans will be tweaked shortly as interest rates have gone up by two per cent in the last one year.
"So far, we have resisted doing so but we will do so now," SBI Managing Director Yogesh Agarwal told reporters here.
He, however, feared that this may marginally push up the bank's non-performing assets (NPAs) on home loans as it may impinge upon the capacity of borrowers to repay.
As far as any possible hike in rates, Agarwal said: "As of now there is no change. The bank was awaiting the RBI's stance in the forthcoming quarterly review of its credit policy and would decide upon its rates accordingly." SBI Chairman O P Bhatt hastened to add that interest rates have virtually peaked and if at all there was any hike in the near future it could not be more than 0.25 per cent. PTI
RIL building Indo-US partnership in various sectors: Ambani
Washington, June 28 (PTI) India's most valued company Reliance Industries is building partnership with the US in many of the sunrise areas like life-sciences, biotechnology and retail.
"Reliance is hugely US-centric spanning different areas such as energy, retail, life sciences including bio-technology and integrated infrastructure.....That is how Reliance is involved with the United States," RIL Chairman Mukesh Ambani said here after receiving the Global Vision Award 2007 for Leadership from the US-India Business Council yesterday.
He said with the new sense of confidence that India has achieved, the country can build a strong partnership with the US on a wider canvas.
Ambani said that agriculture offers a great opportunity for the private sector in India along with energy and renewable energy areas.
Expressing concern over the benefits of globalisation not reaching the poor, Ambani said innovative business models could help bridge the gap between the islands of prosperity and vast poverty in the world.
"While globalisation has created specialised places, we cannot have islands of prosperity with places of poverty and squalor," he said.
He said the world a skewed place where 15 per cent of the global population were getting away with 85 per cent of the income. "A lot of people say the world is flat. I think it is spiky" Ambani said.
He said his father late Dhirubhai Ambani believed in the democratisation of wealth and in the youth.
The power of youth is the mainstay of RIL, which is India's number one company in terms of market valuation. The average age of the RIL's 100,000 employees is 29 years. PTI
Kuwait hopeful of ending flight row with India
Dubai, June 28 (PTI) Kuwait has expressed optimism that the row over a possible ban on landing of state-owned Indian airliners in its capital will be resolved amicably as the two countries prepare to hold talks on the issue.
A high-level Indian delegation comprising joint secretary of the Aviation Ministry, R K Singh and representatives of 'Air India' and 'Indian' will arrive in Kuwait later today for talks which will last until Friday.
"An Indian delegation will arrive in Kuwait and we will begin negotiations about the issue. We will reach an agreement and the results will be announced before or on Saturday," a senior official of Kuwait's Department of Civil Aviation, Salah Al-Armeni was quoted as saying in Kuwait Times.
The airline row comes at a time when thousands of passengers are preparing to fly to India for summer holidays.
Kuwait had issued a notice to 'Air India' and 'Indian' saying it will not receive flights of the airlines from July 1 in the capital, alleging that New Delhi was going back on commitments in the air bilateral agreement between both countries.
A bilateral agreement was signed between the states last year allowing for 5,200 seats per week for both states. Kuwait has requested the limit be raised in addition to requesting that Kuwait's carriers be allowed to pick up passengers from third countries.
While Kuwait Airways and Al-Jazeera operate daily flights to India, Air India and Indian maintain a total of seven flights per week out of Kuwait. PTI
Sensex surges by over 105 points in early trading
Mumbai, June 28 (PTI) The Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex today surged by over 105 points in early trade on brisk buying by funds in heavy-weight stocks led by cement sector.
The BSE-30 share index, Sensex, which had lost over 70 points yesterday, shot up by 105.98 points at 14,537.04 in the first five minutes of trading, following a significant rise in blue chips stocks and cement shares like ACC, Gujarat Ambuja Cement and Grasim industries.
Similarly, the wide-based National Stock Exchange's index Nifty shot up by 42.45 points at 4,291.40. PTI
Infosys to declare Q1 results on July 11
Mumbai, June 28 (PTI) Software giant Infosys Technologies today said it will declare on July 11 the financial results for the first quarter ending June 30.
The meeting of the Board of Directors would be held on July 11 to declare the audited first quarter results of the company and its subsidiaries as per Indian Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), Infosys informed the BSE.
The Board would also discuss the company's un-audited results as per US GAAP for the first quarter, it said.
Shares of the IT firm were last trading at Rs 1939.90, up 0.19 per cent on the BSE. PTI
CIA wiretapped scribes and dissidents: Report
Sridhar Krishnaswami
Washington, June 28(PTI) The latest revelations of the surveillance and operational machinations of the Central Intelligence Agency has offered a stunning glimpse into the agency functioning, according to latest documents.
The latest documents obtained by the National Archives of George Washington University on "Family Jewels" showing that the agency repeatedly violated its own charter, wire-tapping journalists and dissidents.
According to the Archives' listings, the "best" of the "Family Jewels" would include: Journalists surveillance; Covert mail opening at JFK airport; Watergate burglar; former CIA operative E. Howard Hunt of Watergate fame requesting a lock picker; investigating foreign support for domestic US dissent; Plan to poison Congo leader Patrice Lumumba; John Lennon funding anti-war activists; and a CIA counter-intelligence official James J. Angleton and issue of training foreign police in bomb-making, sabotage.
The peek into the functioning of the CIA started flowing since last week when documents surfaced detailing activities by the agency more than three decades ago that included wiretappings of journalists, kidnappings, warrantless searches and more.
The 700 odd page of materials that has been made public includes a six-page summary memo declassified in 2000 and released by the National Security Archive at George Washington University that essentially outlined 18 activities by the CIA that "presented legal questions" and were discussed with President Ford in 1975. PTI
EU, China ink new project on climate change
Beijing, June 28 (PTI) China and the European Union today announced the launch of a joint project to deal with climate change and boost the clean development mechanism (CDM) in the world's most populous nation.
According to the agreement, the EU will provide 2.8 million euros into the EU-China CDM Facilitation Project which aims to promote sustainable development in China by developing the regulatory and policy regimes to facilitate application of the CDM in China.
The project targets EU and China joint climate change objectives, first counsellor of the Delegation of the European Commission to China and Mongolia, Nicholas Costello said.
"(The project) will facilitate the implementation of the CDM, make it easier to exchange information on CDM projects and encourage EU companies to engage in CDM projects in China and hence to tackle climate change on a global scale," Costello said.
The project has been launched a week after the Dutch government's environment agency declared that China has overtaken the United States to be the world's No. 1 top emitter of carbon dioxide.
The EU-China Facilitation Project, which will run until 2010, will support China's CDM through research, capacity development, technical exchange and training activities.
Technical cooperation will be established with Chinese government agencies, standards and certification companies and wider stakeholder groups so that knowledge of CDM issues can be widely disseminated, Costello added.
The promotion of CDM is a specific objective of the EU-China Climate Change Partnership that was established in 2005.
The CDM was set up under the Kyoto protocol. PTI
Civil service no longer appeals to the youth: IAS Couple
New Delhi, Jun 28 (PTI) Civil service which was once considered as an elite service and the 'steel frame of India' no longer appeals to the youth as before says a senior IAS officer couple.
"A career in the administrative services was earlier a most admired and popular option. The change in perception that has come about now is not only because of government's role is reducing in every sphere.
"In fact, renumeration, though never the most attractive aspect of the job, has turned out to the biggest the biggest reason for the change in perception - the salary structure, when compared to that of the private sector after liberalisation, is ludicrous. Cut out the frills and consider the essentials, and it will boil down to a choice between earning one's bread and illusory prestige," writes Leena Nandan, Director, Ministry of Tourism and Jiwesh Nandan, Director, Ministry of Power, Government of India in their book, 'How to Placate an Angry Naga'.
They further point out that, "If the present stage of affairs continues then only those who can't make the best of competitive opportunities will opt for this career in the coming years." The 1987 batch couple stops short of showing the murky undercurrents of the Indian Administrative Service while frequently bordering on their reflective stories featuring whimsical bosses and autocratic politicians, overzealous juniors and suspicious spouses besides other aspects of the service. PTI
Bingo to the new chat lingo!
New Delhi, Jun 28 (PTI) 'Hey dey..Ssup! m doin gr8..Cr4 a coffa ton8 ?? kewl.. C'ya at 8...G2g ,tc!!' Shortened verbs, sentences sans prepositions, abbreviations used as never before...Get accustomed to the language of young, considered the 'in thing' today. After all who has the time in this world to inquire if the person on other side is a he or she, an uncle or a kid, a "hi" is much more happening these days.
"The new chat lingo is faster, trendier and a great time saver, when it comes to text chat and on messenger. Moreover, they are in vogue these days", says Sanya Ralhan, Class X student.
As the cell phones replace Barbie dolls and toy cars, it seems laptops are what kids demand for on turning nine. The generation Y cannot debar itself from using the language in vogue. "One often faces time and space constraints in message chats, therefore use of abbreviations and jargons is convenient besides its fun to play with the language as we go on creating more and more smart lingos," says 12 -year -old Devika Kapoor.
What's more, the word 'sms' itself has found itself a comfortable place in Oxford dictionary. Seeing the wide usage of such lingo by a large number of people, its impact is very much visible on the written day to day English.
"With every new batch, chat lingo's are frequently seen in the answer sheets and assignments, but I have no qualms in accepting the changing trend. I feel language is a dynamic thing and changes to suit the needs of man should be readily acceptable," says S D Triparthy, Professor, I.P University. PTI
SAD? Virtual Reality therapy can help
New Delhi, Jun 27 (PTI) At the thought of addressing a classroom or alarger auditorium packed to its capacity some people break out into a sweat, their legs turn to jelly, and their hearts begin to pound wildly or go light-headed.
Glassophobia, or the fear of public speaking is one of the many phobias that are associated with a medical condition called Social Anxiety Disorder of SAD, the third largest mental health care problem in the world, that affects roughly around 200 million people in India according to estimates by the WHO.
Now a US-based company called Illumenta has introduced a Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy (VRET) that will recreate situations, which are most feared and use a combination of desensitisation techniques that would if used over a prolonged period of time gradually help people tide over any type of phobia, fear or addiction.
In VRET those who are afraid of speaking up in front of a large audience, are made to stand on a makeshift podium and given the necessary paraphernalia of goggles, headset and earphones to wear and all lights are dimmed. "A typical classroom with noisy students and blaring music comes up before the client and he or she feels as if they are really standing inside a classroom," says Manish Bhan President and CEO of Illumenta.
Anxiety is developed due to the conditioning that a person receives, says Dr Tulika Mehta Aggarwal, clinical psychologist, who has worked with a select small group of clients on a trial basis for the VRET technique. PTI
The satellite revolution in film distribution
Snehesh Alex Philip
New Delhi, June 27 (PTI) From celluloid prints to digital format, the Indian cinema and its distribution channel has come a long way. But, now taking a step further, the Indian cinema industry is slowly turning a new leaf in the distribution network, 'satellite distribution of movies." "India is a country with diverse geographical conditions and difficult terrain. Hence, satellite delivery takes care of all logistical problems associated with film distribution and exhibition. It ensures that even the remotest corners of the country receive all films - first day, first show. Also it builds in a lot of flexibility with regard to theatre programming. It is equivalent to Video on Demand," says Raaja Kanwar, Vice-Chairman, UFO Moviez, specialising in distribution of movies through satellite. It recently won the 'Innovation award in Indian Cinema' at IIFA Awards in Yorkshire early this month.
Sensing, the future growth prospects of the technology and also the cost cutting factor, major cinema theatre groups are now planning to enter the satellite distribution market.
"We view it as a critical market. We are already using the latest digital format. Satellite distribution is something for which we are in talks with some companies. But, by next year, we might just have our own satellite distribution company for our own theatres," says Ashish Shukla, Chief Executive, PVR Cinemas, the largest multiplex chain in the country.
According to industry estimates, there are nearly 1500 screens in India which currently use satellite to relay movies directly to the screens. PTI
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Sensex: 14504.57, +73.51
The sensex closed at 14504.57, up 73.51
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______Forex_______
1 U.S. $ = 40.790 INR
1 Japanese Yen = 0.3318 INR
1 British Pound = 81.672 INR
1 Canadian $ = 38.380 INR
1 Singapore $ = 26.587 INR
1 UAE Dirham = 11.106 INR
1 Saudi Arabian Riyal = 10.876 INR
1 Euro = 54.928 INR
1 Qatar Rial = 11.205 INR
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