MONTH THAT WAS

Worms & Insects in Temple Laddus

Vijayawada : Thousands of devotees who thronged the Indrakeeladri shrine got a major shock when the laddu ‘prasadam’ meant for sale was found filled with worms and insects, exposing gross negligence on the part of the temple authorities. Following an uproar, Sri Durga Malleswara Swamy varla Devasthanam Executive Officer, Surya Kumari, immediately ordered withdrawal of over 50,000 laddus. The incident once again highlighted the lackadaisical manner in which the Kanaka Durga temple, the second largest in the state after Tirupati, is managed.

Food inspectors from Vijayawada Municipal Corporation inspected the temple kitchen and seized samples of the laddus for an examination.

The hill shrine of Indrakeeladri is the abode of Goddess Kanaka Durga who is the presiding deity of Vijayawada and lakhs of pilgrims visit the hill shrine during the nine-day Dasara festival. As some two lakh laddus were supposed to be prepared to meet the festival rush so temple authorities started using an old portion of the hill shrine for preparation of the ladoos but it was filled with filth.

After preparing nearly 50,000 laddus, the temple staff placed it in the hall for drying, completely neglecting safety and cleanliness. Worms, moths, insects and other species swamped the laddus by the time the temple staff arrived morning to shift them to the sales counters. They immediately alerted the Executive Officer who silently asked them to remove the lot and dispose it off in another place without putting it for sale. But as word spread, devotees vented ire at the temple authorities over such a glaring negligence even as the food inspectors from the civic body arrived to seize the stock samples for examination. While the Devasthanam EO, the first IAS officer to be appointed to the post, did not comment on the issue, temple superintendent Ramesh said insects might have come in because of overnight rain.

Budget hotels at railway stations

New Delhi: No need to look for the low budget hotels while traveling as you will get the facility right at the railway station on alighting from the train. The Indian Railways have decided to convert its retiring rooms and dormitories available at almost all the railway stations into the budget hotels. It has decided to handover the retiring rooms and dormitories to the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), a subsidiary of the Indian Railways, in a phased manner to refurbish them with all the facilities available in any 3-star hotel. The IRCTC will change furniture and fixtures to give the places a new look. It will also take care of the catering in these hotels.

The IRCTC that handles the train reservations will also take care of online booking of the rooms at the stations. The Railway sources said the IRCTC is undertaking the project under the PPP (private-public participation) mode. The project envisages that 75% of the income will go to the railways while the rest will be shared by the IRCTC and the private players. There will be different rates for hiring of the rooms in the metropolitan cities, big cities and small cities.

The retiring rooms will be converted into hotels through a tendering process, the sources said, pointing out that the condition of the retiring rooms and dormitories at the railway stations is pitiable because of old beds, dirty mattresses, pillows, broken floors, cockroaches, bedbugs and rats. Besides, there is no catering facility for those staying there. Moreover, their rent is high at Rs 250 to 400 for 12 hours. All these factors force the passengers to better look for cheap and clean private hotels near the railway stations.

SC fines minister for not naming non-cooperating babus

New Delhi: Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain was slapped a fine of Rs 25,000 by the Supreme Court for not disclosing names of officials, accused by him of not cooperating with the AAP government in containing the menace of dengue and chikungunya in the national capital. “When people are dying in Delhi, you don’t need 24 hours to file an affidavit,” the apex court said as it lashed out at Jain’s counsel who had sought time to file the affidavit containing these names.

“Why have you not given the names and evidences on affidavit? You have made very serious allegations against them. You deposit Rs 25,000 by today as cost for not filing the affidavit with legal service authority,” a bench of Justices M B Lokur and D Y Chandrachud said and listed the matter.

Is Hollywood Colour Conscious?

New Delhi: Mira Nair is shocked that the big screen in the West doesn’t reflect the diversity of the world and feels artistes of colour are “marginalised in the mainstream industry”. The acclaimed Indian filmmaker, who is garnering plaudits for making “Queen of Katwe” with an all-black cast, however says her aim is not to propagate a colour.

Disney’s “Queen of Katwe”, released in India, traces the journey of 11-year-old Ugandan girl Phiona Mutesi and how she gets out of the slum where she resides to become a world class chess player. The film, which stars Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o, is being lauded for its heart-warming story. But reactions also saw the virtual world buzzing with hashtags like #BlackGirlsRock or #BlackLivesMatter.

Asked if the bigger picture is to reinstate the importance of colour over talent or story, the National Award-winning director Nair was quick to dismiss this. “I don’t think it is anything about colour more than talent. We have been marginalised in the mainstream industry for long. It is shocking that the screen does not reflect the way the world is and the diversity in the world… What the world really looks like should be on screen and it isn’t,” Nair told.

Delving on the importance of getting diversity on the big screen, Nair also said that this should be done by the “talent of our work and integrity of our work”. “I welcome the talk about this issue because we have got to remind people that we matter. And we matter through the talent of our work and integrity of our work.

“The film itself should interact with the audience. In the case of ‘Queen of Katwe’, people are laughing, sobbing and dancing. I am taking them on a ride… It is not like I am asking them for handouts,” said the 58-year-old, adding that the industry and the “people responsible for taking decisions” need to wake up to the truth of diversity.

“The fact is that it is not doing charity to make a black film or an African film… But finally the work has to speak.” The colour debate has been under way for long in India and abroad but got added attention with the diversity row after the 2016 Oscar nominations.

In fact, India has also got a notorious image due to its obsession with fair skin, which again made headlines this week when critically-acclaimed actress Tannishtha Chatterjee was “roasted” on a nationally televised comedy show with what she called a “regressive and blatantly racist attack” on her skin tone.

Be it with her debut fiction feature “Salaam Bombay!” – which was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Foreign Language Film category – to films like “Mississippi Masala”, “Monsoon Wedding”, “The Namesake” or “The Reluctant Fundamentalist”, Nair has explored diverse themes and represented different issues long before “diversity” became a buzzword in Hollywood.

A family of world record holders

Bengaluru: An eight-year-old girl from the city has excelled in gymnastics and set three world records.  Deeksha Girish performed the most number of forward rolls in an hour, and took the shortest time to finish 100 metres in forward rolls. The third record is for being the fastest to complete 10 metres in the box-split position.

This makes her the third member of her family to enter the Guinness registry. The family tally of entries comes to nine.  This is just the beginning and Deeksha will win many more records in the days to come, said her father Girish Kumar, popularly known as 'Guinness Girish'.

Girish holds five records, one of them for outdoing himself by opening 63 beer bottles with his teeth in one minute. His 14-year-old-daughter Tejaswini holds the record for passing the longest string through her nose and pulling it out of her mouth in 30 seconds.  Manjula, his wife, too attempted a record to break the most number of eggs with her toes, but her accomplishment is yet to be certified by Guinness.  The previous world record for the most number of forward rolls in an hour was held by Ashrita Furman, now 62. The US citizen took the title in 2007 by completing 1,330 rolls. Deeksha doubled the record by doing 2,787.

The task was a breeze for Deeksha, who beat the previous record with 32 minutes and 23 seconds to spare. Her older sister Tejaswini sat by the track and spoke words of encouragement as she rolled closer to her target.

Deeksha completed 10 metres in the box-split position in 10.96 seconds, breaking the previous record set by Kazumi Kawahara of Japan, who had done it in 16.90 seconds.

It took Deeksha 48.57 seconds to do 100 metres in forward rolls. The previous record holder had taken 53 seconds.

Donald Trump- A tax dodger !

Washington: Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s allies have said the billionaire is a “genius” if he paid no federal income taxes for 18 years.

According to the New York Times, it received some of Trump’s 1995 tax documents revealing $915 million losses that allowed him to legally avoid paying taxes.

The real estate mogul’s camp refused to confirm or deny the report, but said the filing was “illegally obtained”, while Democrat Hillary Clinton’s campaign called it a “bombshell”. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said the New York Times article was a “very good story” because it showcased the “genius” of Trump and that it would only underline Trump as the best qualified to ease tax policy on working people.

According to BBC, there is no evidence at this point that Trump did anything improper. Rudy Giuliani, a close adviser to Trump, said the Republican was an “absolute genius” if he avoided taxes. “A lot of the people that are poor take advantage of loopholes and pay no taxes,” the former New York mayor said. “Those are loopholes also.”

Trump himself played down the report. “I know our complex tax laws better than anyone who has ever run for President and am the only one who can fix them. #failing@nytimes,” he tweeted. During the first presidential debate, Clinton attacked Trump for not releasing his tax returns, as all previous White House candidates have done since Jimmy Carter in 1976. The Democrat suggested he was hiding “something terrible” and that he had perhaps not paid any federal income tax. He replied: “That makes me smart.”

The New York Times in its article said three pages of documents were anonymously sent to one of its reporters who had written about Trump’s finances.

A former accountant for the property tycoon, Jack Mitnick, whose name appears as Trump’s tax preparer of the filings, said the documents appeared to be authentic copies of portions of the 1995 returns, according to the newspaper. Trump’s campaign did not directly address the authenticity of the excerpts, but the New York Times said his lawyer had emailed the newspaper arguing that publication of the records was illegal. The Republican candidate’s camp accused the New York Times, which has endorsed the Democratic candidate for President, of being “an extension of the Clinton campaign”. Trump, the campaign added, was a “highly skilled businessman who has a fiduciary responsibility to his business, his family and his employees to pay no more tax than legally required”.

Hindustan Zindabad Pakistan Murdabad- Ajmer Madrasa Students

Jaipur: The holy city of Ajmer witnessed hundreds of students of the local madarsas taking out a rally from the holy shrine of Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti in the old historic city and marching with the tricolour raising slogans like Hindustan Zindabad, Pakistan Murdabad.

The rally by young Muslim students surprised everyone as they joined the rally with children and raised slogans against Pakistan.

The rally was organised by the Dawatul-Haq that manages the affairs of madarsas and also a large number of Khadims of the holy shrine joined the rally. Khadims are the workers who help the pilgrims in the holy shrine.

The rally proceeded to a roundabout in the city where a Pakistani captured tank of the 1971 war is on display. The children climbed on the Patton tank and raised anti-Pakistan slogans.

Abdul Bari, a senior Khadim said the rally was started from the holy shrine to send a message that Hazrat Khwaja Moinuddin was a secular person who taught the lesson of peace to humanity. He said it is the same shrine where Presidents and Prime Ministers of Pakistan come to pay their obeisance. Bari said that the madarsas children by taking out the rally want to send a message to the people of Pakistan that the rulers of Pakistan were unnecessarily trying to disturb peace between the two countries. The Chief of the Dawatul Haq Maulana Abdul Qasmi said that the surgical operation conducted by the Indian army was not only timely but also fully justified. He said Pakistan lost two major battles against India in 1965 and 1971 and yet if it chooses to confront India this time it would lead to total disintegration of the country.

This was for the first time that religious leaders of the Muslim community came out in the open to condemn the terror attacks sponsored by Pakistan.