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indianexpress: The Fire Brigade may not have had many ‘fire calls’ this Diwali, but surgeons were definitely on call as they saved hands and repaired fractured bones of children and adults who played with fire crackers. So much so that on Wednesday Dr Pankaj Jindal, was waiting for a 30-year-old Ramesh (name changed) who was flown in from Raipur straight to the operating table at Jehangir for saving the remaining fingers on his hand.

On Diwali day Ramesh held a fire cracker bomb in his left hand and a sparkler in the right hand. Unfortunately, the bomb exploded after coming in contact with sparks from the sparkler and Ramesh lost three fingers and half a thumb. Orthopaedic surgeons at Raipur referred him to Jindal at Jehangir Hospital. Jindal said that skin will taken from his tummy and toes will be transferred from the feet to his hands. It is going to take a long time to repair but we can give him a “working” hand, Jindal assured Ramesh’s family.

Accidents may be freak ones but when parents and children are not careful then serious injuries can also occur. Like the one where a 10-year-old Deepak (name changed) from Aundh was bursting fire crackers after Laxmi Puja. He put all the fire crackers in one bottle and burst them. “This kind of bursting of fire crackers is something like an improvised explosive device blast,’’ says Jindal. The surgeon had to perform two operations on Deepak as he had fractured seven bones of his hand.

Deepak is still recuperating in the paediatric ward of Jehangir Hospital while Navin (name changed), a 25-year-old mobile shop owner from Pimpri was brought in on Diwali night as a fire cracker burst in his hand. The palm had burst open and he had lost blood circulation in his thumb. Jindal had to perform a microsurgery in order to restore the blood supply. These mishaps mostly harm the eyes, face and hands and can in turn result in blindness, permanent disfigurement or amputation.

indianexpress:  IN a major breakthrough in the multi-crore Manjari land scam case, the Anti Extortion Cell (AEC) of the city crime branch on Wednesday arrested notary Dilip Ratnakar Amolik (55) on charges of preparing forged power of attorneys (POAs) to allegedly dupe 377 local farmers at the instance of builder Pradeep Runwal, earlier arrested in connection with the scam and now out on bail.

AEC chief Bhanupratap Barge said: “Amolik has confessed to having prepared three POAs in the name of 377 farmers in 2000 and notarised the documents in his own name and even signed the documents as a notary. This he did on March 29, 2000, when he was not a notary. He became a notary in 2002.”

Barge said even the signatures of the farmers and witnesses are suspected to be fake. “Some signatures have been forged in the name of one advocate named Purandhare. We are investigating if a person named Purandhare exists at all. The documents also bear signatures in the names of 35 dead farmers all notarised by Amolik. We have taken a serious note of these glaring irregularities and will go to their root,” Barge added.

Amolik has been booked under sections 420, 467, 471, 468 and 34 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The police are verifying the genuineness of the stamp paper used for the transactions as they have found it to have been issued by stamp vendor V.R. Jamkol, currently lodged in Yerawada Central Jail in connection with the multi-crore Telgi fake stamp paper case. “This angle is being probed but there is no evidence to confirm the suspicion of a connection between the Manjari land scam and the Telgi case,” said Barge.

indianexpress: COME winter and monstrous clouds of smoke coming out of leaf burning adds to rampant pollution in the city leading to headache, skin allergies, watery eyes and more serious problems like asthma, bronchitis, cough and allergic reactions. After repeated complains by citizens, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has decided address the problem by setting up a cell and initiating action against those who pollute air by burning leaves.

This is a serious problem as smouldering of leaves is 60 per cent more toxic than quick burning says Dr. Suchita Raman who added that “inhaling ammonia causes headache, skin allergies and watery eyes. Oxides of nitrogen affect the lungs and the nervous system while sulpur dioxide causes asthma, bronchitis, cough and allergic reaction. Carbon monoxide lessens the blood’s ability to transport life giving oxygen”. She added that the problem is as serious as pollution caused by vehicles.

Agrees Dr. R.R. Pardeshi, PMC deputy medical officer (solid waste management). “In winter leaves burning problem multiplies and we have decided to address the problem by setting up a cell to address the same. Any leaves burning instances should be brought to the notice of the PMC by calling sanitary inspector on 25501277,” he said.

“With the number of vehicles adding to city roads Pune air has already become poisonous. Along with the conservancy staff the general public burns leaves as they fail to understand the gravity of problem. The PMCs garbage segregation has gone for a toss and at many places the garbage stinks for days together. Now with leaf burning the problem is multiplying,” says Vikrant Shirote, resident of Bibwewadi demanding that the PMC should guide people about using dry leaves for compost fertilizer instead of burning.

indianexpress: THE Pune crime branch carried out a major raid in search of suspected hidden contraband items in the premises of the Yerawada Central Jail on Wednesday. The raid which started around 2 pm continued till late in the evening. However, no prohibitory material was recovered by the policemen who participated in the massive exercise.
 
Deputy Inspector General (Yerawada Prisons) Ravindra Kedari told reporters : “The operation went for about three hours and nothing prohibitory was found inside the jail premises. Besides, the police, jail officials including jail superintendent Rajendra Dhamane too were present during the exercise.”

DCP (crime) Anil Kumbhare termed the search ‘routine’. “It was a routine affair and nothing has been found,” Kumbhare said. The crime branch was led by the DCP along with three Assistant Commissioners of Police and over 300 policemen.

According to jail officials, it was for the second time that such a massive raid-cum-search exercise was conducted in the jail premises since December. Yerawada is considered one of the largest prisons in the country with over 3,000 convicts lodged inside. The jail has been in the news recently ever since Bollywood actor Sanjay Dutt became an inmate. Besides Dutt, over 30 convicts of the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts are serving their prison terms inside the jail.

indianexpress: TAKING cue from the previous monsoon in which city roads were flooded due to lack of storm water drainage, the civic administration has sought the standing committee approval for Rs 2 crore towards constructing storm water drainage on various city roads. Rs 1 crore work has been proposed for roads in Sangamwadi and Dhole-Patil ward offices and the construction of storm water drainage in Bibewadi, Mohammedwadi areas.

The PMC has also proposed a Rs 75 lakh project of shifting poles and laying underground electricity cables on various city roads to be developed under Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission. The PMC had made a provision for laying these cables in the detailed project report (DPR) of various roads to be constructed under JNNURM.

indianexpress: ACADEMIC departments at the University of Pune (UoP) will see a change in helm with the Vice-Chancellor Narendra Jadhav making new appointments. New heads of department (HoD) have been appointed in history, anthropology, defence and strategic studies departments as well as in the National Center for International Security and Defence Analysis (NISDA).

As per UoP regulations, the V-C must appoint a new HoD every three years on a rotation basis. Accordingly, Deepak Gaikwad will replace R.P. Ranade as head of the department of history. With the retirement of former HoD of anthropology Amrita Bagga, Anjali Kurane will assume charge. BV Sangvikar will take over from Anil Keskar as head of the department of management sciences (PUMBA)

Changes will also be seen in the department of defence and strategic studies, which was earlier headed by A.S. Dalvi. Dalvi, being replaced by Shreekant Paranjape, will take over as director of NISDA after Major (Retd.) Gautam Sen. Meanwhile, NISDA has been renamed as the Yashwantrao Chavan National Centre for International Security and Defence Analysis.

techtree: A supercomputer developed by the Tata Group has done India proud by becoming the fourth fastest computer in the world, not to mention the fastest in the whole of Asia.

This — as per the Top 500 Supercomputer list announced at SC07, the International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage and Analysis at Reno in Nevada in the US.

Called “EKA”, which is Sanskrit for number one, the supercomputer was developed at Tata Group’s Computational Research Laboratories (CRL) based in Pune.

The development costing nearly $30 million has put India at the forefront of high performance and supercomputing technology globally.

“EKA” uses nearly 1,800 computing nodes, and boasts a peak performance of 170 teraflops. It follows a near-circular layout of the data center, unlike the traditional hot aisle and cold aisle rows that typically make up densely-packed supercomputers.

“EKA” has been built using CLOS architecture, with off-the-shelf servers and infiniband interconnect technologies with Linux operating system.

CRL claims to be the first site in the world to use dual data rate infiniband with fibre-optic cable technology for superior performance.

“EKA” has nodes and racks built by Hewlett Packard (HP Cluster Platform 3000 BL460c system), which uses high-speed quad-core Clovertown processors from Intel Corp, and dual data rate infiniband switches from Mellanox and Voltaire.
 

techtree: Microsoft today launched “Office Professional 2007 Prepaid Edition” in the country, bringing the power of its Office productivity suite to home users and small businesses at an affordable price.

The “Office Professional 2007 Prepaid Edition” subscription plan gives customers the flexibility to pay as they go, and renew when they choose. Besides, it does not require any credit facility, additional contracts, or commitments.

Sanjay Manchanda, director (Information Worker Business Group) of Microsoft, said they are seeing strong demand from small and medium businesses for such applications.

With the introduction of “Office Professional 2007 Prepaid Edition”, customers can purchase a ‘Prepaid Starter Kit’ for a six month subscription.

A 25 character product key on the back of each kit activates their software over the Internet for this period. Customers can renew their subscription via a three month ‘Prepaid Renewal Card’ that costs Rs 1,299.

Even when the subscription expires, customers can continue to access, view, and print existing Office documents/data. However to be able to create new files or modify existing ones, they would need an active subscription. At any stage, customers can choose to convert their prepaid subscription to a perpetual license.

techtree: Pentax has introduced its Optio E40 compact digital camera in the country. The camera will be distributed through IDLDPL.

The entry-level, 8.1 effective mega pixels camera uses AA batteries, and does not require constant re-charging. It features 3X optical zoom and 4X digital zoom for up to 12X magnification, movie capture options including VGA and QVGA, sound recording, voice memo, movie, continuous shooting mode for recording up to 16 consecutive images (640 x 480 pixels per image) in a two second burst, advance Face Recognition technology, and Digital Shake Reduction, among others.
 
Weighing-in at 6.2 ounces sans battery and memory card, the camera comes with a high resolution 2.4-inches LCD. Users can choose from a variety of options while taking photographs, which include: auto flash on/off, auto preset modes, White Balance, etc.

The E40 is compatible with a wide range of photo transfer and direct printing softwares, including PictBridge, DPOF, Exif Print, Print Image Matching III, and Auto Picture.

The camera has a MRP of Rs 12,999, but as a special offer from IDLDPL, it is available for Rs 9,999. It comes along with a carry case and a 1GB SD card.

infoweek:  Zumobi, a Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT)-backed startup focused on creating an open platform for mobile content, this week unveiled details of a beta mobile browser user interface.

The company, which just changed its name from ZenZui to Zumobi to better reflect its zooming user interface and mobile platform, said the beta will become available to the general public, including consumers, developers, content providers, advertisers, mobile operators, and distributors, on December 14. The beta will contain a version of the Zumobi software development kit.

Zumobi has developed a software interface that allows users to zoom in on and enlarge content on Web sites accessed though mobile browsers. The startup uses technology called Zooming User Interface, developed and patented by Microsoft, to make that possible.

Microsoft in March announced it would back Zumobi through its Microsoft IP Ventures arm, which was designed to help startups by providing them with funding and access to the software maker’s technologies.

“The beta version of the product that we’re now launching will offer consumers an exciting new set of mobile features and functionality that helps them stay on top of the things that are important to them personally and have fun doing it,” said Eric Hertz, Zumobi’s CEO, in a statement.