ISSUES AND CONCERNS

Isn't POPULATION a Problem in India ! 11th July 2009 came and got lost into the national amnesia. Another 50,000 got added by the next morning to the ballooning demographic numbing numbers. Quite fra nkly, how many of us were truly concerned? Word Population Day came and passed off as just another day. The fourth estate, whether electronic media, the print media or the radio were deafeningly silent on the problem, supposedly the MOTHER OF ALL PROBLEMS. "We are sitting on a volcano. It is unfortunate that India has just 2.5% of the global land area but 17% of the world population. Large population means greater number of have-nots which is the root cause of poverty, unemployment. That’s how naxalism came up". Mr.Ghulam Nabi Azad, the Union Health Minister was to have reportedly stated while talking on the ‘World Population Day’ at New Delhi. This is for the first time that a union minister has spoken so seriously about the issue in recent times. Such seriousness is glaring...

Binayak Released but Many Questions Remain Unanswered :- KG Kannabiran Binayak Sen has been released at last. But was there any reason at all for his arrest? There was a debate in the electronic media on his release. The debate was not about Binayak Sen, his background and about the total absence of reason for his arrest and prosecution. The media person who generally guides the debate did not ask questions about his arrest and prosecution. He veered the debate around to Maoists and their acts of violence and the condemnation of the Maoists and their politics. Thus the media person very successfully moved away from the debate about Binayak Sen and his arrest. The debate throughout was a campaign against the Maoists. Gautam Navlakha fell into this trap and was arguing about the tribes, their land and its expropriation, none of which is of interest to Arnold, the media person. The result of the confused debate was that Binayak was not projected as a medical person who was practicing in ...

DARING HEROES OF THE DISTANT PAST Our younger generation in medicine looks up to the present day divine interventionalists and the heroic surgeons, who are all over the media, both print and electronic, to emulate and follow on their footsteps. Modern medicine is suffering because we have been following what others have been doing elsewhere. Such copy-cat procedures and interventions do not take knowledge forwards in any field. India needs to progress by taking the present inadequate knowledge forwards in modern medicine. That needs a different kind of research, called refutative research, wherein one tries to refute false dogmas that do not stand on very firm grounds. We should not waste time copying others by repeating known facts-repetitive research. History of modern medicine is replete with such mistakes. One example would suffice. It was in the year 127 AD that the great guru of medicine of those days, Galen, thought that blood circulated from the liver. This was repeated by all ...

ROLE OF MOTIVATORS IN JOB SATISFACTION The world scenario has changed suddenly over the last six months or so where we find a global financial crisis affecting the lives of everyone. It has led to salary cuts and layoffs in various sectors and finding a dream job has become difficult. A dream job or an ideal job refers to providing opportunities to men and women to work in an environment of freedom, equity, security and human dignity. The concept not only helps to get the best out of employees but also to build the company’s brand image and retain talent. An ideal job can be defined as one that provides opportunities for work that is productive and delivers a fair income, security in the work place and social protection for families, better prospects for personal development and social self-actualization, freedom for people to express their views and ideas, organize and participate in the decision making process. There are numerous factors that can effect the productivity level of emp...

Flower helps fight prostate cancer: Study GOETTINGEN : A substance from the root of a flower growing in many gardens may cure prostate cancer, Germany’s cancer-science council has said. The lily-like flowers of Belamcanda chinensis are grown in temperate-region gardens. In China it grows wild. The plant is used in Korean and Chinese medicine. In laboratory tests, tectorigenin, obtained from roots of Belamcanda chinensis, stopped cancer cells growing and in animal tests it had slowed the spread of the cancer, experts said at the University of Gottingen. Cancer of the prostate gland is the most common cancer among German men. Scientists, Peter Burfeind and Paul Thelen, are to continue the research. They said it might also be possible to use the substance as preventive medicine to stop men from developing cancer.- DPA

Maggi Healthy Soups Gimmick leaves a bad taste in the mouth By flashing the words like "Happy Heart" and "Healthy Soups" on its packs of Maggi Healthy Soups, Nestle India claims that the product leads to better heart health. It also mentions that REAL (Centre for Right Eating and Active Lifestyles, a unit of DFI), recognises that the soups that are low in fat and cholesterol help the heart stay healthy. The promotion through print ads in magazines like Femina and the TVC’s (TV commercials) in Zee, HBO, etc. might have caught many consumers unawares. ASCI found, on independent testing, that the product contains high levels of salt which releases sodium (well known to have direct link to hypertension/ high blood pressure) into the body. Moreover, "the pack does not give any details of DFI or REAL to substantiate its credibility. The DFI and REAL are neither an international body nor any Centre recognised by the Government of India as a competent authority to take...

Dr. Bakshi’s Bakson’s Homoeopathy Psoriasis of sorts Jagmohan Singh, a BPO owner, was quoted as saying, "While most doctors gave m e a 2 to 3 per cent chance, Backson’s remarkably cured me of psoriasis without the use of steroids and radiation. Thank you, Bakson’s". We had no issues on Jagmohan’s contentions, as projected in the ad in The Times of India, Delhi. We would rather let it pass and would have taken it on face value. But why did the ad have to resemble the cover page of the Time magazine of the USA? There were other claims too like ‘World’s first chain of allergy treatment clinics’, ‘International Standard Quality Certification’, ‘Over 1.5 million smiling patients’, etc. When we wrote to Dr. Bakshi’s Bakson’s Homoeopathy, we received no response. We wrote to the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) which promptly responded and took it up with the Bakson’s Group. Bakson’s failed to substantiate its claims and has since assured consumers that the claims would...

Corporate honcho cheated own firm to pay personal dues! MUMBAI : IN a grim reminder that corporate crime is on the rise, the vice-president of Patel On-board Couriers (POBC) Ltd cheated his company, with which he had been working for the last nine years, to the tune of Rs 30 lakh by taking cash on behalf of the company from clients in a span of around two years reportedly to pay off his personal dues. S Balakrishna (54), a resident of Challenger Towers in Kandivli (E), joined POBC, whose head office is located in Santacruz (W), around nine years ago as a branch manager and worked his way to the post of the Vice President of the company around four years ago. On June 13, Farrokh Wadia, the director of POBC registered a cheating case against Balakrishnan after discovering that the latter had siphoned off the company’s money into his personal bank account. "The matter came to light when I called up a client who had to pay the company dues worth Rs 7 lakh, he told me that he had alrea...

Mumbaikar appointed Deputy Mayor in Texas HOUSTON : AN Indian American has been appointed as the Deputy Mayor of the city of Stafford in Texas, becoming the first person of the community to hold the post in the US. Ken Mathew has been unanimously appointed as the Mayor Pro Tem (Deputy Mayor) of the City of Stafford, Texas. He is the first Indo- American to become a Mayor Pro Tem in the state of Texas. Mathew, married with two daughters, said , "I want to see a clean and efficient government at all levels. I see before me Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa as my idols." He added that the defence minister of India also inspired him, "I also see a rare politician, like AK Antony, the current Defense Minister of India, as a living example of what public servant ought to be." Mathew, known as soft spoken yet confident person is originally from Mumbai and has done his graduation from University of Bombay, India. He also holds an MBA degree from the Univer...

Goa Minister claims casino duped him PANAJI : GOA Tourism Minister Francisco alias Mickky Pacheco has accused a casino operator, working out of a popular five-star resort in South Goa, of not paying him Rs. 1.25 crore that he had won at the casino. In a complaint filed at the Colva police station, the controversial Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) legislator Mickky Pacheco has said that the management of Treasures, a licensed casino operating at the Majorda beach resort, had denied him his winnings in the casino between May 15 to May 22 this year . The complaint, filed before the police said that only a paltry portion of the winnings was paid to him by the casino operator, that too after repeated requests. The minister says he had won Rs. 1.53 crore and had been paid only Rs. 28 lakh of the amount. "The casino staff had requested a day or two to make the full payment as they do not hold large cash reserves in the casino premises," the complaint mentions. "The payment was...

CHINA A NATION IN TROUBLE. :Dr M. v. Kamath China is in trouble. It is in trouble both on the economic and political front. To begin with, a word on the former. For years China started accumulating foreign exchange reserves. As of now they amount to an estimated $ 2 trillion which is ten times larger than that of India which has hardly about $ 200 billion to boast of. China raised its reserves, to put in simple terms, by selling cheap goods in the international market, but more especially in the United States, Europe and Asia. From 2001 to 2007 Chinese exports grew at an unprecedented yearly average of 28 per cent. If 45 per cent of its trade came from Asia, Europe and the U.S each contributed 21 per cent. Because cheap labour was available in China, foreign investment poured in. since the late 1980s Taiwanese companies invested a minimum of $ 100 billion in China. It paid Taiwan to do so, considering that some four lakh Taiwanese got work permits to stay in China. Investment in China ...