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indianexpress:  PUNE’S Ganpati visarjan procession is among the most sought-after event in the cultural calendar. The traditional procession that passes through Laxmi Road, accompanied by dhol-tasha troupes is all song, dance and quite a spectacle watched by lakhs.

Adding to the splendour this year will be a troupe of tribal dancers from Nandurbar in Taloda district. On Tuesday, dressed in all their finery, the troupe will be the star attraction of Hind Tarun Mandal in Camp leading the mandal’s immersion procession.

It won’t be the first time for them. They have already performed and won several hearts in Pune when they showcased their talent on Saturday for the processions of Jwala Mitra Mandal at Kharadi and Kanjarbhat Tarun Mandal at Yerawada.

The troupe is in Pune on special invitation by the Ganesh mandals that has put them up in a flat and arranged for their meals. “Instead of calling local troupes to play dhol and tasha, we thought of giving an opportunity to these people and also help them financially,” said treasurer of Hind Tarun Mandal Rajesh Kurhade.

The men in the group will be wearing a white dhoti and a vest with a belt made of metal balls and bells on their waists, chains of Re one coins on their necks and peacock feathers in a cone shaped headdress. They will dance to the beats of the heavy wooden drums slung around their necks. The women will wear nine-yard sarees and jewellery.

indianexpress:  WITH genetic disorders on the rise, Maharashtra University of Health Science (MUHS) will set up its own research laboratory on genetic testing at its regional centre in Pune. Currently, there are around 4,000 known genetic disorders with more being discovered. Genetic testing will help identify an increased risk of developing a particular disease. At present, only a few select laboratories conduct the tests.

Dr P M Shere, coordinator of the regional centre of MUHS at Aundh said equipment is being installed. Genetic disorder is a condition caused by abnormalities in genes. It is a disease that is caused by an abnormality in an individual’s DNA. To determine the presence of an altered gene and identify an increased risk of developing diseases like Down’s Syndrome and other disorders, genetic testing is crucial, explained Dr Prakash Gambhir, head of the department of genetics at the centre.

The laboratory will concentrate on genetic investigations and also conduct newborn screening tests as part of a research project with State government hospitals. For instance, a disorder is like hypothyroidism (or underactive thyroid) is found at least in one in 5,000 babies. This congenital hypothyroidism is a disorder where the thyroid fails to grow normally and cannot produce enough of its hormone. There is no known cause, but screening of babies for hypothyroidism 24 hours after birth can help in identifying the disorder, explained Gambhir.

indianexpress: THE proposed ring road project meant to decongest Pune’s roads by diverting heavy traffic from the city to the outskirts is likely to cost Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) Rs 409 crore for land acquisition. The total amount to be spent on land acquisition for the project is estimated at Rs 855.40 crore with PMC, Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation and Public Works Department chipping in.

The ring road has been divided into four stretches starting from Somatne Phata to Pune City (South) to Lohegaon (North) to Wadki. The road will pass through Mhamurdi, Kiwale, Chincholi, Nigdi, Talawade, Chikhli, Moshi, Wadmukhwadi, Charholi, Nirgudi, Wadgaon Shinde, Lohegaon, Wagholi, Manjri Khurd, Loni Kalbhor, Phursungi, Wadki, Urali Devachi, Undri, Pisoli, Katraj, Kondhwa Budruk, Nimbalkarwadi, Shindewadi, Ambegaon Khurd, Dhayari, Wadgaon Khurd, Warje, Bhugaon, Lande, Jambhe, Mahlungi and Maan.

Two months ago, the civic administration had sent a proposal to the standing committee to permit PMC to pay for the land acquisition for the 90-mt wide and 117. 52 km long project.

The discussion on the proposal was postponed after the BJP opposed the civic administration’s plan to pay for the land acquisition process saying it was outside the city’s limits and there was no reason for tax-payers to bear its burden. The ruling alliance partner Shiv Sena and opposition Congress too had joined BJP in opposing the PMC to spend money for the ring road and sought details of the project.

indianexpress: POLICE commissioner Jayant Umranikar has appealed to all city mandals to strictly adhere by the Supreme Court directives on use of loudspeakers on Monday. Umranikar also asked mandals to refrain from excessive use of gulal since it was injurious to health.

For the immersion processions in the city on Tuesday, Umranikar said the police had divided the city into sectors. According to Umranikar, sector-wise allocation of police personnel would help them provide immediate reinforcements comprising police personnel, JCB and fire brigade to other sectors in case of emergencies. “ A number of NGOs and social organisations have come forward to help the police during the immersion procession. They will provide food to the policemen on duty,” Umranikar said, adding that the entire police force would be on the roads by 8 am on Tuesday.

He urged citizens who turn up in large numbers to watch the processions to be vigilant and act in self-defence in case of an emergency. The police commissioner also cautioned senior citizens and urged them to keep the doors closed as they might be targeted by thieves. He has asked them to call the police control room for help.

indianexpress: ON his way to head the new Indian consulate in Guangzhau (formerly Canton) in China is Indian Foreign Service officer Gautam Bambawale, a Puneite and former student of Fergusson College and Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is scheduled to inaugurate the consulate, that’s come up due to increased trade relations between India and China, in late December or early January. Speaking at a felicitation ceremony organised by the Ex-Fergussonians’ Association at the Fergusson College premises on Monday, Bambawale outlined his strategy thus: “Promoting Indian exports, and bringing more Chinese investment to India.”

Not that China is unknown terrain for Bambawale. His former two stints at Beijing were in 1988-91, and 1998-2001. Having closely observed the development of China over the last 20 years, he said that the diplomatic success in the form of the Bilateral Peace and Tranquility Agreement, which has reduced the presence of armed forces along the Indo-China border, has gradually created an atmosphere conducive to mutual development.

“In the days to come, our largest trading partner will be China, not the US. Together, the two Asian giants will command great eco-political clout. I also see a significant rise in educational and cultural exchanges, “ he said.

indianexpress: TO streamline its Open Distance Learning (ODL) system and expanding its learner base, the Maharashtra Regional Centre of Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), Pune will host the West Zone meeting of the six western regional centres —Ahmedabad, Bhopal, Jabalpur, Jaipur, Rajkot and Pune at Yashwantrao Chavan Academy of Development Administration (YASHADA) on Tuesday.

“To strengthen its network, IGNOU has taken a policy decision to launch five zonal centres across the country. For Maharashtra regional centre, we want to set up an ODL centre in each district of the State. The meeting will help identify areas where we are lacking and work towards improvement,” said IGNOU regional director B Sukumar at a press conference on Monday.

Regional directors, coordinators, programme in-charges, and academic counselors from various regional centres will attend the meeting chaired by IGNOU Pro-Vice Chancellor Pravin Sinclair. The meeting will include a brainstorming session with focus on learner support for practicals, technology mediated instruction, streamlining evaluation of assignments, undertaking promotional activity measures and innovative means for effective academic counseling.

techtree: ”A PC for every home” may not be such a distant possibility after all — especially if you happen to be a MTNL customer!

The state-owned telecom major, in association with Chennai-based Novatium, is today launching its Rs 4,500 PC, which comes with the added benefit of an Internet connection for just a small monthly fee.

The computer, christened ‘netPC’, will be launched today in the capital by Communication and IT minister, A Raja.

While ‘netPC’ looks and feels like any other PC, it’s essentially a no-frills device. Which means it lacks most of the common hardware found on a typical PC. It does not have a regular CPU or any storage device.

MTNL will connect the terminals to a centralised server in the locality, and will provide the PC with Internet access. All applications including consumers’ data storage will be done by the server.

According to Novatium, the advantage of ‘netPC’ is that customers will not have to face the challenges that are associated with a regular PC.
Besides, they will retain the choice to use either Windows or Linux operating systems.

The Novatium Web site explains the concept of ‘netPC’ as: “netPC reaches one’s home on a network cable just like a cable television service or Broadband. Metro ethernet deployments are quickly becoming a pervasive reality, and hence, instead of just Internet Broadband to one’s home, one can ask for a complete desktop with inbuilt Internet access, educational packages, online games, chat, Web cam, productivity suites, and much more served on the Nova netPC.”

techtree: HFCL Infotel, providers of fixed line- and Broadband- services in Punjab, have launched their mobile service for Punjab and Chandigarh, under the brand name ‘Ping’.

‘Ping’ offers call charges of 1 paisa per second, with the benefit of single second billing. This means that users will pay for exact usage time — in seconds, rather than in minutes.

In addition, HFCL has launched a new SIM-based color mobile handset on which the ‘Ping’ mobile service will be made available. The handset is priced at Rs 999, with 6,000 minutes of free on-net calls, along with free ‘Ping’ Tunes subscription for one month.

The SIM-based color mobile handset has a speaker phone feature with a large phone book and voice recording facility.

The service will be available on the CDMA platform across 150 towns and 5,000 villages in Punjab and Chandigarh.

Meanwhile, HFCL’s existing ‘Connect’ landline subscribers are being offered ‘Valued customer advantage’ under which, the bundled ‘Ping’ mobile handset with connection costing Rs 1,298 will be available for just Rs 698.

msnbc: Deer can’t see cars at night because of blindingly bright headlights. And until now, astronomers couldn’t see foreground galaxies outshined by the dazzling quasars behind them.

A new technique can pick apart the intense pattern of light emitted by quasars, finding irregularities in the image where “invisible” galaxies are absorbing some of the quasar light.

“The difficulty in actually spotting and seeing these galaxies stems from the fact that the glare of the quasar is too strong compared to the dim light of the galaxy,” said Nicholas Bouche, an astronomer at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Munich, Germany.

Bouche and his team’s findings will be detailed in an upcoming issue of Astrophysical Journal.

Quasars are small, distant and extremely bright cosmic beacons that produce more light than typically comes from an entire large galaxy. In spite of their brightness, however, some of the light is soaked up by intervening objects during its long journey to Earth’s telescopes.

To locate the so-called “invisible” galaxies, Bouche and his team looked through huge catalogues of quasar data and picked out those with “dips” in their light signatures. Then, using the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT), located in the mountains of northern Chile, the team searched for galaxies close to the pulse of quasar light.

msnbc: The social networking Web site MySpace is launching a free, advertising-supported cell phone version Monday as part of a wider bid by parent News Corp. to attract advertising for mobile Web sites.

Fox Interactive Media, which oversees News Corp.’s Internet properties, said it also plans to roll out versions of FoxSports.com, the gaming site IGN, AskMen and its local TVaffiliates in the coming months that will work on cell phones that can access the Internet.

The company said it also plans to offer a mobile version of its Photobucket picture sharing site in coming months.

The company already offers premium, subscription-based versions of MySpace through AT&T Inc. and Helio wireless services. Those versions include special features integrated into specific handsets, such as uploading cell phone photos directly to a user’s profile page.

The new version set to launch Monday will work on all U.S.carriers and will allow users to send and receive messages and friend requests, comment on pictures, post bulletins, update blogs,and find and search for friends.

The company said advertisers have become more interested as the quality of the mobile Web experience has improved.

“Accessing the Internet from your mobile phone will soon be ascommon as text messaging and voice calling,” said John Smelzer,s enior vice president of mobile at Fox Interactive.

Initially, advertising will taker the form of sponsorships and banner ads that can be clicked on.