News

IndianExpress: IF there is a flood in the rural parts of Pune district this year, a well-oiled machinery will begin moving to rescue people and ensure they get food and water in time.

In a grass root-level action, some 49,000 trained members of the Village Disaster Management Committees (VDMCs) and Village Disaster Management Teams (VDMTs) will help victims.

For the first time, collectorate officials have gone to the villages to ensure there is no slip-up in the disaster management plan that is part of the Government of India-United Nation Development Programme Disaster Risk Management Programme. Pune district was selected as the pilot project.

IndianExpress:  WITH Pune district recording more than normal average rainfall in the month of June, sowing activity for kharif season has gained momentum in the district. So far, 41.2 per cent of sowing for kharif season has been completed in the district.

In June last year, Pune district had recorded 142.4 mm average rainfall. However, the average rainfall recorded in the month of June this year was 231.6 mm.

In July last year, the average rainfall recorded in the district was 295.7 mm. The average rainfall recorded in the last one week in the district is 150.9 mm.

IndianExpress: Obesity (excessive body fat) has increased to such an extent that researchers at KEM hospital have shown, in an ongoing study, that men and women who were small at birth (low birthweight) have an increased risk of cardiovascular diseases (CVD), type 2 diabetes and insulin resistance syndrome.

This is the first Pune children’s study in which the CVD risk factor was measured in 480 children born at KEM hospital. Birth-weights were obtained from labour ward records. Children were studied at the age of four and eight years with a consistent follow-up every year, says Dr Sheila Bhave, consultant in paediatric research at KEM hospital and one of the co-investigators of the study.

IndianExpress:  THE targeting of Pune Municipal Transport buses by Shiv Sena workers during their agitation on Sunday cost the cash-crunched public transport undertaking a whopping Rs 20 lakh.

The daily revenue collection of the PMT crashed from Rs 45 to 47 lakh to a meagre Rs 30.87 lakh on Sunday. While the damage to glass and tyres by the Sena workers set back the transport body by Rs 5 lakh, it also suffered additional loss due to closing down its schedule.

‘‘After co-ordinating with the police we had to keep the schedules shut between 2.30 pm and 6 pm. This resulted in additional loss in revenue collection,’’ said PMT General Manager Niranjan Kumar Sudhanshu.

IndianExpress: FROM now, drinking of liquor in the railway premises and while travelling will cost a fine of Rs 500 or a jail sentence of six months. The Ministry of Railways has sent a notification to its divisions empowering railway staff to take action against whoever is found doing so.

Section 145 of the Indian Railways Act prohibits consumption of liquor in passenger, express, mail trains and on platforms. The notification has empowered the railway staff to book passengers found in inebriated state who commit any nuisance. The offence will be punishable by a court with a fine of up to Rs 500 and imprisonment which may extend up to six months. Smoking in Railways premises is punishable with a fine of Rs 200 under section 167 of the Act.

IndianExpress: Prabha Dawde’s husband left her two years ago. A resident of Dattawadi slums, she took up a job as an anganwadi helper to support her three children. From serving meals to ensuring health and hygiene at the anganwadi, she looks after all the students’ needs. After a hard day’s work, she is paid a paltry honorarium of Rs. 740 a month, barely enough to sustain her family.

On the Akhil Bharatiya Maagani Divas today, she stood outside the Pune ZP office with her co-workers of the Anganwadi Karmachari Sanghatana, hoping her voice would be heard. Three lakh others like Dawde, protested at 23 states across the country. A ‘relay hunger strike’ will be held at Jantar Mantar in Delhi on July 25, wherein the Maharashtra wing will present its demands between July 28 and July 31.

ITWire.com: IBM plans to release a version of Lotus Notes client groupware for Linux desktops and it will be a free download for existing Lotus Notes users.

There are 125 million Lotus Notes users and a version for a Linux client has been a long time demand of users, especially since Domino has been available for Linux servers since 1998.

The first Linux version, Lotus Notes 7.0 will be available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4, Update 3 clients, with a Novell Suse Linux desktop version promised within three months. Suse Linux Enterprise Desktop 10 is due for release within the next two weeks.

Notes on Linux users will reportedly be able to run all applications that are currently available on Windows provided there is a Domino server 7.0 back-end.

News.com: China has successfully tested a new rocket engine to power the country’s ambitious program of manned space flights and moon landings, the official Xinhua news agency reported Monday.

Tests of the liquid hydrogen- and kerosene-fueled engine were a “complete success,” a spokesperson from the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation told Xinhua.

With maximum propulsion of 120 tons, the new engine is three times more powerful than those currently used by China’s Long March rockets.

The engine will propel a new-generation rocket able to sling heavy satellites and moon exploration equipment into orbit, experts told Xinhua. The report did not say when the new rocket engine would go into service.

News.com: Microsoft has introduced Private Folder 1.0, free software that lets people store sensitive data on their home or work computers in a password-protected folder.

Private Folder 1.0, which is saved to a person’s desktop, aims to shield private data from others when they have access to someone’s computer or account. The potential fallout from IT administrators remains to be seen, should their colleagues opt to hide sensitive data in a private, password-protected folder. Microsoft does not offer support for the software.

“Private Folder 1.0 is a useful tool…to protect your private data when friends, colleagues, kids or other people share your PC or account,” the software giant said in its announcement.

ITNews.com: SanDisk said Monday its begun shipping USB drives to retail stores preinstalled with Skype’s VoIP software.

Plug earphones with microphone and the SanDisk drive into a PC. A phone keypad pops up on the PC’s screen allowing consumers to make free PC-to-PC calls to Skype users in most major markets.

On the SanDisk drives, consumers will find a bundle of four applications that consumes about 40 MB of storage space on either the Cruzer Micro or the Titanium flash drives. Aside from Skype, the drives include a password-protected synchronisation tool, antivirus software, and password manager application that can remember passwords for online trading and banking
The pre-laded applications are based on U3, a technology SanDisk co-developed that provides application developers, such as EBay’s Skype, with a standard platform to create apps for portable devices