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The Morung Express
Dimapur VOL. IX ISSUE 240
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www.morungexpress.com
Monday, September 1, 2014 12 pages Rs. 4
NMP+ campaign against stigma & discrimination
Taylor Swift set to share her expertise...
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north east mulls over how to fill the ‘knowledge gap’
reflections
By Sandemo Ngullie
Morung Express news Dimapur | August 31
He is suffering from liver cirrhosis. Causes? Ammm. In Nagaland, the most common causes are chow, momo and cold drinks abuse.
Vote on www.morungexpress.com SMS your answer to 9862574165
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Others
Are you satisfied with how the Nagaland state government has addressed the boundary issue? Yes
21% 69%
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No AFSPA review now, states Rijiju New Delhi, August 31 (ht): Admitting that Irom Sharmila’s struggle had had significant impact, Union minister of state for home Kiren Rijiju has said many things need to be considered before a review of the controversial Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA). “A review of the AFSPA is not on the cards right now. The entire gamut of inputs from security forces, agencies, state governments etc has to be taken into account before a review is undertaken,” Rijiju told HT. “While human rights is vital in a democratic set-up like ours, the country’s national security is supreme and is non-compromisable. The AFSPA issue needs to be considered in a much deeper manner and is not something that can be settled in a jiffy.” Admitting that Sharmila’s struggle has had significant impact, Rijiju said he is open to meeting her in person. Sharmila had been on an indefinite hunger strike for the last 14 years in protest against the AFSPA in Manipur. Under AFSPA, in Kashmir and parts of Northeast, security forces have the right to take action without fear of possible prosecution.
Batteries to run on sugar
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New York, August 31 (iANs): In a breakthrough to develop longlasting batteries for smartphones and other gadgets, scientists have successfully created a sugar biobattery that completely converts the chemical energy in sugar substrates into electricity. This biobattery can achieve an energy-storage density of about 596 ampere-hours (A/h) per kg - an order of magnitude higher than the 42 A-h/kg energy density of a typical lithium-ion battery used in various gadgets. The sugar biobattery is also less costly than the lithium-ion battery and environmentally friendly, researchers reported in the journal Nature Communications.
There are many books written on the North East (NE) of India, but only the people from the NE are interested in them. Despite efforts, thus, there is a ‘knowledge gap’ between ‘mainland India’ and the landmass that lies North East of it. Concerned that this gap is creating stereotypes and leading to increased misunderstandings, historians and scholars met recently in Shillong where they considered the development of a syllabi and teaching tools on the NE for under-graduate and post-graduate students across India. Dr. Atso Venuh, Assistant Professor at the Department of History & Archaeology, Nagaland University, was part of this two-day meet organized by the Centre for North East Studies and Policy Research (CNESPR) at Jamia Millia Islamia in New Delhi. “No central university in other parts of India covers the history of the NE. Even in Nagaland, two full papers on Naga history, for instance, at the under graduate level, and one at the post graduate level, were introduced only 3 years back,” says Dr. Venuh, adding that these histories are “sensitive” and “we need to be careful about developing
the syllabi.” As discussed in Shillong, the attempt would be to introduce NE history on the lines of its social history, polity, environment and economic history, etc. The proposed syllabi will look “beyond boundaries” and will cover States as well as Peoples—it could also bring closer ties between the people of the NE, he offers.
medium textbooks, as suggested by the Committee, Jamir feels that the private sector should be encouraged to promote the NE— special sections on the KBC, for instance, could help. “We had a discussion with the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting about how the media can play a big role by covering and projecting the positives rather than the negative aspects of the region,” he suggests. Regionally, infrastructure could be boosted. Except for Assam, no other State in the NE has ‘uplink’ facilities (for satellite broadcasting)—could some Outside Broadcasting vans not be provided, wonders Jamir. At the core of it all, however, he points out, is “how important can this region become to India or the world?” “We have no economic or political status—while politically we raise interest in India only vis-à-vis China, all other attention goes to the commercial hubs of Mumbai or Kolkata. As long as we are not important, no one will engage with us,” reflects Jamir. For him, the NE and a projection of it as a violent region cannot be the only point of engagement forever—it is not the nature of aspirations. Recommendations and actions need to be implemented in policy by the Government of India.
As long as the North East region is not important to India or the world, no one will engage with it!
The Morung Express POLL QUESTIOn
Yes
–Henry Paulson
Irresistible Liverpool trounce Spurs, Villa win
Philippine troops pull ‘greatest escape’ in Golan
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Is ignorance of the North East people and their culture the cause for the rising discrimination?
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In just about every area of society, there’s nothing more important than ethics
India seeks Japan’s help to combat sickle cell disease
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Diego Ferreira, right, punches Ramsey Nijem, left, during the second round of a lightweight mixed martial arts bout at UFC 177 in Sacramento, Calif., Saturday, August 30. Ferreira won in the second round. (AP Photo)
Border conflicts: UNTABA flays Nagaland & Assam Govts ‘Review all existing interim agreements’
DiMAPur, August 31 (MexN): The United Naga Tribes Association of Border Areas (UNTABA) today expressed dismay at the strategy adopted by the Assam and Nagaland State governments to tackle the border imbroglio. The UNTABA, in a media release, cited the August 30 meeting between officials of Assam and Nagaland in Dimapur as an instance, which it termed was an ex-
ercise with no substantial outcome. “It only tried to absolve the abject failure of the 2 (two) Governments in preventing clashes in the border areas in spite of various terms of Agreements entered between the two and the Home Ministry, Government of India starting from 1972 onwards,” the UNTABA said in the statement. UNTABA chairman Hukavi T. Yepthomi and general secretary Ejanthung Ngullie, in a statement held the governments of the two states responsible for the recurring boundary conflicts. It stated that the Ralan inci-
dent was an upshot of two governments’ negligence. “The Government of Assam deliberately facilitated the unabated encroachment from its side (while) successive Government(s) of Nagaland has remained a silent observer all these years over the illegal actions of the Government of Assam...” Any consultation between the two State governments “must seriously consider and review the existing terms of agreements ... and firmly put in place appropriate legal structure for preventing such incidents in future,” it stated, while adding, “otherwise
such exercise (August 30 meeting) amounts to nothing as seen by the outcome of yesterday’s (August 30) meeting.” It further stated that while the government of Assam has instituted Inquiry Commission to study the circumstances leading to the repercussions of the Ralan incident, the Nagaland government on its part has failed to inquire into the killings of Subong Temjen April 13, 2014 and Ento Chakhesang on May 13 by the Assam Police during the conflict along the Karbi-Anglong- Dimapur inter-state boundary.
That, no doubt, will take time. However, what of discrimination against the people of the NE till then? “Why not squeeze in a slot about the NE during Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC)?” asks Alemtemshi Jamir (IAS retd.), who travelled through metro cities in India as part of the Bezbaruah Committee expressing concern over the “limited knowledge” of the NE despite high end institutions of learning. The Committee submitted several recommendations and actions plans to the Home Ministry of the Government of India in July this year—the latter has neither released the report till date nor taken it up at a policy level. In the time that a NEbased syllabi is inserted into NCERT or vernacular
says Senegal People-to-People dialogue Ukhrul incident: UNC to decide WHO Ebola case ‘a top Call for internal reflection course of action on Sept 1 priority emergency’
First understand the problem on the ground, and then engage with it Morung Express news Dimapur | August 31
Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju said at a meeting in Guwahati this August that people-to-people contact in the disturbed border regions of Assam and Nagaland would remove misgivings and help build bridges of understanding between the people living along the inter-state border. The Government of Nagaland and that of Assam have now embarked upon State-level meetings on all rungs of bureaucracy in a bid to eventually “building trust and confidence between the people of Assam and Nagaland.” The dearth of ideas on the subject as well as the non-acknowledgment of ground realities could prove to be stumbling blocks, say activists. “The people who are dealing with the border issue on the Nagaland side need constructive and creative ideas to look at this issue,” says peace activist, Niketu Iralu. A consultation could help. “We are not able to keep pace with the problems we are creating—in Nagaland, there should be a consultation with people from both inside the government and outside it to get an objective response around which to work,” he ponders, though this should not be on the lines of a “public meeting” which then confuses more people than
give direction. While Iralu stresses on the importance of civil bodies from both Assam and Nagaland meeting regularly, it is essential on the Nagaland side, he suggests, to first understand the problem on the ground and then engage with it. Human rights worker, Xonzoi Barbora finds this idea useful, as he does the engagement of the two State governments on the issue. “We have to figure out what these fights are about first of all,” says Barbora of the border issue, and puts his foot down—“It is about land! The people of the region are poor, and we are surrounded by rich government land. We have to reflect on this. But who else owns land in these disturbed areas?” For him, an acknowledgment that people who die in these areas are those without any rights to property anywhere has to be there—a simple cadastral survey by local BDOs, for instance, he suggests, could be telling of who the large landowners are, and who creates these skirmishes. “It is good that the governments are engaging in this—they should look deeply into the core of what has become of land and rights over it,” says Barbora, while calling for reflection in Nagaland about the “fiction” of community held land while private ownership of land, especially in the foothill region, proliferates. He also calls for rooted media coverage of the issue, with stories being reported from the border belt regularly, which remains mostly under covered in Nagaland, and is filled with speculation in Assam. All this, in essence, would lead to a deeper people-to-people engagement.
Last rites of deceased on Monday
seNAPAti/ukhrul, August 31 (MexN/NNN): The United Naga Council (UNC) will hold an emergency Presidential Meeting of all Naga Tribe Hohos and frontal bodies at Ukhrul soon after the public funeral of the two deceased and collectively decide the course of agitation or action to protest on September 1. The UNC said today that the last rites and public funeral of the two deceased people from Saturday’s rally will be held in Ukhrul town on Monday (September 1). UNC leaders said that during the public funeral of the two persons, a simultaneous public protest will be observed in all the Naga hill districts of Manipur. They also announced the total shut down in both the national highways and all business establishments for two hours from 10 am till 12 noon. The UNC confirmed that it has communicated to all its units and Naga civil bodies to strictly enforce the said ‘total bandh’ for two hours during the funeral to show solidarity to the victims and those injured in the Ukhrul incident. Meanwhile, the post mortem of the two deceased persons was held at the Ukhrul district hospital on Sunday reportedly by ‘forensic specialists’ from Imphal. While the procedure was captured on video camera, both bodies showed death by bullet injuries. The UNC has asked the apex bodies of Nagas in Manipur to be present for the funeral and meeting.
Naga Hoho for revoking 144 CrPC
Condemning the Ukhrul incident, the Naga Hoho today stated that it had urged the Government of Manipur (GoM) to “relax” Sec. 144 CrPC in Ukhrul district “sensing that the citizens were subjected to undue harassment” ever since the imposition of it. “It is as though Government of Manipur have been waiting for the people to assemble in large number to register their protest whereby they can demonstrate their military superiority.” The Naga Hoho urged the Government of India to immediately direct GoM to revoke the imposition of laws that “restricts citizens to a life of honour and dignity.”
NSF for thorough investigation
The Naga Students’ Federation (NSF) has also condemned the incident and asked the Government of India to set up an independent enquiry body to “thoroughly investigate” the incident and punish the officer(s) responsible. “The incident has clearly shown the intention of the Govt. of Manipur that the Manipur commandos and IRB are deployed in the district not for safeguarding but for militarization and bring fear psychosis in the minds of the peace loving citizen,” NSF stated in a press statement appended by its Speaker RS Jollyson and Vice President Joseph Nguori. The Federation has questioned the Manipur government on the “rationale” behind still promulgating CrPC 144 in Ukhrul district when the public has sought to do away with it.
NSUD demands CBI enquiry
Expressing “extreme displeasure” at the GoM, the Naga Students’ Union Delhi (NSUD) has demanded a CBI enquiry into the killings of unarmed civilians and immediate intervention of Government of India for “lasting political solution.” It has stated that revoking of CrPC 144 in Ukhrul is not enough. “Words are insufficient in condemning the GoM’s brutal way of snatching the lives of two young and promising men from the Naga community and causing grave injuries to hundreds of peaceful demonstrators,” NSUD stated in a press statement. “The indiscriminate and deliberate firing by an agency of the state government on unarmed civilians during the rally has clearly shown that the Nagas in Manipur cannot live with the dominion community under one administrative roof any longer.”
DAkAr, August 31 (AP): The effort to contain Ebola in Senegal is “a top priority emergency,” the World Health Organization said Sunday, as the government continued tracing everyone who came in contact with a Guinean student who has tested positive for the deadly disease in the capital, Dakar. Senegal faces an “urgent need” for support and supplies including hygiene kits and personal protective equipment for health workers, the WHO said in a statement Sunday. “These needs will be met with the fastest possible speed,” the WHO said. The presence of Ebola in Senegal, a tourist and transport hub, could complicate efforts to bring the outbreak under control. The country has already closed its land border with Guinea, where the outbreak originated, and barred air and sea travel from Sierra Leone and Liberia in an attempt to keep the disease out. In Dakar on Sunday, at least one pharmacy was limiting purchases of hand sanitizer to one small bottle per person because of rising demand — underscoring fears that the number of cases in the city could soon multiply. There is no cure or licensed treatment for Ebola, so health workers can only provide supportive care to patients such as keeping them hydrated. Health care workers are especially vulnerable to infection. The WHO says 240 health workers have contracted the disease during the current outbreak and more than half of those have died. In Sierra Leone on Sunday, officials said they had avoided a strike threatened by workers at an Ebola treatment center in the east of the country, the region hardest hit by the outbreak. Protective equipment is being sent to the health workers and a “monthly incentive allowance” will be paid on Monday, health ministry spokesman Sidie Yahya Tunis told The Associated Press.
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NMP+ campaign against stigma & discrimination ‘There is legal provision against discrimination of HIV/AIDS patients’
NMP+ officials and nursing students of Imkongliba Memorial District Hospita (IMDH) pose for lens after the sensitization programme on HIV/AIDS held at IMDH on August 31. (Photo courtesy: Toshi Sangpi)
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Mokokchung, August 31 (MExn): In its endeavour to eradicate HIV/AIDS- related stigma and discrimination, the Network of Mokokchung District People Living with HIV/ AIDS (NMP+) conducted a programme with the nursing students of Imkongliba Memorial District Hospital (IMDH) here on August 31 at IMDH Chapel Hall. A press release from NMP+ Media Cell informed that NMP+ president T. Temsu Jamir sensitized the nurses and health workers on the scenario of HIV/AIDS in Mokokchung. Speaking strongly against stigma and discrimination related to
HIV/AIDS, Jamir challenged the nurses and IMDH to be the starting point in the fight against the same. Meanwhile, former president of NMP+ Toshi Sangpi, while expressing deep regret at the discrimination meted out to people with HIV/AIDS, said there were instances of HIV/AIDS at IMDH and urged the nurses to deliver the best of services to all, whether People Living with HIV/AIDS or not. Counsellor Vihaan NMP+, Peter Alley, who was the main resource person, further cautioned that there is legal provision against discrimination of
Lt Gen Bipin Rawat new GOC of Spear Corps
DiMApur, August 31 (MExn): Lt Gen Bipin Rawat, an Infantry Officer from the Gorkha Regiment, has taken over the command of the Spear Corps, Rangapahar from Lt Gen SL Narasimhan, who has been assigned Commandant, Army War College, Mhow. A press release received here informed that Lt Gen Bipin Rawat is an alumnus of St Edward’s School, Shimla and was awarded Sword of Honour from Indian Military Academy in December 1978. The General Officer has rich experience in Counter Insurgency as well as conventional operations, it was stated.
Besides commanding an Infantry Battalion, a Rashtriya Rifles Sector and an Infantry Division, he also has the distinction of commanding a Multinational Brigade in a United Nation Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Lt Gen Bipin Rawat is the fourteenth GOC of Spear Corps since its raising on February 4, 1985. Meanwhile, the note added that Lt Gen SL Narasimhan has conveyed his appreciation and gratitude to the people of the North East region for their whole hearted support and cooperation during his tenure as the GOC of Spear Corps.
HIV/AIDS patients. There is no comprehensive law in India to deal with the menace of HIV/AIDS and protect the people infected with the disease from discrimination and social stigma attached with it, however, Peter Alley said that the Constitution of India provides ample provisions for prosecution, if health workers, be it nurses or doctors, discriminate against any patient coming for medical care at health institutions. The sensitization programme, sponsored by Bharti Infratel (Ltd), was part of the NMP+ campaign against stigma and
discrimination related to HIV/AIDS. The NMP+, according to the release, has more plans in the offing which will be disseminated to the public from time to time. “The NMP+, with the continued sponsorship of Bharti Infratel (Ltd) would continue to work for the cause in the Naga society,” it asserted. The programme was chaired by NMP+ Programme coordinator, Archila Jamir, while the Chaplin of IMDH, Wenyie invoked God’s blessings. A question hour was also held where the nurses raised various questions regarding HIV/AIDS.
The Morung Express C M
PHED new office inauguration on September 2
kohiMA, August 31 (MExn): The newly constructed office building of PHED directorate will be inaugurated by minister for PHED Noke Wangnao on September 2 at 11:00 AM near Naga Solidarity Park, new Secretariat Area, Kohima. The function will be chaired by R. Binchilo Thong, IAS, principal secretary PHED. Technical report will be given by Er. Kevisekho Kruse, chief engineer, PHED. The function will also witness release of documentaries on “Sanitation- Human rights” and “Sanitation – Reach Out.” Vote of thanks will be proposed by Er. K. Ghushito Sumi, Director WSSO (PHED) Nagaland.
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Womenfolk sell vegetables along the roadside of Anangba in Tuensang district. (Photo by Chizokho Vero)
Salesian College Bible Skit and Bosco Singout Competition
DiMApur, August 31 (MExn): The Salesian College Youth Services conducted its annual Bible Skit and Bosco Singout Competition for the hostels and villages catered to by its students on August 31. Around 600 students from 21 hostels and youth centres participated in the programme, a press release informed, adding the youth displayed great familiarity and knowledge of the Bi-
ble and excellent dramatic skills and voices. In the English section of the Bible Skit Competition, the first, second and third prizes were secured by Nongbri Memorial Hostel, Infant Jesus Hostel, and St. Joseph’s Church Samaguri respectively. In the Hindi-Nagamese section, the first, second and third prize went to Ebenezar Home, Kristu Jyoti Lahorijan and Mother Teresa
Colony and St. Alphonsa Church, Borlengrijan respectively. Meanwhile, in the English Bosco Singout Competition the first, second and third prizes went to St. Francis Assisi Church, Zeliangrong-Dhobinala, Nongbri Memorial hostel and Our Lady of Lourdes Church Diphupar ‘A” respectively. In the HindiNagamese category, the first, second and third went
to Ebenezer Home, St. Alphonsa Church, Borlengrijan and St. Mary’s Church Singrijan respectively. The St. Francis Assisi Church, Zeliangrong-Dhobinala secured first prize in the singing category for the third consecutive year, the release informed. Earlier, the event began with celebration of the Holy Eucharist presided over by Rev. Fr. Tom Karthik, Rector.
Renaissance Clique: Tetso College English dept celebrates fest
Launches ‘3T Chronicles’ blog
DiMApur, August 31 (MExn): The Department of English, Tetso College organized its fest ‘Renaissance Clique’, meaning a jamboree of people with similar interests in arts and literature, on August 30. The fest consisted of various competitions and performances by the students of the college. The students, according to a press release, explored the correlation between education, creativity, society, and globalization as part of the essay writing competition.
Students of English Department, Tetso College during their Renaissance Clique fest held on August 30.
In the debate competition, students had a notable argument on whether there should be a minimum educational qualification for politicians in India. In the competition titled 12 Min-
utes to Fame, each honours class had to perform as many items as they could in twelve minutes. Other events included quiz, extempore, and caption writing. The Dra-
ma Club of the college staged a play titled Rules of Deception. Scripted by Toshimenla Ao, a student of 5th Semester English Honours, the play told the story of a student who
had enrolled in a college. He soon found himself deceived and lost in the world around him, making him realize life isn’t a bed of roses. The Department
also launched their blog 3T Chronicles (www.3tchronicles. blogspot.com), which will be reviewed by student editors, Toshimenla Ao, B.A. 5th Semester and Anubhav Tiakaba Kar, B.A. 3rd Semester. 3T, the release informed, stands for Tetso today and tomorrow. The blog is an outlet to make the creative voices of the Tetso family read over the internet, giving them a platform to express themselves, it stated. Students can submit stories, poems, essays, paintings, and it will be published on the blog. The contents of the blog are protected by a Creative Commons 4.0 International License, it was added.
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WASU, WASA, WAYO joint consultative meet Yitachu to grace state level Teachers’ Day celebration
kohiMA, August 31 (MExn): The third joint consultative meet of Western Angami Students’ Union (WASU), Western Angami Sports Association (WASA), and Western Angami Youth Organization (WAYO) has been scheduled for September 13 at WAPO Building, Sechii Zubza. The resource persons of the meeting are: Mhiesizokho Zinyii, former president of Angami Public Organization (APO), Nibu Nagi, Ist Class contractor & entrepreneur, and Dr.
PBVC members should resign on moral grounds: BAN
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DiMApur, August 31 (MExn): Business Association of Nagas (BAN) has lauded the Dimapur District Administration for conducting “thorough and impartial inquiry” into the Purana Bazar Village council (PBVC) v/s East Dimapur Business Association (EDBA) case and promptly bringing out the truth. “Thus, vindicating Solomon L Awomi, president EDBA, from the malicious allegations by PBVC and further exposing the corrupt practices of the PBVC who were the actual defaulters.” A press release from Media Cell, BAN stated that PBVC members should resign on moral grounds so that Justice is served. “That it serves as a reminder to all that there is accountability and that be it individual or organizations, it cannot flagrantly defy the laws of the land.”
Kethoser Kevichüsa, Ministry Associate, Ravi Zacharias International Ministry. Zinyii will speak on the topic “The concept of social politics and state politics in the context of Western Angami,” Nagi on “Business management & entrepreneurship,” while Kevichiisa will talk on “Youth challenges of our age.” Session I will start from 10:00 AM onwards with Rokoketu Sechii, general secretary, Angami Youth Organization as chairman and Zakiekhoto Khawakhrie,
president WAYO as recorder. Greetings will be shared by Savilie Krunilie, president Western Angami Public Organization. Abaii Zhunyii, president, Western Angami Women Organization will pronounce invocation prayer while special number will be presented by Asenuo Medoze. Session II will start at 11:30 AM with Thekrulhousie Mor, vice president WASA as moderator. Session III starting at 1:00 PM will be moderated
by WAYO general secretary Kepelhoubi Rino. Vote of thanks will be proposed by WASU president Kedoroko Casavi, while Khrieselhouno Sirie, chairperson, Sechü Zubza Women Organization will pronounce closing prayer. A release received here said that it is mandatory for all the unit office bearers of students, youth and sports organizations concerned to attend the meet. Senior leaders, elders, and well wishers have also been invited to the programme.
Our Correspondent Kohima | August 31
STATE LEVEL TEACHERS AWARDEES 2014
Dziesengulie Mere, Head Teacher, GMS P.Khel, Kohima Parliamentary secretary for Kikruneiü, Teacher in charge, GMS Porterlane, Kohima school education Yitachu Yhunshunle Kemp, Sr. G/T, GHSS Tseminyu, Kohima will grace the state level Nini Lungalung Pooyanthinkal, Vice Principal, Northfield School, Kohima Teachers’ Day celebration Molly Kutty Joseph, Principal, Little Flower Higher Secondary School, Kohima on September 5 at NBCC P.Tako Jamir, P/T, GPS Wameken, Mokokchung Convention Centre here at M.D Alauddin, G/T, GHS Alongkima, Mokokchung Imnasangba, G/T, Queen Mary Higher Secondary School, Mokokchung 10:00 AM. The occasion will wit- Anito L. Shohe, P/T, GMS Rotomi, Zunheboto ness presentation of awards P.K. Ghosh, Head Teacher, GMS Atokhiji, Zunheboto to 36 teachers in recognition V. Kavito Sema, Sr. G/T, GHS Satakha, Zunheboto of their meritorious service, P. Ramachandran, Sr. G/T, GHSS Sakraba, Phek and financial assistance to Neihite Kanuo, Sr.G/T, GHSS Phek, Phek seven teachers on ground of Rieneisie Ngouri, Teacher in charge, GPS Meluri, Phek "serious tragic misfortunes K.Ayamo Kikon, Asst. Teacher, GMS Yanmhon Old, Bhandari, Wokha in life." The awardees have Tarun Kanti Mukherjee, G/T, GHS Baghty, Wokha been requested to attend the Thungchibemo T. Lotha, Head Master, Mt. Sinai School, Wokha celebration and receive the K. Yanmong, P/T, GPS Sangkumti, Kiphire Shikheho Sumi, G/T, GMS Sitimi Town, Kiphire awards in person positively. The function will be Lipiri Sangtam, G/T, GHSS Kiphire chaired by M. Patton, IAS, Seikholal, P/T, GPS Old Chalkot, Peren commissioner and secre- Thangkhojang Hansing, G/T, GMS Lilen village, Peren tary for school education Kewengupe Salhe, Head Teacher, GPS Siethekie Basa, Dimapur and SCERT while welcome Tovikhe, P/T, GPS Ghotovi, Dimapur speech will be delivered Sashi Kumar Pathak, PGT, GHSS Chumukedima, Dimapur by Kesonyu Yhome, IAS, Mereninla, Asst. Teacher, Dimapur Mission Higher Secondary School, Dimapur Queen Chakraborty, Asst. Teacher, St. Mary Higher Secondary School, Dimapur principal director school Noor Mohammad Ansari, G/T, GMS Noksen, Tuensang education. Pamensangla, Asst. Teacher, GHS Kuthur, Tuensang Themainhighlightsofthe Saji Joseph, Asst. Head Master, Holy Angel School, Tuensang celebration include: opening Y Hamman Phom, P/T, GPS Nyengching, Longleng song- GHSS Seikhazou Ko- Murtaza Hussain, Acting HM, GHS Yongnyah, Longleng hima, life sketch of late Dr. K.Saku Pongen, Asst. Teacher, Mt. Carmel School, Longleng S. Radhakhrishnan by Stella N. Wangthom Konyak, P/T, GPS Shangsa, Mon Higher Secondary School L. Thepong Konyak, P/T, GPS Yei, Mon Kohima, honoring teach- Lanuakum Lemtor, Sr. G/T, GHSS, Mon ers- Little Flower Higher Secondary School, Kohima, special musical item- Baptist High Kohima, Taekwondo Dziesebeituo Kense, D/T, GMS Touphema, Kohima demonstration- Northfield Asao Seb Rengma, P/T, GPS Khonibinzun Tseminyu, Kohima School Kohima, Teachers’ Mhabeni Lotha, Asst. Teacher, Model Higher Secondary School, Kohima Day greetings- Hononag M. Kronosa Vitsu, P/T, GPS Viswema K.Khel, Kohima Jessuha, general secretary, Supongmenla, K/I, Mayangnokcha GHSS, Mokokchung ENSF and Bithongo Kikon, Mazui, P/T, GMS D.C Colony, Peren president ANPSA, cultural Livi Yeptho, Asst. Teacher, Corner Stone School, Zunheboto item- Ruzukhrie GHSS Kohima, Unity in diversity- Mt. Blossom School Kohima and commence with invoca- Fellowship while vote of Saramati Montessori School, Rashtra Basha Hindi Train- tion prayer by Rev. Dr. thanks will be proposed On August 30, Voices of Hope performed at Patkai Christian College in aid of Margrette Vevo Phesao, president, by Ponchulo Wanth, presShishak Institution of Music. Seen here are the band members posing for photograph Unity Village Dimapur, en- ing Institute, Kohima. tertainment items- Cherry The programme will Kohima Town Pastor’s ident, ANSTA. after the show. (Photo courtesy: Heutinggumbe).
TEACHERS To gET FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE
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The Morung Express
Monday
1 September 2014
Manipur Government announces compensation for victims of Aug 30 firing IMPHAL, AUGUST 31 (NNN): The Government of Manipur has announced to give Rs 5 lakhs each to the next of kins of Ramkashing Vashi and R. Mayopam as ex-gratia who were killed by the Manipur state force on Saturday. The State Government has also announced to bear all the medical expenses of the treatment of those injured. Meanwhile, the Naga Student Union Delhi (NSUD) expresses its extreme displeasure against the Government of Manipur for its inhuman and callous treatment on civilians at a rally organized on August 30, 2014 by the United Naga Council (UNC), the apex body of the Nagas inhabiting in Manipur. "Words are insufficient in condemning the Government of Manipur’s brutal way of snatching the lives of three young and promising men from the Naga community and causing grave injuries to hundreds of peaceful demonstrators. The indiscriminate and deliberate firing by an agency of the state government on unarmed civilians during the rally has clearly shown that the Nagas in Manipur cannot live with the dominion community under one administrative roof any longer," the NSUD stated. Itthensaidthecommunal colourofthestategovernment hasbeenrepeatedlydisplayed and there is no respite from its
Several Organisations condemns police firing in Ukhrul Impose PR in ‘communal’ government of Manipur: NPF Manipur The Naga Peoples' Front (NPF) Manipur State strongly condemned the high-handedness by the security forces who mercilessly 'murdered' innocent Naga citizens taking undue advantage of S. 144 CrPC during peaceful rally at Ukhrul district headquarters and demands immediate imposition of President Rule (PR) on Manipur state as the most “communal” Ibobi led Congress government has failed to maintain law and order. "If Mr. Ibobi continues to rule the state, then the innocent Nagas citizens' lives are not secure at all. Past incident at Mao Gate, Senapati, Tamenglong incident, Chandel incident and now at Ukhrul and tomorrow he may have plans to carry out genocides on entire Naga community," NPF, Manipur State general secretary Athuan Abonmai stated in the press communique. "The Government of India's immediate intervention is therefore drawn to save the innocent Naga public from the hands of blood thirsty Ibobi led government. The innocent Naga citizens were harassed in name of restoring normalcy where there is no disturbance” the NPF, Manipur State press release added. NWU condemns arbitrary police actions in Ukhrul Expressing deep concerns over the tense situation prevailing in Ukhrul for last 40 days, the Naga Women’s Union (NWU) terms the August 30 Ukhrul incident as "alarming". The speech by our political leaders yesterday was also serious," the NWU said. While strongly condemning the alleged arbitrary actions, the NWU added that, the protest was against the 'militarisation of oppressive approach toward the Naga people. NSUD extends its heartfelt condolences to the family and kin of those who laid down their
Naga areas as well as unabated aggressive policies encroaching upon the ancestral lands of the Nagas and the tribal and disrespect for the democratic process of tripartite talk of “Alternative Arrangement” by the Government of Manipur (GoM). NWU demands for speedy removal of the imposition of Section 144 CrPC in Ukhrul district and ceasing of arbitrary actions against the public who raised voices against it. The GOM is responsible for the killing and wounding more than 17 persons and present situation was created by the by imposition and non-removal of S.144 CrPC, it stated. ATSUM denounces ‘terror in public domain’
to preempt chaos in Ukhrul is withdrawn immediately," the IDF demanded. (Newmai News Network)
THN condemns “barbaric atrocities” dIMAPUr, AUGUST 31 (MExN): The Tangkhul Hoho Nagaland (THN) condemns the highhandedness and the barbaric atrocities committed by the Manipur Police Commando and the IRB at the behest of Manipur Government which led to the killing of two innocent youth and injuring several others on August 30. In a press release through its President, Shai Raleng and Secretary P A Ramsing, the THN added that, the promulgation of S. 144 CRPC Act in Ukhrul district for more than one month is in no way “justifiable” but a direct threat to individual rights and freedom. It also every civil organisation to condemn such barbaric action of Manipur Police and IRB and support the citizens of Ukhrul district in this trying time. The organisation also offers condolences to the bereaved families and wishes speedy recovery to those injured.
The All Tribal Students Union Manipur (ATSUM) have strongly condemned the killing of civilians in Ukhrul on Saturday by the state security force personnel. ATSUM led by its president Muan Tombing has strongly condemned the brutal killing of Ramkashing Vashi and R. Mayopam by state security force on August 30 during a peaceful rally at Ukhrul. This again has gone to prove the notoriety of the state police force in un- NEFIS questions Manipur state’s attitude leashing terror in public domain, it added. North East Forum for International Solidarity IDF censures ‘military (NEFIS) strongly condemns the killing of two brutalisation’ in Ukhrul peaceful protesters and injury of several othThe Indigenous Democratic Front (IDF) strongly ers when Manipur Police opened fire against condemned the killing and injury civilians in Ukh- the peaceful protesters in Ukhrul. In a press rul on August 30. "It is beyond words to express note, NEFIS added that, Manipur state’s attithe anguish when state government went out of tude towards its minorities is very “conspicideas and start combating its own citizens to re- uous seeing incidents like these” and it will solve outstanding issues. Imposition of CrPC 144 always stand against such oppression in any is being abused in Manipur. It had claimed 18 lives part of the world. Further, it warned that, if earlier in Imphal. This kind of military brutalisa- such incidents occur in future, NEFIS will call a tion is unlikely to solve any problem. In the fitness nation-wide protest against “Manipur state’s of things the infamous CrPC144 being imposed oppression on people’s movement”
lives for the cause and dignity of the Nagas. We will continue this fight and strive for truth and justice in Naga-land. NSUD salutes its heroes
and martyrs and acknowledges their courage and sacrifice; they shall continue to inspire generations to come in our fight against
AIzAwL, AUGUST 31 (INdIAN ExPrESS): The Sunday before the Congress government was to table a much-debated Bill to allow KOLKATA, AUGUST 31 (IANS): A West Bengal court Sunday sent three Visva the sale and consumption of Bharati University students, arrested for alleged sexual harassment of a female stu- alcohol in Mizoram and end dent from the northeast, to three days' police custody, police said. "We sought seven an 18-year-old liquor ban, days' custody but the court after hearing the prosecution and defence counsel, re- Excise Minister R Lalzirliana manded the three accused to three days' police custody," said Bolpur sub-divisional attended an evening Church police officer Surya Pratap Yadav. Accused of sexually assaulting the fine arts student service in his neighbourand blackmailing her, the trio was arrested Saturday and booked for criminal intimi- hood of Armed Veng. dation and outraging the modesty of a woman. The accused have claimed innocence. Towards the end of mass "We are innocent, we have been falsely implicated," one of the accused said at the prayers for the continuation court premises while being taken away by police. The university founded by Asia's of total prohibition in the first Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore in Bolpur town in Birbhum district, Saturday state, Lalzirliana stepped up suspended the three and lodged a police complaint following an internal probe into to pray, and in his booming the incident. However, the victim's father has accused a university official of offering voice that could be clearly him money to hush up the matter and not to approach the police. The West Bengal heard by the congregation, Commission for Women has already taken cognizance of the incident and said it will said: “Lord, I am the one who seek the intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. is to table this new Bill this week. If it is against your will, then make it impossible for me to do so by sending a calamity on me or my family.” Lalzirliana, the secondAGArTALA, AUGUST 31 (IANS): The Tripura government has suspended a senior officer and cautioned another for issuing an order to purchase books writ- in-command in the state ten by the chief minister and the then chief secretary, an official said here Sunday. Congress government, "Ambalika Datta was suspended from service and the government also cautioned was speaking in all seriAdditional Director of School Education D.K. Debbarma," School Education Direc- ousness. As Kerala heads tor Pradip Kumar Chakraborty told IANS. Datta was the deputy director in-charge towards prohibition, disof Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyan (RMSA). He said the two officers issued tant Mizoram these days is an order to the district programme coordinators of RMSA asking them to purchase hiccuping its way out of it "Atit Diner Smriti" (Reminiscence of yesteryears) written by Chief Minister Manik — shaking and stirring the Sarkar, and "Making One Plus One Eleven - Some Experiences of Tripura" written by same mix of the Congress former chief secretary Sanjay Kumar Panda. The official said the order to secondary party and Church. Unlike schools to purchase the two books out of annual grant provided to 839 schools by in Kerala though, here the RMSA during 2013-14 fiscal was issued without taking permission from the appro- Congress and Church find priate authority. "A probe is on regarding the issue," Chakraborty added. The issue rocked the political circle and forced the government to cancel the order and to take themselves on opposite action against the officials. "It is not acceptable. The chief minister should refrain ends of the battle bottle. On July 10, when Lalzirfrom intervening in suggesting procurement of his own book for school students...," liana rose from his seat next said Congress spokesperson Ashok Sinha. to Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla and introduced the Mizoram Liquor (ProhibiKOLKATA, AUGUST 31 (IANS): Continuing its probe of the multi-crore-rupee tion and Control) Bill at the Saradha scam, the CBI Sunday grilled Assam singer Sadanand Gogoi and business- state Assembly, people were man Rajesh Bajaj, who also hails from the northeastern state. Alleged to have made a glued to their television sets commercial for the tainted group, Gogoi, along with Bajaj, was grilled by the Central across the state to watch on. Bureau of Investigation (CBI) sleuths for the second consecutive day. Coming out the It was the longest debate in CBI office here, Gogoi denied having made any financial transaction with the Saradha the 40-seat Assembly in regroup. "I have not made any financial transactions with the Saradha," said Gogoi cent memory — with 19 Conwhose residence in Assam was earlier raided by the agency. Taking over the probe in gress MLAs pointing out that West Bengal following a Supreme Court directive, the CBI has interrogated several prohibition-induced spurihigh profile people and arrested East Bengal Football Club official Debabrata Sarkar ous alcohol had caused the and Kolkata entrepreneur Sandhir Agarwal. The CBI has also repeatedly quizzed Bapi Karim, a former confidential assistant to West Bengal Sports and Transport Minister deaths of countless youths, and the six opposition legisand Trinamool Congress leader Madan Mitra. lators warning that the move
Northeast Briefs
3 arrested for sexual assault on a NE Student
tyrant rulers and undemocratic governments. Revoking of CrPC 144 in Ukhrul is not enough; the NSUD demands CBI enquiry into the
brutal killing of unarmed civilians and immediate intervention of the Government of India for a lasting political solution.
Newmai News Network Shillong | August 31
T
he Meghalaya militant outfit Hynñiewtrep National Liberation Council (HNLC) has appreciated the stand taken by Meghalaya chief minister Dr Mukul Sangma for his reported eagerness and dedication towards the customary rights and practices of the people of the state, whereby lakhs of people in the state were affected by the draconian ban of the National Green Tribunal (NGT). According to HNLC, several Central laws are in conflict with customary rights and practices of the indigenous people, the para 12(a) of the sixth schedule (IOA& AA). The chief minister has shown responsibility by intervening into the matter of the NGT and given some hope to people affected by the NGT ban. Logically speaking, the NGT should also close down all the cement plants and industries in the state that are dependent on coal. "Because if our poor people are suffering into the hands of the NGT, then the same fate should be met by the industrialists," the HNLC said. The group then said the positive response of the Government of Meghalaya (GoM) that appeared in sections of the media on August 30, 2014 through the Commissioner and Secretary Political Department,
Tripura govt suspends officer for ordering schools to buy CM's book
SARADHA SCAM: CBI grills Assam singer
Youths from the Chaltlang South Presbyterian Church putting up posters denouncing alcohol as the “killer of body and soul” and citing quotes from the Bible. (Express photo)
that we as a party should be ready to lose an election if we are to do something we feel is correct. I strongly disapprove of those who hide behind the Church.” A month and a half on, the debate hasn’t died. Christian youth groups put up thousands of antialcohol posters across the state before the Bill was tabled and Church groups continue to organise mass prayers in the state for continued prohibition. Local Councils of more than a dozen Aizawl neighbourhoods have announced that they won’t allow the sale of alcohol in their areas, or let it be warehoused, consumed or transported from there. Phullen, a self-declared “dry village”, also issued a public statement to that effect. At least half-a-dozen local units of the Young Mizo Association, the state’s
‘Generic Drugs Store’ arriving soon in Aizawl Newmai News Network Aizawl | August 31
‘Generic Drugs Store’ where medicines will be sold at cheaper price for the relief of common people and the poor, is soon to come up in Mizoram. Sources said that the same is planned to be opened up this year at Aizawl Civil Hospital compound, for which necessary things are being dealt with. The people-friendly Generic Drugs Store here
in the State will be among the firsts in India, sources mentioned. It added that Chief Minister Lal Thanhawla and Health Minister Lal Thanzara have taken vigorous steps at the Central level for the setting up of the same in the State, and now steps are being taken for procuring license. For the start, the Generic Drugs Store will be opened at the morgue near Aizawl Civil Hospital main building, until it is shifted to the new build-
ing near cabin. Me d i ca l Su p e r i n tendent of ACH Hospital Dr. Rosangluaia said that the central government has 361 drug items to be sold at the Generic Drugs Store. But then, all such drug items will not be taken at the start; only needful items will be taken first, he said. Dr. Rosangluaia further said that they will not force doctors to prescribe the medicines from the Generic Drugs Store, adding, “Doctors
will prescribe only those they think are good”. He added that the drugs being sold in general drug store comes in a chain such that the manufacturing Company first sold to other Company who does the packing, from whom the stockist/wholesale buy it, and then the drug store, hence high price at the end. In case of Generic Drugs, on the other, the manufacturing company shall be the dealer as well with no middle stages. Moreover, being without
any extra-packaging and diluted mixture in the middle, the drugs are supposed to be more effective. When sold, drugs that are bought by the people now at Rs. 100 will be available at about Rs.20. With the initiative of Department of Pharmaceutical under Ministry of Chemical & Fertilizers, Generic Drugs Store has been successfully opened up in Rajasthan and Gujarat, and initiative is now taken to open up the same in Maharastra.
Generic Drugs are to be sold exactly at the price fixed by central government, and 15% of the sale will be the profit of the seller. As to the dimension of the Generic Drugs Store, it shall not be smaller than 120 sq.ft. and there shall be at least 3 workers, and also it is to be opened at least 12 hours a day. Medicines at Generic Drugs Store are expected to be cheaper than the medicines at general drug stores by 70%.
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HNLC affirms Sangma's stand on customary rights
‘So help it God’
would lead to “mass drunkenness and social discord”. At one point, Revenue Minister R Romawia wept, saying, “Our sons and our daughters are dying because of spurious alcohol.” Cabinet Minister Zodintluanga, whose prosperous family business was once dominated by liquor trade, recalled a speech by Laldenga, the founder of the main opposition party, the Mizo National Front (MNF), which is opposing the new law. Laldenga had said, he pointed out, that “Alcohol is neither wrong nor right. It is just a thing. We will not consult any religion because that is not what a secular government does.” Finance Minister Lalsawta went further: “In the early 1990s, I was against condoms, but I was wrong. Abstinence does not always work. And I also believe
Dimapur
most powerful and largest voluntary organisation that has spearheaded a campaign against drugs and alcohol, have asked residents not to sell alcohol. Some local YMA units are on patrol every night to make sure there are no “liquor dens” or youths drinking in dark roadside corners. During the prohibition years, the YMA had come to be known for its strong-arm tactics against such “liquor dens”. Some people even died at the hands of zealous mobs that often associated themselves with the organisation’s now-defunct ‘Supply Reduction Service’. The Congress believes the Local Councils which have prohibited alcohol are doing it at the behest of the MNF. The day after the new law was passed, its president and former CM Zoramthanga had warned: “This law will be the tough-
in matters relating to the peace talks with the HNLC was appreciated by the leadership of the HNLC. This is a positive step taken by the GoM but at the same time the HNLC would not like to repeat history as it was done in the year 2004. The seriousness of the matter can only arrive to a conclusion (1st stage) by appointing an interlocutor by the GoM at the earliest. The HNLC claimed that it has put a step forward to initiate peace talks with the government; hence the appointment of an interlocutor is the first and foremost requirement. "If the Government of Meghalaya is at all serious for take the peace talks to the first level then it should try to appoint an interlocutor within 24 days of this press communiqué," the HNLC stated. The HNLC further added that, it will strive to achieve its objective through the process of dialogue and achieving peaceful settlements of with justice and equality. Its overall mission and eventual goal is to facilitate and enable overall development of the Hynñiewtrep in particular and the state as a whole, the outfit stated. The first rule of peacekeeping is to understand peace. Peace is a structure of expectations, a social contract. It will be kept only as the parties, for whatever reason, find it in all their intersecting interests, capabilities, and wills to do so, the HNLC added. est law to implement.” Incidentally, towards the end of its rule in 2007, the MNF government had tweaked the prohibition law — with the Church looking the other way — to allow farmers in the colder eastern regions of the state to build wineries and use locally grown grapes to make wine. That industry is now worth more than Rs 4 crore annually and supports hundreds of families through sale of Zawlaidi (Love Potion) and Zowine brands. The Excise Department is currently working on rules to accompany the new law and liquor shops and bars are expected to open in Mizoram before Christmas. While allowing the consumption, sale, retail, manufacture, storage and transport of various kinds of alcohol, including country-made ones, the new Bill emphasises on permits, including for buying alcohol, and also provides for fines and jail terms —ranging from five days to five years — for a plethora of offences. The new law also empowers citizens to arrest offenders, provided they hand them over to police or excise. There is another Kerala parallel incidentally in the Mizoram story. The current momentum to lift prohibition saw the first push by then governor Vakkom Purushothaman in July 2013. At a press meet, Purushothaman called Mizoram “the wettest dry state”, telling its government that it was missing out on alcohol as a major source of revenue. The state he cited as an example was home state Kerala.
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public discoursE
Monday 1 September 2014
An Angel’s Visit to a Government School
F
ew days back I was sitting in my office and drafting a report. A beautiful lady entered my room asking, ‘May I come in Sir?’ I nodded with a smile, showed her a seat and said, ‘Yes, please.’ She asked with a soft voice, ‘If you are not very busy, may I take few minutes of your time?’ I replied, ‘Sure, What can I do for you?’ She said, ‘I would like to visit all the classes of your school.’ I politely asked, ‘May I know your identity, Madam?’ She looked with such a look that completely mesmerized me and said, ‘I am an Angel, coming from heaven.’ Something strange made me to believe her words; I silently stood up and glanced at her with a child’s fascination and said, ‘Angel, I am blessed to have you here in this poor school.’ She raised her eyes and asked, ‘What did you say, poor school? The monthly salary bill of your school is nearly 15 lakhs; how do you say your school is a poor school?’ I replied, ‘Angel, all of my students are from economically backward families. Moreover, see the schools’ infrastructure; that’s why I said poor school.’ She smiled and said, ‘Strange! When communities compete in constructing big churches, Govt. school buildings are becoming more and more deplorable.’ We walked towards the class rooms and she keenly
M
observed the children and the teachers. Teachers in most of the classes were teaching sincerely and expressions on her face indicated that she was impressed with it. Suddenly there was a change in her face and I looked at the class rooms; there were no teachers in few classes and children were playing happily inside the class rooms. I said, ‘Few teachers are on leave today.’ We went to the staff room and I introduced her to the teachers as a researcher. She interacted with them casually and few teachers painfully explained how the nondetention policy under the RTE hampers the very basic of the education system. She asked with curiosity, ‘How is that only the students of Govt. schools suffer due to the nondetention policy?’ One teacher explained, ‘Madam, most of the Government school students belong to the poorer sections of society and from rural backgrounds, whose parents are mostly illiterate. Therefore, to train them up at par with private schools is not an easy task’. She said with a smile, ‘I agree with you to some extent. Govt. schools may not be able to produce qualitative results like private schools. But at least you could produce an average result of simple passes.’ There was silence in the room.
She calmly looked at the teachers and continued, ‘I have visited the Evening Section of Assisi School in Dimapur, which is a private school managed by the catholic missionary. There are nearly 1000 students studying in the evening shift and almost all of them belong to the social category you have described now. Even majority of the students are working as domestic helps and are involved in doing menial works. The teachers are of comparatively less qualified than the Govt. school teachers and are also underpaid. But the general performance of those students is above average and there is no complaint from the school authorities regarding the RTE act!’ I said, ‘Madam, private school teachers are answerable to their employers and continuance of their job depends on the work output. But, we, the Govt. servants developed a feeling that we are the masters of public and not answerable to anyone. So, expecting sincerity and dedication of private school teachers from us is not wise.’ We came back to my office and the time was around 12:30 p.m. Students from the high school section were returning home and she asked with a surprise, ‘Is your school time from 9 a.m to 12:30 p.m?’ I said, ‘No, the actual class hours are from 9 a.m to 2 p.m.
But, mostly we end the classes for the high school section by 12:30 p.m. as 2 to 3 teachers use to be on leave every day.’ She asked, ‘May I see the teachers’ attendance register?’ I silently gave it to her. She glanced through the pages, expressed a strong wave of disapproval and said, ‘I believe a Govt. servant is entitled for only 12 C/Ls in a year; how is that many of your teachers have exceeded the limit?’ I said, ‘Angel, when an employee exceed the leave limit, first I give verbal warning, followed by written warning and then force them to apply for other kinds of leave such as Earned Leave which causes financial loss to them at the time of retirement. Even then, few teachers continue to be irregular and the next option is to send complaint letters to my superiors for initiating disciplinary action against them. Before this cycle is completed, I would be transferred to another school and the case would end there.’ After a moment of silence she asked, ‘Don’t you apply the rule “No Work, No Pay”?’ I said, ‘Time to time we come across those terms in news papers. But practically this rule might have never been applied anywhere in Nagaland.’ Now, she looked at my eyes and said, ‘I have seen hundreds of students reaching
your school after travelling 6 to 7 kms on foot. They were resting in 2 to 3 places during the journey to get relief from the heat & sweating and the same hardships they would face while returning home. Here, you are teaching them just for 3 hrs per day and take home a handsome salary; don’t you think what you are doing is a sin?’ Uncontrollably few drops of tears emerged out of my eyes and I said, ‘Yes, Angel, I know; on each day of my service, I go on adding sin in my account. At times, I ask myself, what is the meaning of calling me as a Principal if I can’t deliver justice to the poor children whose future are entrusted with me? I really don’t know where do I stand and what should I do?’ She rose from the chair, held my hands with compassion and said, ‘Don’t worry son, God knows you well and sent you here with a purpose. He will protect you from all the odds; carry on your duty without fear’. In a moment she disappeared like a flash of light and I stood there as a statue. I heard bells ringing from the nearby church and suddenly came to my sense. My God! What a wonderful dream during the short Sunday nap after a heavy lunch!! Nellayappan B Principal’s Quarter GHSS Colony, Bhandari
It’s A Time To Strengthen The Friendship Us We Celebrate Mongmong Festival
ongmong festival is celebrated every year in first week of September and it will continue every year but life cannot be predicted we never know what will be our tomorrow and may be this will be our last opportunity to celebrate. And us we celebrate mongmong festival let us strengthen our friendship to all the people by forgiving the past as it was practiced by our forefathers because there is no point of celebration without friends and there is no point of weeping over our mistake of not strengthening our friendship after dead. Once upon there was a famous warrior named Tsinglongli. His prowess as a warrior was so well known in every village that there was many younger warrior aspiring to take his head for the
honor of being known as a man who had taken Tsinglongli`s head. As a well-built man, the warrior was head taller than his age-mates and was easy to spot in the crowd. Tsinglongli had a lady love. She was the most beautiful women of their village and both of them often went to a field and worked together. When it was time to begin field work, they went to the field and began burning dry grass and straw to prepare the soil. The whole region was covered with vine and unfortunately on that day, the fire started burning the field and the forest and whole place was covered with smoke, and heard a voice of screaming and shouting and he sow people running for their life. Then, Tsinglongli started calling his beloved loudly and started searching for her. Suddenly he saw her body all
burned up except her head. He return to the village grief stricken with his beloved`s head. The villagers began to suspect that he had killed his lady love and therefore, excommunicated him from the village. So, Tsinglongli went into the forest very sad and after a few months, suddenly he heard a voice shouting, “Oh! Tsinglongli, Tsinglongli’’ on hearing the voice Tsinglongli responded, “Here I am! .’’ then he saw that it was one of his villagers who came to take him because the neighboring village was defeating them and his villagers believed that only Tsinglongli can protect his village. So he return to his village and defeated all the enemies. The villagers were very happy and shouted, “Long live! Tsinglongli”. As month and years go by, he became very sick and came to the point of death. And as he was resting in his bed
and was recollecting his past memory where he spent his time in a jungle when all his villagers rejected him and was moved with pain and still he was longing to celebrate and dance for the last time before he turn to dust. So he turns his head towards the window and facing the jungle started shouting, “strengthen your friendship before it is too late”. Then after sometime, with tears he passed away. Therefore let us take this opportunity to strengthen in every possible way before it is too late and earlier us our forefathers celebrate by wearing the best cloths, dancing and celebration in every house let as celebrate with Christ in every house. Wishing happy mongmong to all.
The Morung Express
My Diary
T
oday the 30th August, 2014 a day in tears, with angers and a hope. I know for sure that today, the sun might have set unwillingly in the Naga hills of Manipur. For I believe she foresees the tragedy that lies ahead in her absence. Now the clouds are drizzling with tears as it was filled with stinky smells of bullets and tear gas. The rivers and streams are roaring in shame as the innocent blood were too pure to be in their midst. The trees and grasses are hissing in anger seeing the blood mongers travelling unceasingly on the small dusty roads, the only roads from the valley that leads to the abode of clouds. Today is a day, lived like there will be no tomorrow. The supreme sacrifice made by courageous Eno. Ramkashing Vashi and Eno. R. Mayopam shall now be inscribed in the eternal book of the Nagas. And I can proudly foretell that the generation to come after them shall endlessly sing their praises. For today, they gave all for a better tomorrow. We bid farewell, a farewell mixed in grief and in pride. Now somewhere deep inside in a whispering voice tells me to loudly proclaim to the world that brave hearts like Eno. Shelley Chara, Eno. Ng. Sanii, Eno. Ashun R Jangvei, Eno. Nanthiurai Abonmai, Eno. Gemcliff V Zimik, Eno. Dikho Loshou, Eno. Neli Chakho and other thousands of martyrs are waiting for them with an open arm to be in the league of immortals. I know it will never be easy for the family and kins of the Heroes who laid down their lives for the cause and dignity of the Nagas. My sincere condolence to all. But forgive me, for I say with a prayer that the lost is never a lost in real sense. They have given us a renewed hope that the Nagas common aspiration is still so dear and we shall have it soon, very soon. And I believe all Nagas will sincerely bless the child of Eno. Mayopam who will oneday be the reason for our happiness. It’s time for the Nagas to rise above the tribal line and shout in unison against the people subjugating us. We may have differences in almost everything, we may have the desire to strike back when wrong opportunity is freely available, we may think that we do not need neighbours’ help, we may think that we are the all knowing community, we may have the worldly riches which are just temporary, we may enjoy the power which are unreal and deceptive, we may have all the might which are destructive, we may have all the things a man can wish for but at the end of the day we should always accept the fact that NAGAS ARE ONE. And in no way an outsider should be allowed to break in nor a fifth column to breakthrough. It’s not the time to think but the right time to act. We have seen enough of bloodshed, we have seen enough of atrocities, we have seen enough of humiliation, we have gone through all sorts of sufferings a human can ever imagine. Continuously remaining a mere spectator only showing our mouth and paper concern just because it do not happen to you and me can be a decision that will make us regret till our graveyard. Today’s individual decision taken in tears and in anger should be the biggest strength for fulfilling the hope of the people who fail to see the last sun of 2014 August. Let us all be reminded by the famous quote of Martin Luther King, Jr ‘In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.’ And today let us change the word ‘Friend’ to ‘Brother’ and introspect. “First they came for the communist, and I did not speak out because I was not a communist; Then they came for the socialist, and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist; Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist; Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew; Then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.” Martin Niemoller Today, let us all fight a good fight for the foregone leaders, present and future Nagas. LONG LIVE NAGA UNITY! KUKNALIM! Boveio Poukai Duo Senapati. time: 11:30 pm dated: 30th August 2014
Lumtsase Chosemong Sangtam Japfu Christian College
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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STD CODE: 03862
Metro Hospital: Faith Hospital: Shamrock Hospital Zion Hospital: Police Control Room Police Traffic Control East Police Station West Police Station CIHSR (Referral Hospital) Dimapur hospital Apollo Hospital Info Centre: Railway: Indian Airlines Chumukedima Fire Brigade Nikos Hospital and Research Centre Nagaland Multispecialty Health & Research Centre
Answer Number # 2981
KOHIMA
Police Control Room: North Police Station: South Police Station: Fire Brigade: Naga Hospital: Oking Hospital: Bethel Nursing Home:
232224; Emergency229529, 229474 227930, 231081 228846 228254 231864, 224117, 227337 228400 232106 227607 232181 242555/ 242533 224041, 248011 230695/9402435652 131/228404 229366 282777 232032, 231031 248302, 09856006026
STD CODE: 0370
Northeast Shuttles
100/2244279 2222222 2222111 2222952 2222916 2243339 2224202
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FOOTBALL SOCCER BASKETBALL FITNESS WELLNESS ENDURANCE TEAM STRETCH BALL MUSCLE TEAMWORK RESPECT PLAYER GYM CARDIOVASCULAR RULES PROCEDURES UNIFORM RUN TRACK CROSSCOUNTRY LOCKEROOM WEIGHTS TRYOUT AGILITY SPEED VERTICAL STRENGTH WINNER TITANS ATHLETICS EDUCATION
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ACROSS 1. A French dance 6. Deceased 10. Hit hard 14. Poplar tree 15. As well 16. Ancient Peruvian 17. Drowsiness 19. Fastened 20. Brave 21. Compete 22. Anagram of “Note” 23. Units of force 25. 100 to a dollar 26. Rational 30. Anagram of “Rental” 32. Funny 35. Unhappiness 39. Small 40. A Native American tent 41. Least difficult 43. After dinner treat 44. Change 46. Views 47. Vamoose 50. More recent 53. Gossip 54. Hotel 55. A ribbed woven fabric 60. Hindu princess 61. Advantageous
63. Therefore 64. Anagram of “Sire” 65. Groin 66. Biblical garden 67. A covered garden walk 68. Malicious
DOWN 1. Deep cut 2. Competent 3. Swerve 4. Margarine 5. Lukewarm 6. A tribe of Israel 7. 1 less than a dozen 8. Helps 9. An amount of medicine 10. Resentment 11. Negatively charged particle 12. Smell 13. God of the underworld 18. Frozen 24. Henpeck 25. Yields 26. A period of discounted prices 27. Dogfish 28. Cashews and almonds 29. Appraisal 31. Tardy 33. Part of the small
intestine 34. Where a bird lives 36. Type of sword 37. Arid 38. Collections 42. Leather-making place 43. Morning moisture 45. Wimbledon sport 47. Sloping mass of loose rocks 48. Common beet 49. Cooktop 51. F 52. Train tracks 54. Wild goat 56. Computer symbol 57. 53 in Roman numerals 58. Territory 59. If not 62. Eastern Standard Time Ans to CrossWord 2988
DIMAPUR: 03862 232201/101 (O) 9436017479 (OC) CHUMUKEDIMA: 03862 282777/101 (O) 9856158740 (OC) WOKHA: 03860 242215/101 (O) 9862039399 (OC) MOKOKCHUNG: 0369 2226225/101 (O) 9436012949 (OC) PHEK: 8414853765 (O) 9862130954(OC) ZUNHEBOTO: 03867 280304/101 (O) 9856156876 (OC)
MON: 03869 251222/101 (O) 9436208480 (OC)
08974997923
KIPHIRE: 8414853767 (O) 8974304572 (OC)
Toll free No. 1098 childline
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KOHIMA: 0370 2222952/101 (O) 9402003086 (OC)
TUENSANG: 8414853766 (O) 8414853519
CHILD WELFARE COMMITTEE
MOKOKCHUNG:
FIRE STATIONS
STD CODE: 0369
Police Station 1: Police Station 2 :
2226241 2226214
Civil Hospital: Woodland Nursing Home: Hotel Metsüpen (Tourist Lodge):
2226216 2226263 2226373/2229343
TAHAMzAM (formerly Senapati) STD CODE: 03871 Police Station: Fire Brigade
222246 222491
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The Morung Express
I
Monday 1 September 2014
Dimapur
Watinaro, Sit-in Protest and Change
n Nagaland, one is used to power welding through political and bureaucratic wheeling and dealing under the table, behind closed doors and sometimes blatantly. The two supposedly independent estates - the legislative and the executive does so in the generic name of development, peace and prosperity. Nothing wrong with the stated objectives but surely the means can be questioned and requires stringent scrutiny. But judicial, the other estate seems to be almost muted. Notwithstanding, the political movement, that truly found its genesis on the enormous sacrifice and foresight of the founding fathers, comes closest to our national pride, duty and reverence, but now turning to a mockery because of the acrimonious fractions and actions of the splintered political factions. All these compound to the sorry state of the societal being. Truth be told, these estates in Nagaland settle uneasily as strange bedfellows, sometimes unrecognizable from each other in their interest and collaboration but for the office they represent which had become a system, coveted by many, ridiculed, scorned and abused by almost all rather than hallowed and respected. With public almost accepting such nexus and dealings as the norm, the functioning had eroded the value-system of fairness, transparency and justice in governance. With an indifferent public after all the false promises, the corruption, the burden of the reality, and highhandedness of the bourgeois, these elites go on with their business free-rein. Their bastions of power seem almost indomitable. So in tune with the norm, a student candidate with the right backing and background pushed aside the deserving candidate and snatched her seat to the DYSP University in Himachal Pradesh for B.Sc Horticulture. The long enjoyed script in Nagaland is to sweep aside people who come from the lower tier of the societal rung, representing the majority, by those in power with no rue when they can, when people stand in their interest. The candidate and his family unfortunately followed the script but underestimated the spirit of the deserving girl. And boy, what a spirit it was! The fact that another candidate has taken the seat of the deserving student is not surprising and nothing new. What is un-precedent is the response of Watinaro, the victim. When she first went to the highest official, not once, but twice and to various offices to address her problem and point out the misdeeds, the door were firmly closed and locked to shun her out. But when she refused to go, instead of giving what had been taken from her wrongfully, attempts were made to pacify and smothered
Sustaining Pursuit of Truth & Justice in Nagaland
her with other alternatives. Undeterred she stood her ground and to her principles. Then she declared her intentions to protest against the blatant corruption and manipulation and system by staging a Gandhian sit-in protest and sent out a public appeal. Watinaro, with simple clarity appealed: Since then, all my efforts for my rightful admission to the said University has being unjustly delayed and denied by the so called “official” procedure… I am left behind struggling for my legitimate rights for my career…to fight for my rights which will pave way for a corruption free future for all the future Naga students. I feel that this is not only my struggle but a common struggle for all the Student bodies, Naga students, their parents, concern NGOs and like-minded citizens, so as to put an end to this kind of corruption. It is also to show to the world that the democratic voice of the public matters and becomes a precedence over corruption. Justice delayed is Justice denied. When the response from the public to her appeal was overwhelming, the table turned. But some support were withdrawn, fearful of the ramification thereafter, from these elites. The fight for fairness and justice were sacrificed at the altar of fear, self-serving interest and kinship. Pressure was on from many sides and put on Watinaro and her family, some maybe, well intended. But Watinaro held her own and stage her non-violence protest in the most amazing way. She picked the Secretariat, the space and epitome that symbolize the drizzling bureaucratic power situated in Kohima, the capital that wield the whole State. This was something unheard of in Nagaland. And in doing so Watinaro has become the face and the voice of the discontent public who for too long had been pushover by the government and its system. She represent a generation that refuses to be coaxed and cowed by the intricate web of lies, deceit, power abuse and proxy- money that puts fairness and justice for sale. In fighting for her right to her acquired technical seat, she was challenging the system of corruption that has permeate to almost every aspect of Naga society; she was appealing to the moral consciousness of the Naga public; she was exposing the blatant double-standard of individuals, unions or federations who advocates for the welfare of the people and students but wash their hand and stands on the fence, unwilling to get into the bad books of these elites. She has poked unsuspectingly perhaps, the crux of the powerful nexus that schemes, plot and make the public bleed. Who have thought, that a young girl of just eighteen with
nothing to show but her brilliance through sheer dedication and hard work would rattle the bureaucracy at its highest echelon? She was bullied and pushed out but she refused to go quietly, be defeated or trampled. She decided instead to fight in a way never witnessed in Nagaland- not with guns, not with money, not through political backing or begging but appealing to human sense of justice and fairness, and what a precedent it was. That said, to be at the receiving end of rampant corruption and be the symbol of the fight against that cause is a big cross to carry upon the tender shoulder of Watinaro. Watinaro should not be staging a sit-in protest that day, the 19th August but be stationed in her university, attending her Horticulture degree classes and meandering in her business and doing normal things what a student her age should be doing. She was pushed and dragged to the public sphere because of the injustice meted on to her and did she take it on with great dignity and courage. On 19th itself in public glare and under pressure the lone seat in Dr YSP University for B.Sc Horticulture, a quota allotted to Nagaland state was once again allotted to Watinaro, which was rightfully hers at the first place based on her meritorious selection. For the second time she packed her bags and got the early morning train to leave for Himachal Pradesh two days after her victory. The following week she was successfully admitted to the seat. A small step taken against corruption. A huge victory for Watinaro and those who stand for fair means and justice. It is not the end. It can only be the beginning. But what a refreshing, hopeful journey it can be. Yes, this is Watinaro giving a human face, a symbol to the people’s movement against corruption and blatant manipulations. Yes, it is a message loud and clear that the government and its functionaries could not take the public for cheap joy-rides. It is a voice that Nagas had enough. Most importantly the voice from Watinaro, the response during her protest and the reaction from the public through the media- visual and print and other media delivers hope that the value for a fair equitable society can still be aspired and fought for in Nagaland. And SHE is a girl, from a low-income family and so a nobody in Nagaland world of wheeling and dealing and SHE has taken Nagaland by storm. In such wind of change, women participation in decision-making in public sphere can’t be too far off, can it? Public are not longer muted spectators, aren’t they? The younger
generations are doing the unthinkable and making a stand, aren’t they? The victims are no longer willing to be taken to the gallows, wallow in their self-pity and complaints, aren’t they? The high towers of those bourgeois who are immune to the cries of the people are flustered, aren’t they? It may be mentioned that since the academic year 1994-95 all state quota for all sorts of technical seats are filled up through the Department, Higher and Technical Education now after it bifurcation assigned to the Directorate of Technical Education (DTE) as the nodal authority. No other authority, Government Department nor North East Council (NEC) is authorized with that power as of today. To think, promote, manipulate and mislead otherwise so to serve ones interest is not only ethically wrong but violation of Government regulation. One may also remember that routine exam takes place in every respective college; the brilliance and merit of students in such exams are respected and not questioned. But as mentioned allocation of technical studies against Nagaland state quota after exams based on merit is done only through DTE so a fair chance is given to all irrespective of background and status, thereby encouraging excellence. In this respect, when the procedure laid down are followed there can be no confusion. Manipulation can create only more confusion. Unless the pursuit of excellence is encouraged, individually and collectively, a society can never truly progress. For any student and their family to explore and avail the opportunity of a seat in any institution in India or internationally in their individual capacity is a private affair. But to manipulate the seat quota of the state through various justification and means must not be tolerated for the sake of excellence, progress and fairness in Nagaland or any society for that matter. ACAUT media cell released the six point resolution representation submitted to the Chief Minister in the presence of other top brass bureaucrats. The apology by the Chief Secretary is admirable and commendable. In addition, firstly if any concern authorities or Department wanted to avail seat, Horticulture or any other for that matter, against Nagaland quota, then it should be open and transparent to all deserving students through competitive merit exam under DTE. Secondly, it is just right that Watinaro be compensated by the Government for her precious energy and time spend; money wasted from her meager budget; classes she had missed; mental trauma and tension
caused; and emotional stress inflicted which is no fault of hers but for manipulation of the system by the powerful whose self-interest and dealing conflicted simply because Watinaro had the ability to make it to the merit list and that could not be accepted. Not that money will be enough to pay off but this symbolic gesture is an acknowledgment of the injustice meted upon an innocent girl. Finally, there should be a thorough investigation into how this outrage discrepancy was allowed to happen at the first place. Watinaro is the hero here and deserves all applause for her courage and spirit. But I must mention her family, specially her aunt; the Nagaland media; Z. Lohe, former President NSF for his bold unbiased writeup; Yaongyimsen Union, all other frontal organizations and individuals specially ACAUT who responded so selflessly. The courage, vision and leadership of all the concerned parties are laudable. It just goes to show that such action is a collective effort if we must make it sustainable and an ongoing process. Interesting things are happening in Nagaland. Some-things are shifting in Nagaland. We may not expect the moon just yet, but I know change is there somewhere in the air. Don’t you feel it? The public, the so call subaltern and the generation Watinaro represents are speaking, some shouting, some singing in unison, slowly but surely it is happening. We remain hopeful. This in itself is a wonderful gift. And who can take this away from us. So then, how can we keep the steady momentum to continuously fight for a just society and this precious spirit alive? In Nagaland more often than not any issue and contention between individuals or group takes the tone of tribal lines instead of thoughtful assessment and working towards a fair, just agreement and direction to change. On the other hand, if the contending parties are from the same tribe, the numerous union of the respective group normally pacify and hush up the issue behind closed doors with the rationale that our dirty linen should not be washed in public for all other community to belittle us, lest we lost our self-inflated estimation in their eye. Such sense of identity, pride, sacrifice and allegiance is important. It has brought us thus far. But such must not take precedence over justice and truth. This time in Watinaro dharna, mentioned must be made of the fact that the unions and organizations of the contending parties who belong to the same community did not played such rationale and diktat. This is commendable.
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Nagas must grow into a society that encourages public spaces where freedom of expression can be informed and responsibly shared, respected and deliberated. Objective thinking, reflection, dialogue and decisions that take people and society beyond and above narrow allegiance, biases and misguided calculations should be undertaken as a serious enterprise. We must develop a social system where our kinship, our familiarity or allegiance to a said identity may not blind us to the rights and wrongs that occurs in our system. Our allegiances, identities and kinship must be build and sustained upon a foundation not because we blindly embrace and smother the wrongs and the injustices but we take a stand against the wrongs and make it right; and hence, our comradeship and camaraderie despite and inspite of it because we care enough. Otherwise it is a weak and a shallow foundation upon which the enormity of building a nation let alone society cannot be undertaken. It called for a structural change, a new thinking, thoughtful reflection and renewed vision. The various Naga units, organizations and federations starting from the very foundation- the villages must seriously take on their responsibility to address truth, honesty and justice and internalize its value into their functioning, system and way of life. Justice, truth and honesty much as they are a private, are also a collective public virtue. These virtues should be diligently pursued individually and collectively with humility, compassion and understanding. Otherwise there is a danger such campaign can lead Naga society rather into a vindictive cycle of anger, resentment, revenge and elimination. How do the churches in Nagaland speak out clearly the issue of morality of right and wrong in adherence to the biblical foundation of truth, justice and mercy? How do the Naga Christian individuals and families apply these moral values in everyday lives? How do we imprint these virtues into our Naga value-system? How do we translate this in our governance? How do the various individuals and organization working for these noble causes transform themselves, individuals and society? These questions need to be processed with humility, continuously and reflectively, individually and collectively. Otherwise the casualness, the recklessness, the pretence and the selfrighteous stance that can characterize such pursuit may become be a futile exercise. For comments and feedbacks toshinaro.longchar@gmail.com Toshinaro Longchar Dimapur, Nagaland
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.
MEx FILE SSUD greets on Mongmong
Dimapur, august 31 (mExN): Sangtam Students’ Union Dimapur (SSUD) has wished all the Sangtams a very happy Mongmong. The SSUD through its president V Lumpise Sangtam hoped that the community would celebrate the Festival with spirit of love and brotherhood that would uphold peace, prosperity, and tranquility among the members.
DMC, DTCC awareness campaign on tobacco
Labour union changes nomenclature Dimapur, august 31 (mExN): The Nagaland Mazdoor Sangha has changed its nomenclature to that of Dimapur Mazdoor Society, as a registered society under Home Department (Regd. No. H/Rs-5707), with effect from August 31. This was announced in its meeting held at society office in Thakur Bari, Dimapur today. A press release received here informed. Addressing the meeting, president of the labour union Vikheho Zhimomi
stated that erstwhile Nagaland Mazdoor Sangha covered the entire state, which is vast and because of which it was difficult to cover the whole of the state and in order to ensure smooth functioning of the organization, it was felt necessary to confine itself for the welfare and interest of the labourers of the commercial hub. He added that the well being of a town largely depends on the labour force. Khehovi Chophi, secretary of the
society said anyone providing labour work for any business establishment or private sectors and as well as those daily wage labourers within Dimapur fall under the umbrella of Dimapur Mazdoor Society and therefore the need to register with the society for their own benefit. Registration of the labourers and sardars would commence from 2nd week of September 2014 at the society’s office, the release informed.
Miss Phek Beauty Pageant 2014
Dimapur, august 31 (mExN): Dimapur Municipal Council and District Tobacco Control Cell, Dimapur are jointly organizing an awareness campaign on Cigarette and Other Tobacco Products Act 2003 (COTPA) amongst the hoteliers/restaurants/ tobacco products dealers and pan shops on September 2 at 11.30 am in Holy Cross Higher Secondary School auditorium, Dimapur.
SBTA convenes emergency meeting
Dimapur, august 31 (mExN): The Sümi Baptist Theological Association (SBTA) has convened an emergency meeting on September 9 at 10 am. The meeting will be hosted by Unity Village Sümi Baptist Akukuhou (formerly Sugar Mill Village), 5th Mile, Dimapur, near Green Park. All the office bearers and executive members have been requested to attend the meeting positively to discuss the pending agendas from the first meeting.
NTTA elects officials
Kohima, august 31 (mExN): The Nagaland Table Tennis Association (NTTA) had a felicitation cum handing & taking over programme on August 19 last. Following new team of officials were elected for the tenure 2014-2017: President – K Tiayanger Tzudir, vice president (Administration) – Kezhaletuo Angami, vice president (Development) – Vikuo Metha, general secretary – Swelul Pucho, joint secretary – Moasashi, joint secretary – Limaakum Ao, joint secretary-cum-treasurer – Tepuruku Sothu, and publicity & information secretary – Kethose Chuzho. Executive members: Tiatemsu Imchen, Sunup Imchen, Khupo Kezo and Kerihosa Natso. Advisors: P. Atuo Mezhur and Dr. Asalie Khiezhie.
Rotary club and Rotaract club of Dimapur organized a voluntary blood donation camp in association with Model Blood Bank, Dimapur district hospital on August 31 at Rotary Centre, Dimapur. Members of both the clubs as well as citizens of Dimapur donated 21 units of blood under the supervision of Dr. Temsu.
Juniors' Day of St Francis Xavier Church Kidima held
Kohima, august 31 (mExN): St Francis Xavier Church Kidima observed the 24th Juniors' Day with Reverend Father Thomas Muttathil, Parish Priest as main celebrant under theme of “Rejoice always” (I Thessalonians 5:16) on August 30 and 31 at the Church premises. A press release received here stated that Reverend Father Thomas Muttathil in the introductory note said Jesus was the leader of the peoples through carrying his cross. Muttathil in his homily asked the parents on the day to encourage and support their children to be good Christian that would bring in return joy, happiness and peace in the society. The release added that Muttathil chal-
lenged the faithful people to be united. Urging the children to study hard, be obedient and helpful to their parents, the father also told the children that they control their own future and career. Muttathil reminded the large gathering of people that each possessed different kinds of talent and urged them to use it for the greater glory of God and good of the society. The children were divided into three groups - St. Ezekiel, St. Benedict and St. George - and they competed in skits, quiz and recitations on Holy Bible, mono act, hymn competition (solo, quartet and group). Eucharist, felicitation and mass amusement followed by fellowship meal were the other events.
Kohima, august 31 (mExN): The Elite Club, Phek is presenting Miss Phek Beauty Pageant 2014 on September 18 at Phek town hall from 5:30 pm onwards. Miss Phek title winner will pocket a cash prize of Rs. 70,000 along with gift hampers while the 1st and 2nd runner-up will receive Rs. 50,000 and Rs. 30,000 respectively. Sub-title winners will also get Rs. 5000 each. Gift hampers will be given to all the contestants. Minister for PWD (Roads & Bridge) and Parliamentary Affairs Kuzholuzo (Azo) Nienu will be the special guest while Minister for Forest, Environment and Wildlife Dr. Neikiesalie (Nicky) Kire will make a ‘special appearance’. Sekuzo Sovenyi will be the season designer while Rosou Rhi (Designer) will be the chief judge. Choreographer will be Dovine Venuh (Former Miss Nagaland 1st runner-up). For further information, call 9436204877/ 8732892402 or email to elitephek@gmail.com.
JD (U) State Unit executive meeting held Dimapur, august 31 (mExN): The JD (U) State Unit held its executive meeting on August 30, where it discussed, among other issues, the Prime Minister Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY) scheme and the Ralan area issue. A press release from Nagaland State Unit Janata Dal (United) President, Mhonjan Lotha informed that JD (U) appreciates the initiative of Prime Minister, Narendra Modi for launching his government "Mega Scheme" PMJDY all over India to provide banking and credit facilities to the poor. In this regard, the JD (U) has appealed to the authorities, banking officials, and all concern village council / colony Chairman, secretaries and GBs to cooperate with the directives and ensure 100 percent
success of the NDA propoor initiative. With regard to Ralan area issue, the JD (U) appreciated the Chief Ministers and Home Ministers of both the states of Nagaland and Assam for taking prompt measures by bringing the situation under control and agreeing to resolve the issues by forming a joint mechanism to monitor the situation until it arrives at mutual understanding based on ground realities between the land owners and the tenants. The JD (U) further urged upon the State Government of Nagaland to deploy adequate state IR and police force to safeguard life and properties of the effected villages till the situation is brought under normalcy.
greetings Dear Elibo!!! On this special day, I wish you all the very best, all the joy you can ever have and may you be blessed abundantly today, tomorrow and the days to come! May you have a fantastic birthday and many more to come... HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! Loving Mom,Dad, Afo Avity & Achi. Dearest Suiyi (Birth-Day Gal), Many many happy returns of the day...! May you keep shining with your cheerful nature & may the Good Lord bless you with a long and prosperous life. With luv & Prayer Always Tinggum.
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IN-FOCUS
The Power of Truth
The Morung Express
THE EDIT PAGE
C O M M E N T A R Y
John Feffer Foreign Policy In Focus
The Plague
MonDAy 1 SEPTEMbEr 2014 voluME IX ISSuE 240
Along Longkumer Consulting Editor
Timely, Pro-People ACAUT Movement and HPC
T
he Government of Nagaland has finally done justice and taken a pro-people and timely decision to set up a High Powered Committee (HPC) to “inquire into illegal and multiple taxations in the State” as was the demand of the mass based movement—Against Corruption and Unabated Taxation (ACAUT). The demand of the ACAUT for constituting the HPC had been pending for nearly a year with the previous government under Neiphiu Rio, unable to take a favorable decision. We need to therefore applaud the present government under the leadership of the Chief Minister and Chief Secretary for this very important decision and coming at a time when collective effort and political will is required towards solving the various ills plaguing our national, social and political system. The problem of illegal taxation is not confined to a few group or people alone but is all pervading, something of a popular culture in Naga society, involving a web of elements and having a criss-crossing effect on our everyday lives. This is perhaps the first time in our history that we will have the opportunity to study the problem in-depth and seek correction. The HPC will therefore undertake a very important exercise through the next three months and everyone should support it and look forward to what the HPC will offer in terms of the problem i.e. its proper diagnosis and remedy. Since the Government notification, while mentioning about the “numerous complaints” from the public and civil societies against illegal and multiple taxations, has called for going into the “genesis, the causes and conditions which facilitate such harmful practices”, the HPC may have to draw a time-line—the list of events or circumstances that may explain the increasing trend of such illegal and multiple taxations. One of the arguments is that the large scale extortion culture prevalent in our midst is because of loopholes in the ceasefire currently in operation between the Government of India and some of the Naga Political Groups (NPGs). This angle has to be probed. There have been demand in the past by Naga civil society to “flush out all Naga undergrounds from civilian populated areas”. If at all the unabated taxation and the proliferation of factions are to be blamed on the present ceasefire regime, perhaps the ceasefire itself will need a re-look and improvement to the extent of even providing some kind of ‘sustenance’ to the undergrounds as was suggested in the past from certain quarters. In this regard, the pre and post ceasefire years will have to be studied besides of-course the absence of a strong government (rule of law) and the governance deficit. Coming back to the notification on the formation of the HPC and its term of reference, perhaps some clarity is required on whether ‘illegal and multiple taxations’ will also include the practice of cuts and commissions widely prevalent in the State government system. If not, why should this be overlooked given that both extortion and corruption are detrimental to our common well being. What quality of work can one expect when commissions have to be first paid? While we may condemn the so called ‘extortions’ of the underground groups or the illegal and multiple taxations of various other agencies, one cannot look the other way when it comes to the equally corrupt state machinery. Here an important point mentioned in the terms of reference is that the HPC will also study the adverse impact of “illegal collection” in various forms on the resource mobilization efforts of the State Government. This will naturally mean that the HPC will not be able to ignore the case of State sponsored corruption and how the rampant misuse of public funds has had a detrimental effect on our limited resources and the abject quality of life and development deficit. It will be perhaps right to say that studying the problem of “illegal and multiple taxations” will require a comprehensive approach and to look at the totality of cause and effect. Similarly the remedy may lie in a complete overhaul of the present systems and a moral awakening of our people. (Feedback can be sent to consultingeditormex@gmail.com)
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Anurag Dey IANS
Child crusader's story to inspire the world
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er defiance against an age-old custom developed into a campaign that caught the imagination of the nation. And now anti-child marriage crusader Rekha Kalindi will rub shoulders with Malala Yousafzai and Anne Frank in a book that tells the tales of how they changed the world. The story of this braveheart from West Bengal's Purulia district, conferred the National Bravery Award for refusing to be a child bride and inspiring many of her ilk, features in the "Kinderen Die De Wereled Hebben Veranderd" (Children Who Changed the World), a Dutch book to be released Nov 20 to mark the 25th anniversary of the UN Declaration of the Rights of the Child. Written by renowned Dutch journalists and historians, the book portrays the heroics of 20 children who stood up against injustice or became a symbol of injustice done to them and includes the likes of Pakistani education activist Malala Yousafzai and holocaust diarist Anne Frank. Talking about Rekha's story - the only one from India Aletta Andre who has penned the chapter on her, elaborated about the 16-year-old's efforts to inspire nearly 10,000 girls in the district to pursue their studies and not to concede to their families' demand of an early marriage. "It's not only about her own defiance but also about how she counselled and inspired a lot of other girls to do the same. At least 10,000 in Purulia district have resisted child marriage and her story has been also mentioned in a Class V textbook," Andre, a Delhi-based Dutch journalist, told IANS on the phone. Considered a liability, her parents had planned to marry Rekha off at 11 to get rid of "their burden". But having seen her elder sister suffer as she became a mother at 12, the idea of marriage terrified Rekha and eventually led her to revolt that created history. Conferring the Bravery award in 2009, the then president Pratibha Patil had described Rekha as a "messenger of social change". At the age of four Rekha started working, rolling beedis along with her mother. Now a class 10 student of Jhalda Satyabhama Vidyapith, she actively campaigns against child labour and child marriage. Ecstatic about being part of the book, Rekha at the same time is distraught for she can read only Bengali and not Dutch. "I heard the book is in some other language which I cannot read. I am sad at that, but I am also very happy that my story will be read by foreigners," Rekha told IANS. Aspiring to be a teacher and preparing hard for her board exams, Rekha insists her job has just begun. "There is so much poverty; many girls have to work because of which they don't get time to study. I wish a day comes when all of us will go to school without having to worry about work," added Rekha. Unicef, which has been working to curb the menace of child marriage, expressed happiness at Rekha's contribution getting international recognition and hoped this would inspire and create many a crusader like her. "This is surely a proud moment for all of us and I hope it creates many a Rekhas to fight out the menace of child marriage and child labour," Asadur Rahman, head of Unicef's field office, told IANS.
Liberian health workers outside a home of a man that they believed died from the Ebola virus in Monrovia, Liberia. The Ebola outbreak in West Africa eventually could exceed 20,000 cases, more than six times as many as are now known, the World Health Organization said. A new plan released by the U.N. health agency to stop Ebola also assumes that the actual number of cases in many hard-hit areas may be two to four times higher than currently reported. (AP Photo/Abbas Dulleh)
The twin plagues of ISIS and Ebola thrive on the breakdown of the existing order
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n his novel The Plague, Albert Camus describes how death comes to an ugly French port in Algeria. Thanks to an infestation of rats and the fleas they carry, the bubonic plague descends upon the city in the spring and intensifies during the hot summer. After a short period of denial, the residents panic, then sink into despondency and alcoholism. The port is put under quarantine. Undeterred by the apathy of the population and the danger of exposure, a small number of courageous individuals mobilize to fight the epidemic and eventually beat back the invader. Camus took great care to detail the symptoms of the disease. But for all his medical exactitude, the French writer was not primarily interested in epidemiology. His inspiration was a different kind of infection. The novel is set some time in the 1940s. The plague is Nazism, and those who fight the disease stand in for the heroes of the French Resistance. It is a supremely apt allegory, for did not the Nazis claim that their victims were vermin? Camus surely must have enjoyed reincarnating the German fascists as the lowest of the low: bloodsucking fleas and desperate rats. The twin plagues of Nazism and bubonic plague, except for some isolated cases, are behind us. But now it seems that a different pair of plagues is in our midst. Today’s headlines are filled with similar stories of the spread of death and destruction in the Middle East and Africa. American commentators worry that these plagues will burst their borders and somehow spread to these shores. And, as in Camus’s novel, these diseases point to something larger, not the imposition of a new malignant system but the breakdown of the existing order. In West Africa, the plague is Ebola, a terrifying fever that ends in massive hemorrhaging. The mortality rate, if untreated, is as high as bubonic plague. But at least with the modern version of the Black Death, treatment brings the mortality rate down to 15 percent. Ebola, by contrast, resists treatment. There are no vaccines for this hemorrhagic fever—though there’s promising news out of Canada—and the few treatments that have been used remain highly experimental. Doctors and officials establish quarantines and hope the disease will burn itself out. With airlines shutting down service to the infected region, hampering efforts to deliver medical supplies, the disease continues to rage on. Ebola has so far claimed around 1,500 lives. This is terrible, of course, but it pales in comparison to how many children succumb to diarrhea in Africa. According to a 2010 report, 2,000 African children die every day of a disease that can be prevented through relatively cheap methods: safe water and hygiene. But diarrhea is not a communicable disease in the same sense as the plague or Ebola. And no one in the United States wor-
E
ven people at significant risk for heart attacks and strokes can take an active role in reducing their own high blood pressure, by measuring it themselves and adjusting their medications, according to a new study from the UK. Researchers found that patients who closely monitored their own blood pressure and medications, using detailed instructions from their doctors, lowered their readings more than patients who relied on their healthcare providers to take periodic readings and make medication changes. “We’ve previously done a study with a group of people with uncomplicated hypertension (or high blood pressure),” said Dr. Richard McManus, the report’s lead author. “We wanted to see if that intervention would also work with people with greater coronary heart disease and in the elderly.” The intervention consisted of patients creating a detailed plan with their doctor, measuring their own blood pressure daily and adjusting their medications according to their blood pressure readings and instructions in the plan. This new approach resulted in better management and lower blood pressure after a year, in part because doctors tend to be reluctant to change medications based on blood pressure readings recorded at a single healthcare visit, the researchers suggest. Healthcare providers don't always act on readings that are above target, McManus said.
ries that a summit of African leaders or the repatriation of infected patients will spread an epidemic of diarrhea stateside. Ebola monopolizes the headlines because what grabs attention is fear (along with the usual colonial images of Africans as dirty and irresponsible). The panic is, of course, more acute in the areas hardest hit by Ebola. Consider the case of Kandeh Kamara, a brave 21-year-old who volunteered to help fight the disease in Sierra Leone. He was promptly drafted to become a “burial boy” responsible for dealing with the corpses of the infected. “In doing their jobs, the burial boys have been cast out of their communities because of fear that they will bring the virus home with them,” writes Adam Nossiter and Ben Solomon in a powerful piece in The New York Times. Talk about thankless tasks. Kandeh Kamara initially received no payment for his work and had to beg for food on the street. He now gets $6 a day and hopes to rent an apartment, though landlords often refuse to lease to the burial boys. Ebola is bad news, but it hasn’t generated the same kind of fury as that other fast-spreading scourge, namely the Islamic State (IS). The recent beheading of U.S. journalist James Foley has ratcheted up the outrage of U.S. observers. It’s certainly not the first beheading that IS has done. The group specializes in meting out barbarous punishments—decapitation, crucifixion, amputations. But just as Ebola’s impact became real for Americans when it infected people “like us”—two U.S. missionaries in Liberia—the United States was prompted to act against IS when it began killing non-Muslims, first the stranded Yazidis and then the abducted journalist. IS has spread quickly, and so has the panic that has accompanied its territorial acquisition. There have been the inevitable analogies to Nazism. But even those who don’t invoke Hitler are quick to use Manichean language to describe the IS challenge. “We can see evil through the eye slits of the ski mask worn by Foley’s killer,” writes David Ignatius in a Washington Post commentary entitled The New Battle Against Evil. “But stopping that evil is a harder task.” The IS killers are a nasty piece of work, and their ideology is thoroughly malign. But I hesitate to use the language of good and evil. Such moralistic terminology presumes that they, the beheaders, are a Satanic force that can only be exorcised with whatever version of holy water our angelic forces dispense—air strikes, boots on the ground, military aid to the Kurdish peshmerga, efforts in the community to dissuade angry young men from taking the next flight to Mosul. We, on the other hand, are good. We would never behead anyone. Those we execute “deserve” their punishment (though the occasional innocent person might inadvertently fall through the cracks). And the civilian casualties from our military offensives, because we are by definition good, are simply mistakes. After all, we don’t publicly celebrate the deaths of Afghan civilians from our drone strikes (45 in 2013 alone) or the deaths of over 400 children in Gaza. But our protestations of innocence are little consolation to the families of the victims. At what point do mistakes aggregate into something evil? At the very least, do they prevent us from claiming the mantle of good? And, of course, it’s not just the mistakes that are problematic but also the
deliberate policies that, for instance, align Washington with dictators and other murderous actors. U.S. disgust with IS may already have prompted intelligence sharing with the regime in Damascus, though the Obama administration has denied such deals. Camus had some choice words for those who are reluctant to call evil by its name. “Our townsfolk were like everybody else, wrapped up in themselves; in other words they were humanists: they disbelieved in pestilences,” he wrote in The Plague. “A pestilence isn’t a thing made to man’s measure; therefore we tell ourselves that pestilence is a mere bogy of the mind, a bad dream that will pass away. But it doesn’t always pass away and, from one bad dream to another, it is men who pass away, and the humanists first of all, because they haven’t taken their precautions.” Humanists perhaps disbelieve in pestilences. “I used to not believe in evil,” confesses Richard Cohen this week in a Washington Post column declaring a “return of evil” with ISIS. Once a liberal humanist, Cohen long ago remade himself into a liberal hawk. I still consider myself a humanist. But my brand of humanism sees pestilence everywhere. Indeed, I tend to see pestilence not only in the acts of individuals but in the structures within which the plague takes root and spreads. And this is where the two plagues intersect, Ebola and IS. They both prosper where the immune system is weak. When it comes to medical infrastructure, Africa definitely has a compromised immune system. The continent has been hit hard by HIV/AIDS (70 percent of those living with HIV are in Africa), cholera (major outbreaks took place recently in Senegal, Zimbabwe, and Sierra Leone), and malaria (an African child dies every minute from this disease). Ebola has spread rapidly because of critical shortages in medical staff and supplies. But the deeper reason is environmental: the clearcutting of forests that have served as a traditional barrier to pathogens. West Africa has one of the fastest rates of deforestation in the world, losing nearly a million hectares a year. The forests are Africa’s natural defenses, and Ebola is a sign that these defenses have been fatally weakened. What used to stay in remote villages now spreads quickly to urban areas. The recent victories of IS in Syria and Iraq, meanwhile, suggest not a breakdown in the environmental system but in the political one. IS is not simply a band of serial killers. They have a distinct ideology and set of political motives. Nor does it matter whether they are operating in a formally dictatorial or democratic environment. IS thrives both where Assad rules with an iron fist and where Saddam is long gone. The common denominator is chaos. IS has ruthlessly expanded in the grey areas beyond the reach of the rule of law. In Syria, it has prospered in regions that already broke loose from the country during the uprising. In Iraq, it took advantage of a paralyzing conflict between Shi’a and Sunni that left the northern reaches of the country tenuously connected to the central government. Local governance, whether it’s democratic or authoritarian, serves the same function as the forests of West Africa. Such governance holds society together. When it deteriorates, the very cellular structure breaks down. In Ebola, the cell walls fray and the patient bleeds out. With a virus like IS, the fibers of the social fabric fray and large sections of the country bleed out. There are, of course, many differences between a pestilence like Ebola and a movement like IS. But they are both the result of systemic breakdown. They are opportunistic infections. In both cases there are no magic pills. Even if we come up with an antidote to this version of Ebola, as long as we continue to cut down the forests of Africa, more potent versions will continue to appear and spread. And if we attempt to obliterate IS only with bombs or boots on the ground, it will simply pop up somewhere else where the conditions favor such desperate efforts to create a totalitarian order. Instead we should focus on the conditions that give rise to these phenomena—and our role in helping to perpetuate these conditions. Camus recommended vigilance. Pestilence, he concluded, “bides its time in bedrooms, cellars, trunks, and bookshelves and…perhaps the day would come when, for the bane and the enlightening of men, it would rouse up its rats again and send them forth to die in a happy city.” The current plagues have certainly been a bane. Whether they also help to enlighten us remains to be seen. John Feffer is the director of Foreign Policy In Focus
Self management may reduce blood pressure: study Andrew M. Seaman Reuters Health He and his colleague write in JAMA that other studies have found self monitoring of blood pressure may result in lower readings and many people in the UK already monitor their own blood pressure. For the new study, the researchers enrolled 552 patients with high blood pressure and a history of other significant health problems, such as strokes, heart attacks, diabetes and kidney disease. The patients were recruited from 59 doctors’ offices in the UK and participated in the trial between 2011 and 2013. Normal blood pressure is considered to be a systolic (the top number) reading of 120 millimeters of mercury (mmHg) or less and a diastolic (the bottom number) of 80 mmHg or less, according to the U.S. National Institutes of Health. High blood pressure is usually defined as a systolic reading above 140 mmHg and a diastolic reading of 90m mmHg or more. Any reading between the normal and high categories is considered to be "prehypertension." Half of the patients were assigned to take
part in the intervention and the other half were assigned to receive usual care, which consisted of periodic visits to their doctors for blood pressure readings and medication adjustment. At the beginning of the study, the participants in each group had an average blood pressure reading of about 144 mmHg over about 80 mmHg. Among patients in the self-management group, the number and types of medications taken tended to increase, so that after 12 months, they were taking, on average, 3.3 doses of medication a day compared to 2.6 in the usual care group. After 12 months, the systolic reading fell in both groups, but significantly more among those who took their own readings and managed their own medications. People in the usual care group saw their average systolic reading fall to about 138 mmHg after one year, compared to 128 mmHg among those in the intervention group. “These differences in blood pressure that were observed in this study were quite substantial,” said Dr. Steven Nissen, chairman of the Robert and Su-
wRiTE-wiNg
zanne Tomsich Department of Cardiovascular Medicine located on the main campus of Cleveland Clinic in Ohio. Any reduction in blood pressure of more than 2 or 3 mmHg is a noticeable difference, said Nissen, who wasn’t involved in the new study but coauthored a commentary on it in the journal. While the results can’t prove whether those in the intervention group went on to have fewer strokes and heart attacks, Nissen said lower blood pressure is tied to better long-term outcomes. He cautioned that not every person with blood pressure problems will be able to handle their own readings or medication management. “It just means you can’t go into every community and expect every patient to have the sophistication and means to follow this type of algorithm,” Nissen said. He added that people have difficulty controlling their blood pressure for a variety of reasons – not just that doctors won’t adjust medication during office visits. For example, Nissen said, people in the U.S. may also have trouble accessing healthcare and affording prescriptions. He said self treatment is a potential option, however. “There are a lot of people out there with high blood pressure - a significant number of them (are) still above targeted readings despite treatment,” McManus said. “This is an intervention that could be used in those people.” He cautioned, however, that people need to talk with their doctors about this type of blood pressure management and should not attempt it on their own.
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PERSPECTIVE
7 The Fall and Rise of Investigative Journalism
Monday
THE MORUNG EXPRESS
1 September 2014
NEWS ANALYSIS, FEATURE AND DISCOURSE
From Asia to Africa to Latin America, muckrakers have corrupt officials and corporate cronies on the run
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The future of news is anticipation
anya Schiffrin
“Our interests are temporal, as is the news cycle. But those two don’t always align perfectly”
CommonDreams
amy Webb
n our world, the news about the news is often grim. Newspapers are shrinking, folding up, or being cut loose by their parent companies. Layoffs are up and staffs are down. That investigative reporter who covered the state capitol -- she’s not there anymore. Newspapers like the Los Angeles Times, the Washington Post, and the Chicago Tribune have suffered from multiple rounds of layoffs over the years. You know the story and it would be easy enough to imagine that it was the world’s story as well. But despite a long run of journalistic tough times, the loss of advertising dollars, and the challenge of the Internet, there’s been a blossoming of investigative journalism across the globe from Honduras to Myanmar, New Zealand to Indonesia. Woodward and Bernstein may be a fading memory in this country, but journalists with names largely unknown in the U.S. like Khadija Ismayilova, Rafael Marques, and Gianina Segnina are breaking one blockbuster story after another, exposing corrupt government officials and their crony corporate pals in Azerbaijan, Angola, and Costa Rica. As I travel the world, I’m energized by the journalists I meet who are taking great risks to shine much needed light on shadowy wrongdoing. And I’m not the only one to notice. “We are in a golden age of investigative journalism,” says Sheila Coronel. And she should know. Now the academic dean at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, Coronel was the director of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, whose coverage of the real estate holdings of former President Joseph Estrada -- including identical houses built for his mistresses -- contributed to his removal from office in 2001. These are, to take another example, the halcyon days for watchdog journalism in Brazil. Last October, I went to a conference of investigative journalists there organized by the Global Journalism Investigative Network. There were 1,350 attendees. In July, I was back for another conference, this time organized by the Association of Brazilian Investigative Journalists and attended by close to 450 reporters. Thanks in part to Brazil’s Freedom of Information Act and the “open budget” movement that seeks to shed light on the government’s finances (and let people have a say in how their tax dollars are spent), journalists there have been busy exposing widespread corruption in local government as well as a cash-for-votes scheme that resulted in the arrest of nine senior politicians. Cross-border news networks funded by foundations and philanthropists are carrying out similar investigations all over the world. Based in New York and edited by a Nigerian, Omoyele Sowore, Sahara Reporters uses leaked stories and documents to expose corruption in Africa’s richest country. Its funders include the Omidyar Network, created by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife, Pam, and its stated goal is nothing less than “seeking the truth and publishing it without fear or favor.” A group of students and I studied Sahara Reporters earlier this year. In our report, we described one typical story that outlet broke which detailed how then-Minister of Aviation Stella Oduah purchased two bulletproof BMWs -- at nearly double the normal price -- with funds from the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA). Sahara Reporters posted receipts of the purchases and documents linking Oduah to the scheme. It also located sources who testified that the whereabouts of the cars were unknown and that they were suspected of being employed for Oduah's private use. Meanwhile, Sahara Reporters exposed the budgetary constraints the NCAA was operating under and linked these to several air mishaps, including two crashes resulting in the deaths of 140 people. Oduah, who was already under fire for the NCAA’s poor performance, initially denied the accusations. Within days, however, numerous news outlets had picked up the story and run with it. The reports triggered a series of reactions from the government, opposing political parties, civil society organizations, and the Nigerian public. Earlier this year, Oduah was fired. Honorable Mentions In recent years, I’ve been a judge for the human rights reporting awards given out by the Overseas Press Club in New York. You should see the staggering pile of entries. It takes days to read through them all. Our major “problem”: an overabundance of top-notch report-
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ne of the most important trends going into 2014 is the wave of sophisticated algorithms and processes that will forever change how journalism is both created and consumed. They are inherently social, but not in the way you may think. And they rely on the vast repositories of data we generate each time we connect, whether that’s searching Google for a restaurant, wishing friends happy birthday on Facebook, or posting an in-line annotation on Medium. This past year, we saw the first anticipatory computing opportunities in Google Now, which originally launched as part of the Android operating system, and an app called MindMeld, created by former MIT researcher and current Expect Labs CEO Tim Tuttle. In short, apps like Google Now and MindMeld observe the last few minutes of your thought process in order to predict the next 10 seconds. In the case of Google Now, if you’ve been searching Google for information about the new movie Inside Llewyn Davis and then ask it “Where is it playing?” Google Now assumes you want to know the nearest movie theater, times, and perhaps even directions on how to get there from where you’re standing. MindMeld offers something even more exciting. When users are connected, it listens in and begins to populate its dashboard with contextual information to help you have a more informed conversation. So if you’re talking with a friend about Llewyn Davis, MindMeld will automatically show history about the 1960s folk scene, the cast, directors, details about the soundtrack, reviews and more. In the hands of journalists, these and the other emergent anticipatory computing applications can be harnessed as powerful reporters’ assistants. Google Now can query calendars, traffic, weather, and news to deliver just the right information at the right time. Example: It might see that there’s heavy traffic along your route and alert you to leave seven minutes earlier than you normally would. MindMeld has the power to
ing we’re unable to acknowledge with prizes. (Happily, some of them received prizes anyway, just not from us). Among the remarkable pieces we read but didn’t give the human rights prize to was an Associated Press series on the effects of narco-violence on ordinary people in Honduras. It laid out the way they have been forced to flee their villages or vacate neighborhoods block by block as drug dealers moved in and took over their homes. The series described how some homeowners stopped painting their houses or mowing their lawns lest they appeal to drug lords who might seize them. People were even being shaken down by gangs that left notes demanding payments if they wanted to be allowed to stay in their houses. At the same time, the government was sowing misery of its own. As part of the series, Alberto Arce wrote about a 15-year-old boy -- the son of a college professor -- who went out one night to meet a girl he had friended on Facebook only to be killed at a government roadblock by trigger-happy soldiers. This year, when the press started to cover the flood of children from Central America crossing the U.S. border, I thought back to that series and how well it explained the kinds of desperate conditions that can lead to mass migration. Similarly unforgettable was the reporting of Cam Simpson at Bloomberg Businessweek about the workers behind Apple’s iPhone 5. Migrants from Nepal, they fell into debt paying middlemen for jobs assembling that smartphone in factories in Malaysia. After Apple started rejecting the phones, production was cut back and some 1,300 workers were left to fend for themselves for months without food or pay. Since their passports had been taken from them, they were unable to leave the country and essentially confined to a hostel, trying to scrape together a bit of rice each day. Finally, in despair, they began rioting and the Malaysian police were called in. Their response will seem odd indeed to anyone reading recent reports from Ferguson, Missouri. Instead of arresting the workers, the police had food delivered and went to work to get the Nepalese sent home. (Still broke, many of them are likely to go further into debt to again pay brokers to secure overseas jobs that may land them in similarly dire straits.) A third striking piece of global reportage was E. Benjamin Skinner’s “The Fishing Industry’s Cruelest Catch.”
deliver contextual content to reporters as they’re conducting an interview. Suddenly that usual last question “Is there anything else I should ask you?” seems irrelevant while using MindMeld, since it would have already unearthed ambient information you might have missed during the conversation. If apps can anticipate our next thoughts, then algorithms should allow for two interesting possibilities in 2014: predicting breaking news and delivering highly personalized content to each consumer. Already, social feeds can be mined and crunched to show crises as they start to erupt. This is especially obvious during sporting events, when fans tend to post sentiment, then photos or videos of fights and eventually the details of large brawls after games. Some companies, such as IBM, have been harnessing big data along with artificial intelligence and machine learning to infer changes in the real world. This isn’t about predicting the news a few days from now — it’s about seeing a breaking news event just as it’s about to unfold. News organizations have long hoped for meaningful personalization — the more directly a news product can be tailored for each individual, the more likely she’ll be to stay with that brand and to use it over and over. Personalization experiments have failed at numerous big media brands, but it’s because the approach has always been too rudimentary. Users would tick a few interests, like “sports” and “world news,” and depending on how well the backend system was programmed, stories that kindof sort-of fit into those categories would be delivered. Selecting a few broad categories never allows for nuances in geography, taste, or even our changing interests as we have fresh ideas and encounter new people. Our interests are temporal, as is the news cycle. But those two don’t always align perfectly. If you think about it, the exciting promise of Google Now and MindMeld is in the ability to anticipate what content might interest us next. It eviscerates the need for related content, since ostensibly all of the content we’d be delivered is relatable only to each one of us individually. As a result, news organizations have thrilling opportunities in the months ahead to supercharge the reporting process and to personalize content in ways we have never seen before. The future of news is anticipatory. It focused on the conditions Indonesian migrant workers encounter fishing in the waters off New Zealand, for New Zealand companies, aboard Korean boats. A report by academic researchers Christina Stringer and Glenn Simmons, in collaboration with deep sea fishing skipper Daren Coulston, prompted Skinner, a journalist specializing in slavery, to spend six months in several different countries checking out their allegations. The result was a gripping story of modern day slavery. Indigent Indonesian villagers were, he reported, misled into accepting contracts on vessels that ply the Southern Pacific Ocean and Tasman Sea searching for fish to be sold to giant American chains like Safeway, Walmart, and Whole Foods. Many of the Indonesians thought they were signing on to first world labor conditions on modern New Zealand-owned vessels. Once aboard, however, they found themselves virtual prisoners, forced to work long hours for substandard food and beaten or sometimes sexually assaulted when they tried to resist. After various deductions were taken from their paychecks, the workers, promised $12 an hour, ended up getting only about a dollar an hour. Not only was Skinner’s story well-written and well-reported, but within months of its appearance, New Zealand had moved to change its laws and Safeway, Whole Foods, and Walmart began investigating their supply chains. The Future of Global Muckraking When I began researching my new book, Global Muckraking: 100 Years of Investigative Journalism from Around the World, I assumed that the good old days of investigative reporting were in the past. It was a surprise to learn just how much high quality work is still being done around the planet. The amount of data now available online, the ability of journalists to use the Internet to connect to one another and share information -- a major aid in cross-border reporting -- and a wave of new philanthropy have all helped fuel the current boom. In addition, fresh news operations of every sort seem to be popping up, eager to promote investigative reporting. I thought I was well versed in innovative twenty-first century methods of news funding when I headed into this project, but I continue to stumble upon exciting experiments. For example, Morry Schwarz, a book publisher and property developer from Melbourne, Australia, funds weekly, monthly, and quarterly publications devoted to
The Morung Express
long-form writing on serious issues of the day, while also running the publishing house Black Inc. Australian philanthropist Graeme Wood, with money he made from an online business, founded the Global Mail,a nonprofit website that was similarly aimed at promoting long-form journalism. He also underwrites cross-border investigations via the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. In Brazil, João Moreira Salles, scion of a prominent family enmeshed in the banking sector, has used his money to found a monthly magazine, Piauí, whose recent issue included an investigative piece about indigenous opposition to Belo Monte, a hydroelectric plant under construction in Altamira in the Amazon region. Moves toward democracy in many countries, along with the Arab Spring (however shortcircuited it was) have also unshackled the global press in a variety of ways. Compared to five, 10, or 20 years ago, Myanmar, Ghana, and Tunisia, to take just three examples from many, have far freer -- sometimes remarkably freewheeling -- media atmospheres. And what’s happening in countries like those has had a knock-on effect on nearby states. Of course, there are also democratically elected governments in countries like Turkey, Ecuador, and Hungary that have been clamping down on free speech. And from Syria to Ferguson, Missouri, many locales remain dangerous for journalists. On balance, however, the press is ever less under the thumb of government, a situation that only encourages investigative reporting. To take two examples where the press has become at least marginally harder to control thanks to social media, the Internet, and some brave (or nervy) independent-minded journalists, consider China and Vietnam, where once utterly closed media scenes are slowly being pried open. The mass layoffs of older journalists around the world has had one benefit: there are plenty of experienced hands ready to train the next generation and provide institutional memory at innovative ventures. Some of these oldtimers, who aren’t busy teaching (or taking public relations jobs -- but that’s a story for another time), are busy founding and running nonprofits dedicated to doing hard-driving, investigative reporting. These include: 100 Reporters, Global Journalism Investigative Network, Forum for African Investigative Reporters, Investigative Reporters and Editors, Investigative News Network, SCOOP, and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. All of these organizations are benefitting from experienced editors and reporters downsized from traditional media outlets and committed to helping the next generation -- and learning from them, too. No one can say how this wave of new reporting will continue to be funded in the future, nor can I promise to be as cheery a decade from now as I am today about investigative journalism’s prospects. Already some donors are putting in place stipulations that might constrain future reporting -- like requiring publications to meet benchmarks offering proof of a story’s impact. Still, if the history of investigative reporting in the United States has taught us anything, it’s that outlets come and go, but the legacy of great investigative reporting, the tradition that inspires future generations of crusading journalists, endures. It can take years for investigative journalism to make a difference and, in the past, many of the most important outlets didn't make money and disappeared. They were sometimes run by passionate crusaders who seized the moment, wrote the stories, and then moved on. Everybody’s Magazine folded long ago, but Upton Sinclair’s takedown of the scandalous Beef Trust, specifically Armour and Co., in 1908 opened American eyes to the way meat was produced in this country. Who remembers In Fact? But George Seldes's prescient 1941 exposé of the dangers of cigarettes in the pages of that now-defunct publication has stood the test of time. And while McClure’s, I.F. Stone’s Weekly, and Ramparts may be increasingly distant memories, the effects of their investigative work ripple all the way to the present. And this isn’t peculiar to the United States. Young journalists on their way up are being trained in a craft that, history tells us, will outlast the death of any particular publication. Ory Okolloh of the Omidyar Network regularly makes this point. She notes that after the pioneering Nigerian newspaper Next234 went out of business, its reporters and editors simply moved on to other media outlets in Africa, where they are breaking important stories and training the next generation of reporters. For investigative reporting, injustice is the gift that just keeps giving. While so much of the business side of journalism remains in flux, fine reporters with an investigative urge are finding ways to shine much needed light into the parts of our global lives that the powerful would rather keep in the shadows. These may be tough times, lean times, difficult times, but don’t be fooled: they’re also boom times. There can be no question that, if you’re a reader with access to the Internet, you’re living in a new golden age of investigative journalism.
POLL RESuLTS
Are you sAtisfied with how the NAgAlANd stAte goverNmeNt hAs Addressed the bouNdAry issue? Some of those who voted YES had this to say: • Yes quiet satisfactory..These problems cannot be resolved at one go..its about a land dispute between the two states ,which will obviously take its time.. Because of the recent incident we cannot go and counter them back.. It has be done legally with a mutual understand for a peaceful coexistence. • Yes, I think the government is genuinely concerned about the problem, but they have no clue about it. I don’t think they are smart enough to tackle the problem. This is the reason why the problem is continuing. • In the present political state scenario, I don’t think they could have done more than they did. Our Naga society is filled with so much of divisions and we are so disunited. Our disunity is destroying the people and that is why we are not strong enough to deal with our problems.
It is very sad to say that our chief minister did not even visit the disturbed area belt where the problem was boiling. But when the oil exploration launching was there, he went with force to inaugurate the oil exploration. What hyprocricy is this? • Not at all. Our chief minister did not go to the spot where the violence was. He was busy inaugurating hotels and shops. So what kind of leadership is this? This is sending a wrong signal to the people. • No, the Nagaland government is sleeping. It is not ready at all to resolve the border problem. • Every issue Assam (Adivasi) gain in money plus Lands. Whereas Nagaland lose in everything. • No, what addressed? nothing positive lasting has been done. its matter of time only when the Nagas will say enough is enough and do what the state government failed to do. as no government policy ever works. • No, they follow the instructions of their pay masters instead of the voice of the people Some of those who voted no who elected them. let next election come had this to say: we shall remember. • I think the administration is more con- • Not at all. The government has no concerned than the elected representatives. cern at all. As long as they are not being
69%
• No, article 371(a) should not be diluted in is it? any manner • You guys are really dumb.. Nagaland • No. The public knew what was happening has an illegal liquor government, illebut the government, it seems was waiting gal drugs government, but a legal govfor a formal invitation. ernment... show me? • No, in Nagaland its seems there is no • The question is not even worth askgovt (pun intended). You don’t see the ing. As it appeared in local print megovt or its representatives anywhere dia , when Tarun Gogoi was in the when any problem arises (be it border Border meeting the affected people( issue, roads etc) only NGOs. People even risked being booed n attack), the elect their representative in the hope same day CM was apparently inaugufor development and good governance. rating a Show room in Kohima- showThe govt of Nagaland is there only room is not an issue here but prioritizwhere funds are available and not for ing the larger interest is what he ought our problems uh. Therefore, I think the to do. Or did he even go to the affected govt can do much better in the border area to meet the people and assess issue, else the Nagas will face shortthe situation by himself as a CM? Or ages whenever the Assm-Nagaland isannounce any relief measures to the sue happens, and it is not over. displaced Nagas? This border issue is age long which undoubtedly requires Some of those who voted OTHERS pragmatic and holistic approach so had this to say: we do not expect a fortnight solution • Resolving the dispute is one thing, but that should not be an excuse of break down of law and order insulting someone's inefficiency and incompein the lost of precious lives is another tency. Rhetoricism is all but the only thing. Prevention is better than cure. approach of Nagaland government YES no OTHERS Events like this create lasting hatred (assuming there is a group of monand animosity. ey making band of politicians aka as affected by the problem, they dont want to • Nagaland has a government? Where Government but no Governance). get involved at all.
21%
10%
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Modi, Shinzo Abe look to take India-Japan ties to next stage India seeks Japan’s help to combat sickle cell disease
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, front left, and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe, front right, stroll at Toji Temple in Kyoto, western Japan on August 31. (AP Photo)
tOkyO, August 31(Pti): Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Tokyo on Sunday on the second and key leg of his five-day visit to Japan for talks with his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe to propel the India-Japan global and strategic partnership to a higher plane. Modi and Abe are to discuss economic and bilateral security cooperation during their talks scheduled for Monday which will follow a ceremonial welcome. Cooperation in the fields of defence, civil nuclear energy, infrastructure development and rare earth materials—used in the man-
ufacture of high-end electronics—is expected to top the agenda of the discussions. News reports Japan said both countries could sign an agreement that will see around 2,000 tonnes of kyOtO, August 31 (iANs): Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi Sunday rare earth metals imported discussed cooperation with Japan to combat sickle cell anaemia that is prevalent from India as Japan looks to in India’s tribal regions, an official said. Modi met Shinya Yamanaka, Japan’s stem tap sources other than Chi- cell pioneer and 2012 Nobel Prize winner, at Kyoto University and discussed treatna. However, a showpiece ment of the disease. They discussed the “possibilities of sickle cell anaemia cure” agreement on civil nuclear and “prospects of cooperation among Indian and Japanese institutes”, tweeted an cooperation with Japan is external affairs ministry spokesman. “The prime minister expressed concern over unlikely to be clinched dur- the prevalence of sickle cell anaemia, especially among tribal communities across ing the visit. India,” a statement by the Indian government said. In a series of tweets on Sickling decreases the cells’ flexibility and results in a risk of various life threatSunday, Abe extended his ening complications. It mostly occurs in regions where malaria is rampant. “The “warmest welcome” to prime minister urged Yamanaka to work towards a cure for this,” the statement said. Modi. “Very enjoyable to Yamanaka said there were currently no Indian researchers at his institute, the Centre have dinner together with for iPS Cell Research and Application, and “he would like Indian scientists to conPM Modi last (Saturday) duct research at the institute”. night. Quite valuable to exchange views on topics such as Japan-India cultural ex- tion, city modernization and cooperation in the fields of changes and international affairs,” Abe said referring to the art, culture and academics. On Sunday, Modi received a dinner he hosted for the visiting Indian prime minister in presentation from Kyoto mayor Daisaka Kadokawa on Kyoto on Saturday soon after his arrival from New Delhi. how Kyoto’s cultural identity was preserved while buildIn a rare gesture, Abe travelled to Kyoto from Tokyo ing it into a modern city. Modi’s pre-departure statement to welcome Modi on Saturday—a sign that Abe was keen on Friday summarized his views on India-Japan relato deepen cooperation and ties with India and its new tions. In the statement, Modi described Japan as one of government. Referring to their visit to the Buddhist Toji India’s “closest partners in political, economic, security Temple in Kyoto on Sunday, Abe tweeted: ”Looking at and cultural realms” and hoped to draw up a road map for statutes of Buddha, we were reminded of the deep his- an India-Japan strategic partnership in his meetings with torical ties between Japan and India. I am very glad that Japanese leaders including Abe. PM Modi enjoyed the cultural heritage of Japan’s ancient That Japan has been chosen as the destination of Mocapital, Kyoto.” di’s first bilateral visit outside the subcontinent, “underSoon after his arrival on Saturday, Modi witnessed the lines the high priority that Japan receives in our foreign signing of a pact for the old imperial capital of Kyoto to and economic policies. It is also a reflection of Japan’s partner with Varanasi, considered one of the holiest of paramount importance in my vision for development Hindu cities and Modi’s parliamentary constituency. The and prosperity in India and in peace, stability and prospact also provides for cooperation in heritage conserva- perity in Asia at large,” Modi said.
‘Norms made for sensitisation on date rape drugs’
NEW DElhi, August 31 (Pti): A set of guidelines has been prepared for sensitising people on ‘date rape drugs’, the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) has informed a court here. DCW has filed a report in the court following its last year’s judgement in a rape case in which it had expressed concern over the increase in number of cases where women were administered drugs and then sexually exploited. The court had stressed on the need for sensitising people on the issue of “date rape drugs” and had asked DCW to take up this issue with competent authorities including the Delhi Police Commissioner and the Delhi government. Advocate Vandana Chauhan, appearing for DCW, said in the report that the commission had sent letters to various departments and Department of Women and Child has constituted an advisory committee of experts on prohibition of drug abuse. “The committee expressed serious concern over date rape drugs. The advisory committee was of the view that school and college students and general public need to be made aware of the misuse of such drugs, the report said. “The advisory committee prepared a set of guidelines which enumerate the precautionary steps which should be taken by the potential victims. These guidelines have been circulated to various educational authorities,” it said. It also said the committee includes representatives from AIIMS’s Nation Drug Dependence Treatment Centre, Department of Education, Chairman of Health Care Foundation of India, psychologist and officers of Department of Women and Child Department and Prohibition. The court had passed the judgement in February last year while awarding 10 years jail term to a youth for raping a girl, known to her, after giving her drugs and blackmailing her by making indecent videos.
TB epidemic driven by lack of food in India
NEW DElhi, August 31 (tNN): Undernutrition or lack of adequate food is the biggest cause of latent TB infection progressing to active tuberculosis in India, adding over a million cases of the 2.3 million new cases each year. If endemic HIV infection is what drives the TB epidemic in Africa, in India, endemic undernutrition in adolescents and adults is what drives it. This was revealed in a paper published on Friday in the National Medical Journal of India by researchers from the Himalayan Institute of Medical Sciences in Uttarakhand and the McGill International TB Centre, McGill University, in Canada. According to the paper, more than half of all cases of TB every year — two-thirds of new cases in people 15-19 years old — could be prevented by ensuring that people get enough to eat in terms of calories and proteins. India has the highest number of new cases of tuberculosis and of TB-related deaths in the world, with 2.3 million new cases and an estimated 320,000 deaths annually. “In India, an estimated 400 million people, a number larger than the entire population of the USA, are infected with the TB bacillus, but are asymptomatic though at risk of developing active TB. This infection can be contained if the immune system functions normally. Undernutrition, which suppresses the immune system, is the major factor driving the progression of infection in these people to active tuberculosis in India — rather than HIV (which accounts for only 7% of new cases), diabetes or smoking,” said the lead author Dr Anurag Bhargav of the Himalayan Institute of Medical Sciences. Undernutrition is endemic in India, with 34% of men and 36% of women aged 15-49 undernourished, according to National Family Health Survey (NFHS)-3 estimates. These people are up to four times more likely to develop TB than healthy people are, as undernutrition, the leading cause of immunodeficiency globally, weakens resistance to the TB bacillus. Scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, other backward classes and the poorest one-fifth of the population are at greatest risk of TB disease. Women are at greater risk than men. “We must strive to improve the quantity and quality of food Indians — especially the poor, those in rural India, and those belonging to disadvantaged social groups — eat. There is clear evidence that tuberculosis underwent a significant decline in the western world even before the first TB drugs or the BCG vaccine was introduced because of improvements in living conditions, particularly nutrition. The India Human Development Report 2011 of the Planning Commission has drawn attention to the decline in the per capita intake of calories as well as proteins in Indians, in successive nutritional surveys over the past 25 years, which is very worrisome,” said Dr Bhargava. An article published in the journal PLoS ONE in October last year, had revealed the state of ‘wasting’ in rural Indian patients with 50% of women having a BMI (body mass index) of less than 15 and 50% of men having a BMI of less than 16. Many had BMIs which are considered incompatible with life. Most had evidence of chronic undernutrition, and most remained undernourished at the end of successful treatment. The PLoS paper had stressed the need for nutritional support during the treatment of pulmonary TB, especially in the rural population.
Will see Trinamool only at the battleground: Buddhadeb kOlkAtA, August 31 (iANs): Describing West Bengal’s ruling Trinamool Congress as a party “full of antisocials”, CPI-M veteran Buddhadeb Bhattcharjee Sunday ruled out any kind of talks with the Mamata Banerjee-led party. Bhattcharjee’s comments come in the wake of his Chief Minister Banerjee opining that she was not averse to the idea of tying up with the Communist Party of India-Marxist to counter the Bharatiya Janata Party. “Talks with the Trinamool... never, a party which is top to bottom full of anti-socials, a party which is destroying the state. “It has finished off law and order, industry, culture, morality, Trinamool is destroying everything. There can never be any talks with them. We will see them only in the battle ground,” Bhattcharjee said at a party programme here. Earlier in the day, Left Front chairman and party state secretary Biman Bose too had ruled out any truck with the Trinamool. “Trinamool pursues soft communal politics; we will never have any kind of talks with a party which has been destroying the state through its politics,” Bose told media persons. Averring that no one is “untouchable” in politics, Banerjee Friday said her Trinamool would consider and discuss the matter if a proposal for a tie-up came from her long-time foe CPI-M. While Left Front including partners the Forward Bloc and RSP have rejected the idea of an alliance with the Trinamool, the BJP has ridiculed Banerjee saying her statement was an acknowledgment of the party’s surge in the state.
The Morung Express
Omar slams Centre for suspending talks with Pakistan NEW DElhi, August 31 (Pti): Jammu & Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah on Sunday attacked the Narendra Modi government for suspending talks with Pakistan over a “cup of tea” with separatist Hurriyat Conference and said India has set up a difficult benchmark for resumption of talks. Speaking on a variety of issues including the resolution passed by the Jammu & Kashmir legislative council seeking resumption of dialogue with Pakistan, Omar said cancellation of talks with Pakistan was “demoralizing” people of his state. The chief minister also debunked BJP’s ‘Mission-44’ for the forthcoming assembly elections, saying it was one of those nice Bollywood glitz slogans like ‘love jihad’. “What BJP is trying to do is to cosy up to separatists so that they can take advantage of boycott call in some seats and basically wrest those seats away into their kitty but the 44 number is a pipe dream, that’s not happening,” he said. On the cancellation of talks, Omar said, “It basically just demoralizes the people because at the end of the day we only see a solution emerging out of dialogue. We had 25 years of violence, we had wars, we had skirmishes but we haven’t seen a solution. “The closest we have come to the solution is through dialogue, first with the then Prime Minister (A B) Vajpayee and (former Pakistan President Gen Pervez) Musharraf and then with former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Musharraf and with Nawaz Sharif and Singh. We were hoping that process will actually carry on,” Omar told Karan Thapar on his programme ‘Nothing but the truth’ broadcast on Headlines Today. He said the Modi government had raised the expectations of the people of the state, which bore the brunt of failure of talks. “You are the ones who were all buddy buddy sending each other shawls and saris and mangoes and all the rest of it. All that you put in Punjabi ‘jhapiyanpappian’ (hugs and kisses). What happened to all that? You raised our expectations and hopes that this process was going to go forward and now over a cup of tea you dash them,” he said. The government cancelled foreign secretary-level talks with Pakistan scheduled for August 25 after Islamabad refused to agree to India’s demand of not entertaining Hurriyat leaders from Jammu & Kashmir.
Not apt for former CJI to become governor: Congress thiRuvANANthAPuRAm, August 31 (iANs): The Congress in Kerala Sunday expressed doubt over the aptness of a former chief justice of India taking over as the governor of a state. The state’s ruling party’s response came following reports that former CJI P. Sathasivam would replace Sheila Dikshit who last week announced that she is quitting. There has been no official announcement of the new governor’s name yet. “It’s the chief justice of the country that swears in the president of our country. After that a person in that post going to serve under the president does not augur well,” state Congress president V.M. Sudheeran told reporters here. “I feel this aspect should be open to debate by all, including constitutional experts. I do not think it’s apt,” he said. Sathasivam, 65, who hails from the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu, was the 40th chief justice of India, holding office from July 2013 to April 2014.
‘CBSE evaluation system needs thorough review’
NEW DElhi, August 31 (iANs): The CBSE’s Continuous and Comprehensive Evaluation (CCE) system, which entails frequent evaluation of students, needs a “thorough review” in design and appropriateness, as well as in teaching training and implementation, says an impact evaluation report carried out in various government schools in Haryana. The CCE, which intends to help improve a student’s performance by identifying his/her learning difficulties at regular intervals and employing suitable remedial measures, was introduced by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) in 2009 under the Right to Education (RTE) Act. The evaluation was funded by 3ie, an international organisation which focusses on generating high quality evidence that contributes to effective policies for the poor. Carried out in 500 government primary and upper primary schools in Haryana, the evaluation intended to quantify the effect of CCE and NGO Pratham’s Learning Enhancement Programme (LEP) that provides teachers with the “right tools and space” enabling them to teach according to a child’s competency level. “There are a variety of issues that affect the Indian education system - lack of physical, human resources
and financial inputs, lack of teacher accountability, inappropriate pedagogy and curriculum, health, knowledge barriers of students and parents,” Shobhini Mukerji, executive director, Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), South Asia, told IANS. To understand the effectiveness of both the programmes, the Haryana government partnered with research centre J-PAL to conduct a rigorous randomised impact evaluation of both CCE and LEP in two districts - Mahendragarh and Kurukshetra. The CCE has to be adopted by all Indian states. Haryana introduced the programme in 2011. The primary schools evaluated were divided into four groups of 100 each. Group one received only CCE treatment, group two received only LEP, group three received both programmes simultaneously and group four received neither. The students were tested on their abilities in basic Hindi and basic math - written and oral. The 100 upper primary schools surveyed were divided into two lots, one where CCE was in force and other where it wasn’t. (The LEP is applicable to only primary schools.) nSharing the results of the evaluation, Harini Kannan, senior research manager, J-PAL South Asia, said that the LEP demonstrates that government teachers can
improve learning outcomes through changes in teaching practices. “The CCE programme had no significant effect on test scores for students in either primary or upper primary schools. The CCE scheme, in its current form, needs a thorough review in design and appropriateness, as well as in teacher training and implementation,” Kannan told IANS. “LEP on the other hand mitigates the issue of ‘teaching to the top of the class’ by allowing for grouping of students by ability level and focusses its attention on first ensuring children attain some basic competencies,” Mukerji added. She said that regular evaluation of pupils is essential to teaching, but the “complexity of CCE’s evaluation tools and the lack of a clear connection between such evaluations and specific changes in teaching practices appear to have limited the usefulness”. The results of the impact evaluation will be shared at the first international conference on impact evaluation Making Impact Evaluation Matter - in Manila Sep 1-5 that the Asian Development Bank is hosting. Apart from Haryana, case studies of Gujarat, West Bengal and Bihar will also be presented and discussed.
Centre working on Justice system reflecting values enshrined in Constitution: Law Minister
BANgAlORE, August 31 (Pti): Union Law and Justice Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad today said the Centre is working hard to ensure citizens get a justice system which reflects values and ideals enshrined in the Constitution. A big step forward in this direction is structural reforms of the judicial system, he said in his address at the 22nd annual convocation of National Law School of India University here. He said once the states endorse the constitutional amendment of National Judicial Appointments Commission Bill which was unanimously passed in both houses of Parliament, the law would mark the beginning of a new participatory process, with increased transparency in selection of judges, while maintaining judicial independence and predominance. “This was a process for which the wheels were set in motion at least two decades ago. We are now committed to developing the databank of the performance of young lawyers so that the best talent is considered for appointment as judges,” he added. The convocation was presided over by Justice R M Lodha, Chief Justice of India and NLSI Chancellor. It was also attended by sitting and retired judges of Supreme Court and State High Courts and representatives from the Bar Council. Prasad said not only was a transparent and independent justice system required, “we also must address the fact that the justice delivery system itself is weighed down with issues of pendency and backlog of cases.” The Minister said this was problem that concerns not only mem-
bers of legal profession, but more importantly the public at large, which is looking for much more efficiency in dispensation of justice. The two major contributing factors to pendency, he said, are the inadequate number of judges (vacancies) coupled with infrastructure deficiencies. “Many of you (students) may become judges and I encourage you to aspire towards that, but be the kind of judge or advocate that simplifies the experience for the litigants, and demystifies the judicial process so that he or she is satisfied and feels that justice has been served.” Admitting that a large number of vacancies continues to be a problem at both the subordinate and High Court level, he said “on a more positive note, I’m pleased to announce that there has been an in principle approval to increase in the sanctioned strength of High Courts by 25 per cent.” “The High Courts have begun the process of sending in proposals regarding the same. We look forward to having this develop quickly and will keep everyone up to date on its progress,” he added. Noting that provision of good infrastructure is a stepping stone to ensure more efficient justice delivery, Prasad said this is a primary responsibility of a state government, but the Centre is working on these issues in tandem with various High Courts and State governments through a centrally sponsored scheme. “By extending a hand financially, we are hoping that the resources of the state government would be bolstered to ensure that judicial infrastructure is robust, and as per global standards, that is the ultimate goal. This includes
construction of court premises and buildings as well as residential accommodation for judicial officers,” he added. Stating that substantial efforts had already been made to embrace Information and Communication Technology in courts at both district and subordinate levels, he said this is a major priority area for the government, which was working in mission mode, in collaboration with National Informatics Centre (NIC) and the Supreme Court eCommittee. “Through this, we are aiming to get over 14,000 subordinate Courts computerised,” he said. Highlighting the issue of undertrials, Prasad said this was something that was of utmost concern to the government. “This is not only a human rights issue for those who are lodged behind bars, but also a matter of great concern for our judicial system,” he said. He said 66 per cent of the prison population today comprises undertrials. “In other words, there are more undertrial prisoners in jails compared to actual convicts.” Pointing out that the law was amended to facilitate release of prisoners who had served at least half the maximum period of imprisonment specified for that crime, he said implementation must however be undertaken urgently and there was a need to employ technology and ICT methods to address this problem. “The Centre has already started this process. The National Informatics Centre has created software for prisons with a goal of developing a database of prison inmateswith a focus on undertrial prisoners,” he said.
the Morung express
InternatIonal
Monday 1 September 2014
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PhiliPPine trooPs Pull ‘greatest escaPe’ in golan Fiji says no word on UN peacekeepers
Philippine military chief Gen. Gregorio Pio Catapang shows reporters where Filipino peacekeepers in Golan Heights have been repositioned during a press conference at Camp Aguinaldo military headquarters in suburban Quezon city, Philippines on August 31. Catapang said more than 70 Filipino peacekeepers have escaped from two areas in the Golan Heights that came under attack by Syrian rebels. (AP Photo)
uNItED NAtIONs/EIN ZIVAN, August 31(REutERs): The head of the Fijian army said on Sunday negotiations for the release of 44 soldiers seized by an al Qaeda-linked group on the Syrian side of the Golan Heights were being pursued but he worried there had been no word on where his men are being held. The U.N. peacekeepers from Fiji were detained by Islamist militants on Thursday, one of several groups attacked in the volatile frontier between Syria and Israel. The United Nations and Manila said on Sunday all of more than 70 Philippine troops trapped by Islamists in a different area of the frontier were now safe, but it is still not known where the Fijians are being held. “We still at this stage cannot confirm the exact location of our troops. We are continuing negotiations at all levels,” Fijian Army Commander Brigadier General Mosese Tikoitoga told a media conference in Fiji on Sunday. He said they had been assured that the men were being treated well and had come to no harm, he said. “However, we are still very concerned that we cannot confirm at this stage their exact location, whether they are still in Syria or whether they have been moved to neighbouring countries,” Tikoitoga said. The Fijian and Philippine troops are serving with UNDOF in the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East War. Syria and Israel technically remain at war and UNDOF monitors the area of separation, a narrow strip of land running about 70 km (45 miles) from Mount Hermon on the Lebanese border to the Yarmouk River frontier with Jordan. The United Nations said earlier on Sunday that 40 Philippine troops had been moved to safety during a ceasefire agreed with “armed elements” in the area shortly after midnight local time.
MANILA, August 31 (AP): Under cover of darkness, 40 Filipino peacekeepers made a daring escape after being surrounded and under fire for seven hours by Syrian rebels in the Golan Heights, Philippine officials said Sunday, leaving 44 Fijian troops still in the hands of the al-Qaida-linked insurgents. “We may call it the greatest escape,” Philippine military chief Gen. Gregorio Pio Catapang said. The peacekeepers became trapped after Syrian rebels entered the U.N.-patrolled buffer zone between Syria and Israel this past week, seizing 44 Fijian soldiers and demanding that their Filipino colleagues surrender. The Filipinos, occupying two U.N. encampments, refused and fought the rebels Saturday. The first group of 35 peacekeepers was then successfully escorted out of a U.N. encampment in Breiqa by Irish and Filipino forces on board armored vehicles. The remaining 40 peacekeepers were besieged at the second encampment, called Rwihana, by more than 100 gunmen who rammed the camp’s gates with their trucks and fired mortar rounds. The Filipinos returned fire in self-defense, Philippine military officials said. At one point, Syrian government forces fired artillery rounds from a distance to prevent the Filipino peace-
keepers from being overwhelmed, said Col. Roberto Ancan, a Philippine military official who helped monitor the tense standoff from the Philippine capital, Manila, and mobilize support for the besieged troops. “Although they were surrounded and outnumbered, they held their ground for seven hours,” Catapang said in a news conference in Manila, adding that there were no Filipino casualties. “We commend our soldiers for exhibiting resolve even while under heavy fire.” As night fell and a cease-fire took hold, the 40 Filipinos fled with their weapons, traveling across the chilly hills for nearly two hours before meeting up with other U.N. forces, who escorted them to safety early Sunday, Philippine officials said. During the siege, the Philippine secretaries of defense and foreign affairs, along with the country’s top military brass, gathered at military headquarters in Manila to communicate with the Filipino forces and help guide them out of danger. The Syrian and Israeli governments, along with the United States and Qatar, provided support, the Philippine military said without elaborating. “If they held their ground, they could have been massacred because they were already running low on ammunition,” Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin told The Associated Press. “So we discussed with them the option
Curbing water scarcity possible by 2050: Study
Global road mapping to balance development and conservation
tORONtO, August 31 (IANs): Despite what appears to be an insurmountable problem, researchers have found that it is possible to turn the situation around and significantly reduce water scarcity in just over 35 years. With strong commitment and strategic efforts such as increased water-recycling and improved irrigation techniques it is possible to achieve the above objective, the study indicated. “Significant reductions in water-stressed populations are possible by 2050,” said co-author Yoshihide Wada from Utrecht University in the Netherlands. Water stress occurs in an area where more than 40 percent of the available water from rivers is unavailable because it is already being used. The researchers separated strategy areas for reducing water stress into “hard path” measures, involving building more reservoirs and increasing desalination efforts of sea water, and certain “soft path” measures. The soft path involves focus on reducing water demand rather than increasing water supply with the help of community-scale efforts. “There is no single silver bullet to deal with the problem around the world,” said co-author professor Tom Gleeson from McGill University in Canada. “But, by looking at the problem on a global scale, we have calculated that if these strategies are applied at the same time we could actually stabilise the number of people in the world who are facing water stress,” Gleeson added. Water stress currently affects about a third of the global population, and may affect as many as half the people in the world by the end of the century if the current pattern of water use continues. The study appeared in the journal Nature Geoscience.
of escape and evasion.” Philippine military officials believed there may have been rebel casualties in the fighting in Rwihana. President Benigno Aquino III, Gazmin said, praised efforts that brought the Filipino peacekeepers to safety but wanted to be sure they could not be targeted by rebel retaliatory attacks. In New York, the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, or UNDOF, whose mission is to monitor a 1974 disengagement in the Golan Heights between Israel and Syria, reported that shortly after midnight local time,
WAsHINgtON, August 31 (IANs): Did you know Harvard, Cambridge, Melbourne, Minnesota and other that over 25 million km of new roads will be built world- universities for nearly two years to map out the world’s wide by 2050, encircling the earth more than 600 times? most important ecosystems and biodiversity areas. After mapping out the priority areas for conservation, Keeping the above fact in mind, a study has created a global map for prioritising road building across the planet the team then tried to decide where roads would have the to balance the competing demands of development and greatest benefits for humanity. In general, areas that would benefit most from new roads are those environmental protection. Many of these roads would slice into “It is challenging but that have largely converted to agriculture, currently relatively low-yielding the earth’s last wildernesses where an influx of players would enter the fray in we think we have iden- but not too distant from urban markets. tified where in the “All continents have regions that fit the form of destructive loggers, hunters and illegal miners. “It is challenging world new roads would this bill, including parts of central Eurasia, Central America, Mexico and the but we think we have identified where in the world new roads would be most be most environmen- Atlantic region of South America,” Laurance added. According to Dr Gopalaenvironmentally damaging,” said study tally damaging,” samy Reuben Clements from James co-author professor Andrew Balmford from University of Cambridge’s department of zoology. Cook University, “We focused on agriculture because The map has two components: an environmental global food demand is expected to double by mid-centuvalues layer that estimates the importance of ecosystems ry and new or improved roads are vital for farmers”. “With better roads, farmers can buy fertilisers to imand a road benefits layer that estimates the potential for increased agriculture production via new or improved prove their yields and get their crops to the markets with roads. “By combining these layers, we have identified ar- far less cost and waste,” he commented. According to aueas where new roads would have the most potential ben- thors, this new global road mapping scheme can be used efit, areas where road building should be avoided and as a working model that can be adapted for specific areas. “We hope our scheme will be adopted by governconflict areas where potential costs and benefits are both ments and international funding agencies, to help balsizeable,” Balmford explained. Balmford and professor William Laurance from James ance development and nature conservation,” professor Cook University in Australia worked with colleagues from Laurance concluded.
China slams door shut on HK democracy in 2017 vote BEIJINg/HONg KONg, August 31 (REutERs): China’s parliament said on Sunday it will tightly control the nomination of candidates for a landmark election in Hong Kong in 2017, a move likely to trigger mass protests in the city’s Central business district by disappointed democracy activists. The Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress (NPC) said it had endorsed a framework to let only two or three candidates run in a 2017 vote for Hong Kong’s next leader. All candidates must first obtain majority backing from a nominating committee likely to be stacked with Beijing loyalists. The relatively tough decision by the NPC - China’s final arbiter on the city’s democratic affairs - makes it almost impossible for opposition democrats to get on the ballot. “This is a legal, fair and reasonable decision. It is a dignified, prudent decision, and its legal effect is beyond doubt,” Li Fei, the deputy secretary general of the NPC standing committee, told reporters after the decision. Hundreds of “Occupy Central” activists, who demand Beijing allow a real, free election, will this evening hold a small protest to formally launch their campaign of civil disobedience, that will climax with a blockade the city’s business district. Political reform has been a constant source of friction between Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement and the mainland since the former British colony was handed back to Communist Party rulers in 1997. In nearby Macau, another special administrative region, leader and sole candidate Fernando Chui was “re-elected” on Sunday by a select panel of 400 largely pro-China loyalists in the tiny but wealthy former Portuguese colony.
GirdinG For Action The activists in Hong Kong stressed that they wouldn’t paralyze the Central district immediately but would this evening lay out plans for smaller actions in the coming weeks leading up to a full-scale protest in the main business district. Scores of police vehicles and hundreds of officers were deployed outside Hong Kong government headquarters as people began to gather, some chanting slogans. Key government buildings, including the Chief Executive’s office and a People’s Liberation Army barracks nearby,
Protesters attend a protest rally in Hong Kong on August 31. China's legislature's standing committee announced Sunday that all candidates must receive more than half of votes from a special nominating body to go before voters. Following the committee's widely expected decision, pro-democracy supporters rallied in a park in front of Hong Kong government headquarters. (AP Photo)
were also ringed by high fences and barricades. “It (the NPC decision) leaves no room for us to fight for a genuinely democratic system, and we will begin our campaign for peaceful, non-violent struggle,” said Joseph Cheng, the convenor of the Alliance for True Democracy, a coalition of groups advocating universal suffrage in Hong Kong. “We want to tell the world we haven’t given up. We will continue to fight,” he said. On the surface, the National People’s Congress’ decision is a breakthrough that endorses the framework for the first direct vote by a Chinese city to choose its leader. Beijing is already hailing it as a milestone in democratic reform. However, by tightly curbing nominations for the 2017 leadership poll, some democrats said Beijing was pushing a Chinese-style version of “fake” democracy. The NPC statement said all nominations would be carried out according to “democratic procedures” and each candidate would need “the endorsement of more than half” of a nominating committee that will be simi-
lar in composition to an existing 1,200-person election committee stacked with Beijing loyalists. The proposed electoral framework will still have to be endorsed by two-thirds of Hong Kong’s 70-seat legislature. With prodemocracy lawmakers holding more than a third of the seats, the proposal will likely be shelved. Senior Chinese officials have repeatedly warned activists against their “illegal” protests and say they won’t back down. Some key members of the pro-democracy movement, including media magnate Jimmy Lai, have also come under pressure in the run-up to the Chinese parliamentary decision. On Friday, China also repeated its warning against foreign interference, saying it will not tolerate the use of Hong Kong “as a bridgehead to subvert and infiltrate the mainland”. The Occupy Central movement has not yet won broad support among Hong Kong’s middle class, who are concerned about antagonising China and disruptions to business, but strong measures by China or the Hong Kong police could change that.
during a cease-fire agreed with the armed elements, all 40 Filipino peacekeepers left their position and “arrived in a safe location one hour later.” The Filipinos escaped during the cease-fire because they refused to agree to surrender as the insurgents demanded, Philippine military spokesman Lt. Col. Ramon Zagala said. Another group of 32 Filipino troops that had been trapped at a nearby encampment were extracted on Saturday morning with the help of Irish peacekeepers, the U.N. said. The clashes erupted after Syrian rebel groups — including al-Qaida’s Syrian affiliate, the Nusra Front — overran the Quneitra crossing on the frontier between Syrian- and Israeli-controlled parts of the Golan on Wednesday. A day later, Nusra Front fighters seized 44 Fijian peacekeepers. In a statement posted on militant websites Sunday, the Nusra Front confirmed that it had seized the Fijians, and posted a photo showing what it said were the captured Fijians in their military uniforms along with 45 identification cards. The group said the men “are in a safe place and in good health, and everything they need in terms of food and medicine is given to them.” The statement mentioned no demands or conditions for the peacekeepers’ release. The Nusra Front accused the U.N. of doing nothing to help the Syrian people since the uprising against President Bashar Assad began in March 2011. It said the Fijians were seized in retaliation for the U.N.’s ignoring “the daily shedding of the Muslims’ blood in Syria” and even colluding with Assad’s army “to facilitate its movement to strike the vulnerable Muslims” through a buffer zone in the Golan Heights. The U.N. mission has 1,223 troops from six countries: Fiji, India, Ireland, Nepal, Netherlands and the Philippines. A number of countries have withdrawn their peacekeepers due to the escalating violence. Philippine officials said Filipino forces would remain in Golan until their mission ends in October and not withdraw prematurely following the rebel attacks and the capture of the Fijian peacekeepers. Both U.N. SecretaryGeneral Ban Ki-moon and the Security Council strongly condemned Saturday’s attack on the peacekeepers’ positions and the ongoing detention of the Fijian peacekeepers. The Nusra Front has recently seized hostages to exchange for prisoners detained in Syria and Lebanon. Late Saturday, the group released four Lebanese soldiers and policemen taken captive earlier this month in a cross-border raid on the frontier town of Arsal, Lebanon’s military said. The Nusra Front and other militants still hold some two dozen Lebanese soldiers and police that they kidnapped in the town of Arsal on Lebanon’s border with Syria.
Imran Khan blames Sharif brothers for protesters’ killings
A Pakistani protester uses slingshot to shoot a stone towards police during a clash near the house of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in Islamabad, Pakistan on August 31. Pakistani police clashed with scattered pockets of antigovernment protesters trying to advance on the prime minister's residence after a night of violence that saw hundreds wounded and the first death in more than two weeks of demonstrations. (AP Photo)
IsLAMABAD, August 31 (IANs): Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Imran Khan Sunday vowed not to spare Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, and Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif after eight people were killed and 450 injured during anti-government protests here. Cricketer-turned -politician Imran Khan told his supporters that FIRs would be registered against the Sharif brothers and the interior minister for murder as clashes continued in the Pakistani capital city between police and supporters of PTI party and Tahir-ul Qadri’s Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) party. He said Sunday was a decisive day and he would continue to fight till his last breath, Geo News reported. Police have arrested over 500 workers. The clashes broke out Saturday night when supporters of the PTI and PAT started marching towards the Prime Minister’s House to stage a sit-in there, Xinhua reported. Qadri claimed his party’s seven workers were killed and many others were seriously injured when police fired steel and rubber bullets on the demonstrators. Imran Khan said one of his workers was killed and scores of others were injured in the clashes. However, Defence Minister Khawja Asif rejected the claims by the opposition leaders, saying no one was killed in the clashes. Officials, however, confirmed that 240 injured people, including six children and 40 women, were shifted to Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences while 210 others - among them five children and 25 women - were shifted to Poly Clinic Hospital. The injured also included over 40 policemen and six journalists. The protest leaders said that clashes broke out when police burst teargas shells to disperse the protesters marching in the capital’s high security area Red Zone towards the Prime Minister’s House for staging a sit-in. However, the country’s Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar said the protesters were carrying clubs in their hands and were aiming to enter sensitive government buildings. During the clashes, some protesters also entered the Parliament House by breaking its outer barrier. The PTI leadership has announced a countrywide protest Sunday against the incident, while some other parties have supported the call. Another opposition party, the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), demanded the immediate resignation of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Following the clashes, party workers of the PTI and PAT started protests and blocked main roads in other major cities, including Rawalpindi, Lahore, Faisalabad, and Karachi. Thousands of Qadri and Imran Khan supporters started two separate long marches from Lahore Aug 14 and reached Islamabad Aug 15. Both parties have held talks with the government for their demands but the talks remained deadlocked. Imran Khan, whose PTI party has 34 seats in the lower house, alleges Sharif rigged in the 2013 general elections. He has been demanding a probe by apex court and re-elections. Qadri’s supporters have been protesting for their 10-point agenda, including prime minister’s resignation and the registration of a murder case against 21 people, including Nawaz Sharif and his brother, over June 17 police firing in Lahore’s Model Town area.
10 Marc Marquez makes it 11 wins out of 12 races Dimapur
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1 September 2014
Spain's Marc Marquez of Repsol Honda celebrates on the podium after winning the MotoGP British Grand Prix, applauded by third place Italy's Valentino Rossi, right, of Movistar Yamaha at Silverstone, England, Sunday, August 31. (AP Photo)
sILVERstONE, August 31 (AgENcIEs): Reigning world champion Marc Marquez won a thrilling British MotoGP at Silverstone to make it 11 wins out of 12 races this season. The Honda rider, 21, overtook last year's winner Jorge Lorenzo on a Yamaha with three laps to go to cross the line 0.732 seconds in front. Yamaha's Valentino Rossi completed the podium placings after fending off Honda's Dani Pedrosa. Marquez is the first rider to win 11 races in a season since Rossi in 2005. The Spaniard gained revenge for losing out to two-time world champion and compatriot Lorenzo on the last lap at Silverstone last year. Despite dominating practice and qualifying on pole, Marquez lost the lead
to Lorenzo before regaining it with eight laps to go. Marquez had greater power but was struggling with his tyres at corners and went wide three laps later, allowing Lorenzo to get back in front. It was a superb and engrossing contest highlighted by the exchange with three laps to go as Marquez looked to have got the better of Lorenzo on one corner only for the door to be shut on him. However, Marquez was not to be denied and took the lead on the next corner and for once Lorenzo had no answer. Marquez said: "Jorge was stronger than I expected and we had a great battle. "When I passed him the first time I expected to pull away, but I did a mistake and he came back. "It was a
really nice battle and I was thinking about last year's race, so I really wanted to beat him." Lorenzo's team-mate Rossi gained his first podium at Silverstone but was more than eight seconds behind the winner. The Italian won a threeway tussle for third with Spain's Pedrosa and fellow Italian Andrea Dovizioso on a Ducati. Scott Redding was the highest-placed Briton finishing a creditable 10th on his Honda Gresini, while Yamaha Tech3 rider Bradley Smith was a lap behind after a crashing early in the race. Marquez extends his lead in the championship to 89 points over teammate Pedrosa, with Rossi closing the gap for second to 10 points with six races remaining.
ISL: Ronaldinho keeps Chennai waiting
PANAJI, August 31 (tNN): The Chennai franchise of the Indian Super League is waiting for a word from Ronaldinho's agent and brother, Roberto de Assis, to carry forward an almost implausible dream of playing in India. Neither owners of the Chennai franchise - Abhishek Bachchan, Asian Paints - or technical partner Play On Skills have directly established contact with ExBarcelona and Brazil star Ronaldinho. But, according to sources, another international player-management agency is in the forefront of the negotiations, even appointing a Portuguese interpreter for smooth talks. "We are waiting to hear from
Ronaldinho's brother if he is willing to come to India for advanced negotiations or if someone from here needs to rush to Brazil. That will happen only if there is confirmed interest," said the source. When contacted by TOI, Ronaldinho's brother who is also his agent, dodged the India query. "I cannot say anything about this. I am catching a flight at the moment. We could speak sometime later," Roberto de Assis, told TOI. The Chennai franchise first made contact with Ronaldinho's agent last week and, coincidentally, it came on the eve of breakdown in talks with Brazilian club Palmeiras, who wanted to sign the two-time World Player
of the Year as part of their centenary celebrations. The Chennai franchise, it is learnt, would have no hesitation in paying almost $3 million (approx. 18 crore) for the former Barcelona star for a twoyear contract - only for the ISL - and have also agreed on paying a ten percent signing fee, besides a major share of income from sponsors signed after his arrival. Sources said the newest franchise should brace themselves for a minimum of $2 million (Rs 12 crore) a year if they are to entertain any hopes of landing the magician footballer. Chennai, though, are not alone in jostling for Ronaldinho's services.
SPORTS
The Morung Express
Australia suffer shock loss to Zimbabwe Zimbabwe end 31-year wait, stun Australia by 3 wickets
HARARE, August 31 (AgENcIEs): Australia have suffered a shambolic defeat at the hands of cricket minnows Zimbabwe in front of a rocking crowd at Harare Sports Club. The No.10-ranked African nation exposed Australia for their poor batting, lack of spin options, mistakes in the field and a worrying injury to Michael Clarke, in a fairy tale threewicket triumph. It's just Zimbabwe's second ever win against Australia in ODI cricket the last time it happened was at the 1983 World Cup. When No.9 batsman Prosper Utseya brought up the winning runs with a towering six with 12 balls remaining, teammates flooded the pitch in celebration. The embarrassing result for the world No.1 Australians means they aren't yet assured of qualifying for Saturday's tri-series final against South Africa. Only three Australian batsmen made it past 20, with Clarke's courageous 68 not out on one leg about all that held the total of 9-209 together - a record low score against battlers Zimbabwe. After bucking the trend so far this tri-series and electing to bat first, Australia couldn't cope with Zimbabwe's spin battalion who combined to take 6-117 from 36 overs on a raging turner. In response, Australia were underequipped for the conditions, with not enough support for Nathan Lyon (4-44 from 10)
Zimbabwean batsman Sikandar Raza plays a shot during the cricket One Day International match against Australia in Harare, Zimbabwe, Sunday, Aug. 31. (AP Photo)
in the spin department. Zimbabwean captain Elton Chigumbura's unbeaten 52 led his team to one of their greatest wins. Needing 44 off 60 with three wickets in hand, Zimbabwe were given the life they needed two overs later when Chigumbura survived a running mixup thanks to an off throw from Mitchell Starc at midon. Starc (2-41) and James Faulkner cracked under pressure with wides and
no balls at the death and Chigumbura and Prosper Utseya (30no) combined for the final 55 runs. Clarke re-aggravated his hamstring when on 62 and, after getting to the point where he could barely hobble between wickets, retired hurt. The captain would appear long odds to play again this series, but in another display of grit under pressure - he returned to the non-striker's end for the final two balls of the in-
nings and then remarkably came onto field midway through the Zimbabwe innings when Australia were floundering. He even bowled the 47th over with Zimbabwe needing 11 to win. A firedup and focused Clarke was dissatisfied with his team's intensity in the field after 18 overs and came from the dressing rooms barking instructions and pointing figures. The injection had an almost immediate
impact, with Zimbabwe slipping from a stronghold at 2-100 to the wobbles at 5-106. But Australia's decision not to pick a second recognised spinner for the tour has been shown up to be a mistake - with nothing in the Harare deck for the bevy of seam bowlers. Selectors also erred in leaving Test batsman and capable part-timer Steve Smith out of the XI on Sunday, with Glenn Maxwell and Aaron Finch going for plenty.
'India showing England how to play ODI cricket'
LONdON, August 31 (AgENcIEs): Alec Stewart, the former England captain, has come down heavily on the home team for their poor showing in the ongoing ODI series against India, calling them 'overcautious and unadventurous'. While the first match in Bristol was washed out, England suffered big losses in Cardiff and Nottingham as India took an unassailable 2-0 lead in the five match series. Stewart, writing for The Mirror, said it pained him to see England repeatedly committing the same errors, which reminded him of the team in the 1990s. "Last week, I asked England to be brave and take the positive options at every opportunity but whats been on show so far is the same old failings. Overcautious and unadventurous, repeating mistake after mistake. Watching England in this current series is exactly how England played back in the mid 1990s," Stewart wrote. "England have to understand that the game has moved on and must be prepared to play a style of cricket that will worry the opposition," added Stewart, who captained England in 42 ODIs between 1992 and 2003. Former players like Michael Vaughan and Graeme Swann had questioned Alastair Cook's place in the side and had
Alec Stewart (File Photo)
even mentioned that England, with a defensive skipper, did not stand a chance in the World Cup next year. While writing that the England selectors would not want to change things with only a few months to go for the world event, Stewart said that the current lot of England players have to play without fear in order to succeed in ODI cricket. "Any call for Cook to stand down will fall on deaf ears and I can understand why the selectors won't change things with just a few months to go before the World Cup starts. The big challenge is to get this group of players playing without fear and being allowed to show off their talents," he said. "Ian Bell and Eoin
Morgan are fine players but they could become vulnerable with Gary Ballance and Moeen Ali in the squad but yet to play. If the batting still shows no signs of improvement then the selectors will have no choice but to experiment and throw in the likes of James Taylor, James Vince or Jason Roy for the seven match series in Sri Lanka before Christmas," he added. England have had a forgettable summer as far as ODI cricket is concerned. They lost the series against Sri Lanka 3-2 before conceding a 2-0 lead to India. Stewart said the Indian cricketers are showing England how to play ODI cricket and the home-team players should learn from the way the visi-
tors have hit back following their dismal showing in the Test series. "India look a completely different team to the rabble that threw in the towel in the recent Test series. They are currently giving their hosts a lesson in how to play 50 over cricket. Strong shots, improvisation and not allowing any England bowler to settle has been their formula mixed in with variety in the bowling attack." While most of the England players have been below par, Stewart is impressed with the way Chris Woakes and Alex Hales have played. "On the few positives from England I've been impressed with the progress Chris Woakes is making as an all rounder while Alex Hales has shown enough in his first two games at the top of the order that he can succeed at this level." Stewart's advice to the England team is to identify the right players for the World Cup and ensure that their roles are properly defined. "England mustn't fall into the trap of previous World Cup when the carefully laid plans that had been in place were suddenly ripped up just a few weeks before the tournaments began. By the time England take on India and Australia "down under" in a tri series leading into the World Cup, they must know how they're going to play and which players can deliver," he said.
Wild Chelsea win capitalizes on Manchester City slip-up
LIVERPOOL, August 31 (AP): Chelsea showed off its new-found attacking sparkle in a 6-3 win over Everton on a day Manchester City lost its cutting edge to slip to a surprise first defeat in its Premier League title defense. City's 1-0 home loss to Stoke on Saturday was exacerbated by its title rival's wild victory at Goodison Park, in which Spain striker Diego Costa scored in the first and last minutes to continue the superb start to his Chelsea career. Another big-money arrival in English football, Angel Di Maria, made a promising debut for Manchester United but its 0-0 draw at promoted Burnley left Louis van Gaal's side with just two points from three games — despite a spending spree of 130 million pounds ($215 million) this summer. Chelsea has no such problems, with a third straight win leaving the team top of the early standings on goal difference from surprising Swansea. In Costa, Chelsea also has arguably the standout player so far this season with four goals already since
joining from Atletico Madrid. "He's literally got everything," Chelsea captain John Terry said. "He's been brilliant, and he's off to a flying start." With Costa in such electric form and Cesc Fabregas picking up two more assists, Chelsea has an attacking swagger it lacked last season. "I want the team to play the way we did, to be positive," Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho said. "We were killers in attack." Goals by Costa — after just 34 seconds — and Branislav Ivanovic put Chelsea 2-0 ahead inside three minutes, only for Kevin Mirallas to reduce the deficit for Everton just before halftime. Seamus Coleman's own goal in the 66th minute sparked a rush of five goals in a chaotic 11-minute spell during which both defenses were carved open to the dismay of the team's managers. Steven Naismith made it 3-2, Nemanja Matic regained Chelsea's two-goal lead in the 74th but Everton came back again through Samuel Eto'o's header on his debut, against the club that released him in the summer.
Chelsea's Diego Costa, left, is thwarted by Everton's goalkeeper Tim Howard during their English Premier League soccer match at Goodison Park Stadium, Liverpool, England, Saturday August 30. (AP Photo)
Ramires put Chelsea 5-3 ahead and Costa wrapped up a madcap second half with a low finish after a back-heel from substitute Didier Drogba. In an all-action display,
Costa was booked for a tussle with Coleman, and then goaded the defender provocatively after the right back's own goal — sparking a melee with Everton's American goalkeeper Tim
Howard. "There are certain players who come to the Premier League who need to understand the ethics and the culture," Everton manager Roberto Martinez said. Swansea is tied on
nine points with Chelsea after beating West Bromwich Albion 3-0 thanks to two goals from Nathan Dyer and another from Wayne Routledge. Also Saturday, Wilfried
Zaha scored an injury-time equalizer on his second debut for Crystal Palace in a 3-3 draw at Newcastle, Southampton won 3-1 at West Ham and Queens Park Rangers also earned a first win of the season by beating Sunderland 1-0. City and United had hundreds of millions of pounds' worth of attacking talent on show in the third round of the Premier League but couldn't muster a goal between them. A flat display by City, five days after its impressive 3-1 win over Liverpool, was punished when former United striker Mame Diouf ran 70 meters in the 58th minute in a solo effort that was capped by a finish between goalkeeper Joe Hart's legs. "I tried just to stay on my feet and keep on going," Diouf said. "We will enjoy this win — it is a big one." It was Stoke's first-ever goal at the Etihad and earned the team a first win of the season under Mark Hughes, the former City manager. City failed to score at home for only the second time in 71 Premier League games, even with Argentina striker Sergio Aguero back in the lineup
after regaining full fitness. "It's a surprising defeat because we don't expect to lose against Stoke but these games sometimes happen," City manager Manuel Pellegrini said. "Really we were not very creative, we did not find the space and that is credit to Stoke." Di Maria made his first start for United after his British-record move from Real Madrid for 59.7 million pounds ($99 million) and showed enough signs that he will be a success at Old Trafford. He still couldn't inspire Van Gaal's team to a first win in any competition this season, with United lacking a cutting edge despite fielding Di Maria, Juan Mata, Robin van Persie and Wayne Rooney in an exciting front four. Van Persie was denied twice with United's best chances. "When you have two points, that is not good enough and that is disappointing," said Van Gaal, whose team lost 4-0 to thirdtier MK Dons on Tuesday in the League Cup. "At the moment it's certainly not a world-class team, but we have to wait, and have belief that it will come."
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‘What is surprising is that it was a film launched in August.’ Guardians was able to beat out thriller As Above, So Below, which made its debut on Friday to the tune of $3.2 million, coming in at number two at the box office. The horror flick centres around a team of explorers who venture into the catacombs beneath the streets of Paris only to uncover a dark secret. The John Erick Dowdle film features a cast of virtual unknowns including Perdita Weeks, Ben Feldman, Edwin Hodge, François Civil and Marion Lambert. Coming in third was Megan Fox and Will Arnett blockbuster Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, bringing in $2.3 million on Friday, which was a 41 per cent drop from last week. If I stay, starring Chloe Grace Moretz, brought in $2.3 million for fourth and a total of $23.2 million domestically. Rounding out the top five was the highest grossing release of the week, The November Man, starring Irish actor Pierce Brosnan, which brought in $2.2 million for a total of $3.9 million since its release on Wednesday.
First Lava Clip Released
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ava is the short film that will play in front of Pixar’s film Inside Out next year, and new footage from the film is here. Lava take place over missions of years and follows volcano Uku. In this brand new clip, Uku sings a song about finding love: James Ford Murphy is in the director’s chair for the film, as he makes his directorial debut. He is no stranger to Pixar, having worked as an animator on Ratatouille, The Incredibles and Finding Nemo. Inside Out is the big release from Pixar and is their first film since the success of Monsters University last year. Inside Out is released 31st July 2015.
if ratings continue to plummet
Taylor Swift set to share her expertise with contestants on The Voice as she joins the hit NBC show as an adviser for the upcoming seventh season
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he may be just 24 years old but Taylor Swift is already something of a veteran when it comes to the music industry. And now the Shake It Off singer will be passing on some valuable tips to contestants on The Voice. The Grammy-winning starlet has signed up to be an adviser on the seventh season of the hit NBC show, according to Us Weekly. A source tells the magazine that the popstar will be taking on a similar role to the one Coldplay’s Chris Martin had in season six. Taylor will be advising wannabe singers across all four teams - and she will not be the only new face to join the all-star rotating cast. Gwen Stefani and Pharrell Williams have joined as coaches working alongside old hands Adam Levine and Blake Shelton. ‘Taylor was an absolute pleasure to work with,’ a source on the show tells the publication. ‘She had great feedback for all the contestants. She made for an amazing mentor.’ Taylor has been busy working on her new album this year, which is due for release on October 27, a little over a month after the new season of the show kicks off on September 22. The title - 1989 - is taken from her year of birth. In an interview with UK radio station Capital FM, she said she was proud of the new material. ‘One of the things you can expect is that I’m really trying to challenge myself in every single way possible to make music that doesn’t sound like music I’ve made before,’ she said. ‘When you get into the album’ there are a lot of late ‘80s sounds and vocal styling and production elements.’ She added: ‘We were really just playing around with this album and didn’t limit ourselves. ‘What ended up happening was we made an album that really sounds like an album; it’s really sonically cohesive, and I’m really proud of it.’
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e returned to his seat on The X Factor judging panel with much fanfare on Saturday night. But Simon Cowell has warned that he will pull the plug on his long-running talent show if viewing figures continue to drop. Speaking to the Daily Star on Sunday, he said: ‘In this day and age when you look at the overall numbers, which are down, we’re very lucky that we’re still on air at the moment. ‘If I’d been asked about the future of the show ten years ago I’d never imagine we’d still be making it in 2014. ‘Once people get bored with it or if we get bored with it, for sure I’ll drop it.’ The show was given a boost last year with the return of Sharon Osbourne, but ratings slumped as the season went on. Cowell is now hoping his own comeback on the show, alongside fellow returnee Cheryl Fernandez-Versini, will encourage viewers to tune in. Figures for Saturday’s show are yet to be released, but the series will face tough competition from rival talent extravaganza Strictly Come Dancing when it returns on September 7. Slamming the BBC’s decision to air
the beloved dancing programme at the same time as The X Factor, Cowell accused them over sparking a ratings war. At the launch of the show last week, he said: ‘It happens. I always think the people they p**s off are the viewers and when they say it isn’t a ratings battle, it is - and that’s why they did it. ‘They didn’t have to put it on at the same time, but they did and it means that people then have to make the choice. ‘But it just shows, personally speaking, the producers of the show, for what they are. They don’t want [X Factor] to do well. ‘They don’t want people to watch it and our job is to ensure that we do the best job we can so people prefer X Factor to them.’ Meanwhile, the 54-year-old could soon have a more tiring challenge on his hands - he’s planning to have a second child. He became a first-time dad to his son Eric in February and now he has revealed that he wants to expand his family with girlfriend Lauren Silverman. He told the Sunday People: ‘Of course I’d like another child. You have one, and I’d always have another. ‘I’ve thought about having one in between the series of X Factor.’
K-Pop Sets the Tone
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fter South Korean musician Psy’s infectious 2012 dance number, Gangnam Style, K-Pop has now become a popular genre of music, a movement in itself, with its distinctive style and fashion. Which is why the third edition of the K-Pop India Festival this year in Delhi, was brimming with contestants and spectators alike. Part of the jury for the festival and for the finale performance, was the band N-Sonic, who are performing for the first time in India, . “It’s so exciting to see so many people who are passionate about Korean music. The energy and passion that the contestants bring is wonderful, and we are pleasantly surprised at how talented they are,” says J Heart, leader of the group. The six-member K-Pop outfit, who arrived from Honk Kong on August 26 after performing there, released their debut album in October 2011, and are currently working on their next.
The finale at Siri Fort Auditorium on Saturday saw a winner each in the dance and song categories. Urban Age Crew from New Delhi were the winners for dance. Sandeep Chhabra from the team says, “We’ve always dreamt of taking our dance international. A platform like this is perfect for people who are passionate about Korean music and want to make it big as K-Pop artistes. We love and respect K-Pop because it has its own distinct style, the way they move and carry themselves; it grows on you.” While the winner in the song category Sparsh Bajpai, again from New Delhi, says, “We have worked hard to get here, and to be performing in front of K-Pop megastars like N-Sonic is exciting.” They are two of the 13 finalists, who made it to Delhi. The prelims, which were held at Chennai, Dimapur, Mumbai and Delhi, last year, had 80 participants.
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as Prince Harry found himself the perfect girlfriend? It certainly seems that might be the case – but it could get confusing as she shares her name with his stepmother, Camilla. I’m told Harry enjoyed a mini-break to the glitzy French resort of St Tropez last week, with his new love interest, Camilla Thurlow – staying with her on a luxury yacht. Camilla, 25, pictured below, is the ‘mystery’ brunette Harry was spotted kissing at Guy Pelly’s nightclub Tonteria in June, three months after he split from Cressida Bonas. As well as being stunningly attractive – she is a former beauty pageant winner – Camilla is charitable and sporty. In fact, she seems as well-qualified for Royal girlfriend status as the Duchess of Cambridge was when she started dating Prince William. The exclusive picture on the left, showing Camilla celebrating a goal in the Under-19 World Lacrosse Championships in Canada in 2007, is reminiscent of that famous shot showing Kate playing hockey during her days at Marlborough College. Dumfries-born Camilla went to Tony Blair’s alma mater – £22,000-a-year Fettes College, Edinburgh – before achieving a firstclass honours degree in sport and exercise science at Loughborough University. She now works for the Halo Trust, the landmines organisation once supported by Princess Diana. A friend of Camilla tells me: ‘She is really outgoing and down-to-earth. She was popular at school and always won lots of prizes at the end of the year.’ Don’t expect things to get too heavy though. I gather 29-year-old Harry wants to make the most of his summer as a singleton before another serious relationship. You’ve got to love Prince Harry’s sense of humour. I hear he was walking past a yurt in the VIP area at last month’s Secret Garden Party in Cambridgeshire when he overheard some people talking in scathing terms about the Monarchy – so popped his head inside. ‘We couldn’t believe our eyes,’ my source said. ‘He said that everyone is entitled to their opinion and then he laughed and said, “Don’t worry I won’t tell anyone what you said.” The Countess of Wessex is to be the guest of honour at an Islamic fashion show at Windsor Castle – including models wearing hijabs. Islamic inspired designs will be paraded in front of Sophie – wife of Prince Edward – on a catwalk specially designed for next month’s event. The show will take place during a dinner hosted by The Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award foundation. I gather three international designers have submitted outfits including Ralph & Russo, the Australian brand favoured by the Duchess of Cambridge.
Britney SpearS Simon Cowell warns he will scrap The X Factor
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Dimapur
latest goal-friend - it’s Camilla No2: Rumoured royal fling revealed to be sporty Scottish pageant winner
the US box office following huge Labor Day weekend ticket sales uardians Of The Galaxy topped the first day of the US holiday weekend box office on Friday, adding another $3.8 million to become the highest-grossing movie of 2014, raking in a total of $262.1 million domestically. The film, which features some of Marvel’s lesser known comic book heroes, was able to beat out highly-popular superhero sequel Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which was released in April. Starring Chris Pratt and Zoe Saldana, the movie was released four weeks ago to the highest debut weekend in August, grossing $94.3 million domestically. The space-adventure blockbuster has been able to take advantage of the weak end-of-summer competition. ‘This movie just couldn’t have come at a better time,’ said Paul Dergarabedian, senior media analyst for box-office tracker Rentrak. ‘When we were really down and out in the summer box office - at one point down 20 per cent from last year - Guardians came along and injected life.
1 September 2014
Prince Harry’s
Guardians Of The Galaxy becomes highest-grossing movie of 2014 taking in a total $262m at
Taylor Swift
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The Morung Express
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ritney Spears’ father has saved his daughter a major embarrassment after purchasing the rights to an incriminating video allegedly featuring her now-exboyfriend David Lucado kissing another woman. The Toxic hitmaker, 32, revealed she is single again on Thursday (28Aug14), amid rumours suggesting lawyer Lucado had been caught on camera dancing and locking lips with a new lady. The film footage, which was being shopped around to various media outlets, was reportedly shot in mid-August (14). Jamie Spears, who has served as his daughter’s conservator since her well-publicised meltdown in 2008, caught wind of the cheating allegations and successfully offered up big money to purchase the video and keep it private. His representative has confirmed the news to TMZ.com, revealing he took the necessary steps to protect Britney from what could have turned into a huge tabloid scandal. It is not known if other copies of the tape exist, but Spears Sr. has vowed to sue for copyright infringement if anyone publishes the footage. The pop star, who currently splits her time between her concert residency in Las Vegas and her California home, began dating Lucado early last year (13), following the breakdown of her engagement to agent Jason Trawick.
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(LEFT) Tony Ferguson, right, attempts to hit Danny Castillo with his knee during the second round of a lightweight mixed martial arts bout at UFC 177 in Sacramento, Calif., Saturday, Aug. 30, 2014. Ferguson won by split decision. (CENTER) T.J. Dillashaw, left, kicks Joe Soto during the third round of a bantamweight championship mixed martial arts bout at UFC 177 in Sacramento, Calif., Saturday, Aug. 30, 2014. Dillashaw won by technical knockout in the fifth round to retain his championship. (RIGHT) Bethe Correia, right, punches Shayna Baszler during the second round of a women's bantamweight mixed martial arts bout at UFC 177 in Sacramento, Saturday, Aug. 30, 2014. Correia won in the second round. (AP Photos)
Spaniard Carolina clinches Bouchard, Williams progress to US Open 4th round World Badminton C'ship
Spain’s Carolina Marin, second from right, with her gold medal after her victory over China’s Xuerui Li, right, and bronze winners, India’s P.V-. Sindhu, far left, and Japan’s Minatsu Mitani, sendond from left, after the women's singles final match at the World Badminton Championships at Ballerup Arena, Denmark, Monday, August 31. (AP Photo)
CoPeNhAgeN, August 31 (IANs): Spaniard Carolina Marin stunned reigning Olympic champion Li Xuerui of China to become the first European in 15 years to clinch the women's singles title at the World Badminton Championships here Sunday. The World No.10, who had defeated India's P.V. Sindhu in the semi-finals Saturday, drubbed World No.1 Li 17-21, 21-17, 21-18 in an hour and 18 minutes to notch her first victory over the top seed in four meetings. Danish great Camilla Martin was the last European to win the World Championships in 1999 which were also held here. Li failed to clinch the coveted title for the second year in a row after losing in last year's
final as well to Thai Ratchanok Intanon. The Olympic champion had to settle for the silver while losing semi-finalists Sindhu and Japanese Minatsu Mitani went home with the bronze. Earlier, South Korean 12th seeds Sung Hyun Ko and Baek Choel Shin upset second seeded countrymen Yong Dae Lee and Yeon Seong Yoo 22-20, 21-23, 2118 to clinch the men's doubles title. The women's doubles title, on the other hand, was taken by Chinese fifth seeds Qing Tian and Yunlei Zhao, who defeated fourth seeded compatriots Xiaoli Wang and Yang Yu 21-19, 21-15 at the Ballerup Super Arena.
New York, August 31 (AFP): WIMBLEDON runner-up Eugenie Bouchard has pulled out a suddenly tight match, edging 30th-seeded Barbora Zahlavova Strycova of the Czech Republic 6-2, 6-7 (2), 6-4 to reach the U.S. Open’s fourth round for the first time. The seventh-seeded Bouchard was the only woman to make it to at least the semi-finals at each of the year’s first three Grand Slam tournaments. Dellacqua hangs tough in US Open quest At Wimbledon, she became the first Canadian to appear in a major singles final. To get to the quarterfinals at Flushing Meadows, Bouchard will need to beat No. 17 Ekaterina Makarova. Zahlavov Strycova fell to 1-28 in matches against opponents ranked in the top 10. After breaking to get to 4-all in Saturday’s third set, Zahlavov Strycova double-faulted to fall behind 5-4. Bouchard then served out the victory. Meanwhile, Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova became the fifth top 10 seed to exit the US Open in the first week when she was knocked out by Serbian world No. 145 Aleksandra Krunic. Five-time women’s champion Serena Williams was a comfortable winner, racking up her 75th victory at the US Open. Third-seeded Kvitova lost her third round tie 6-4 6-4 to pint-sized 21-year-old Krunic, who came through qualifying and had never won a match at a major before this year’s event. Kvitova joins second seed Simona Halep, fourth-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska, Angelique Kerber, the sixth seed, and eighth-seeded Ana Ivanovic in failing to make the fourth round. In the Mens’ John Isner’s trip to Flushing Meadows ended in the third round. It happened with a loss to Germany’s Philipp Kohlschreiber at that stage. And once again, there are zero American men in the US Open’s round of 16. Earlier, 57th-ranked Sam Querrey — entering the day, the only other man from the host country remaining of the 12 originally in the draw — put up little resistance while bowing out Eugenie Bouchard in action during the third round of the US Open against No. 1 Novak Djokovic 6-3, 6-2, 6-2. at the Flushing Meadows, New York, August 31.
Irresistible Liverpool trounce Spurs, Villa win
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LoNdoN, August 31 (reuters): Brendan Rodgers marked his 100th game in charge by watching Liverpool produce an irresistible performance as they beat a toothless Tottenham Hotspur 3-0 in the Premier League at White Hart Lane on Sunday. The result allowed fifth-placed Liverpool to move level with Tottenham in the standings with six points. Raheem Sterling, Steven Gerrard and Alberto Moreno were on target as Liverpool bounced back from Monday's defeat by champions Manchester City with a classy performance that ended Tottenham's 100 percent start to the season. Enigmatic striker Mario Balotelli made amends for his wasteful finishing on his Liverpool debut with his impressive all round performance and positive work ethic. Sturridge and Henderson linked up well and the latter's well weighted cross was steered in at an acute angle at the far post by Sterling in the seventh minute. Sturridge and Balotelli had chances to extend their lead but were thwarted by a combination of poor finishing and the athletic Lloris. Spurs were second best for much of the first half but
Tottenham Hotspur's Hugo Lloris, left, clears the ball in front of teammate Joshua Onomah, center, and Liverpool's Raheem Sterling, during their English Premier League soccer match at White Hart Lane, London, Sunday, August 31. (AP Photo)
could have drawn level in the 42nd minute had it not been for Simon Mignolet's stunning save that blocked Nacer Chadli's rasping shot. Liverpool started the second half with the same intent they displayed in the first, with Gerrard coolly converting a penalty after Joe Allen had been needlessly pulled back by Eric Dier. Moreno, who had been at fault for Stevan
Jovetic's first goal as Liverpool were beaten 3-1 by Manchester City on Monday, added a third with a superb solo run and finish after he had dispossessed Andros Townsend on the halfway line. Aston Villa suffered a shock 1-0 home defeat against third-tier Leyton Orient in the League Cup on Wednesday but showed no lingering effects of that
loss. The lively Agbonlahor opened the scoring in the 14th minute with a pinpoint finish from Weimann's clever lay off. The hosts doubled their lead after 36 minutes when Weimann capped a flowing move with an accurate shot. Villa were coasting but were made to sweat when Nikica Jelavic headed home in the 74th minute to set up a tense finale.
Gritty Sania Mirza advances in 2 events
New York, August 31 (PtI): Sania Mirza fought through a gruelling schedule to enter the last 16 of women's doubles and quarterfinals of mixed doubles by winning both her respective second-round matches on an all-win day for Indians in the US Open. Sania first teamed up Zimbabwean Cara Back in women's doubles to beat the French-Romanian combine of Caroline Garcia and Monica Niculescu 6-1, 6-2. The third-seeded Indo-Zimbabwean team will now be up against Serbia's Jelena Jankovic and Czech Republic's Klara Koukalova. In the evening session, Sania was back on the court pairing up with Brazillian Bruno Soares in the mixed doubles second round. The top-billed combination sailed past the AustraliaBritish team of Casey Dellacqua and Jamie Murray 6-2, 7-6 (8). Their quarterfinal opponents will be the winners of the match between the Spanish-South African pair of A Medina Garrigues and Raven Klaasen and the sixth-seeded Indo-Slovakian duo of Rohan Bopanna and Katarina Srebotnik. Among other Indians in fray, Leander Paes and Cara Black also advanced to the mixed doubles quarterfinals. The third seeds edged past Russia's Alla Kudryavtseva and Pakistan's AisamUl-Haq Qureshi 6-1, 4-6, 10-4. They will now be up against American Abigail Spears and Mexico's Santiago Gonzalez.
20th CLASSIC CUP 2014 Matches for Sept 1
Quarter-finals Nagaland Police vs New Reserve Youth Organisation @ 1:00 pm Head Hunters vs Status Quo FC @ 3:00 pm
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