Malayala Manorama Indian Newspaper of Malayalam Language from eight places in Kerela
Unsigned passport lands official in trouble
New Delhi: Anuradha Thadipathri Gopinath's plan to visit Dubai was dashed at Mumbai airport because she had been issued an unsigned passport. Now a court has pulled up the passport officer for "serious deficiency in discharge of duties".
National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission pulled up the passport officer posted at the Bangalore regional passport office last week for the negligence and asked him to pay a compensation of Rs.10,000 and cost of Rs.2,000 to Gopinath.
Observing that travelling on such a passport could have invited unnecessary trouble for her, commission president M.B. Shah said: "A passport, which is issued without the signature of the competent authority, is on the face of it invalid which would have placed the complainant in a precarious position and she might have been hauled up for various offences if she had tried to go abroad on that passport.
"Such lapse amounts to a serious deficiency in discharge of duties, which is in the nature of rendering of service," said Shah.
Gopinath was issued a passport by the official, who did not sign it at the time of its issuance. She got a visa too.
She reached Mumbai airport to embark on her journey to Dubai. But at the airport, the lacuna came to light and the airport authorities asked her to go back. She lost the opportunity of going abroad on a trip that her company had sponsored.
Gopinath went to the Karnataka District Forum. The forum directed the officer to pay a compensation of Rs.10,000 and costs of Rs.2,000 to her.
The passport officer appealed to the Maharashtra State Commission which upheld the original order.
The official then appealed to the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission. He said he was "exercising a sovereign function" while issuing the passport. He was not charging a fee, and therefore this could not be a consumer dispute, the official contended.
But the commission ruled: "In our view, issuance or non-issuance of a passport may be a statutory duty and may not be a consumer dispute but issuance of an invalid passport which is not signed by the passport officer, would be deficiency in service on the part of the officer concerned."
Everybody pays a fee for getting a passport, the commission, and dismissed the appeal.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Friday, July 25, 2008
ABC News: Randy Pausch, 'Last Lecture' Professor Dies
ABC News: Randy Pausch, 'Last Lecture' Professor Dies
Carnegie Mellon Professor, Author of 'The Last Lecture,' Succumbs to Cancer
By GEOFF MARTZ, SAMANTHA WENDER and CHRIS FRANCESCANI
July 25, 2008
Randy Pausch, the charismatic young college professor who chronicled his battle with pancreatic cancer in a remarkable speech widely-known as the "Last Lecture," has died at the age of 47. He was at home, surrounded by his wife, Jai, and his three children.
A dear friend to Diane Sawyer and "Good Morning America," Pausch's lecture and subsequent interview was one of the most powerful accounts of hope, grace and optimistism ABC News has ever featured, and drew a worldwide response.
"I'd like to thank the millions of people who have offered their love, prayers and support," Jai Pausch said in a statement. "Randy was so happy and proud that the lecture and book inspired parents to revisit their priorities, particularly their relationships with their children. The outpouring of cards and emails really sustained him."
Tune in to "Good Morning America" Monday July 28 and Tuesday July 29 for a special tribute to Professor Pausch. Then be sure and catch "The Last Lecture: A Celebration of Life" Tuesday July 29 on "Primetime" at 10 p.m. ET and click here to see ABC News' full coverage of his story.
It all began with one, age-old question: What would you say if you knew you were going to die and had a chance to sum up everything that was most important to you?
That question had been posed to the annual speaker of a lecture series at Carnegie Mellon University, where Pausch was a computer sciences professor. For Pausch, though, the question wasn't hypothetical.
Pausch, a father of three small children with his wife Jai, had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer -- and given six months to live.
Friends and colleagues flew in from all around the country to attend his last lecture. And -- almost as an afterthought -- the lecture was videotaped and put on the Internet for the few people who couldn't get there that day.
That was all it took.
Alice: Randy Pausch's Computer Software for Kids
Somehow amid the vast clamor of the Web and the bling-bling of million-dollar budgets, savvy marketing campaigns and millions of strange and bizarre videos, the voice of one earnest professor standing at a podium and talking about his childhood dreams cut through the noise.
The lecture was so uplifting, so funny, so inspirational that it went viral. So far, 10 million people have downloaded it.
And thousands have written in to say that his lecture changed their lives.
If you had only six months to live, what would you do? How would you live your life? And how can all of us take heart from Pausch's inspiring message to live each day to its fullest?
Pausch's answers to these questions, both in the lecture and in three separate interviews over a series of months with Diane Sawyer, are moving, funny, thought-provoking and extraordinary.
According to the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, an advocacy organization for the pancreatic cancer community, approximately 37,170 Americans will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2008 and 33,370 will die from it. The Pausch family has asked that donations on Randy's behalf be sent to the organization or to Carnegie Mellon's Randy Pausch Memorial Fund.
Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer death in the United States, and unlike other cancers, during the last 30 years the medical community has seen very little advancement in prolonging the lives of pancreatic cancer patients.
But instead of focusing on his death, Pausch spoke about his childhood dreams. "You may not agree with the list but I was there. ... Being in zero gravity, playing in the National Football League, authoring an article in the World Book Encyclopedia -- I guess you can tell the nerds early. ... I wanted to be one of the guys who won the big stuffed animals in the amusement park."
He went on to attain almost all of those dreams, but they didn't all come easy.
In the lecture, he spoke of overcoming the obstacles that may seem insurmountable.
Although he graduated magna cum laude from Brown University, he nearly didn't get in to Brown in the first place -- he was wait listed. It was a brick wall that some might have walked away from. But Pausch had a novel way of looking at obstacles:
"The brick walls are there for a reason," he said during his lecture. "The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something."
He kept calling the college until it let him in.
Pausch maintained that his most formidable brick wall was a beautiful graduate student named Jai Glasgow. Pausch was 37, with a reputation as something of a ladies' man, when he met her at a lecture. Pausch was smitten, but she resisted. However, he refused to give up, and they eventually married and had three children.
Pausch spoke movingly of how he was trying to create memories for his three kids, Dylan, 6, Logan, 3, and Chloe, 18 months, and why he couldn't allow himself to wallow in self pity.
"I mean, the metaphor I've used is ... somebody's going to push my family off a cliff pretty soon, and I won't be there to catch them. And that breaks my heart. But I have some time to sew some nets to cushion the fall. So, I can curl up in a ball and cry, or I can get to work on the nets."
Pausch was already a popular professor, and one of the foremost teachers in the field of virtual reality, when he proposed a class that would become legendary at CMU: It was called Building Virtual Worlds, a high-wire act that brought together students from many different disciplines, writers and computer programmers and artists who were forced to work together intensively in small groups.
Pausch told Sawyer that while the course was ostensibly about designing virtual reality worlds, there was a stealth message as well: "How do you behave with integrity? How do you behave in a way that other people will respect you and want to keep working with you?"
The result was so popular that it eventually spawned an entire program at the university. Together with drama professor Don Marinelli, Pausch started the Entertainment Technology Center, which over the years has become the go-to school for video gaming and Hollywood high tech.
At the ETC, students were encouraged to try the unconventional and the risky.
As former student Phil Light said, "We went to him and said, 'We have these ideas, we have a couple of ideas. This idea here is very safe. This idea here is risky.' He said, 'Go for the risk. It's better to fail spectacularly then to pass along and do something which is mediocre.'"
Pausch said that over the years, he went from attaining his own childhood dreams to learning to enable the dreams of his students, which he maintained is every bit as satisfying.
'Never Lose the Childlike Wonder'
To enable dreams on a grand scale, Pausch began his latest venture, called Alice. Alice is a free computer application that teaches kids to program, while giving them the impression that they are simply creating animated stories.
Created by a Carnegie Mellon team including Wanda Dann, Dennis Cosgrove and Caitlin Kelleher, Alice has already been downloaded more than a million times. The new version of Alice will feature characters from the popular computer game "The Sims."
After his diagnosis, Pausch devoted almost all of his time to his family, moving to a location near his wife's family, so that she would have some emotional support, and spent a lot of time with his three kids.
He had tried to approach what he called his "engineering problem" as a scientist: He interviewed people who'd lost their parents and asked them what they would have wanted to have as keepsakes; what they wished their parents had told them before they died. Pausch said he wanted to make sure he gave his wife and children what they would need to remember him, and to know that he loved them.
He and his wife, Jai, consulted psychotherapist Michele Reiss and other experts to help them grapple with such issues as when to tell the children. Reiss says very young children "have no particular time orientation yet. So you can talk to a young child in terms of breakfast time, or lunchtime, or dinnertime, or nap time, but you can't talk about the day after tomorrow, or next week, or next month, much less three to six months from now."
Therefore, the decision was made not to tell the children until their father was much sicker. The Pausch family had asked any viewers who might run into them to respect the experts' opinion and say nothing.
One of the things Pausch left behind for his kids: the lecture. He called it a message in a bottle. The lecture, along with private videos he made for their eyes alone, and a book he wrote called "The Last Lecture" would help give his children -- at least one of whom is too young now to be able to have distinct memories of her father -- a sense of how much he loved them.
Sawyer asked Pausch about his children, in particular Chloe, the youngest. "I hope that her passion will take her to wherever she goes. And the same for Dylan and Logan. I just hope that they have passion for things, and I'm sure they will. I'm sure their mother will instill that in them. And whatever they see of me in direct memories and indirect memories, uh, will send that signal. Because if they have passion for things, then I'm happy for whatever they have passion for."
Worldwide Impact
But if Pausch's lecture was written for an audience of only three, it has touched millions of others as well. People around the country told ABC News about the many ways his lecture had helped bring magic into their lives.
Alfred Nicolosi of Salem, N.J., said the night he watched Pausch's lecture was the "same night when Randy's life turned mine around." Battling depression, cancer surgery and facing heart problems, Nicolosi cleaned up his life, literally.
"I had never been very organized person, but this was exceptional. I'd allowed piles of boxes, groceries, laundry, books scattered everywhere. There was absolutely no order to my life, no way to find things, it was just lost. So immediately after seeing the lecture, I began to organize my house, and I felt like I was rediscovering my life in the process."
Peter Riebling, a lawyer from Vienna, Va., handed his 10-year-old daughter, Kimberly, a pencil and gave her free reign on her bedroom walls. "He told me to go draw on my walls, so at first I honestly thought he had gone crazy, because most parents wouldn't let their children draw on the walls, especially when they are brand new and painted and stuff. So I did start drawing on my walls -- and then I actually found it was extremely fun so I kept doing it," said Kimberly.
Diane Gregory from Las Vegas encouraged her teenage son Matt to express himself by hanging every piece of sports memorabilia he had collected on his walls. Matt jumped at the opportunity and with the tacks and double-sided tape went to work. Harry Wooten, a choir minister from Dallas, uses Pausch's message to touch his congregants through prayer and song.
After battling breast cancer, Kaje Lane of Los Angeles says Pausch has inspired her to pursue singing -- a passion she had put aside for many years.
"I think so many people relate to Randy because every one of us has some sort of dream they want to make real, or some sort of passion that they want to tap into if they're not already thinking that way. … I think people are just drawn to that. It's very magnetic to see someone positive not just about the big things but the little things."
'Leave It All on the Field'
Even though he had enabled the dreams of so many others, we couldn't help but notice that there was one dream Pausch had never been able to fulfill -- playing in the NFL.
So ABC News made a couple of phone calls, and in October, Pausch took the field with the Pittsburgh Steelers. He was wearing the jersey of his favorite player: wide receiver Heinz Ward.
Moments later he was catching balls thrown by Ward.
He caught every pass -- and even kicked a field goal, on his first attempt.
"There was a definite sense," Pausch told Sawyer, "when I put that talk together, to use another football expression, you know, I wanted to leave it all on the field. … If I thought it was important, it's in there. I played in football games where you walk off the field and the scoreboard didn't end up the way you wanted. But you knew that you really did give it all. And the other team was too strong. Yeah, I'm not going to beat the cancer. I tried really hard … but sometimes you're just not going to beat the thing…I wanted to walk off the stage and say anything I thought was important, I had my hour."
After a bout earlier this year in the hospital to overcome kidney and congestive heart failure -- side effects of his chemotherapy -- Pausch returned home to his family.
"His fate is, is our fate, but it's just sped up," said co-author Jeff Zaslow. "He's, you know, 47, and, and we don't know when we're gonna go, but we all have the same fate. We're all dying, just like Randy is … when we can see him, how he's, how he's traveling, it makes us think about how we're going to travel."
Millions of people around the globe have been touched by his message of optimism.
Last spring, Sawyer asked Pausch what was the best thing that had happened to him that day. He replied, "Well, first off, I'd say the day's not over yet. So there's always a chance that there will be a new best."
Lasting Legacy
Carnegie Mellon University will honor Pausch's commitment to collaboration by building the Randy Pausch Memorial Footbridge to connect a computer science center under construction with a nearby arts building.
Announcing the project last September, Carnegie Mellon President Jared L. Cohon said, "Randy, there will be generations of students and faculty who will not know you, but they will cross that bridge and see your name and they'll ask those of us who did know you. And we will tell them."
In a statement released by the university today, Cohon expressed the community's sadness at Pausch's passing.
"Randy had an enormous and lasting impact on Carnegie Mellon," Cohon said . "He was a brilliant researcher and gifted teacher. His love of teaching, his sense of fun and his brilliance came together in the Alice project, which teaches students computer programming while enabling them to do something fun -- making animated movies and games. Carnegie Mellon -- and the world -- are better places for having had Randy Pausch in them."
The family requests that donations on Randy's behalf be directed to the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, 2141 Rosecrans Ave., Suite 7000, El Segundo, CA 90245, or to Carnegie Mellon's Randy Pausch Memorial Fund.
Carnegie Mellon Professor, Author of 'The Last Lecture,' Succumbs to Cancer
By GEOFF MARTZ, SAMANTHA WENDER and CHRIS FRANCESCANI
July 25, 2008
Randy Pausch, the charismatic young college professor who chronicled his battle with pancreatic cancer in a remarkable speech widely-known as the "Last Lecture," has died at the age of 47. He was at home, surrounded by his wife, Jai, and his three children.
A dear friend to Diane Sawyer and "Good Morning America," Pausch's lecture and subsequent interview was one of the most powerful accounts of hope, grace and optimistism ABC News has ever featured, and drew a worldwide response.
"I'd like to thank the millions of people who have offered their love, prayers and support," Jai Pausch said in a statement. "Randy was so happy and proud that the lecture and book inspired parents to revisit their priorities, particularly their relationships with their children. The outpouring of cards and emails really sustained him."
Tune in to "Good Morning America" Monday July 28 and Tuesday July 29 for a special tribute to Professor Pausch. Then be sure and catch "The Last Lecture: A Celebration of Life" Tuesday July 29 on "Primetime" at 10 p.m. ET and click here to see ABC News' full coverage of his story.
It all began with one, age-old question: What would you say if you knew you were going to die and had a chance to sum up everything that was most important to you?
That question had been posed to the annual speaker of a lecture series at Carnegie Mellon University, where Pausch was a computer sciences professor. For Pausch, though, the question wasn't hypothetical.
Pausch, a father of three small children with his wife Jai, had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer -- and given six months to live.
Friends and colleagues flew in from all around the country to attend his last lecture. And -- almost as an afterthought -- the lecture was videotaped and put on the Internet for the few people who couldn't get there that day.
That was all it took.
Alice: Randy Pausch's Computer Software for Kids
Somehow amid the vast clamor of the Web and the bling-bling of million-dollar budgets, savvy marketing campaigns and millions of strange and bizarre videos, the voice of one earnest professor standing at a podium and talking about his childhood dreams cut through the noise.
The lecture was so uplifting, so funny, so inspirational that it went viral. So far, 10 million people have downloaded it.
And thousands have written in to say that his lecture changed their lives.
If you had only six months to live, what would you do? How would you live your life? And how can all of us take heart from Pausch's inspiring message to live each day to its fullest?
Pausch's answers to these questions, both in the lecture and in three separate interviews over a series of months with Diane Sawyer, are moving, funny, thought-provoking and extraordinary.
According to the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, an advocacy organization for the pancreatic cancer community, approximately 37,170 Americans will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2008 and 33,370 will die from it. The Pausch family has asked that donations on Randy's behalf be sent to the organization or to Carnegie Mellon's Randy Pausch Memorial Fund.
Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer death in the United States, and unlike other cancers, during the last 30 years the medical community has seen very little advancement in prolonging the lives of pancreatic cancer patients.
But instead of focusing on his death, Pausch spoke about his childhood dreams. "You may not agree with the list but I was there. ... Being in zero gravity, playing in the National Football League, authoring an article in the World Book Encyclopedia -- I guess you can tell the nerds early. ... I wanted to be one of the guys who won the big stuffed animals in the amusement park."
He went on to attain almost all of those dreams, but they didn't all come easy.
In the lecture, he spoke of overcoming the obstacles that may seem insurmountable.
Although he graduated magna cum laude from Brown University, he nearly didn't get in to Brown in the first place -- he was wait listed. It was a brick wall that some might have walked away from. But Pausch had a novel way of looking at obstacles:
"The brick walls are there for a reason," he said during his lecture. "The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something."
He kept calling the college until it let him in.
Pausch maintained that his most formidable brick wall was a beautiful graduate student named Jai Glasgow. Pausch was 37, with a reputation as something of a ladies' man, when he met her at a lecture. Pausch was smitten, but she resisted. However, he refused to give up, and they eventually married and had three children.
Pausch spoke movingly of how he was trying to create memories for his three kids, Dylan, 6, Logan, 3, and Chloe, 18 months, and why he couldn't allow himself to wallow in self pity.
"I mean, the metaphor I've used is ... somebody's going to push my family off a cliff pretty soon, and I won't be there to catch them. And that breaks my heart. But I have some time to sew some nets to cushion the fall. So, I can curl up in a ball and cry, or I can get to work on the nets."
Pausch was already a popular professor, and one of the foremost teachers in the field of virtual reality, when he proposed a class that would become legendary at CMU: It was called Building Virtual Worlds, a high-wire act that brought together students from many different disciplines, writers and computer programmers and artists who were forced to work together intensively in small groups.
Pausch told Sawyer that while the course was ostensibly about designing virtual reality worlds, there was a stealth message as well: "How do you behave with integrity? How do you behave in a way that other people will respect you and want to keep working with you?"
The result was so popular that it eventually spawned an entire program at the university. Together with drama professor Don Marinelli, Pausch started the Entertainment Technology Center, which over the years has become the go-to school for video gaming and Hollywood high tech.
At the ETC, students were encouraged to try the unconventional and the risky.
As former student Phil Light said, "We went to him and said, 'We have these ideas, we have a couple of ideas. This idea here is very safe. This idea here is risky.' He said, 'Go for the risk. It's better to fail spectacularly then to pass along and do something which is mediocre.'"
Pausch said that over the years, he went from attaining his own childhood dreams to learning to enable the dreams of his students, which he maintained is every bit as satisfying.
'Never Lose the Childlike Wonder'
To enable dreams on a grand scale, Pausch began his latest venture, called Alice. Alice is a free computer application that teaches kids to program, while giving them the impression that they are simply creating animated stories.
Created by a Carnegie Mellon team including Wanda Dann, Dennis Cosgrove and Caitlin Kelleher, Alice has already been downloaded more than a million times. The new version of Alice will feature characters from the popular computer game "The Sims."
After his diagnosis, Pausch devoted almost all of his time to his family, moving to a location near his wife's family, so that she would have some emotional support, and spent a lot of time with his three kids.
He had tried to approach what he called his "engineering problem" as a scientist: He interviewed people who'd lost their parents and asked them what they would have wanted to have as keepsakes; what they wished their parents had told them before they died. Pausch said he wanted to make sure he gave his wife and children what they would need to remember him, and to know that he loved them.
He and his wife, Jai, consulted psychotherapist Michele Reiss and other experts to help them grapple with such issues as when to tell the children. Reiss says very young children "have no particular time orientation yet. So you can talk to a young child in terms of breakfast time, or lunchtime, or dinnertime, or nap time, but you can't talk about the day after tomorrow, or next week, or next month, much less three to six months from now."
Therefore, the decision was made not to tell the children until their father was much sicker. The Pausch family had asked any viewers who might run into them to respect the experts' opinion and say nothing.
One of the things Pausch left behind for his kids: the lecture. He called it a message in a bottle. The lecture, along with private videos he made for their eyes alone, and a book he wrote called "The Last Lecture" would help give his children -- at least one of whom is too young now to be able to have distinct memories of her father -- a sense of how much he loved them.
Sawyer asked Pausch about his children, in particular Chloe, the youngest. "I hope that her passion will take her to wherever she goes. And the same for Dylan and Logan. I just hope that they have passion for things, and I'm sure they will. I'm sure their mother will instill that in them. And whatever they see of me in direct memories and indirect memories, uh, will send that signal. Because if they have passion for things, then I'm happy for whatever they have passion for."
Worldwide Impact
But if Pausch's lecture was written for an audience of only three, it has touched millions of others as well. People around the country told ABC News about the many ways his lecture had helped bring magic into their lives.
Alfred Nicolosi of Salem, N.J., said the night he watched Pausch's lecture was the "same night when Randy's life turned mine around." Battling depression, cancer surgery and facing heart problems, Nicolosi cleaned up his life, literally.
"I had never been very organized person, but this was exceptional. I'd allowed piles of boxes, groceries, laundry, books scattered everywhere. There was absolutely no order to my life, no way to find things, it was just lost. So immediately after seeing the lecture, I began to organize my house, and I felt like I was rediscovering my life in the process."
Peter Riebling, a lawyer from Vienna, Va., handed his 10-year-old daughter, Kimberly, a pencil and gave her free reign on her bedroom walls. "He told me to go draw on my walls, so at first I honestly thought he had gone crazy, because most parents wouldn't let their children draw on the walls, especially when they are brand new and painted and stuff. So I did start drawing on my walls -- and then I actually found it was extremely fun so I kept doing it," said Kimberly.
Diane Gregory from Las Vegas encouraged her teenage son Matt to express himself by hanging every piece of sports memorabilia he had collected on his walls. Matt jumped at the opportunity and with the tacks and double-sided tape went to work. Harry Wooten, a choir minister from Dallas, uses Pausch's message to touch his congregants through prayer and song.
After battling breast cancer, Kaje Lane of Los Angeles says Pausch has inspired her to pursue singing -- a passion she had put aside for many years.
"I think so many people relate to Randy because every one of us has some sort of dream they want to make real, or some sort of passion that they want to tap into if they're not already thinking that way. … I think people are just drawn to that. It's very magnetic to see someone positive not just about the big things but the little things."
'Leave It All on the Field'
Even though he had enabled the dreams of so many others, we couldn't help but notice that there was one dream Pausch had never been able to fulfill -- playing in the NFL.
So ABC News made a couple of phone calls, and in October, Pausch took the field with the Pittsburgh Steelers. He was wearing the jersey of his favorite player: wide receiver Heinz Ward.
Moments later he was catching balls thrown by Ward.
He caught every pass -- and even kicked a field goal, on his first attempt.
"There was a definite sense," Pausch told Sawyer, "when I put that talk together, to use another football expression, you know, I wanted to leave it all on the field. … If I thought it was important, it's in there. I played in football games where you walk off the field and the scoreboard didn't end up the way you wanted. But you knew that you really did give it all. And the other team was too strong. Yeah, I'm not going to beat the cancer. I tried really hard … but sometimes you're just not going to beat the thing…I wanted to walk off the stage and say anything I thought was important, I had my hour."
After a bout earlier this year in the hospital to overcome kidney and congestive heart failure -- side effects of his chemotherapy -- Pausch returned home to his family.
"His fate is, is our fate, but it's just sped up," said co-author Jeff Zaslow. "He's, you know, 47, and, and we don't know when we're gonna go, but we all have the same fate. We're all dying, just like Randy is … when we can see him, how he's, how he's traveling, it makes us think about how we're going to travel."
Millions of people around the globe have been touched by his message of optimism.
Last spring, Sawyer asked Pausch what was the best thing that had happened to him that day. He replied, "Well, first off, I'd say the day's not over yet. So there's always a chance that there will be a new best."
Lasting Legacy
Carnegie Mellon University will honor Pausch's commitment to collaboration by building the Randy Pausch Memorial Footbridge to connect a computer science center under construction with a nearby arts building.
Announcing the project last September, Carnegie Mellon President Jared L. Cohon said, "Randy, there will be generations of students and faculty who will not know you, but they will cross that bridge and see your name and they'll ask those of us who did know you. And we will tell them."
In a statement released by the university today, Cohon expressed the community's sadness at Pausch's passing.
"Randy had an enormous and lasting impact on Carnegie Mellon," Cohon said . "He was a brilliant researcher and gifted teacher. His love of teaching, his sense of fun and his brilliance came together in the Alice project, which teaches students computer programming while enabling them to do something fun -- making animated movies and games. Carnegie Mellon -- and the world -- are better places for having had Randy Pausch in them."
The family requests that donations on Randy's behalf be directed to the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, 2141 Rosecrans Ave., Suite 7000, El Segundo, CA 90245, or to Carnegie Mellon's Randy Pausch Memorial Fund.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Abhishek, two Bollywood Khans in Forbes' 10 'cell celebs' list - Yahoo! India News
Abhishek, two Bollywood Khans in Forbes' 10 'cell celebs' list - Yahoo! India News
Abhishek, two Bollywood Khans in Forbes' 10 'cell celebs' list
Thu, Jul 17 07:14 PM
New York, July 17 (IANS) Three Bollywood stars, Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir Khan and Abhishek Bachchan, feature in Forbes magazine's list of 10 celebrities who are brand ambassadors for different mobile phone companies.
The three Indian actors are joined by football star David Beckham and tennis champion Maria Sharapova on the list released by the US magazine, otherwise known for its billionaire rankings. Sharapova endorses Sony Ericsson phones and Beckham lends his name to the Motorola RAZR2 phone.
While Shah Rukh lends star power to mobile phones made by Nokia, Abhishek and Aamir endorse Motorola and Samsung phones respectively.
The Forbes report said that Nokia, the world's largest phone manufacturer, 'doesn't work with many celebrities but makes an exception for Shah Rukh, who says he has used Nokia phones for more than a decade.'
It added that after a popular commercial last December, the company sponsored Shah Rukh's Indian Premier League cricket team earlier this year.
The magazine said Abhishek, a former LG Electronics' brand ambassador, now represents Motorola phones in India, and that he is 'Bollywood royalty, thanks to his famous actor father, Amitabh Bachchan, and glamorous actress wife Aishwarya Rai'.
About Aamir, the report said: 'After appearing in his first movie at eight, Bollywood star Aamir now produces and directs films, as well as acts. Samsung has said it is counting on his popularity to help it double its market share in India this year.'
Samsung also claimed that Aamir's work mirrors their brand's 'qualities of innovation, change, discovery, self-expression and excellence in performance'.
Explaining how mobile phone companies are now emulating perfume and designer jean makers in hiring celebrities, Forbes said: 'As nearly everyone on the planet seems to have a cellphone, device makers must work harder to win new customers. Cool designs and low prices help, of course. But so do celebrities. That's led phone makers to recruit some A-listers from Usher (a singer) to David Beckham to lend an ear and a smile to selling cellphones.'
Others in the magazine's 'Ten Celebs and Their Cells' list are singers Fergie, Rain (also known as Jung Ji Hoon), Andy Lau and race car driver Danica Patrick.
Abhishek, two Bollywood Khans in Forbes' 10 'cell celebs' list
Thu, Jul 17 07:14 PM
New York, July 17 (IANS) Three Bollywood stars, Shah Rukh Khan, Aamir Khan and Abhishek Bachchan, feature in Forbes magazine's list of 10 celebrities who are brand ambassadors for different mobile phone companies.
The three Indian actors are joined by football star David Beckham and tennis champion Maria Sharapova on the list released by the US magazine, otherwise known for its billionaire rankings. Sharapova endorses Sony Ericsson phones and Beckham lends his name to the Motorola RAZR2 phone.
While Shah Rukh lends star power to mobile phones made by Nokia, Abhishek and Aamir endorse Motorola and Samsung phones respectively.
The Forbes report said that Nokia, the world's largest phone manufacturer, 'doesn't work with many celebrities but makes an exception for Shah Rukh, who says he has used Nokia phones for more than a decade.'
It added that after a popular commercial last December, the company sponsored Shah Rukh's Indian Premier League cricket team earlier this year.
The magazine said Abhishek, a former LG Electronics' brand ambassador, now represents Motorola phones in India, and that he is 'Bollywood royalty, thanks to his famous actor father, Amitabh Bachchan, and glamorous actress wife Aishwarya Rai'.
About Aamir, the report said: 'After appearing in his first movie at eight, Bollywood star Aamir now produces and directs films, as well as acts. Samsung has said it is counting on his popularity to help it double its market share in India this year.'
Samsung also claimed that Aamir's work mirrors their brand's 'qualities of innovation, change, discovery, self-expression and excellence in performance'.
Explaining how mobile phone companies are now emulating perfume and designer jean makers in hiring celebrities, Forbes said: 'As nearly everyone on the planet seems to have a cellphone, device makers must work harder to win new customers. Cool designs and low prices help, of course. But so do celebrities. That's led phone makers to recruit some A-listers from Usher (a singer) to David Beckham to lend an ear and a smile to selling cellphones.'
Others in the magazine's 'Ten Celebs and Their Cells' list are singers Fergie, Rain (also known as Jung Ji Hoon), Andy Lau and race car driver Danica Patrick.
Monday, July 14, 2008
Mukesh Ambani's $2 bn home world's most expensive: Forbes
tag: luxuary
Economic Times - Indian Newspapers in English Language from seven editions.
Mukesh Ambani's $2 bn home world's most expensive: Forbes
2 May, 2008, 1225 hrs IST, PTI
NEW YORK: The 27-storey skyscraper being built in Mumbai by Mukesh Ambani, the richest person in India, could be the world's largest and costliest home with a price- tag nearing two billion dollar, according to Forbes magazine. ( Watch )
"When the Ambani residence is finished in January, completing a four-year process, it will be 550 feet high with 4,00,000 square feet of interior space," Forbes said in a report on its website.
Earlier in March, Mukesh Ambani was ranked as the fifth richest person in the world with a net worth of 43 billion dollars by the Forbes magazine in its annual list of world's wealthiest billionaires. While Lakshmi Mittal, who is an Indian citizen was ranked higher at fourth, he is a British resident. Among resident Indians, Mukesh was ranked at top.
"The only remotely comparable high-rise property currently on the market is the 70 million dollar triplex penthouse at the Pierre Hotel in New York, designed to resemble a French chateau, and climbing 525 feet in the air," Forbes said in its report titled, "Inside The World's First Billion-Dollar Home."
Mukesh Ambani heads India's most valuable firm Reliance Industries, an oil and petrochemicals giant.
"Like many families with the means to do so, the Ambanis wanted to build a custom home. They consulted with architecture firms Perkins + Will and Hirsch Bedner Associates, the designers behind the Mandarin Oriental, based in Dallas and Los Angeles, respectively," the report said.
Economic Times - Indian Newspapers in English Language from seven editions.
Mukesh Ambani's $2 bn home world's most expensive: Forbes
2 May, 2008, 1225 hrs IST, PTI
NEW YORK: The 27-storey skyscraper being built in Mumbai by Mukesh Ambani, the richest person in India, could be the world's largest and costliest home with a price- tag nearing two billion dollar, according to Forbes magazine. ( Watch )
"When the Ambani residence is finished in January, completing a four-year process, it will be 550 feet high with 4,00,000 square feet of interior space," Forbes said in a report on its website.
Earlier in March, Mukesh Ambani was ranked as the fifth richest person in the world with a net worth of 43 billion dollars by the Forbes magazine in its annual list of world's wealthiest billionaires. While Lakshmi Mittal, who is an Indian citizen was ranked higher at fourth, he is a British resident. Among resident Indians, Mukesh was ranked at top.
"The only remotely comparable high-rise property currently on the market is the 70 million dollar triplex penthouse at the Pierre Hotel in New York, designed to resemble a French chateau, and climbing 525 feet in the air," Forbes said in its report titled, "Inside The World's First Billion-Dollar Home."
Mukesh Ambani heads India's most valuable firm Reliance Industries, an oil and petrochemicals giant.
"Like many families with the means to do so, the Ambanis wanted to build a custom home. They consulted with architecture firms Perkins + Will and Hirsch Bedner Associates, the designers behind the Mandarin Oriental, based in Dallas and Los Angeles, respectively," the report said.
Monday, July 7, 2008
karnataka BJP paid MLAs Rs 5 cr to switch
Deccan Chronicle - Indian Newspapers in English Language from Secunderabad
BJP paid MLAs Rs 5 cr to switch
Bengaluru, July 7: The four MLAs who quit their Assembly membership last week were paid Rs 5 crores each to switch sides. Sources in the BJP said the party — that worked out a strategy to pre-empt the Congress’ strategy to bring down the BJP government midway through the Budget Session of the state legislature — agreed to a long list of demands put forth by these leaders.As part of the deal, Rs 5 crores was paid to each MLA on resignation. At least two of the MLAs, Balachandra Jarkiholi and Narasimha Swamy, will be inducted into the Cabinet on Wednesday.
Two others are likely to be made chairmen of boards and corporations. Besides this, the party will bear the expenses of the by elections in which the MLAs will contest as BJP candidates. Also, they will be helped in retaining political clout in their constituencies.Sources in the party said that the entire episode was strategised when the Congress Rajya Sabha MP Anil Lad tried to persuade BJP MLAs Shankarlige Gowda and A. Narayanaswamy to quit their Assembly membership midway through the Budget Session besides cajoling the six independent MLAs to rock the BJP’s boat in exchange for a fat sum that was promised by the Congress leaders.
The Congress’ strategy, is to woo disgruntled BJP MLAs and persuade them to leave the party. In fact, BJP approached Mr V. Somanna, who had promised to resign, but he is believed to be bargaining for a ministry. The BJP spin doctors found it easy to convince the four MLAs who quit to defect. BJP strategists are working overtime to persuade a few more MLAs into quitting the Congress and Janata Dal (S). The names doing the rounds include Umesh Katti, Mahadev Prasad, Cada Venkatesh and H.C. Mahadevappa.
BJP paid MLAs Rs 5 cr to switch
Bengaluru, July 7: The four MLAs who quit their Assembly membership last week were paid Rs 5 crores each to switch sides. Sources in the BJP said the party — that worked out a strategy to pre-empt the Congress’ strategy to bring down the BJP government midway through the Budget Session of the state legislature — agreed to a long list of demands put forth by these leaders.As part of the deal, Rs 5 crores was paid to each MLA on resignation. At least two of the MLAs, Balachandra Jarkiholi and Narasimha Swamy, will be inducted into the Cabinet on Wednesday.
Two others are likely to be made chairmen of boards and corporations. Besides this, the party will bear the expenses of the by elections in which the MLAs will contest as BJP candidates. Also, they will be helped in retaining political clout in their constituencies.Sources in the party said that the entire episode was strategised when the Congress Rajya Sabha MP Anil Lad tried to persuade BJP MLAs Shankarlige Gowda and A. Narayanaswamy to quit their Assembly membership midway through the Budget Session besides cajoling the six independent MLAs to rock the BJP’s boat in exchange for a fat sum that was promised by the Congress leaders.
The Congress’ strategy, is to woo disgruntled BJP MLAs and persuade them to leave the party. In fact, BJP approached Mr V. Somanna, who had promised to resign, but he is believed to be bargaining for a ministry. The BJP spin doctors found it easy to convince the four MLAs who quit to defect. BJP strategists are working overtime to persuade a few more MLAs into quitting the Congress and Janata Dal (S). The names doing the rounds include Umesh Katti, Mahadev Prasad, Cada Venkatesh and H.C. Mahadevappa.
The Telegraph - Indian Newspapers in English Language from Kolkatta (Calcutta) India.
The Telegraph - Indian Newspapers in English Language from Kolkatta (Calcutta) India.
Goddess of small change
- 100kg of coins in retired alms-seeker’s shanty
Calcutta, July 7: Lakshmi started begging from the age of 16 but it wasn’t for nothing that her parents had named her after the goddess of wealth. Over 100kg of coins stored in four iron buckets have been found in her one-room shanty.
At 60, Lakshmi Das is worth anywhere between Rs 20,000 and Rs 30,000.
Shantanu Neogi and J.P. Singh, two employees of the Central Bank of India’s Manicktala branch, expect that it will take them three days or more to count the woman’s life’s savings.
Partho Mondal, a constable at Burtolla police station, watches the counting, which started today, in the branch manager’s cabin. Lakshmi, physically challenged, looks hawk-eyed from her chair, springing to pick up a coin when it falls.
“I used to beg at the Hatibagan crossing and would keep the coins in buckets. I thought these coins would buy me food and clothes when I became too old to beg,” she said.
From a one-paisa coin going back to 1961 to the more recent Rs 5 coin, the buckets contain denominations of all kinds.
“It is taking a lot of time. There are several coins which have become obsolete over the years but we have to accept them as directed by the Reserve Bank of India,” said Singh.
Neogi, who guessed that it would take two more days or maybe more to go through the three other buckets, put the value at Rs 25,000-30,000. It cannot be less than Rs 20,000 even on the rough assumption that each is a Re 1 coin, whose latest version weighs 4.85 gm.
Lakshmi was dipping into her savings to meet her daily expenses as she had retired from begging until one day a few weeks ago a teenaged boy chanced upon her treasure that she had covered with jute bags while playing.
Four days back, some local youths entered her shanty at Nandanbagan looking for the coins. She raised an alarm and her neighbours informed Burtolla police station.
The police visited the shanty where Lakshmi lives alone and took away the buckets. When she did not hear from them for a couple of days she thought her money was gone.
The cops were wondering what to do with her and her buckets.
“Our officers were stunned to see such a huge quantity. Realising that Laskhmi stays alone and these coins would be stolen, the officers brought them to the police station,” said Baidyanath Saha, the officer-in-charge of Burtolla police station.
Banks would usually not accept currency that has ceased to be legal tender, though there is a Reserve Bank directive to do so. Saha said the police narrated Lakshmi’s story to the Central Bank manager who was so touched that he agreed to open a savings account for her.
But before that the coins have to be counted.
“This is the first time we have a customer who has come with such a huge number of coins to open a bank account. She is poor and we want to help her,” said Neogi.
All that Lakshmi has for family is a sister, Asha, who lives nearby. “She is very possessive about her coins and never allowed me to touch them,” Asha said.
Lakshmi doesn’t remember her parents or when she lost them. Nor may she be aware that in her own way she has lived up to the name they gave her.
Goddess of small change
- 100kg of coins in retired alms-seeker’s shanty
Calcutta, July 7: Lakshmi started begging from the age of 16 but it wasn’t for nothing that her parents had named her after the goddess of wealth. Over 100kg of coins stored in four iron buckets have been found in her one-room shanty.
At 60, Lakshmi Das is worth anywhere between Rs 20,000 and Rs 30,000.
Shantanu Neogi and J.P. Singh, two employees of the Central Bank of India’s Manicktala branch, expect that it will take them three days or more to count the woman’s life’s savings.
Partho Mondal, a constable at Burtolla police station, watches the counting, which started today, in the branch manager’s cabin. Lakshmi, physically challenged, looks hawk-eyed from her chair, springing to pick up a coin when it falls.
“I used to beg at the Hatibagan crossing and would keep the coins in buckets. I thought these coins would buy me food and clothes when I became too old to beg,” she said.
From a one-paisa coin going back to 1961 to the more recent Rs 5 coin, the buckets contain denominations of all kinds.
“It is taking a lot of time. There are several coins which have become obsolete over the years but we have to accept them as directed by the Reserve Bank of India,” said Singh.
Neogi, who guessed that it would take two more days or maybe more to go through the three other buckets, put the value at Rs 25,000-30,000. It cannot be less than Rs 20,000 even on the rough assumption that each is a Re 1 coin, whose latest version weighs 4.85 gm.
Lakshmi was dipping into her savings to meet her daily expenses as she had retired from begging until one day a few weeks ago a teenaged boy chanced upon her treasure that she had covered with jute bags while playing.
Four days back, some local youths entered her shanty at Nandanbagan looking for the coins. She raised an alarm and her neighbours informed Burtolla police station.
The police visited the shanty where Lakshmi lives alone and took away the buckets. When she did not hear from them for a couple of days she thought her money was gone.
The cops were wondering what to do with her and her buckets.
“Our officers were stunned to see such a huge quantity. Realising that Laskhmi stays alone and these coins would be stolen, the officers brought them to the police station,” said Baidyanath Saha, the officer-in-charge of Burtolla police station.
Banks would usually not accept currency that has ceased to be legal tender, though there is a Reserve Bank directive to do so. Saha said the police narrated Lakshmi’s story to the Central Bank manager who was so touched that he agreed to open a savings account for her.
But before that the coins have to be counted.
“This is the first time we have a customer who has come with such a huge number of coins to open a bank account. She is poor and we want to help her,” said Neogi.
All that Lakshmi has for family is a sister, Asha, who lives nearby. “She is very possessive about her coins and never allowed me to touch them,” Asha said.
Lakshmi doesn’t remember her parents or when she lost them. Nor may she be aware that in her own way she has lived up to the name they gave her.
ABC News: Blood Atonement: Survivors of Sect Ritual
ABC News: Blood Atonement: Survivors of Sect Ritual
Two Polygamist Sect Survivors Tell Their Stories
"When I Thought of My Dad, I Thought of Him Being God"
by JEN PEREIRA, KIRAN KHALID and EMILY YACUS
July 7, 2008
7 comments
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There's been a lot in the news recently about polygamist groups, but what is it really like for the children who grow up in them? Amber Dawn Lee and Estephania LeBaron are two women who spent their childhoods in two very different -- and very troubled groups -- and later escaped.
Two women discuss growing up in secret societies.
The women shared with "Good Morning America" what it is like to live in and to survive the secret society of a renegade polygamist sect.
"The children were all taught that if we were ever to talk about what happened sexually inside the group, that we will go straight to hell," Lee said of her time spent inside the Zion Society.
After she was abandoned by her mother, Lee was adopted and her new parents joined the Zion Society, a group led by a retired landscaper and excommunicated Mormon named Arvin Shreeve.
"I always had a feeling that something wasn't right. That it wasn't normal," said Lee.
Related
Sect Members: Brainwashed or Faithful?
Children of Polygamy: Life on the Outside
WATCH: Mother Escapes Polygamist Cult
Shreeve divided the women into groups called Sister Councils in which it was their job to sew lingerie to sell to local strippers. But first they had to model the lingerie. Shreeve reportedly even hired strippers to train his wives for the sect's fashion shows.
Lee, who as part of a Sister Council learned to sew at a young age, said that she "hoped that I could stand out somehow to Arvin, and that he'll notice that I'm here too."
Lee also said that the children suffered repeated physical and sexual abuse. "A 15-year-old girl would be instructed to teach the 9-year old girl how to sexually satisfy a man or woman," she said.
"Arvin sort of came out of nowhere. There are a lot of independent polygamists," according to senior reporter Mike Watkiss at KTVK in Phoenix. "That's what they call themselves, and they're just guys who basically put their hands up and say, 'I'm a prophet.'"
Estephania LeBaron said she knew about the horrors from a different sect. She is the daughter of polygamist Ervil LeBaron, founder of the Church of the Lamb of God.
"When I thought of my dad, I thought of him being God," she told "GMA." "I just had a huge feeling of awe." She also feared that if she deviated from her father's sect, she "might not get into heaven."
Two Polygamist Sect Survivors Tell Their Stories
"When I Thought of My Dad, I Thought of Him Being God"
by JEN PEREIRA, KIRAN KHALID and EMILY YACUS
July 7, 2008
7 comments
FONT SIZE
SHARE
RSS
There's been a lot in the news recently about polygamist groups, but what is it really like for the children who grow up in them? Amber Dawn Lee and Estephania LeBaron are two women who spent their childhoods in two very different -- and very troubled groups -- and later escaped.
Two women discuss growing up in secret societies.
The women shared with "Good Morning America" what it is like to live in and to survive the secret society of a renegade polygamist sect.
"The children were all taught that if we were ever to talk about what happened sexually inside the group, that we will go straight to hell," Lee said of her time spent inside the Zion Society.
After she was abandoned by her mother, Lee was adopted and her new parents joined the Zion Society, a group led by a retired landscaper and excommunicated Mormon named Arvin Shreeve.
"I always had a feeling that something wasn't right. That it wasn't normal," said Lee.
Related
Sect Members: Brainwashed or Faithful?
Children of Polygamy: Life on the Outside
WATCH: Mother Escapes Polygamist Cult
Shreeve divided the women into groups called Sister Councils in which it was their job to sew lingerie to sell to local strippers. But first they had to model the lingerie. Shreeve reportedly even hired strippers to train his wives for the sect's fashion shows.
Lee, who as part of a Sister Council learned to sew at a young age, said that she "hoped that I could stand out somehow to Arvin, and that he'll notice that I'm here too."
Lee also said that the children suffered repeated physical and sexual abuse. "A 15-year-old girl would be instructed to teach the 9-year old girl how to sexually satisfy a man or woman," she said.
"Arvin sort of came out of nowhere. There are a lot of independent polygamists," according to senior reporter Mike Watkiss at KTVK in Phoenix. "That's what they call themselves, and they're just guys who basically put their hands up and say, 'I'm a prophet.'"
Estephania LeBaron said she knew about the horrors from a different sect. She is the daughter of polygamist Ervil LeBaron, founder of the Church of the Lamb of God.
"When I thought of my dad, I thought of him being God," she told "GMA." "I just had a huge feeling of awe." She also feared that if she deviated from her father's sect, she "might not get into heaven."
Friday, July 4, 2008
Indo-US nuclear deal Good for us: A. P. J. Abdul Kalam
Good for us: Kalam
Faraz Ahmad
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, July 3
Having secured the endorsement of former President of India A. P. J. Abdul Kalam for the Indo-US nuclear deal, the Samajwadi Party for the first time came out in open support of the deal ditching its partners in the United Progressive National Alliance (UNPA).
This decision of the SP with 39 MPs in the Lok Sabha has also put the Left under greater pressure to announce withdrawal of support to the four-year-old United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government before Prime Minister Manmohan Singh leaves for Tokyo on July 6 to attend the G8 Summit.
Late on Thursday evening, SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav announced that the “Nuclear deal is in the interest of the country.” He said this soon after meeting former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam and said, “Kalam told us that the deal is in the interest of the nation and it is beneficial. Kalam explained to us the nuclear deal. Now we will decide what to do.”
The SP chief declared, ”Without the interest of the nation there is no politics.”
Earlier in the day, Mulayam and his confidant general secretary Amar Singh made a big show of camraderie and bonhomie with his UNPA colleagues N. Chandrababu Naidu of TDP and Om Prakash Chautala of INLD, others and swore by their loyalty to the UNPA at Amar Singh’s residence.
They endorsed Chautala’s declaration that “We will not give a certificate to the Prime Minister before July 6. Till we are convinced we will never give our ascent,” Chautala asserted.
In fact, Amar Singh and Mulayam Singh had said, This is a national issue. It should be debated nationally It dosn’t just concern the SP or the UNPA.”
To avoid the embarrassment of answering for the capitulation of SP leaders, the other UNPA leaders went underground. While Naidu remained incommunicado, his parliamentary party leader here K. Yerrannaidu refused to speak to The Tribune pleading urgent business.
Simultaneously, the Left is busy making preparations to pull out support from the UPA government as soon as the government says it is going ahead with the deal, either before July 6 or after the Prime Minister returns, depending on the government’s response.
The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) has already authorised its leaders Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury to take the necessary steps as and when the government finalises its decision to go to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to sign the Nuclear Safeguards Agreement.
The Communist Party of India (CPI) central secretariat also met here on Thursday authorising Bardhan and Raja to decide together with the other Left parties the timing of withdrawing support to the UPA government and the contents of the letter to be given jointly to President Pratibha Patil.
The other two Left parties, the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) and the Forward Bloc, also conducted a similar exercise.
After the meeting Bardhan said, “We will demand tomorrow from the government to tell us as to when it is going to the Board of Governors of the IAEA. The question is not whether they are going (to IAEA). The fact that they are going ahead is clear, but when is the question,” he said.
”There are no two opinions (about the Left decision to withdraw support). Modalities will be decided ... We have to write to the President (to declare withdrawal of support) ... all these things will be decided,” he said.
Asked whether the Left parties had any indication as to when the government would move the IAEA, Bardhan said “The government itself is in a hurry. If they are going (to IAEA), they are going within this week... Within the next seven, eight or 10 days.”
Asked whether the Left will wait for the Prime Minister to return from G8 Summit, Bardhan said, “If they tell us they are going on the 5th or 6th, we will withdraw then itself. But in the normal course, we will wait till he comes back.”
Faraz Ahmad
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, July 3
Having secured the endorsement of former President of India A. P. J. Abdul Kalam for the Indo-US nuclear deal, the Samajwadi Party for the first time came out in open support of the deal ditching its partners in the United Progressive National Alliance (UNPA).
This decision of the SP with 39 MPs in the Lok Sabha has also put the Left under greater pressure to announce withdrawal of support to the four-year-old United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government before Prime Minister Manmohan Singh leaves for Tokyo on July 6 to attend the G8 Summit.
Late on Thursday evening, SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav announced that the “Nuclear deal is in the interest of the country.” He said this soon after meeting former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam and said, “Kalam told us that the deal is in the interest of the nation and it is beneficial. Kalam explained to us the nuclear deal. Now we will decide what to do.”
The SP chief declared, ”Without the interest of the nation there is no politics.”
Earlier in the day, Mulayam and his confidant general secretary Amar Singh made a big show of camraderie and bonhomie with his UNPA colleagues N. Chandrababu Naidu of TDP and Om Prakash Chautala of INLD, others and swore by their loyalty to the UNPA at Amar Singh’s residence.
They endorsed Chautala’s declaration that “We will not give a certificate to the Prime Minister before July 6. Till we are convinced we will never give our ascent,” Chautala asserted.
In fact, Amar Singh and Mulayam Singh had said, This is a national issue. It should be debated nationally It dosn’t just concern the SP or the UNPA.”
To avoid the embarrassment of answering for the capitulation of SP leaders, the other UNPA leaders went underground. While Naidu remained incommunicado, his parliamentary party leader here K. Yerrannaidu refused to speak to The Tribune pleading urgent business.
Simultaneously, the Left is busy making preparations to pull out support from the UPA government as soon as the government says it is going ahead with the deal, either before July 6 or after the Prime Minister returns, depending on the government’s response.
The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) has already authorised its leaders Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury to take the necessary steps as and when the government finalises its decision to go to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to sign the Nuclear Safeguards Agreement.
The Communist Party of India (CPI) central secretariat also met here on Thursday authorising Bardhan and Raja to decide together with the other Left parties the timing of withdrawing support to the UPA government and the contents of the letter to be given jointly to President Pratibha Patil.
The other two Left parties, the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) and the Forward Bloc, also conducted a similar exercise.
After the meeting Bardhan said, “We will demand tomorrow from the government to tell us as to when it is going to the Board of Governors of the IAEA. The question is not whether they are going (to IAEA). The fact that they are going ahead is clear, but when is the question,” he said.
”There are no two opinions (about the Left decision to withdraw support). Modalities will be decided ... We have to write to the President (to declare withdrawal of support) ... all these things will be decided,” he said.
Asked whether the Left parties had any indication as to when the government would move the IAEA, Bardhan said “The government itself is in a hurry. If they are going (to IAEA), they are going within this week... Within the next seven, eight or 10 days.”
Asked whether the Left will wait for the Prime Minister to return from G8 Summit, Bardhan said, “If they tell us they are going on the 5th or 6th, we will withdraw then itself. But in the normal course, we will wait till he comes back.”
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