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indianexpress:   With over 6,000 health department staff of Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) going on strike on Thursday protesting against what they said was an alleged move to privatise PMC-owned Dalvi Hospital by handing over its reigns to privately run Phadnis Clinic, a major casualty was the city’s garbage collection service. Many parts of the city were strewn with uncollected garbage on Thursday and the PMC is looking at alternative means of garbage collection.

“The PMC will ensure that garbage will be collected from all over the city even if the conservancy staff of health department continues to be on strike,” said Municipal Commissioner Praveensinh Pardeshi.

He said what was on at Dalvi Hospital was an experiment to provide quality medical service to citizens at cheaper rate through a public-private partnership. He warned action against the employees who went on strike. Pardeshi told the PMC general body that he has personally asked the employees to call off their agitation that has hit the city conservancy service. The issue was raised by the leader of house Anil Bhosale on problems faced by citizens due to the strike by conservancy staff.

Clarifying the PMC move to allow private medical practitioners to function in Dalvi Hospital, Pardeshi said the PMC has been unable to get qualified and trained doctors in its hospitals due to low salary scale which in turn led to poor citizens being denied advanced medical services.

indianexpress: After two days of frenetic search, hopes faded for the families of Lalit Kumar Jain, With Municipal Commissioner Praveensinh Pardeshi stressing on a one-child norm, doctors and nurses at 30 family welfare centres have been directed to motivate couples to undergo sterilisation after one child.

“We have been instructed to counsel couples with one child to undergo sterilisation,” said Dr Anjali Sabne, head of the City Family Welfare Bureau. In fact, a move has also been proposed to provide a ‘health package’ for the children of such couples. From April to August this year, a total of 388 couples from slum areas underwent sterilisation.

Even though the stress will be on a one-child norm, care will be taken to ensure there is no gender discrimination when nurses go from house-to-house and encourage women to opt for only one child whether it is a girl or a boy. So far there have been 7,500 eligible couples with one child in the slum areas, Sabne said. Doctors and nurses at the centres have been instructed to carry out follow ups on these couples.

Each family welfare centre approximately covers a population of 50,000 with focus on people from nearly 500 slums. The PMC has roped in ward medical officers, nurses and health officials to visit people at their doorsteps and counsel them. “While family welfare is not just family planning, there is a need to stop unwanted pregnancies. We can only persuade and counsel people. Finally, it is the decision of the couple,” said Pardeshi.

With the infant mortality rate in Pune at 32 per 1,000 live births, the civic body is also conducting meetings of newly married couples from the slum areas at its maternity hospitals. We provide information about issues like hygiene and family planning measures, Sabne said. For the purpose doctors, nurses, angandwadi workers and supervisors have been trained.

indianexpress: Chairman of Kumar Builders and his kin, the Rankas and Kotharis, when six dead bodies of those washed away in the Qualis they were travelling by in flash floods near Sihor in Bhavnagar district of Gujarat were recovered on Thursday.

“We were praying for a miracle,” said Mahendra Surana, a close friend of Indermal Jain, the eldest brother of Lalit Kumar Jain one of the six who died. Surana who was on his way to Bhavnagar said all the bodies were found by Thursday afternoon. The funeral will take place at Palitana on Friday, he said.

The trip to Palitana — a well known pilgrim centre for the Jain community — turned into a nightmare for the families of Jain, Kothari and Ranka as they were swept away by the swirling waters of Randhona river near Sihor, some 210 km away from Ahmedabad on Tuesday.

Three sisters from a single family — the Palrechas — were widowed as the bodies of their husbands Indermal Jain, Dilip Ranka and Sanjay Kothari were recovered on Thursday. The other three bodies found were that of Jatanraj Jain, Kewal Sonigra and Praveen Bamboli, all relatives of Jain.

Jain’s wife Ranjan, Dilip Ranka’s wife Sangeeta and Sanjay Kothari’s wife Aruna are sisters. They were travelling in another bus with their children and escaped the flood fury.

indianexpress:  Human bones, insect repellants, syringes, and tonnes and tonnes of plastic. These were found among the over 17 tonnes of garbage collected on Pune’s river banks in September last year during a massive cleanliness drive led by youth action group Friends Society as part of the International Coastal Clean-up (ICC). This year, the drive will focus on infusing sustainability in the cleanliness campaign, going beyond mere garbage collection to creating awareness about garbage reduction at source.

The ICC, an initiative of the Indian Maritime Foundation and Washington-based Ocean Conservancy coordinated by the Friends Society in Pune, is held simultaneously at water bodies across the world on September 15, and is held in Pune towards the end of September.

While one phase of the drive already began in Pune on September 22, the phases will be continued on Saturday, October 2 and 13. “This year, the campaign will be taken nationally, with a total of 11,000 participants expected in 27 cities including Hyderabad, Patna, Mysore and Bangalore,” said Friends Society Founder-President Darshan Mundada. Added to this will be over 4,000 students in Pune.

This year, the campaign will have some changes. “Last year, all 17 tonnes of garbage were taken by the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to the landfill at Urali Devachi. This time we want to avoid as much landfill dumping, by recycling most of the garbage, especially the plastic bags, which constitute 43 per cent of the total collection,” said ICC Zonal Captain for Pune Ashish Rojatkar.

Besides, waste segregation will also be an essential component. Separate ‘green’ bags provided by the PMC will be used for biodegradable waste to be used for vermicomposting, while the black plastic bags will be recycled along with the dry and plastic waste gathered.

indianexpress: With a view to urge wider efforts for tiger conservation at government level, wildlife enthusiasts in the city are launching a massive campaign to garner support for their ‘Save the Tiger Campaign’. While a wildlife photography exhibition will be held from Saturday to underline the importance of the tiger, a signature campaign will be launched with a target of one lakh signatures to be sent to President Pratibha Patil.

Led by wildlife photographer Anant Zanjale and nature group In Search Outdoors, the campaign has been organised on the occasion of Wildlife Week beginning in the first week of October. “The aim is to build a pressure group on the government, which is yet to take up the issue on a war footing. The signature campaign will also show that the public believes the tiger is still a focal point of conservation. This will act as a wake-up call to local politicians that large-scale awareness exists in Pune,” said Zanjale.

A total of 400 flex banners will be made available for the campaign, to be circulated in various organisations, including corporates, schools, nature clubs, and so on. Banners will also be put up at the photography exhibition to be held at the Balgandharva Rangmandir till October 4.

The photographs taken by Zanjale, depict rare Indian wildlife species captured at rare locations. Information will also be given on the entire food chain to show interdependence in nature, and the central role of the tiger to the forest ecosystem. “This will help to make the people understand the importance of the campaign instead of blindly signing the banners,” said Shauri Solakhe of In Search Outdoors.

indianexpress: Around 3,000 farmers — members of Shetkari Sanghatana — gheraoed the Central Building on Thursday and demanded revision of the Minimum Support Price (MSP) for agriculture produce given by the Central government. They warned that sugarcane factories in the state would be kept closed if their demands were not met with. The gherao came to an end after State Principal Secretary for Agriculture NB Patil agreed to hold a meeting with the Sanghatana leaders on October 4.

Farmers from all over the state gathered at the Central Building at 11 am and blocked all entry points for almost six hours. Sanghatana senior leader Raghunath Patil met Director of Agriculture PN Raut, who suggested that the organisation members speak to the principal secretary before taking any steps.

Patil said the organisation had been assured some months ago that the government would look into the issue of MSP, but no steps were taken.

The Sanghatana is agitated over the “defective” method of formulating the MSP for agriculture produce. They also link the large number of farmers’ suicides to the widening gap between the actual expenses for production and the amount disbursed by the government. He blamed the government for the farmers’ suicides. He said it was “very unfortunate that such a huge number of suicides are happening during the regime of Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar.”

techtree: Amazon.com has launched a public beta of its eagerly anticipated digital music download store called “Amazon MP3″.

The store claims to offer the world’s biggest selection of a la carte, DRM-free, MP3 music downloads in the form of over 2 million songs from over 180,000 artists represented by over 20,000 major and independent labels.

With the entire collection available exclusively in MP3 format sans digital rights management (DRM) software, customers can enjoy music downloads using devices such as PCs, Macs, iPods, Zunes, Zens, iPhones, RAZRs, and BlackBerry; as well as organize their music using applications such as iTunes or Windows Media Player.

Besides, Amazon MP3 users can burn the downloaded content onto CDs. Most of the songs are priced between 89 cents and 99 cents, while albums are priced at anything between $5.99 and $9.99.

Customers can purchase downloads using Amazon 1-Click shopping, and seamlessly add them to iTunes or Windows Media Player libraries using the Amazon MP3 Downloader.

Meanwhile, the music collection comprises music from major labels including 50 Cent, Coldplay, Feist, Nelly, Norah Jones, Philip Glass, Pink Floyd, Radiohead, Spoon, Stevie Wonder, The Chemical Brothers, The Rolling Stones, etc. And from independent labels including Alligator Records, HighTone Records, Madacy Entertainment, Sanctuary Records, Rounder Records, Righteous Babe Records, Sugar Hill Records, and Trojan Records.

techtree: Fujitsu Asia Pacific has launched its first ultra-mobile PC (UMPC), the LifeBook U1010.

The LifeBook U1010 weighs just over half-a-kilogram, and features a 0.3mm glass LCD screen and high-density mounting among others. With a convertible, swivel form factor, the LifeBook can be used like a hand-held or tablet or NB PC.

Fujitsu claims the LifeBook is a mini powerhouse capable of handling multiple functions, including watching movies and listening to music, viewing and editing documents, video-conferencing, and surfing the Internet.

The device has a slim 0.2mm Aluminum-plated Qwerty keyboard, and a touch-screen that allows a user’s fingers to do the walking, in the absence of a stylus. The glide point pointing device makes interaction that much easier.

Security features include: platform module support, 2-level BIOS lock, and fingerprint sensor, among others.

LifeBook U1010, which runs on Intel’s latest Ultra Mobile Platform 2007, will be available through distributors, Salora International, for Rs 85,000, along with a 3-year warranty.

reuters:  IRobot Corp (IRBT.O: Quote, Profile, Research), a maker of vacuums and bomb defusers, said on Thursday it has developed a device for cleaning gutters on homes and a Web-controlled robot with a video phone.

Its shares shot up 5 percent to $19.99 after it issued a statement, helping pare declines on other news earlier this month that it lost a key contract to provide robots to the U.S. military.

IRobot’s products will join a line that includes floor cleaners for consumers and bomb-dismantling robots sold to the military.

The $99, 2.25-inch high Looj drives under gutter straps propelled by a three-stage auger that sweeps out dirt, leaves and debris.

Users control the Looj from the ground, though they need to climb up and down a ladder at least four times — to place and remove it.

Currently, most U.S. homes owners have to clean the gutters by hand and that process is more labor intensive.

IRobot said it was looking to revolutionize communications when it thought up ConnectR, the second product it debuted on Thursday, at the DigitalLife show in New York.

The robot has a top-mounted, tilt-and-zoom video camera, speaker, microphone and headlight to enable users connected remotely via the Web to see, hear and interact with people in the home
 

cnet: Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have come up with a way to detect potential structural problems with fighter planes while in flight, and in some cases repair them.

The technique, which is still experimental, involves applying an epoxy later infused with a wire grid and carbon nanotubes onto a wing or other structure. The epoxy is similar to the materials currently used to make fighter plane components. The wire grid and the nanotubes function as a communication network. Mechanics (or a computer) will shoot an electrical charge through the structure and measure how long it takes an electrical charge to go from two selected points.

If there is a crack in the structure, the crack will create electrical resistance. In that case, the signal will have to travel a longer distance to get around the crack. The extra time required to get from point A to point B serves as a signal that a potential problem exists. The picture shows carbon nanotubes randomly dispersed in an epoxy.