MONTH THAT WAS
Liberal Pakistan!
Islamabad: The latest Pakistani song to have gone viral on the internet pokes fun at Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving Mumbai attacker, being treated like a "hero" in his home country and slain Governor Salmaan Taseer’s assassin being treated like a "nawab," PTI reports.
Over the weekend, Lahore-based band Beyghirat Brigade (The Dishonor Brigade) unveiled its first single "Aloo Anday"- a sad commentary on Pakistani politics and the Pakistani psyche. The song’s vedeo starts on an unassuming note with three boys in school uniforms complaining over their mother packing ‘’Aloo Anday" for lunch, but in the following three minutes, the band takes on everyone from Sharif brothers of the PML-N to the "good-looking fundamentalist" Imran Khan.
Sung in Punjabi with subtitles in English, the video features singer Ali Aftab Saeed grumbling about Nobel Prize- wining Pakistani physicist Abdus Salam being forgotten by most while Taseer’s assassin Mumtaz Qadri and Kasab are being hailed as new heroes.
If the clever lyrics were not stinging enough, the band holds up placards to leave no scope for doubt.
Among them are: "Nawaz Sharif, bye bye. Papa Kiyani no likey you"; "Tehreek-i-Insaf = good looking Jammat-e-Islami"; "free Judiciary = Hanged PPP"; "your money + my pocket = we’re still enemies" and "Mullah + Military + Ziaul Yuckee".
Well-known columnist Nadeem F Paracha dedicated his latest article to the video.
On its Face book page, the band describes itself as a "deadly injection for deadly infection" and tells people cheekily - "if you want us killed, like us".
Apart from the stupendous response on the internet, the song has been played on ‘Dawn News’ channel. Comments are piling up on You Tube, where the song has been uploaded, and also on Face book. A fan decided not to eat "aloo anday" for a week to show solidarity to the band.
Ernakulam is the first smoking-free city
Thiruvananthapuram:Ernakulam, the business hub of Kerala, has become India’s first smoking-free tourist destination.
State Excise Minister K Babu declared the port city smoking-free at a function held at Marine Drive. District Panchayat President Eldhose Kunnappillil released "smoke free Ernakulam" balloons on the occasion.
Residents’ associations, Hotel and Restaurants Association, Vyapari Vyavasayi Association, Hotel and Bar Association, and other civil society groups declared their solidarity to the endeavour in ensuring and maintaining smoke-free status of public places.
The achievement culminated 18 months of efforts made by the district administration Health Department, Cochin Corporation and District Panchayat under the ‘Smoke-free’ Ernakualm project. It was aimed at controlling smoking in public places and affective implementation of the Indian Tobacco Control Act.
The project was launched by putting warning signs against public smoking and the people’s right to smoke free air in prominent public places. Later, trading was even to police inspectors, panchayat secretaries, health inspectors in the Health Department and corporation.
District collector Sheik Pareeth said an independent observation study conducted on smoking in public places had found that there was no active smoking in nearly 95 per cent of public places, including liquor bars, cinema halls and restaurants.
The city achieved the feet 12 years after High Court banned smoking in public places through out Kerala for the first time in the country. The city that has several tourists attractions including heritage buildings built by the Dutch, Portuguese, the English and the local kings, is a premier tourism destination in the state.
It has attracted 20 lakh tourists during 2010. This accounted for nearly 23 percent of the total tourists arrivals in the state. The total tourist arrivals, including domestic tourists, during the year were 86 lakhs.
The smoking ban came on a petition filed by a housewife. Monamma Kokkad, a retired English professor at BCM College. Kottayam, moved the court after she was exposed to passive smoking while commuting by train between Kochi and Kottayam.
Kottayam, however, took the smoking ban seriously and strictly implemented it in the whole district. The effort brought it the distinction of being the first district in the country to ‘totally’ ban smoking in a public places in 2008.
Japanese MP passes Fukushima acid test
Tokyo: A Japanese MP became nervous and his hands shook as he drank water collected from near the quake-hit Fukushima nuclear power plant in a bid to prove it was safe, IANS reports. Yasuhiro Sonoda, who works as the cabinet office’s parliamentary spokesman, drank the water taken from puddles under two reactor buildings during a televised news conference after reporters challenged him.
Journalists have repeatedly queried the safety of the water there.
"Just drinking doesn’t mean safety has been confirmed. Presenting data to the public is the best way," Sonoda said. Government officials say they are confident over the plant’s safety, and have invited journalists to visit the site.
Judge who convicted Qadri flees to Saudi
Lahore: The Pakistani judge who gave the death sentence to Governor Salmaan Taseer’s assassin has sought refuge in Saudi Arabia with his family after receiving death threats from religious extremists. Anti-terrorism court Judge Pervez Ali Shah had gone on leave after a group of lawyers ran-sacked his courtroom and several hardline religious groups offered a bounty to anyone who killed him.
"The death threats have forced Shah to leave Pakistan along with his family for Saudi Arabia," Saiful Malook, who served as special prosecutor during Qadri’s trial, told PTI.
Sensing the gravity of the situation, the government had arranged for lodging Shah and his family in Saudi Arabia, Malook said.
"Though security was provided to the judge and his family, the government, acting on reports from intelligence agencies, opted to send him abroad," he said.
E-toilets for Thane
Thane: Adapting the Dubai model of sanitation with the help of modern technology, the Thane Municipal Corporation has come up with an innovative idea to start "e-toilets" in the city which would be based on automated electronic system and would have the facility of smart card. The idea of the "e-toilet", originated in Dubai, has been put forward by the town planning department of the TMC. The civic officials believe that if everything works well then Thane would be the first city in the state to start the "e-toilets". The "e-toilets" have been successfully implemented in Kerala last year, which are automated, pay-and-use with the help of mechanical, electrical inputs. According to TMC sources, in the first phase, the civic body would install around 150 e-toilets.
The Great Wall of China is ‘crumbling due to illegal mining’
Beijing: Parts of China’s famous Great Wall are reportedly being damaged due to illegal mining for minerals. At one wild section in Laiyuan county in North China’s Hebei province, the wall has completely crumbled due to people carrying out night operations to steal reserves of iron, copper, molybdenum and nickel that are buried along a 150 kilometer stretch of the famous landmark, the ‘China Daily’ reports. A survey has revealed that over 80 percent of the Great Wall in Hebei province is in bad shape due to tourism and inappropriate infrastructure, but it is the illegal mining that is causing the most damage to the site. "We have no idea how many enterprises are engaged in the mining along the Great Wall site. The cultural heritage department has no knowledge of the specific information on the passages in the mining, either," the paper quoted an engineer from the Hebei provincial ancient architecture protection institution, as saying.
Islamabad: The latest Pakistani song to have gone viral on the internet pokes fun at Ajmal Kasab, the lone surviving Mumbai attacker, being treated like a "hero" in his home country and slain Governor Salmaan Taseer’s assassin being treated like a "nawab," PTI reports.
Over the weekend, Lahore-based band Beyghirat Brigade (The Dishonor Brigade) unveiled its first single "Aloo Anday"- a sad commentary on Pakistani politics and the Pakistani psyche. The song’s vedeo starts on an unassuming note with three boys in school uniforms complaining over their mother packing ‘’Aloo Anday" for lunch, but in the following three minutes, the band takes on everyone from Sharif brothers of the PML-N to the "good-looking fundamentalist" Imran Khan.
Sung in Punjabi with subtitles in English, the video features singer Ali Aftab Saeed grumbling about Nobel Prize- wining Pakistani physicist Abdus Salam being forgotten by most while Taseer’s assassin Mumtaz Qadri and Kasab are being hailed as new heroes.
If the clever lyrics were not stinging enough, the band holds up placards to leave no scope for doubt.
Among them are: "Nawaz Sharif, bye bye. Papa Kiyani no likey you"; "Tehreek-i-Insaf = good looking Jammat-e-Islami"; "free Judiciary = Hanged PPP"; "your money + my pocket = we’re still enemies" and "Mullah + Military + Ziaul Yuckee".
Well-known columnist Nadeem F Paracha dedicated his latest article to the video.
On its Face book page, the band describes itself as a "deadly injection for deadly infection" and tells people cheekily - "if you want us killed, like us".
Apart from the stupendous response on the internet, the song has been played on ‘Dawn News’ channel. Comments are piling up on You Tube, where the song has been uploaded, and also on Face book. A fan decided not to eat "aloo anday" for a week to show solidarity to the band.
Ernakulam is the first smoking-free city
Thiruvananthapuram:Ernakulam, the business hub of Kerala, has become India’s first smoking-free tourist destination.
State Excise Minister K Babu declared the port city smoking-free at a function held at Marine Drive. District Panchayat President Eldhose Kunnappillil released "smoke free Ernakulam" balloons on the occasion.
Residents’ associations, Hotel and Restaurants Association, Vyapari Vyavasayi Association, Hotel and Bar Association, and other civil society groups declared their solidarity to the endeavour in ensuring and maintaining smoke-free status of public places.
The achievement culminated 18 months of efforts made by the district administration Health Department, Cochin Corporation and District Panchayat under the ‘Smoke-free’ Ernakualm project. It was aimed at controlling smoking in public places and affective implementation of the Indian Tobacco Control Act.
The project was launched by putting warning signs against public smoking and the people’s right to smoke free air in prominent public places. Later, trading was even to police inspectors, panchayat secretaries, health inspectors in the Health Department and corporation.
District collector Sheik Pareeth said an independent observation study conducted on smoking in public places had found that there was no active smoking in nearly 95 per cent of public places, including liquor bars, cinema halls and restaurants.
The city achieved the feet 12 years after High Court banned smoking in public places through out Kerala for the first time in the country. The city that has several tourists attractions including heritage buildings built by the Dutch, Portuguese, the English and the local kings, is a premier tourism destination in the state.
It has attracted 20 lakh tourists during 2010. This accounted for nearly 23 percent of the total tourists arrivals in the state. The total tourist arrivals, including domestic tourists, during the year were 86 lakhs.
The smoking ban came on a petition filed by a housewife. Monamma Kokkad, a retired English professor at BCM College. Kottayam, moved the court after she was exposed to passive smoking while commuting by train between Kochi and Kottayam.
Kottayam, however, took the smoking ban seriously and strictly implemented it in the whole district. The effort brought it the distinction of being the first district in the country to ‘totally’ ban smoking in a public places in 2008.
Japanese MP passes Fukushima acid test
Tokyo: A Japanese MP became nervous and his hands shook as he drank water collected from near the quake-hit Fukushima nuclear power plant in a bid to prove it was safe, IANS reports. Yasuhiro Sonoda, who works as the cabinet office’s parliamentary spokesman, drank the water taken from puddles under two reactor buildings during a televised news conference after reporters challenged him.
Journalists have repeatedly queried the safety of the water there.
"Just drinking doesn’t mean safety has been confirmed. Presenting data to the public is the best way," Sonoda said. Government officials say they are confident over the plant’s safety, and have invited journalists to visit the site.
Judge who convicted Qadri flees to Saudi
Lahore: The Pakistani judge who gave the death sentence to Governor Salmaan Taseer’s assassin has sought refuge in Saudi Arabia with his family after receiving death threats from religious extremists. Anti-terrorism court Judge Pervez Ali Shah had gone on leave after a group of lawyers ran-sacked his courtroom and several hardline religious groups offered a bounty to anyone who killed him.
"The death threats have forced Shah to leave Pakistan along with his family for Saudi Arabia," Saiful Malook, who served as special prosecutor during Qadri’s trial, told PTI.
Sensing the gravity of the situation, the government had arranged for lodging Shah and his family in Saudi Arabia, Malook said.
"Though security was provided to the judge and his family, the government, acting on reports from intelligence agencies, opted to send him abroad," he said.
E-toilets for Thane
Thane: Adapting the Dubai model of sanitation with the help of modern technology, the Thane Municipal Corporation has come up with an innovative idea to start "e-toilets" in the city which would be based on automated electronic system and would have the facility of smart card. The idea of the "e-toilet", originated in Dubai, has been put forward by the town planning department of the TMC. The civic officials believe that if everything works well then Thane would be the first city in the state to start the "e-toilets". The "e-toilets" have been successfully implemented in Kerala last year, which are automated, pay-and-use with the help of mechanical, electrical inputs. According to TMC sources, in the first phase, the civic body would install around 150 e-toilets.
The Great Wall of China is ‘crumbling due to illegal mining’
Beijing: Parts of China’s famous Great Wall are reportedly being damaged due to illegal mining for minerals. At one wild section in Laiyuan county in North China’s Hebei province, the wall has completely crumbled due to people carrying out night operations to steal reserves of iron, copper, molybdenum and nickel that are buried along a 150 kilometer stretch of the famous landmark, the ‘China Daily’ reports. A survey has revealed that over 80 percent of the Great Wall in Hebei province is in bad shape due to tourism and inappropriate infrastructure, but it is the illegal mining that is causing the most damage to the site. "We have no idea how many enterprises are engaged in the mining along the Great Wall site. The cultural heritage department has no knowledge of the specific information on the passages in the mining, either," the paper quoted an engineer from the Hebei provincial ancient architecture protection institution, as saying.
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