News

IndianExpress: With an eye on the civic elections early next year, Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh on Monday disbursed Rs 112 crore to all the civic bodies in the State to carry out road repairs. Pune too got its share of Rs 3.15 crore to level roads, fill potholes and fix the bad patches. Mumbai was the largest beneficiary with a grant of around Rs 17.80 crore.

The cheque was handed over to Mayor Rajni Tribhuvan at a workshop organised for mayors, municipal commissioners, municipal council presidents, chief executive officers and district collectors on Monday.

However, it is not the lack of funds that has held up road repairs in Pune. This year, the allocation was increased from Rs 50 crore to Rs 250 crore in the civic budget. Moreover, in the last four months the civic administration had spent at least Rs 6 crore for the roads under the Integrated Road Development Plan (IRDP) and non-IRDP and another Rs 30 lakh for repairing the city’s roads.

IndianExpress: As the tug-of-war between the Union Government and minority institutions regarding admission and allotment of seats in professional and technical courses continues to go on without any consensus reached, it is the students who are caught in the crossfire.

One such case is that of 30 students, who were allotted to the Maharashtra Cosmopolitan Education Society’s (MCES) Allana Institute of Management Sciences (AIMS) on the basis of their results in the government-held MHT-CET-MBA in February.

These students — when they applied to the college — were denied admission on grounds that the college would not accept government CET students as the case was still in the Supreme Court and hence, sub judice.

IndianExpress: The Pune Municipal Corporation has decided to outsource health services. The decision to develop a 60-bed trauma centre at Bopodi on a Build, Operate and Transfer (BOT) basis is the first step and the tendering process for the project has already begun.

The centre will benefit residents of Bopodi, Dapodi and Khadki along the Mumbai-Pune highway, though the services would not be subsidised for people other than those falling under the Below Poverty Line (BPL) and PMC employees.

The trauma centre has come up in view of the rise in the number of mishaps in the highway. At present, the victims of accidents have to be taken to Sassoon Hospital or to private clinics

IndianExpress: CIVIC health officials are leaving no stone unturned to ensure that citizens celebrate a safe and healthy Ganeshotsav this year.

Be it, sampling the ‘gulal’ and examining it at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) laboratory, activating emergency ambulances at private hospitals or setting up mobile teams of doctors to provide first aid during the ten-day festival.
 
Also, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) health officials have resisted the move by activists of the Hindu Jagran Manch who have allegedly urged citizens to immerse the Ganesh idol in the river, instead of the immersion tanks set up at 60 ghats.

IndianExpress: BAJAJ Auto Limited will invest Rs. 2,000 crore to set up its fifth manufacturing unit on 250 acres in Chakan that will roll out 5 lakh three and four-wheeler vehicles.

Bajaj Auto signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the State government on Monday. ‘‘Three-wheelers and light four-wheelers are important for the automobile industry, in India and many foreign markets. Our R&D is developing new products for this segment and we propose to build a new state-of-the-art plant at Chakan to produce these products,’’ said chairman Rahul Bajaj.

IndianExpress: Officials from the Forest Department conducted a search operation in the premises of Shri Chanakya Education Society’s Indira Group of Institutes, Wakad, after People for Animals, Mumbai, alleged that an illegal zoo has been set up at the premises.

Divisional Forest Officer Ashok Khadse said a sub divisional forest officer and two range forest officers conducted the search operation, which began around noon.

He said that PFA volunteer Manoj Oswal and Young Jains of India volunteer Dhiraj Jain had lodged complaints about the zoo and added that PFA founder Maneka Gandhi had also called up the Forest Department in this regard

TechTree: ASUSTeK Computer (Asus) has launched its sleek 12.1-inch ultra portable U5F Notebook Series, which according to the company, is entirely environmentally friendly (RoHS-compliant).

The U5F series marries Asus Splendid Technology with integrated Bluetooth EDR, and according to Asus, is ideal for business professionals who require mobility with full connectivity on-the-fly.

Speaking at the launch, Richard Chen, business manager - notebook business, Asus India, said, “The U5F is the latest ultra-portable offering from ASUSTeK. It s a notebook which combines aesthetics, style, and a whole gamut of the latest desirable features all rolled into a compact, slim, and light package.”

TechTree: Sony Electronics has unveiled the BWU-100A, its first internal Blu-ray Disc (BD) rewritable drive that supports up to 50GB of data on BD-R (write once) or BD-RE (rewritable) discs, or up to four hours of high-definition video using HDV 1080i on a BD-RE 50GB disc.

The company says the new drive is capable of burning a full 25GB disc in around 50 minutes, and is optimized for video in native HDV 1080i for playback on home players that are compatible with BD-AV format, and on PCs that have BD drives installed. The BD drive also supports recording of standard single layer 4.7GB DVD R/RW/RAM discs, 8.5GB DVDR Double/Dual Layer Discs, and CDs, thus making it a multi-format burner.

News.com: The PicoCricket Kit centers on a small device, appropriately called the PicoCricket. The tiny computer can be attached to all sorts of building blocks, sensors, motors and lights; connected via USB or serial cable to a Mac or PC; and programmed with a piece of software called PicoBlocks.

Playful Invention Co. (Pico) is promoting the new toy as a way for children–the intended audience is 9 and older–to use technology to explore art, music and other creative fields. Kids can design light-up lamps, motorized toys, stuffed animals that make noise when patted, and other inventions.

Pico and the PicoCricket Kit arose out of a collaboration between Lego and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Laboratory, the team responsible for Lego’s MindStorms robotics kit line. Like MindStorms, PicoCricket fuses plastic building blocks with electronic sensors, output devices and controller software. But according to Mitchel Resnick, an MIT professor who has worked on both projects, PicoCricket aims to reach out to kids who might be interested in something other than building robots.