News

IndianExpress: Life for students from standards I to VIII in government and private school is going to be tougher from this academic year. The department of education has introduced eight diagnostic tests over and above the four unit tests and two examinations, taking the total tests to 14.

The previous system included four unit tests, two per semester, plus one term-end and one final examination. The new tests will be held in four subjects for classes I to IV and in five subjects for classes V to VIII, and will be objective in nature. Four such tests will be held in each semester, and though they will carry 10 marks each, they will not be counted in the final result.

The purpose is to give some feedback to the teachers regarding each child’s understanding of basic concepts, without which the child cannot progress to the next class,’’ said primary education director Dilip Gogate. It would also curb the tendency of teachers to attend to those who top the class, he added.

IndianExpress: The Armed Forces might be mired in controversies over the role of women in the Army but an internal study conducted by the Director General Armed Forces Medical Services (DGAFMS) on the competency of women put them not only on a par with their male counterparts, but also labels them as being more responsible, transparent and meticulous.

‘‘Women are competent enough for a combative role. The notion that women are physically weak is a myth. Given a suitable chance they will excel in whatever role or duties they have been entrusted with — whether fighting or flying supersonic combat aircraft,’’ Vice-Admiral V K Singh said
 
The report was done by collecting data for five years on women officials attached with the medical corp. The study takes into account physical and mental ability of medical officers, paramedics and nurses attached to the corp. In fact, plans are on to put female officials on warships.

IndianExpress: Incessant rain for the second consecutive day and poor visibility due to a thick cloud cover disrupted most flights at the Pune International Airport on Sunday. With both incoming and outbound flights delayed by up to three hours, the Lohegaon terminal building was overflowing with stranded passengers and relatives.

There are 35 flights that take off from Lohegaon and a similar number that land here. On Saturday too, flights from Pune airport were delayed by over three hours due to bad weather conditions.

IndianExpress: Be it Zinedine Zidane’s skills with the balls, David Beckham’s free kicks or Miroslav Klose’s strikes on target, it is the city’s clubs and pubs that are raking in the moolah. With FIFA World Cup Football entering the final stages, the soccer fans of the city have kept the cash registers of clubs and pubs ringing.

A majority of them have seen their business going up by at least 15-20 per cent. ‘‘Restaurant sales have definitely gone up and customers love to sit here till the match gets over,’’ says Amardeep Singh, manager, sales and marketing, Hotel Aurora Towers, who has put up a big screen at Aqua Lounge. ‘‘It is a happy time for both pub owners and soccer enthusiasts.’’

NDTV.com: India’s space agency is set to launch its heaviest satellite, a move that will catapult the country into the multi-billion dollar launch market.

The new communications satellite weighs 2.2 tonne and is due to lift off in mid-July from Sriharikota, country’s spaceport on the southeastern coast.

Launches from India is likely to be 30-35 percent cheaper than other countries.

The Indian Space Research Organisation is investing $543 million to upgrade infrastructure for launching heavier rockets to carry satellites weighing four tonne.
 

MSNBC.com: Consumers wanting to ditch old printers, personal computers or other electronics gear made by Dell Inc. will soon be able to recycle them for free, chairman Michael Dell announced Wednesday.

“We don’t think the consumer should have to pay for the responsible retirement of used computer equipment,” Dell said.

The new recycling policy, already available in Europe, is slated to launch in the United States by September and the rest of the world by November.
Industrywide, companies have begun adopting more affordable recycling policies to prevent cadmium, mercury and lead and other hazardous materials contained in many electronics from ending up in landfills as so-called “e-waste.”

MSNBC.com: Yahoo Inc. will consider refunding money to thousands of advertisers dating back to January 2004 and pay $4.95 million in attorney fees to settle a class-action lawsuit alleging the Internet powerhouse has been profiting from bogus sales referrals generated through a sham known as “click fraud.”

The agreement, given preliminary approval Wednesday by U.S. District Judge Christina Snyder in Los Angeles, doesn’t limit Yahoo’s liability — one of several contrasts to a settlement reached in March by online search engine leader Google Inc. to resolve a class-action lawsuit over the same issue.

The settlement also will give Yahoo an opportunity to provide more clarity about one of the most confusing — and potentially disruptive — issues hanging over the rapidly growing Internet advertising market

News.com: Bad weather forced NASA to postpone the launch of the space shuttle Discovery on Sunday for the second consecutive day, with the next launch attempt set for Tuesday.

The decision to cancel liftoff came minutes after the seven crew members boarded the spaceship, even before the vessel’s hatch was closed. Hours before, NASA forecasters had estimated only a 30 percent chance that weather would favor launch, as thunderclouds menaced the Kennedy Space Center
Any rain during liftoff might damage the spaceship’s heat-shielding tiles, and a lightning strike could knock out the computers that control the ship. Even some kinds of thick, high clouds make launch hazardous.

ITV.com: An asteroid big enough to wipe out a small country is about to pass the Earth.It has been classed as a Potentially Hazardous Asteroid (PHA) named 2004 XP14 is around half a mile wide and travelling at 17 kilometres per second.It will not hit Earth but it will pass almost as close as the moon.

The object, discovered in December 2004, is one of a class of “apollo” asteroids whose orbits cross that of the Earth.Initially there were concerns that the asteroid might collide with the Earth later this century.