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Indianexpress:  THE Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), riding on its success in recent civic polls in the Marathwada region, tasted defeat on Monday, that too right in the backyard of party supremo Sharad Pawar. NCP lost power in four of the seven municipal councils in the district which went to vote on Sunday. Significantly, of the four municipal councils that it lost, three fall under Pawar’s Baramati Lok Sabha constituency. It was the first time that the NCP contested civic polls in these towns as it had always gone in for a tie-up with another party in the past, except for Baramati.

The NCP lost in Indapur, Daund, Alandi and Saswad municipal councils while it won in Baramati, Jejuri and Shirur. District Guardian Minister Ajit Pawar, who was in-charge of NCP’s election campaign, was not available for comment.

Political observers feel that the NCP’s defeat in western Maharashtra would put the party on the backfoot in the State. The party had become increasingly aggressive after winning elections in four municipal corporations in Marathwada where polls were held in November. The NCP has been demanding 60 seats from Congress in the civic elections of Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation scheduled on February 1. It has also been refusing to go in for any sort of alliance with Congress for civic polls in Pune and Pimpri Chinchwad municipal corporations, also scheduled for February 1.

IndianExpress: REINFORCING Pune’s reputation as a hub for back-end operations, VSNL on Monday went live with their global delivery centre at what is considered to be the country’s first IT-specific special economic zone (SEZ) at Kharadi.

“The centre will cover our international footprint and allow us to handle a major component of our back-end operations for our international network support. With this centre, we will be entering the new area of business process outsourcing (BPO). Besides this, the facility will also include network engineering and design,” VSNL International chief technology officer John Hayduk said.

He said VSNL would also look at handling back-end operations for other carriers. “There are a lot of network carriers that will be coming to India soon and we may look at providing BPO services for them as well,” Hayduk said.

Spread over 60,000 sq ft, the centre will have 600 people once the entire facility is operational at Panchshil’s ‘EON Free Zone’. Currently, the company will commence operations from a 180-seater incubational facility.

Following VSNL to the free zone will be automobile products and solutions firm Eaton with a 1,800-seater facility.

IndianExpress: GIVING shape to the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre’s (VSSC) initiative to produce an alternative to petrol and petrol-blended fuels using non-edible vegetable oils, the University of Pune, on Monday, officially handed over land on its campus to VSSC to construct the pilot plant for the project.

This was announced by Vice-Chancellor Narendra Jadhav at a joint press conference with noted scientist and Chairman of the Rajiv Gandhi Science and Technology Commission, Vasant Gowariker.

With a view to tackle the oil crisis fuelled by depleting natural resources and trade imbalance, the VSSC had developed a technology to develop Bio Hydrocarbons via Space Crude Route from Renewable Natural Resources. The technology involves the thermal cracking of non-edible vegetable oils derived from plants of the castor family like jatropha on a small fixed bed reactor system using a specially-developed catalyst, which removes the oxygen to derive a hydrocarbon compound that can directly substitute petrol.

While this technology had been developed and patented in 1976 by the Propellant Engineering Division under Gowariker, it had been discarded as it was not economically feasible.

VSSC decided to revive the project given the current surge in crude oil prices. For this, the space centre has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Jnana Prabodhini to handle the accounts, while the UoP will provide land for the project.

Indianexpress: AN MBA graduate, working as a sales manager for Reliance Insurance in the city, was arrested by the Chatuhshrungi police for duping GESBI Co-operative Company to the tune of Rs 8.17 lakh. The police said the amount was likely to be over Rs 40 lakh.

Devendra Narsingh Sharma (23) of Imperial Residency, Kalyaninagar, whose family owns a textile factory in Indore, since March 28 procured 17 credit cards from the State Bank of India (SBI) by submitting fake documents

He pasted his photographs or those of unknown persons on the forms and attached documents that were fake, stolen or tampered with. SBI manager (fraud detection section) T Padmarajan’s complaint with the Chatuhshrungi police said Sharma had applied for a number of cards by submitting fake document each time.

Investigation officer sub inspector ASA Sayyad said, “Sharma used the cards to pay for petrol, clothes, hotels and purchasing luxury goods.This incident is a warning for other banks to install a prompt scrutiny and monitoring mechanism for documents submitted while issuing credit cards. Sharma hails from a good family and has an excellent academic record. However, he took the short cut to become rich. He has confessed that he has duped the company for Rs 40 lakhs.’’

TechTree: Intex Technologies has unveiled an ultra-slim, light-weight range of wide-screen TFT-LCD monitors comprising three models; 1404 W, 1504 W, and 1704 W, designed in 14.1-inch, 15.4-inch, and 17-inch sizes respectively.

Equipped with RoHS (Restriction of Hazardous Substances) compatibility, the entire range is environment friendly. A user can savor multi-tasking and best quality visual output, on the wide display area, for computing, multi-media, and gaming applications. The monitors score high on aesthetics, convenience, and space saving features.

Sanjay Kumar, Product Manager for PC, Intex, said, “This is our latest offering after the launch of the 19-inch TFT-LCD monitor. Intex 1404 W and 1504 W are apt for basic computing needs, and are a perfect choice for students, home users, SOHO and small enterprises. Professionals, big corporates, and entertainment enthusiasts will find the best desktop companion in 1704 W.”

The new range that is Vista compatible is available at prices ranging between Rs 7,000 and Rs 9,900.

TechTree: Sony Ericsson has broadened its Walkman phone portfolio by introducing the “W200″.

The W200 Walkman phone, according to Sony Ericsson, includes all key features needed to take the first step towards ‘music on your mobile’.

The W200 can store up to 37 full length tracks, and can support up to 18 hours of music listening. It enables simple transferring of music from the PC with the Disc2Phone music management software bundled with it.

Talking about the new Walkman phone, Steve Walker, Head of Product Marketing, Sony Ericsson, said, “The W200 is an affordable music phone that compliments existing MP3 players. It’s not everyday that you want to carry lots of devices with you; and with the W200, you have enough music storage for your current playlist, and if you get tired of these, the FM Radio allows you to quickly tune-in to your favourite drive-time show.”

The W200 features a dedicated Walkman key that takes you straight to the Walkman player menu. It comes with a 128MB Memory Stick Micro (M2) card that can be used to share music instantly with friends, and 128MB internal memory. However, the memory card can be upgraded to higher storage capacity.

In addition, the W200 allows pre-setting of up to 20 radio stations and comes bundled with the color-matched Stereo Headset HPM-64, which Sony Ericsson claims to be the first to feature Bass Reflex that preserves audio quality when the bass is turned up. The radio can also be used as an alarm clock with the in-built speakerphone.

TechTree: InSilica has developed its next generation image processor “INS-3510″ which according to the company, beats the cost, power, and size constraints associated with high volume camera phones.

According to Renu Raman, Vice President of InSilica, “Till date, the few phones that have come near digital still camera (DSC) class capability have done so at extreme price and power consumption premiums. The INS-3510 was designed from the ground up to move true ‘print and frame’ quality photographic capability into the highest volume segments of the phone market.”

Interestingly, the INS-3510 brings full 3- and 5-megapixel DSC class capabilities to lower cost mobile phones with features previously not available such as advanced adaptive tone mapping, and full auto-functions.

Using programmable architecture, additional features like special effects can be included to facilitate further customization of phones.

With INS-3510, Insilica claims to minimize the negative effects of adding advanced camera features to phones. The INS-3510 has been designed from the ground up to leverage deep submicron 90nm process and advanced physical design techniques to attain very small die size and low power consumption.

The company believes that the new image processor with optimized firmware and tuning for all primary image sensor providers will enable handsets to use multiple sources in sensors.

TechTree: Toshiba has reportedly announced its first HD DVD writer “SD-H903A” for desktop PCs.

According to Toshiba, this is the world’s first dedicated HD DVD Writer for the Desktop that offers all the functionality of a super multi-drive, with high performance, high-speed read and write to HD DVD, and to standard DVD and CD discs.

Using this, consumers can capture content, edit home videos, and create vast digital content repositories for movies, music, and photos.

The new “SD-H903A” incorporates a blue-violet laser diode that can read and write to HD DVD-R discs, and offers support for high-density HD DVD-ROM discs, including high definition movie and video images.

Taking advantage of the shared physical structure of HD DVD discs and standard DVD discs, it reads and writes to HD DVD-R discs, and to standard DVD and CD discs, using an optical pick-up head with a single objective lens.

Toshiba believes that designed for single-bay desktop PCs, the new “SD-H903A” is the perfect solution for professional high-definition content creation. It allows PC and CE (Consumer Electronics) manufacturers to make a smooth and affordable transition to high-definition offerings.

Moreover, the “SD-H903A” features a Serial ATA (SATA) interface for superior performance. It is fully compliant with the EU’s RoHS directive, which came into force in July 2006.

The new Toshiba SD-H903A will be featured at the ongoing International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2007 in Las Vegas. Sample shipments are slated to begin this month onwards. Pricing will be revealed upon availability.

TechTree: Sony Corporation has announced it will enable most of its new televisions, including high-definition flat screens, to play video from the Internet.

The company, which unveiled this plan at the ongoing Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, said that the drive to combine Internet and other digital video with traditional devices was part of a bid to showcase its four strategic growth areas, including video gaming, digital imaging, high definition, and mobile products.

Going further with this move, Stan Glasgow, President and Chief Operating Officer, Sony Electronics, unveiled the company’s first Internet video system. Glasgow announced that starting this year, the majority of new Sony televisions, starting with several ‘BRAVIA’ flat-panel LCD TVs, would accept an attachable module that can stream broadband high-definition and other Internet video content with the push of a remote control button.

This first-of-its-kind Sony feature, which is expected to be available this summer, would enable consumers to access video content from the Internet via an optional module without requiring a PC. The module links the television set directly to a user’s broadband Internet service provider via an Ethernet connection.

And using the TV’s remote control and optional module, consumers can access the Internet and simply navigate through a series of menus to browse and play free videos. Sony also informed that consumers could easily pause, fast forward, and rewind a video using the TV’s remote control.