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TOI : PUNE: Lalu’s ‘advertising and brand-baaja’ for the Indian railways is set to roll into Pune.

In the next few months, three Pune-Mumbai trains — Sinhagad Express, Pragati Express and Intercity Express — as well as three goods trains will wear advertisements on their coaches.

And moves are also afoot to offer a limited-period brand name for some trains.

The railways are looking at maximising revenues in the advertising initiative by covering all coaches of the three passenger trains with ad content, while leaving space for the display of train names and reservation charts.

The Sinhagad Express has 17 coaches, Pragati Express 12 and Intercity Express 11.

Initially, the railways are targeting a revenue ranging between Rs 11 lakh and Rs 19 lakh per train per year, which would subsequently be increased by around ten per cent every year.

The advertising agencies will be required to use special fleet graphic films to cover the trains with ads.

The railway authorities have made it clear that no offensive or vulgar advertisements would be allowed.

Apart from offering ad space on its fleet, the railways are also working on branding of trains. Here, you could have the sponsoring company’s name being attached to the name of the train for a limited period.

Senior railway officials told TOI that such branding has been long overdue. While branding is allowed only for holiday special trains, the hitch for the Pune railway division is that the two holiday specials running from the city leave at night. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI :
PUNE: A fast track court on Friday rejected the interim anticipatory bail plea of city-based builder and hotelier Ramkumar Agarwal, his son Ajay and three others of the family in connection with a dowry harassment case lodged against them on Thursday night by Agarwal’s daughter-in-law Priya.

The plea is due for final hearing on March 12.

Ramkumar, Ajay and the other three (Priya’s mother-in-law Reeta Agarwal, sister-in-law Sharmilee Kapoor and her husband Nikhil Kapoor) were reported as ‘untraceable’ since Thursday night by the police.

The Agarwals own construction firm Brahma Builders and are also into the hospitality and leisure industry, controlling five-star hotel Le Meridien and the Residency Club.

Ajay and Priya (daughter of Y.K. Bali, a Dutch national of Indian origin) were married on January 29, 2007.

On Thursday, Priya registered a plaint with the Bund Garden police accusing Ajay, Ramkumar, Reeta and Nikhil, of subjecting her to physical and mental torture for dowry.

Among other things, Priya accused her father-in-law of trying to outrage her modesty and mother-in-law of misappropriating her diamond jewellery.

All the four suspects named by Priya were booked under sections 3 and 4 of the Dowry Prohibition Act, besides offences under IPC sections 498 (a), (cruelty by husband or his relatives), 354 (assault or criminal force to woman with intent to outrage her modesty), 506 (criminal intimidation), 509 (insult to modesty of a woman), 403 (dishonest misappropriation of property), 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 34 (common motive).

A police team carried out searches at Agarwal’s house ‘Brahma Paradise’ off the Mangaldas road and two other properties in Koregaon area in the wee hours of Friday in their attempt to arrest the accused.

Fast track judge S.J. Kale, while rejecting the anticipatory bail plea, observed that all the five applicants…More

TOI : PUNE: Come October, and the city will host its biggest extravaganza — the Commonwealth Youth Games (CYG), and to meet the need of volunteers, Suresh Kalmadi, president of the Indian Olympic Association, recently launched a ‘Team Pune’ programme.

“We will require at least 10,000 volunteers for the CYG, who should be hard-working and have a positive attitude.

Registrations for the programme are underway and individuals will be selected after a round of personal interviews,” Kalmadi said.

The interviews will be conducted between March 15 and April 30. The volunteers will undergo a special training for different functional areas in July and August.

Besides, the volunteers will also receive specially-designed Team Pune uniforms and accreditation passes.

Shooters Tejaswini Sawant, Anjali Bhagwat and former Indian hockey team captain, Dhanraj Pillay, were the first ones to join Team Pune, Kalmadi said.

Explaining the roles of the volunteers, Kalmadi said, “There are about 20 functional areas for the volunteers such as accreditation, administration, catering, communications, cultural activities, news and media, transportation, venue organisation and so on.

Their rewards lie in their participation and in doing their city and nation proud.”
The volunteers will work for about eight to 10 hours continuously in assigned shifts for a minimum of 20 days from October 5 to 25.

The organisers have assured the participation of a record 71 countries, which means over 2,000 athletes and officials will converge on the city for this grand event. Competitors will vie for honours in nine sporting disciplines of athletics, badminton, boxing, swimming, shooting, tennis, table tennis, wrestling and weightlifting. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: The women’s front of the Shiv Sena will hold an agitation at 11.30 am on March 8, the International Women’s Day, in front of the Savitribai Phule statue to demand that the state government make amendments in the Pre-conception and Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (prohibition of sex selection) Act (PCPNDTA),

Women’s front head of the Sena and local corporator Pooja Yadav told the media that amendments were required in the Act as some aspects of it were an obstacle in the drive to reduce female foeticide.

“According to the Act, abortions are allowed until twenty weeks of pregnancy. However, studies have revealed that the number of abortions conducted after 12 weeks of pregnancy are high, since after that period the sex of a baby can be detected,” Yadav said.

She said that for couples, with a financial or any other problem, the decision of an abortion usually happens within ten weeks of conceiving.

“Usually, only those people who do not want a girl child wait until the sex of the baby can be determined — i.e. the tenth week. We want to stop this, which is why we are demanding amendments in the Act.”

Severe action should be taken against those who abort a girl foetus after ten weeks of pregnancy, said Yadav.

“Similarly, sex detection is a crime, but not much is being done to curb it. Some doctors have been arrested in the past, for running sex detection clinics, but nobody knows what happened thereafter. We also want that action should be taken against those guilty,” she said. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: The Sahitya Premi Bhagini Mandal, a group which has been consistently reviewing literature has recently wrapped up its ambitious project on women’s literature in Indian languages.

The project tracks down women’s literature between 1850 to 2000 in 20 languages besides Marathi.

The project is being translated into English to enable a wider reach. Both the volumes will be published in May this year. The English version is titled ‘A Review of Women’s Literature in Indian Languages’.

The 1,200-page volume has been funded by the Bharati Vidyapeeth and the Mysore-based Central Institute of Indian Languages, said chief editor Dr Manda Khandge and Bharati Pande, chief research officer of the Mandal.

Prior to this, in 2003, the Mandal had published a volume on women in Marathi literature in three parts.

“That project is nearing completion,” said Khandge. The volumes include works in languages such as Bengali, Hindi, Sanskrit, Maithili among other languages. A team of sixty people have worked on the project said Khandge.

Dr Nishikant Mirajkar and Dr Neelima Gundi have assisted Khandge in the Marathi section. While Dr Pande has been assisted by Dr Shubhangi Raikar in the English version of the project.

Pande is confident that a project of this nature that tracks works of women littérateur 150 years back, will help researchers and scholars gain a new perspective on women littérateur then and now. “Overall, literature written by women has always been conferred a second place. We are proud to take up the project,” said Khandge. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More