High alert sounded in city

 Sep 6, 2011,
A high alert has been sounded in the city in the wake of communal tension in Adoni. All police mobile parties have been asked to stay on high alert and, irrespective of its size, each Ganesha procession was escorted by cops on Monday night. Patrolling has been intensified in the communally sensitive south zone and some pockets in west and central zones.
"On Monday, 90 Ganesha idol immersion processions were carried out in the south zone and all of them were escorted," DCP Vineet Brijlal said. The centralised Ganesha procession is scheduled for Sunday and over 15,000 police personnel have been deployed in the city for the bandobast.

Pulichintala cofferdam flooded

 Sep 7, 2011
GUNTUR: The cofferdam of Pulichintala project was flooded on Tuesday, a day after water was released from Nagarjunasagar reservoir as the back waters entered the low-lying villages in Guntur and Nalgonda districts.
Pulichintha village in Atchampet mandal and Kollur in Bellamkonda mandal in Guntur were cut off from rest of the world as the flood waters gushed into the houses. Gollapeta, Kamepalli and Chityala villages in Nalgonda district on the other side of the Krishna river were also inundated. Though the officials tried to evacuate people from flood-prone areas under Pulichintala project, the locals resisted the move stating that the relief colonies were not ready yet to shelter them. More than 11 villages in Guntur district and seven in Nalgonda district face severe flood threat from the Pulichintala balancing reservoir.
The project, where works are still being carried out, has no gates to operate and release the surplus waters to the downstream. Two private lensmen engaged by irrigation officials had a providential escape after they were trapped in the waters near Atchampet. They were rescued by fishermen and sent back to Jaggaiahpet.

Teacher acid-attacked

| Sep 7, 2011
KANIGIRI (Prakasam): A school teacher was seriously injured when some unidentified miscreants attacked her with acid in the early hours of Monday. However, the incident came to light only on Tuesday after the relatives of the woman approached the police.
The 26-year-old woman, who is working as a physical education teacher at Kasturba Ashram Girls School at Veligandla mandal headquarters near Kanigiri, was in deep sleep outside her residence in her native Mogallur village when the offenders attacked her.
She suffered burns on her face and body parts in the acid attack. Jyothi woke up screaming and shouting, but the assailants fled the scene by the time the neighbours came to her rescue. She was rushed to a private hospital at Kanigiri. Doctors said the teacher is out of danger.Upon information provided by the victim, police have launched a search for one Koteswara Rao of Mogallur.
She told the police that Rao had been pestering her to marry him for the past few months. "He may have resorted to the attack as I had turned down his proposal," she told the cops, who suspect that at least two persons are behind the attack.

People on the edge as Krishna swells

TNN | Sep 7, 2011
VIJAYAWADA: People living along the Krishna river bund were on the edge following massive outflow of waters from the Nagarjunasagar into Prakasam barrage on Tuesday. Though the flood situation is completely under control, the authorities did not take any chances as at least 20 relief camps were set up in the city to shift people residing along the river bund.
About 100 agriculture labourers, who went for work in Kotikalapudi Lanka village in Ibrahimpatnam mandal in Krishna district, were rescued by the officials after they were trapped in the flood waters. The workers raised an alarm when the flood waters started inundating their fields making it difficult for them to return in the country boats. Upon information, the revenue officials rushed expert swimmers to the spot and brought them to safety.
Municipal commissioner G Ravi Babu, who began touring the low-lying areas in the late hours of Monday, continued his visits on Tuesday and identified flood-prone colonies. The civic officials with the assistance of revenue, police and irrigation departments started evacuating people from the flood-prone areas.
With the water levels rising steeply at the barrage, the irrigation officials lifted all the 70 gates up to 1 ft height in the morning and released 65,000 cusecs to the downstream. Ravi Babu said that since people from low-lying areas not willing to shift from their houses, they had decided to shift them by force. "Though many colonies in the city are likely to face the flood, the situation is not alarming. We are taking extra care by keeping continuous vigil on the water levels and outflows. Special teams were kept ready to jump into action in case of emergency," Ravi Babu said.
Residents of Krishnalanka, Ranigarithota, Metla Bazar, Balaji Nagar, Geethanagar, Ramalingeswara Nagar and Bhupesh Guptha colony were alerted. Irrigation officials said the inflows at the Prakasam barrage, which was around 2 lakh cusecs at present, could touch three lakh cusecs by late in the night.
The flood level touched a historic 11 lakh cusecs in the barrage in 2009 and keeping that in mind, officials were not taking any chances though the current flood level might not go beyond four lakh cusecs at the barrage. Meanwhile, the outflows from Nagarjunasagar have reduced to 1.8 lakh cusecs on Tuesday from nearly 3.5 lakh cusecs on Monday.

Devotees want ‘tainted’ crown returned to Gali

HYDERABAD: Devotees of Lord Venkateswara of Tirumala and goddess Gnana Prasoonambika Devi in Srikalahasti are up in arms over the offerings made by remand prisoner No. 697 - G Janardhana Reddy, former Karnataka BJP minister, who is cooling his heels at the Chanchalguda jail - and are terming them 'tainted.'

Devotees of the two deities staged protests in the temple town of Tirupati on Tuesday, and demanded that the Rs 45-crore diamond-studded golden crown donated by Janardhana Reddy to Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) in June 2009 be returned to him, confiscated by the government, or simply not be part of the deities' possessions.

"The Lord can do without the tainted offerings of the corrupt mining baron. We do not want the crown to be present in the temple for even a minute," said R Lingeswara Rao, a devotee of Lord Venkateswara, present at the rally.

The Reddy brothers, especially Janardhana, have been known to make expensive donations to temples, including jewel-encrusted crowns, jewellery and gold ornaments. Soon after Jaganmohan Reddy, son of former AP chief minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy, won the Kadapa byelection, Janardhana, who counts Jagan among his friends, went and donated a magnificent diamond-studded crown worth Rs 12 crore to Prasoonambika, consort of Lord Srikalahasteeswara, presiding deity at the Srikalahasti temple, in May 2011.

Devotees of the deities are upset by the temple's practice of adorning the Lord with the 'tainted crown' every Friday. "The crown could be the most significant contribution to Lord's ever-growing wealth in gifts, but the Lord of Kalyuga would not be comfortable with the riches offered by the mining baron," said Congress leader P Navin Kumar Reddy. The crown is "polluting the sacred ambience of the sanctum sanctorum" and TTD should not play with devotees' emotions. We will intensify our protests if the TTD does not return the offerings, or urge the government to take possession of them".

The crown is 2.5 feet tall and weighs 30 kg. It took nine months for workers to craft it. The crown is studded with 800 diamonds and a green emerald sourced from South Africa.

Old City's Vinayakas a big draw

TNN | Sep 7, 2011

HYDERABAD: This year, creativity seems to be the buzzword at Ganapati pandals of Old City. With vivid colors and bright lights, the idols put up in tiny pandals in dingy bylanes to the mega ones in crowded main roads, reflect the many ways in which devotees see lord Ganapati. So, from an Anna-themed display to a ten-headed Ganapati, Old City pandals are scoring on both messages and idol designs.

Drawing crowds are pandals depicting idols with contemporary themes. Take for instance the Ganesh pandal put up by textile traders of Patel market, where the lord's idol stands behind Team Anna. This divine backing of the Anna movement, however, is not without reason as textile traders have planted 'Abolish VAT on Textiles' placards in the hands of Anna's 'aides'.

And beating the skyrocketing prices of commodities is the lord presiding at the Gulzar Houz pandal. Made of dry fruits and weighing 51 kgs, this Ganapati could well be among the most precious in the city. And eco-friendly too. The organizer, Naveen Kumar, says, "We have been doing something new here for 21 years. This year our idol is in the form of Shyam Baba (an avatar of lord Krishna)." The Ganesh idol installed at the Mitti-ki-Sher Kaman, is also popular in the locality.

The pandal at Begum Bazaar chourasta may not be competition to the Khairatabad idol but certainly is one of the biggest in the city. The idol with ten heads stands 30-ft tall and each head depicts a virtue, the idea being to show lord Ganesh as a harbinger of justice. While there are many other idols in Begum Bazaar that stand out, the Pari Ganesh is worth a visit. This beautifully sculptured idol shows Ganesh being lifted by an angel.

"It is different from the rest and hence I decided to have Ganesh made like this," says Nitin Kumar, one of the organisers of the pandal. Ganesh idols at Begum Bazaar, say locals, are among the most creative of the lot. The famous Kokharwadi Ganesh this time has a more serious theme of a war, but a divine one, between Ganesh and a demon. Brought to life with pulleys and levers and light and sound effects, the pandal is drawing crowds. "We try to be different from others every year. We found a similar theme in Kolkata last year during Durga Puja and we decided to have it here," said Praveen Goel, an organizer. He adds that this is one pandal that children frequent everyday in the locality.

By Indo Asian News Service

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MiG-21 crashes in Punjab, pilot safe

By Indo Asian News Service | IANS – Tue, Sep 6, 2011

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Rajpura (Punjab), Sep 6 (IANS) The Indian Air Force (IAF) Tuesday lost another MiG-21 combat aircraft in a crash near Rajpura town in Punjab's Patiala district. The young pilot, who was on a routine training sortie, bailed out to safety before the crash.

'A MiG-21 Bison crashed about 10 km from the Ambala airbase (in Haryana) from where it had got airborne. The pilot, Flight Lieutenant A. Ghosh, ejected out of the plane safely,' an IAF spokesperson said in New Delhi.

'The crash took place when the aircraft was on an approach south of Ambala. The pilot was on a routine training sortie,' he added.

The plane crashed on agricultural land near the Shumbu barrier, 10 km from Rajpura town, Rajpura Superintendent of Police Manmohan Sharma told IANS.
'No loss of life was reported on the ground. Air force, district administration and police officials have reached the spot and cordoned off the area,' he said.
The crash site, about 50 km from state capital Chandigarh, is close to the busy National Highway No.1 between Delhi and Amritsar.
On Aug 2, the IAF had lost one of its pilots in a MiG-21 crash near Bikaner in Rajasthan.
Only last week, the IAF chief, Air Chief Marshal Normal Anil Kumar Browne, had said that beginning December, only experienced pilots will fly the Soviet-era MiG-21s, which have a poor safety record.
The MiG-21s, which the IAF first bought in 1961 and has operated over 400 of them in its fleet for over 40 years, have earned the sobriquet 'flying coffins' after over 100 planes were lost in crashes between 1993 and 2002. India plans to retire the over 100 MiG-21s presently in its fleet by 2017.
Before the phase out, the IAF would begin inducting 126 medium multi-role combat aircraft for which a $10.4-billion tender is likely to be finalised before March 2012.

The IAF has been persisting with the supersonic MiG-21 for long to train its rookie pilots as it did not have a better medium-powered plane between the HJT-16 Kirans and more sophisticated aircraft like the Jaguar, the Mirage-2000 and the Sukhoi SU-30MKI. That gap was filled with the IAF buying the Hawk advanced jet trainer in 2004, with deliveries beginning in early 2008.

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By Indo Asian News Service

London, Sep 7 (IANS) About 750,000 people could die in East Africa over the next four months due to famine, if enough aid didn't reach the famine-stricken region, the UN has warned.

According to the UN, about 12 million people across the region, and four million in Somalia alone, are in need of food aid, Daily Mail reported.
Getting aid to the starving is a 'race against time', said a top humanitarian official for Somalia, while also warning that the famine is likely to spread before the end of the year.

Mark Bowden, who heads the UN office coordinating humanitarian aid to Somalia, said: 'This isn't a short-term crisis.'

There are fears as many as 750,000 people could starve to death. This is a rise of 66 percent from July. Hundreds of Somalis are dying every day, at least half of which are children.
Bowden said the four million Somalis in need of aid represented more than half of the country's entire population.
The southern Bay region is the latest to be declared a famine zone.
Nearly 60 per cent of people there are acutely malnourished - four times the rate at which an emergency is declared.
'I've not seen anything like it,' said Grainne Moloney, the head of the food security unit.
Famine has now affected six areas, including four southern Somali regions and two settlements of refugees.
The UN says tens of thousands of people already have died in Somalia due to the severe violence, drought and famine.

Over 150,000 refugees have sought aid in the last few months. Families in Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti have also been affected.

Prasar Bharati approves expansion of DD's DTH platform

By Indo Asian News Service
New Delhi, Sep 6 (IANS) The Prasar Bharati board Tuesday approved further expansion of national broadcaster Doordarshan's Direct to Home (DTH) platform so as to reach 150 channels by December, an official statement said.
The board also approved the DTH platform adding another 100 channels in 2012.
At its 104th meeting here, the board approved expansion of the All India Radio's FM stations to all 313 cities planned for coverage under the FM expansion scheme of the information and broadcasting ministry, an official statement said.
The board approved a token allocation of Rs.300 crores 'as bridge finance for undertaking this work to be recouped from the government once the scheme of expansion of FM coverage by All India Radio is approved and adopted in the 12th Five Year Plan'.
The board approved creation of 2,183 new vacancies in All India Radio to cover new projects and a special package for Jammu and Kashmir.
A similar scheme for Doordarshan has also been sought and is expected to be approved before the end of September.
Strengthening of finance wing of Prasar Bharati also came up for discussion. The board approved nine posts at the level of general manager and manager, exclusively for strengthening finance, budget and accounting wings of Prasar Bharati.
The board also noted the result of the latest auction of the six vacant slots on the DTH platform at the prices ranging from 3.21 crores to 3.5 crores per year.
It was decided to consider adoption of the e-auction model for programming of slots on Doordarshan as well.
The board also mooted an amendment to an act which governs telecast of sports events held in foreign countries with the aim of enabling Doordarshan garner greater revenue through an equal sharing policy.
Sources said the board proposed policy amendment to the Sports Broadcasting Signals (Mandatory Sharing with Prasar Bharati) Act so that revenues of the events held abroad and telecast by Doordarshan be shared on an equal basis with foreign broadcast partner.
The board decided that the information and broadcasting minister be requested to immediately implement the recommendation because 'of the heavy financial consequences imposed on Doordarshan due to unequal playing field provided under the present dispensation'.

Accused says CBI tampering with 2G evidence

By Indo Asian News Service | IANS 
New Delhi, Sep 6 (IANS) The Supreme Court was told by an accused in the 2G case Tuesday that the Central Bureau of Investigation was tampering with evidence by asking the telecom regulator to revisit its opinion that the precise value of the spectrum, if it had been auctioned, could not be arrived at.
Senior counsel Ram Jethmalani told an apex court bench of Justice G.S. Singhvi and Justice H.L. Dattu that 'your (CBI) intended correspondence so that TRAI (Telecom Regulatory Authority of India) should change its opinion amounts to tampering with evidence - a habit we (his client) are totally free of'.
Jethmalani was arguing on the bail plea of Unitech's Sanjay Chandra. The court was hearing a plea by Chandra and Vinod Goenka of Swan Telecom challenging the Delhi High Court's May 23 verdict rejecting their bail applications.
As Jethmalani told the court that 'if they (CBI) don't want to rely on a piece of evidence as it does not suit them, it is entirely up to them. But the disclosure (of that evidence) must be made', Additional Solicitor General Harin Raval gave the copy of TRAI's opinion to the court and the petitioner's counsel.
Senior counsel told the court that normally the apex court did not interfere with the high court's findings in bail matters, but if 'there is grave, blatant and atrocious miscarriage of justice and raises important question of law' then the apex court may interfere with it.
The court was told that Chandra had cooperated and made himself available to the investigating agency as and when it asked him to. The court was told that in one instance when Chandra was abroad and was required by the investigating agency, he cut short his visit and came back to India.
Describing the high court judgment as 'wonderful', Jethmalani said that the fact that his client was not arrested by the investigating agency was held against him (in the high court) as his being 'very influential'.
Referring to certain media reports, the court said: 'Irrespective of the dignity of any person in the society, leave aside those who are accused in the case, they are assassinated in the society.'