January 3rd, 2015

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www.morungexpress.com

The Morung Express

Dimapur VOL. X ISSUE 1

www.morungexpress.com

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Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year Investigators battle weather in hunt for AirAsia black boxes [ PAGE 9]

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Saturday, January 3, 2015 12 pages Rs. 4 – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Cong concern over plight of religious minorities

Captain Gerrard leaving [ PAGE 2] After Coast Guard chase, Liverpool at end of season fishing boat explodes, sinks

‘PK’ beats ‘Chennai Express’ and ‘Kick’

[ PAGE 8]

[ PAGE 11]

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The Watchman demand a more ‘stringent’ NLTP Act • Suggests ‘death penalty for certain offences’ • Demands setting up of Special Courts

A lavish display of fireworks at midnight in Kohima welcomes 2015. (Morung Photo/Chizokho Vero)

refLecTioNs

By Sandemo Ngullie

‘Time for Nagas to be decisive’ Nagaland CM urges Naga people to ‘build a better society’

You resolve to, read the bible daily, be kind and help people..mmmn. No plan to quit beating me up?

Petrol, diesel prices cut Rs.2 a litre each NEW DELHI, JANUARY 2 (IANS): With international crude oil rates slipping below $55 a barrel, state-run oil marketers had a New Year Day gift of a cut petrol and diesel rates by Rs.2 a litre, excluding local taxes. Petrol and diesel prices were last cut each by Rs.2 a litre on Dec 15, and prior to that on Dec 1 by 91 paise and 84 paise respectively.

Prices have also been cut for the non-subsidised LPG cylinder, that a consumer may buy at market rates after exhausting the quota of 12 cooking gas cylinders.

IMA informs: Minor fever with breathlessness can be swine flu

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NEW DELHI, JANUARY 2 (IANS): The Indian Medical Association (IMA) has issued a set of guidelines to tackle swine flu and urged citizens not to neglect minor cases of fever with breathlessness.

It said in its guidelines that the matter is important as the current seasonal influenza vaccines are not expected to provide protection against human infection with avian or swine flu viruses. According to the IMA, swine flu can have symptoms like fever, coryza, cough, sore throat and body aches and may last for one-two weeks. However, occasionally, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea and rash may also occur. It said that swine flu can be prevented by adhering to cough and respiratory hygiene. One should avoid coughing over hands or handkerchief and use a disposable paper instead. “Frequently hand wash should be done if hands get contaminated with any secretions,” it said.

KOHIMA, JANUARY 2 (MExN): Nagaland state Chief Minister, TR Zeliang today extended New Year greetings to the people of the state. “Let us introspect and reflect on the past, including the journeys that we have collectively under taken as Nagas. At the same time, let us also strive harder to build a better society, based on our age old traditions and customs, which bring people together. Let us try to develop a consciousness for doing the right thing at the right time, keeping in mind that the need of the hour in Naga-

land today is peace and reconciliation,” the Nagaland CM stated in a press note.

“I have always wondered and questioned myself what the Nagas can give to the nation and to the world,” stated the CM. He further cautioned that “we will obviously not be able to give much if we continue with our stagnant mindsets.” The Naga people, he stated, “have waited long for a solution to the vexed Naga political problem, which alone can bring permanent peace to our land.” “Very few people realize what consequences the Naga people will face, if we allow the problem to drag on for many more years to come,” he added.

If the Nagas are “serious with our unique identity and history,” Zeliang

stated that “there is no reason why the Centre or the world will not be serious about the Nagas.” Stating that the “time has come for us to be decisive,” he urged against “talk just for the sake of talking.” He instead called upon “every section of people to accept that it is the concern of every citizen to resolve our decade old Naga political issues, so that we can progress and move forward, with the vision to be self sufficient and to no longer remain a liability.”

Terming the year 2014 as “full of Jubilees,” the Nagaland state CM expressed hope that 2015 “will be a year of blessings for all the Nagas.” “Let us all be positive in our approach to make positive contributions to our land,” he concluded.

DIMAPUR, JANUARY 2 (MExN): An organization comprising of Pastors, Reverends, Church leaders and professionals, calling themselves the Watchman Team has written to the Nagaland state Chief Minister, TR Zeliang, calling for various provisions to be “incorporated or amended” regarding the Nagaland Liquor Total Prohibition (NLTP) Act. In a memorandum to the Nagaland CM, the Watchman team proposed stringent provisions to the said act, which it suggested, can be incorporated by the way of interim measures. Stating that alcoholic and intoxicating drinks have “produced countless, nameless and faceless victims in many undesirable and destructive forms,” the memo said “juxtaposing revenue loss to the state against the ravaging impact of liquor and alcoholic drinks to our society, we came to the conclusion that repealing the said Act for the purported revenue gain is a poor bargain.”

The Watchman team informed that the provisions and suggestions contained in the memo have been proposed after consulting “legal experts” and after “studying, comparing and analysing the relevant laws of various Central and state laws...”

While stating that the amendments proposed are only an interim measure, the memo urged that the law be “completely overhauled for effective implementation of the said Act.” As per “legal experts” it lamented that the “procedures, mechanism, powers and the authority to implement the provisions as set out in the said Act are flawed and may not stand the scrutiny of law, if challenged before the Higher Judiciary.” Moreover,

the Act in its present form has many loopholes and not stringent enough to comprehensively deal with the widespread abuse of liquor by our people, it added.

The memo advised that offences under the Act be made “cognizable, non-bailable and non compoundable,” and that they be punishable with rigorous imprisonment for a term exceeding five years. Further, it demanded punishments for allowing premises, etc., to be used for commission of an offence under the act; for illegal possession of any liquor or alcoholic drinks or consumption of such liquor or alcoholic drinks; for preparing, distributing and selling spurious liquor and financing illicit traffic and harbouring of offenders; for attempt to commit offences under the act; abetment and criminal conspiracy and enhanced punishment for certain offences after previous conviction.

The Watchman team went as far as to call for the imposition of the “death penalty” for “certain offences after previous conviction.” In this, the memo stated: “Any person who is found guilty of preparing, making and selling spurious liquor which causes death of a person shall be punishable with the penalty of death.” Going to the extent of conferring the death penalty, it stated would “instil fear and raise the deterrent level of the said Act.” “This suggestion may appear draconian at a glance, however, in deeper analysis of the malice of liquor and alcoholic drinks and its destructive impact and long term implication to our society, it becomes necessary that we incorporate such provisions in the said Act,” the memo claimed.

It also demanded punishment for the failure of officers in duty or their connivance at the contravention of the provisions of this Act. The memo further urged against suspension, remission or commutation in any sentence awarded under this Act Meanwhile, it also called for Con-

fiscation of sale proceeds of illicit liquor or alcoholic drinks; seizure or freezing of bank accounts or property acquired from the proceeds of sale of liquor or alcoholic drinks; the power to take property and forfeiture of property derived or acquired from the proceeds of sale of liquor or alcoholic drinks, or illicit traffic.

For speedy trial of offences committed under this Act, the memo called for setting up as many Special Courts as may be necessary for such area or areas as may be specified in the notification. “A Special Court shall consist of a single Judge who shall be appointed by the Government with the concurrence of the Chief Justice of the High Court. In this section, "High Court" means the Guwahati High Court. A person shall not be qualified for appointment as a Judge of a Special Court unless he is qualified to be a District Judge or the Additional District Judge,” it added. It demanded that offences under this act be triable only by the Special Courts. It further stated that any offence committed under this Act, “until a Special Court is constituted, shall, notwithstanding anything contained in the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, be tried by a District Court and not by administrative or quasi judicial officers.”

The Watchman team meanwhile expressed concern that despite the enactment of the NLTP Act, 1989, (hereinafter said Act) “unscrupulous elements in the society have taken undue advantage of the laxity of law and the lackadaisical approach of the Law Enforcement Agencies with dire consequences, afflicting the moral fabric, the prime of our youth and the very foundation of the Naga society which combined together threatens the future of our society at large.” Holding this view, it called for the law to be “made more stringent and the same be acted upon in letter and spirit to stem the tide of alcoholism in Naga society.”

Centre will increase budget for North East Modi replaces Planning Commission NEW DELHI, JANUARY 2 (IANS): DoNER Minister Jitendra Singh Friday assured chief ministers of the northeastern states that the central government will increase the budget allocation for overall development of the region, a member of the North East Council (NEC) said Friday.

The union minister for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) Friday met governors and chief ministers of the eight northeastern states in Meghalaya's capital Shillong for a brainstorming session on a roadmap for the development of the region.

"The budget allocation by the central government for the development of the northeast region and and its usage was the prime content of the meeting. Singh assured that the budget for the region's development will

be increased, if required special focus will be given to it," NEC member M.P. Bezbaruah told IANS over phone from Shillong.

Bezbaruah headed the Bezbaruah Committee formed by the erstwhile central government to suggest immediate measures to ensure safety of people from India's northeast living in Delhi and other major cities.

The recommendations were submitted to the union home ministry July 11 and were Friday accepted by the central government.

Bezbaruah said during the meeting most of the chief ministers raised the issue of the "mismatch" between the funds allocated in the budget and the amount which states actually receive.

"It was decided that the issues like communications, road construction, skill

development and capacity building will be the area of prime focus," he said.

The minister also directed the NEC to submit reports every month on the development work being carried in the region. "The meeting was of great importance as the members of the NEC had met after a long gap, which hinders the planning process of development in the region."

Bezbaruah also said to make the development planning of the northeast region effective, minister Jitendra Singh urged all the members of the NEC to meet every month and send the reports to the DoNER ministry. Eight states - Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura and Sikkim - constitute the northeast region.

IED recovered from ATM booth Morung Express News Mokokchung | January 2

A low-density improvised explosive device (IED) was found inside an ATM booth heretoday.Theexplosivewas reportedly uncovered by one CRPF personnel at around 11:00 am when he went into the booth to draw cash. The crude bomb was wrapped in a small parcel with brown adhesive tape, found inside the SBI ATM booth located below Rural Bank, Alongmen Ward, AM Road.

Personnel of the 31 Assam Rifles bomb disposal squad safely disposed the crude bomb at around 3:00 pm. The motive behind the act or the miscreants responsible was not known till the filing of this report.

Personnel from the 31 AR Bomb disposal squad disposing the IED that removed from an SBI ATM booth in Mokokchung on January 2. (Photo courtesy: Imrongkumba Aier)

Police sources assured that investigation into the matter is ongoing and that CCTV footage and other possible evidences are being collected to aid the in-

vestigations.

Meanwhile, the Mokokchung Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI) has expressed concern at the incident and

stated: “this is a wake-up call to the various banks in Mokokchung that the security of their respective ATM booths is their responsibility.” A press note from the MCCI lamented that “almost all the ATM booths in the town remain open without adequate security or any caretaker, for which the banks are requested to look into with urgency.”

It further acknowledged the “preparedness and timely intervention of the personnel of 31 Assam Rifles bomb squad and police.” The Ao Senden as well as the Ao Students Conference also condemned the act of the miscreants who were responsible for placing the IED and called for investigation into the matter.

• Prime Minster to chair NITI Aayog • Niti Ayog empowers states for development

NEW DELHI, JANUARY 2 (IANS): The Narendra Modi government began the New Year replacing the 65-year- old Planning Commission with a new institution named NITI (National Institution for Transforming India) Aayog, where the prime minister would continue as chairperson of the revamped body and have state chief ministers as part of the governing council.

"The institution will serve as a 'think tank' of the government - a directional and policy dynamo. NITI Aayog will provide governments at the central and state levels with relevant strategic and technical advice across the spectrum of key elements of policy," a union cabinet release here said.

Modi, in a series of tweets, said with the NITI Aayog the government would bid "farewell to a 'one size fits all' approach towards development while the body also "celebrates India's diversity".

"A pro-people, pro-active and participative development agenda stressing on empowerment & equality is the guiding principle behind NITI Aayog," he said.

Noting that NITI Aayog "has been formed after a wide range of consultation with the various stakeholders including the chief ministers", he said it will "pro-

vide key inputs on various policy matters".

"A landmark change is the inclusion of all State CMs & LGs of UTs in the NITI Aayog. This will foster a spirit of cooperative federalism.

"Having served as a CM in the past, I am very much aware of the importance of actively consulting the states. NITI Aayog does precisely that," he said.

Modi had indicated in his Independence Day speech that the Planning Commission was on its way out.

The NITI Aayog will have regional councils to "address specific issues and contingencies impacting more than one state or a region. These will be formed for a specified tenure," the statement added.

Elaborating on the rationale for the revamping the planning body as the many forces transforming India, the government said the industry and service sectors have developed and are operating on a global scale now.

"To build on this foundation, new India needs an administration paradigm in which the government is an 'enabler' rather than a 'provider of first and last resort'. The role of the government as a 'player' in the industrial and service sectors has to be reduced," the statement said.

Earlier this month, in

a meeting with chief ministers here, Modi said the Planning Commission should be replaced by an organisation that thinks creatively, strengthens the federal structure, and is able to energize governance at the state level.

Congress chief ministers had opposed the government's move to replace the Planning Commission with a new body.

The Congress slammed the move.

Party leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi said: "The real issue is do you have a substantive meaningful program to reform the Planning Commission. If you simply want to abolish it because it is something which (first prime minister Jawaharlal) Nehru created for this country and you don't like Nehru or simply something which is run by the Congress for 60 years or you don't like the Congress, that is pitiable."

Communist Party of India-Marxist leader Sitaram Yechury said: "Mere changing this nomenclature, and this sort of gimmickry is not going to serve the purpose.

Let's wait and see what the government is eventually planning."

A Janata Dal-United leader said that his party will not support the move as they feared that weaker states would be left behind in the development process.

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Saturday

Seed testing lab in Nagaland

Our Correspondent Kohima | January 2

Seed is considered as the most vital input in agriculture, with an objective to issue quality seeds to the end users.

Towards this, a Seed Testing Laboratory was set up in 2002 in the premises of DAO’s office Dimapur.

Strengthening of the lab was carried out in the recent years to test more farmer’s seeds for both Rabi and Kharif season.

According to the annual administrative report of

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the agriculture department (2013-14), testing of seed for germination, purity, moisture analysis is done in all the samples.

The major seeds tested in the laboratory are paddy, maize, soyabean, millets, sesamum, groundnut, arhar, moong during kharif as well as winter paddy, maize, pea, mustard, linseed, gram, lentil in rabi season.

Besides this the seed harvested for crop cutting survey is also tested in this laboratory for authentication of results.

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Kohima, January 2 (mExn): The Chakhesang Wrestling Association (CWA) mourned the sudden demise of its member Late Kiiveo Vadeo on December 23 last at Dimapur.

Late Kiiveo Vadeo had served in various wrestling associations at different level and also serving as CWA representative to Naga Wrestling Association till his last breath.

He was a social worker and a sports lover, who had keen interest in promoting Naga wrestling in

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Dimapur, January 2(mExn): The Golden Jubilee celebration of Yimpang A.G.Church was held at Yimpang village on December 1214, with a theme “In His Mercy, celebrating the triumph of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.” All together there were 700 believers attended from all over Lotha Wokha District of A.G. Churches in Nagaland.

The jubilee speakers were Rev. Moses Murry, General Supertintedent AGEI, Rev. T Nzio Ezung, Rev. Dr. T N Lotha, Rev. Solomon H Wasker and Rev. Mervy Tan. All the speakers spoke dynamically on the theme with special emphasis on forgiveness, spiritual rejuvenation and the wealth of loving each other as disciples of Jesus Christ.

According to the press note from Convener of Golden Jubilee Celebration, Rev.Thebemo Yanthan, on the first day, the giant Jubilee Padal Hall for the celebration was opened

by Rev. T Nzio Ezung

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Cong concern over plight of religious minorities

Kohima, January 2 (mExn): Congress leader KV Pusa expressed his concern for the plight of religious minorities who are being subjected to intense harassment in many parts of the country and are forced to convert by fringe elements of a particular religion backed by RSS with the BJP government remaining a mute spectator. While expressing the concern, a press statement issued by Media Cell, NPCC stated, “It is appalling to note the statement of the state BJP leaders blindly defending the actions of its communal masters that has no substance and was uncalled for, was cultivated during rabi especially at this juncture when religious discriminaseason.

Some of the paddy va- tion is at its peak.” rieties grown in seed farm are Ranjit, I.E.T 8585, HMTSona, BP-IR-8 and MTU1010. During rabi season mainly oilseeds like mustard (M-27), Toria T-36 and Jute Breeders seeds.

During the year 2013 an area of 25 ha. was brought under cultivation with the production of 52.5 MT decrease in area is due to damage dam where by irrigation facility was drastically cut leading to the cultivable area.

Dimapur, January 2 (mExn): The All Nagaland PHED Filed Staff Association today stated in a press release that as per judgment order dated 05-03-2012 and 1509-2014, regularization and ROP order of W/C employees was supposed to be issued within December 31, 2014. However, till date nothing has been done. ANPHEDFSA General Secretary Maong Tzudir stated in the press release that physical verification

the district and at the state level.

In his department, the CWA in particular and the wrestling fraternity in general had lost a dedicated social activist, a condolence message received here said, adding that his departure had left a great vacuum which would be difficult to fill in.

CWA president Thiipusayi Nienu also conveyed deepest condolence to the bereaved family and prayed that Almighty God grant them timely solace at this moment of sorrow and grief.

“By asking congress leader KV Pusa not to meddle in the national issues of forced religious conversion that are beyond our control, the state BJP leaders have exposed their narrow mindset that is unable to understand the repercussions of this issue which is a political tinder box,” stated the statement. It adds, “The state BJP leaders must understand that Nagaland being a Christian majority state cannot be insulated from this religious upheaval being created by communal forces and will be affected in way or the other if the present trend of religious discrimination continues.”

When communal temperaturesarebeingheatedup across the country by the RSS

and on second day Rev. Moses Murry dedicated the Golden Jubilee stone as a mark of the Golden Jubilee celebration and Jubilee Booklet Journal was also released by Rev. Solomon H Wasker.

During the celebration, special songs were presented by Yimpang Jubilee Choir, Lotha AG Church Kohima and hosts individuals and also special awards were also given out by Rev. Thebemo Ya n t h a n , C o n v e n o r, Golden Jubilee Celebration to those pioneers members and present church workers in recognition of their tireless ministry. The celebration was concluded with candle light service.

Pastor P Nyimsao Yanthan, pronounced deep words appreciation and thanks to all the people connected to the church for their immense help and sacrificial contribution in cash and in kinds for the celebration and prayed for God’s blessings to all.

in PHED was conducted many times in the past, which simply stretched time to avoid court order. Moreover, the longer the time is stretched most of the W/C employees will complete 35 years of service and 60 years of age and will retire from the service. Therefore, by January 2015 the W/C employees are prepared to start its own course of action against the Government, it sated further.

Rev. Dr. Chen Rengma releases biography of Rev. Wekheno Kath on December 24

Rengma community, especially to the neighboring tribes like Sumi and Lothas villages bordering to the Northern Rengma.

Rev. Wekheno Kath continued to serve the Sishunu Baptist Church as pastor till he was invited by the Rengma Baptist Church Dimapur (Khermohal), in the year 1981.

From 1983 onward after coming back from Dimapur, he rejoined the Sishunu Baptist Church as its pastor which he served till 1977.

The Sishunu Baptist Church honoured Rev. Wekheno Kath and wife

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Ngalu Kath by given them an official retirement at Sishunu Baptist Church in the year 1997, after serving for 43 years, from 1954 to 1977.

After the retirement from the pastoral ministry at the Sishunu Baptist Church, in the year 1997, Rev. Wekheno Kath started working at the Kandinu Prayer Centre. This ministry has been a living witness for God’s active intervention in our Christian life.

Again, since 2011 involve in Sishunu Prayer centre along with Yathansha Tep, Yaushi Wanth, Phentshii Kath and Mune-

nya Kath.

The Council of Rengma Baptist Churches awarded Rev. Viliezhii Kent Ministry Award to Rev. Wekheno Kath in recognition of his faithful and unwavering commitment in the service of the Lord.

Rev. Wekheno Kath was one of the CRBC Peace Commission members in the Phenshiinyu and Sendenyu Village dispute over Kenorhii area. Deputed at Phenshiinyu village as CRBC peace mission team for the negotiation and reconciliation initiatives of the two villages.

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and fringe elements to target the religious minorities, more particularly the Christian community through a series of “Ghar Wapsi” programmes, the BJP government had further declared Christmas Day as ‘Good Governance Day’ thereby belittling the significance of the day revered by the Christians across the world.

The NPCC further alleged that the BJP ministers and MPs in and outside the Parliament issuing inflammatory and communally inciting speeches have become a routine affair. Prime Minister Modi and the BJP have managed to pull off the biggest political con act of the country since independence. “The tall promises of growth and economic

development, recovery of black money and good governance have all receded into the background and the real hidden agenda of heating up communal temperatures to incite hatred against the religious minorities has dominated headlines for the past seven months,” it added.

“Enough of their (state BJP leaders) true character as opportunist individuals masquerading as leaders has been manifested through their press statements and it is high time for concerned citizens and various organisations to denounce and reject the leaders who are ready to abandon their own upbringing and beliefs for the sake of sharing the spoils of power,” NPCC added further.

Pongidong Village Students’ Union (PVSU) office bearers’ picnic cum file handing over programme was held at Nzhu Valley on December 30, 2014.

The new team will be lead by Nzanchumo Y Humtsoe and Benathung Tsopoe as President and General Secretary for the tenure 2015-2016.

Biography of Rev. Wekheno Kath released Kohima, January 2 (mExn): A biography of Rev. Wekheno Kath was released by Rev. Dr. Chen Rengma, executive secretary Nagamese Baptist Churches Association Nagaland on December 24 last.

Commemorating 60 years in the Lord’s Ministry of Rev. Wekheno Kath (1954-2014), Rev. Wekheno’s children and grand children hosted Christmas feast for Sishunu Baptist Church members and relatives on December 24.

Rev. Wekheno Kath accepted Jesus Christ as his Lord and savior Jesus Christ in the year 1950. He was the earliest, among the Northern Rengmas to study theology.

On the completion of his theological training at Eastern Bible School Churuchandpur (Manipur), in the year 1972, he re-joined the Sishunu Baptist Church as pastor.

Apart from the pastoral responsibility, Rev. Wekheno and the believers of the Church has been actively involved in Mission and Evangelistic work both within and outside the

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“Nagaland being a Christian majority state cannot be insulated from this religious upheaval being created by communal forces”

ANPHEDFSA reminder on Nagaland coal regularization and ROP order in great demand

Yimpang AG Church celebrates Golden Jubilee

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The lab has a capacity of testing 5000-10000 seed samples per month, the reported added.

STATE SEED FARM MERAPANI: This farm was established during the year 1969 with a total area of 534 ha. under Wokha district.

The main objective of this farm is to produce quality seeds to meet the growing demands of the farmer specially paddy seed; thereby reducing the expenditure on the imports of seeds from other sources.

Besides paddy, jute in kharif season and mustard

Kids sitting around campfire waits to welcome the year 2015 at Mao Colony Nagarjan Kuda Village, Dimapur

CWA mourns

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LocaL

3 January 2015

LOOKING BACK (2014)

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Dimapur

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Our Correspondent

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Kohima | January 2

The quality of Nagaland coal is highly rated qualitively in the market and there is great demand for various commercial purposes.

In order to tap this good prospect of coal trading business, the Nagaland Industrial Raw Materials & Supply Corporation Ltd, Dimapur has been initiating venture for procuring and supplying local coal outside the state, according to the annual administrative report of the department of industries & commence.

This new venture of local coal trading business would generate sustainable income for NIRMSC Ltd and also help the local traders in providing well organized market and with the offer of reasonable rate timely, the report stated.

The matter is still under process, the report added.

It is pertinent to mention that the NIRMSC Ltd, Dimapur is a Government of Nagaland undertaking, established in March 1973, and fully taken over by the state government under industries and commerce department since January 1978 with objectives for procurement and supply of scarce raw materials to SSI units in the state also export/supply of state produce to the Public Sector Enterprises of both central and state government undertakings outside the state.

The Corporation dealt with procurement of scarce raw material such as Iron& Steel, Paraffin Wax, Rubber, Caustic Soda and Plastic raw materials to the SSI units in the state at government controlled price and also export/supply of state produce such as hardwood timber to Defense Ordnance Factories, Indian Railways, Coal India Ltd and bamboo to Hindustan Paper Corporation Ltd. And thus smoothly venturing with good prospect of revenue resources until recession to business stagnation, as a result of decontrol/decentralization policy of the central government on scarce raw materials, such as Supreme Court ban on export of forest produce and non-availability of working capital.

NIRMSC Ltd has taken up Consignment Agency Yard of Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) at Dimapur as the second SAIL C.A Yard in the Northeast India next to Guwahati for custody and handling operation on sale of quality iron and steel materials at government company price to the state of Nagaland, Manipur and adjoining areas of Assam which is operational from 01.07.05 initially for the period of three years and the business contract is further renewed from 01-08-09. And the SAIL is yet to intimate to NIRMSC for their new policy towards Consignment Agency Yard.

1. Jubilant look Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Naga traditional attires durin g Hornbill Festival of Nagaland 2014.

2. A mouth watering preparation of Naga delicacies at the Naga Chef Season 2. It was won by Sukulung and walked away with prize money of Rs. 5 lakh.

3. Miss Nagaland 2014 Veineinem Singsong flanked by Ist runners up Kaheli Chophy and 2nd runners up Muliivesalu Keyho.

4. Khruzoto Tetseo, winner of Naga Wrestlemania-3, King of the Ring Series 2014 organized by Elite Entertainment Enterprise.

5. Besesayo Kezo retired as DGP Nagaland 6. Harmonic Voices- winner of 2nd Ultimate Hornbill Choir 2014 organized by Unlock Productions.

7. Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan and others during golden jubilee celebration of Nagaland Legislative Assembly.

8. Section of gathering at ACAUT Rally in Kohima.

(Photo and text by Chizokho Vero)

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REgional

The Morung Express

Six governors in six months: Now Qureshi goes to Mizoram AIZAWL, JAnuAry 2 (IAnS): Mizoram's Governor-designate Aziz Qureshi, who was transferred from Uttarakhand, will be the sixth head of the state in less than six months in the northeastern state.

Qureshi will arrive to take charge of the Congressruled state after a "two-week break", a Raj Bhavan official said Thursday.

T h e 7 4 - y e a r- o l d Qureshi was transferred by President Pranab Mukherjee Tuesday and appointed as Mizoram governor for the remainder of his term till May 2017.

Meghalaya Governor Krishan Kant Paul will take his place in Uttarakhand.

Paul was holding additional charge as the Mizoram governor.

Qureshi had earlier filed a petition before the Supreme Court over the BJP-led government's pressure on him to relinquish his post.

"Aziz Qureshi is likely to assume office as the 15th Governor of Mizoram in the third week of January after a two-week break," a Raj Bhavan official who did not want to be named told IANS. The successive transfers of the governors started with Vakkom B. Purushothaman when he was sent to Nagaland July 6.

Purushothaman resigned soon, claiming he was not consulted over his transfer. "Governors cannot be treated like clerks," he had said.

Former Gujarat governor Kamla Beniwal was then transferred to Mizoram.

Beniwal, 87, took charge July 9 as the 12th governor of Mizoram. However, in less than a month, she was sacked from the post Aug 6.

Former union home secretary Vinod Kumar Duggal, the then governor of Manipur, was then giv-

en the additional charge of Mizoram.

Duggal assumed office Aug 8 as the 13th governor, but resigned Aug 28.

Maharashtra governor K. Sankaranarayanan was then transferred to Mizoram Aug 24 for the remainder of his term which was scheduled to end in 2017. He resigned immediately on his transfer.

Krishan Kant Paul, a retired Indian Police Service (IPS) officer and former Delhi Police commissioner and then governor of Meghalaya, was given additional charge of both Mizoram and Manipur until his transfer orders were issued Tuesday along with those of Qureshi.

Paul took additional charge as the Mizoram governor Sep 16.

Beniwal, who had a strained relationship with Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he was the Gujarat chief minister, was

sacked two months before her tenure was to end.

A Congress leader in Aizawl said the National Democratic Alliance government has chosen Mizoram Raj Bhavan as a "punishment centre or a dumping ground" for governors appointed by the previous United Progressive Alliance government.

"This approach and mindset would make the constitutional posts 'childish assignments'," the Congress leader told IANS on condition of anonymity.

Politicians, civil society groups, youth and students' unions have condemned the use of the border state as a "dumping ground" for governors.

There are no permanent governors in four of the seven northeastern states -- Congress-ruled Assam, Meghalaya and Manipur and Left-ruled Tripura.

Nagaland governor

Padmanabha Balakrishna Acharya is holding additional charge of Tripura and Assam, while Paul will continue to hold additional charge of Manipur till further orders though he is transferred to Uttarakhand.

"West Bengal governor Keshari Nath Tripathi has been asked to discharge the functions of the governor of Meghalaya, in addition to his own duties, till further orders," a Rashtrapati Bhavan release said.

After Narendra Modi took charge as prime minister May 26, eight governors resigned following signals from the central government. They were B.L. Joshi (Uttar Pradesh), Shekhar Dutt (Chhattisgarh), Ashwani Kumar (Nagaland), M.K. Narayanan (West Bengal), B.V. Wanchoo (Goa), Purushothaman (Mizoram), K. Sankaranarayanan (Maharashtra) and Sheila Dikshit (Kerala).

Saturday

3 January 2015

Dimapur

3

Connectivity in NE to improve SHILLOnG, JAnuAry 2 (PTI): Connectivity in the north eastern region will increase in the coming month as Alliance Air, which operates flights in the area, is likely to induct a second aircraft, Minister for Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) Dr Jitendra Singh said here today.

"A second aircraft is expected to be inducted by Alliance Air and once this is done, the other unconnected airports in the re-

gion can be connected by air in the coming months," Singh told the concluding session of the 63rd plenary of the North Eastern Council (NEC) here.

An MoU has already been signed for a period of two years between NEC and Alliance Air to provide connectivity to unconnected areas by air wherein the former provides viability gap funding to the agency, he said.

Acknowledging that

connectivity has always been an issue for the north eastern region, Singh said NEC had been able to restore Alliance Air flights to Umroi, Lilabari, Silchar and Tezpur Airports providing air connectivity to Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh.

For strengthening of air connectivity in the region, the NEC has been trying to promote a dedicated lowcost airline for the region, he said.

Manipur rights bodies seek panel to probe skull case

Taking into account frequent charges ImPHAL, JAnuAry 2 (Tnn): Demanding that the recovery of eight hu- of 'enforced disappearances' and extra-juman skulls from a market construction dicial killings leveled against the security site in Imphal last week be investigated forces in Manipur, various civil society orby an independent probe panel, many ganizations, rights bodies and opposition civil bodies of the state staged a hunger parties had demanded a thorough examistrike at Keishmapat junction here on nation of the remains.

On Tuesday, the state cabinet decidThursday.

The protesters, belonging to more ed to hand over case to the CBI. Manipur than 40 civil groups, also sought the with- forensic experts have taken the bones for drawal of the controversial Armed Forces further examination.

"We demand that the government (Special Powers) Act from Manipur. They said excavation and construction work at constitute an independent probe panel, the market site should stop immediately headed by a retired judge and compristo prevent the evidence from being dam- ing experts, to reveal the truth," said Kangujam Ranjit, president of Families of the aged.

During excavation of earth mass from Involuntarily Disappeareds' Association, the construction site, which is located Manipur, (FIDAM) Ranjit, who joined Thursday's demonclose to the old assembly complex, on December 25 and 26, the skulls, skeletal stration, said the whereabouts of 20 peoremains and old coins were unearthed. ple, who had been picked up by security AGArTALA, JAnuAry 2 (IAnS): The Tripura gov- The site had earlier been occupied by the forces between September 1980 and February 2011, remain unknown. ernment will take stern action against 'proxy' teachers security forces. and their employers in government and governmentaided schools, an education department official said here Friday.

Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar, during a meeting here Thursday, asked education department offiLaunch of PAHAL (DBTL) scheme in Nagaland on 1.1.15 cials to take strict action against 'proxy' teachers and 1. The Direct Benefit transfer of LPG (DBTL) scheme PAHAL (Pratyaksh Hanstantrit Labh) their employers. has been re-launched in 54 districts on 15.11.2014 in the 1st Phase and will be launched "In recent months, 38 government school teachers in the rest of the 622 districts of the country on 1.1.2015 which includes 11 districts in the have been dismissed from service for engaging 'proxy' state of Nagaland. teachers in schools in remote and hilly areas," the of2. Consumers who wish to join the scheme will have to either link their Aadhaar number into ficial said. their bank account and their LPG consumer or if they do not possess Aadhaar number, they It has been observed that the government school will have to link their bank account directly with their 17 digit LPG Id. Once a Consumer joins teachers posted in schools located in remote and hilly the scheme, he will get the cylinders at market price and will receive LPG subsidy directly in his areas usually engage proxy teachers. They do it so that bank account. A sum of Rs.568 will be paid in advance to the consumer, in the bank account, they are free to run some business or work at their prewho now joins the scheme, as soon as he makes the first booking for a cylinder after joining the ferred place. scheme to ensures that he has extra money required to pay for the first LPG cylinder at market According to Tripura school education department price. This is in addition to subsidy due on each cylinder. Camps are being set up at various director Pradip Chakraborty, around 1,500 government banks, and LPG distributor’s premises to enable LPG consumers to open bank account and school teachers were either suspended or other action was enroll for Aadhaar if they need to do so to join the scheme. taken against them last year for neglecting their duties.

3. To keep consumers informed about their status in the scheme, consumers will receive He said the state government has taken a series of SMS at every stage in the scheme. To avail of this feature all LPG consumers are requested measures, to be effective from this academic session, to to register their mobile number with their distributor if they have not done so. They are ensure 85 percent attendance of students and 100 peralso advised to receive cylinders only with cash memos to be assured of their subsidy transfer. cent attendance of teachers in a bid to improve the qual4. The scheme will cover over 15.3 crore consumers across 676 districts of the country. ity of education in Tripura.

Currently over 6.5 crore consumers i.e. 43% have already joined the scheme and will He also said that "a continuous and comprehensive receive subsidy in their bank account. evaluation (CCE) would be undertaken from this year 5. The State of Nagaland has 1.81 lakh active LPG consumers, of which 14448 consumers up to standard eight instead of the conventional examihave already become Cash Transfer Compliant (CTC). nations".

6. DBTL is designed to ensure that the benefit meant for the genuine domestic customer Under the Right to Education Act, 2009, it is mandareaches them directly and is not diverted. By this process public money will be saved. All tory that every child who completes his or her educaLPG customers are requested to immediately join the scheme as above (Detailed Scheme tion till standard eight be awarded a certificate as per the is in Annexure). education department's format after conducting CCE at 7. All LPG consumers who are yet to join the scheme must do so quickly. Those who do not regular intervals. have bank accounts must first open bank accounts and then submit the required details

NEC draft plan outlay approved Tripura govt to act against SHILLOnG, JAnuAry 2 (PTI): The ed the maximum proposals accounting to 'proxy' teachers, employers North Eastern Council (NEC) today ap- 71.26 per cent of the plan outlay. proved a draft annual plan outlay of Rs 1,088.21 crore for the year 2015-16 to enable the council to carry out its functions till the next plenary is held.

DoNER Minister and NEC chairman Jitendra Singh gave the approval during the 63rd plenary meeting of the council along with the Governors and Chief Ministers or representatives of eight north eastern states who are members of the council.

The proposals are tentative but these will enable the NEC secretariat to carry out its functions during the year till the next plenary is held where the final annual plan will be placed for approval, according to an NEC statement.

Transport and communication, agri and allied sector and power were allocat-

Of the Rs 1,088.21 crore, Rs 500 crore is meant for transports and communication and accounts for 45.95 per cent of the total outlay, the statement said.

Rs 150.4 crore and Rs 125 crore has been proposed for agri and allied sectors and power sectors respectively accounting for 13.82 per cent and 11.49 sectors.

Meanwhile, concluding the plenary, the DoNER minister also approved a proposal by Assam Governor P B Acharya on the need to take the plenary on rotation to all state capitals of the north eastern states.

Today's plenary meet at the NEC secretariat here came after a gap of 10 years and this was done keeping in mind the Act East Policy endorsed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Singh said.

Govt to task celebrity to promote NE

neW DeLHI, JAnuAry 2 (PTI): The NDA government is planning to rope in a celebrity to be the brand ambassador for the Northeast, on the lines of Amitabh Bachchan promoting Gujarat tourism.

"We have a plan to rope in someone as brand ambassador for the Northeast.

The region has lots of potential but there is hardly any promotion. We are thinking of bringing some

celebrity, the way Amitabh Bachchan promotes Gujarat," Minister for DoNER Jitendra Singh said.

"We also have plans to invite Bollywood filmmakers to shoot their films in the region as there are plenty of beautiful locations which would be ideal for outdoor shooting," he said. Highlighting the potential of organic farming in the region, the Minister for DoNER said the govern-

Centre accepts report on safety of NE people neW DeLHI, JAnuAry 2 (IAnS): The central government has accepted the recommendations of a committee that has suggested immediate measures to ensure the safety of people from India's northeast in Delhi and other major cities.

suggested by the committee. "The IPC will be amended for insertion of new sections of 153C and 509A as recommended by the committee," Rajnath Singh said, adding that the law and justice ministry has also agreed to the proposal in this regard.

Rajnath Singh assures that government is committed to security of NE people "The government (has) accepted the recommendations of the M.P. Bezbaruah Committee with regard to immediate measures," union Home Minister Rajnath Singh told the media Friday. "The government is committed (to the) safety and security of the people from the northeast region living in Delhi and other metropolitan cities," he said.

The committee headed by M.P. Bezbaruah, a member of the North Eastern Council, was set up in February 2014 after 19-year-old Nido Tania, a student from Arunachal Pradesh, died here after he was attacked. The panel was formed to look into the concerns of the people of the northeast living in other parts of the country and suggest suitable remedial measures.

The minister said the Indian Penal Code (IPC) will also be amended as

"As part of legal assistance, a panel of seven lawyers, including five women lawyers, has been constituted by the Delhi State Legal Service Authority for providing legal assistance to the needy people from the northeast," he said.

Rajnath Singh said the Delhi government would also provide monetary assistance to the victims of any violence in the city.

"The Delhi government will also be providing compensation and monetary assistance to the northeast people under Delhi Victim Compensation Scheme 2011."

"Recommendations made by the committee regarding special police initiatives and additional steps to be taken by the various state police forces and Delhi Police have been accepted for immediate implementation," the minister said.

ment has earmarked Rs 100 crore exclusively for organic farming.

Singh said around 40 per cent horticulture produce in the Northeast gets wastaed due to non-availability of proper storage and the DoNER ministry is in touch with some food processing industries to set up their units in the region and avail the benefits of plenty of horticulture products.

Press release

ElitE HEaltHcarE training institutE Dhobinallah, near ICICI Bank, Dimapur – 797112 ADMISSION GOING ON COURSES 1. ANM 2. DMLT 3. Nursing Assistant Office Timing For detail Contact

DURATION 2 Yrs 2 Yrs 1 Yr : 8 AM – 12 Noon : 9856125245/9089660785

ELIGIBILITY 10th Passed 10th Passed 8th Passed

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The Duncan Women Union would like to thank all the residents of Duncan Bosti, Duncan Bosti Council, Duncan Bosti Gaon Buras, and the Duncan Youth for the support and co-operation towards the success of the Duncan Winter Festival from 27-29 December 2014. The DWU would also like to thank the following without whose help the success of the Festival would not have been possible.

1) Deputy Commissioner, Dimapur 2) Director, NEZCC 3) Director Land Resources 4) SDO (Civil) 5) SDO, & JE (Power Dept, No. 3) 6) Live Sound 7) All Artists & Bands 8) Design Stash 9) The Morung Express (Media Partner) The DWU looks forward to further partnerships and co-operation in future endeavours and take this opportunity to wish the Dimapur citizens a very HAPPY and PEACEFUL NEW YEAR. Elizabeth Merry Chairperson, Duncan Women Union

to their LPG distributor/Bank for becoming cash transfer compliant.

8. So far Rs.624 Crore has been transferred to over 20 Lakh LPG consumers since the launch of the scheme on 15th November 2014.

9. LPG consumers who do not wish to avail the LPG subsidy for LPG cylinders can simply choose to opt out of subsidy. Over 12000 citizens have already voluntarily given up subsidy freeing up crores of subsidy amount for their less privileged brethren.

(Sanjib Chakravarty) Divisional Retail Sales Manager Tinsukia Integrated Divisional Office Indian Oil Corporation Limited cum, State Level Co-ordinator , Oil Industry , Nagaland.

Annexure Salient Features/Timelines of the modified DBTL scheme What if LPG consumer had joined the scheme earlier?

LPG consumers who had joined the scheme earlier by linking his Aadhaar number in LPG and Bank database will get the cylinder at Market price w.e.f 1.1.15 and the subsidy will be transferred into their bank account. They do not have to do anything further. They can check CTC (cash transfer compliance) status on www.mylpg.in.

How to Join the modified Scheme?

For joining the scheme, the consumers have to fill up a form available with distributors and also on www.mylpg.in. The options are as under: 1. LPG consumers can join the scheme by providing their Aadhaar number to LPG distributor and to Bank.

2. LPG consumers who do not have Aadhaar number can a. Give Bank details to LPG distributor OR b. Give 17 digit LPG ID to the Bank (select banks only).

What happens if the LPG Consumer joins the scheme or if he doesn’t join it?

Once the scheme is launched in Nagaland on 1.1.15, LPG consumers who join the scheme will get a one time permanent advance of Rs.568/- as soon as they book a cylinder after joining the scheme.

All consumers who have joined the scheme will get LPG cylinders at market price and subsidy amount in their bank account after launch of the scheme in their district/state.

Between 1st January 2015 and 31st March 2015 (three months), any LPG consumer who does not join the scheme will get the cylinder at subsidized price as they are getting it today.

Between 1st April 2015 and 30th June 2015 (three months), those LPG consumers who still do not join the scheme will start getting the cylinder at market price and subsidy will be parked with the OMCs. As soon as they join the scheme within this 3 month period, the parked subsidy would be sent to their bank account, else it will lapse.

From 1st July 2015, consumers who have still not joined the scheme will get the cylinder at market price, but subsidy will not be admissible. Subsidy will be transferred only to the bank account of those consumers who have joined the scheme prior to 30th June 2015.

Any consumer joining the scheme after 30th June 2015 will get permanent advance and subsidy with prospective effect.

What happens to the LPG Consumers of the 54 districts where the scheme is ongoing?

1. All consumers who have joined the scheme from 15th November 2014 are getting LPG cylinders at market price and cash in their bank accounts. They have also got the one time permanent advance of Rs.568/- on booking a cylinder after joining the scheme.

2. Between 15th November 2014 and 14th February 2015 (three months), LPG consumers in these 54 districts who do not join the scheme will continue to get the cylinder at subsidized price as they are getting it today.

3. Between 15th February 2015 and 14th May 2015 (three months), those LPG consumers who still do not join the scheme will start getting the cylinder at market price and cash admissible will be parked with the OMCs. If they join the scheme within this 3 month period, the parked cash would be sent to their bank account, else it will lapse.

4. From 15th May 2015, consumers who have still not joined the scheme will get the cylinder at market price, however, cash subsidy will not be admissible.

4

businEss

Saturday

Dimapur

3 January 2015

The Morung Express

Mixed auto data, rough ride ahead for some

NEW DELHI, JaNUary 2 (agENcIEs): The mixed numbers from the few auto players that have reported sales volumes for December suggest the industry might have a rough ride in the next few months with the government having withdrawn excise duty concessions. While the country’s top two car manufacturers, Maruti Suzuki and Hyundai Motor, did well to post a double-digit increase in volumes, Mahindra & Mahindra reported only a modest growth while two-wheeler major Hero MotoCorp’s volumes were flat.

Indeed, with the economy not showing any signs of a sustained recovery, the road ahead could be bumpy even though lower prices of commodities could help cushion the pressure on profits.

In fact, the December sales volumes may have been the re-

sult of consumers not wanting to pay more for their purchases in the new year — otherwise buyers typically avoid buying cars in December since they prefer the label of a new manufacturing year. Sales during the festive season had been lacklustre but had picked up slightly in November.

Pravin Shah, M&M chief executive, automotive division and international operations, said he was happy his firm had achieved a growth of 5%. “The year 2014 was an immensely challenging year for the auto industry,” Shah said.

Hyundai Motor India senior vice-president (sales and marketing) Rakesh Srivastava said his firm had reported record sales in 2014 and had garnered a market share of 21.8%.

However, since manufacturers propose to pass on the higher excise duties, sales could suf-

fer, Maruti Suzuki chairman RC Bhargava had observed, adding that a temporary dip in demand could not be ruled out.

While a revival in the economy can spur auto sales, analysts say that only players with a strong product portfolio can hope to gain market share given the keen competition. The aggression of Honda Motorcycles and Scooters over the past year, for instance, has left players like Bajaj Auto with far less market share — of just around 17% — than they enjoyed at the start of 2014.

In December, Hero MotoCorp’s sales volumes were flat; the company has lost 120 basis points share year-on-year in the domestic two-wheeler market over the January-October 2014 period led by a 360-bps y-o-y decline in the domestic scooter market share.

It has, however, picked up

share in the domestic motorcycle market of 100 basis points and is fighting back by adding scooter capacity which will go up from 85,000 units a month currently to 100,000 units a month.

Maruti Suzuki too is gearing up to stay ahead with five new launches in the next 12-18 months, buoyed by the response to the Celerio and Ciaz. Without the new offerings, volumes are likely to grow only in high single digits, analysts point out.

The higher excise duties are expected to push up the price of cars by 6-8% across models. For instance, for entry-level cars in the Rs 2-4 lakh range, like the Maruti Alto, the price is likely to go up by almost Rs 15,000, while premium hatchbacks like the Maruti Swift or the Hyundai i20 will likely see a hike of up to Rs 30,000.

Sales of passenger vehicles — cars, utility vehicles and vans — have been sluggish for more than two years now, with volumes up just 2% in FY13 and down 6% in FY14. Between April and November this year, volumes were up just about 3% at 1.7 million units.

In order to boost sales, excise duties were cut by the previous UPA government in the interim Budget in February. For small cars, scooters, motorcycles and commercial vehicles, duties were reduced to 8% from 12%, while for SUVs, it was cut to 24% from 30%. For mid-sized cars, duties were cut to 20% from 24%, and to 24% for large cars from 27%.

In June, the new government led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi had extended the excise duty concessions by six months to December 31.

India prepares reform AAI now warns GoAir over rising dues Trouble at GoAir has on payment front. “Air In- SpiceJet on cash-and-carry DELHI, JaNUary roadmap for ailing state banks 2NEW (tNN): After SpiceJet, the surprised aviation au- dia has dues of over Rs 2,000 and has asked the authorPUNE, JaNUary 2 (rEUtErs): India’s top bankers have gathered in Pune in a one-of-a-kind huddle to discuss long-pending reforms vital to improving the health of ailing public sector banks in Asia’s third-largest economy.

The country’s more than two dozen inefficient staterun banks have been constrained by a pile of bad loans and corporate governance issues. They also lag their private sector rivals in profitability.

For years, political interference and union opposition have thwarted major reforms. Many industry observers remain sceptical about big changes being implemented in the near future, especially with the economy still recovering from its worst slowdown since the 1980s.

If reformed, however, the country’s mega state lenders offer investors the best exposure to any sustained upswing in India’s economy.

“When the country is trying to achieve accelerated growth in economic development it is absolutely essential that banking reforms are thought about, deliberated upon and implemented also,” Hasmukh Adhia, financial services secretary in the finance ministry, said on Friday.

Besides the heads of all public sector banks, the two-day meeting ending on Saturday will also be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan.

The issues to be discussed include industry consolidation, restructuring of state banks for better efficiency and governance, as well as asset quality.

Instead of “imposing any recommendation”, the government and central bank will be consulting with all stakeholders in the state banking sector, Adhia told reporters in Pune.

State lenders recorded the highest level of stressed loans at 12.9 percent of their total advances in September last year, while the same ratio for private sector banks was at 4.4 percent, according to the latest central bank data.

State banks account for more than 70 percent of total outstanding loans in the sector.

Public sector lenders are estimated to need as much as $60 billion in capital over the next four years to meet upcoming global regulations and to build a buffer against rising bad loans.

Airports Authority of India (AAI) has sounded an alarm over budget carrier GoAir’s galloping dues. The staterun airport operator has warned GoAir to bring its dues within its bank guarantee amount by next week, failing which the Wadia Group airline may be put on cash-and-carry.

A senior AAI official said GoAir’s dues are now Rs 42 crore, while its bank guarantee is for Rs 30 crore.

A GoAir spokesman said: “GoAir dues to AAI are about Rs 38 crore and our bank guarantee is for over Rs 30 crore. We will abide by what the authority says.”

thorities as the unlisted airline claims to be a profitable one along with IndiGo. GoAir had reported a profit of Rs 100 crore in 2012-13. The subsequent fiscal (2013-14) was also profitable but the figure was lower due to the fall in rupee and a sharp rise in aviation turbine or jet fuel (ATF) price that year. The first quarter of the current fiscal was profitable and Go expected 2014-15 to be profitable too. Sources say ‘cash flow’ issues may have led to AAI bill crossing the bank guarantee amount.

AAI is facing troubles with a number of airlines

HyDErabaD, JaNUary 2 (agENcIEs): The price of milk and milk products in the country would remain subdued in the near term with no room for increase in the next 5-6 months, according to Amul India managing director R S Sodhi today said .

“Looking at the present local market conditions, and also the world over, I don’t see any increase in the prices of milk and milk products in the next 5-6 months in the country.

Major cooperatives have been receiving 20-25% more milk in the last few months due to a drop in procurement by milk powder manufacturers,” Sodhi told mediapersons here.

Milk powder manufacturers had reduced procurement following a 30-

40% drop in the price of value-added product globally, he added. However, he said the current environment of no price rise and the falling inflation would “motivate” people to consume more milk and milk products, brightening the scope for future rise in prices.

Sodhi, who today officially launched Amul milk in Hyderabad, said the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation-run Amul aimed to become the top FMCG company brand in the country by clocking a turnover of Rs 50,000 crore by 2020.

“We have been growing consistently at 24% for the last five years, which is the highest in the FMCG sector. We are on track to clock a turnover of Rs 50,000 crore by 2020,” he said.

Simple Rules - There is just one simple rule: “Fill in the grid so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 through 9.”

SUDOKU Game Number # 3097

ity to give the LCC time till January 10 for clearing its dues, a date that is likely to be extended again. A senior aviation ministry justified the directives to AAI for SpiceJet, saying: “We have been informed that SpiceJet’s former promoter Ajay Singh is arranging for funds. Singh says he is in talks with US-based agencies for the same. Since everything in the West is closed for Christmas and New Year, we were told funding will take some time. That’s why we have given more time to SpiceJet. We don’t want any airline to shut down.”

Milk prices may not go up in next 5-6 months: Amul

_

LEISURE

crore and that is just the principal amount. Still, AI cannot be put on cash-andcarry as it is a governmentowned airline and another state concern (AAI) will not be allowed to do so. Kingfisher, which closed in October 2012, owed us Rs 167 crore. Now we are worried about SpiceJet as well. The low-cost carrier (LCC) has dues of Rs 230 crore,” said an official, while adding that such figures have put AAI’s own financials under serious strain. The official said that Jet Airways and IndiGo have been paying in time.

The aviation ministry has not allowed AAI to put

For the fiscal ending 2013-14, Amul’s total turnover stood at Rs 18,150 crore, which it expects to grow to more than Rs 22,000 crore by the end of the present fiscal. Amul stood at an overall second position, next to HUL, among the top selling consumer good companies in the country, according to him.

To invest Rs 4,000-5,000 crore in the next 3 years Anticipating a peak processing capacity of 320 million litres per day for it, as against 230 million litres now, Amul plans to invest Rs 4,0005,000 crore in the next three years in creating modern dairy processing units in the country.

DAILY CROSS WORD

CROSSWORD # 3106

Answer Number # 3096

Public DiscoursE

The triumph of love in the face of frozen ice at Dzüku

T

o the parents relatives and friends of Rokosietso, Keturovino,and Mhiesikhono, they were the most precious things in life. But to the other thousands that went to their rescue, they were just another three teenagers from a village called Khonoma. Yet braving the freezing temperatures and the steep slopes, they came in their hundreds to keep vigil for four long days. All along the treacherous route, in four camps starting from the base camp, different age groups from Khonoma kept hot tea and food ready for the hundreds of people that passed the camps carrying heavy loads of equipments for the rescue mission. The rescuers were from neighboring villages of Kenoma (Poilwa), Benrew, Kohima, Jotsoma, Mezoma, Phesama, Kigwema, Viswema, Sechüma Kiruphema, Wokha etc. They all came from North, South, East and West of Khonoma. Many of the rescue experts from the National Disaster Response Force and the Indian army came from all over India. And for four long cold days, this chain of human love never abandoned our Khonoma teenagers to the cold embrace of the frozen lake.

The sight of their dedicated and determined efforts as they broke tons of snow the whole day only to cower in cold caves at night-will forever be edged in Khonoma’s memory for all times to come. Words are insufficient to thank all these heroes of the Dzüku tragedy. But your gesture of love has touched many stony hearts in the stony village of Khonoma. Khonoma will ever remain grateful for all the kindness you have shown to her.

Kaka D. Iralu

The short life span of ‘Laikie’ NEC Road!

A

big sigh of relieve re-dawned on the people of the area at the thought of a better road when they heard the proposal for the re-construction of the NEC Road which connects Kohima – Peren/Laikie via Jotsoma and Khonoma. The hope of a ‘dust-free and bump-free road’ was doubled as the work was taken up by the GREF and seeing the deployment of its personnel and machineries. Road-widening and culvert-making are almost over and some portions of the road are being tarred.

But the high expectations of the people seems too short-lived as the finished portions of the road are already giving way to the original soil, while the personnel are still busy blacktopping the road just a kilometer away. In addition, even the tarred portions appear to be haphazardly done, since potholes have appeared in many places and the patch-work to cover them is being done. So these few questions came to my mind as I traveled on this brand new road. Please allow me to share: • HasthishighlyesteemedOrganization(GREF)started to embrace corruption; dismantling the good image earned by the sincere Officers of the past?

• Are the suppliers giving the lowest quality materials available in the market to construct the road?

• Are the personnel making the road following the Detail Project Report (DPR) properly?

Rev Fr George Rino Kohima, Nagaland

Readers may please note that the contents of the articles, letters and opinions published do not reflect the outlook of this paper nor of the Editor in any form.

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E I N T E R N E T F J I H N T J J I A U

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A F K R H J E P N S A V A D A O L P U X

P A S S W O R D L A P P D B D K K A P Q

A F N I N S T A L L I P O T P A L O H A

W V P K R X V R P A R O S R U C O Q A Y

ACROSS 1. Trainee 6. A person who is in charge 10. Found on most beaches 14. A drama set to music 15. Affirm 16. Smell 17. Half of a sphere 19. Exploded star 20. Black Sea port 21. At this time 22. Got bigger 23. Ways out 25. Inhabit 26. Perishes 30. Chemical cousin 32. A former Turkish term of respect 35. Not excessive 39. Noisy quarrel 40. Spin 41. Labored respiration 43. High ranking officer 44. Guarantee 46. Learning method 47. Severe pain 50. Clairvoyants 53. Not right 54. And so forth 55. Imperium

60. Against 61. Fastidious 63. Adolescent 64. Weightlifters pump this 65. Small cities 66. Feudal worker 67. Small slender gull 68. Sudden burst

DOWN 1. Small salmon 2. Copied 3. Greek territorial unit 4. Anagram of “Sire” 5. Thigh armor 6. Derisive laugh 7. Happenings 8. Spray can 9. Sketched 10. Composer 11. Love intensely 12. Book of fiction 13. A slow speech pattern 18. Latin for “Peace” 24. 3 in Roman numerals 25. An evil supernatural being 26. Deceased 27. Questionable 28. F F F F 29. Snakelike

31. Bog 33. Nursemaid 34. Colors 36. Tropical tuber 37. French for “State” 38. Expunge 42. Spartan 43. G 45. Parson 47. Winged 48. Segments of DNA 49. Frequently 51. Record (abbrev.)

52. Fungal diseases of plants 54. Send forth 56. Raindrop sound 57. Hawkeye State 58. Litter’s littlest 59. Being 62. Hotel Ans to CrossWord 3105

Police Control Room: North Police Station: South Police Station: Fire Brigade: Naga Hospital: Oking Hospital: Bethel Nursing Home: Northeast Shuttles

STD CODE: 0370 100/2244279 2222222 2222111 2222952 2222916 2243339 2224202 08974997923

DIMAPUR: 03862 232201/ 101 (O) 9436017479 (OC) CHUMUKEDIMA: 03862 282777/101 (O) 9856158740 (OC)

MOKOKCHUNG: 0369 2226225/ 101 (O) 9436012949 (OC) PHEK: 8414853765 (O) 9862130954(OC) ZUNHEBOTO: 03867 280304/ 101 (O) 9856156876 (OC) TUENSANG: 8414853766 (O) 8414853519 MON: 03869 251222/ 101 (O) 9436208480 (OC) KipHire: 8414853767 (O) 8974304572 (OC)

CHILD WELFARE COMMITTEE Toll free No. 1098 childline

MOKOKCHUNG:

KOHIMA: 0370 2222952/ 101 (O) 9402003086 (OC)

WOKHA: 03860 242215/101 (O) 9862039399 (OC)

Chumukedima Fire 282777 Brigade Nikos Hospital and 232032, 231031 Research Centre

KOHIMA

FIRE STATIONS

STD CODE: 0369

Police Station 1:

2226241

Police Station 2 :

2226214

Civil Hospital: Woodland Nursing Home:

2226216 2226263

Hotel Metsüpen (Tourist Lodge):

2226373/2229343

TAHAMZAM (formerly Senapati) STD CODE: 03871 Police Station: Fire Brigade

CURRENCY EXCHANGE CURRENCY NOTES US Dollars Sterling Pound Hong Kong Dollar Australian Dollar Singapore Dollar Canadian Dollar Japanese Yen

222246 222491

BUY(Rs)

SELL(Rs)

62.55 98.07 8.05 51.36 47.55 53.92 52.69

62.99 99.18 8.14 52.10 48.12 54.57 53.33

Euro

77.62

78.48

Danish Krone

10.42

10.56

Norwegian Krone New Zealand Dollar Swedish Krona

8.43

8.52

48.20

48.94

8.25

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PubLiC SPACe

The Morung Express

ACAUT Nagaland responds to NSCN (K)

T

he NSCN (K) instead of issuing a public clarification as demanded by ACAUT Nagaland as to why its cadre bombed KT Gas Agency on 22nd Dec 2014 justified its activities from the perspective of “Unresolved Indo-Naga-Myanmar Political issue” (30th December 2014, local papers). Thus, it’s an open admission that it was involved in bombing KT Gas Agency and of throwing bombs in the past against innocent business establishments. This stand has made it clear that the NSCN (K) is an organization which has adopted terrorist tactics against its own civilian population. Since the NSCN (K) has chosen not to respond to ACAUT charges that “NSCN (K) have in the past blasted grenades at various places on several occasions creating death and injuries”, the ACAUT is left with no option but to conclude that the following were committed by the organisation: 1. The bombing of a Goldsmith-cum-Jewellery shop, GS Road, Dimapur, on 7th August, 2013, where one person was killed and another injured.

2. The bombing of Rhino Roadways Corporation, Dimapur, on 13the August, 2013.

3. The bombing of Progressive Motors (TK Service Station), Dimapur, on 31st October, 2013.

4. The throwing of a grenade inside the house of a businessman at Marwaripatti on 1st March, 2014.

5. The bombing of Maruti Trading Agency, Dimapur on 22nd April 2014 and planting of a bomb at Jasokie Market, Dimapur around the same time.

The ACAUT Nagaland would like to know from the NSCN (K) as to whether the NSCN (K) is waging war against the Burmese and Indian state or against its own civilian population? The duplicity of the NSCN (K) is in full view when it accuses ACAUT of collaborating with police in arresting Nagaho and contemptuously addresses the Nagaland police as ‘Indian security agencies.’ However, ACAUT would like to remind the organisation that their allergy for anything ‘Indian’ should include Indian Rupee too but their sheer hypocrisy means that their ‘love’ for Indian money cannot be stopped.

It has been the stand of ACAUT that the NPGs should not indulge in unabated taxation under the garb of sovereignty to legitimize their activity. Our memorandum submitted to the PM Narendra Modi stated this fact that taxation is a political issue related to Naga Movement but it in no way legitimizes unabated taxations or extortions committed by the NPGs. Therefore, the NSCN (K) stand is misplaced.

As per government protocol and Supreme Court guidelines, the members of HPC are fully entitled to remunerations and therefore, are given honorarium and vehicles for stipulated period only. It may be noted that members of ACAUT were inducted into the HPC so as to maintain the integrity and impartiality of the HPC in investigating issues of corruption and unabated taxation. So the NSCN (K) making noises about ACAUT members asking for NL10 SUVs and remunerations is nonsense.

Issued by Media Cell ACAUT Nagaland

W

hy is India an X factor in the world community today?

It is because of the people of India. What is the one single factor which has enhanced the image of India not just as a military power to reckon with, but also as a fast emerging economic superpower and a power house of untapped human resource and potential? The very simple answer is again the people of India. It is the patience, the resilience, the entrepreneurship and the magnitude of the young population of India that is at the core of this old and huge behemoth Soviet era machine of a country powered with the old British model engine, finetuned with the ever secretive silent dynamos of the Japanese, all fitted together with the amazingly very cheap Chinese made nuts, bolts and spares which the locals are now being able to replicate faster than the Chinese can think of newer idea and items.

Why could India not crack out of that shell of, as an emerging super-power, all this time inspite of the fact that it had remained as the front runner from among all the developing nations of the world to very naturally break into the “developed” category? Why has India inspite of fulfilling all the conventional criteria to become a permanent member of the “Security Council” of the UNO been unable to do so? Why has India inspite of having been the founding brain of the non-aligned movement after her independence and around which almost all the newly independent nations of Asia and Africa weaved their domestic and foreign policy, been unable to occupy the pole position and that due respect from even among the SAARC and the BRICS nations till nearly today? The answer to the above three Whys, I believe, is because of the nature of Indian politics until very nearly today. It is actually not the politicians who are to be blamed.

Democratic, representative, parliamentary politics has much to shoulder the blame.

The mushrooming of Regional political parties and their compulsions in India has dented and damaged the standing of National politics and thereby its reputation in

the international arena.

While India has much to thank the ‘Indian National Congress’ and the NehruGandhi family, the inability of the Congress Party to look beyond the family, and the family beyond the party, has proved to be the proverbial last straw that broke the camel’s back. Yes indeed, a double edged sword. It has hurt India in more ways than one, the main casualty being the National pride. In any profession, it is human nature and instinct that the lineage is maintained in one form or the other. It is universal. Theoretically, politics is not a profession. It is a service and therefore the continuity is, more often than not, not viewed sympathetically. But in a representative democracy it is the majority that counts and therefore very legitimate if it does not look vulgar as was the case of the Rabri Devi Government of the RJD in Bihar some time back, or for that matter, even the Akhilesh Yadav’s SP Government of today in UP. The real stink is only when there is the absence of the flair for politics, or not taking it up as a service but more of a profession, or is fostered upon.

It is an extreme view but nevertheless made sense when one commentator emphasized that had the Congress led UPA Government won India this time round too, India herself would have been sold to the highest if not the lowest bidder. The lure of power which is directly proportional to the fear of losing power has fueled many a political minds to legitimate any means to meet the ends. This is the tragedy of Indian democracy. And in the same breath, this also is the beauty and excellence of Indian democracy. Reality indeed is stranger than fiction. When every commentator worth his or her salt had been advocating, professing and resigned to the theory that single party rule in India was dead and buried, a nostalgia and a relic of the past, the people of India thought otherwise, and suddenly the whole outlook of India has turned on its head. The verdict given by the people of India has enhanced and elevated the Indian nation to a status of unprecedented respect and has transformed

duo were collecting fire crackers free of cost, informed the police. After a chase, the Dimapur Police arrested the duo and seized one M-20 pistol with 5 (five) live rounds. Accordingly, a case has been registered at Dimapur West Police Station and investigation is on.

Meanwhile three persons were arrested on November 30, 2014, “for demanding Rs 50,000 from a businessman in Dimapur.” A press note from the Dimapur Police stated that the accused persons were identified as Hutoi Khujumi, a Lieutenant in the NSCN (IM); Razul

Ahmed and Haris Ali. “It is ascertained that the main accused Hutoi had been threatening the victim over phone to shoot him if he do not pay fifty thousand,” informed the Police.

“The accused persons further directed the victim to leave the cash in a lottery counter located at Duncan Basti. Accordingly, the victim paid only `10,000/(Rupees ten thousand) to save his life,” further stated the press note from Dimapur Police. A case has been registered in this connection at the Dimapur West Police Station for further investigation.

Nagaland welcomes 2015 TVC condoles Our Correspondent Kohima | January 2

New Year 2015 was celebrated across Nagaland on January 1 with much pomp and gaiety.

In the state capital Kohima, the people in their best attire were seen flocking to the special church services to give thanks to Almighty God and to receive blessings. They also prayed for peaceful and prosperous Nagaland Welcoming New Year 2015, fireworks lit up the skies as the clock hit midnight. People were seen sharing gift and best eateries with friends, neighbours and the poor and needy people.

River banks turned into

3 January 2015

Dimapur

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What would we have done had…..?

LOCAL Police arrest five for extortion DIMAPUR, JANUARY 2 (MExN): Dimapur Police today informed that it has arrested five persons in two separate occasions on November 30 and December 31, 2014.

A press note from the Dimapur Police informed that on December 31, 2014, two men were found harassing businessmen in Circular Road, Dimapur.

They have been identified as Tokishe (49), a Captain in the GPRN/NSCN and Kitoka (28). The main accused Tokishe who was armed with an M-20 pistol had been threatening the fire cracker sellers and the

Saturday

picnic spot amongst friend circle, families, clubs and other organizations.

Meanwhile, government offices in Nagaland re-opened today.

Chief Minister T.R. Zeliang in his New Year greetings hoped that this New Year 2015 will be a year of blessings for all the Nagas and wished all fellow citizens a blessed year ahead.

Earlier, Nagaland state Governor, PB Acharya in his New Year 2015 greetings said “As we step into the New Year, May the Almighty God bless us abundantly throughout the journey of life with new visions and thoughts. May the days ahead bring good luck and happiness to the people and society.”

DIMAPUR, JANUARY 2 (MExN): The Thahekhu Village Council (TVC) has conveyed its heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family members of those who were killed in an accident on December 24 near Sub-Urban Police Station.

In a message, TVC Chairman, Khekuto Yeputho also wished for speedy recovery of those injured in the incident.

Condemning the act of the reckless driver, the council appealed to the law enforcing agency to take appropriate action against the driver and also sternly warned those drivers resorting to rash and negligent driving in populated areas under the influence of alcohol.

the earthly being of its chief architect into a national demigod and an international hero. Nothing short of an electrified Rock Star. The same Barack Obama, the President of the United States of America who had denied Modi even a tourist visa yesterday has today whole heartedly accepted to be the Chief Guest of India’s republic day celebration in New Delhi, literally even before Prime Minister Modi could complete his sentence of proposal. The imitator of the “Yes, We Can” slogan has outwitted, outdone and outshone the original composer of the “Yes, We Can” slogan. And to understand the magnitude of the win in the right perspective we need to remember that fighting and winning the direct personalized Presidential form of Government as in America is far, far more easier than fighting and winning the Prime Ministership of an indirect representative parliamentary form of Government as in India. Indeed, it is nothing short of a massive diplomatic coup. Narendra Modi is not in the mould of the regular Prime Ministers who would depend on the extensive ground work of the External Affairs Minister as far as foreign affairs are concerned. This guy, Wow! He is his own excellent foreign minister and the world is lapping it all up.

In all seriousness, India as a nation would have fallen apart and not survived its diversity this long a period since independence, much on the lines of the short lived Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt today after the fall of Hosni Mubarack, the Dictator, had it not been for the resilience, belief, hardworking, the wisdom of knowing its limitations and the Amar, Akbar, Anthony mindset of the Indian people, the vast majority of whom are the people following the Hindu faith. The tolerance of the mainstream Indian population is the one single chief factor that is responsible for the growth of India and its tall standing and reputation in the community of the Nations of the world. The same qualities has enabled Indians to fit in seamlessly, in any corner of the world where they are obviously assets and not liabilities. The workmanship and dedication of Indians

has been recognized globally and it is not for nothing or by fluke and chance that Indians have been enabled to take up leadership roles of huge responsibilities in the developed world, even without mentioning the pioneering and sacrificing contributions to and in the least developed and the developing nations of the world. In this context I would like to mention the iniquities and the shallow mind complex of our fellow NorthEast people in general and the Nagas in particular. We have a tendency of a superiority complex, or if not, we reflect such tendencies even if we actually don’t intent to, and bring upon ourselves, situations and circumstances, which otherwise would have never been there in the first place. If China Town in Calcutta is the same as during the time I frequented some nearly two decades back, it is worth emulating. By the sound of it, it appears to be an exclusive Chinese affair of a township but actually it hardly is.

The Chinese community has been able to preserve and display its distinct Chinese characteristics in every possible way but had seamlessly adopted the Bengali culture of mind frame and their accent of speaking the Bengali language itself would put many a grassroot Bengali to shame. All the roadside eateries of authentic Chinese food is patronized by the local Bengalis and the tourists.

China town has effortlessly assimilated itself as a part and parcel of the Bengali society which the local Bengalis are indeed proud of. The tragedy of we Nagas is that we want others to be in our shoe, but not us in others shoe.

Since independence India has been provoked no end by Pakistan. The Muslims wanted a separate nation state and thus Pakistan came into being at great cost of even the life of Mahatma Gandhi. Today, the population of muslims in India is greater than the population of Pakistan, and Muslims in India enjoys as much rights and privileges as any Indian citizen, if not more, because of vote bank politics adopted by atleast some of the so called secular, regional and national political parties of India. Pakistan had been very vocal and practical in its open

declaration of bleeding India to death with a thousand cuts. Had India paid back Pakistan by the same coin, Pakistan today would have been bombed back to the stone age era in all legitimacy, and no right thinking organization or body or country could have faulted India.

Hindu majority India survives as the world’s biggest democracy, the one and only unique position in the world, because it does not impose.

Inspite of many irritations and provocations even from the small neighboring nation states, India has never behaved as that big bully brother. Instead, India has always been in the forefront when they are in need. When Kargil happened, India had all the legitimate right, in and of the world, to take the war right to the doorstep of every Pakistani home, and once and for all, break Pakistan’s spine and its nuclear boast to the dustbin of history, but India did not. When 9/11 happened in America, President Bush took the opportunity to hunt down Saddam Hussain, a personalized adversary, in the pretext and guise of destroying Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction WMD’s and for its patronage of the Afghan Taliban responsible for 9/11. Christian America made a fool of the world and went for the unjustified second Gulf War even though Iraq had no role to play whatsoever in both the unfounded charges. President Bush had settled his personal revenge carried over from his father and former President Bush senior. The unrest today in the Middle-East is a creation of the western world.

Compare and contrast it with Hindu majority democratic India. When the Indian Parliament was attacked by fully Pakistan sponsored terrorists, and also when 26/11 happened in Mumbai, India had all the legitimate right of the whole wide world to say enough is enough, and in both the instances respectively, follow it up with an iron-fisted blow back, and this time, once and for all wipe off Pakistan off the map, but yet again India displayed that proverbial Christian teaching of turning the other cheek as well, by even giving a fair trial to the lone surviving Pakistani terrorist, when

the filmiest of a kangaroo court or even worse would have sufficed with no objections what-so-ever.

Yours truly, truly and very sincerely feels that Hindu majority India has been playing out the role of what the Bible teaches, while Christian Nagaland has been playing out the role of what a pagan society would. Judging by the way we have been behaving and the intolerant and insensitive language and the remarks that we have been spewing out for the sake of narrow local politics gives us no moral right to be heard.

People need not have to do anything to convince atheists not to embrace the Christian faith, by simply playing out our Nagaland Christian way of life and the tone and nature of languages that we use to degrade the faith of others.

Never in the Bible has the Lord Jesus taught us to degrade others and their faith, but to enrich oneself with the spirit and justice of His teachings, the reflection of whose light will do the rest. Is not the misinterpretation of the truth by the unaware negativity of the few damaging the whole?

Can we afford to wait for another election to bring forth change? Can we risk missing the bus as we wait for the next election? Will we not be like that five virgins who took their lamps but forgot the oil? Can we risk a new team of players to take sanctuary in the “never out of fashion” excuse of learning from mistakes, and wait for them to finish learning from their mistakes, to bring forth positive change? Can Nagas be so unjustifiably selfish that if I am not to get it, so will the other? Are the Nagas so bereft of ideas that inorder to convenience ourselves that it is not so, we go the “laipata” way? Laipata boil for breakfast, laipata fry for lunch and laipata ghalo for dinner?

Three menu of the same in a day! How long will even the laipata last? Are we missing the cue from our Heavenly Father in Heaven by remaining active for all the wrong reasons and passive for just one right reason that could very well be the answer for all our iniquities and a fresh beginning, a clean slate, a new perspective, a new dawn. (to be continued) Benito.Z.Swu

The Naga Culture Conservation: First Expedition

T

he Naga Culture Conservation is a Facebook group initiated by Lemwang Chuhwanglim on May 26, 2013.

The group emphasizes educating young Nagas on the significance of Naga culture and traditions that have been practiced since our foreparents’ time. It also aims to engender our older and middle-aged men and women in Naga society to rethink the significance of transferring Indigenous histories, wisdom, and knowledge; poems and every detail of cultural and traditional practices to prevail among the Naga people to every new born Naga. Such rethinking would inevitably compel both old and young Nagas to keep the culture and traditions alive from generation to generation. It is disheartening to witness the gap between elderly, middle-aged, and young people in the Naga society regarding the knowledge of Naga culture. Many young Nagas have failed to see the palpable relationship between the time immemorial cultural traditions and then endorsed modern, foreign culture. That lack of awareness has become a menace for both old and young Nagaland it will continue to be; today and tomorrow.

Wangjin Wangru and Lemwang Chuhwanglim made an expedition to a few Konyak villages few months back to dialogue with old and young people on preserving and con-

serving one’s own culture and traditions every day.

During the expedition, they met old and young people in a house and Pa (Morung) to discuss the significance of culture and tradition. This initiative provided the people in the villages an opportunity for retrospection on how far the identity of Konyaks is preserved and conserved till today. Such preservation and conservation includes traditional methods for fire ignition, the preservation of seeds from different crops and vegetables, the continuation of cotton refinement, maintenance of monuments and the origins/histories of villages, retelling stories and poems, learning traditional crafts and pottery, building stronger relationships among villagers, as well as many other cultural traditions that have been practiced since our foreparents’ time.

Culture expands from within human civilization indicating the growth of the human being in respect to society. It measures the historical phenomena that promulgate civilization without abrogating one’s own culture. Culture should be retained for the transfer of knowledge, beliefs, patterns of behavior, and institutions which will inevitably be transferred from one generation to the next, as well as shared among different groups and people in varying stages of life. It is culture that enables the history of iden-

tity among many Indigenous people allowing them to remain recognized, able to assemble and settle as one’s own group and society. It is crystal knowledge that human beings remain naked with culture; it is culture that leads human beings in society to prosper and survive (James Birx, 2006). For Birx, naked is the metaphorical language that indicates meaningless of existence without culture. The Naga Indigenous people would become naked without preserving and conserving their culture. Any indigenous people without culture from the origins of their society and group would remain meaningless without identity, history, tradition, and so on. It is mandatory in society that cultural conservation safeguards traditional cultural knowledge, customs, materials, and natural recourses that people depend on for existence. The primary goals of cultural conservation focus on sustainable culture, natural resources, and traditions in every modern and post-modern world that supports indigenous people to adapt to social evolution without obliteration of their own historic culture.

Humans are a cultural species who learn multiple beliefs, attitudes, knowledge, customs, and norms from members belonging to different groups through social learning processes such as institutions, imitation, teaching, and language (Alex Mesoudi, 2011)

that give both negative and positive impacts to society. Indeed, learning from one another is a strategy to develop new strategies to promulgate one’s own culture. However, one should understand that imitation of foreign cultures without consciousness of the potential for diminishing one’s own culture is a deadlock in many indigenous societies. For instance, the development and resulting influence of modern technology is inescapable among many indigenous people. This development has become a poisonous opiate among many Naga indigenous people, especially in terms of reducing the perceived value of their own culture as savage and of less value. Such an ideology brought desolation among the Naga indigenous people by promoting an abhorrence of the value of historic culture. During the expedition, people in a few villages among the Konyaks made surprising responses that they have lost some seeds of crops that were usually found in the village before. They have lost the culture of pottery, the culture of granaries, and many others as the modern techno world riveted and mesmerized them. Imitation of modern culture has made many Naga indigenous people lose the indigenous culture of creativity, innovation, and hard work. It leads to attempts to assimilate whatever is mechanized by the foreign culture and

thereby results in losses for the young people who do not reach their destiny to remain strong in their own historic culture. Though a few young people could achieve benefits in the modern culture, many others have failed without making their dreams come true. Such failure takes place due to the imitation of easy earning which leads to the existence of corruption in families, villages, towns, and in larger society. However, there is always a hope to be achieved.

These people have realized the significance of cultural preservation and conservation in every village. Such rethinking, reeducating, and retrospection of preserving one’s own culture is the first achievement of the one of the goals of Naga Culture Conservation.

The Naga Culture Conservation encourages old, young, and every newborn Naga child to respect, honor, and preserve their own culture and tradition in the midst of everyday social and cultural evolution taking place in society. We save our yesterdays, as well as today, for tomorrow’s generation who will remain grateful for what we have done for them. Despite numerous social activities emerging in the Naga society, one can pay attention to such significant efforts of cultural preservation that preserves the culture for generations to come.

A Prosperous New Year 2015 to all the Nagas.

Lemwang Chuhwanglim Researcher & Activist

The Morung Express is introducing “Public Space” as part of our intention to provide deliberate space for the opinions of the people to be expressed and heard through this newspaper. Nonetheless, The Morung Express points out that the opinions expressed in the contents published in the “Public Space” do not reflect the views and position of the newspaper or the editor.

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People, life, etc...

Saturday | 3 January, 2015

The History of Nagaland Reflected in its Literature

Early History Before the advent of the American Missionaries, Nagas were illiterate, practised headhunting and lived in their village-states, mostly in isolation from each other.

History and culture were passed down through word of mouth, from generation to generation. There was a rich tradition of oral literature but no question of books or written literature then.

The first literary figure to make his presence felt in the region was E.W. Clarke, an American missionary of Dutch origin. With a journalistic background, he arrived in Assam in 1869 and was stationed at Sibsagar (Sivasagar) Mission. Armed with a printing press and an Assamese assistant (Godhula) in particular, he used to make forays into the Ao Naga hills. Slowly he started having converts. For the sake of his converts, he first translated and printed a hymn book and the Lord’s Prayer. He, finally, climbed the hills for a base at Molungyimsen Village in Ao Naga country in 1872. In 1884, the first printing press, called Molung Printing Press, was set up in Molunyimsen village. The same year The Gospels of Mathew and John were translated into Ao language. W.E Witter’s Grammar and Vocabulary in Lotha language came out in 1888. The book, St Mathew, in Angami language followed in 1889 and the Sema Primer by Rev H B Dickson in 1908. Later, E W Clarke brought out a “dictionary” in the Ao language in 1911. So while the primary objective was to teach the new Naga converts to pray, read the Bible and sing hymns, literacy/education slowly followed in its wake.

Earlier, the British Colonialists had made their presence felt in 1832, when they decided to consolidate the areas under their control, particularly the Manipuri kingdom which they received, following the Treaty of Yandabo in 1826. Naga country lay between the Manipuri kingdom and their headquarters in Assam. This was the point of contact and conflict with the Nagas when the British attempted to trace a land route to connect the two parts. After about 50 years of fighting the Nagas, the British managed to consolidate their position over western part of Naga areas.

The first big exposure of the Nagas to the outside world was when several thousand Nagas went to Europe and, possibly, Mesopotamia, as part of the Labour Corps, to assist the Allied Forces in the WW1. The main benefit seemed to have been a consciousness among the disparate Naga tribes that they were a people and separate from others. This “consciousness” would come to fruition in 1918 through the formation of the Naga Club where the educated Nagas from different tribes would assemble regularly. Initially a social club, this would finally emerge as the birthplace of Naga political aspirations.

But as far as literature and books were concerned, no writings had appeared on the scene except, perhaps, some reports by British officers who served in the Naga Hills. Even much of the “travelogues” by serving British officers would appear later. These were, not surprisingly, mostly descriptive in nature. There was no serious research even in the fields of Sociology and Anthropology although, given the absence of published material, some of these “travelogues” were sometimes given the status of specialised studies.

In the latter part of 1920s, following some consolidation of Naga brotherhood from their common experience in France and elsewhere, and the formation of the Naga Club, the need for political action took over. This was epitomised in the submission of the now famous Memorandum to the Simon Commission on January 10, 1929, asking the British Government to leave the Naga people out of the proposed Reformed Scheme of India.

This was the first Naga expression of wanting to remain outside of and separate from India. The Nagas were left out of the Reformed Scheme as per Government of India Act, 1935, which took effect in 1937. But soon all the principal players – British, Indians and Nagas – would be engulfed in the WW 2, with the battlefields all over Naga inhabited areas. Once more, violence engulfed much of the Naga Hills. The battle for survival took precedence over everything else.

On the whole, there was no time for the few well educated Nagas to devote their time to writing or even educating their fellow Nagas in the few schools available.

They were in great demand everywhere as the Naga people decided to take up cudgels with the soon to become Independent India as Nagas decided that they also wanted to be politically independent. Several parleys took place with India’s leaders but these did not bear fruit. And as Naga Society, once more, descended into what a writer would later call the violent “Night of the Guerrillas”, there was no question of literature and books.

What did stand out was that the few educated Nagas had real quality education -- the political writings of late T. Sakhrie, in particular, could be cited as example.

Sadly, this would place them, the Naga people, and foreign missionaries for no fault of theirs, in an unfortunate situation because Government of India could not believe that Nagas could write so well and, therefore, suspected that the foreign missionaries in Nagaland must be writing the political letters of the Nagas. It made life difficult for the foreign missionaries; it did not benefit Government of India in any way except for propaganda purpose and the Nagas felt insulted and became more determined about their independence, which quickly became a Cause. The violence would continue, throttling any potential for growth of Naga literature.

This political pre-occupation of the Nagas continued for a very long time – indeed, a political agreement is still to be arrived at today. So, writings by Nagas, about themselves or others, continued to suffer drought. Only with the passage of time and a more sizeable population getting education, particularly higher education, from 1970s onwards, would emerge Nagas who would start writing. This category included Nagas who were in Government service. Where Naga literature is concerned, Nagaland Statehood established in 1963, although controversial in some quarters, had proved to be an enabling institution. With regular salary and some security over livelihood, some could devote time to writing. Of course, these early writers would write on non-political or politically non-controversial subjects. Some like Alemchiba Ao, would delve into history and culture. But they paved the way for others to follow.

There were other writers who wrote mostly on the Naga Political Issue. People usually write about what concerns them most. Naturally, Politics, (Naga) History, and Religion became the three favourite topics for early Naga writers. The obsession of Nagas for politics and history, as subjects of writing, is understandable. Indeed, there would arise a category of writers who might be described as Naga politico-historians, who would try to prove that historically Nagas had nothing to do with India, that the two are separate in every way, and that the only meeting point between the two is the military invasion of Naga country by Government of India. Thus, in this brand of writing a closeness of affinity between Naga history and the independence movement makes

Charles Chasie President, Kohima Educational Society

Naga men in traditional attire drink rice beer as they sing songs of their story.

them almost synonymous.

Religion seems less visible but permeates every strata of Naga society. In extreme situations of violence and privations, as Nagas have seen, people have often found an anchor in religion. Faith has sustained the Nagas. Church and promotion of faith became a full time pre-occupation for many Nagas and explains, to some extent, the Naga mentality for evangelization. Some denominations are committed to sending “missionaries” outside Nagaland, in India and even abroad despite the violence and other ills, still prevalent in their own society. Religion and Church have converged and often become a necessary self-definer for most Nagas and cannot be questioned! This is why even in Naga politics, both “Overground” and “Underground”, the Church remains a most powerful institution in Naga Society.

Thus we find writings on Nagas seem to have been limited to a few subjects. It was also, sometimes, not just writers choosing a limited number of subjects to write on but a general unavailability of readership. The following factors are worth noting.

1. Prolonged years of intense fighting and privations forced most Nagas into eking out a living. Survival took precedence over everything else, including schooling and literacy.

2. It must also be remembered that many became refugees because of the armed conflict, having to settle down far away from their own homes and villages.

As displaced persons, their priorities became totally different and they became disoriented. Their identity and lives were clear in their given village-state/s but no longer available to them in their new homes/villages. They had to rebuild a whole new identity by reinventing themselves! Such a situation was not conducive to reading and writing, much less promoting the growth of literature.

3. The few who wrote anything, not necessarily books, did so with an overwhelming sense of needing to set the records of history and politics straight as they saw/perceived them.

4. Not having had a tradition of written literature, and still operating within the customary social relationships of the village-state, there was a tendency among some Nagas to take any published criticism about them as “hostile” and as a “personal attack”. This is so even today, made worse by the fighting and opposition among the political factions. This makes objective writing on some subjects very difficult.

5. Naga ability for artistic creation was there. Their indigenous knowledge systems, often found more scientific and superior, by visiting scientists themselves, were inbuilt in the Nagas, but they were usually too exhausted, disoriented or pre-occupied with the business of surviving. In any case, the knowledge system/s, widely shared across tribes, would make it seem unnecessary for people with similar knowledge to purchase and read published works.

Naga wisdom passed down through the generations say that songs and music get promoted when there is peace and prosperity and are leisure occupations. Literature even in the broad sense can be said to belong in this group. Unless your means of survival, and those close to you, have been assured, it is difficult to have a free and objective mind to do scholarly work or write good, imaginative literature.

Despite these challenges and problems, it is comforting to see that the descendants of some of those who suffered greatly have since done well in their studies and have managed to find financially sound employments and placed well in society.

But surely, Naga Society has lost one generation, may be even two, of potential writers and promoters of Naga literature because of conflict situation. Only during latter part of 1970s works by Naga writers started appearing even though still tempered by questions of how the Government of India may view the works and if they may be banned or disallowed and/or authors branded “rebels” or “hostiles”. The pioneers in the field of writing, as mentioned above, were Nagaland/Indian Government civil servants or those who were accepted as “Overground”.

They, quite naturally, wrote on subjects that were not controversial or wrote it in a way that their views would not be interpreted adversely by Government of India.

Nevertheless, they laid down the foundation for other writers to follow.

Publishing Book writing and literature are usually encouraged and promoted by publishing houses and publishers who go in search of products for sale. These publishers are usually business houses. Sometimes, even individuals who act as patrons of authors come on the scene.

On the whole, however, self publishing by authors who are moved by events to write form the foundations of publishing. Very often it is also the Church and religious people who begin the process. And Nagaland was no exception.

Given the history of conflict and violence in Nagaland, there were hardly any publishers for authors.

This was the reason many of the early books by Naga authors were self-published, apart from the Church as mentioned above. Happily, in limited circles, there were also Literature Committees among tribes and in Church circles which promoted publishing of books in fields of their interest. One of the earliest such secular lo-

cal bodies in Nagaland is Ura Academy in Kohima; this year (2014) they celebrated their Platinum Jubilee with a book fair-cum-sale.

Since the turn of the century some business publishing houses have come up, with ISBN numbers, and focussing on quality products. * There are at least three business publishing houses of repute now in Nagaland, plus one in the region, and more than 8 publishing houses on the mainland, including international publishers now promoting books from/on Nagaland and in the North-eastern region. The formation of the North East Writers Forum has also created a platform of interaction among NE writers and with others from outside the region.

The Indian mainland has recently discovered the richness of subjects in the North East and more and more publishers are coming forward and promoting books from the region, including Nagaland. Zubaan Books, which promotes women writers, has been making quite a lot of efforts to promote books from Nagaland.

Their efforts are often altruistic. Ms Preeti Gill of Zubaan Books says, “Writing from the North East brought to the mainland a sense of the vast richness and diversity of culture, its literature a rich mapping of not just social and historical events but also brought to the readers here some of the most wonderful writers from the seven states of the Northeast. Alongside stories of violence and conflict, of simmering anger and outrage we have stories of human courage and endurance, of exceptional beauty and hope, the hope of a peaceful tomorrow. And it was the sheer talent, the vigour and strength of this writing that captured the imagination of the people in the mainland and that has made mainstream publishers wake and take note of the huge pool of talent”.

What is interesting here is that what was often perceived as a disadvantage in the region has been turned into a positive. Most people in North East belong to small language groups and publishing in their own tongues would not have given them adequate readership. But because of this difficulty most writers from Nagaland and North East write in English. This gives them an international audience and readership. Because their writings are in English, it also makes it easier for publishers to display their books at book fairs, both nationally and internationally. It goes without saying that book fairs are one of the most important ways of promoting books and literature. It is at such fairs that book rights are sold giving writers bigger audience and reward as well.

Ms Easterine Kire, a Naga author, for example, has sold German and Norwegian rights for some of her books.

It may not be out of place to go back to history and divide the periods of growth of books and literature in Nagaland. Let us broadly separate the periods into the following categories for the sake of convenience:1. British period: This period covers until the departure of the British from India. During this time not much is known about written literature although there was a rich Naga oral history. What is known are some of the publications by people like E W Clark and other Christian Missionaries. Some anthropological writings

by Johnstone, Mackenzie etc. are mentioned. Second, there were, naturally, official documents of communication between British officers and their Government in the UK. Some of these would become important documents for the Naga people. Third, surprisingly, there was a budding sense of literary consciousness when three early educated Nagas from Kohima Village (Zhapuzhülie, Khiezhie and Lhoulienyü) translated John Bunyan’s English classic, “Pilgrim’s Progress” into Angami language during this period.

2. Post British period to early 1970s: From during the British period there were a number of people -- officials, missionaries, and some anthropologists -who were on the scene and whose writings we now read. Some came soon after departure of the British. However, their writings were largely published much later. Most of the “travelogues” by British officials and anthropologists were also published in the 1960s. An easy example is Verrier Elwin’s “Nagas in the Nineteenth Century” by Oxford University Press which came out in 1969. This was also a period of drought by Naga authors. Interestingly, a Naga author, Mr Tajenyuba Ao, made an appearance with his “A History of Anglo-Naga Affairs” in 1958. This was an exception as was the earlier translation of Pilgrim’s Progress mentioned above.

3. 1970s to turn of century: With formation of Nagaland Statehood, livelihood security of the Government servants and spread of education, some writings started appearing, including by those who were serving employees of the government. What was more, newspapers also started appearing – beginning with tabloid weekly newspapers which could be said to be the first publishing houses in Nagaland. Four tabloid newspapers – namely, Citizen’s Voice, Nagaland Times, Ura mail and Platform news* – were published during this period. By the 1980s and 1990s more and more books started appearing as more people attained higher education.

4. New Millennium: By the turn of the century, the dawn of writing in Nagaland truly began. There is still more poetry than book writing and more nonfiction than imaginative writing. But, at least, one could say the direction now appears more secure

than before. What is of great significance is that Naga business publishing houses have now come up to encourage Naga authors. There are also now many others from the mainland as well as from international publishers interested and willing to promote Naga authors although there is still much reluctance among some to publish what Nagas might think is their right to express their feelings, particularly in the area that falls under “politics”. But the road ahead is much brighter today.

Still, in a place like Nagaland, it is simply not possible for a writer to survive on his/her writings alone if such writings are confined to a local readership. The fact that traditional Naga society sustained itself through word of mouth history and education does not help, given their man-land relationship and hangover mentality that books were not essential for survival. Further the presence of high inflation for all (essential) commodities in Naga society has a dampening effect on growth of scholarly works as the people are left with less to spend on `non-essential’ things. Naga society had jumped straight into War Economy from Barter Economy during the 2nd World War. (It skipped Money Economy). Since then the continuing conflict situation has kept the prices of all goods very high. Nagaland continues to be one of the costliest places in India.

By the end of the last century and the turn of the Millennium, more writers started appearing on the scene.

Poetry and creative writings started coming out although poets seemed to greatly outnumber other creative writers. Works of fiction also started coming out including book-length narratives and short stories. The creative works component of Naga writing is making remarkable progress in the hands of a few writers but conscious and planned steps will have to be taken to promote further growth. The same goes for other kinds of literature be they scholarly, discursive or imaginative non-fiction.

A few suggestions:1. Research and documentation of existing literature of all types (written and oral) would be a good start in not just disseminating knowledge about a society so rich in sociological, anthropological and political material, but in inspiring a new generation of writers on a host of subjects.

2. There is need to break out of the traditional word of mouth history mould and give due credit, through reward and recognition, to those who provide society with adequate ideas for the future. In other words, knowledge-keepers and idea-givers will need to be given status and wealth by the society. If the people who can provide the thinking for Naga Society cease to function, Naga Society can only lose. This is how Naga Society, and Nagaland Government, must view this entire issue. Anything less than this would be inadequate. Reward and recognition can also, hopefully, make the literary and scholarly situation vibrant for ideas to emerge from those capable of giving ideas.

Our University/ies and institutions of higher learning will need to play their true roles as productive agents and of advocacy in this regard. Societal and governmental practice of recognition and reward must embrace all the knowledge keepers and the idea-givers.

3. Toward this end, the Nagaland Government/Naga Society could institute a proper body to recognize and reward the knowledge-keepers and idea-givers.

• Institute adequate and commensurate awards for excellence in creative and scholarly works, for instance, in the manner government does for sports, Olympians and remarkable achievers in other fields.

• Government could make sure that the good works of creative people are purchased through its departments and disseminate them through the library system throughout the State.

• Invite knowledge-keepers and idea-givers to official functions of the State and make them members of important Boards and Committees.

• Encourage and sponsor Book Fairs and literary/intellectual/creative events in the State.

• What about an annual award for best Writing by Nagas on Nagas?

Once these steps are started, we may find friends offering to assist or at least this will give an opportunity for others to contribute if they so wish. But we must be convinced that knowledge-keepers and idea-givers are important for our society. Here no outsider can help. On such decisions the future of Naga society may very well be cast!

4. In traditional society, Wealth and Status were very important. But Wisdom was treasured more. The introduction of Money Economy (of which Nagas had no experience) has changed the scales of rich and poor. But the craving for wealth and status continues as ever while Wisdom is often forgotten. So, the present Naga milieu, where knowledge-keepers and idea-givers have neither status nor wealth, is not a conducive environment to promote the creative and scholarly people in society.

These categories of people could be given proper status at home and helped to earn from abroad with their works being published in foreign lands. This would also promote and extend Naga contributions to the world family of literature and civilization. Naga society can even start this process by promoting creative workers and their works on mainland India.

It is imperative that right incentives are given to contributors of society. Knowledge-keepers and ideagivers need recognition and reward if society is to progress. Ways of doing it will have to be found so that these productive people can continue to contribute.

Without enough to live on and/or finding patronage from the right quarters, their contributions will be in danger of dwindling or disappearing! By extension, knowledge and idea disseminators (including media and the men and women there) must be recognised and rewarded adequately. If the people who can provide the thinking for Naga Society and their agents of dissemination cease to function, Naga Society will begin to decay. This is how Naga Society (and Nagaland Government) must view this entire issue. Anything less than this would prove sorely inadequate.

References (Most economical shown) : 1. Longchar L. Kari, Editor & Compiler, “Walking the Path of despair and Hope : Understanding and Justifying the Ways of God”, Volume 1, Nagaland Baptist Church Council (NBCC), N. V. Press, Kohima, 2011.

2. Chasie, Charles, The Naga Imbroglio : A Personal Perspective, Standard Printers and Publishers, Kohima, 1999.

3. Ltu, Khrienuo, Nagas Role in World War II, Journal of North East India Studies, Vol. 3(2), Jul.-Dec. 2013, pp. 57-69, Shillong, India.

4. Yonuo, Asoso, The Rising Nagas, Delhi, 1974.

5. Alemchiba, M., A Brief Historical Account of Nagaland, 1970.

6. Nibedon, Nirmal, The Night of the Guerillas, Lancer Publishers, Delhi, 1983.

7.Zhapuzhülie, Khiezhie and Lhoulienyü, Rüvemia Rüve Dze, The Angami Naga Church Council, Kohima, 1953.

(Note : Some people were convinced that the book was published before 1944).

Readers may please note that the contents of the articles, letters and opinions published do not reflect the outlook of this paper nor of the Editor in any form.

Morung Youth Express

Saturday

THE MORUNG EXPRESS

3 January, 2015

7

Promise Of Generation Cultural Dialogue

I

S Varah

t is fear that has quieted down the dynamic of dialogue to give human friendly ground. We know fear as it is: it is a very poor motivator; promotes only violence. Enduring values supporting liveliness of a cultural people like the Naga is within us and we do not want to be who we are not. Our constant awareness of threat can be idled only when we brave out and accept together our own mistakes that are still attached to both past accomplishments as well as disagreements under defining moment and hard-pressed situations. Assessment of present-day messiness demands more social and intensified generational culture intercourses to make amend some of our brokenness. A good start may come from the boldness of our belief that we can grow like others essentially based on who we are with amenable relationship with other ethnic communities other than sectarian views conforming to the convention of state’s charity-dependent-tendency and how much can one devour in the run. That has become a disease.

Use of gun and snuffing out any snag that stands in the way of personal motivations has begotten more enemies and endorsement of violence than reasoning support and its reward. It does not mean to say that collaborating to destroy one’s identity with declared opposition against our rights to self determination is lesser than the tyranny in itself. What we do need is finding the ‘fairer means’ and prove to convert the doubter that the general disagreement and its schemes is not achievable as long as every unique cultural people accept themselves in the virtue of one’s creation no matter what the other’s economic gambits actively engaged to insert a form of treaty or pact to usurp authenticity over what is inseparable from them. This is not to mean to say that Naga do not relate to India or Myanmar and their future economic connections as well as shared security necessity for many including the Naga.

We believe now that fear itself is afraid of being seen authoritarian that is intolerant to man-man dialogue decapitating people-friendly space and that festering anxiety destroying belongingness. Offer of workable terms some fair decades ago now which then appeared to be capitulation to which messiness of present is always accounted for, and yet unscrupulously roughing out as if nursing the deep cut to calm the fury and compressed emotion within has upset peace education and its processes. We do know how much had flown down beneath the bridge. No more lead news from political organizations seems to either evoke sensitivity or upset one to forsake the other’s opinion. It is like that of a cat counting the tripod stones used inside every Naga hearth and home. The Naga Know them better than what others do. If one sanely observes what is really going to happen next it simply indicates that we will surely feel our need to restart all over again. If not so, then, it is all about dog eat dog contest. Our trepidation provides better advantage for those who are opposed to our rights to exist as a free people. Are we comfortable with the idea to find recipe for a pair of shoes that suits all feet? That is pitiable: Consuming our tomorrow while fretting about our yesterdays.

K

eeping in view of my last articles on public concern in the local dailies for the last 2-3 months in 2014, it is an opportune time for me to continue to write such matters while many of our people maintain the attitude of “let it be” in our living style of public domain.

I also request the like-minded people to join with me in fighting against the social evils and the narrow fanatics, prevailing in our society to make our land a better place to live in. This time also I am bringing out such few events/areas of public concern/importance for public consumption:1) While mourning the deaths of the three aged persons who met a tragic deads on the eve of Christmas while they were on their happy and excited mood at the Christmas carol on the 24th December, 2014 and another three teenage charming students met a tragic dead in the frozen lake at the Western Dzükou Sanctuary falls on the 26th December, 2014 which had caused panic to all of us in this Christmas-New Year season, 2014. Anyway, gone is gone and we cannot bring them back to life except to give our moral/prayer support to the bereaved family members to bear the brunt/situation with solace and to take their good example of those during their life-time. But, then what to do for future to prevent such occurrences, is very important and here I would like to propose my few raw suggestions to all concerned.

2) As for vehicle accident causing dead to the pedestrians/carol procession on the Christmas Eve, henceforth no such procession/rallies should take place without traffic police control and no officer/VIP/VVIP/vehicle-owner should not have used habitual drunkard driver since it has proved that the accused driver Shri Meeng might not drink only that particular night which led to defamation of his vehicle owner and a lost to three immortal souls.

3) As the saying goes, “prevention is better than cure”, why not the concerned departments – Tourist Department, National or Nagaland Disaster Management Department, the District Administration, the NGOs/the neighbouring villages of Dzükou valley or Sanctuary waterfalls have not been put up any public awareness/tips long before lest more lives have been lost or many may be losing because of lack of public awareness and over-excitement of the trackers. Thanks to Mr Zakie Khate a student activist of Khonoma village for sharing his life-experiences at the Sanctuary Waterfall and its lake and also the advises given by Shri Jonny R, OSD of NSDM for safety measures to

Naga’s 50s were horrors. 60s saw reduction of this tragedy to a lesser magnitude. These decades peaked to the limit of missing in spite of the India’s 16th state with profuse economic incentives and peculiar protective exploitation. That did not upset the Naga’s perpetual perception that many things were one and one was anything: Naga freedom. The dynamism driving the Naga this far is anything including the yearning to embrace freedom without knowing what a free man would be like but loving him before seeing him. We were already married. The Naga had learnt to live freely amid threats, not of outside political incursion but inherited legacy both of fear and necessity. The thought of political suppression and getting disentangled from it was more of a preannounced Tsunami for many---excluding those who did contemplate on the fate and realness of bondage---until the arrival of the real form: military actions and violence, the urgency to struggle for justice and the fallout from within. That reinterpreted the definition of both freedom and bondage. Are we really happy counting wrongs done by past leadership? Living life amidst fear of our own is no lesser fear of becoming bound man. Hate of one against his/her own blood is no less loathsome while one loudly and sanctimoniously harps on Naga case desperately in need of remedy. Being free from fear no matter the fairness he/she interprets in terms of political uprightness as well as wrongness, hate still reigns; and as long as it does, our source of fear is ‘we’, not the language we have assumed to be otherwise, to be heard.

Ours is entirely different time with warren of political identities. Some say ours is so complex while the obscurity is announced with obstinate elements of individuals’ affiliation to one or either of opposing opinions out of want of vision but adamant to detachment from stuck-up. How much it takes to say Naga are not India is as easy as saying “I am right and you are wrong; therefore, you must follow my route. This is the only way to Naga destiny”. Here we have always found that complexity of what it could have been rather a human leader often being iconized. We have (collectively) become smart to multiplying this human into lethal weaponry we so often had sought to serve purposes which are never parts of an object we have sacrificed so much. That we have revered leadership other than reinforcing our faith that success should instead come from the followers through the leader. Leadership is a human who is begotten and dies a human leaving his trails to be followed or rejected at the convergence of many road intersections. One’s legacy lives a history to be reread and remembered, not as a graven image we genuflect under all the time we are beset with misfortune. Who and what force can separate us from the history of a leader who showed us the way like a candle that dispels blackness we were shit scared of, when we so desperately needed a light leading our confused and difficult times? We are a people. We are a culture nobody can ever stripe us down from what we are and will be. We share this commonness in spite of divergence in feelings and observation.

What makes a nation is not all about singing about what one had outsmarted over the other. Unless these intergenerational human persons are free to intercourse and play in the vast field of cultural identities and values like young puppies charging, re-

treating, toppling and showing soft belly and gnarled up their mother’s bosom, they will stay there glued up amid uncertainty and yet quick changing world and its complexity while we keep on lamenting over our implied complicatedness. There are other reasons all the time bringing home our worry: we are running further away from our own distinctness. Many cultural pirates who decry our authenticity of being a distinct race and an undisputable political entity are at the same time pilfering our identity-based values such as our old age heritage and our outfit. We have often seen this section of people sashaying down the ram attired with our cultural attires and get crowned celebrities. There are many techno-docs engineering our indigenous seeds to produce modified seeds and at the same time criss-crossing them to destroy our endemic species to enhance consumerists craving to make money. They are there: the illegal migrants swarming our home stead and nudging the denizens out slowly but steadily. We are just finger-count steps to the dangerous precipice: Dimapur is gawking at the faces of trade and business hungry peoples from different places. Many of us have loudly spoken over this unusual proportion and the soon would-be Agartala-like situation while some of us are haranguing on supplanted origin. How serious we are to this is the inaction of our politicians who are mostly responsible for this hilarious mix-multitude to fatten their vote sites. When Tubul-Jiribam-Imphal rail head becomes operational, there will very soon be dramatic shift of social life and economic scenario along the eastern frontier. India-Myanmar boarder will be fenced and there will be transfer of biodiversities, not only human citizenship. Worth reminding: many of our possessions have been and are likely to be patented away by technical thieves and predators while we are murmuring our mistakes. It is never intended to express discontent over the achievements of some of our enterprising young in various fields.

While extending all possible supports towards their ambitions and progress, we are equally concerned for retaining our identity for which we have unsparingly given up so many. We must not and cannot afford to murder our motherland strewn with so many rare flowers, health giving and life supporting herbs and plants, other wild life forms by using chemicals and fertilizers. Yes, we must love other birds as we love other seasonal raptors. We must give those trees.

We have the right to eat fish but we do not have the right to poison their water. These are our common grounds where this generation can play like young canine without biting to harm. Here we will surely find democratic ground and rediscover Naganess.

Morung can be relived and practiced if innovated with modern motivation and practiced values.

Here we will surely realize what we have forgotten so long and have felt the missing. Let the sneer of hate turn to smile when our cold differences melt and turn into tears of joy----of finding ourselves.

Here we have a place, a common space we may call Naga ground. People-based bodies will do well to organize such common ground now and then---very often---instead of nursing our sores. This could be the promise of year new 2015!

Matters of public concern and importance!

Ruovihulie Angami Rtd. Joint Director of School Education

the would be trackers and also thanks to the first hand publication of such tips under the caption, “WE SHOULD BE PREPARED” by the Morung Express dated the 31st December, 2014.

4) Teen-agers disobedience to parents’ advices, is another problem these days which also leads to disorder and family problems. While we don’t totally blame those teen-age trio who met a tragic dead at the Sanctuary Falls on the 26th December, 2014 but at the same time such unfortunate incident would not have happened if they took heed of their parental advises or approval to go there without having much experiences or maturity to avoid such accidents. Let us take it as a lesson that parents should give the right counsel or right direction in every activity of their children and also children should take heed of such advises to live long or get blessing as the Bible commanded how difficult to follow in their life styles. These two incidents remind me of my colleague when I took my School team (Government High School, Sechü-Zubza on study tour to Shillong-Cherrapunji in May, 2005 where little imbalance in standing on a cemented post while taking photographs at Kala Pathor (Cherrapunji) waterfalls would have led to no return attempt if he didn’t listen to me or got down from that standing post. Most of the accidents take place because of our lack of advises or people who don’t take heed of such advices.

5) We know the armed forces have both war-time and peace-time contribution to the nation and society. Even in Nagaland, the Para-military forces like IRB/NAP also can give manifold contributions on public importance in times of need like vehicle accidents, floods/landslides/fire hazards/sanitation/price control/public disorders under the command of their concerned authority (s) but not to work under the domestic affairs of some of their commanders’ farmings or private building constructions etc. as has been observed all these years.

6) We talk about over-staff of the State Government by politicians/bureaucrats/ CANSSEA/UEEN and other NGOs without knowing how far our Government has been enforcing office

discipline/sincerity of its employees at various levels. This can be seen if we go to the working Saturdays or weekends especially a week ahead of Christmas or after the New Year holiday. Now, one of the most efficient Chief Secretaries will take over the office w.e.f.

1st January 2015 and let us see office discipline starting from his Nagaland Civil Secretariat down to the District/ Sub-division/village levels establishments and how far the public servants (office goers will obey their concerned authority (s) or conscience by giving their best services to their superiors and the public who are in need of their service in the days to come. Declaring 25th December, 2014 as working day is not good in a secular country but at the same time declaring one particular day as a good governance day to enforce the spirit of good governance because it is a must for every office-goer and their government functionaries to deliver the goods of good governance as their daily bound duties.

7) Above the duties and assignments for every profession, there are also moral ethics for every profession as professional ethics which we all have to follow failing which there can be no success in our duties as expected by others who are in need of our helps.

Professions such as politicians, businessmen, doctors and nurses as healthworkers, teachers, engineers, lawyers, scientists, farmers, social workers, journalists, bureaucrats or Government servants, public leaders, astronauts, economists, church workers etc. have its own ethics/ guidelines/tips to follow. In the event of a failure to follow their own ethics, the recipients on the other side shall face the consequences being caused by the givers. As for me as a school teacher for 23 years and dealing with the teachers for another 12 years as a school administrator, I have been insisting professional code of ethics to be followed by every teacher whether trained or untrained to follow so that all our training will become wasted in the implementation part. So also people in other professions are not keeping up their ethics, there are others who are ready to interfere into their business where they are failing to do the right things for which the form-

ers should not feel bad or take it otherwise.

8) I really appreciate the writeups of Selie Visa, Benito Z. Swu, J. Ambross Thakre, Vishü Rita, Vekupa Rhakho George etc. even without knowing their background but it seems these writers although imperfect like many others, have real concern for our generation/people all these days to improve us all. Also the recent article written by Shri Thepfulhouvi Solo, IFS (Rtd.) suggesting the right season to burn our treeplantation fields during January-February but not April-May which is the right and timely advice (positive) because he is an expert in forest matters but not expert in every field as we see his critical comments after every event with both negative and positive comments. I further request him to write more about the conservation of our forests and afforestation for ecological balance as he is one of the Naga forest experts for his rich experiences in this field which can help our people more than in many other fields as he interferes in his write-ups in local papers. For me as a one-time school teacher would like to suggest to the District Administration, Forest Department, Land Resources Department, the Village authorities and the NGOs to take precautionary measures to save our forests from burning before any part of our forest is burnt in 2015 but not after every part of our forest have been burnt .

9) In the column of the Eastern Mirror, the 31st December, 2014 on page 2 under the caption “Nagaland: the year that was” should include one unfortunate event which took place in September that the CANSSEA claimed that it had taken a decision on the 19th September, 2014 to support the 2009 Retirement Act which was a total lie or misleading statement for which the NGSEF had filed an RTI case against it (CANSSEA) either to apologise or withdraw its misleading statement or resign gracefully or to be impeached by all employees of the Nagaland Government employees failing which the case shall go to the court of Chief Information Commissioner, Nagaland for 30 days had expired on the 20th December 2014 since the RTI case was filed on the 20th November, 2014. The NGSEF is on the job that by any means, the Cabinet shall decide to review and amend the 2009 Retirement Act in order to save the State ex-chequer.

Let us prayerfully receive the New Year, 2015 with all good expectations of prosperity, peace free from all tragic accidents/incidents which may lead to shedding of sorrowful tears.

The Naga Blog is a forum on facebook where Nagas from Nagaland and around the world network, share ideas and discuss a wide range of topics from politics and philosophy to music and current events in Nagaland and beyond. The blog is not owned by any individual, nor is it affiliated to or associated with any political party or religion. The only movement it hopes to stir is the one raised by the voices of the Nagas every step of the way, amassing perhaps to mass consciousness one day. www.facebook.com/groups/thenagablog

New challenges for ACAUT & HPC Roko Angami How long are we Naga people going to let the NSCN threaten ACAUT when we all know that ACAUT is the only voice which is liberating us from illegal taxation. As for Nagaho Aye and all alike criminals should be put in 'Tihar Jail' for life time. The general public and organisations should also raise voice and come out in support of the ACAUT in print media and condemn the criminal activities that are carried out by the NPGs. If not now then when??

Robert N. Solo Time and again we see that the undergrounds try to defend themselves with the mistakes of others. Here my question, if the Acaut is demanding SUVs or pork from government does it give the right to Nagaho to extort and throw bombs to kill people? No doubt, the tax has not stopped completely but I have a reason to believe that it has reduced a lot and I feel Acaut has gained more supporters than the so called freedom fighters.

In the past many people took arms to protect us but they are long gone now. Today many selfish people have just tied their waste with the belt of exaggerated form of nationalism to destroy the very building which was built by our leaders.

Yemsen Ongh We need a bottom line. Do we want freedom or not? If so, then we ought to pay our men. If not, then National workers should dissolve.Its high time Naga people make up their mind.Because the Naga Freedom movement stopped a long time ago when we accepted the Indian constitution and became an Indian state. I know its not that simple as i have stated but it has to be that simple .i.e.do we want freedom or not.

If we want, we all the Nagas as a whole can only hope and fight for freedom. I dont believe someone can bring freedom or talk or negoitiate freedom we can only fight for it be it nonviolence or violence.History is a proof of that .

She Minsang Kaibah Konyak One govt. One tax doesn't explain much. All the NSCNs opposing the ACAUT.. whom are we trying to unite?? There should be an acceptable solution to both the parties...otherwise this fight will go nowhere.Struggle for Naga Independent will go on... I don't know if ACAUT's can unite all the NPGs, not in our time I guess. What if the unification fails? Which will be the One govt.Naga people should pay tax or should we fight forever?? I wish we have an alternate solution acceptable to ACAUT and NPGs,because without one,the fight gona be null.

Oja Tam Paying tax is our contribution towards the national cause, let us do our duty. Problem of misuse be judged by a responsible person. we are a nation don't underestimate yourself.

Admin Acaut ACAUT at no point in time has demanded NL-10 SUV or remuneration as alleged. Bloggers please differentiate between HPC and ACAUT. As per Govt. order on formation of HPC, its members are entitled of certain remuneration and vehicle to carry out and complete the task assigned to HPC which involves lots of travelling. Some of the ACAUT member are part of HPC and therefore are automatically entitled of such remuneration and vehicle and not as alleged.

The decision to provide such facility to HPC was purely Govt. of Nagaland decision and not ACAUT demand as alleged.

Hope our intellectual bloggers will be able to differentiate between between HPC and ACAUT and leave this propaganda to tarnish the image of ACAUT to rest. Have a blessed New Year.

Soreingam Kashung Constitute another Committee or organization possibly a task force to match the number of NPG factions. We(Nagas) are running short of organizations to deal corruptions, factional killing, tribalism and division among the public. Oh what a mockery of the very purpose we are claiming to be fighting for....

Hope and Pray that with the coming of New Year 2015.

Our minds, hearts and approach will be fresh. Let us pray for coming together of all organizations, factions and splinters to unison instead of forming more organizations or factions to fight the others.

Need for strengthening Disaster Management

Chingme Rungsung The tragic incident at Dzukou brought to light the lack of proper equipments and gears which was needed to retrieve the bodies. Is it not high time that we get these equipments ourselves and get trained? We have a lot of tourist spots but if we are unable to handle such unfortunate incidents, it doesn't bode well for winter tourism in Nagaland. This kind of tragic incident is not the first time and this also may not be the last. But if it does happen, we should be able to deal with it ourselves instead of waiting for others to come and aid us. Just some food for thought.

Richard Dzuvichu Very true. High time Nagaland state disaster management acquire all necessary equipments for different emergencies.

Viky Noel Y Jimomi As far as my knowledge is concerned, there are even funds specifically earmarked for NSDMA...This should be utilized judiciously for exhaustive training and procurement of equipments for such emergencies.

Readers may please note that, the contents of the articles published on this page do not reflect the outlook of this paper nor of the Editor in any form.

8

Dimapur

NATIONAL

Saturday 3 January 2015

Planning Commission’s end will spur privatization: CPI-M NEW DELHI, JaNuary 2 (IaNs): The government decision to replace the Planning Commission with NITI Aayog is a regressive step that will only push India towards a market-driven economy, the CPI-M said Friday.

And allowing the finance ministry to decide allocations to the states amounts to “centralizedunitarian” and will put the states under the mercy of the central government, it said in a statement.

“The announcement of a NITI Aayog to replace the Planning Commission is a regressive step which will further push the country into a market-driven economy and privatization in all spheres,” the CPI-M said.

This will be “at the expense of diluting even the present inadequate schemes aimed at improving people’s welfare”, said the Communist Party of India-Marxist.

“Whatever role the Planning Commission had to allocate resources for the public sector and deploying public investment keeping in mind the regional disparities has now ended.” “... The (Narendra) Modi government’s claim that new set-up will be based on cooperative federalism with the states as stake-holders is a spurious one,” the CPI-M said. “The National Development Council is replaced by a Governing Council which is a powerless body of a think-tank.

“That think tank will be under the prime minister and the Prime Minister’s Office. This is a centralizedunitarian structure.

“Moreover, allocations to the states will be decided by the finance ministry, making the states subject to the political whims of the Central government.

“By saying ‘one size fits all’ cannot work, what is being done is to put the states at the mercy of the centre to be dealt with arbitrarily without any common principles and norms. “This dangerously opens new doors for political bargaining and deal making.”

The CPI-M said that underlying the abolition of the concept of the Planning Commission was the Modi government’s “ideological conviction that public resources should be put at the disposal of the private sector and the market forces”.

“With this the role of the state in ensuring the citizens the fundamental rights and fulfilling the directive principles of the constitution regarding education, health, food security and livelihood, is being abandoned.”

WBengal minister’s judicial custody extended to Jan 16

KoLKata, JaNuary 2 (IaNs): A court here Friday again rejected the bail plea of West Bengal Transport Minister Madan Mitra, who was arrested in the Saradha scam,and extended his judicial custody till Jan 16.

Mitra, a close associate of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, was presented before the court of Judicial Magistrate M. K Roy on the expiry of his earlier judicial remand. After hearing both the prosecution and the defence, the court extended his custody.

Opposing the minister’s bail plea, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) counsel claimed a huge amount was transferred to Mitra’s bank account and he also encouraged investors to put money in Saradha.

Denying the allegations, Mitra said he was ready to be hanged if these charges were proved. He also claimed he never encouraged investors, but only assured the company of legal help if it needed any.

“The CBI claims that huge money has been transferred to my account, but I want to say that if it is proved that even a single penny was so transferred, then the court may hang me. I will be happy to be hanged,” Mitra told the court.

“I was a newly-elected MLA (legislator) and unaware of NBFCs (non-banking finance companies) or chit funds. My boys told me that there is a company which is providing money to farmers, so I attended one of their programme and offered them legal help if they needed any,” he said.

The senior Trinamool Congress leader was arrested Dec 12 by the CBI for criminal conspiracy, cheating and deriving undue financial benefits in connection with the Saradha Group chit fund scam.

Swine flu scare in India

NEW DELHI, JaNuary 2 (agENcIEs): The deadly H1N1 influenza virus has returned and appears to have taken epidemic proportion in several parts of the country like Telangana and Andhra Pradesh where two fresh cases were reported on Friday, according to the health department officials. As per reports, two women, one each from Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, were found infected with swine flu disease.

“A woman from Kadapa in AP and another woman from Telangana tested positive for swine flu,” said Dr K Subhakar, the nodal officer for the disease in Hyderabad. In 2014, 88 cases of swine flu were reported in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh together; of them 22 cases were reported in the last week of December alone.

Around 10 persons reportedly died of swine flu last year. Noting that swine flu is not a life-threatening disease for healthy people, P Sambasiva Rao, Director of Health of Telangana had said that the government had taken various steps for checking the spread of the disease.

“Now with more confirmed cases, I have no hesitation to say that swine flu has taken epidemic proportion. It is time to declare it as an epidemic in order to give the seriousness it deserves,” Dr K Narsimhulu, the swine flu coordinator at the state-run Gandhi Hospital Gandhi Hospital, said seperately. On December 30, three fresh cases of swine flu were reported in the national capital, taking the number this year to 35, according to the state health officials. Two women, both aged 33, and a five-year-old boy were the three infected, a Delhi government health department official informs. He said nine cases of swine flu have been reported in Delhi in the December month, including these three new cases.

According to the health department, 35 swine flu cases were reported in Delhi since Jan 1, 2014 till date.

Union Health Minister JP Nadda had earlier assured people that there is no need to panic and the Health Ministry and all concerned departments under it are taking all preventive measures to tackle the swine flu outbreak.

Asserting that the Health Ministry will deal with the situation, Nadda further said that 17 government hospitals in Delhi have adequate medical facilities to deal with the disease. He also urged people to visit the nearest government hospital if any symptoms of swine flu are observed.

The Morung Express

After Coast Guard chase, fishing boat explodes, sinks NEW DELHI, JaNuary 2 (IaNs): A suspicious Pakistani fishing boat apparently loaded with explosives blew up in the sea and sank off Gujarat after being intercepted by the Indian Coast Guard, officials said Friday, prompting fears that a major terror attack may have been planned.

The Pakistani vessel, which had set off from near Karachi on the eve of New Year, turned into a ball of fire and sank after its occupants, believe to be four in number, set fire to it early Thursday, about seven hours after it was spotted following an intelligence tip off.

Darkness and bad weather prevented the Coast Guard from apprehending any of the crew as they sank in the Arabian Sea along with the vessel.

The dramatic incident -- a reminder of the manner Pakistani terrorists sneaked into Mumbai in 2008 -- took place on Dec 31Jan 1 night. The Coast Guard’s Deputy Director General K.R. Nautiyal said he suspected “something serious”.

Nautiyal told the media that the boat was spotted by a military aircraft, nearly 365 km from Porbandar in Gujarat late Wednesday night.

At least three aircraft monitored the boat, and it was inter-

‘Pak-based terrorists trying to strike ahead of Barack Obama’s India visit’ NEW DELHI, JaNuary 2 (PtI): Pakistanbased terrorist groups are continuously trying to infiltrate into Jammu and Kashmir by taking advantage of cross-border firing as they aim to carry out “spectacular attacks” ahead of US President Barack Obama’s visit to India, according to security agencies.

Quoting intelligence reports, senior Home Ministry officials said the terrorists were waiting for opportunity in eight locations along the International Border and Line of Control to sneak into India to indulge in terrorist acts.

“As per our information, the militants have the blessings of the highest authorities of Pakistan Army,” an official said.

The largest group comprises about 40-45 terrorists who are waiting at the launching pads just across the Samba sector in Jammu and Kashmir.

There has been heavy exchange of firing between cepted by Coast Guard ships near the India-Pakistan maritime boundary, around 11.30 p.m. Dec 31.

Nautiyal said the boat switched off its lights when it was asked to halt for an inspection of the crew and cargo.

“The boat started manoeuvering to escape. We chased it for nearly an hour and a Coast Guard ship managed to stop it with warning shots,” he said.

the BSF and Pakistan Rangers in this sector.

“The Pakistan-based groups are planning to carry out spectacular attacks ahead of Obama’s visit to India to attend the Republic day parade,” the official said.

Home Minister Rajnath Singh today accused Pakistan of trying to push terrorists into Jammu and Kashmir and giving cover to such attempts by continuous firing along the border.

“No doubt about that,” Home Minister Rajnath Singh told reporters here when asked whether the repeated ceasefire violations by Pakistani troops were to cover infiltration attempts by militants.

Pakistan Rangers yesterday targeted 13 border outposts in Samba sector in Jammu and Kashmir, a day after four Pakistani rangers were killed in a sharp counter-attack following the death of an Indian jawan in cross-border firing.

The crew members, four of whom were spotted, then went below the deck. It then blew up, indicating it may have been carrying explosives.

“Due to darkness, bad weather and strong winds, the boat and persons on board could not be saved or recovered. The boat burnt and sank in the same position in early hours of Jan 1,” a defence ministry statement said.

Nautiyal said the boat sank at

6.33 a.m. after being cornered.

“There must be something serious. If they were not doing anything wrong, why would they run away and set the boat on fire,” he said.

Nautiyal said the intention of the boat and those on board would be known once all “dots are joined”.

“The intelligence inputs, accounts from the Coast Guard ships and the aircraft will help,”

he said.

Nautiyal called the incident the outcome of “good coordination between the intelligence and forces”.

Experts meanwhile said the incident reminded of the Mumbai terror attack of November 2008 when 10 Pakistani terrorists massacred 166 Indians and foreigners.

The terrorists had hijacked Indian fishing boats to enter Mumbai.

“This is a matter of concern. It appears a big terror strike was being planned, reminds of 26/11...

It also shows that Indian agencies are alert and prepared,” security expert Qamar Agha said.

Retired major general S.R.Sinho said the blast in the boat “is a clear indication they were coming with a lot of explosive. Probably they wanted to enter Indian soil”.

Strategic expert Commodore C. Uday Bhaskar tolD IANS: “The incident does remind one of the Mumbai terror attack, but it also reflects positively on the Coast Guard and shows we are better prepared now.

He said it “can be linked to the US president’s visit (to India this month)”.

The Indian Navy chief had last month warned of increased threats from the sea.

Crime against women, rapes up in Delhi NEW DELHI, JaNuary 2 (IaNs): Delhi has witnessed an 18.3 percent rise in crime against women in 2014 as compared to 2013, with a whooping 31.6 percent rise in rape cases, police said Friday.

A staggering 14,687 cases were registered under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) up to Dec 15, up from 12,410 in the previous year.

Po l i c e Commissioner B.S.Bassi said that in addition to the measures taken by the force, every woman in Delhi would be trained in self-defence.

“We appeal to everyone to join hands with us so that every woman in Delhi gets trained in self- defence. I want every woman to have a brown belt in judo,” said Bassi at the Delhi Police’s an-

nual press conference.

“For this we also plan to conduct mapping of Delhi so that we can choose the areas from where the women will be trained,” he added.

Police data also revealed that 2,069 cases of rape were registered in 2014 compared to 1,571 cases in 2013.

A total of 4,179 molestation cases were reported in 2014 against 3,345 were reported in 2013.

The cases of harassment stood at 1,282 in 2014 compared to 879 in 2013, while the cases of dowry death touched 147 in 2014 as compared to 137 in 2013.

Bassi also emphasised on the fact that to reduce the number of crime against women, the “mindset of the society” needs to be changed.

An Indian wrestler who ran to greet Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav, unseen, is stopped by policemen after a wrestling match during Saifai festival in Saifai village in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

A 15-day festival in the home district of Mulayum Singh Yadav with folk music, dance, theater acts and wrestling. (AP Photo)

Modi’s wife files appeal after police deny info under RTI India to track toilet aHMEDaBaD, JaNuary 2 DySP) for denying the information. ten by the public information offiuse with tablets (PtI): Prime Minister Narendra I am Prime Minister’s wife, there- cer and deputy superintendent of Modi’s wife Jashodaben has filed an appeal under RTI act after she was denied information by Mehsana District police saying that all queries about the protection given to her were related to local intelligence bureau, which is exempted under RTI Act. “I am the wife of Prime Minister of India.... I have asked for the order’s copy (regarding the protection given to her), which are not related with LIB (local intelligence bureau).

So I demand to get the copy of those orders in this appeal,” Jashodaben Modi said in the appeal to Mehsana district Superintendent of Police (SP) on December 30.

“There is no specific reason given to me in the reply (by Mehsana

fore the information under RTI was not given to me with someone’s intervention,” Jashodaben said in the appeal.

Jashodaben has also demanded the copy of the state home department’s order under which LIB was given exemption under RTI Act according to Mehsana police. Mehasana District police denied information under RTI to Jashodaben on December 27.

“The information sought by you (Jashodaben Modi) was related with the LIB and as per the Gujarat home department’s resolution of November 25, LIB has been exempted from RTI Act and therefore the asked information cannot be given to you,” reads the letter writ-

police in Mehsana Bhakti Thakar to Jashodaben.

In her RTI application, she sought documents related to security cover given to her as per protocol.

She also wanted to know the laws and related provisions in Indian Constitution about security cover given to a PM’s wife.

She had asked the government to explain the definition of protocol and sought details about what is included under it and what other benefits she is entitled to as per that protocol.

She also expressed unhappiness about the current security set-up, where her guards travel in government vehicles like car, while she, despite being a PM’s wife, has to travel in public transport.

NEW DELHI, JaNuary 2 (rEutErs): Prime Minister Narendra Modi is launching a nationwide online programme to check whether people are using toilets as part of his cleanliness drive. From next month, officials will head out with mobile phones, tablets and iPads to report on whether toilets are being used in rural India, with results uploaded onto a website in real time.

India’s shortage of toilets costs the country more than $50 billion a year, according to a World Bank study. India suffers a greater cost than other Asian countries from the poor collection of human excreta.

About 626 million Indians defecate in the open compared, the World Health Organization said in a 2012 report. Since taking office, Modi has repeatedly lamented the poor state of sanitation and public cleanliness in India, vowing to solve the problems within the next five years. The government has doubled spending on a toilet building programme and requested financial donations from some of the country’s largest companies to help.

India-China border resolution: Is it ever likely?

NEW DELHI, JaNuary 2 (IaNs): Despite promising noises of an early resolution and many rounds of annual dialogue, why does the India-China border issue continue to fester? Why is there no moving forward in actual terms? Is it because it suits Beijing to let the status quo continue?

According to China expert Ranjit Singh Kalha, a former secretary in the external affairs ministry, the “stalemate” on the boundary issue, which has seen 17 rounds of formal talks so far over the disputed boundary of around 4,000 km, is likely to continue.

In his seminal book “India-China Boundary Issues: Quest for Settlement” (Indian Council of World Affairs & Pentagon Press/310 pp/Rs.995), Kalha says that Chinese policy makers appear to have

taken the decision “that the present status quo is perhaps preferable than opting for a solution. A settlement may be politically or strategically unwise or the price may be far too high”.

He argues that the issues of China-Pakistan relations, Tibet and the Dalai Lama and India’s propensity to seek enhanced strategic and security links with countries of East Asia under the aegis of the US “rebalancing” towards Asia are “important factors that China takes into account while determining policy”.

China has contiguous 22,000 km of land borders with 14 countries, though India considers the ChinaPakistan Occupied Kashmir border to be illegal as the whole of Jammu and Kashmir is a part of India.

According to India, China’s land border is, therefore,

with 13 countries.

While China has solved its land border disputes with most countries - notably Russia - India and Bhutan remain the only states that have continuing land border disputes with China.

“As regards Bhutan, China alleges that it is still under ‘India’s firm control’ and that India will not allow it to ‘freely engage in diplomatic relations with China and solve the border issue’.”

Kalha says that it is “indeed an anomaly” why China is unable to settle the border dispute with India when it has done so with other countries, though it is at loggerheads with many countries on the maritime front in the South and East China Seas.

“While assessing the prevailing reality along the Sino-Indian border, three factors need to be kept in

mind. Firstly, in the Western sector, the Chinese are in possession of territory up to their stated claim line.

Secondly, India is in no position to evict them physically by using military force.

Thirdly, although India is in possession of territory in the middle and Eastern sectors, the Chinese would like to take possession of even larger chunks of Indian controlled territory, particularly in the Eastern sector,” Kalha writes, adding that Beijing has still not given up its claim to the whole of Arunachal Pradesh and smaller pockets in the Middle sector. “The Chinese know that short of use of force, with all its concomitant consequences, India will not give up its position in the Middle and Eastern sectors”.

He writes that China has used “the threat of in-

trusions across the LAC as part of coercive diplomacy in order to influence decisions in a way most desirable for it. And that is also the principal reason why China does not desire an early conclusion, except perhaps completely on its own terms.”

Kalha devotes pages to India’s recognition of the new government of the People’s Republic of China on Dec 30, 1949, and how documents show that then prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru sought Britain’s advice on the subject - and acted in conjunction with it.

On the Chinese occupation of Tibet in 1950, Kalha says that it took place as a result of Soviet “advice” and that Nehru not only consulted the British government but acted on British advice not to militarily intervene.

On the Chinese claim

on the Tawang border district of Arunachal Pradesh, Kalha says that Chinese insistence on it being returned is based on Tibetan administrative control and its claim that India took over Tawang only in 1951.

He says that the Chinese should be reminded that both the Chinese delegate at the Simla Conference (March 7, 1914), Ivan Chen, and then Chinese foreign minister Sun Paochi (June 13, 1914) personally debunked the Tibetan position - and has provided exact quotations to back this up.

On the Chinese claim that its attack in 1962 was only a “self-defence” measure and that it was India that initiated hostilities, Kalha terms this a “complete sham” and has devoted a large part of the book to this.

InternatIonal

the Morung express

Saturday 3 January 2015

Dimapur

9

New Year’s stampede leaves 36 dead in Shanghai

SHANGHAI, JANuAry 2 (AP): Grieving relatives identified the bodies of loved ones a day after a stampede during New Year’s celebrations along Shanghai’s historic waterfront area killed 36 people.

Some families lashed out at authorities, accusing them of being unresponsive to their plight and failing to prevent the disaster.

The chaos began about a half-hour before what was supposed to be a joyful celebration of the start of 2015. In the end, dozens were dead and 47 people were hospitalized, including 13 who were seriously injured, according to the Shanghai government.

Some of the victims had suffocated, said Xia Shujie, vice president of Shanghai No. 1 People’s Hospital.

Seven of the injured had left hospitals by Thursday afternoon.

The stampede’s cause was still under investigation. It happened at Chen Yi Square in Shanghai’s old riverfront Bund area, famed for its art deco buildings from the 1920s and 1930s. Throngs of people often jam the area during major events.

A day after the tragedy, some criticized the government, blaming it for failing to keep order at the city’s most popular site and for miscommunications with victims’ relatives.

“We were told my sister was still being rescued the minute before we were taken to the morgue, where she had been lying dead — clearly for a while,” said Cai Jinjin, whose cousin Qi Xiaoyan was among the dead. “There she was, cold and all by herself.”

Other victims’ relatives

China demands answers after stampede

Chinese paramilitary policemen form human chains to guide pedestrians crossing a major intersection near the site of a deadly stampede in Shanghai, China on January 1. Thirty six died in a stampede during New Year's celebrations in downtown Shanghai, city officials said - the worst disaster to hit one of China's showcase cities in recent years.

(AP Photo)

complained that authorities failed to notify them of the deadly stampede and had been unresponsive to their requests for information. In one case, relatives of 24-year-old victim Pan Haiqin said they were alarmed after Pan’s employer reported a no-show at work on Thursday, and after traveling hours to Shanghai, got no answers from authorities before they finally were able to confirm Pan’s death.

At one of the hospitals where the injured were being treated, relatives tried

Plane blown off runway, and another catches fire LoNdoN, JANuAry 2 (IANS): A passenger aircraft was blown off the runway by strong winds at the Stornoway Airport in Scotland’s Isle of Lewis, injuring four people, media reported Friday. The Loganair Saab 340 aircraft, with 28 people on board, was taking off for Glasgow, when a wheel collapsed due to heavy winds, causing it to veer off the runway, Sky News reported. Police said two men were taken to hospital and two women received minor injuries but declined medical assistance, according to a related report on BBC. A full investigation into the incident is underway. One passenger told the BBC that it felt as if the plane’s tail was caught in a crosswind. “Efforts to remove the aircraft from the runway are ongoing and investigations into the cause of the incident are under way,” Stornoway Airport Management said in a statement. “It is our intention to resume normal operations as soon as the aircraft is safely removed from the runway. There are no scheduled arrivals or departures at Stornoway until later this afternoon,” it added.

A Loganair spokesman said: “All passengers and crew were safely evacuated and returned to the airport’s terminal.” Meanwhile, a Blue Island Airways plane travelling from Jersey had to be diverted from London City Airport to Southend Airport in Essex Friday after an engine fire, according to media reports. The fire was put out by the plane’s automatic systems before it landed safely around 8.30 a.m. None of the 28 people on board were injured, according to Essex Fire and Rescue.

to push past guards, who used a bench to hold them back. Police later allowed family members into the hospital.

A grieving mother dragged a low-ranking municipal official out from a government compound, demanding answers.

Police at one hospital brought out photos of unidentified dead victims, causing dozens of waiting relatives to crowd around.

Not everyone could see, and young women who looked at the photos broke into tears when they recog-

nized someone.

A saleswoman in her 20s, who declined to give her name, said she had been celebrating with three friends. “I heard people screaming, someone fell, people shouted ‘don’t rush,’” she said. “There were so many people and I couldn’t stand properly.”

She added that she still could not contact one of her friends.

The official Xinhua News Agency quoted a woman with the surname Yin who was caught with her 12-year-old son in the

middle of crowds of people pushing to go up and down steps leading from the square.

“Then people started to fall down, row by row,” Yin said. When her son was finally brought to safety, he had shoe prints over his clothes, “his forehead was bruised, he had two deep creased scars on his neck, and his mouth and nose were bleeding,” she said.

One Taiwanese was among the dead, and two Taiwanese and one Malaysian were among the injured, the Shanghai gov-

SHANGHAI/BEIJING, JANuAry 2 (rEutErS): Chinese state media and the public criticised the government and police on Friday for failing to prevent a New Year’s Eve stampede in Shanghai that killed 36 people and dented the city’s image as modern China’s global financial hub.

Apart from Hong Kong, which is run as a separate territory, Shanghai is China’s most international and cosmopolitan city, a glitzy home to global companies with ambitions to become a world financial centre by 2020.

The official Xinhua news agency said the government could not shake responsibility for what happened. It asked why there were apparently so few police on duty for the tens of thousands thronging Shanghai’s famous waterfront, known as the Bund. “It was a lack of vigilance from the government, a sloppiness,” the news agency wrote.

Xinhua noted that the crush happened not far from a much trumpeted

new free trade zone described as the “pride of the country”. “The disaster, which happened in China’s financial hub of Shanghai, served as a wake-up call that the world’s secondlargest economy is still a developing country which has fragile social management,” it said in an Englishlanguage commentary.

Shanghai people echoed those complaints.

“There was not enough policing and planning. It is really sad to see a stampede happen in a big city like Shanghai,” said resident Tang Lifeng, 38. The site of the stampede was cordoned off on Friday, with grieving relatives holding a candlelight memorial. Most victims were students in their 20s.

City officials said one Taiwanese was among the dead. Of the 47 injured, 13 were in critical condition, they said. The waterfront has become a New Year countdown site in recent years after authorities brought in performances such as 3D light shows and fireworks.

Celebrations in 2013 drew more than 300,000 revellers. Police have given few answers, saying an investigation is going on. On Thursday, they did not allow foreign media into a briefing, underscoring concern about negative coverage.

They have dismissed reports that a rush to pick up coupons thrown from a bar overlooking the Bund was the cause, with focus shifting to overcrowding on a raised viewing area. The stampede has prompted unflattering comparisons with India, where stampedes are relatively common, another rapidly developing country and rival that many Chinese feel superior to.

“I originally thought that stampedes like this could only happen to Indians on pilgrimages,” Cheng Daolin, a manager at a Chinese engineering company, wrote on Weibo, China’s answer to Twitter.

“In the space of one night, China has become like India, and Shanghai has become like Mumbai,” wrote another Weibo user.

ernment information office said.

On Thursday morning, dozens of police officers were in the area and tourists continued to wander by the square, a small patch of grass dominated by a statue of Chen Yi, the city’s first Communist mayor.

Steps lead down from the square to a road across from several buildings.

“We were down the stairs and wanted to move up and those who were upstairs wanted to move down, so we were pushed down by the people coming

from upstairs,” an injured man told Shanghai TV. “All those trying to move up fell down on the stairs.”

Xinhua quoted witness Wu Tao as saying some people had scrambled for coupons that looked like dollar bills bearing the name of a bar that were being thrown out of a thirdfloor window. But police dismissed speculation that the coupons had triggered the stampede, saying they were thrown after the tragedy.

Last week, the Englishlanguage Shanghai Daily

reported that the annual New Year’s Eve countdown on the Bund that normally attracts about 300,000 people had been canceled, apparently because of crowd control issues. The report said a “toned-down” version of the event would be held instead but that it would not be open to the public.

The stampede appeared to be near that area.

The city apparently did not expect that so many people would assemble there and was not adequately prepared.

Two-thirds of cancer cases due to bad luck, study says

WASHINGtoN, JANuAry 2 (IANS): The majority of cancer cases can be explained by “bad luck” rather than the result of environmental factors and inherited genes, a US study said Thursday.

The study, published in the US journal Science, found that two-thirds of adult cancer incidence across tissues might be caused by random mutations that occur in dividing healthy stem cells.

The findings, based on a statistical model that quantified how much of three factors -- bad luck, the environment and heredity -- contribute to cancer development, might help researchers design more effective prevention strategies for different cancer types.

“Changing our lifestyle and habits will be a huge

help in preventing certain cancers, but this may not be as effective for a variety of others,” Xinhua quoted co-author Cristian Tomasetti, assistant professor of oncology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Bloomberg School of Public Health, as saying. “We should focus more resources on finding ways to detect such cancers at early, curable stages.”

It was well-known that cancer arises when tissuespecific stem cells make random mistakes, or mutations, when one chemical letter in DNA is incorrectly swapped for another during the replication process in cell division.

The more these mutations accumulate, the higher the risk that cells will grow unchecked, a hallmark of cancer.

The actual contribution of these random mistakes to cancer incidence, in comparison to the contribution of hereditary or environmental factors, was not previously known.

In the new study, researchers analysed published data on stem cell divisions in 31 different human tissues and compared the data to the lifetime incidence of cancer in those tissues. They determined the correlation between the total number of stem cell divisions and cancer risk to be 0.804.

“Our study shows, in general, that a change in the number of stem cell divisions in a tissue type is highly correlated with a change in the incidence of cancer in that same tissue,” said co-author Bert Vogelstein, professor of oncology

at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.

One example, he said, is in colon tissue, which undergoes four times more stem cell divisions than small intestine tissue in humans. Likewise, colon cancer is much more prevalent than small intestinal cancer. Mice, by contrast, have a lower number of stem cell divisions in their colons than in their small intestines. Similarly, cancer incidence in mice is lower in the colon than in the small intestine.

Using statistical theory, the pair calculated how much of the variation in cancer risk can be explained by the number of stem cell divisions, which is 0.804 squared, or, in percentage form, about 65 percent.

Further, research found

that 22 cancer types in 31 tissues could be largely explained by the “bad luck” factor of random DNA mutations during cell division.

The other nine cancer types had incidences higher than predicted by “bad luck” and were presumably due to a combination of bad luck plus environmental or inherited factors, they said. “We found that the types of cancer that had higher risk than predicted by the number of stem cell divisions were precisely the ones you’d expect, including lung cancer, which is linked to smoking; skin cancer, linked to sun exposure; and forms of cancers associated with hereditary syndromes,” said Vogelstein.

He claimed that cancerfree longevity in people exposed to cancer-causing

agents, such as tobacco, may not be due to their “good genes”.

“The truth is that most of them simply had good luck,” said Vogelstein, cautioning that poor lifestyles can add to the bad luck factor in the development of cancer. “However, many forms of cancer are due largely to the bad luck of acquiring a mutation in a cancer driver gene regardless of lifestyle and heredity factors,” he said. “The best way to eradicate these cancers will be through early detection, when they are still curable by surgery.”

The researchers noted that some cancers, such as breast and prostate cancer, were not included in the study because of their inability to find reliable stem cell division rates in the scientific literature.

Investigators battle weather in hunt for AirAsia black boxes

PANGKALAN BuN, JANuAry 2 (rE utErS): International experts with sophisticated acoustic detection gear joined teams scouring the sea for the wreck of an Indonesia AirAsia passenger jet on Friday, but bad weather was again hindering the hunt for the plane’s black box flight recorders.

Strong wind and heavy seas have stopped divers from looking for the fuselage of the Airbus A320200, which went down on Sunday en route from Indonesia’s second-biggest city Surabaya to Singapore with 162 people on board. The Indonesian-led search for the wreck of Flight QZ8501 is centred in the northern Java Sea, off Borneo island, where 10 bodies and pieces of the broken-up plane have been recovered. No survivors have been found.

“With the increasing amount of evidence and data, it’s very likely we’re getting closer to the fuselage of the AirAsia aircraft, based on what has been detected by sea vessels,” Supriadi, operations director of the Indonesian search and rescue agency, told reporters. Two ships carrying hydrophones, or underwa-

ter listening devices, left the southern Borneo port of Pangkalan Bun on Friday, Indonesian officials said.

Aboard one vessel were experts from France’s BEA accident investigation agency, which attends the crashes of all Airbus planes, although officials were unsure if the weather would allow the sensitive hydrophones to be deployed.

“The waves could reach five metres this afternoon.

Higher than yesterday,” said air force Puma helicopter pilot Flight Captain Tatag Onne, in Pangkalan Bun, who has been flying missions to recover bodies and debris from the sea.

“We look for breaks in the clouds where conditions improve so that we can approach. Yesterday, when we went to collect a body from the sea we couldn’t because the body was being rolled by waves.

Sometimes we could see it, sometimes we couldn’t.”

Search and rescue official Supriadi, who like many Indonesians uses just one name, said it was raining at the suspected crash site on Friday morning, with waves 3-4 metres (10-13 feet) high and wind speeds of 30-40 knots.

Stall Theory The cause of the crash - the first suffered by the AirAsia group since the budget operator began flying in 2002 - is unexplained. Investigators are working on a theory that the plane stalled as it climbed steeply to avoid a storm about 40 minutes into a flight that should have lasted two hours.

Officials earlier said it may take up to a week to find the black boxes, which investigators hope will unravel the sequence of events in the cockpit during the doomed jet’s final minutes. Even in bad weather, however, the search for the AirAsia plane is less technically challenging than the two-year search for an Air France jet that crashed into deep Atlantic waters in 2009, or the fruitless hunt for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 that disappeared last year.

Given Flight QZ8501 crashed in shallow seas, experts say finding the boxes should not be difficult if its locator beacons, with a range of 2,000 to 3,000 metres (6,560 to 9,800 ft) and a battery life of around 30 days, are working. Ten bodies have been recovered from waters near the suspected crash site, search and rescue

agency head Soelistyo said, along with debris such as a suitcase, an emergency slide and a life jacket.

The bodies are being taken in numbered coffins to Surabaya, where relatives of the victims, most of whom were Indonesian, have gathered. Authorities have been collecting DNA from relatives to help identify the bodies.

“Unbelievably” Steep Climb The plane was travelling at 32,000 ft (9,753 metres) and had asked to climb to 38,000 ft to avoid bad weather just before contact was lost. When air traffic controllers granted permission to fly at 34,000 ft a few minutes later, they received no response.

A source close to the investigation said radar data appeared to show the aircraft made an “unbelievably” steep climb before it crashed, possibly pushing it beyond the A320’s limits.

“It appears to be beyond the performance envelope of the aircraft,” he said.

Online discussion among pilots has centred on unconfirmed secondary radar data from Malaysia that suggested the air-

Indonesian air force personnel carry parts of a plane found floating on the water near the site where AirAsia Flight 8501 disappeared, at the airport in Pangkalan Bun, Indonesia on January 2. More ships arrived Friday with sensitive equipment to search for the fuselage of AirAsia Flight 8501 and the more than 150 people still missing since it crashed five days ago. (AP Photo)

craft was climbing at a speed of 353 knots, about 100 knots too slow, and that it might have stalled.

The Indonesian captain, a former air force fighter pilot, had 6,100 flying hours on the A320 and the plane last underwent maintenance in midNovember, according to Indonesia AirAsia, which is 49 percent owned

by Malaysia-based AirAsia.

Three airline disasters involving Malaysian-affiliated carriers in less than a year have dented confidence in the country’s aviation industry and spooked travellers. Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 disappeared in March en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing with 239 passengers and crew

and has not been found. On July 17, the same airline’s Flight MH17 was shot down over Ukraine, killing all 298 people on board.

On board Flight QZ8501 were 155 Indonesians, three South Koreans, and one person each from Singapore, Malaysia and Britain. The co-pilot was French.

10

Dimapur

SPORTS

Saturday 3 January 2015

The Morung Express

Lampard clinches win for Man City

MANCHESTER, JANuARy 2 (AP): Frank Lampard showed his value to Manchester City on Thursday by clinching a 3-2 victory over Sunderland just one day after extending his deal with the club until the end of the season.

After City threw away a 2-0 lead, the 36-year-old Lampard spared City's blushes with a milestone goal in the 73rd minute.

The former Chelsea midfielder moved to fourth place on the Premier League's all-time scoring leaderboard by netting for the 176th time in the division, heading in from Gael Clichy's cross.

By now Lampard was due to be getting ready for his Major League Soccer career with City's new sister club New York City FC. But Man City announced late on Wednesday that Lampard would be staying un-

til the end of the season to be part of the second-place team's title push.

A dull contest burst into life after Yaya Toure broke the deadlock with a stunning strike after 57 minutes.

Four more goals followed in the next 16 minutes as Stevan Jovetic added a second for City and Sunderland hit back through former City players Jack Rodwell and Adam Johnson. It then fell to substitute Lampard to score his seventh goal for City.

What unfolded in the second half came in remarkable contrast to the first half. City, who had Willy Caballero in goal in place of the rested Joe Hart, dominated possession but Sunderland played deep.

City created an early opening with Jovetic flashing a shot wide after combining Manchester City's Frank Lampard, second right, celebrates with teammates after scoring against Sunderland during with David Silva but their the English Premier League soccer match between Manchester City and Sunderland at the Etihad Stadium, Manchester, opportunities were lim- England, Thursday January. 1. (AP Photo)

ited. Toure, who gave City control of midfield after being rested for Sunday's 2-2 draw with Burnley, sliced one chance from distance well wide and high.

City tried to up the tempo in the second half, and Jesus Navas shot wide within a minute of the restart, but the game appeared to be changing little until Toure finally struck. City again seemed to be getting little joy as they looked to prize an opening in the Sunderland defense - but Toure opted for power. The Ivory Coast midfielder, who heads off to the African Cup of Nations next week, was lurking just outside the area when he raced onto Jovetic's lay-off and smashed a shot into the top corner.

City then seemed to have made the game safe as Jovetic released Clichy down the left and then sprinted into the area to

take his return pass and beat Costel Pantilimon with a neat flick. But with the game having suddenly come to life, Sunderland produced a remarkable response to level with two quickfire goals.

Emanuele Giaccherini extended Caballero with a good shot but Rodwell got a firm header to Larsson's cross from the resulting corner to pull a goal back.

City lost its discipline and was pulled apart moments later as Sunderland attacked again. Ricardo Alvarez drove the ball across the box and Zabaleta felled Billy Jones attempting to stop the inrushing defender. Johnson made no mistake from the penalty spot.

But after Sunday's frustration against Burnley, Lampard prevented a repeat.

Lampard might even have had further goals as he twice forced Pantilimon to save.

LeBron to miss 2 weeks with knee, back injuries

NSA 60th games meet today

CLEVELAND, JANuARy 2 (AP): Cleveland Cavaliers superstar LeBron James is expected to miss at least the next two weeks with injuries to his left knee and back.

The timing of the injuries is another blow to the Cavaliers, who have been jarred by a rash of medical issues and failed to live up to the enormous expectations triggered by James re-signing as a free agent with Cleveland last summer.

The team said on

Thursday that James has knee and back strains.

He'll be treated with "anti-inflammatories, rehabilitation, training room treatments and rest," and the Cavs projected he will miss two weeks.

If he's out for just that span, James will be back for a Jan. 15 game in Los Angeles against the Lakers. The Cavaliers begin a five-game West Coast trip on Jan. 9.

James, who turned 30 on Dec. 30, missed his second straight game on

Wednesday. Before his team lost 96-80 to Milwaukee, the four-time league MVP said all tests on his knee had come back negative. He acknowledged his knee has been hurting all year, which helped explain why James hasn't shown the same explosiveness driving to the basket, and his willingness to defer to teammates.

He also acknowledged that 11 NBA seasons have taken a toll on his body.

"I've got 41,000 min-

utes on me, including the playoffs," he joked. "You drive that car in the winter time."

James has ne ver missed more than five straight games in his professional career. If the twoweek timetable holds up, his absence could reach 10 games or more. That could be a major problem for the Cavaliers, who've had issues with chemistry and recently lost starting Brazilian center Anderson Varejao for the season with a torn Achilles. On

top of that, forward Kevin Love missed Wednesday's game with back spasms and reserve Shawn Marion has sat out the past two games with a sprained ankle.

If that wasn't enough, first-year coach David Blatt has come under intense scrutiny for the team's sluggish start.

At 18-14, the Cavs have lost three straight and four of five heading into Friday's game in Charlotte.

James briefly left Cleveland's game at Mi-

Chelsea's lead wiped out by loss at Spurs

LoNDoN, JANuARy 2 (AP): Chelsea opened 2015 by seeing its English Premier League lead wiped out by a frenzied 5-3 capitulation to Tottenham on Thursday as former midfielder Frank Lampard drew Manchester City level on points with a 3-2 victory over Sunderland.

Uncharacteristic defensive frailties by Chelsea allowed Tottenham to beat its London rival for the first time in almost five years, with Harry Kane scoring twice.

Never before, across Jose Mourinho's two spells as manager, had Chelsea conceded so many times.

"We made some defensive mistakes," Mourinho said. "We had some individual problems with the defensive structure."

As did Man City, but the champions recovered after squandering a two-goal lead for the second time in a week, preventing a repeat of the 2-2 draw against Burnley on Sunday.

It showed just how important it was for City late on New Year's Eve to secure the 36-year-old Lampard until the end of the Premier League season rather than see him return to sister club New York City FC to start the Major League Soccer campaign in March.

With Chelsea and Man City level on points, goal difference and goals scored, only alphabetical order keeps Chelsea on top.

Arsenal and Liverpool are struggling to make the top four.

Liverpool threw away a 2-0 lead to draw 2-2 with bottom-place Leicester and stay eighth, while Arsenal missed a chance to dislodge Southampton from fourth place by losing 2-0 at the surprise high-flier.

Southampton is only a point behind Manchester United after the third-place team drew 1-1 at Stoke, with Radamel Falcao recovering the point.

All three teams in the relegation zone drew. Crystal Palace, which is on the verge of completing the managerial signing of Alan Pardew from Newcastle, drew 0-0 at Aston Villa.

Burnley drew 3-3 at Newcastle, which is yet to ap-

Tottenham's Jan Vertonghen, foreground, clears the ball from Chelsea's Diego Costa during the English Premier League soccer match between Tottenham Hotspur and Chelsea at White Hart Lane Stadium in London, Thursday, January 1. (AP Photo)

"Super Frank" not so popular at Chelsea now LoNDoN, JANuARy 2 (REuTERS): Few Chelsea fans would have begrudged Frank Lampard his farewell Premier League cameo at Manchester City but the goodwill is starting to dissipate after he scored another goal to keep his new club in the title hunt.

On Wednesday, Chelsea's all-time record scorer Lampard tied up the deal that extends his loan from New York City to Manchester City until the end of the season and 24 hours later he showed exactly why Manuel Pellegrini was so keen to keep him.

The league champions, for the second time in four days, had blown a 2-0 lead in front of their own fans, this time against Sunderland, and were in danger of again handing the initiative to leaders Chelsea who were in action later.

Lampard, who had been on the pitch for three minutes, then stepped up to the plate yet again, meeting a Gael Clichy cross with a firm header in the 73rd minute to earn a 3-2 lead which they held to the end to take them level on points with his former club.

It was the 36-year-old's fifth league goal, and seventh in all, in a season where point Pardew's successor.

West Bromwich Albion confirmed Tony Pulis as the new manager earlier Thursday, and he was at Upton Park to see his team

he has started most games on the bench but where his calmness and experience is becoming increasingly important.

"Nobody can be surprised with Frank Lampard," Pellegrini told reporters. "He is a top player with a huge amount of important goals in his career.

"When you use him in the second half, when players are tired, he knows exactly where to go and how to move. I always said we would try to keep him for the rest of the season, it was not an easy decision but Frank is very happy to stay here and we need him here."

While City fans are delighted to have the former England midfielder, supporters of the club's American franchise are not so impressed, with one group "publicly denouncing" his decision to stay until the end of the season.

"We reject out of hand any suggestion NYCFC is in any way secondary to Manchester City FC and are disappointed City Football Group would give such an appearance," supporters' group the Third Rail said in a statement.

Pellegrini had some sympathy.

"I understand. To see Lampard in New York is an amazing thing," he said.

draw 1-1 at sixth-place West Ham to stay a point above the relegation zone.

Everton is surprisingly in the bottom half of the standings — three

points above the danger zone — after Hull's 2-0 victory inflicted a fourth straight loss. Queens Park Rangers' survival hopes were helped by a 1-1 draw

against Swansea.

No game could match the wild drama produced at White Hart Lane.

Chelsea led briefly.

Eden Hazard was denied by the post, but Oscar sent the ball back across the face of goal and Diego Costa was primed to tap into the net in the 18th minute.

But Kane leveled on the half-hour, facing little resistance before powering the ball past goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois, and Tottenham led from the 44th.

After Nacer Chadli hit the post, Danny Rose resisted Gary Cahill's sliding challenge to bury the follow-up in the net.

The lead was extended before the break from the penalty spot by Andros Townsend after Kane was tripped by Cahill. And Kane was on target seven minutes into the second half after cutting through the Chelsea defense again.

Tottenham's defense was less impressive.

On the hour, Federico Fazio was dispossessed near the halfway line, Hazard seized the ball, and played a one-two with Cesc Fabregas before dispatching the ball low past goalkeeper Hugo Lloris.

Although Chadli's deflected shot beat Courtois in the 78th, Chelsea captain John Terry pulled another back for Chelsea.

Chelsea and City have the same goal difference, and both have 44 goals in 20 games.

Lampard's goal for City — a header from Gael Clichy's cross — was his 176th in the Premier League, taking fourth place on the division's all-time leaderboard.

After coming off the bench, his 76th-minute winner came after City goals by Yaya Toure and Stevan Jovetic were cancelled by former players Jack Rodwell and Adam Johnson.

Arsenal could find no way back against Southampton after Sadio Mane scored from a tight angle Dusan Tadic capitalized on a defensive error.

"It was a self-inflicted defeat," Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger said. "We made the mistakes at the back."

ami on Christmas Day — his first in the regular season against his former team — after jumping into the stands to chase an errant pass, and was grabbing at his left knee in obvious discomfort not long afterward. That was not the cause of the injury, just a recurrence of an ongoing issue, James said before the Milwaukee game.

"It was before that, but it reaggravated it," James said. "It's been hurting pretty much all year. I've

been playing with it and it goes away, it comes back."

Including playoffs, James has logged 41,082 NBA minutes — ninthmost among all active players.

James lost weight before this season, but insisted it wasn't to compensate for a loss of speed, to help him jump higher or try to prolong his career. However, he seemed to understand that he needed to make changes to remain the game's best all-around player.

KoHiMA, JANuARy 2 (MExN): The 60th games meet of Nerhema Sports’ Association (NSA) will take place on January 3 next at Chiephobozou Ground from 9:00 AM onwards.

Speech will be delivered

by Zakieneisa Kiewhuo, chairman Nerhema Village Council while presidential address will be delivered

by Peteneizo Pienyii, president NSA. Administration of oath will be done by NSA games & sports secretary Vikhozolie Riilho.

IGS Academy girls team win football match KoHiMA, JANuARy 2 (MExN): Indira Gandhi Stadium (IGS) Academy Girls Football team, currently playing at the 1st North East Women open championship at Jorhat ,in their first match on Wednesday, defeated Jorhat Sports Association, the women league champion of Assam by 3-1.

IGS next match will be played on January 3 for

semi-final match, with the winner of the match between Jampui Jala Play Centre, Tripura or Hailakandi, Assam team.

The IGS team is led by Ropfu Meyase, team manager cum coach and 17 players.

The tournament, played by 10 teams, started on December 28 will conclude on January 7, 2015. The champion team will walk

home with Rs.50,000 and running trophy , runner-up Rs.30,000 and running trophy, Fair play trophy award with Rs.10,000 besides individual prizes such Player of the tournament, Highest goal scorers of the tournament and best players for the final match. The tournament is organized by Ranjit Club of Jorhat, an affiliated unit of Assam Football Association.

Naga chess player shines at Late Siba Ram Das Memorial Chess C’ship

KoHiMA, JANuARy 2 (MExN): The "Late Siba Ram Das Memorial Chess Championship 2014" concluded successfully at Radisson Blu Hotel Guwahati on December 29 last.

Trailokya Nanda of Jorhat clinched the championship with 8.5 points out of possible 9.

Y dhanabir Singh of Manipur became second while Mughaho Awomi of Nagaland came third position.

Top 20 position holder received cash award while top two players in each of the age group categories of Under 7, 9,11,13, women and veteran were awarded trophies and certificate.

A total of over Rs 1 lakhs was distributed as cash award.

Altogether 97 players including 48 International rated players participated in this 9 round swiss league mega chess event held un-

der rapid time control.

Krishnanjan Chanda, Principal South point school was the chief guest of the closing ceremony while Pabitra Gogoi, chief Sports Reporter, The Assam Tribune, Bishov Lal Pathak, convenor Sports Cell BJP Assam Pradesh, Tulashee Das, wife of Late SIBA RAM DAS and Manoj Das elder Son of late SIBA RAM DAS were present as Guest of honour.

AGE CATEGORY PRIZES Under 7 (boys) 1st. Pran Govinda Parasar Kashyap 2nd. Navoneel Choudhury

Under 11 (Girls) 1st. Medha Barooah 2nd. Monmoyuri Sarma

Under 7 (Girls) 1st. Ashlesha Talukdar 2nd. Baibhabi Baruah

Under 13 (Boys) 1st. Debanga Kalita 2nd. Ritwick Sinha

Under 9 (Boys) 1st. Dhrupad Kashyap 2nd. Rishabh Singh

Under 13 (Girls) 1st. Nikita Nath 2nd. Adrija Dutta

Under 9 (girls) 1st. Rishita Sinha 2nd. Anushka Priyam

Women 1st. Nabajani Saikia 2nd. Rubi Nath

Under 11 (Boys) 1st. Bhabishnu Pranti Bordoloi 2nd. Arkaprovo Rajkonwar

Veteran 1st. Sankar Nath 2nd. Hiranya Kumar Das

C M Y K

Saturday

Entertainment

The Morung Express

3 January 2015

Dimapur

11 C M Y K

Branded “Disgusting & Horrific” By Former Ku Klux Klan Wizard The 32-yearold rapper, the hip-hop genre and the producers behind the hit tracks were recently harshly criticised in an hourlong tirade by a former KKK wizard.

Nicki Minaj’s latest studio album ‘The Pinkprint’ has widely received rave reviews since it was dropped on December 15th, as expected not ev-

eryone is going to be a fan, but a former Klu Klux Klan wizard recently went on a lengthy rant about why he hates her music, as well as all rappers. During an addition of his online radio show, David Duke, the former KKK member, nearly spent one hour complaining about the hip-hop genre and the producers behind the hit tracks for promoting the “absolute filth, drugs and violence” of the this type of music. Duke, a former state legislator who has unsuccessfully run to be president and U.S. senator, began his lengthy tirade by bashing “our Jewish-dominated media and our Jewish-dominated awards ceremonies.”

“One of the Jewish producers who’s boasting about

the fact that every one of the top 10 Billboard songs were those he controlled -- even rap music is not something that blacks really are responsible for,” Duke said. “It was the Jewish record producers who promoted this degenerate and sick and horrific music.”

As well as slamming Minaj’s “disgusting and horrific and violent and drug-drenched” music, he also further blames other people within the industry. “Why do people blame blacks like Minaj?” he asked. “Because Minaj wouldn’t be a pimple on somebody’s rear end except for the fact that she is promoted by the Jewish record producers and the media, the mass media, the powerful media, that promotes absolute degenerates like her.”

Emika wins Pond’s

Eclectic Model Hunt 2014

I

n front of a packed crowd at ITA Machkhowa auditorium, Pond’s Eclectic Model Hunt 2014 Winner, Emika J. Pakynteinfrom Shillong was crowned by the Managing Director of Eclectic Publications, Tanushree Hazarika and Boxer Shiva Thapa.

The 1st Runner-up was awarded to Sneha Biswa another gorgeous contestant from Shillong, whereas the 2nd Runner-up, Daisy Deuri, is from Guwahati. The prestigious panel of judges included well-known names from the entertainment industry across the Northeast such as popular actor Kopil Bora, Boxer Shiva Thapa, Super Model from Nagaland Opang Jamir, Social Activist from Meghalaya HasinaKharbhih and Fashion Industrialist Julie Deb judged the charismatic event.

The contest was enlivened by an impressive and diverse line up of talents from the region.

A thousand-plus crowd cheered as Guwahati

‘PK’ beats ‘Chennai Express’ and ‘Kick’

A

based Rapers. The Konflated Poets performed the inaugural sequence. Delhi based singer and song writer Borkung Hrangkhawlset the stage on fire with his powerful songs. It was a night the city of Guwahati will remember for a long, long time.

The Pond’s Eclectic Model Hunt believes in grooming young women of the Northeast for becoming empowering role models of beauty, health and leadership. We thank everyone for making the event a roaring success. The event was managed by Tattva Creations Pvt Ltd. The event was started with paying tribute to the departed souls in recent violence across the state and the state anthem ‘O murapunardex’.

TuliramRonghang, Chief Executive Member, Karbi Anglong Autonomous Council, Diphu was the Chief Guest of the evening and Apurba Kumar Patar, Chairman, ALPCO was the Guest of Honour of the evening.

amir Khan starrer PK has been in the news lately, due to the film’s content that seems to have hurt the sentiments of certain religious groups. However, the movie has worked well at the box-office, becoming the highest grossing film of all time in the domestic market. According to a report on Boxofficeindia. com, the movie has collected Rs 263 crore in just 13 days, thus beating films like Dhoom 3 (Rs 261 crore), Kick (Rs 212 crore), Chennai Express (Rs.208 crore) and 3 Idiots (Rs.201 crore).

Macklemore Speaks Candidly About Racism Within The Music Industry: “You Need To Know Your Place In The Culture

A

fter the recent conflict between Iggy Azalea and Azalia Banks over white and black rappers within the hiphop industry, one of the genres biggest stars, Macklemore, is speaking out on if he has experienced any racism as a white artist. The 31-year-old rapper addressed the sensitive issue during Hot 97 radio interview this week, in which he explained how his position as a success in the industry can make him feel uncomfortable. “For me, as a white dude-as a white rapper-I’m like, how do I participate in this conversation? How do I participate?” he said. “How do I get involved on a level where I’m not co-opting the movement or I’m not making it about me, but also realizing the platform I have and the reach that I have, and doing it in an authentic, genuine way. Because race is uncomfortable to talk about. White people, we can just turn off the TV when we’re sick of

C M Y K

Testament of Youth: New Year Preview

talking about race. We can be like, ‘No, I’m done.’”

“It does not work that way for everybody,” Macklemore added. “White ‘liberal’ people want to be nice.

We don’t want to mess up. We don’t want to be racists.

We want to be like, ‘We’re post-racial and we have a black president and we don’t need to talk about white privilege. It’s all good, right?’ It’s not the case.” The Grammy-winner also implied that his meteoric rise to success may have been due to “white privilege” in America. “Why am I safe? Why can I cuss on a record, have a parental advisory sticker on the cover of my album, yet parents are still like, ‘You’re the only rap I let my kids listen to,’” he said. “Why can I wear a hoodie and not be labeled a thug?...The privilege that exists in the music industry is just a greater symptom of the privilege that exists in America. There’s no difference.”

But when discussing if white artists are always accepted in the hip-hop community, Macklemore said, “You need to know your place in the culture. Are you contributing or are you taking? Are you using it for your own advantage or are you contributing? I saw a tweet that said, ‘Hip hop was birthed out of the civil rights movement.’ This is a culture that came from pain and oppression. It was

the byproduct [of white oppression]. We can say we’ve come a long way since the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, but we

The 31 year-old rapper recently opened up about whether white artists are being accepted within the hip-hop community.

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haven’t. Just because there’s been more successful white rappers, you cannot disregard where this culture came from and our place in it as white people. This is not my culture to begin with. As much as I have honed my craft...I do believe that I need to know my place.”

Angelina Jolie We’re not alone in the world

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f you are a fan of British movies then Testament of Youth is one that is not to be missed when it hits the big screen later this month - and it kicks off what is set to be another terrific year for British movies. Testament of Youth is a big screen adaptation of the First World War memoir of the same name by Vera Brittain, and sees James Kent back in the director’s chair. Kent is best known for his television work with the likes of The Thirteenth Tale, The White Queen, and Inside Men under his belt, and The Testament of Youth will mark his big screen feature film directorial debut. In the last couple of years, Alicia Vikander and Kit Harington have started to make a real name for themselves on both the big and the small screen, and Testament of Youth will see them team up for the first time in what looks set to be a very exciting acting partnership. Vikander will take on the central role of Vera Brittain - on whose memoir the movie is based - while Harington will play Roland Leighton, a solider who fought during the First World War and was the fiancé of Brittain.

Vikander has been making her name in movies such as The Royal Affair, Anna Karenina, and The Fifth Estate in recent years, and we are also going to be seeing her in Son of a Gun, Seventh Son, Ex Machina, and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. in 2015 - it really is set to be a very busy 2015 for the actress. Harington’s big screen filmography will also

continue to grow this year with Seventh Son and Spooks: The Great Good set to hit the big screen. He will also return to television as he reprises the role of Jon Snow in the new series of Game of Thrones.

As if Vikander and Harington on the same cast list was not exciting enough, the pair are joined by Hayley Atwell, Dominic West, Emily Watson, Taron Egerton, Miranda Richardson, Colin Morgan, and Anna Chancellor. It really is a who is who of great British acting talent and I am excited to see them all in action in this piece of historic drama. Testament of Youth is a powerful story of love, war, and remembrance, based on the First World War memoir by Vera Brittain, which has become the classic testimony of that war from a woman’s point of view.

A searing journey from youthful hopes and dreams to the edge of despair and back again, it’s a film about young love, the futility of war and how to make sense of the darkest times. Testament of Youth has already started to win over the critics Vikander’s central performance in particular has gained a lot of praise - and I can’t wait to see this very talented cast in action as they tell a very poignant story. The release of Testament of Youth comes as we continue to commemorate the First World War and those who served and died in the conflict. This true story looks set to be something that is not to be missed. Testament of Youth is released 16th January.

ctress-director Angelina Jolie says she embraced her spirituality after growing close to Louis Zamperini, the subject of her film ‘Unbroken’ and has come to the conclusion “we’re not alone in the world.”

The 39-year-old began to embrace her spiritual side after getting to know Zamperini, the American prisoner of war survivor and Olympian who is the subject of her film “Unbroken” , and becoming inspired by his journey through life, reports people.com. When asked on what she had learned from Zamperini, she said: “When there is an obstacle, you have to rise to the challenge, not be overwhelmed by it. And we’re not alone in the world.”

Jolie, who raises six children with her husband Brad Pitt, feels that while she’s certain there’s something “greater” than human life, she’s unsure what to actually call it. “I don’t know if there’s a name for that - religion or faith - just that there’s something greater than all of us, and it’s uniting and beautiful.” She became close friends with Zamperini, who is portrayed by actor Jack O’Connell in the movie, while directing the film and was heartbroken when he passed away aged 97 earlier this year. “It is a loss impossible to describe. We are all so grateful for how enriched our lives are for having known him. We will miss him terribly,” she said in a statement at the time of his death.

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Captain Gerrard leaving Liverpool at end of season Rose leads Bulls over LONDON, JANUARY 2 (AP): Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard is set to move to a foreign club after disclosing on Friday he will leave his boyhood team after the season to seek a new football experience away from the English Premier League.

The 34-year-old midfielder said he "agonized" over whether to accept Liverpool's offer of a new contract, and made the announcement midway through a season when he was no longer guaranteed a place in the team.

With his contract expiring at the end of the season, Gerrard has been free to talk to foreign clubs since New Year's Day, and he has no plans to retire yet.

"I'm going to carry on playing," Gerrard said. "Although I can't confirm at this stage where that will be, I can say it will be somewhere that means I won't be playing for a competing club, and will not therefore be lining up against Liverpool — that is something I could never contemplate.

"My decision is completely based on my wish to experience something different in my career and life, and I also want to make sure that I have no regrets when my playing career is

eventually over."

Major League Soccer would be an obvious destination for Gerrard, who rose through the academy to become one of Liverpool's greatest ever players, and also captained England before retiring from international duty after the 2014 World Cup. "This has been the toughest decision of my life, and one which both me and my family have agonized over for a good deal of time," Gerrard said of his Liverpool departure. "I am making the announcement now so that the manager and the team are not distracted by stories or speculation about my future.

"Liverpool Football Club has been such a huge part of all our lives for so long, and saying goodbye is going to be difficult, but I feel it's something that's in the best interests of all involved, including my family and the club itself."

Gerrard, who has scored 180 goals in 695 appearances, has won the Champions League, UEFA Cup, FA Cup and League Cup, but his Liverpool career, into its 17th year, will end without winning the Premier League. After coming so close to winning the

Steven Gerrard (AP Photo/File)

trophy last season, Liverpool collapsed in the closing stages of the title race and the team is struggling at eighth in this campaign.

Gerrard's drive, the determination, and the goal-scoring heroics from midfield have come to Liverpool's rescue repeatedly since making his debut in

1998.

"He is immense and the influence he has on games should never be understated," manager Brendan Rodgers said. "At times he has carried this club on his back, and in my time here he has always shown the ability that has rightly seen him be regarded as one of

the world's best for well over a decade.

"As a leader and as a man, he is probably incomparable to anyone I have ever worked with. He takes professionalism to a new level, and the dedication he has to his work is an example to everyone in the game."

Gerrard said he will be

"fully committed" to Rodgers' team until May and plans to extend his association with the club.

"It is my sincere hope and wish that one day I can return to serve Liverpool again, in whatever capacity best helps the club," Gerrard said. Liverpool's Boston-based owners said Gerrard will "always be at the summit" of the club's list of greats.

"Steven will always have a part to play for this club, as and when the time comes that he wishes to return," owner John Henry and chairman Tom Werner said in a statement. "I hope we all respect that Steven and his family want to pursue something new and different for the final years of his playing career."

Liverpool's Bostonbased owners said Gerrard will "always be at the summit" of the club's list of greats.

"Steven will always have a part to play for this club, as and when the time comes that he wishes to return," owner John Henry and chairman Tom Werner said in a statement. "I hope we all respect that Steven and his family want to pursue something new and different for the final years of his playing career."

Nuggets 106-101

CHICAGO, JANUARY 2 (AP): Derrick Rose scored 13 of his 17 points in the fourth quarter, and the Chicago Bulls beat the Denver Nuggets 106-101 on Thursday night to maintain its stranglehold on the Central division.

The late surge by Rose lifted the Bulls to their 11th win in 13 games. The 2011 NBA MVP missed his first eight shots, including all seven in a scoreless first half, but the point guard dominated down the stretch, coming up with one big basket after another. Wilson Chandler led Denver with 22 points.

Ty Lawson scored 20, while Arron Afflalo had 19 points.

Chicago was clinging to a 100-97 lead after Denver's Jusuf Nurkic scored on a layup with 46 seconds left.

Rose then nailed a jumper, and the Bulls hung on after Faried dunked with 22 seconds remaining to get the Nuggets within three again. Chicago's Aaron Brooks hit two free throws to make it a fivepoint game before Nurkic hit two of his own after he got fouled with 11 seconds left. But Rose then hit two more foul shots to make it 106-101.

The Bulls were trailing 74-70 late in the third quarter when Gasol blocked Nurkic. Butler then got fouled and hit two free throws, sparking a ninepoint run.

Kirk Hinrich nailed a 3 from the corner with 16 seconds left, giving the Bulls a three-point lead, and Gasol capped the run with a running hook to make it 79-74.

At Minneapolis, Rudy Gay had 21 points, six rebounds and five assists, and the struggling Sacramento Kings handed the Minnesota Timberwolves their 10th straight loss.

DeMarcus Cousins had 19 points and seven rebounds after being ejected one night earlier, and the Kings shot 54 percent while each of their starters scored in double figures.

Andrew Wiggins had 27 points and nine rebounds, but the Timberwolves couldn't take advantage when Cousins and Gay both fouled out in the fourth quarter. Troy Daniels' 3-point attempt at the buzzer was partially blocked.

Gorgui Dieng added 15 points and 10 rebounds for Minnesota.

The Nagaland Sepaktakraw boys team won a Gold medal in the 60th national School games , held from December 16 to 20, 2014 at Hyderabad. The team represented the Government Higher Secondary School, Dimapur.

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