Voice of Asia June 21 2013

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ANNIVERSARY 1987-2012

VOICE OF ASIA

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

How to Avoid Medicare Enrollment Penalties

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The Leading Community Weekly from Texas since 1987

Vol. 26 No. 25 Friday, June 21, 2013 Published Weekly from Houston 713-774-5140 24 Pages ( 2 sections) 50 cents E-mail: voiceasia@aol.com

ASIE young professionals honor US lashes China, Russia Senior Engineers and Architects for human trafficking

W

ASHINGTON - The United States on Wednesday downgraded China, Russia and Uzbekistan to the bottom of a US table for failing to make greater efforts to combat human trafficking, a move that may spark sanctions.

The sharp blow came in the State Department’s annual report on human trafficking after the three nations languished for years on a US watch list, having been granted past waivers amid promises to do better.

Three other countries, however -- Azerbaijan, the Congo and Iraq -were elevated off the watch list to Tier 2 status as a reward for what US officials called “real movement” in the fight against trafficking and slavery.

The US estimates that about 27 million remain enslaved around the world.

“People get so focused on the politics behind this that they forget that every one of these is a person,” Luis CdeBaca, director of the office to monitor and combat trafficking in persons, told AFP. ASIE honors eleven senior engineers and architects. Seen in picture (not in any order) are: Hasmukh Doshi, Ben Bansal, Jasbir Singh Sethi, Ravi Arora, Ramesh Garg. Narendra Gosain, Dinesh Shah, Krishna Vavilala, Rao Ratnala , Mahesh Wadwa, and Chad Patel. Vishal Merchant, ASIE President, seen 4th from left standing.

by Dinesh Shah, MBA, PE

A

merican Society Of Indian Engineers (ASIE) is a Houston, Texas based non-profit organization established in 1994 for engineers, architects, and designers of Indian origin. After laying a solid foundation for the future, the senior professionals of ASIE decided to take the organization to the next level and focusing on Building the Future together with the younger generation. In appreciating the seniors, the ASIE organized a special event, first time ever happened of honoring senior engineers and architects for their community service. The event was held last week at Sankalp Banquet hall in Sugar Land with the attendance of over 140 guests.

With a sponsorship by Virendra Bansal, the current member of Advisory Board made the event a magnificent success.

The event started with networking and social hour. ASIE President Vishal Merchant made the welcome address with brief information of ASIE, which was followed by wonderful presentation of awardees. In the opening remarks of the award ceremony Vishal Merchant said, “This year we will recognize 11 professional engineers and architects for their illustrious careers, accomplishments, ingenuity, entrepreneurship and contributions to the IndoAmerican Society and the society as a whole. These Honorees come from different walks of the engineering and architectural fields, however they share

one thing in common and that is their dedication to their disciplines. This enthusiasm and commitment has resulted in decades of creativity and thousands of projects not only in Houston, but all over the country. We the young generation, look up to them as our role models and inspiration as we move forward in our professional careers.”

Sam Kannappan, the current board member of Texas Board of Professional Engineers, and other distinguished guests presented the award to each honoree. It was very interesting to learn the history form each honoree from their individual remarks. After the delicious dinner served by Sankalp, the program was concluded with vote of thanks.

Under the terms of a 2008 law, the six countries could no longer stay on the Tier 2 Watch List and either had to move up to Tier 2 or be downgraded to Tier 3 -- a move that could trigger cuts in non-humanitarian and non-trade US aid.

“We have a moral obligation to meet this challenge head-on. Human trafficking is an assault on our most dearly held values of freedom and basic human dignity,” US Secretary of State John Kerry said in the report’s foreword.

But he stressed that “governments bear primary responsibility for responding to this crime.”

The 2013 report found that “trafficking is pronounced among China’s internal migrant population” and “forced labor remains a problem, including in brick kilns, coal mines and factories.”

The one-child policy has resulted in “a skewed sex ratio of 118 boys to 100 girls in China, which served as a key source of demand for the trafficking of foreign women as brides for Chinese men and for forced prostitution.”

Beijing had failed to “demonstrate significant efforts to comprehensively prohibit and punish all forms of trafficking,” the report maintained.

Representative Chris Smith, who has authored key legislation on trafficking, said China has become the “sex and labor trafficking capital of the world.”

“Women and young girls have been -- and are today being -- reduced to commodities and coerced into prostitution,” he added in a statement.

Uzbekistan had reduced the number of children under 15 forced to pick the key annual cotton crop, but “continued to subject older children and adult laborers to forced labor in that harvest,” the report found.

In Russia, a million people “are exposed to ‘exploitative’ labor conditions characteristic of trafficking cases, such as withholding of documents, nonpayment for services, physical abuse, or extremely poor living conditions.”

President Barack Obama will determine whether to enact any sanctions against the three nations in September.

Such a move will also act as a warning to other nations on the watch list to improve their efforts or face relegation next year. Afghanistan, Barbados, Chad, Malaysia, the Maldives and Thailand will all no longer be eligible for a waiver and face either relegation or promotion.

It is also likely to surprise rights organizations who had feared that geopolitical considerations could halt any downgrade of key US allies.

Continued on Page 9

India, Nepal monsoon floods leave 160 dead D

EHRADUN - Military helicopters dropped emergency supplies Wednesday to thousands of people stranded by flash floods that tore through towns and temples in northern India and neighbouring Nepal, killing more than 160, officials said.

uated, describing the floods as “most distressing”.

high in the mountains attract many pilgrims.

Some 65,000 people are still stranded, five days after the rains hit on Saturday, Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde told reporters in New Delhi.

Thousands of pilgrims and tourists have already been evacuated after floods and landslides caused by early monsoon rains wrought devastation through India’s Himalayan foothills, they said.

“There has been large scale devastation,” the prime minister said after flying over the flooded region late Wednesday with ruling Congress party chief Sonia Gandhi.

He said the government would give $170 million to the worst-hit state of Uttarakhand for rescue and relief operations, adding “all possible resources” have been deployed to deal with the “ghastly tragedy.”

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said the priority was rescuing those still stranded and helping the more than 10,000 people already evac-

Torrential rains at least three times as heavy as usual have hit Uttarakhand, often called the “Land of the Gods,” where Hindu shrines and temples built

Houses, multi-storied buildings, cars, bridges as well as roads have been swept away or damaged after rivers burst their banks, forcing authorities to deploy military as well as civilian helicopters to evacuate people and drop Continued on Page 2 Local residents look out to the sea during heavy rain in Mumbai, India.

(AFP/Punit Paranjpe)

OP-ED/OPIONS/VIEWS

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by K. Shankar Bajpai,

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India, Nepal monsoon floods leave 160 dead Continued from Page 1 essential food and other supplies.

“At least 110 people have died. The state government and the army are trying to rescue thousands of tourists who are stranded near the submerged valleys and Hindu shrines,” said Yashpal Arya, the disaster relief minister of Uttarakhand.

At least another 28 people have been killed in the neighbouring states of Uttar Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh, officials said.

Prime Minister Singh said the total official death toll is 102 “but it is feared that loss of lives could be higher”.

Over the border in Nepal, at least 22 people were killed in recent days in landslides and flash floods also triggered by monsoon rains, officials said, prompting the government to step up relief efforts.

In northern India, close to 10,000 soldiers along with 13 teams from the National Disaster Response Force have been deployed for the rescue and relief effort, a statement from the prime minister said.

Soldiers from the IndoTibetan Border Police have been building rope and log bridges across swollen rivers to try to reach those stranded, said Ajay Chadha, chief of the paramilitary force.

Local officials said 40 relief camps have been

set up to house evacuated locals and tourists. Some 18 air force helicopters are ferrying many of those rescued to the camps, with a control centre set up in the holy town of Badrinath.

Tourists have been travelling to Uttarakhand in recent weeks to undertake pilgrimages before some sites are shut down for the monsoon season, which does not normally start for another two weeks.

State disaster relief minister Arya said portions of a revered Hindu temple have been washed away, leaving thousands of pilgrims stranded.

“The Kedarnath temple is submerged in mud and slush. We just hope that it does not collapse,” Arya told AFP. In Uttar Pradesh, 18 people, including a family of five, were killed in rainrelated accidents on Monday. A doctor and his family were driving through Saharanpur district, when their car was swept away in a flash flood, officials said.

In Himachal Pradesh, flash floods destroyed more than 500 houses and government buildings and at least 10 people were killed in landslides, officials said.

The monsoon, which covers the subcontinent from June to September, usually brings some flooding. But the heavy rains arrived early this year, catching many by surprise and exposing the country’s lack of preparedness.

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The impression is now widespread that IndiaAmerica relations are on a plateau, if not in the doldrums. This would not matter had they matured into a mutual understanding that allows two countries to be satisfied with nothing striking happening between them as welcome normalcy. Since the days when we hardly knew, and gravely suspected or even mistrusted each other, so much has developed between our two countries, and especially peoples, that we should not be at all bothered by the present situation, but for one reason: how well have we really learned to know each other, or shed earlier misgivings? Policymaking and specific measures of cooperation are still subject to deep doubts about just how good they are for either country. Convincing each other in these respects will continue to require periodic boosts by leaders for some years to come. This is what makes the coming Strategic Dialogue important.

Need for objectivity We in India need to approach international relations with hard-headed, dispassionate objectivity, concentrating on national interest. Emotional attitudes and downright prejudices affect public opinion and state policies everywhere, but they affect us excessively. The view that we are too inclined towards abstract considerations, unrealistic world views and outdated thinking is not unjustified.

Particularly damaging has been our illusion about friendship in international relations.

States are often enemies but cannot be friends.

Their peoples may have friendly feelings, but states can only develop greater or lesser closeness of views and cooperation. This is so obvious as to be almost banal, but we have ignored it to our cost — often going overboard supporting others to show our friendship, beyond their expectations or our benefit. With America it has been the opposite: leave alone friendship, for decades, to speak favourably about America was considered virtually unpatriotic and, curiously, the legacy prevails. Respected pollsters may find that Indians as a whole have the best feelings toward America. There may hardly be a politician, bureaucrat or professional without a sibling or offspring settled there (or an innate longing to follow suit) but berating America remains more than an intellectual fashion, it spills over into a lack of cooperation.

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

The art of managing differences In the forthcoming Strategic Dialogue, India and the U.S. should focus on their long-term interests to take the bilateral relationship forward is not going to give way to the ideal world order soon, if ever; but the search for it finds more supporters in either country than in some one could name. It is a thought to bear in mind for the future.

Interest in partnership While we should adopt a more purposeful approach, the other side should have a real interest in partnership.

Much Indian dubiousness about better ties flows from resentment about being pressurised, and America’s so-called “transactional” attitudes: buy our planes, reform your investment rules, safeguard intellectual property our way, enact our climate change urgings; whereas much of what we want is perpetually blocked in Washington.

Both sides could exchange complaints forever. mine your handling of it.

India faces no such cruel choices today, nor any overnight external threat. There are only two foreseeable challenges to our territorial integrity, and two states to which a strong India is unwelcome, although one might take it in its stride. If either difference ever erupted in violent conflict, nobody would help us: we would be alone.

But our strength is surely the best hope of preventing any eruptions, and some states see their interests served by a strong India, and are willing to help us become so. Nobody does such things for ‘friendship,’ much less because we are so great or good that they ought to help — as, unfortunately, too many of us fondly imagine. Mutual benefit, so entrenched in our Panchsheel, means mutual trade-offs. There are no lack of advocates for seeking closeness with other countries, including those with whom we could have conflict, but oddly enough such an approach towards America remains suspect.

We also have vital interests beyond our immediate neighbourhood; the security of the Gulf, stability of Central Asia (especially after America’s cut-down in Afghanistan), the pow-

er balance to our East, tranquillity in the Indian Ocean. Our capabilities being limited, we surely need partners for all this.

We must consider which powers have congruence with our objectives (assuming, perhaps too hopefully, that we know what our objectives are).

Commonality of objectives never precludes disagreements, even bitter ones, on ways of getting there: Gulf security, for instance, would involve obvious differences on how to deal with Iran, like the role of Pakistan in Afghanistan apropos Central Asia; and looming over everything is the universal ambivalence about dealing with China.

There are many other issues on which our interest and views will differ basically from America’s; but there are enough issues with manifest commonalities calling for an intensified dialogue.

Another important commonality is hardly noticed.

Everyone talks about the need for a world order with little idea as to its meaning or content. Ideas for making sovereign states abandon the brute dominance of power which persist in the intrinsic anarchy of international relations, and accept common rules of behaviour, have long been proposed, to little effect.

Two World Wars initiated

idealistic efforts to make states settle differences and develop cooperation through multilateral institutions and international law, based on equity and the sovereign equality of nations. Nothing of the sort actually happened; the great powers continued trying to impose their will, using the new “systems,” accordingly. India was perhaps the leading sincere believer in the ideal, though we objected to all the unfair old dominating machinations which were so vitiating it, and we continue to fight hard against them. Other states, also opposed to western control of what currently passes for “order,” want another one, but really seek to replace the West, recasting the order with themselves in control. India remains the one genuine believer in making the existing system conform to the ideals that it professed to embody, with a truly fair deal for the underprivileged states, truly based on equity. America might seem the last country from which to expect cooperation to that end, as the leading unilateralist in the multilateral institutions (the Indian representatives who have had to endure its arm-twisting in the U.N., etc., are perhaps its strongest critics)) but it is also there that the ideas for betterment are most actively discussed. Power politics

Not that America has not done wrong: mistakes, deliberate misdeeds, behaviour and purposes that offend — all are there to make a formidable case for criticism and distancing. But that can be done against every state, definitely including some we call friends. Nobody has criticised America more sharply than Americans, and nowhere are there more forces at work for self-correction. In any case, international interactions have to be determined regardless of the virtues and vices of individual countries: if you find a state innately harmful to you, you must of course treat it as such, but howsoever horrible a regime, it is what it can do for or against you, not its nature, that must deter-

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The Strategic Dialogue will doubtless avoid that, but the problem remains: the working machinery on which delivery depends is obstructed by such faultfinding, fuelling doubts and hesitations on both sides. Top-down guidance has helped, but how much of that is to be expected today? Both countries are so heavily preoccupied with domestic and other concerns, developing this relationship is not exactly a priority for either leadership. Delhi is heading for national elections, and Washington’s focus is elsewhere. Many decisions badly needed by New Delhi in their own right are long overdue, but won’t be risked for appearing as bowing while scepticism — “what has India ever done for us-or ever will” — never left the beltway.

All this points to marking time — a perfectly normal situation in most relationships but potentially retrogressive in this instance because of the persistent negativisms.

There are major long-term interests to be served; they will be one day, if both sides focus on them, and manage interim differences instead of throwing them at each other. (The Hindu).

(K. Shankar Bajpai is former Ambassador to Pakistan, China & the U.S., and Secretary, External Affairs)

VOICE OF ASIA 3

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FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Second Front Page

Friday, June 21, 2013

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Swami Girishanandaji of Belur Math makes a stop over at VSGH Center

by Sanchali Basu

I

t was a great opportunity for VSGH devotees to be able to meet Swami ji Girishananda on his very short hurricane tour through Houston on June 16 and June 17. Being a trustee and the Belur Math office manager, Houston Vedantites were fortunate that Maharaj made a little time out of his very busy schedule to make a stop at Houston.

On Sunday, June 16 after his arrival late afternoon, he gave a lecture on the guru (teacher) - shishya (disciple) relationship between Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda. As the 150th birth anniversary celebrations of Swami Vivekananda continue this year, it was good to hear about how important a role a guru plays in spiritual life. He described a guru as one who has got the realization of the interpretation of the scriptures, has no bad intentions, lust or evil in mind. When one approaches the Guru to know the truth, he has the power (Guru Shakti) to choose the path to follow. The shishya has to depend on the Guru to be exempt from the repeated birth and death cycles of human life.

The Guru holds the hand of the shishya and helps cross Samsara (worldliness) by making ignorance/darkness go away with faith.

The Guru must be respected and there needs to be immense earnestness to learn and absolute surrender. The guru must be served with utter devotion and questions must be asked with humility and humbleness to extract truth. The Guru will then bless and advise and direct the shishya in the right path.

Sri Ramakrishna had various Gurus beginning with Kenaram Chattopadhyay, then Bhairavi Brahmani and then Totapuri and each played a great part in him attaining Sat-chit-ananda (truthconsciousness- bliss). Swami Vivekananda who initially had several doubts in his mind about Sri Ramakrishna tested him in various ways before accepting him as his Guru when he realized that Sri Ramakrishna was indeed an incarnation of the Divine Power.

As the chief disciple he then took on

Bay Area Winners: (From L to R) First Runner Up Neel Kovelamudi of San Jose, CA alongside Regional Champ Shirlyn Prabahar of Fremont, CA; Second Runner Up Anwesh Sahu of Fremont, CA with Rahul Walia, Founder of the South Asian Spelling Bee. HH Swami ji Girishananda , Trustee and Treasurer of Belur Math (India) during his visit at the Vedanta Society of Greater Houston. the colossal work of spreading his Master’s message, once the dormant power (Brahmakundalini) within him was awakened. Sri Sarada Devi, Sri Ramakrishna’s consort in whom Sri Ramakrishna saw the Holy Mother was the catalystic power who provided the support to Swami Vivekananda on the Master’s passing. So much so that in the short 18 years of his life after Sri Ramakrishna’s death, Swami Vivekananda was the first key figure in the introduction of the Indian philosophies of Vedanta and Yoga to the western world and was credited with raising interfaith awareness, bringing Hinduism to the status of a major world religion in the late 19th century. He was ahead of his time in preaching the motto that all the different religions lead to the same goal – realization is one.

On Monday, June 17 there was a Satsang at the center where Sw. Girishananda answered questions asked by the devotees. “What is the relationship between God-guru and the shishya?” was the question posed. He replied that one does not have to be an intellectual to have spirituality and God realiza-

tion. These come to the most common man through unimaginable absolute renunciation. Mother Kali made Sri Ramakrishna follow all the religions including Christianity, Islam and nondualism to find out the ultimate truth for himself. Incomparable renunciation of lust and attachment to gold made his mind crystal pure leading him to go into Samadhi (pure ecstatic state) often. Discrimination is the other asset and seeing God in everything and looking at all work as God’s work is the other tool for the highest spiritual transformation.

The events both the nights were well attended and ended with Arati and Prasad dinner. The effort of VSGH to attain a resident swami was well accepted by Sw. Girishananda. He mentioned that patience and perseverance needs to be practiced and to then leave it in God’s hands. We at VSGH are very hopeful that Sw. Girishananda will put in a good word in our favor and the toils of the devotees will come to fruition.

For information on upcoming events and Swami visits please login to www. houstonvedanta.org

In LA, Aditya Mishra from Lincoln, CA was the regional champ and Samruddhi Hande from San Diego, CA was the first runner up while Atharva Patil from Irvine, CA was second runner up.

In Bay Area, Shirlyn Prabahar from Fremont, CA was the regional champ and Neel Kovelamudi from San Jose, CA was first runner up while Anwesh Sahu from Fremont, CA was second runner up.

“MetLife congratulates all of the families who took part in this year’s event. We were so pleased to see how many families took part in the LA & Bay Area competition. All the families should be so proud of the skills these children demonstrated,” said Laurel Daring, assistant vice president, Diverse Markets, MetLife.

The winners received cash prizes of $500, $300 and $200 respectively.

Children up to 14 years of age are eligible to participate and the contest saw spellers of even 6 years of age compete and make it past a few rounds. There are 10 more cities on the anvil and for more information and to register your child, please visit www.

SouthAsianSpellingBee.com.

The top two winners plus one parent each from every city will be given an all expenses paid trip to NJ on August 17 for the FINALS. The contest will be telecast globally on Sony Entertainment TelevisionASIA. Find us on Facebook at South Asian Spelling Bee and you can follow us on our Twitter handle at Spell South Asian.

To reserve your FREE passes to the Finals, please log on to www.SouthAsianSpellingBee.com and fill in your details.

The 2013 MetLife South Asian Spelling Bee kicks off LA & Bay Area winners announced June 17, 2013 - The 2013 MetLife South Asian Spelling Bee (www.

SouthAsianSpellingBee.com) began its 12 city tour this past weekend with the first two events in Los Angeles and

Bay Area.

With a huge turnout this year as well, the bee attracted some top talent as well as young and new spellers that competed for the coveted prizes and titles.

“It is very heartening to see that each year we get fresh faces and new talent which is a continuing testimony to our community’s strength in this craft,” said Rahul Walia, Founder - South Asian Spelling Bee.

LA Winners: (From L to R) First Runner Up Samruddhi Hande of San Diego, CA alongside Regional Champ Aditya Mishra of Lincoln, CA; Second Runner Up Atharva Patil of Irvine, CA with Rahul Walia, Founder of the South Asian Spelling Bee.

COMMUNITY

VOICE OF ASIA 4

The People’s Lawyer www.peopleslawyer.net

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

‘Get Covered America’ Campaign Launches in Texas to Engage Consumers About The Opportunity to Enroll in New, Affordable Health Insurance Coverage Kickoff Events in Austin, Dallas, and Houston Mark 100 Days Until Open Enrollment Starts

Richard M. Alderman Interim Dean of the Law Center

Landowner not liable for injury to trespasser Q. I own a large vacant lot, near a residential development. Because the lot is fairly level and doesn’t have any holes or trees, local children often play there. I have put up “no trespassing” signs, but it doesn’t seem to matter. I am concerned that I may be sued if someone is hurt while playing there. What is my possible liability?

A. As a general rule, a landowner is not liable for injuries that occur on his property unless the owner was negligent, and did something that caused the injury. When it comes to people who trespass, however, the law is even stricter. As owner of land does not owe a duty of care to a trespasser on the land and is not liable for any injury to a trespasser on the land, unless the owner injured the trespasser willfully, wantonly, or through gross negligence. In other words, you should have no liability if a trespassing child gets hurt playing on your property, unless you injury him or her.

Q. I co-signed for my brother when he bought his car. He has been paying the note on time for over three years and has now established pretty good credit. I want to buy a house and it is hurting my credit to be a co-signer on his note. What can I do to have my name removed?

A. The only way to have a co-signer removed is for the creditor to agree to remove him, or for him to refinance and pay-off the debt. The creditor is under no legal obligation to remove a co-signer, even if there is no longer any need for one. I suggest you talk with the creditor to see if it will agree to refinance the note in only your brother’s name, or see if someone else will refinance the car for him.

Q. I inherited some property. It is owned jointly with my brother and sister. I no longer want to own a share of the property, and they will not buy me out. What are my options?

A. You cannot “force them” to buy you out, but you may be able to make them see that is the best option. Under the law, you have the right to go to court and get the court to order the sale of the property. It would then be sold, and the proceeds divided between you and your sisters. A court ordered sale, however, usually is not in anyone’s best interest. Bringing a legal proceeding to force the sale of the property will involve the time and expense of a lawsuit, and will probably not result in the highest price. In my opinion, both you all stand to lose money from a forced sale. A better solution is to speak with your brother and sister to see if you can work things out, without hiring a lawyer and involving the courts. My guess is that once they realize you are serious and understand the options, they will either buy out your share or agree that you should all sell the property and divide the proceeds.

Q. My bank account was just garnished for a credit card debt. I thought there was no garnishment in Texas?

A. The Texas Constitution generally prohibits wage garnishment in Texas. In other words, a credit card company cannot garnish your wages through your employer, even if it sues and gets a judgment against you. Garnishing the money in a bank account, however, is not considered wage garnishment. Even though the money in the account probably is from your paycheck, creditors can garnish a bank checking or savings account. Once you are sued and a judgment is entered against you, you need to be careful about keeping a large balance in a checking or savings account. The best way to avoid this type of garnishment is to contact the creditor’s attorney and work out a payment plan.

A

USTIN, TX – With open enrollment in the new health insurance marketplaces just 100 days away, Enroll America – the nation’s leading healthcare enrollment coalition – is launching the Get Covered America campaign in Texas to start a conversation with consumers about the benefits of health coverage and the new health care options they’ll have starting October 1st.

“This fall, affordable health insurance will finally be available to the millions of Americans who need it, and we’re here to spread the word to people in Texas, to let them know what their options are and how they can enroll,” said Mimi Garcia, Texas State Director for Enroll America.

“We’ll be engaging consumers across Texas, by knocking on doors, gathering folks together at information sessions, and working with local organizations and community centers.

We have a dedicated team of staff and volunteers in place who are committed to making sure that come October, people across Texas will have the information and tools they need to choose an affordable health care plan that works best for their families.”

As a result of the Affordable Care Act, a new Health Insurance Marketplace will open in Texas that will allow Texans to compare prices and shop for health insurance – by phone, on-line, or in-person. The insurance plans offered through the Marketplace will cover

doctor visits, hospital stays, preventive care, prescriptions and more. And there will be financial assistance available for many Texans.

Get Covered America has staff and volunteers on the ground in Texas engaging people directly by going doorto-door, talking to consumers at places like grocery stores and community centers, and working with local organizations – like community health centers, places of worship, and schools - to get the word out about the new Marketplace. A central component of the Get Covered America effort will be engagement with young people, key minority communities, and women. The campaign will partner with groups like the Center for Public Priorities, Texas Health Institute, Texas Organizing Project, the Austin Sustainable Food Center, Central Health, the United Way for Greater Austin, City Square, the Greater Dallas Community Council, Gateway to Care, and Good Neighbor Healthcare Center.

“We at Gateway to Care, and the over 167 organizations we collaborate with on working to improve access to health care resources in the Texas Gulf Coast Region, are excited to be working with Enroll America to prepare for the opportunities related to the Affordable Care Act,” said Ron Cookston, Executive Director, Gateway to Care.

“Working with Get Covered will be invaluable to our enrollment effort. Over several

campaigns we have found that neighborhood efforts are more successful when respected public media sources help raise awareness.

Together we will be able to have a significant impact that would be impossible if we each worked separately.”

Kicking off the campaign this week, the Get Covered America team is hosting a national virtual strategy session on Thursday, June 20th, where interested volunteers will learn about the campaign and how to inform their communities about the enrollment process. On Saturday, June 22nd, Get Covered America will join Austin City Council Member Mike Martinez for a Press Conference at City Hall Plaza. Also on Saturday, Get Covered America volunteers will be gathering together in Dallas and Houston to talk directly with local residents.

County Judge Clay Jenkins will join Get Covered America volunteers in Dallas.

To augment the in-state efforts, the campaign is also launching online and social media communications to help arm consumers with important information they’ll need when they’re shopping for insurance – including where they can go to get unbiased, no-nonsense help signing up for coverage, and how they can find out if they qualify for financial assistance.

For more information on Get Covered America, visit www.GetCoveredAmerica. org.

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COMMUNITY

VOICE OF ASIA 5

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

IACCGH Small Business Outreach at HCC NW Campus

O

ne June 12th 2013 IACCGH President Pankaj Dhume welcomed over 40 attendees at the third in the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce of Greater Houston small business outreach series sponsored by Houston Community College. Resource partners at the event included representatives from the U.S. Small Business Administration and SCORE Houston.

Mr. Dhume emphasized the Chamber’s focus on helping empower small business owners and professionals grow their business by helping them connect through IACCGH resource partners at these outreach events.

HCC Professor Dr. Ritu Raju introduced Houston Community College Northwest President, Dr. Zachary Hodges who delivered the keynote address. A strong supporter of small business development and entrepreneurial growth in Houston, Dr Hodges has been President of the college for approximately 20 years, and as a committed partner with diverse stakeholders has leveraged the college as a catalyst for economic and community development in West Houston.

In addition to his passion for economic and community growth in Houston, Dr. Hodges also admires the wealth of diversity, business knowledge and capital that the IndoAmerican community has brought

IACCGH Executive Director introduced Sandra A Louvier, Director, Center for Entrepreneurship(c4E), HCC who talked about the Center and Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses are two vibrant programs that HCC has for individuals seeking to stake their claim in Houston’s economic growth. Each program has dedicated professionals that provide education and training for entrepreneurs and small business owners to develop the skills they need to grow their companies.

Additional programs that HCC has developed to lead students into the 21st Century workforce are the college’s engineering partnership with University of Texas at Tyler. Students can obtain a four-year Civil, Mechanical or Electrical Engineering degree for less than $20,000 at the HCC Alief campus in West Houston.

While beneficial for the student, the program is also designed to support Houston’s demand for engineers.

L to R:Dr Ritu Raju (HCC), Pankaj Dhume , HCC NW President, Dr. Zachary Hodges, Sandra A Louvier(HCC) Jagdip Ahluwalia (IACCGH) . Picture courtesy Bijay Dixit (Unique Photo). to the Bayou City. In his talk on how HCC is preparing students for the 21st Century workforce at the Spring Branch campus, he charged the chamber to get involved in with

the college’s efforts of entrepreneurship and engineering.

“At HCC, we are creating a learning environment for students to pur-

sue their dreams, not just their majors. This helps our students develop independent and entrepreneurial thinking,” said Dr. Hodges.

For more information on C4E, visit hccbizconnect.org and to learn more about HCC’s partnership with UT Tyler visit hccs.edu/engineering.

To learn more about the Chamber visit www.iaccgh.com The 14th annual IACCGH Gala and awards banquet is on Saturday, August 17th, 2013 at the Hilton Americas. For sponsorship opportunities and to buy your Gala tickets contact jagdip@iaccgh.com

Dr. Subramanium Swamy talks ISI/Dawood, Corruption and Narendra Modi in Houston Visit members are Pakistani Muslims. He emphasized fight against corruption has to be started from top executives, top leadership at Central / State Government offices, if top leadership is corrupt free, downstream systems and process will fall in line.

He says that people of India are smart enough to understand the problem and culprits and

A

nother serious challenge is countering rapid conversions which is underwent in many eastern & southern states, work is underway to contain such conversion projects by pro Hindu forces. He states that Taliban considers India as unfinished chapter and is constantly conspiring to create havoc among Hindus and emphasized the strength of Hinduism who was able to sustain 200 years of Christian rule and 800 years of Islamic rule, still 80% India is Hindu in population.

On Kashmir policy he states that not a single inch of Kashmir will be ever given to Pakistan and PoK is part of integral India. On Bangladeshi Muslim immigration he states that since 1/3 of Bangladeshis are in India, in that scenario 1/3 of Bangladesh land should also be integrated with India for equal adjustment or deportation of illegal Bangladeshi Muslims is recommended.

But there are two favorable trends also, one is India’s growing young population which is talented, innovative and with good online education models and associated employment projects can educate and employ millions of young Indians, this will immensely help grow India.

On agriculture he said that India is currently optimizing 33% of yield, India can optimize 100% yield as it can grow crops round the year and be a global leader in agriculture produce. He said China is running on steroids and prospective financial breakdown of Chinese economy is near in future.

He is optimistic that India

can have a growth rate of 12% and can be a developed nation by 2020 under good nationalist leadership.

He requested Hindus to have a positive out-look for future and not loose hope but make correct move . He suggested ideology of keeping National interest should be above local and regional interest for the upcoming elections. India should check Chinese investments in Indian ocean area and foster good relations with Israel. For overseas Indians he suggested to support pro Hindu Organizations and work on projects that weakens political leaders who are corrupt and anti national. On question of some of Bollywood movies themes are targeted against Hinduism & Hindu Organizations, he said that’s an area of concern and should be carefully countered.

On Narendra Modi he stressed that with an pro -agenda towards development, good governance and Hindutva —Narendra Modi led NDA victory is certain in next general elections.

Dr. Subramanium Swamy visited Houston, Texas at “ INDIA AT THE CROSSROADS” presented by Hindu Mahasabha of America (HMSA), Arsha Vidya Satsanga and hosted

by Arya Samaj of Greater Houston. The event was a success with 200+ persons in-cluding eminent Hindu community leaders presence.

During his public address, Dr. Swamy informed audience on contemporary trends impacting social,

religious and political dynamics in India. He mentions three negative trends and two positive trends that are under focus. One is rampant corruption which is undergoing in full push under the current UPA regime, scams like Coalgate 2G and railways have impeded economic growth and there is prospective corruption set up in each and every central government deal. Regarding foreign investments more focus is towards luxury goods production and investments for goods catering middle class and poor is less. Moreover corruption fosters black money which is leading to serious threat to India’s national security.

With billion in black money which is being routed via Dubai via hawala brokers to international financial safe heavens, now since ISI and D–Company and has access to Dubai financial systems Including hawala brokers, private financial data (account, amount and final destination) of corrupt ministers is accessible to ISI and D– Company, as a result these politicians are fearful to speak openly and take stiff action against D– Company or ISI sponsored terrorism & other projects in India, as they fear ISI will expose their black money data. Not only this but many of the 2G licenses (which were given at relatively heavy discounted price) to Indian firms, were later sold to foreign firms, some of which has ISI and Pakistani Muslims presence, for example the way Swan Telecom was later sold off UAE-based company Etisalat, whose majority board

will revert back with strong ballot support for NDA. On Sanjay Dutt court verdict he said that the court verdict should have been stiffer as supporting Islamic underworld which resulted in Mumbai bomb blasts which killed hundreds of Indian’s is heinous crime against nation. He believes in zero sympathy, zero tolerance political policy for tri

problems of Islamic Terrorism, Maoism and Naxalism. Another negative trend he mentioned is that Indian society sole focus is becoming more materialistic whereas under Hindu Vedic and Sanatan Dharma the materialist progress of an individual should be kept in balance with social welfare. This trend of having whole focus for material well off needs to be arrested and diluted.

COMMUNITY

VOICE OF ASIA 6

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

DAM 999 holds premier screening in Houston, Director thanks shipping tycoon Ravi K Mehrotra for his support

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ollowing the footsteps of making the first screening for the Mariner’s, the movie by the mariners, DAM 999 made its recent appearance in the Offshore and Maritime hub, Houston. The screening held on 16th June at SMG City Center Theater saw a packed community of various mariners. The audience gave a warm reception to the director of DAM 999, Sohan Roy, who himself is a part of the maritime fraternity.

In his statement, Mr. Sohan Roy, thanked Executive Chairman of Foresight Group,Mr Ravi .K. Mehrotra for his support rendered to the screening in Houston. In his statement, Mr. Roy said “Ravi is a good friend of mine and a connoisseur of art himself and I am very thankful to him for his moral support and guidance to screening the movie for mariners in Houston.”

Mr. Mehrotra who didn’t make it to the screening did make sure that the right support went to the movie for its Houston screening, added the officials of DAM 999.

The makers of the movie credited the success of the movie to various organizations like MAGH, MEA, FOKANA and FOMAA and also thanked the members of Samunder Club mainly Capt.

Joseph Lobo of BP and Capt.

Joey Da Costa of Intermarine.

Besides, the original English version, DAM999 also screened its Tamil Version for the very first time in Houston again. The Tamil version was banned in the country on unruly grounds forcing the makers to take the movie for release in the US. The Tamil version was screened on 14th June 2013 at AMC 24. Before, it’s grand Houston screening DAM999 was also showcased at various maritime destinations worldwide, starting from the International Maritime Organization (IMO), London, Singapore, Hong Kong, Dubai, Cochin and Indonesia

.

between Tamil Nadu and Kerala. The DMK party chief M. Karunanidhi urged the Tamil Nadu chief minister J.Jayalalitha to ban the movie considering “people’s safety”.

A day before its scheduled release on 25 November, the film was banned by the State Government of Tamil Nadu on the grounds that the release would disturb the cordial relations between Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

DAM999, released by Warner Bros was the most controversial movie during its year of release and garnered innumerous awards and accolades from all over the world. The movie gained 5 Oscar selections in 3 categories (Original Score, Original Songs and Best Picture), won 2 Global Music Awards (GMA), was well appreciated at various film festivals across the world and made history as the first ever Indian Movie to be selected for screening at Golden Rooster film festival popularly known as the ‘Chinese Oscars.’ Recently DAM999 won Best English Film Award at Sangli Film Festival and Best International Feature Film, Special Jury Award and Best Movie of the Festival awards at International Film Festival for Environment, Health and Culture 2013 and is now heading for its Italian Screening at Salento Int’l Film Festival to be held in October 2013.

Challenging the Tamil Nadu government’s ban on screening of his film Dam 999 in the State, Producer-director Sohan Roy, on 30 November 2011, moved to the Supreme Court with writ petition, questioning the subjective satisfaction of the Chief Minister (on whose directions the impugned November 24 order was passed), arrived on “narrow political objectives.” He said the order had no constitutional, much less legal, basis.

• Summary: Dam 999 is a 3-D English language UAE-Indian coproduction film produced by BizTV Network, UAE and directed by Sohan Roy. The film is based on the award winning short documentary DAMs The Lethal Water Bombs.[3] and the Banqiao dam disaster of 1975 that claimed the lives of 250,000 people in China and anticipated calamity for outdated dams in the world.

The film falls in the category of an emotional thriller. The ancient Indian concept of Navarasas, or the nine human emotions, are represented by an assortment of actors from India and Hollywood. The movie also portrays the concepts of Ayurveda as well as lost love against the backdrop of the story of a dilapidated colonial dam.

Apart from being a controversial movie in India with respect to its theme, the Screenplay of the movie was added to the permanent core collection in Library of the Academy of

Motion Picture Arts and Sciences before its release .

• Plot Starring: Ashish Vidyarthi, Joshua Fredric Smith, Rajit Kapur, Vinay Rai and Vimala Raman Linda Arsenio The story encompasses around nine characters portraying nine variants of emotion (Navarasa) and an outdated dam.

The story starts with Vinay (Vinay Rai), who is a mariner and works in ships. One day he visits his native place, somewhere in Kerala, with his son Sam (Jineeth Rath) to meet his father Shankaran (Rajit Kapur). Shankaran is a village doctor or ‘Vaidyan’ and is also a master in astrology and the ancient sciences.

Sam is a Diabetic and Vinay

wanted to have him treated by his grandfather. Another story line is that of the orphan Meera (Vimala Raman), who has been staying with Shankaran since her childhood, treated as his own daughter and who helps him treat various patients. Vinay and Meera share a special bond and love each other. But when Shankaran studied their horoscopes, he learned that whenever they express their love towards each other, something terrible would happen. Learning this Meera sacrificed her love, and thus Vinay married Sandra (Linda Arsenio) who is a TV journalist. Now after a long time when Vinay returns home with his son, his special bond with Meera develops again with Meera reciprocating the feeling as well. On a parallel track, a corrupt Mayor - Durai (Ashish Vidyarthi)- is fighting an issue of an old dam in his area. Towards the end a leak is discovered inside the dam, and when a heavy storm and rains hit on the same day, a high alert is declared.

Controversies The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) complained that the film is based on the Mullaperiyar Dam dispute

He said the State suspended the screening of the Hollywood movie without hearing him or affording him an opportunity for clarification. The “arbitrary, unilateral and unjustified act” violated his fundamental right to freedom guaranteed under Article 19(1) (a).

Nowhere did the film say it was about the Mullaperiyar dam. Even an indirect mention of a water-sharing contract between two neighbouring States was deleted as per the request of the censor board.

Explaining the contents of the film, he said it “spreads the message about the consequences of dam disasters around the world.”

In response to this on 8 December 2011, the Supreme Court asked the Tamil Nadu government to hear the objections of Sohan Roy on December 12 and pass appropriate orders by December 16.

The Supreme Court on 24 January 2013 dismissed filmmaker Sohan Roy’s petition challenging a further extension of the ban by the Tamil Nadu government on screening of this film in the State. It further added, “the people are expecting this issue [of the Mullaperiyar dam] will be resolved.

At this stage, why should we aggravate the situation not only in Tamil Nadu but also in Kerala? We can’t close our eyes to the objections and decide the case purely on legal aspects. We have to respect the sentiments of the people”.

Star Spangled Spectacular at Constellation Field is SOLD OUT Sugar Land, TX ¬- There are no more free tickets available to the City of Sugar Land’s Star Spangled Spectacular at Constellation Field on July 4 from 6-10 p.m.

With more than 10,000 tickets distributed since April 6, the event has reached capacity. Anyone with tickets who is now not able to attend the event is encouraged to return their free tickets to the Imperial Park Recreation Center, 234 Matlage Way, so the tickets can be redistributed to others on the City’s “waiting list.”

Sugar Land’s Star Spangled Spectacular at Constellation Field is intended to provide a fan-friendly, family venue that incorporates a rich holiday tradition for the local community. Planned activities include a 3D laser fireworks show, appearances from Skeeters’ mascots Swatson and Moe, dual entertainment stages in the outfield and much more.

The stadium accommodates a capacity of 10,500 and provides a safe alternative to Oyster Creek Park that lacks adequate infrastructure to host what has become a large-scale community event.

Constellation Field provides adequate parking, restroom facilities and multiple entry points, amongst other advantages.

A festival site accommodating large-scale events like the City’s annual Fourth of July celebration is one of several projects voters will consider as part of a bond election in November. The projects have been developed based on extensive public feedback that has identified a need for public spaces for parks, special events and festivals that enhance the quality of life in Sugar Land and make it an even better place to live, work, play and visit.

DIASPORA

VOICE OF ASIA 7

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Over 8,000 Hindu Youths to Attend BAPS Duo plead not guilty National Youth Convention in Atlanta, GA to murdering Indian in New Zealand

O

ver 8,000 Hindu youths from all parts of North America have registered and are preparing for the National Youth Convention being organized

by BAPS Swaminarayan Sanstha (BAPS) in Atlanta, GA from July 4 to July 14, 2013.

Themed around the central concept of ‘Ekāntik’, these youth will learn how profound spiritual concepts given by Hindu scriptures and emphasized by Bhagwan Swaminarayan can anchor their spiritual self and enhance their day-to- day life.

W

Blessings from India from HH Pramukh Swami Maharaj, as well as discourses from Sadguru Pujya Mahant Swami and other senior Swamis will enhance the meticulously planned programs.

Planning for the event commenced over a year ago. Every detail, including logistics, transportation, meals as well as program, has been meticulously considered by the hundreds of volunteers involved.

Mukesh Swaroop, one of the lead volunteers of the organizing committee, shares his experience. “When I went to my first convention in 2004, I knew very little about my own religion. I am a Hindu by birth but did not know how to practice it. What I’ve learned cannot be expressed in words.

When so many other people with the same yearning come together in one place, the feeling is really life-transforming.”

According to the report, on the fateful day, after withdrawing the money from the bank and texting Kumar about it, Prasad got into his car and followed the latter from the car park outside.

Bryne Pelmar, 20, and Shivneel Shahil Kumar, 18, have been charged with burning alive 21-year-old Shalvin Prasad Jan 30 in south Auckland.

Kumar and Prasad continued texting and talking to each other and later arranged to meet up after the victim’s football practice and after Pelmar’s work got over.

The two appeared in the Auckland High Court Wednesday and pleaded not guilty to the charge, media reports said.

Prasad reportedly met Pelmar at the latter’s workplace and got into his car.

Both the accused have been remanded in police custody and the case will be heard by a jury in July next year.

Prasad was killed Jan 30 hours after he withdrew NZ$30,000 from a bank, according to a police report made public last month.

Youth Convention in progress. of ‘Ekāntik’, youth will learn how to balance their lives with various aspects of Dharma, Bhakti, Gnān and Vairāgra. Each convention will include cultural programs, spiritual discourses, multimedia presentations and workshops. A grand maha-arti will be held at the reflection pond in front of the intricately carved stone mandir.

Pujya Anandswarup Swami along with some of the most learned Swamis of

vention being organized by BAPS.

BAPS from USA, UK, India and Far East will address the convention.

Contact: Lenin Joshi, BAPS North American Headquarters

BAPS has been organizing such grand conventions in the United States from 1984.

The convention in Atlanta is the 16th National Youth con-

Each convention will provide delegates with tools to strengthen their Hindu roots and become better citizens.

Convention Overview The BAPS National Youth Convention 2013 is an 11-day convention organized in Atlanta for Hindu youths of different ages. The first convention will gather 3,000 children, the second will gather 3,000 college and high school students, and the third will gather 2,000 young professionals.

Themed around the concept

ELLINGTON Two men accused of murdering an Indian-origin man in New Zealand in January have pleaded not guilty and are now headed for trial.

Phone: 732-777-1414 (ext.

140) E-mail: media@na.baps.org Website: www.baps.org

Prasad’s father had got concerned after his son withdrew such a large amount of money and called the police, who then recovered the body from McRobbie Road in Kingseat in south Auckland.

At 10.33 p.m, Pelmar and Kumar went to a petrol station in Great South Road, Papakura, in the former’s car, and bought petrol.

They then went to the scene of the crime and set Prasad afire, police said.

In the following days, Kumar spent NZ$3,800, deposited NZ$14,000 in a joint account he held with his father and a further NZ$4,100 into his own account.

Pelmar and Kumar will next appear in court Aug 7 to set a date for a pre-trial hearing.

(IANS)

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Both Kumar and Prasad had been exchanging text messages in the days leading to the incident about a debt Kumar had to repay to Prasad.

“The events between 9.19 p.m. and 10.33 p.m. are unclear,” the police report said.

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VOICE OF ASIA 8

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

India’s Tata Motors revamps ‘world’s cheapest car’

M

UMBAI - India’s top automaker Tata Motors unveiled a new version of what was once billed as the world’s cheapest car Wednesday, in a bid to reverse a slump in sales.

a mistake to market the Nano merely on its low-price, saying “various stigmas have been attached to it”.

The jellybean-shaped Nano, which sold for around $2,200 when its first edition went on the market in 2009, has seen sales drop by more than 27 percent in the last year and Tata’s recently-retired supremo admitted the car had an image problem.

The compressed natural gas(CNG)-fuelled version of the Nano unveiled on Wednesday is expected to hit showrooms within the next 90 days, the company said.

Tata Motors did not disclose the CNG Nano price, but said it would be announced soon.

“This (CNG) is the first major variant for the Nano since its launch,” auto analyst Mah-

A Nano car is displayed during the Indonesia International Motor Show in Jakarta. (AFP/Bay Ismoyo) antesh Sabarad of Fortune Equity Brokers said.

Sabarad said the CNG version is being introduced to “give

customers a better choice” but may take away its “affordability” tag.

whether the Nano would retain its title as the world’s cheapest car.

It was not immediately clear

In an interview shortly before his retirement last December, the company’s long-time chairman Ratan Tata said it had been

Militants kill six soldiers in NW Pakistan: officials

P

ESHAWAR - Militants ambushed an army convoy in northwest Pakistan late on Wednesday killing six soldiers and wounding two others, military officials said.

fire continued for about 15 minutes,” a military official said.

The vehicles were patrolling the Matani area, 25 kilometres (16 miles) south of Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, when they came under attack.

A security official in Peshawar confirmed the attack and the military casualties. He said five “terrorists” were killed in the clash.

The province is on the frontline of a seven-year Taliban insurgency and borders the semiautonomous tribal belt, where US drone strikes target Taliban and Al-Qaeda operatives.

“Militants used rockets and small arms and an exchange of

Six soldiers embraced “martyrdom” and two were wounded, he said, adding that at least four militants were also killed.

At least one military vehicle was destroyed in the ambush, the security official said.

Washington considers Pakistan’s tribal areas a major hub of Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants plotting attacks on the West and in Afghanistan.

Tackling homegrown Isla-

mist militancy is one of the major tasks for Pakistan’s new government, which was sworn in earlier this month after the elections.

More than 6,000 people have died in attacks in Pakistan in the last six years according to an AFP tally.

A suicide bombing at a funeral in northwestern Shergarh town on Tuesday killed 34 people including a lawmaker in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial assembly who won a seat in elections last month.

This was the deadliest attack to hit the country since a bombing in a Shiite Muslim area of Karachi on March 3 killed 50 people.

Rover, which have compensated for its weak domestic car sales.

Sales of the part-plastic Nano fell 27.7 percent in the fiscal year to March 2013, to 53,847 units, according to company data.

Automakers in India have witnessed an unprecedented seven straight months of lower car sales, due to a slowing economy and a rise in the cost of raw material.

Since its launch, the Nano has had several small makeovers -- including upgrades to its interior and a doubling of the warranty to four years.

In May, Tata Motors’ total domestic passenger vehicle sales fell 45.69 percent at 11,134 units, from levels a year earlier.

The unveiling of the CNG Nano -- called E-Max -- was part of a mega launch by Tata Motors at its factory in Pune where it also introduced new versions of its existing Nano, the hatchback Indica and Sumo sport-utility vehicles.

“The market has been bad in the past two months but since then there has been some improvements,” managing director Karl Slym told reporters on Wednesday, according to the Press Trust of India agency.

The enhanced Nano -- with features like remote locking and sleeker interiors -- will cost upward of 150,000 rupees ($2,580).

In recent quarters, Tata Motors’ earnings have been boosted by the performance of its luxury brands Jaguar and Land

Tata Motors bought Jaguar and Land Rover from Ford Motor Co in 2008 for $2.3 billion as part of plans to expand its reach beyond Asia.

The deal vaulted Tata Motors from a commercial vehicle and small-car maker into a global player whose portfolio includes luxury brands.

Pakistani girl killed in Kashmir border firing: officials

I

SLAMABAD, June 19, 2013 (AFP) - A Pakistani girl was killed Wednesday when Indian troops opened fire across the de facto border that divides disputed Kashmir between the two nuclear-armed rivals, officials said.

The incident took place in Rawlakot district, around 65 kilometres (40 miles) east of Islamabad near the the Line of Control (LoC) separating the Indian and Pakistani-controlled sectors of the Himalayan territory.

“Indian troops resorted to small arms and artillery fire in

Battal area killing a 10-year old girl and wounding her mother,” a senior security official told AFP.

On Tuesday, Indian troops opened fire on a small village in Kotli town along the LoC, injuring a 65-year old woman.

He said Pakistani troops returned fire and senior local official Sohail Azam, confirming the casualties, told AFP sporadic exchanges were ongoing.

India and Pakistan have fought two of their three wars over Muslim-majority Kashmir, which is held in part by each country but claimed in full by both.

He said that the girl died after shrapnel from a mortar fired by Indian troops hit her house in Battal area.

Local resident Imtiaz Ahmad told AFP that he and other members of his family were confined to their house because of Indian firing.

The two nuclear-armed neighbours agreed to a ceasefire along the LoC in November 2003, but there have been sporadic clashes in Kashmir with both sides accusing each other of violating the deal.

India’s opposition divided ahead of 2014 election

N

EW DELHI, India — Indian politics are in for a major shake-up after a powerful regional party pulled out of the country’s main opposition alliance, less than a year before the next general election.

The Janata Dal-United (JDU) party, based in the northeast state of Bihar, split from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) on Sunday after 17 years together in the National Democratic Alliance.

The break-up was precipitated by the BJP’s choice of right-wing firebrand Narendra Modi to lead the Hindu nationalist party’s 2014 campaign, a move that most analysts here believe means he’ll also be named its candidate for prime minister.

“Our foundational principles have been irrevocably damaged,” JDU senior leader and Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar told reporters over the weekend. “I’m not bothered about the consequences even if they harm us. It may be anything but the coalition has ended.

“It’s a question of morality, not about holding on to power.”

The divorce confirms that the BJP’s elevation of the controversial Modi will have a deep, and potentially unforeseen, impact on the formations that have dominated Indian politics for at least the past 20 years.

More from GlobalPost: Indian leader of BJP, L.K. Advani, resigns in protest The long-serving chief minister of Gujurat, Modi is still remembered for the 2002 Hindu-Muslim riots in the state’s largest city, Ahmedabad, in which some 2,000 people were killed—though none of his critics have been able to prove charges that he purposefully slowed the police response to the carnage.

And despite his success in making Gujarat India’s most business-friendly state, the various anti-Muslim remarks he made in the immediate aftermath of the riots have won him a reputation as a hardline Hindu ideologue.

On the face of it, Kumar broke with the BJP for ide-

ological and practical reasons—though ambition and personal enmity for Modi may also have played a role.

Kumar’s center-left JDU won power in economically depressed Bihar through what experts term “a coalition of the high and low,” comprising the state’s highcaste Brahmins and low-caste Dalits. Muslim voters are key, however, if the JDU hopes to make further strides in Bihar.

The group’s alliance with the BJP always hinged on the Hindu party downplaying its ideology of Hindutva, or Hinduness—which critics say demands that Muslims assimilate or accept secondclass status.

Modi’s rise put paid to that uneasy relationship.

But the end of the BJP-JDU alliance, as well as rumblings from other regional leaders such as Odisha’s Naveen Patnaik and West Bengal’s Mamata Banerjee, could signal broader changes than a rejigging of coalition partners for the dominant Congress and BJP. More from GlobalPost: Is India’s Narendra Modi too big to ban?

“All the present assumptions will be irrelevant,” said M.J. Akbar, longtime newspaper editor and political analyst.

“New alliances at the vote level, between identity groups, are being formed as we speak.”

“Whatever happens in Bihar, the effect is big on the national level,” agrees Shaibal Gupta, a social scientist with the Patna-based Asian Development Research Institute. Like Akbar, he believes that the split presages a “reconfiguration of forces” among social groups—not just political parties.

Though India’s national politics are frequently simplified to a contest between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s secular Congress and the Hindu BJP, those divisions have not proved the deciding factor in the past several elections. Rather, complex coalitions forged through a mix of identity politics and patronage, such as

Kumar’s high-low alliance, have been the key to electoral victory—steadily eroding the influence of the two most powerful national par-

ties and increasing the power of regional kingmakers.

Now, both Gupta and Akbar suggest, those underlying formations, based on regional or

religious or caste-based ideas of identity, are likely to be thrown into flux. Essentially, that means virtually anything could happen. But whatever happens will seriously shake

things up.

“We should see very quickly which way the new winds begin to blow,” said Akbar. “But they will be new winds.”

VOICE OF ASIA 10

WORLD/US

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Kabul lashes out over Cheers, sobriety meet Obama prospective Taliban-US call to action in Berlin talks

by Deborah COLE

BERLIN- Under a blazing sun and waving German and US flags, a crowd in Berlin cheered a call by US President Barack Obama on Wednesday for more transatlantic cooperation, but with a whiff of disappointment in recent American leadership.

Anticipation ran high for the address before the Brandenburg Gate, the symbol of Germany’s hard-fought national unity, nearly 50 years after John F. Kennedy’s “Ich bin ein Berliner” pledge to the divided city.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai speaks at a military academy outside Kabul on June 18, 2013. Karzai opposes bilateral US-Taliban talks

by Sardar Ahmad The Afghan government lashed out Wednesday at US efforts to broker peace with the Taliban, suspending security talks with Washington and threatening to boycott contacts with the insurgents.

Kabul issued two strongly worded statements threatening to sabotage US efforts to start talks with the Taliban, just one day after its Islamist foes opened an office for dialogue in the tiny Gulf emirate of Qatar.

With the US-led NATO combat mission due to end next year, US officials are determined to resume talks with the Taliban after tentative contacts limited to a prisoner swap collapsed last year.

But President Hamid Karzai, who heads the US-backed Afghan government that took over in Kabul in the wake of a 2001 US-led invasion that brought down the then Taliban regime, opposes bilateral US-Taliban talks.

On Wednesday he broke off ongoing Afghan-US talks on an agreement that would allow Washington to maintain soldiers in Afghanistan after a NATO combat mission ends next year.

A few hours later the US State Department dismissed earlier reports which said the United States had scheduled talks with the Taliban for this week.

“Reports of a meeting being scheduled or on the books aren’t accurate,” spokeswoman Jen Psaki told reporters, saying Washington had “never confirmed” the date and place of any specific meeting.

“We are now in consultations with the Afghan leadership and the High Peace Council on how to move forward,” she said.

Hopes of peace were given a further reality check when the Taliban claimed an overnight rocket attack that killed four US troops at the largest US-led military base in Afghanistan.

In response to the talks suspension, US President Barack Obama said he always expected “friction” at Afghan reconciliation talks but voiced hope that “despite those challenges the process will proceed”.

But Karzai’s spokesman Aimal Faizi told AFP there was a “contradiction between what the US government says and what it does regarding Afghanistan peace talks”.

The row centred on the Taliban office calling itself the “Islamic Emirate Of Afghanistan” -- the formal name of its 19962001 government -- and an entity which Kabul insists does not exist, officials said.

A follow-up statement from Kabul threatening to boycott prospective talks in Qatar unless they were “Afghan-led” exposed a wider rift and criticised the US involvement outright.

“The latest developments show that foreign hands are behind the Taliban’s Qatar office and, unless they are purely Afghan-led, the High Peace Council will not participate in talks,” it said.

The High Peace Council is the government body in charge of leading peace efforts with the Taliban.

“The opening of Taliban office in Qatar, the way it was opened and messages it contained, contradicts the guarantees given by the US to Afghanistan,” the statement said.

On Wednesday, Psaki insisted the United States did not recognise the name of the Taliban’s new office, adding that US Secretary of State John Kerry had made that clear in two phone calls in the past 24 hours with Karzai.

Troubled relations between Karzai and Washington have degenerated into public spats in the past, but many Afghans also re-

acted with scepticism to news that the Taliban could be ready to enter peace talks.

“It is a historic mistake by the US government, recognizing and giving legitimacy to a terror network who are killing every single day Afghan civilians, women and children,” Shukria Barakzai, a moderate female lawmaker told AFP. Karzai initially seemed to embrace the opportunities presented by the opening of the Taliban office in Qatar on Tuesday, when NATO formally transferred responsibility for security to Afghan forces.

About 100,000 foreign combat troops, 68,000 of them from the US, are due to withdraw by the end of next year.

But a continued American military presence is considered vital to support the Kabul government, hence the security talks now suspended.

Obama himself gave one of the biggest speeches of his 2008 campaign for the White House in Berlin, to an ecstatic crowd of 200,000 hungering for change after the wars and widespread disillusionment here during the George W. Bush years.

Karin Huber-Levy, a 49-year-old American housewife living in Berlin, said Obama’s address to 6,000 invited guests was bound to lack the same elan this time round.

“2008 was a different time -- that was pre-marriage romanticism. Now that we’re married, we see how the other person looks when they wake up in the morning,” she said.

“He had a lot to live up to but I still think he did a fantastic job bringing back some of the enthusiasm that might have faded in our relations.

US President Barack Obama gestures during a joint press conference with the German Chancellor on June 19, 2013 in Berlin (AFP, Johannes Eisele) erful resonance in Berlin, which spent four decades on the front line of the Cold War. “It was extremely important to hear that here,” he said.

As if anticipating the speech’s themes, German violinist David Garrett revved up the crowd with covers of 1980s US anthems like “Born in the USA” and “Eye of the Tiger” followed by David Bowie’s Cold War love song “Heroes” blaring from giant speakers.

now called upon to assume more responsibility in the world.

“Expectations were quite high here for the speech,” she said. “He didn’t only speak about history but said what needed to be done globally now.”

Egyptian Yasser Kosbar, a 29-year-old on an international parliamentary fellowship, said he also wanted to hear more concrete words on Syria and other Arab Spring countries rocked by turmoil.

“To be honest I was expecting more from him,” he said. “We are in a time of change, especially in my country, but it was a textbook, politically correct speech.”

“This was an important platform to use for his message -- a country that has come back from war and succeeded with American help.”

But Vecchiato said the fact that the guests had been handpicked this time, and the stifling security measures required for a public address by a US president, had put a damper on the event.

Daniele Vecchiato, a 29-year-old Italian student living in Berlin, was in the audience at Obama’s 2008 rally at the Victory Column just a few hundred metres (yards) down the road from the Gate.

Hanne Eckrodt, a 50-year-old on the board of a local symphony, said she was disheartened that Obama did not go into more detail about what he would do to stop the slaughter in Syria.

But Kosbar, like several others in the crowd, noted that Obama’s championing of gay rights, to which he referred repeatedly in the speech, was a clear example of his moral leadership that was being heard the world over.

He said Obama’s call to shrink the US and Russian nuclear arsenals had a pow-

But she said she thought Germans were ready to hear the message that they were

“That really reaches hearts and minds,” he said.

VOICE OF ASIA 11

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

VOICE OF ASIA 13

LIFESTYLE

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Vol. 26

No. 25

Friday, June 21, 2013

Section 2

Email: voiceasia@aol.com

Tel: 713-774-5140

For David Bowie, Japanese style was more than just fashion

L

By Helene M. Thian- Japan Times

otic, spacey, Japan-inspired outfits

by Bowie-as-alien Ziggy Stardust put Japonism center stage in the fashion scene of the West, placing a seal of approval on inspirations from Japan, which in the early ’70s was still considered an indecipherable, alien nation.

ONDON – The Victoria and Albert Museum in London has scored a victory with its exhibition “David Bowie is…” for elucidating what many have probably always suspected: David Bowie is a bit of a Japanophile.

From the kabuki-inspired costumes for Bowie’s early 1970s alien stage character, the famed Ziggy Stardust, to a page of notes mentioning a Japanese restaurant and hotel as sets for Nicolas Roeg’s 1976 film “The Man Who Fell to Earth,” in which Bowie played the role of yet another alien named Jerome Newton, there is no shortage of evidence of Japanese associations in Bowie’s artistry.

Having shared with the museum aspects of my research on the influence of Japonism on Bowie’s stage costuming, and participated in the museum’s Bowie Weekender of events in April as well as lecturing at the first Bowie Symposium last October at

A space oddity: (left to right) ‘Tokyo Pop’ vinyl bodysuit (1973), designed by Kansai Yamamoto for the Aladdin Sane tour; Asymmetric knitted bodysuit (1973), designed by Kansai Yamamoto for the Aladdin Sane tour; cloak decorated with kanji characters (1973), designed by Kansai Yamamoto for the Aladdin Sane tour. | THE DAVID BOWIE ARCHIVE his birthday, with the release of a new album “The Next Day.” It was then followed by the V&A’s blockbuster exhibition, which, though running until Aug. 11, has long sold out of tickets online, with only a limited number available at the door each morning.

A Japanese proverb says, “Speech is silver but silence is golden.”

Bowie may have adopted the pose of the silent type for the past decade, but the V&A, in tandem with the Bowie Archive, has All time musical legend and rock star and English put the spotlight on actor David Bowie is also an icon in the fashion his many golden years world. of creativity and given quite a voice to the gethe University of Limerick in Ireland, stalt of his artistic accomplishments.

I entered the V&A’s exhibition space Geoff Marsh, V&A theater and pertwo months ago and came face to face formance department director and with “Tokyo Pop Jumpsuit” designed Bowie exhibition curator, has stated

by Kansai Yamamoto. The zig-zag- that the Bowie Archive stewards stitched Ziggy Stardust jumpsuit is a some 75,000 objects. Providing “un“tear-away” costume as is much ka- precedented access” to the V&A, the buki theater wear. And this story of archive made available items includBowie’s “turning Japanese” contin- ing Bowie’s costuming, handwritten ues throughout the exhibition. lyrics and even a lipstick-stained tisBowie’s private self-exile of sorts, sue from a makeup session. shying away from the public eye for Bowie’s initial foray into the world the past 10 years after a heart attack of Japan began in the mid-1960s, in 2003, ended this year on Jan. 8, when he encountered the flamboy-

ant, openly homosexual performance artist Lindsay Kemp, who was teaching dance and mime with a Japanese twist to students at the London Dance Center. In a documentary aired last year on BBC 4, Kemp discussed how Japan influenced his art and Bowie’s performances. And in a recent interview, Kemp told me that the music of Japanese composer Toru Takemitsu featured in his classes at the time Bowie was a student of his, and that he educated Bowie about Japanese theater conventions using books on noh and kabuki — all of which intrigued the budding rocker.

Bowie was, in 1967, devoted to Tibetan Buddhism and seriously considering becoming a monk due to time spent at Samye Ling monastery in Dumfriesshire, Scotland.

The androgynous rocker himself has acknowledged that encountering Lindsay Kemp was a turning point in the life of David Jones who had changed his name to David Bowie in 1965. Kemp’s outre style rife with androgynous characterizations was the catalyst for the singer, who caught a glimpse of his life as a performance artist as opposed to a monk living in quiet contemplation.

Bowie’s association with Kemp, who himself enthusiastically acknowledges the influence of Teinosuke Kinugasa’s silent film “A Page of Madness” (1926) on his own work, preceded the rocker’s collaboration in the early 1970s with Tokyo fashion

designer Kansai Yamamoto. Yamamoto was the first Japanese designer to present a fashion show overseas — complete with models doing kabukiinspired moves — in May of 1971 at the Great Gear Trading Company on the King’s Road in London. Impressed by the show, Bowie reached out to the designer through stylist Yasuko Takahashi, requesting that Yamamoto design his 1973 U.K. tour costuming, and subsequently the U.S. tour costuming for the Aladdin Sane shows.

Working as a fashion journalist for some time and married to an executive with Kansai’s company, I became well acquainted with Kansai and assisted him on site at his 1990 Paris Collection. The V&A exhibition has further energized the designer’s career as he approaches the age of 70.

Fashion magazine Arena Homme’s fall/winter 2012 issue, for example, was devoted entirely to the theme of David Bowie and featured a twopage spread of male models wearing Kansai Yamamoto vests printed with kanji harkening back to his ’70s designs for Bowie.

Costuming by Kansai in the V&A retrospective of Bowie’s career reflects the postwar period of rapprochement between Japan and the West. “Space Samurai” is a satinand-sequin jumpsuit complete with hakama, the split-skirt associated more with martial arts practitioners than rock stars. The wearing of ex-

The kanji on the white cape used

by Bowie for kabuki -style quick onstage changes of costume actually spell out “David Bowie” phonetically and loosely translates as, “Fiery vomiting and venting in a menacing manner.” T-shirts printed with Japanese characters are commonplace now, but in 1973 kanji on such a garment symbolized that the Japanese aesthetic had officially debuted in the West by way of Bowie. Wearing such costuming, Bowie unwittingly became a symbolic representative of popular culture’s new world order in a postmodern world, which had oriented toward a bricolage-based dress aesthetic.

A knitted, one-armed and onelegged bodysuit oddly resembles the patterning of a yakuza tattoo, and interestingly Kansai appeared in a 1971 issue of U.K. Vogue, just prior to the time he created this outfit for Bowie, wearing a fundoshi (loincloth) with his body painted in jacket-tattoo style. In actuality, however, it was kimono textile patterns that provided the inspiration for the ensemble. The addition by Bowie of a feather boa, as inspired by Kemp’s costuming, creates the androgynous look with which he was then synonymous. Patterns for this knitted jumpsuit were widely published in magazines such as Elle France.

Bowie’s androgynous look paid homage to onnagata, the male actors who specialize in playing women’s roles in kabuki. It was in fact Tamasaburo Bando V, the famed onnagata, who taught Bowie how to apply kabuki makeup. Bowie wore a “shortie kimono” with matching silky boots, his makeup was onnagata-inspired, and his celebrated hairstyle, as created by Yamamoto, was electric red in color, imitating the look of a flaming red-lion dance wig of kabuki theater.

As Bowie’s lyrics to the song “Ziggy Stardust” describe it, the alien rocker was “like some cat from Japan.”

Helene M. Thian, J.D., M.A., is a fashion historian/curator, Japan specialist and a Pasold Research Fund grant recipient for Tokyo-based work on Bowie and Japonism. For more information, visit www.cargocollective. com/japonicastrasse.

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VOICE OF ASIA 14

Friday, June 21, 2013

by Ari Levy (Bloomberg

A

cupuncturist Courtney Wallace was struggling to pay off $60,000 in student debt.

Seeking more lucrative work through tapping skills she’d learned as a kid building websites, she went to TrainSignal Inc., which provides webbased computer training for $49 a month. A month later, she was hired as a systems specialist at a consulting company in Chicago.

Section 2

Email: voiceasia@aol.com

They’re part of a revival in web education startups. Venture capitalists poured $632.3 million into the market in 2012, up 41 percent from the previous year, and the most since the dotcom bubble’s peak in 2000, according to the National Venture Capital Association. Lynda, based in Carpinteria, California, raised $103 million in January led by Spectrum Equity and Accel Partners, the largest venture funding on record for an education company, based on NVCA data.

Momentum Building For job training, momentum for online education is building. Richard Gallanti, a vocational counselor at Rehabilitation Perspectives Inc. in Burke, Virginia, offers Lynda.com to every client, mostly professionals, like police officers and firefighters, who were injured on the job and need skills for office work.

Clients using Lynda can learn Microsoft Corp.’s Word, Excel and PowerPoint programs and Autodesk Inc.’s (ADSK) AutoCAD software for architects, and typically find jobs in about half the time that it takes for those who stick with traditional classroom training, Gallanti said.

Follow Progress Subscriptions start at $25 a month per person. A single course at a local community college on basic Word or Excel would be more expensive and may be available only at a particular time and place, he said. He can also follow clients’ progress to make sure they’re doing the necessary assignments.

“Cost is one thing, but it’s not the only thing -- it’s availability,” Gallanti said. “I need it now. I can’t wait for the next semester or the next class.”

Requiring Americans who are receiving unemployment insurance to enroll in classes, including online courses, would save the government money, James Sherk, a senior policy analyst at the Washington-based Heritage Foundation, wrote in a Feb. 26

Tel: 713-774-5140

Unemployment Prompts Online Training Challenging Colleges: Jobs skillset or ability to focus on the tools to navigate through some of these online courses,” Garza said. A big part of the curriculum is providing training so clients can apply for restaurant and retail jobs online, he said. Henry Street has a computer lab, sponsored

by Microsoft, which provides the software for free.

“It’s becoming less and less about formal education,” said Wallace, 25, who moved to Washington in the middle of last year for a higher-level tech support specialist job at The Public Health Institute. “People just want to know that you can do the job.”

While online courses have been around since the early days of the Internet, job training has remained the purview of community colleges and vocational schools, requiring students to spend thousands of dollars to learn word processing, financial spreadsheets and web development. With unemployment hovering at 7.6 percent, companies like TrainSignal and Lynda.com Inc. are pitching what they call a more efficient and affordable route for people who need retraining on their own schedule.

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Community colleges “do a tremendous amount of online training themselves,” said David Baime, senior vice president for government relations for the American Association of Community Colleges in Washington. “There is something about being in a classroom that some people like,” he said.

“It really depends on the individual.”

While online courses have been around since the early days of the Internet, job training has remained the purview of community colleges and vocational schools, requiring students to spend thousands of dollars to learn word processing, financial spreadsheets and web development. Photographer: Melanie Stetson Freeman/The Christian Science Monitor via Getty Images New Marketplaces

report.

Improving skills would make the jobless more employable, he wrote.

And because online progress can be easily tracked, it would encourage the 5 percent to 10 percent of people on assistance he estimates who are abusing the system by not seeking work to take a job. Had the program been in place this year, it would have saved $1.5 billion to $3 billion, he said.

Ridding Fraud “It’s a conservative lower-bound estimate that comes just by getting rid of fraud,” Sherk said in an interview. He derived his estimate of the number of people abusing the system and money saved based on various state studies, including in Maryland and Utah, that show more-stringent training or job-search requirements to remain on unemployment insurance reduced the number of those receiving benefits or shortened the duration of assistance.

The Heritage Foundation, a nonprofit headed by former Republican Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina, advocates for smaller government.

“We haven’t seen a lot of this implemented on a large scale,” Sherk said.

“Part of the reason we put out the report was to try and encourage policy makers to think about this as an option.”

Retraining is a growing niche for Lynda, which gets most of its business selling subscriptions to universities and corporations. Lynda has more than 2 million users, and is finding increasing traction with job seekers, said co-founder Lynda Weinman.

“In a super-competitive job market like today, it’s not as simple as you go to school and get certification,” Weinman said. “The personalized aspect of online is incredibly powerful and efficient, because nobody has the time and a lot of people don’t have the money.”

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Lynda and Schaumburg, Illinoisbased TrainSignal have both been around for more than a decade, and have recently moved from mailing out instructional DVDs to offering ondemand services on the Web. Startups like Skillshare Inc. and Curious.com Inc. have established new marketplaces, allowing experts in subjects such as photography, basic car repair and computer programming to put low-cost courses online for anyone to take.

Online programs alone can’t solve the training needs of the jobless. At the Henry Street Settlement in New York, a 120-year-old social service center, some 5,000 job seekers from the city’s Lower East Side neighborhood come through every year. Many don’t own a computer and lack any Internet proficiency, said David Garza, the executive director. He offers the example of a building superintendent who lost his job after 20 years and needed to first learn how to launch a browser.

Lack Skillset “People don’t necessarily have the

For Ina Lee, Internet-based education proved to be the transition she needed after losing her job of 12 years as a graphic designer in 2009. While doing some freelance work, Lee heard about Lynda from a friend who persuaded her to register. She took courses on Adobe Systems Inc.’s (ADBE) Dreamweaver for website development and Apple Inc.’s Final Cut Pro for video editing.

New Skills That gave her the skills to get hired last year as director of creative services at the Elizabeth House Family Life Center Inc., a nonprofit in Wilmington, Delaware. “It helped me greatly,” said Lee, 49. “Dreamweaver really gave me the power to talk to Web developers with confidence,” she said.

Yet Lee isn’t convinced that classrooms are a thing of the past. While u n e m ployed, she also took a two-week course at a community college, gaining some basic web development skills. In addition to

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On TrainSignal, novices who come to the site with no background in computers can be ready for an entry-level job in three months from the training they get in hardware, operating systems and networks, said Chief Executive Officer Scott Skinger. TrainSignal offers the classes and a third party administers the certification.

Promote Services TrainSignal has chosen not to raise venture money. The company expects to almost double this year to $12 million in sales and jump to $20 million next year, according to Skinger. The growth will better enable the company to promote its services to employment agencies, Skinger said.

“It’s a matter of when, not if,” he said. “We need more time to reach out and make people aware of it. It’s a logical fit.”

As Wallace, the former acupuncturist, was looking to change careers, she chose TrainSignal because she could get basic training for computer maintenance and then learn more as she was ready to advance.

Wallace’s improved skills landed her a higher-level job, moving her to Washington from Chicago, and almost doubling her pay to $55,000 a year. Since starting at the Public Health Institute a year ago, she’s taken TrainSignal classes on VMware Inc. (VMW) virtualization technology and is looking into getting certified on using Cisco Systems Inc.’s routers and switches.

“I see myself moving towards being an I.T. director, moving up through the ranks,” said Wallace. “The more skills I have the more marketable I become.”

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VOICE OF ASIA 15

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

India’s population to overtake China’s sooner than expected Will scary UN numbers on India’s soaring population spark a dangerous kneejerk reaction?

by Jason Overdorf

said in a press release. Meanwhile, the world as a whole will be groaning under 9.6 billion people by 2050, as developing nations continue to display high fertility rates.

N

EW DELHI — India’s population is set to outstrip China’s as much as 15 years earlier than previous estimates, according to a new United Nations report. But the real concern is that the scary UN numbers could trigger a drastic and counterproductive government response.

In India, the danger is that policy makers will see the new numbers as evidence their present efforts to control the population aren’t working and push for more aggressive sterilization targets, Nanda said.

“This is bound to cause a kneejerk reaction,� said demographer A.R. Nanda, a former secretary in India’s ministry of health and family welfare. “[But] a state-directed, top-down, targeted approach of sterilization creates more problems, as well as adverse outcomes for women’s health.�

According to the 2012 revision of World Population Prospects, released by the UN on Thursday, India’s population will overtake China’s around 2028. Previous forecasts had suggested that India

More from GlobalPost: Is sterilization the answer to India’s population problems?

Indian school children in Amritsar point to India on a globe on Earth Day, April 22, 2010. The latest UN figures predict that India will overtake China as the world’s most populous country around 2028. wouldn’t catch up until 2035 or even 2045.

By 2028, both countries will have around 1.45 billion people, the UN

India’s largest shopping mall in Kochi, Kerala

Already, India’s National Population Stabilization Fund has brought back controversial, incentive-based sterilization — which critics say have turned operating theaters into veritable assembly lines. According to a recent Bloomberg report, a stunning 4.6 million women were sterilized in India last year, many of them cut open with rusty scalpels and left to recover on concrete floors.

These programs are founded in the logic of the 1980s, reinforced by the perception that China’s “onechild policy� is yet another example of the great benefits of its enviable totalitarian government.

But Nanda points out that China’s fertility rates were plunging long before the one-child policy was drafted, thanks to the greater speed with which the communist government provided access to health care and education. India’s fertility rates remain higher essentially because it started that process later and has been slower in improving the lives of its people. “Our voluntary family planning program in India has not been backed up by a base of social development — access to health, access to education, access to employment has been slower [to emerge] than in China. That has been the substantial difference between the two countries,� Nanda said. (GLobal Post)

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VOICE OF ASIA 16

BOLLYWOOD MASALA

Friday, June 21, 2013

Section 2

Pakistani actress Meera wants to compete with Priyanka Chopra

Email: voiceasia@aol.com

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Tel: 713-774-5140

Shah Rukh Khan faces baby sex test inquiry

Meera and Priyanka MUMBAI - Pakistani actress Meera, who debuted in Hindi films with 2004 movie Nazar, says she believes in competition and wants to compete with Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra.

“I believe in competition and competition allows a person to prove his or her talent,” added the actress, currently busy promoting her forthcoming film Bhadaas, a psychological thriller.

“I hope I get to do many more good films and I want to compete with Alist actresses in Bollywood. I want to compete with Priyanka Chopra and I would also like to share the screen space with her. This will give me an opportunity to prove myself and the audience can see the other side of me,” Meera told IANS.

She zeroed on in Bhadaas because she “liked the script”.

The Khans: Gauri and Shah Rukh Khan with daughter Suhana and son Aryan.

“It’s a psychological thriller. This is something that I have not tried before and wanted to explore,” she added.

UMBAI, June 18, 2013 (AFP) - Indian officials said Tuesday they were probing reports Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan knows he and his wife are expecting a baby boy, in a country where prenatal sex tests are banned.

Produced and directed by Ajay Yadav, the film is coming out on July 28.

(IANS).

Arjun Kapoor: I’m lucky to work with all top actresses

A

rjun Kapoor made his Bollywood debut in 2012 opposite Parineeti Chopra in Ishaqzaade.

“I am really lucky in comparison to all the other young actors beacuse I am working with all the top actresses whether it is Priyanaka, Deepika, Sonakshi, Parineeti. I am also working with Alia,” Arjun said, Asked why he thinks he has become the ‘chosen one’ when it comes to casting in roles opposite almost every actress of this generation, the actor said, “I think I am one of the few actors in the younger generation, who looks good with all of them, which is a rare thing. I am the type who can fit in with a young girl like Alia and someone like Priyanka who is a woman.”

But Arjun is not yet content.

He wants to

Local media has in recent days reported that 47-year-old Khan and his wife Gauri, who have a teenage son and daughter, are expecting another son by surrogacy.

The couple, who live in the entertainment hub of Mumbai, are yet to confirm they are expecting.

He is in his second year in Bollywood and just two films old, but Arjun Kapoor finds himself in a lucky space having bagged roles opposite top leading actresses including Priyanka Chopra and Deepika Padukone.

The 27-year-old actor made his Bollywood debut last year opposite Parineeti Chopra in Ishaqzaadeand in his upcoming films - Gunday, a Hindi remake of Telegu film Okkadu,Finding Fanny Fernandesand Two States- Arjun will be seen opposite Priyanka, Sonakshi Sinha, Deepika and Alia Bhatt respectively.

M

On seeing the reports, the Indian Radiological and Imaging Association (IRIA) wrote to the health ministry in western Maharashtra state, of which Mumbai is the capital, demanding an investigation.

Arjun Kapoor work with every Bollywood actress, including his childhood crush Kareena Kapoor.

“I want to work with Anushka (Sharma), Katrina (Kaif) and yes not to forget Kareena Kapoor, as she is my first genuine crush. But I don’t know when I will get the opportunity. It is always good to work with different actors, instead of repeating the same. May be by next year, I will have projects opposite them. I want to work with all of them,” he said.

“We want to know the truth, and if it is true how (the gender) came out and who told it,” Dr Jignesh Thakkar at the IRIA said.

“Whoever is responsible must be punished,” he added.

The state’s health ministry has told the city’s municipal corporation, the BMC, to look into the matter, a senior official confirmed to AFP. India bans sex tests because of a preference for sons in the country, where aborting female foetuses or sex selection has led to an imbalance in the gender of newborns.

Traditionally, married women in India have faced huge pressure to produce male heirs who are seen as breadwinners, family leaders and carers when parents age.

The 1996 law, designed to prevent the use of ultrasound for prenatal sex

tests, is thought to be widely flouted.

Media reports said officials from Mumbai’s municipal corporation visited the actor’s mansion on Monday but he was not at home.

Khan’s secretary was unavailable to talk to AFP. “The state health directorate has asked the BMC’s health department to inquire into the media reports and initiate appropriate action if needed.

The report is expected in three to four days,” state public health minister Suresh Shetty told the Hindustan Times newspaper.

Khan, star of “Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge” (“The Braveheart will get the Bride”) and “My Name Is Khan”, topped the first Forbes India Celebrity 100 list earlier this year with annual estimated earnings of $37.7 million.

Bollywood star’s boyfriend remanded over suicide chan, was found dead in an apparent suicide on June 3.

The 25-year-old’s parents found a suicide note in her wallet which reports said contained details of her troubled relationship with Pancholi.

Khan, born in New York before moving to London and then Mumbai, made her Bollywood debut in 2007 with the controversial film “Nishabd” (No words), playing a teenager in love with her best friend’s much older father, played by Bachchan.

The movie won attention because of its provocative storyline and Khan was praised for her bold acting.

Jiah and Suraj dated for an year before the relationship ended MUMBAI, June 11, 2013 (AFP) - A court in India remanded the boyfriend of the late Bollywood actress Jiah Khan in custody Tuesday over accusations that his behaviour had helped drive her to commit suicide.

Suraj Pancholi, a 22-year-old aspiring actor, was brought before a court in Mumbai after police arrested him on Monday for “abetment to commit suicide”, a week after his girlfriend’s body was discovered at her home.

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Additional Police Commissioner Vishwas Nangre-Patil told AFP that the charge was based on the contents of a suicide note found at Khan’s Mumbai and from a statement by her mother.

Pancholi was remanded in custody by the court until June 13.

Khan, who made her debut starring opposite acting legend Amitabh Bach-

Khan, who changed her name from Nafisa Khan, went on to star alongside actor Aamir Khan in “Ghajini”, a boxoffice hit.

India’s film industry reacted with shock and sadness to her death, with superstar Aamir Khan saying he was “deeply pained”.

Pancholi has been taking acting lessons and was set to make his own film debut, having signed to feature in the Salman Khan movie “Hero”. He has previously worked as an assistant director.

VOICE OF ASIA 17

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Voice of Asia News Group

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VOICE OF ASIA 18

Friday, June 21, 2013

Section 2

Avoid Medicare Enrollment Penalties by: Sudhir Mathuria f you don’t sign up for Part B when you’re first eligible or if you drop Part B and then get it later, you may have to pay a late enrollment penalty for as long as you have Medicare. Your monthly premium for Part B may go up 10% for each full 12-month period that you could have had Part B, but didn’t sign up for it. Most people pay the Part B premium of $104.90 each month, without penalty, in 2013. Usually, you don’t pay a late enrollment penalty if you meet certain conditions that allow you to sign up for Part B during a Special Enrollment Period.

Special Enrollment Period When a Special Enrollment Period Can Occur If you didn’t take Medicare Part B when you were first eligible because you or your spouse were working and had group health plan coverage through your or your spouse’s employer or union, you can sign up for Medicare Part B during a Special Enrollment Period. You can sign up: • Anytime you are still covered by the employer or union group health plan through your or your spouse’s current or active employment, or • During the 8 months following the month the employer or union group health plan coverage ends, or when the employment ends (whichever is first).

If you are disabled and working (or you have coverage from a working family

I

member), the Special Enrollment Period rules also apply.

When Coverage is Effective if you sign up during a Special Enrollment Period • If you enroll in Medicare Part B while covered by the group health plan or during the first full month after coverage ends, your Medicare Part B coverage starts on the first day of the month you enroll. You also can delay the start date for Medicare Part B coverage until the first day of any of the following 3 months.

• If you enroll during any of the 7 remaining months of the Special Enrollment Period, your Medicare Part B coverage begins the month after you enroll.

To understand your enrollment options and choose the right Medicare plan contact:: Sudhir Mathuria Licensed Professional Health Life 360

Email: voiceasia@aol.com

WASHINGTON, June 17, 2013 (AFP) - Some children with autism have weak brain connections in regions that link speech with emotional rewards, possibly signaling a new pathway in treatment, researchers said Monday.

The study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is the first to suggest that the reason why children with autism display an insensitivity to human speech may be linked to faulty circuitry in the brain’s reward centers.

“Weak brain connectivity may impede children with autism from experiencing speech as pleasurable,” said Vinod Menon, senior author of the study and professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University.

Researchers took magnetic resonance imaging brain scans of 20 children with a high-functioning type of autism; they had normal range IQs and could speak and read, but had a hard time in conversation or understanding emotional cues.

On the left side of the brain, the autistic children showed weak connections to the nucleus accumbens and the ventral tegmental area.

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And on the right side, in the voice-selective cortex where vocal cues and pitch are detected, there was a weak connection to the amygdala, which processes emotional cues.

US program marks birth of one millionth HIV-free baby

by Jo Biddle WASHINGTON, June 18, 2013 (AFP) - Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday hailed the 10th anniversary of a US program to battle AIDS, saying it has helped one million babies be born disease-free to mothers infected with HIV.

deadly pandemic,” he said.

The biggest fall in transmission rates from mother to infant has come since 2009, US Global AIDS coordinator Eric Goosby told AFP.

“Preventing mother to child transmission has been a central pillar of our fight against this disease,” Kerry said at a State Department event.

“Somewhere round 430,000 babies are born annually with HIV and this project that we’ve been in really since the beginning of PEPFAR has intensified over the last three years in partnership with UNAID and UNICEF,” Goosby said.

More effective anti-retroviral drugs and regimens are now dramatically cutting the chances of an infected mother passing on the sickness to her baby during pregnancy or breastfeeding.

The program was working to “virtually eliminate pediatric HIV by 2015 and keep their mothers alive,” he said, with the aim of reducing the number of babies born with the infection to around 30,000 annually.

The birth of the one millionth HIV-free baby was hailed as part of celebrations to mark the 10th anniversary of the US President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, known by its acronym PEPFAR.

This involves not just identifying the mother, but getting her on a drugs program and keeping her in treatment through the pregnancy and any later ones -- not always an easy task in rural Africa.

“Thanks to the support of PEPFAR, we have saved the one millionth baby from becoming infected with HIV,” Kerry said, adding it was “a truly landmark moment on the HIV/AIDS timeline.”

The chances of a mother infecting her baby once stood at around 30 percent, but now, with the launch of a cocktail of three anti-retroviral drugs, that has dropped to only about two percent, Goosby said.

“One million babies can grow up happy and healthy, go to school, realize their dreams, break out of this cycle, maybe even have sons and daughters of their own free from the burden and the fear of HIV.”

Launched under former US president George W. Bush, PEPFAR was an initial commitment of some $15 billion over five years aimed specifically at providing anti-retroviral drugs to people infected with HIV.

Namibian Health Minister Richard Nehabi Kamwi said his government would always be “eternally grateful” for PEPFAR’s assistance, which has helped turn the tide against the disease in his country.

That has risen to a budget of about $5.5 billion annually, including its contribution to the Global Fund -- the world’s largest financing organization of programs to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

The program “represents a decade of hope and renewed health for victims of HIV/ AIDS, who without PEPFAR would have succumbed to the

Kerry told how during a visit some years ago to Durban, South Africa, he had met orphans robbed of their parents “forced to take on the burden

of adulthood at the age of 13, 14, and caring for their younger siblings.”

“We were heartbroken in hearing what these children had been through. You couldn’t help but feel this agony and this total disruption of the way life is supposed to be.”

But with programs like PEPFAR, “when we all looked lost, when this disease appeared to be unstoppable, history will show that humanity and individual humans rose to the challenge.”

“Action was taken, innovations were discovered, hope was kindled and generations were saved,” Kerry said.

Absent a medical breakthrough leading to a cure, experts are working towards a so-called “tipping point” when fewer people contract HIV every year than the number of those going onto treatments.

Kerry also announced that some 13 countries from Botswana to Zimbabwe, including Namibia, were close to that all important “tipping point.”

In Ethiopia and Malawi, the ratio of new HIV infections to the increase of patients on treatment is just 0.3. Ethiopia -which with a population of 84.7 million is the most populous African country after Egypt -- for instance registered only 11,000 new cases of HIV in adults in 2011.

Although some 1.7 million people still die every year from AIDS-related illnesses, PEPFAR supports more than 5.1 million on treatment programs.

The program estimates that worldwide more than 16 million children are living without one or both parents who have succumbed to AIDS, while millions more are left vulnerable with their parents chronically ill.

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Researchers also found that weaker connections meant worse communication abilities.

“The human voice is a very important sound; it not only conveys meaning but also provides critical emotional information to a child,” said lead author Daniel Abrams, a postdoctoral scholar in psychiatry at Stanford.

“We are the first to show that this insensitivity may originate from impaired reward circuitry in the brain.”

The findings also give weight to the theory that people with autism have a deficit in social motivation that explains their inattention to voices and words, rather than a sensory deficit that prevents them from hearing words.

“It is likely that children with autism don’t attend to voices because they are not rewarding or emotionally interesting, impacting the development of their language and social communication skills,” Menon said.

“We have discovered an aberrant brain circuit underlying a core deficit in autism; our findings may aid the development of new treatments for this disorder.”

Further research could also reveal whether a type of therapy called pivotal-response training, which tries to motivate kids to use language for social interaction, has any effect on strengthening these brain circuits.

Autism affects as many as one in 88 in the United States, and about one in 100 in Britain.

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Sugar overload can cause heart damage: study ing to heart failure, according to the researchers at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth).

G6P can accumulate from eating too much starch and/or sugar, researchers said.

“Treatment is difficult.

Physicians can give diuretics to control the fluid, and beta-blockers and Your sweet tooth may be damaging your ACE inhibitors to heart! lower the stress on the heart and allow Eating too much sugar can it to pump more economically,” set people down a pathway to said Heinrich Taegtmeyer, prinheart failure, a new study has cipal investigator and professor warned. of cardiology at the UTHealth A single small molecule, the Medical School. glucose metabolite glucose “But we still have these ter6-phosphate (G6P), causes rible statistics and no new treatstress to the heart that changes ment for the past 20 years,” the muscle proteins and induc- said Taegtmeyer. Taegtmeyer es poor pump function lead- performed preclinical trials in

animal s, as well as tests on tissue taken from patients at the Texas Heart Institute, who had a piece of the heart muscle removed in order to implant a left ventricle assist device. Both led to the discovery of the damage caused by G6P. “When the heart muscle is already stressed from high blood pressure or other diseases, and then takes in too much glucose, it adds insult to injury,” Taegtmeyer said.

Researchers said the study has opened doors to possible new treatments. Two drugs, rapamycin (an immunosuppressant) and metformin (a diabetes medication) disrupt signalling of G6P and improved cardiac power in small animal studies, they said.

“These drugs have a potential for treatment and this has now cleared a path to future studies with patients,” Taegtmeyer said.

The study was published in the Journal of the American Heart Association. (PTI).

‘Mass hysteria’ hits Bangladesh garment workers DHAKA, (AFP) - Hundreds of Bangladesh factory workers who fell sick in recent weeks could have been struck down by a mysterious illness described as a type of “mass hysteria,” officials said Tuesday.

Garment workers at several factories fell sick with stomach pains and vomiting, leading officials to initially suspect contaminated drinking water at their workplaces as the cause.

But doctors and microbiologists investigating the illness said they found nothing wrong with the water supplied at one of the factories where up to 600 workers fell ill earlier this month.

Instead a team from the country’s Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR) suspect a condi-

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Study finds weak brain connections in autistic children COQ-10: Contd..

By comparing the scans to those of 19 children without autism, they found that the brains of youngsters with autism showed poor connections to brain regions that release dopamine in response to rewards.

Sudhir Mathuria

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

tion known as “mass hysteria” which struck the country about eight years ago, and forced dozens of schools and factories to close.

“Water at Starlight Sweaters contained normal contaminants,” the director of IEDCR, Mahmudur Rahman, told AFP, referring to the factory where some 600 workers fell ill.

“We suspect it (to be) a mass psychogenic illness or mass hysteria that affects people from a same group. This happens to mentally and physically vulnerable people,” he added.

The condition appears highly contagious -- as soon as one or two workers fall sick, others are immediately struck with similar symptoms, he said, adding that extremely hot weather contributes to their vulnerability.

“This type of illness can be triggered by big events or tragedies. This is obvious because the disaster of Rana Plaza and subsequent highlighting of poor conditions in our factories have panicked garment workers,” Rahman said.

At least 1,129 people were killed in one of the worst industrial tragedies when Rana Plaza, a nine-storey complex housing five garment factories, collapsed in April outside Dhaka.

The disaster coupled with a series of deadly fires renewed concerns over appalling safety problems in Bangladesh’s $20 billion garment industry in which 4,500 factories employ more than three million workers, 80 percent of them women.

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VOICE OF ASIA 19

NASA announces eight new astronauts, half are women

Apple Joins Facebook, Microsoft in Outlining Data Requests

A

pple Inc. (AAPL), the world’s mostvaluable technology company, received as many as 5,000 requests for customer information from U.S. law enforcement authorities amid widening revelations of government data collection.

Between 9,000 and 10,000 accounts or devices were specified in the requests between Dec. 1 and May 31, the Cupertino, California-based company said in a statement. Facebook Inc. (FB) and Microsoft Corp.

(MSFT) said they received thousands of warrants for data from government entities during the second half of 2012.

Astronaut Mike Fossum during a six-and-a-half-hour spacewalk on July 12, 2011.

W

ASHINGTON The US space agency announced the appointment of eight new astronauts on Monday, and a record half of NASA’s first astronaut class since 2009 are women.

The astronauts will earn between $64,000 and $141,000 per year, and will be part of the team that lays the groundwork for NASA missions to an asteroid in the 2020s and to Mars in the 2030s, NASA administrator Charles Bolden said.

“This new class will be among those who have the opportunity to plan and carry out these exciting missions,” said Bolden in

a video message on the NASA website.

ic Administration (NOAA) Station Chief in American Samoa.

The eight were chosen from the second largest pool of applications ever received -- over 6,100 -- NASA said.

The male astronaut candidates are former naval aviator Josh Cassada, 39; Navy lieutenant commander and F/A 18 pilot Victor Glover, 37; Tyler Hague, 37, a US Air Force colonel working to tackle improvised explosive devices; and Andrew Morgan, 37, an army major and physician of emergency medicine.

Among them are Nicole Aunapu Mann, 35, a Marine Corps major and F/A 18 pilot; and Anne McClain, 34, a major in the US Army and OH-58 helicopter pilot.

The others are Jessica Meir, 35, an assistant professor of anesthesia at Harvard Medical School and Christina Hammock, 34, who is National Oceanographic and Atmospher-

The last class announced in 2009 included three women.

The group of astronauts named in 1998 also included four women, but out of a larger hired group of 25.

Mysterious Steve Jobs emails hang over Apple trial

by John Biers NEW YORK, (AFP) - The late Steve Jobs took center stage Monday in the latest twist in the Apple antitrust trial on ebooks.

A federal court attempted to plumb the meaning of a series of unsent emails Jobs addressed to Eddy Cue, an Apple senior vice president assigned with negotiating ebook contracts with major publishers in late 2009 and early 2010 before the launch of the iPad. Even though the emails were never sent, government prosecutors argue that they help establish a pattern of Apple serving as a “ringleader” in a conspiracy with the publishers to force the retail book industry to adopt higher prices of ebooks.

The government contends that Apple forced publishers to change their pricing system with Amazon, resulting in higher ebook prices across the industry and costing consumers hundreds of millions of dollars.

Apple maintains that it was indifferent to Amazon’s contracts with the publishers and that higher ebook prices were set by publishers, not Apple.

All of the draft emails responded to a message from Cue outlining the emerging price of Apple ebooks, which would

be $12.99 or $14.99, up from the $9.99 Amazon had sold for bestsellers.

In most of the drafts, dated January 14, 2010, Jobs is seen picking over the impact of the emerging deal between Apple and the publishers, according to testimony.

This included the effects of an Apple “most favored nation” (MFN) provision requiring publishers to make available to Apple any ebook offered on another retailer for the same price.

The bombshell was a draft note to Cue in which Jobs said, “I can live with this as long as they move Amazon to the agent model too for new releases for the first year.”

“If they don’t, I’m not sure we can be competitive.”

The Amazon note appears to be the last draft email in the series, said Cue. It is also the only one in the series signed by Jobs.

US Justice Department lawyer Lawrence Buterman depicted Jobs’s draft Amazon email as part of a pattern of Apple demanding publishers to change their terms from a “wholesale” model in which retailers set

price to an “agency” model in which publishers set price but guaranteed booksellers a 30 percent commission.

The government contends this shift led to higher ebook prices.

Buterman also pointed to a January 4 letter from Cue to the publishers demanding that all publishers shift their other retailers to the agency model.

Cue said that letter was an initial proposal before he understood the business and realized that Apple could not impose its model on other retailers.

Apple dropped the requirement on other retailers going to agency as soon as it developed the MFN provision, which guaranteed it could compete with Amazon and others, Cue said.

US District Judge Denise Cote joined prosecutors in repeatedly questioning Cue about the draft emails by Jobs.

The emails suggest Jobs was confused about how the MFN provision worked, Cue told Cote.

“Steve would never send an email if he wasn’t sure about it,” Cue said. “It looks like he’s struggling.”

After signing with Apple, the five publishers demanded

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

The role of technology companies has come under scrutiny since Edward Snowden, a computer technician who did work for the National Security Agency, disclosed this month that the NSA is collecting data under a U.S. government program code-named PRISM. The project traces its roots to warrantless domestic-surveillance efforts under former President George W. Bush.

“Like several other companies, we have asked the U.S. government for permission to report how many requests we receive related to national security and how we handle them,” Apple said in the statement.

“We have been authorized to share some of that data, and we are providing it here in the interest of transparency.”

Apple said it hadn’t heard of PRISM until June 6 when news organizations asked it questions. Requests came from federal, state and local authori-

ties and included both criminal and national security matters, it said. Police investigations into crimes such as robbery were the most-common form of request, it said.

E-mails, Videos Apple sold 125 million iPhones and 58 million iPad tablet computers last financial year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

No government agency has direct access to Apple servers and it doesn’t store data related to customers’ location, map searches or Siri requests in any identifiable form, the company said.

Conversations over the iMessage and FaceTime functions are protected by end-to-end encryption, which means only the sender and receiver can see or read them, and Apple can’t decrypt the data, the company said.

PRISM gathers e-mails, videos and other private data of foreign surveillance targets through arrangements that vary by company, overseen by a secret panel of judges, according to slides provided by Snowden to the Guardian and Washington Post newspapers.

Facebook got 9,000 to 10,000 requests, while Microsoft got 6,000 to 7,000, their legal executives said in blog posts.

Telephone Records Google Inc. (GOOG), Facebook and Microsoft asked the U.S. government for more leeway to report aggregate numbers of data requests, following reports that the NSA is collecting millions of residents’

telephone records and the Web communications of foreigners under court order.

Facebook, based in Menlo Park, California, said it complied with 79 percent of the requests. Inquiries sent to Facebook covered between 18,000 and 19,000 accounts and included everything from local governments to NSA requests, according to the company.

Microsoft said the data-security warrants affected 31,000 to 32,000 consumer accounts.

Google, in response to Facebook and Microsoft’s disclosures, said it’s pushing authorities to let it differentiate between varying types of government requests.

“Our request to the government is clear: to be able to publish aggregate numbers of national security requests, including FISA disclosures, separately,” the Mountain View, California-based company said in an e-mailed statement, referring to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The three-decade-old FISA law lets intelligence agencies monitor the communications of non-U.S. citizens reasonably believed to be located outside the U.S. and involved in terrorist activities or other crimes.

To contact the reporters on this story: Tim Culpan in Taipei at tculpan1@bloomberg. net; Adam Satariano in San Francisco at asatariano1@ bloomberg.net To contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Tighe at mtighe4@bloomberg. net

Echoes can reveal the shape of a room

W

ASHINGTON - A snap of a finger, a handful of scattered microphones and a computer algorithm are all it takes to create an accurate three-dimensional map of a room, Swiss and US researchers said Monday.

tion, researchers said.

The method, described in the US journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, measured the distance between echoes to create maps of both a university lecture room and a cathedral alcove.

The microphones did not need to be placed in precise locations in order to pick up the original sound and its echoes.

With more refinement, the technique could someday lead to better ways of designing concert halls for specific acoustics, aid investigations and even help with crime scene reconstruc-

“Our software can build a 3D map of a simple, convex room with a precision of a few millimeters,” said lead author Ivan Dokmanic, a PhD student at Switzerland’s Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne.

The lags between the sounds and the echoes were used by the algorithm to calculate the distance from the microphones, walls and sound source, and recreate the digital 3D shape of the room.

“Architects could use this to

to shift Amazon to the agency model. Apple maintains that it had nothing to do with Amazon’s negotiations with the publishers.

erwise, they would have been forced to keep selling bestsellers at $9.99. The publishing industry viewed the $9.99 price as eroding the value of all books.

Some publishers have told the court that they decided to shift Amazon to agency because of the Apple MFN provision. Oth-

Cote questioned whether Apple also sought higher prices.

“There’s another way to read this,” Cote said. “There’s some

design rooms -- for example concert halls or auditoriums -based upon the specific acoustics they would like to create,” said Dokmanic.

Forensic science could use the approach to recreate details about a room that cannot be seen, or to identify the whereabouts of a person calling from inside a room.

Some people, including the blind, can naturally detect the general shape of a room by hearing sounds within it. The same process, known as echolocation, is used by bats and dolphins to navigate in the environment.

Co-authors on the study came from Harvard University’s school of engineering. concern at Apple about profitability at $9.99, even with the 30 percent commission.”

But Cue said “there’s absolutely zero chance of that” because Apple has learned to make money with its commission no matter the price of a retail good. Apple was indifferent to book price, Cue said.

BUSINESS

VOICE OF ASIA 20

Friday, June 21, 2013

Section 2

Email: voiceasia@aol.com

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Tel: 713-774-5140

Shale gas powering US petrochemical revival

by Marc Preel

profits,” said Patrick Pouyanne, president of the refining and chemicals division at Total, the French oil and gas giant.

H

OUSTON - The US petrochemical industry, in trouble just a few years ago, is making a spectacular comeback thanks to the boom in shale gas, shaking up the industry worldwide and spreading some discomfort through Asia and Europe.

But will the petrochemicals boom explode like a bubble, once the price of gas goes back up, especially if the United States allows producers to export gas and new gas-fired power plants lock up the supplies?

“It’s pretty simple, there’s just so much feedstock that needs to find a home,” Chuck Carr, a petrochemical analyst at IHS, said in Texas, the capital of the US industry.

Or could it be hurt by an environmental backlash to fracking, the key technique for exploiting shale gas?

“This is not our forecast, but the industry does have a record for overcapacity,” said Walter Hart, another analyst at IHS.

“So everybody’s saying: hurry up to build something, because at that natural gas price, it’s just pure value.”

Production anyway should keep up with a rise in demand. There is enough shale gas in the ground that can be produced profitably at the current price (around $4 per million BTU) to supply the country for 30 years, according to IHS.

The surge in gas production has pushed gas prices in the United States down since 2009, while oil prices have doubled since then.

The low price for gas as a fuel is already helping a comeback in US industry -- natural gas sells for one third the price in Europe and one fifth that in Asia.

But that makes it even more a boon for the petrochemical industry, where gas is a core raw material for producing plastics and other basic industrial products.

In 2008, none of the members of the American Chemistry Council foresaw investing any more in the country.

Now, in the wake of the shale gas boom, the ACC lists 110 new investment projects for the US, worth some $77 billion.

Just in the past two months, 13 projects have been announced.

If all come to fruition, the ACC sees 46,000 new direct jobs, plus another 200,000 for subcontractors, in a sector that employs 800,000, compared with 1.1 million in 1981.

“I’ve been working for the chemical

“As soon as the price goes up a bit, someone opens a tap somewhere in the country” and adds more gas supply, said Carr.

A horizontal gas drilling rig exploring the Marcellus Shale outside the town of Waynesburg, Pennsylvania, April 13, 2012 (AFP/File, Mladen Antonov) industry for almost 20 years now and it’s always been a story of moderating production,” said Martha Moore, an ACC economist.

“Now we’re in a renaissance. Chemicals are at the forefront, but there’s a rebirth of manufacturing in the United States. It’s a very exciting time to be in the industry.”

“Not a miracle” for Europe At the start of the boom, drillers mainly produced essentially methane gas. But faced with lower profitability, they began to focus on producing oil from shale and “wet gas”, natural gas containing the feedstocks that pet-

rochemical plants value more: butane, propane and especially ethane.

up their production of those products inside the United States.

Those are extremely useful as substitutes for naptha, a component of oil often used as feedstock in chemicals plants -- but now much more expensive.

Existing plants are working at full capacity; plants that were shut down are being started back up again; and others are boosting capacity, industry officials say.

Ethane costs today some one third the price of naptha.

And it is delivering profits. In a remarkable example, Lyondell Basell, the US giant, has gone from bankruptcy in 2009 to record profits a year ago.

The natural gas feedstock is transformed into polyethylene, polypropylene, butadiene, the base products for the global plastics and chemicals industry.

And, after a decade of offshoring the industry, companies now are stepping

“If you look at the line ‘United States’ in the profits of the large petrochemical groups, you will see that it comprises often 80 percent of the total

Those under threat from the US petrochemical renaissance include plants in Europe and Asia where feedstocks are more expensive.

In Asia, especially China, said Carr, “we already see the capacity (utilization) rates go down, to around 85 percent, when they used to be at 100 or 110 percent.”

In Europe, where reaching 70 percent utilization is already a challenge, he sees plants shutting down capacity.

Competition from the Americans will only get tougher as the new plants come on stream, mostly over the 20172020 period.

The leaves a few years still to plan, “but there will not be any miracles,” said Total’s Pouyanne.

US raids 14 7-Eleven stores Chrysler agrees to recall of 2.7 million Jeeps in immigration raids

W

ASHINGTON, June 18, 2013 (AFP) - Chrysler announced Tuesday that it would bow to the US safety regulator’s pressure to recall 2.7 million Jeep Libertys and Jeep Grand Cherokees over a fire risk that caused dozens of deaths.

Two weeks after rejecting the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s recommendation for a recall, the number-three US automaker said the two sides had “resolved their differences” over the issue.

Chrysler said it would “conduct a voluntary campaign with respect to the vehicles in question” that would offer visual inspection and, “if necessary”, improve the sport utility vehicles’ rear structure to better withstand crashes.

A Seven Eleven store in New York

N

EW YORK: Nine owners and managers of 7-Eleven convenience stores were charged on Monday in a scheme to exploit immigrants from Pakistan, including some business-owners who used Social Security numbers of children and dead people on the workers’ paystubs.

Most of the defendants were arrested early Monday as federal authorities raided 14 franchise stores on Long Island, New York, and in Virginia. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were inspecting other stores across the U.S. for similar infractions.

The defendants “not only systematically employed illegal immigrants, they concealed their crimes by raiding the cradle and grave to steal the identities of children and even the dead,” U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch said in a statement.

The employers stole their workers’ wages and housed them in illegal boarding rooms, “in effect creating a modern day plantation system,” Lynch added.

The defendants were to appear in court later in the day to face wire fraud conspiracy, identity theft and other charges.

They face up to 20 years in prison if convicted of conspiracy.

Chrysler nevertheless maintained its stance that the SUVs -- 1993-2004 Grand Cherokees and 2002-2007 Libertys -- met safety standards.

“Chrysler Group’s analysis of the data confirms that these vehicles are not defective and are among the safest in the peer group,” it said in a statement.

“Nonetheless, Chrysler Group recognizes that this matter has

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raised concerns for its customers and wants to take further steps, in coordination with NHTSA, to provide additional measures to supplement the safety of its vehicles.”

In its letter to Chrysler dated June 3, the NHTSA said a year-long investigation came to a “tentative” conclusion that the fuel tank’s placement behind the rear axle in the SUVs raises safety risks.

The agency had identified a pattern of fires erupting in the cars after rear-end collisions ruptured the gas tanks. As many as 51 deaths had been reported in such incidents.

But in a rare rejection by an automaker, on June 4 Chrysler, controlled by Italy’s Fiat, declined to recall the SUVs, saying the agency’s conclusions were “based on an incomplete analysis of the underlying data.”

Chrysler had conceded that “about 21” deaths had occurred in rear-impact col-

lisions that resulted in fires, but said the rest of the deaths may have been tied to other types of accidents.

The NHTSA though persisted, insisting that the cars may have a defect “that presents an unreasonable risk to safety,” and suggesting that it would continue to seek the recall.

The details of the recall and the likely costs to the automaker were not immediately clear.

“Chrysler obviously calculated the risks and benefits and concluded that the cost to repair these vehicles isn’t as expensive as the potential long-term damage that could come from bad PR,” said Michelle Krebs of auto industry specialists Edmunds.com.

“This was probably the right decision

by Chrysler. Last year there were 659 recalls issued by NHTSA, and none of them appear to have had a lasting negative impact on any brand.”

FEATURE

VOICE OF ASIA 21

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

Your Horoscope

Tablets thrust Thai classrooms into digital era

(For week beginning Friday, June 21, 2013)

Hardik Vyas, Astrologer Cell : 832-298-9950

As per Indian Vedic Astrology the Moon sign is considered, in which every Rashi has control over certain letters, which are initials of your name. Whereas in Western system of Sun Sign, all the people born in one month belong to the same sign. For example, every year approximately around 21 of March to 20th April, the Sun is moving in the Aries Constellation. So all the people born in that month belong to the Sign of Aries. If you were born in between those two dates then you are a Aries born.

Aries (A,L,E) 21st. March to 20 April Your natural drive for self-expression is high right now. You can push yourself into a competition with great energy and zeal. Play hard and you’ll win in your creative projects.

Your mood to socialize is high. Your intellectual curiosity and mental restlessness may flicker from one scene to another. Your sense of well-being may become quite fragile if you continue to dwell on the negative. Finding a more positive perspective will provide yourself with a real boost. Emotional clashes, short fuses and outright escalations are possible but appear to fix fast.

Spending spikes dramatically but may easily be due to ‘domestic NEED’ and other ‘base issues’.

Taurus High tech: Students use tablet computers at the Ban San Kong school in Mae Chan, northern Thailand, last month. | AFP-JIJI

by Amelie Bottollier-Depois, Apilaporn Vechakij

M

AE CHAN, - In a rural classroom in the Thai highlands, hill tribe children energetically slide their fingertips over tablet computer screens practicing everything from English to mathematics and music.

The disadvantaged students are part of an ambitious scheme by the kingdom to distribute millions of the handheld devices in its schools in a move supporters hope will boost national education standards.

For opponents of the plan, however, it is an expensive gimmick designed to boost the popularity of the ruling party among parents -- and the next generation of voters.

At Ban San Kong school in Mae Chan in the northern province of Chiang Rai, 90 children received a tablet computer last year as part of the “One Tablet Per Child” policy that was part of the government’s election campaign in 2011.

Previously the school had only a few desktop computers with limited Internet access.

Now, with headphones over their ears for one hour a day during class, the students use the devices for activities including singing English songs, watching cartoons about the life of Thailand’s revered King Bhumibol and playing math games.

With the school year just beginning, and the new tablet content yet to arrive, they are left to revise their lessons of the previous year as their teacher Siriporn Wichaipanid sits and watches.

She has received no specific training for using the tablets and seems at a bit of a loss.

“I have some knowledge.

At home, I use an iPad,” she said. But “if I don’t understand, I don’t know how to teach the children”.

For the students -- mostly from ethnic minority Akha hill tribe communities for whom Thai is not their mother tongue -- using the tablets has been a positive experience, according to the

school.

“The students cannot speak Thai very well but they can hear sounds more clearly from the tablets and repeat them,” said their teacher from the previous year, Wannawadee Somdang.

“Some of them dare not ask questions. It’s easier when they listen to the tablets.”

For now only two of the 90 students are allowed to take the computers with them after class to use in their homes, which often lack electricity.

“They don’t have Wi-Fi and it’s not convenient for them to charge the batteries. And most importantly their parents have no knowledge about the tablets,” said school principal Uthai Moonmueangkham.

But using devices that would normally be out of reach for the kingdom’s poorest children is progress, even if it is only just one hour a day, he said.

“They have the same opportunities as those in the city,” Uthai said.

Reducing the “education gap” between the urban rich and rural poor is one aim of the project, said Surapol Navamavadhand, an advisor to the minister of information and communication technology.

By the end of 2014, the government plans to distribute handheld computers to 13 million school children at a cost of about $100 each -a total of $1.3 billion -- and then replace them every two years.

About 850,000 Chinesemade devices have already been given out, and the government says it will soon launch a tender offer for another batch of about 1.7 million tablets, in what it has described as the world’s largest handout of the devices for education.

Experts warn that the computers offer no guarantee of an increase in education standards.

The tablets are “just another tool” like a pencil, according to Jonghwi Park, an education technology specialist at UNESCO in Bangkok.

“It’s not about what to use, it’s about how to use it,” she said, urging governments considering introducing new technology for learning to think hard about whether it will really help them achieve their goals.

Critics of the Thai education system say much more radical changes are needed.

“If you want to deal with the education in Thailand, I can tell you that the whole system must be demolished,” said Somphong Chitradub, an associate professor specialised in child education at Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University.

“Our classrooms are passive, tiring and boring,” he said.

Most Thai children are encouraged to memorise information and “lack courage to express opinions”, he added.

As a result, while other Asian nations fared well in the most recent global education survey by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in 2009, Thailand came about 50th out of 65 countries in the rankings for reading, maths and science.

A mediocre performance compared with other nations that “focus a lot on process of thinking”, admitted Rangsan Maneelek, an advisor to the education ministry.

While the Thai education system places importance on whether the answer is right or wrong, other nations look at how students reached their conclusion, he said.

But he added that the tablets would help by enabling students to “surf the world for knowledge”.

And if some people worry about the possibility of children using the computers to look at pornography or play violent video games, others stress the need to prepare students for the digital era.

“For the kids these days, one of the most important capacities... for them to live in the 21st century is to know how to integrate those devices into their life,” UNESCO’s Park said.

“Without those skills, they cannot get a job.”

Need to try hard to streamline your tasks to create more leisure time in the immediate future. Your perceptive touch will help find the best result by keeping your interest strong in others activities. You’ll be at the right place at the right time. Your ideas will fit in well with your peers. Your aura will lead you to those who will help you find answers. Your patience is low, your hopes are set high and your expectations may be slightly ‘unreasonable’ especially with youth and those just ‘not equipped’ with the capacity necessary to be ‘trusted to do it right.’

Gemini

Finding you in a situation where you need to push your positive influence forward to those in authority. Your original proposal may start to fade but you can retain the essence of it by promoting your true values. Being yourself, as unique as you are, is what makes you a real treasure. You’ll feel empowered once you understand that. You’ll be able to trust other’s ability to help you find answers. Several ‘long discussions’ may be required near and particularly over discipline/ behavior and ‘loyalty issues’.

Cancer (D,H) 21 June to 22 July You may need to slow down your hectic pace to enjoy the company of friends & family.

You really won’t have to push your ideas too hard to find mutual agreements. You’ll be able to find new way to share your daily duties and activities with loved ones. You always love a happy ending and this story should prove to be a real winner. Happy and contented energies are the ‘norm’ for this week and good news, a change for the better and visitors or invitations may be part of it. Get as much accomplished as you can as your stars show some ‘down time’ in the form of distractions, minor illness/injury or unexpected duty/work may take you away from planned achievements.

Leo (M) 23 July to 23 August Looking for want or need to take an opportunity to learn new ways to increase your income. Be sure to check everything thoroughly. Someone may be trying to confuse you.

You may need to work a little harder to find a compromise that pleases everyone. Take the time necessary to research some fascinating adventures far away from home. Emotional discussions MAY escalate out of control, especially IF other members are involved unless you ‘tone it down’ quickly should you find yourself ‘too embroiled’ expressive or ‘loosened easily’ from the core issue being discussed. Discipline issues, spending problems and ‘deception/s’ are typical topics.

Virgo (P) 24 August to - 23 September You are with an urge to decorate and beautify your immediate surroundings is a great way to express your creativity. Look past the immediate to find some old treasures to exhibit your style. You may be feeling very sensitive, even vulnerable. It may be time to think about a little rest and relaxation. You can be imaginative but you need to rejuvenate yourself first.

Generous emotional contributions, especially to in-laws, spouse and youth of any sign, may include time, skill/talent, money and sacrifice of your own needs/wishes. Returns on your ‘thoughtfulness’ appear to come as soon. An enjoyable weekend is indicated but boy, does it appear to be a lot of work.

Libra

Scorpio (N,Y) 24 Oct. to 23 Nov. Your desire for harmony and beautiful surroundings stronger than usual. You’re more inclined to use your charm and persuasion than a more direct method to achieve your goals. A spontaneous inspiration may prove to be very beneficial to your life. You may have an opportunity to directly pitch your ideas and beliefs to those who can make things happen.

You may spend a lot of ‘thinking time’ going over old or current issues and feeling/being rather ‘fed up’ with an older system or ‘attitude’ that is ‘pervasive’ in/within the family and revamping is highly likely.

Sagittarius (BH,F,DH,TH) 23. Nov. to 21 Dec. Realizing that you can be very effective right now. You may find yourself in the position to rally others to your point of view. You’ll also be able to communicate with great conviction. Games or contests will provide you with an extra burst of energy. Excitement will reign, as your romantic urges will also run high. You could actively pursue the one you desire. Family issues have three stars, because you are totally prone to emotional upheavals, clashes and some sort of ‘sad news’ especially announcements of loss.

Capricorn

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Feeling empowered to reach many goals. The nature of your studies will depend on your personal interests. Whatever you decide to pursue, you will do so with great intensity. Your concentration and focus is very strong. You may become so engrossed in your investigation that you won’t be able to do anything else until you find the information that you seek. Several discussions may be required this week, especially near next week and some tend to be needed ‘before’ a decision is made, spending is done or discipline is handed out, especially IF you are dealing with family members.

Aquarius (G,S,SH) 21st Jan. to 18th Feb.

Pisces

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Family Petitions Labor Certifications Naturalization Citizenship

(R,T) 24 Sept. to 23 Oct.

Have friends seeking some guidance in your area of expertise. Your counsel will prove to be very lucrative. Giving of yourself in this generous manner will prove that your motives are genuine. You might have some difficulty in situations which require you to rely on other’s resources. Your sensitive side will help you to recognize how judgmental people can be. Your fuse will be super short and you may not be able to even control or contain it as your ‘lag time’ is in micro seconds.

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Prove that good relationships can bring out your true self. Your energy level will soar high. All victims may not always be innocent. Be wary of those who try to hide their true nature. Your patience and understanding will enable you to grow greatly as a person. You may find a new interest to lead, in your field. You should branch yourself out to reach a larger audience. Financial ‘hits’ are likely near and may come from bring things ‘up to snuff’ with appliances, plumbing/electric or health care issues and vehicles, overdue bills and travel.

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All your hard work noticed by those in authority. Your interest in improving your lifestyle will help you to make some dreams come true. Free yourself from any negative energy. You may feel as if your head is about to burst. Focus on the tasks at hand and you will soon have a deeper understanding of what to do. Don’t be surprised by other’s reaction to your success. Some may have ‘high hopes/expectations’ built into a situation & only to ‘crash’ and then find they may be feeling anxious, annoyed and ‘gathering up restless or aggressive energy’ because of it.

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COMMUNITY EVENTS

VOICE OF ASIA 22

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

RELIGIOUS INSTITUTES & ORGANIZATIONS OF HOUSTON - call Voice of Asia 713-774-5140 Shiv Yog Prog: HH Avdhoot Baba Shivanandji, will be conducting a 7-day workshop at Unity Church, 2929 Unity Drive Houston, Texas-77057, beginning June, 26th 2013 to July 3rd 2013.

Website: www.shivyog.com or www.shivyogus.com Weekly meditations of Shiv Yog are conducted in Sugar Land. Call 1-609-474-4808.

Chinmaya Mission Prog: Jnana Yagna from July 6th -July 13th, 2013 with HH Swami Tejomayanada.

Location:10353 Synott Road, Sugar Land, TX77498.

Phone: 832.541.0059.

Website:www.chinmayahouston.org.

Hare Krishna Dham (ISKCON)

Indo-American Charity Foundation (IACF) Prog: Silver Jubilee Celebrations at Hilton Americas on Sept 21st, 2013 . For more information, call Gala Chair Ramesh Cherivirala at 713875-4336.

BAPS Prog: Location: 1150 Brand Rd. Stafford, TX. Contact: 281-765-2277 Web:

Sri Meenakshi Temple Prog: Location: 17130 McLean Road Pearland, TX 77584 Contact: (281) 489-0358

Vedanta Society of Greater Houston Prog: Vedanta teachings Sundays at 10:30 AM Location: at 14809 Lindita Dr. Houston, TX -77083.

Website: www.vedantahouston. org

Sri Saumyakasi Sivalaya Temple Temple Hrs: 9 am to noon and 5 to 9 pm.

Sri Astalaksmi puja: 7 pm.

Sri Laksmi Archana will be performed on request all day.

Location:10353 Synott Road, Sugar Land, TX77498.

Phone: 832.541.0059.

Website: www.saumyakasi.org;

ISSO Prog: Darshan daily from 7.30 a.m. to 12.30 p.m. and 4 p.m. to 8.30 p.m.; Aarti daily from 7.45 a.m. to 7 p.m.; Location: 10080 Synott Road, Sugar Land, TX 77478 Phone: 281-530-2565 Web:

Prog: Jagannath Ratha-yatra or “Festival of Chariots, will be celebrated at Discovery Green on Saturday, July 13th 2013 beginning at 5:30 p.m.

Arsha Vidya Bharati

Everyday, 7 Aratis and bhoga offerings daily. Sunday Festival: 5.30 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

Location: 1320 West 34th St, Houston, TX 77018.

Contact:281-433-1635/E-mail harekrishnadham@gmail.com Website: www.iskconhouston.org

Prog.:Sanskrit classes and special worship sessions for all ages Location: 2918 Renoir, Sugar Land, TX 77479 Contact: 281-606-5607 or AVB. Houston@gmail.com Web-site: https://sites.google. com/site/avbtexas/classes

VPSS Houston

Hindu Mahasabha of America, Houston Chapter

Ahmadiyya Muslim Community Baitus Samee Mosque

Shri Satyanarayan Sai Puja Darshan

Prog: Hindu Sports Day on SAT., June 22 from 9 AM 5 PM at Woodlands Hindu Temple, 7601 S Forestgate Dr Spring, TX 77382 Contact: Rahul Chandra 713-429-4037 Website: http://www. hmsamerica.org/

VSNA, Houston Prog: Monthly Mahamane event. Puja, Vachana Sahithya discourses, Aarthi and Prasad Contact: vsnahouston@gmail. com/832-545-1185 (Jyoti Biradar) Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VSNA.HOUSTON Website: https://sites.google. com/site/bsusorg/home

QR

Prog: Friday Prayer - 1:30 PM Children’s Classes | Interfaith meeting | Location: 1333 Spears Rd, Houston, TX 77067 Imam - Mohammed Zafarullah Contact : Work: 281-875-3400 | Cell: 713-874-4363 Zafarullah_Hanjra@hotmail. com www.Alislam.org

Ashirwad - A Blessing Temple Prog: Regular prog :Sloka Classes for kids and teens.

Location: Katy, Hwy 249 & Sugar Land.

Contact: 281.995.0930/ 281.808.2159

Prog: Location VPSS Vallabh Hall, 11715 Belfort Village Dr. Houston 77031.

Contact:713-530-2900 Website:www.vpsshaveli.org

Prog: Daily from 10:00 a.m. to 1:p.m. and 6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Every Thursday Abhishek Location: 16338 Kensington Dr, Ste 110, Sugar Land 77479.

Phone: 713-933-8821 / 9359.

Shri Radha Krishna Temple

Houston, TX 77083 Phone: 281-498-5200 Website: www.gurdwaraswh. com

Prog: Sri Vishnu Sahasranama Stotra Parayanam: daily 6.30 p.m. Location:10098 Synott Road. Sugar Land, TX 77478 Phone: 281- 498-2344 Website: www.ashtalakshmi.org

Hindu Worship Society Prog: Open all days except Thursdays (by appt). Regular Puja and Prasad. Sunday Service 11:30 AM to 1:30 Location: 2223 Wirtcrest Lane Houston TX 77055.

Barsana Dham Houston Chapter

Lakshmi Narayan Mandir

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S. Ram and Associates

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M.D. Associates LLP A full service CPA firm

3 Locations to serve you

EGGLESS cakes Available

Computer Repair & Networking Home & Business, Microsoft & A+ certified, low flat rates, free estimates, pickup & delivery.

www.PCNetworkGuru.com Call Amit at 832-971-6807

Prog: Location: Chinmaya Prabha, 10353 Synott Road, Sugar Land -TX 77498.

Contact: 281.568.1690 Website: www.saumyakasi.org

Sri Guruvayurappan Temple Prog: Bhajans: Sat.7:00 -8:00 p.m.; Sundays 9:00 a.m.-1:00 a.m.Location: 1620 Ormandy Street, Houston, TX 77035 Contact: 713-729-8994

Govindaji Gaudiya Math Prog:Satsang every Sunday evening from 5 - 7 p.m. Vedic heritage classes for kids 5-14.

Location: 16628 Kieth Harrow blvd. Houston, TX 77084 Contact: 281-499-3347/281491-4114.

Sathya Sai Baba Centers Prog: Sundays from 3:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. at two locations Locations: Contact: (North) 832-418-3842 or (South) 281-788-4786.

Website:www.saicenterofhouston.org

VOICE OF ASIA GROUP To advertise, call:

Phone: 713-774-5140 E-mail: Adsvoa@yahoo.com Restaurants Bombay to Beijing

Commercial & Residential

KHOA TRINH, Electrical Technician Tel: 832-359-5447 Free Estimate TECL# 27099

* Repair/ Remodeling * New Installation * Ceiling Fans * Light Fixtures * Electric Panel * Trouble Shooting * Services Upgrades

LEGAL SERVICE ACCESS QUALITY LEGAL ADVICE

SMALL BUSINESS: • 1-50 EMP - $75/M • 51-99 EMP - $125/M FAMILY PLAN: • $17/M to $26/M

CONTACT: J. SINGH

INDEPENDENT SALES ASSOCIATE for LEGAL SHIELD

Call 713-894-8771 Email Singh.j@sbcglobal.net

Bakery 5700A Hillcroft Ave. Houston, TX 77036

Sri Saumyakasi Sivalaya

Prog: Sundays Dewan 10:00 11:00 a.m. 1:00 p.m. Langar Location:14811 Lindita Drive,

High School to Medical School Starts $45,000 for all 41/2 years INDIA, Europe, Carib, China etc

713-785-1212 www.houstonhotbreads.com

Prog: Sundays Satsang, BalSanskar Shala, from 11am to 1pm.

Location: 5645 Hillcroft, Suite # 307, Houston, TX 77036.

Website: http://www.gayatripariwarhouston.org/ “

Gurdwara Sahib of SW Houston

Medical School

• BAKERY • CAKE SHOPPE • CAFE

Prog: Sandhya Arati at 6:30 p.m.; Sunday: 9:00 a.m.- 7:00 p.m.

Location: 13944 Schiller Road.

Contact: 281-597-8100 Website:www.houstondurgabari. org

Gayatri Pariwar of Houston

Prog: Location:11625 Beechnut, Houston, TX 77072 Phone: 281-933-8100 Website: www.SRKT.org.

visit us at : www.mdassociatescpas.com

Houston 713-774-6533 Spring 281-251-2205 Dallas 214-722-7545

Prog: Location: 3905 Arc St. Houston, TX 77063 Contact: 281-606-JAIN; Email: ecjsh@jain-houston.org Website:www.jain-houston.org

Durga Bari Society

Prog: Every Friday Satsangh from 7:30 pm to 9 pm. Bhajans and Devi Puja, Discourses.

Location: 12530 Ann Louise Road, Houston, 77086.

Superior One Electric

(832) 620.4757 - Email: setlurn@gmail.com

Prog: Annual Family Camp “Understanding Joy & Sorrow” on March 29 - 31, 2013 (Good Friday Weekend) Bellville, TX. Location: 14102 Schiller Road, Houston TX 77082 Phone: 281.596.9642 Website: www.jvbhouston.org

Jain Center of Houston

Prog: Location:3845 West Bellfort, St., Sugar Land, TX 77498 Website: www.babamandir.org

NARESH SETLUR, CPA Retail, Manufacturing, Construction, Franchise Accounting

JVB Preksha Meditation Center

Prog: Free Yoga Classes every Sat/Sun from 8 am to 9:30 am Location: Arya Samaj @Schiller Road.

Contact: 281-579-9433.

Websites: www.pyptusa.org

Shirdi Sai Jalaram Mandir

Electrical Service

Visit our website www.karanika.net

Location: 7601 S. Forest Gate Drive at Woodlands Parkway, Spring, TX 77382.

Contact: info@woodlandshindutemple.org, 832-585-0001 Website: www.woodlandshindutemple.org.

Patanjali Yogpeeth Center

Prog: Satsang every Sunday from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.

Location: India House, 8888 West Belfort 77031 Phone: (713) 855-9818 for details Website: www.jkphouston.org Weekly Radio Program-1460 AM Saturdays 10-11 a.m.

Accountants Accounting, Tax Returns, Cost Accounting, Peachtree, Sales Tax, Franchise Tax.

Hindu Temple of The Woodlands

Sri Ashtalakshmi Temple

QUICK REFERENCE SERVICES DIRECTORY

Certified, Quickbooks Proadvisor

Phone: Contact Vishnu at (832) 309- 7181.

Become a Doctor

209-830-8266; 248-419-0284

EasyMedSchool@yahoo.com www.EasyMedSchool.com

Roofing 522),1* VEEDONE CONSTRUCTION, LLC. - ROOFING Roofing, Siding, Gutters and Fence WIND & HAIL INSURANCE CLAIMS SPECIALIST

14025 Southwest Fwy. Sugarland.TX 77478 281-242-4242 www.bombaybeijing.com Indian Restaurant

Taste the difference! Cater your next event with us!

Gourmet India - Restaurant & Catering

for home and office parties, Dine in Business Lunches, conferences & parties, On-site dining, corporate lunch packages

Ph: 281-493-5435

India’s Restaurant & Catering

for special parties and corporate events. Preferred Wine list, Authentic vegetarian & non-vegetarian dishes, finest Indian cuisine with chef’s special dishes

Ph: 713-266-0131/ 0805

Shiva Indian Restaurant & Catering specializing in North Indian cuisine, Office and Corporate catering.

• 2514 Times Blvd. Rice Village, Ph: 713-523-4753 • 2130 Lone Star Dr. Sugar Land, Ph: 281-494-2981

Visit Us VoiceofAsiaOnline.com

(281) 701-7760 www.VeeDone.com

Call us today! 713-774-5140

VOICE OF ASIA 23

CLASSIFIEDS Houston Community College Request for Proposals (RFP) Executive Search Services Project No. 13-41 Houston Community College (“HCC”) is soliciting sealed

proposals

from

qualified firms to provide

Executive

Services.

Property Management -Supervisor PROPERTY MANAGEMENT COMPANY looking for Supervising help ( Males Only ) in HOUSTON NORTH AREA. KNOWLEDGE OF GUJARATI LANGUAGE PREFERRED. PLEASE, SEND RESUME TO : powerinvest123@gmail.com

Search

The solicita-

tion documents can be obtained in Procurement Operations,

3100

Main

Street (11th Floor), Houston, TX 77002, between the hours of 8:00 AM and 4:30 PM (local time), Monday through Friday or by calling Jeffery Austin at (713) 718-2777 or by visiting the HCC website at

Pizzeria for Sale In business for 20+ years, Carry out and Delivery only Located Southeast Houston.

Low rent, Asking $119K

Call 832-875-5022

Office in Katy needs female workers in and around katy area to handle office work.

Should be multi tasking with basic Computer and Internet skills, will train. Full time flexible working mom hours 8am - 4pm Please email your resume to

rajatriti@yahoo.com or Call us on 832-363-7448

Multi Media Jounalist - Temporary KTRK-TV, the ABC Owned station located in Houston, TX, has an opening for a full time temporary Multi Media Journalist. Do you like to do-it-all when it comes to great story telling for TV? Do you enjoy being behind the camera and in front of it too? KTRK ABC13 in Houston is looking to fill a temporary position for a hard-working multi-media journalist able to shoot, edit and report stories and live breaking news for broadcast, web and mobile platforms. Applicant must be proficient in working alone or with a crew and meeting multiple deadlines. All interested applicants must apply on-line at www.disneycareers.com by uploading a resume file, cover letter and list of references. Interested applicants should also send video tape samples of your news related work to: Human Resources, KTRK-TV, 3310 Bissonnet, Houston, TX 77005. Please Reference Job ID: 113105BR on all materials submitted. No phone calls please, and no third parties. Equal Opportunity Employer M/F/V/D.

LIVE-IN NANNY WANTED Live-In Nanny Wanted for Indian couple staying in Houston, TX to care for a newborn baby and for light cooking/ cleaning.

If interested, please call (936) 355 -0284 or email us at lysistrata722@gmail.com.

When you find some time, READ!

www.hccs.edu (Click on: Business & Community / Doing Business with HCC / Procurement / Current Bids and RFPs). Sealed proposals will be received in Procurement Operations, 3100 Main Street, 11th Floor (Room No. 11A06), until 3:00 p.m. (local time) on Thursday,

HELP WANTED

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013

July 11, 2013. HCC is an equal opportunity/educational institution, which does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, gender, age or disability.

Read Voice of Asia for Community News

Change of Name I Sunil Kumar, am changing my name to Sunil Kumar Singhal S/O Sh. Kishan Chand Singhal.

My current address is: 11212 West Park Dr, Apt 428, Houston, TX 77042.

Please let me know if anybody has any concerns.

Please contact me: 707-666-7567.

READ DAILY! 15 - 30 minutes of reading daily helps your brain focus better. Grab a novel!

A Community message from Voice of Asia Group

VOICE OF ASIA 24

FRIDAY, June 21, 2013