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Dimapur VOL. VIII ISSUE 246
The Morung Express “
www.morungexpress.com
To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely
Happy to work under Rahul’s leadership: PM
Lauren’s not a golddigger: Simon
[ PAGE 02]
Obama warns against Syria inaction
[ PAGE 11]
[ PAGE 08]
reflections
By Sandemo Ngullie
Dimapur | September 7
CM Chang wins from 51 Noksen tuenSang, September 7 (mexn): C.M. Chang, who contested from the Naga Peoples’ Front (NPF), was declared elected to the 51 Noksen Assembly Constituency bye elections, held on September 4. C.M. Chang won by a margin of 2863 votes defeating his only rival Lima Onen Chang, who contested on an INC ticket. Chang polled 5662 votes plus 46 postal ballot papers totaling 5708 votes while Lima Onen polled 2831 votes plus 14 postal ballots in his favour totaling 2845 votes. 8493 votes were cast in total, with 60 total postal ballot papers received. With this, the NPF retains 38 of the 60 Assembly seats. The Noksen seat was left vacant soon after the February 2013 election, when Chang quit the Nagaland assembly on March 14 this year. He wanted to remain a Lok Sabha MP till the bye election was held for the constituency to avoid parliamentary bye polls in the state. The 16th Lok Sabha elections are slated to be held in April-May 2014. With DIPR inputs
NPSC gets two new members
Kohima, September 7 (Dipr): Former Joint Director, Information & Public Relations, Chipeni Merry and Er. Fury Putsure have been appointed as Members of the Nagaland Public Service Commission (NPSC) w.e.f. the date they assume charge for a period of 6 (six) years or until they attain the age of 62 (sixty two) years, whichever is earlier. This was stated in a notification issued today by Personnel & Administrative Reforms Department (Personnel ‘B’ Branch). The notification also stated that the salary of the two above mentioned Members will be in accordance with Regulation 4 of the NPSC (Chairman, Members, and Staff) Regulations, 2008, plus all other allowances as admissible from time to time.
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Sunday, September 8, 2013 12 pages Rs. 4 –Edmund Burke
Usain Bolt says 2013 not ‘best season of his career’ [ PAGE 12]
[ PAGE 09]
‘fostering and accelerating’ footHill roAD Work should start by October nagaland entrepreneurship as assured, NFHRCC asserts Morung Express News
INDIRECT TAX? I was raising money for the 50th anniversary of Nagaland statehood and........
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R&B minister Azo to attend annual ANCGLSJ in Israel
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Nagaland entrepreneurs today are filled with ideas. Presently, there is no dearth of aspiring entrepreneurs. But the process is filled with numerous challenges associated with the entrepreneurial process of building a business from scratch. Polishing and enabling the business ideas of the selected team of 20 young Naga entrepreneurs in the first phase of “the Entrepreneur program,” was resource person Dr. Rahul Mirchandhani, Executive Director at Aries Agro Limited, Mumbai, and Founder President, Commonwealth-Asia Alliance of Young Entrepreneurs. A successful entrepreneur, Mirchandhani acted as mentor for the two day workshop titled ‘Impact 5000 by 2018,’ a five-year campaign on entrepreneurship and employment which was officially launched on August 30, 2013. The campaign is a joint venture of the Government of Nagaland and Department of Youth Resource and Sports with the initiative of YouthNet. After intense discussions held for two days,
‘In entrepreneurship, scarcity creates opportunity’
Dr. Rahul Mirchandhani is seen here with YouthNet members and the team of young Naga entrepreneurs, after the completion of a two day workshop held under the first phase of “the Entrepreneur program” at Dimapur.
the entrepreneurs were challenged to identify an existing problem in Nagaland and provide a business solution. The group of entrepreneurs, chosen from a wide array, selected the issue of electricity and presented an innovative business model that could be both feasible and sustainable. The program is de-
signed to prepare the entrepreneurs on how to identify and evaluate new business opportunities, understand the roles and responsibilities of an entrepreneur and how to assemble and deploy resources in order to launch and build new ventures. After thoroughly analyzing the business model, Mirchandhani applauded
the effort of the entrepreneurs and offered some suggestions and modifications. Evaluating the potential of the mock business idea of the team, he reflected that Naga entrepreneurs need to work on building meaningful and enduring companies. Of all the places he has traveled to mentor entrepreneurs, he saw great potential in
Nagaland, he said. Mirchandhani pointed out to the team that within a day they were able to “take a product that did not exist and take it to the market.” “If you can powerfully defend an idea that does not even exist, imagine a real idea of your own,” he added. Sharing tips, he said that an entrepreneur needs to question if his/her product is of value, if it is rare, if it is an easy imitate, and if it has sustainable competitive strategy. As an entrepreneur, Mirchandhani opined that it is essential for one to possess showmanship in order to set one apart in the crowd. On a lighter note, he said that one has to possess showmanship to be able to “convince, confuse and sometimes even con.” Also sharing a personal life lesson, he said that one needs to possess courage, patience, knowledge/skills, and humanity. On Nagaland and the scenario of entrepreneurship, he said that “in entrepreneurship, scarcity creates opportunity.” Therefore, he encouraged the aspiring entrepreneurs not to be disheartened but to use the factor of scarcity and seize the opportunity.
Morung Express News Dimapur | September 7
The Nagaland Foothill Road Construction Committee (NFHRCC) reiterated on Saturday that work on the proposed ‘Nagaland Foothill Road Connectivity Project’ should begin by October as assured by the Nagaland state government. The NFHRCC, which is spearheading the Foothill Road movement, convened on September 7 in Dimapur following its meeting with Roads & Bridges engineers in Kohima on September 3. Though not much was disclosed at the September 3 meeting, it now appears that the Nagaland government is dragging its feet on its assurance—the department’s engineers have now sought more time. The engineers reportedly told NFHRCC members that survey of the route agreed on August 8 can be known only after three months. The government, during the July 17 meeting of the NFHRCC with the Chief Minister, had assured that work on the project will begin by October. Stating that the NFHRCC stands by its July 17 representation to the CM and the subsequent assurance by the CM, the
NFHRCC further reiterated that work should start by October as assured. The meeting also discussed and resolved on certain pressing points. On the ‘No land compensation’ (to landowners) resolution adopted by the NFHRCC, it was resolved that No Objection Certificates should be submitted by the ten respective tribal hohos, which are supporting the NFHRCC. It was also resolved that the NFHRCC will approach the “Naga National Workers” to appeal for “exemption of tax deduction” for this project. On allocation of “contract works,” it was resolved that it should be finalised based on the views and consent of the NFHRCC members. “The works shall be shared amongst the ten tribes or NFHRCC.” That aside, the NFHRCC made it clear that it will not allow any kind of deduction by the government, its officials or agencies (on the work allocated) besides the mandatory deposits and payments. Furthermore, the NFHRCC informed that it will hold a meeting with Roads and Bridges on September 13 in Dimapur at the NFHRCC treasurer’s residence, scheduled for 11:00 am.
india speaks 780 languages, Making lives Better: A Healthy Mind 220 lost in the last 50 years David Lalmalsawma
Reuters | September 7
No one has ever doubted that India is home to a huge variety of languages. A new study, the People’s Linguistic Survey of India, says that the official number, 122, is far lower than the 780 that it counted and another 100 that its authors suspect exist. The survey, which was conducted over the past four years by 3,000 volunteers and staff of the Bhasha Research & Publication Centre (“Bhasha” means “language” in Hindi), also concludes that 220 Indian languages have disappeared in the last 50 years, and that another 150 could vanish in the next half century as speakers die and their children fail to learn their ancestral tongues. The 35,000-page survey is being released in 50 volumes, the first of which appeared on Sept. 5 to commemorate the 125th birth anniversary of Indian philosopher Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, who was also the country’s second president. The last one is scheduled to come out in December 2014. Ganesh Devy, who supervised
the project, said this is the first comprehensive survey of Indian languages that anyone has conducted since Irish linguistic scholar George Grierson noted the existence of 364 languages between 1894 and 1928. There is a major reason for the disparity in the government’s number of languages versus what the survey found: the government does not count languages that fewer than 10,000 people speak. Devy and his volunteers on the other hand combed the country to find languages such as Chaimal in Tripura, which is today spoken by just four or five people. One of the most interesting aspects of the project is Devy’s view of language as a marker of the well being of a community. Languages are being born and dying as they evolve – note how Old English [5] is unintelligible today, and how different is Chaucer’s Middle English [6] from ours – and that is a natural process. But bringing attention to Indian languages with small numbers of speakers, Devy said, is a way of bringing attention to the societies that speak them, along with the well being of their people.
Imkumla Aier
Victor Dzüvichü Kohima | September 7
The past few years have seen young Nagas venture into different fields of expertise; be it entrepreneurship, music, sport or the allied sciences. With the need for mental health care being felt, clinical psychology is beginning to find a career niche in Nagaland. Meet Imkumla Aier, who has taken a step forward and pursued her dreams to become a psychological counsel-
or. With an MSc in Psychological Counseling from the Indian Institute of Psychology and Research, Bangalore, Imkum has worked as a special educator and counselor at Gulabi High School, Bangalore. She was also a program servicing executive of Mind Edutainment Pvt. Ltd., with the responsibility to train students in development of Higher Order Thinking Skills at Delhi Public school and Ryan International School, Bangalore. Imkum now lives in Dimapur and runs a psychological counseling centre since February 2013. In a conversation with The Morung Express, Imkum spoke of her profession, the challenges she faced and her objectives. Imkum says that she saw people in need of mental health care being neglected and discriminated against due to the social stigma attached. “This kind of unfair treatment of a fellow human being pricked my conscience and I decided to do something to help them by becoming a psychological coun-
selor,” she adds. Her family was also supportive of her choice of profession. “My parents have always encouraged us to develop interest, to work hard and to follow our dreams.” Imkum’s father is a retired medical officer while her mother is a housewife. She has two brothers and a sister. The most challenging part of setting up her own counseling centre was to make people aware of the importance of mental health—for her, the stress on the need to remove stigma attached to psychological care is essential. The Advanced Psychological Counseling Centre provides (APCC) run by Imkum provides one-on-one counseling. The Centre helps explore issues in a confidential and relaxed environment with qualified and non judgmental counselors to help clients gain insight into the roots of their difficulties and deal with them effectively. Services offered at APCC include career counseling with psychometric assessment (aptitude, interest, personality,
intelligence) and classes for children with Specific Learning Difficulties. Individual, child and adolescent counseling/ therapy for anxiety, depression, anger, stress, academic problems, relationship, break down or bereavement etc. are also provided. They also provide free counseling to the poor, which is a part of APCC’s Corporate Social Responsibility Programme. “The realization of this dream would be by creating awareness about the benefits of positive mental health, by way of empowering people to make the right choices in life,” feels Imkum. She endeavors to specifically help students choose the right career through career guidance programs in schools and colleges. Her Centre has already started this at schools in Dimapur. While she has always dreamed of opening a school for children with intellectual and development disabilities, she states, “all that I want is for people to lead a healthy life by developing a healthy mind.”
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