ISSUES AND CONCERNS ಸಮಸ್ಯೆಗಳ ಮೇಲೆ ಕ್ಷಕಿರಣ

Bias in social communication Dr. M. V. Kamath Technology is creating havoc in the world of social communication as has recently become evident in a demand by Kapil Sibal, Information Technology Minister, that on-line content should be regulated. It would seem that he was incensed to see on one website an image of Dr Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi intimate contact and on another, pigs running through Mecca. This might have driven him to demand of the websites to remove such contents or face action. And, understandably, it has created furore in media circles. The use of morphed images of Sonia Gandhi and Dr Singh in Facebbook in plainly sickening and one can well imagine Sibal’s distress. There cannot be two questions about it. But what is the way out? The print media, even TV news channels in India have their own reporters and news editors and one can’t even dream of a replication of Facebook’s atrocious content in any of them. But it is a different story with social media sites. Faceb...

TUKAARAAM OMBAALEY A Memorial to the IDEA OF INDIA To remember him, and to remind the nation that there existed one like ASI Tukaram Ombale, and to make him part of, not just the oral history but to make the life story of this exemplary Indian, into the page of history book of our motherland, not merely for the information of posterity but for it to live in the heart of every young child, as an inspirational beacon of light. As a memorial, to the everlasting memory of the soul, it is planned to erect a life size statue at an appropriate place in Belgaum, a place perennially politicized by both Karantaka and Maharashtra. This memorial is intended to promote friendship and brotherhood among we Indians from Maharashtra and Karnataka, and as a model for co-operative co-existence in an India divided on linguistic subterfuge. In an India which yearns to be a super power but languishing at 134 in the UNDP ranking of Human Development Index, stuck in the low development module. Assistant Sub I...

Friends In trying to evolve, to improve the quality of the periodical, we have decided on a major departure. We have travelled 11 long years and had our share of accolades and brickbats. Most of our readers did approve our long editorial and have been generous in their approbation. However, there have been those who felt, it is too long, and that nowhere in the world, one can find such long editorial. Perhaps that is the uniqueness of I & C. Thus, from this month we shall make two parts to the editorial take, on the current and the recurrent events of the month that we just left behind. We will have a half page of a general nature with the raison d’être of the Focus and other as ‘Month in Perspective’, with distinctive highlights. Hope all will find this an interesting departure. As usual do revert with your inputs. The media has been under attack from different quarters. With Supreme Court retired Justice Markandey Katju taking over as new Press Council Chairman debate on the 4th ...

SOCIAL ISSUES & MEDIA CONCERNS The other day in Mangalore, we had the pleasure or do we say, displeasure or plainly, an occasion to meet a senior journalist, or at least that is what he claimed non-challently. He had whole lot of complaints against everything Indian. He even said, that Pakistan had motorways and that both Pakistan and Bangladesh are above that of India in Human Development Index (HDI) compiled by United Nations Development Programme. He also told about the problems that he is having with the ‘state BJP and RSS’, but wasn’t clear how and why. Since he had whole lot of complaints, we didn’t bother to know why and how of the Sangh Parivar’s alleged pin pricks. But he appeared very emphatic that secularism in the country is in danger and that Christians are under continuous attack. Of course, just the other day, to be specific on 4th Nov., print media carried a news item that some miscreants had attacked the St. Alphonsa church in Mangalore. As usual Sangh Pariwar outf...

He who hath, shall be given Prof. B. M. Hegde, hegdebm@gmail.com "If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion." The Dalai Lama India has millions starving. Our food stock has been all time high. Most of that precious food is rotting in open storage places, if already not been stolen by greedy business people because the Governments have no storage space. The godowns that they had rented had been returned to their owners. One of the MNC consultants appointed by GOI recently advised that they are not economically viable any more! India has the largest number of Nutritional Immune Deficiency Syndromes (NIDS) among children- more than 67 million in all. This is much higher than all the Sub-Saharan countries put together-their total is about 42 million. Our children die almost daily in thousands. Hardly 50 kilometers away from India’s commercial capital city of Mumbai, in a small Adivasi village of Jamsar, children die every da...

GANG LEADER FOR A DAY Black and Blue Every so often J.T. sent out an entourage to buy food for people in the building. A few tenants carried on us usual, paying little attention to the Black Kings’ dramatic show of security in the lobby. But except for a couple of stereos and some shouting in the stairwells, the building was eerily quiet. We all baked in the still, hot air. Occasionally one of J.T.’s more senior members would throw out a plan for retaliation. J.T. listened to every proposal but was non -committal. "We got time for all that," he kept saying. "Let’s just see what happens tonight." Every half hour Cherise called from the hospital to report on Price’s condition. J.T. looked tense as he took these reports. Price was a friend since high school, one of the few people J.T. allowed in his inner circle. I was just nodding off to sleep on the floor when J.T. walked over. "Thanks, man," he said quietly. "For what?" "You didn’t have to g...

Legs - vital clues in heart failure London: Doctors tend to treat heart muscles when the organ reels under an attack, over-looking the condition of the legs, which could provide vital clues in treating the condition, new research says. Heart failure causes breathlessness and fatigue that severely limits normal daily activities such as walking. A University of Leeds research team, shown that leg muscle dysfunction is related to the severity of symptoms in heart failure patients, the Journal of Applied Physiology reports. "Many chronic heart failure patients complain of leg fatigue during exercise and this can prevent them from being active," says Harry Rossiter, of the Faculty of Biological Sciences at the University. "Our study shows that by warming up properly, patients can improve the oxygenation and performance of their leg muscles, which is beneficial in promoting exercise tolerance," he adds. In a series of experiments with chronic heart failure patients, the r...