News

IndianExpress: NITIN Shantilal Modha, a member of the gang led by Aftab Alam Mohammed Ayub who calls the shots from his base in the Gulf, had managed to give a slip to the Interpol and other agencies and returned to India for a short while in June this year.

Modha, who hails from Gujarat is the prime suspect in the kidnap and murder of Sagar Sahani, the son of a city businessman. He was wanted by the police ever since Sahani was kidnapped in August last year. Judicial Magistrate (First Class) K M Jaiswal had issued an arrest warrant in his name on September 23, 2005. Various agencies including the Interpol had began looking for him after a red corner notice was issued in his name in December 2005.

Police officials said they came to know that Modha had returned to India in June when he was brought to Pune after being arrested in Delhi.

IndianExpress: FOR 16 years, a proposal that former professor of psychiatry at BJ Medical College Mohan Agashe submitted to the State government for setting up permanent cells to counsel disaster survivors in Mumbai has been gathering dust. Today, post-7/11, Agashe in his new avataar as the advisor to the State government’s mental health programme, is all set to make the proposal a reality.

The reason: Mumbai, with a series of natural and man-made disasters, is badly in need of permanent counselling cells for the victims. ‘‘Mumbai has always been a metropolis with a set of problems different from that of any other city in the country. This is due to the sheer speed of life. Now, the time has come to set up a permanent counselling cell for disaster victims and this is the first job I am undertaking in my new capacity,’’ he said.

IndianExpress: WHIZKIDS from the city have done it again. Varun Jog and Abhishek Dang, both students of SP College, have won laurels at the 47th International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO), which was held in Slovenia in the first week of July. While Jog, who cleared his HSC examination this year, bagged the bronze medal, Dang, a standard XII student was awarded a consolation prize for his impressive performance.

This is not the first time that the two have shone at the international olympiads. For Dang, it was his third stint at the IMO, while for Jog it was his second. Having bagged a bronze medal in the Greece edition in 2004, Dang outdid himself by winning the silver medal last year at IMO Mexico. This young prodigy has also won gold medals at the last two International Astronomical Olympiads, held in Ukraine and China.

IndianExpress: THIS year’s Road Safety Day was an eye-opener for Standard XII students Deepika and Kranti Jagtap. They were amongst the 50-odd children from Abhinav Education Society’s Junior College who manned the traffic on Satara Road.

‘‘Whenever I drove, I used to break traffic rules. However, today when I was manning traffic and trying to convince people, a realisation occured to me. I promised myself to follow traffic norms whenever I drive a motorcycle the next time,’’ says Kranti.

However, her sister Deepika sensed that Puneites are very rude when it comes to grasping traffic norms. ‘‘We requested an autorickshaw driver to halt at the stop-line at the zebra crossing, but he did not budge. People argued, saying what will happen tomorrow when you students will not be around,’’ she said.

TechTree.com: Taiwan based Genius, one of the leading IT and Consumer Electronics brand across the globe, has announced the launch of their new innovation in world of music, their latest and one of its kind MP3 Player with Pedometer.

According to the company sources, Genius MP3-DJ Sports a sleek, lightweight, and trendy audio music player that not only runs MP3 music but also plays FM Radio. Genius MP3-DJ Sport biggest advantage is that it is a multi-utility, ultra-portable player with a special pedometer and calorie calculator functions that’s especially been created for all the fitness freaks across the globe.

Genius MP3-DJ Sport can be wrapped around the arm while exercising, jogging, and it provides regular updates to one’s body’s responses to the particular exercise besides giving the calorie counts.

News.com: Maybe it’s the robotic dog resting in the corner or the R2-D2 “Star Wars” droid on the floor, but Tandy Trower’s office is not a typical workstation found on the Microsoft campus.

Trower heads the Microsoft Robotics Group, a nine-person operation with the modest trappings of a start-up company but grand ambitions befitting a $44 billion software giant.

Microsoft aims to bring robotics technology to the masses with programming software to ease the development of new applications, replicating an approach it adopted in the early days of the personal computer industry.

“It really is like a little bit of deja vu,” said Trower, a 24-year veteran at Microsoft. “The thing that sounds very familiar (with the PC) is you had people asking ‘Why would I want to own this technology?’”

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the PC industry was fragmented and limited to only the geekiest die-hards who could grasp the technology’s complexity and appreciate its potential.

News.com: IBM plans to announce Friday that it is offering its Tivoli Continuous Data Protection for Files to home users and to small and medium-size businesses.

Big Blue plans to reach this market via a new online distribution agreement with Digital River, which will sell the software through its oneNetwork marketplace. Digital River’s online marketplace includes major retailers such as Circuit City, CompUSA, OfficeMax and Staples.

IBM, which also plans to offer its continuous data protection product through its Web site, will sell the software for $35 per laptop or desktop.

The Tivoli Continuous Data Protection for Files is designed to save users’ information continuously in real time rather than in periodic snapshots.

Once the information is saved, an encrypted copy is sent to a remote location, such as a USB drive.
 

ABCNews.com: Space Adventures Ltd., the Virginia-based firm that brokered the privately paid for space flights of Dennis Tito and two other multimillionaires, today announced that it’s expanding its offerings. For $20 million, Space Adventures will get you a ride to the International Space Station in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft. For an extra $15 million, you can now go on a 90-minute spacewalk.

Just imagine. You climb into a Russian-made Orlan spacesuit, slowly depressurize the airlock, open the hatch, and then you and a cosmonaut partner float out into the void. For 90 minutes (about $10 million an hour) there is nothing between you and infinity but the gold-tinted visor of your suit. Tethers are included so you don’t float away.