The system overhaul

I often wonder, why I still remember some of my nursery rhymes but not the teachers who taught them. Perhaps, the rhymes are so deeply entrenched in my system that forgetting them is out of question. Also, I must confess the delivery of those rhymes in my early formative years was innately creative to keep me engrossed. Remembering a particular teacher has a lot to do with remembering things associated with him or her.

One barely remembers 100 per cent of what one was taught in school. And of all that one remembers, pedagogy and teaching methods have a significant role in effective recall.

Recently, a report about teacher education in Scotland laid emphasis on grooming teachers for future. The findings from international research on teaching and educational leadership highlighted a number of key features of good teachers. It demands teachers to be reflective, creative, committed to profession and development of each child, passionate about learning, enthusiastic about their subject and keen on participating in their own personal learning and development. Click here to Read more IIPM article at IIPM

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Finding your way to light

Laxmikanth Venkatraman has been a part of the IT industry since 1982. His experience spans software product development and support, marketing of IT products and services, business process outsourcing, human resources and systems administration. His expertise lies in development of offshore delivery models and he has been instrumental in setting up offshore delivery centres for MNCs like Intergraph Corporation, D. E. Shaw & Co., ADP and Broadridge. Mr. Venkatraman is a member of the Chartered Securities Investment Institute’s India committee; chairman, AMCHAM Hyderabad chapter; and a member of the advisory board of the ICFAI.

Q. From physics to management, how did it all come along? Also, what was your career idea when you were in school?

A. I really never had any career idea or goal as such. I have always been an avid cricket fan and used to spend my time playing the game. After completing my post graduation, my father suggested that I do a course in computers, as it was the ‘in thing’ then. Eventually I became a trainer in a computer coaching centre. This is how the journey started that brought me where I am today.

Q. Please throw some light on your journey to becoming the MD of Broadridge Financial Solutions India Pvt. Ltd.

A. In many ways, I would say my journey was probably one of the earliest in software industry in India and pioneering in the ecosystem around it. When I look back, I can see that there were a lot of things that we introduced in those days which are still prevalent. For example, knowledge management, innovative HR practices were some of the practices which we introduced in our organisation, and associates wholeheartedly accepted them. These ultimately translated into becoming the best practices of the organisation. All this was possible may be because we were young, enthusiastic and wanted to do a lot of new things. Click here to read more...

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United Kingdom: PAST AND PRESENT

Trade union density has fallen markedly in the UK since its peak at 56.3 per cent in 1980. Despite occasional small rises in membership since 1997, statistics over the past decade would suggest that union density has reached one of its lowest levels at just under 30 per cent. A large difference in trade union density rates is evident between the private and public sectors. As of 2008, trade union density in the private sector was 16.1 per cent, while it reached 59 per cent in the public sector.

Trade unions in Britain are organised both horizontally and vertically. The sole trade union confederation in the UK is the TUC. There are 6,471,030 members in TUC affiliated unions, down from 12,172,508 members in 1980. However, the TUC does not conclude or has the power to conclude collective agreements at any level. In response to declining membership figures, UK trade unions have engaged in many mergers in recent years. In 2008, there were 167 trade unions in the UK – down from 238 unions in 1998 and 326 in 1988. In 2007, the UK Trade Unions Amicus and the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU) merged to form Unite the Union (Unite). This is the UK’s largest union, with a membership of about 1,900,000 workers. The largest public sector trade union is Unison, which has a membership of 1,344,000 persons and organises workers in all areas of the public sector. Click here to read more...

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The burning question

The problems with India’s higher education sector are well-known – poor leadership and management, inadequate investment and infrastructure, poor utilisation of resources, and inadequately trained and rewarded faculty. There are definitely some successes, most prominently the IIMs and a few other top institutions, which have deserved reputations for their high quality graduates. But this success reflects the shortage of options for students, which creates extreme competition for admission to top institutions. The high quality of the small cohort of graduates from these top institutions and the gap in quality of graduates from the mainstream of institutions reflects the broader failure of the educational system in India. The success of the few at the top and the failure of the system to provide for the rest is an indication of defeat and a cause for concern rather than celebration.

I believe that the responsibility for this poor state of affairs is also clear – the fault lies largely with the government, which includes federal state and state governments. Even allowing for resources limitations, the government’s mismanagement is the underlying reason for poor state of education in India.

The government’s poor record in education over the decades suggests that solutions should be sought elsewhere. Unfortunately, the nature of education is such that government involvement is essential. For India, the government has a critical role to play in correcting the current state and in creating conditions necessary for a truly effective education system to emerge. This does not require the government to directly provide higher education or to manage its institutions. Instead, it should create governance and physical infrastructure, and provide financial and HR support where most needed. Click here to read more...

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Privatisation spurs competition

Q. What are some of the most effective teaching practices you have come across in your career? Please share a cross-national perspective.

A. Two practices have proven highly successful – extending school time upto six days a week and tutoring after school. Countries in East Asia have most or all of these features and generally score highest in international comparisons of achievement. Another advantage in East Asia is that there exists a supportive environment at home along with stimulating parental practices.

Q. What are the major educational reforms introduced by the American government in recent times to raise the standards of learning and teaching?

A. The American government over the past half century has been largely unsuccessful in raising achievement of school children despite being one of the biggest spenders on per student schooling. However, the country has been successful in promoting privatisation, for example, the voucher system that enables children to go to private schools. Click here to read full interview...

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We have a decentralised system of education in the United States.

Q. What are the key motivating factors that draw people towards teaching? How do you assess a teacher’s performance?

A. The fiscal crisis has led to unprecedented cuts in the number of teachers. Young people can see what is happening and they decide to opt for other professions. The amount of money coming from the states to support the public higher education institutions has also been declining rapidly in recent years. As the budgets have gotten tighter, the states have started to put more money in the schools than in their higher education institutions.

Students have been paying more and receiving less from their professors. The increased revenue for the higher education institutions has not been used to improve instruction. The number of days devoted to instruction has declined and the institutions have been cutting down on the proportion of the faculty. Until about 20 years ago, careers in the high status professions were not open to women in the United States. American women with college degrees could choose between nursing, secretarial work and school teaching. Today, careers have opened up to college-educated woman across the whole spectrum of high status professions. Click here to read read full interview..

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The CSR activities that India needs the most are in the areas of education and health care.

Q- I have done BSc in botany. I love interacting with people and understanding their perspective. Is it a prerequisite to obtain a degree in HR to venture into the industry?

A. Traditionally, it was not a prerequisite but nowadays industry requirements have changed. An HR professional today develops an overall understanding of the industry and is prepared to take up any role. An MBA in HR or doing PGDM (HR) from any reputed institute will not only give you ample exposure to the industry but will also help in finding the appropriate platform to start your career. It is good that you are good with people but learning to manage them is something you need to do.

Q- What can be the best HR practices to achieve organisational goals every year?

A. The role of HR management is evolving with the emergence of new technologies and growth of the global marketplace. It is time for companies to recognise the value of talented and informed HR department.

One of the most important HR practices is delighting employees with the unexpected!

Benefits, compensation, and work-life balance are the most important factors in providing overall job satisfaction. These factors further ensure that employees who stay longer are more productive and earnest. Employee recognition is another important factor that helps a company achieve its desired goals, as it is the talent that ensures the overall growth of any business. Spot awards, annual achievement awards, outstanding performance award, best employee award, could be some of the other initiatives as part of best HR practices. Click here to read more interviews..

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The first obvious thing which surfaces when a company is in trouble is replacement of the CEO

The Yahoo! example fits perfectly in this regard as Bostock, along with three of the directors, is near the exit door after failing to lift the company even after replacing the CEO in a tumultuous time.

During a crisis situation, it is not enough to have just one backup plan. In the current economic scenario, it is necessary to plan for the worse.

Sometimes, board members are too confident and have a notion that there are many within the house capable enough to get in the shoes of the outgoing CEO. How many of the potential candidates can adapt to the role perfectly is something to figure out.

“Boards do get careless because they are under a lot of pressure to replace the person, or they might be looking for qualities like charisma that are irrelevant,” says Hambrick. At times, the consensus on a person’s name deemed fit for the role (due to a particular quality) can be a misfit, considering the need for altogether different skill sets.

Nowadays, researchers are advising board members to analyse on the basis of market trends their decision of substituting the top executive and to decide whether the new person is the right one for the job on similar lines. However, when a company fires its CEO who has started to become a liability considering overall conditions at hand, and brings in someone who they believe can turn things around, then performance might improve substantially. Read more...

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No company is immune to internal hard times — stagnation or declining performance. How can HR pave a way forward when the organisation runs into a wall? Prof. Manas Ranjan Tripathy of IBS, Hyderabad, reveals.

The HR function is often viewed as alien to the organisation’s strategic plan, though there is a feeling of unanimity of its larger role in executing strategies. The role of HR during a turnaround is not definitive in context and application. The major role played by the HR team is that of a coach to the intervention team, facilitator to the employees in adapting change and bulwark for the leadership, devising an exit strategy once the objectives are realised.

Thought leaders DiFilippo and Waldt stressed HR professionals need to be visible to all the employees during difficult times. Although they are merely the messengers, HR staff members often bear the brunt of the blame for reductions in force. But the worst thing they can do is to stay hidden in their offices or walk around looking sombre. Instead they must demonstrate that they are available for questions, are responsive to people’s needs and are continuing to do their jobs in an optimistic way. Another reason to be walking the halls is to listen for rumours and to put an end to them before they go too far. The other important aspect HR may take care of is that of delivering strong messages to the fence sitters as satisfactory underperformance. How a company handles a turnaround can make all the difference when it comes to the business moving forward productively as per the devised strategy of turnaround. The biggest concern for the HR team during this difficult time is to overcome challenges such as talent flight or poaching of talent by opportunistic headhunters and rival companies. Recruiting new talents with the right skill sets for turnaround option is another major challenge for the HR team.

The focus of HR should be to attract the talents who are willing to take risk and script success stories in the form of intrinsic rewards. Read more...

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Accessibility, empowerment and an inspiring vision are what HR wishes from a CEO.

Q. What are the key strategic areas where involvement of HR becomes mandatory? How can a CEO help in making HR practices more effective?
A. An organisation primarily consists of the people working in it. HR is all about human relations and how an organisation can develop this relationship. Culture and ethos are what takes an organisation to the next level. Senior management must develop a culture where people love to come back every day. It is the CEO’s job to create an environment where employees give their 100 per cent.

As the focus of the 21st century is on the happiness quotient rather than only on profits and deliverables, the CEO and HR must engage employees in various activities like taking them out or conducting stress management classes to keep them happy.

Q. What is HR’s value proposition to the CEO?
A. If you value the employees, they will value the organisation. An employee who has high regard for the organisation will remain in the company and serve with 100 per cent sincerity and dedication. But such talent can be retained only when they really feel the senior management is taking good care of them. I believe the best way to take care of an employee is by adding value to his profession and giving him the right kind of exposure through knowledge intervention. Read more...

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Minister steals a telephone exchange, loots BSNL

Indeed a shocking, daring robbery. A telecom central minister from Tamil Nadu got the BSNL to connect 323 telephone lines to his home, not in Delhi where he had work, but in Chennai where he had none. He got all the 323 home lines listed not in his name but in the name of the Chief General Manager BSNL Chennai. These lines virtually constituted a telephone exchange in the minister’s home. It was exclusively used for his family business by laying 3.4 km long secret cable along public roads to connect the lines to the business premises. This had caused huge loss to BSNL. Who was that enterprising minister? The infamous A Raja? No. It is the famous Dayanidhi Maran; Raja’s predecessor, now the central Textile Minister. The CBI, which probed the fraud, wrote to the Secretary Telecom on 10.9.2007 recommending action against Maran for the fraud. Dayanidhi Maran was obviously not playing marbles with 323 telephones. He got the BSNL to lay separate and exclusive underground cable from his Boat Club home to the SUN TV office at Anna Arivalayam in Anna Salai and fraudulently linked the 323 home lines to his brother Kalanidhi’s SUN TV network. The first 23 of the 323 lines bore numbers ‘243722 11’ to ‘24372301’ and the next 300 lines bore numbers ‘24371500’ to ‘24371799’. Since the first four digits ‘2437’ were common for all 323 lines, the lines constituted a home telephone exchange. The Dayanidhi home exchange was operational in the SUN TV establishment for at least months from January 2007 through the fraudulent cable connection from Dayanidhi’s Boat Club home. They were no ordinary telephone lines, but costly ISDN lines, which could carry tons and tons of TV news and programmes faster than satellites to any part of the world. These lines, the CBI says in its report, are “normally used by medium to large commercial enterprises to meet special needs such as video conferencing, transmission of huge volume of digital data of audio and video” – precisely the facility that SUN TV would need for its telecasting operations. For this, the SUN TV would have paid huge cost. But it got it all free, at government’s cost. The Maran home exchange, says the CBI, was “programmed in such a way that no one other than the authorised BSNL staff were aware of the existence of such an Exchange created for his [minister’s] exclusive use”. It added that by linking the minister’s home and SUN TV office by the stealthy cables, “it would appear as if the lines were used in the residence of the former minister, but actually the cables laid facilitated SUN TV network to utilise the services of BSNL provided at his residence”. Google map shows the distance to SUN TV as 3.4 kms along the main artery roads of the area, which were dug up to bury the illegal underground cables from Maran home to SUN TV office! It was not one of those secret White Collar frauds, but a crime committed in the open roads.

Maran, a grand nephew of Karunanidhi, was the central telecom minister from June 2004 to May 2007. Perhaps the only Hindi knowing family member, Maran was Karunanidhi’s eyes and ears in Delhi and his connect to Sonia Gandhi. The ‘young’ and ‘dynamic’ minister was amongst the most powerful in the UPA government of which the DMK was the most critical partner.

An Initiative of IIPM, Malay Chaudhuri and Arindam chaudhuri (Renowned Management Guru and Economist).

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The Axis’ Plexus

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Brand: Axis Bank
Agency: O&M

Bidding farewell to the UTI name, this campaign re-branded a quasi- government bank to a professionally run private bank. It helped the bank add new retail customers by 7-8% month on month and the bottom-line too surged by 30% in Q2’08 & 34% in Q3’08.

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Pax Americana - Does the world need America?

Jamie F Metzl
Executive Vice President of The Asia Society
It has become popular to suggest that when the dust settles from the global financial crisis, it may become clear that the US-led post-war world has come to an end. If so, the global system that has secured peace, security, openness, and economic growth over the past six decades could be in grave danger.

Inspired by American leadership since World War II’s end, Europe, then Japan, then much of Asia and the world rose to new levels of prosperity; the world economy globalised upon the foundation of international institutions, norms, and standards; and foreign students educated in American universities returned home with new ideas about free markets, entrepreneurship, and democracy. The US military’s protective umbrella gave large swaths of the world a vacation from war, making it easier to focus on economic growth and regional integration.

America not only took the lead role in building the institutions of a globalising world – the United Nations, World Bank, IMF, NATO – it also became the model of inspiration for many other countries. After eight years of compromised American leadership, a botched war of choice in Iraq, failure to take the lead in global efforts to address climate change, Abu Ghraib, Guantánamo Bay, running up a $10 trillion debt, and igniting a global financial crisis – America’s once-glittering model has lost a good deal of its lustre and it’s leadership has been questioned by many.....Continue

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You are accessible and easy with the people, but there are questions about your capability as a tough administrator. How do you explain this?

I did not need that kind of stuff. I believe in team work. Everyone – from a political leader to an official – has worked together in dispensing of their responsibilities in complete cooperation. And you can see the results.

Any dream of achieving something that you had not in the first tenure?

Not really. We had tried to work for the welfare of all classes and communities. However, this time around the priorities would be slightly different, like reaching potable water to some towns, which is a challenge. We have plans for agricultural projects like making available interest free loans for farmers. We need to make better use of the youth force in the state, hence the need for technical and technological training for them. Young girls will be trained into nursing, and so forth. And especially, we will extend the rice for Rs three per kg needs under the Chief Minister’s Food Programme.

You had announced a metro rail project in the election manifesto, so will that fructify? Do you need funds for that?

The pressure on communication in the Raipur-Durg-Bilaspur corridor is immense, and a metro rail system could be the best way out. And this can be done. We need a proper plan and strategy for this. Money for the heavy investments can be raised from other resources. In fact, this is not the first time that we have started a large project. We are going to lay the longest power transmission line in the country and you shall soon see that happen.

Naxalism is a major headache, with at least one person being killed every day. Why is that we rarely talk of this issue, unlike the way terrorism is a major talking point?

Naxalism is a challenge for the entire country. So far as Chhattisgarh is concerned, the results of giving the menace a good fight has fetched results. For the last five years, we have consistently raised this issue at the Centre, and the tribal communities here have given us the seal of their support for this. True, some critics have questiond the Salwa Judum movement of arming villagers to fight naxalites, but the people of the tribal belt of Bastar have massively supported us by giving us 12 of the 13 seats there, which will help us further in fighting Naxalism.....Continue

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The canine commandos

Even as the nation was mourning its martyrs in the dastardly Mumbai attacks of 26/11, dogs found themselves, willy-nilly, the subject of hospitality debates – houses to visit and not to visit. And this, when a little over a month back, the Kerala Police Academy had demonstrated a better way to avail the services of canines in terror situations.

On October 19, twelve dogs in coloured attire marched through the amphitheatre of the Police Academy at Thrissur, Kerala, for their Passing Out Parade. The new battalion saluted the guest of honour, Kerala Home Minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan. Annie, the Labrador, proved her obedience and training by welcoming the minister with a bouquet of flowers. Canines can be made to play a key role in detecting and thwarting the evil designs of criminals, by sniffing and tracking. They warn about and expose planted explosives, IEDs and weapon caches, espy drugs, and also track down victims trapped under debris in natural calamities. With such abilities, they are best utilised by the Police, Railways Protection Force, airports and Defence Forces.

In the early days, there was no systematic training for canines in crime detection. The success of crime detection with the help of canines depended on the breed of the dogs. Later, the dogs and their handlers were trained at the BSF Academy at Tekanpur in Madhya Pradesh, the first dog training school in India. But owing to the high costs involved, apart from the language and climate impediments to training, the Kerala Police Academy at Thrissur took it as a challenge to train dogs to give more teeth to counter crime and terror in the state.....Continue

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"BSP will play no role. we have always been a two-party state"

Are you going to introduce the Gujarat model of elections in Rajasthan as well?
Every state has a different culture and different needs. One model cannot be perfect for the other. But something we are trying here this time is micro-management of polling booths.

How do you propose to do it?
We have appointed in-charges for each polling booth and assigned them duties. I have got the names and telephone numbers of all 1.70 lakh booths in-charges in my computer. I can reach them whenever I want to. We have also formed a shakti kendra after every three booths, which is supposed to coordinate with them. We organised a maha kumbha (grand assembly) of booth managers on November 6, which was a training session for them. All of this has come from our party chief, Rajnath Singh, whose idea it is to take the BJP to the polling booths.

That is also the CPM model...
Nobody has a copyright over an idea. I don’t know whether they are doing it. But, our idea is to sustain our success rate election after election, and have a constant contact with the electorate. We have also graded the polling booths on the basis of the party’s performance in last election – C grade to the booth we polled less, B to the one we polled moderately and A to the booth we polled well at. Our endeavor is to upgrade all these booths.

Why are you doing it? Don’t you trust the Chief Minister’s development plank?
There is no doubt that genuibe development has taken place under Vasundhara Raje during the last five years. You can see and feel it. I have been asking people in public meetings to vote for her only if they feel she has performed better than her predecessor. But booth management will certainly ensure a better result during the elections.....Continue

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While most of the Indian community is led on by a horoscope check before considering a prospective match, there is yet another pre-marital test – HIV

Another eye opening fact which asks for more than just mandating pre-marital tests is about women “who get infected not at the time of marriage but after the marriage”, reveals Tripti about the kind of cases that have increased in the recent past. She continues, “May be the tests have been conducted at the time of the marriage but what about complacency that sets in after conducting them once.”

It would, of course, be unfair to conclude that such instances have started to occur recently; only, private details are being discussed openly now. Mrs Salvi recalls, “When I got to know of my infection, I completely denied it. I went for the tests again and was frustrated for months. Doctors counselled me. I had to come to terms with it and couldn’t do much apart from getting mad at my husband who died soon thereafter. But slowly, I took control of my life and started working with an NGO. However, I was fortunate to find Mr Salvi who was in love with me from days before my first marriage. Despite knowing my positive status he married me. We take all precautions but still I am scared for him.” Mr Salvi agrees to have taken a risk but feels that the bond of their love transcends their bodies and is prepared for whatever happens.

But not all find such love and support. “Many positive people, to avoid rejection after any such mandate, would obtain a fake certificate which is not at all difficult in a country like India”, asserts Tripti who would rather want awareness to be created about the tests and counselling support from the government so that people get themselves tested voluntarily. Mulling over the intention of such acts she continues, “And why wouldn’t they? Would law guarantee post-test confidentiality? Unless the government can guarantee that, the law may do more harm than good.”....Continue

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Even NATO is shying away from attacking pirates

And due to all this, pirate attacks off the Somalian coast in recent years have increased. This year captures have crossed the 100 mark, with 40 ships still under hijack. Even a warning from the Islamic Courts Union of Somalia, which asked them to leave Harardhere, the Somalian town where the ship is currently anchored, failed to get results. Sirius Star belongs to an Arab nation, and piracy is a capital offence under Islam, but even this doesn’t scare them. So when Sheikh Abdulaahi Osman, a commander of the group in Harardhere warned them by saying, “Saudi Arabia is a Muslim country and it is very serious crime to hold Muslim property. Those holding the ship must free it or face armed intervention." The pirates responded by cutting their ransom demand. Abdi Salan Ahmed, who claimed to represent the pirates, said: “There may be some type of ransom reduction but I can’t confirm it now.” In Malaysia, on November 24, an international association of tanker owners' called for a military blockade along the coast of Somalia,, NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said that the alliance is not considering such a move. Remarkably, noted author Gwynne Dyers has lamented that so far, “with the honourable exception of the Indians and the French, nobody has used force against the pirates of the Horn”....Continue

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Arms and the man

Who is Lt. Col. Srikant Prasad Purohit? In a country where the Military has been as apolitical as it can get, a serving army officer’s involvement in an act of `terror’ is a rare entity. Infact, very rare. But now with Maharashtra's anti-terrorist squad (ATS) linking Purohit to some major bomb blasts - Nanded in 2006, Samjhauta Express and the Hyderabad Mecca Mosque blasts of February and May 2007 and Thane of June 2008 - the critical question being asked is this: is there a rogue element within the military? Are there more Lt. Col. Purohits in the armed forces? If one went by the rarified atmosphere of English TV networks, the answer would have to be yes. The real world, however, could well be different.

Serving officers in the army as well as his former colleagues are mystified at the fast moving chain of events and the plethora of charges that have been levelled against the 36-years old Purohit, a stalwart of the Maratha Light Infantry in Nashik, Maharashtra. A polyglot par excellence, the accused is a master of four languages, including Arabic, which is why he was posted in 2002 with the liaison unit of Military Intelligence (MI) in Jammu and Kashmir so that he could understand terrorists’ intercepts, a vital component of the Indian war on terror in the disturbed Kashmir valley.

Purohit’s swimming coach, Sanjeev Valvalkar, paints a potrait that certainly does not match the one offered by the Maharashtra ATS. Valvalkar, who spent many hours in the pool with Purohit, remembers the army officer as being highly dedicated and cooperative. “He was a nice and soft spoken person who used to help others. He was a fitness freak and was dedicated to sports. It never appeared that he could do anything wrong.” Well neither did it appear to anyone else until investigations of the Malegaon blasts after the arrest of Hindu activist, Pragya Singh, led the trail of the deadly explosions to Purohit and a retired Major, Ramesh Upadhaya, amongst others....Continue

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And Obama it is!

A stunned America is wildly feting the first African-American President-elect in the country's history. From the streets of Brooklyn, New York where people cried and embraced complete strangers, to early morning festivities in the Kenyan village where Barack Obama's father was born, the sense of excitement and pride that a black family will be moving into the White House is palpable. Kenya declared Thursday a public holiday to celebrate the Obama victory. "We, the Kenyan people, are immensely proud of your Kenyan roots," President Mwai Kibaki said in a message. And BBC's Juliet Njeri reported that Obama's step-grandmother was seen dancing and cheering outside her house immediately after the results came in. In Obama's native Chicago well over 100,000 people flocked to hear his victory speech in Grant Park, while millions more watched on television screens across the globe. The 44th US President was flanked on the stage by his wife Michelle and two daughters. The Democratic Party senator achieved decisive majorities in both Congress and the Senate, and grabbed nearly twice as many Electoral College votes as Republican Senator John McCain.

Obama told the story of 106-year-old Ann Nixon Cooper, who cast her ballot in Georgia and would at that very moment be witnessing the momentous change — comparable in its impact to only those other path-breaking moments in United States history: the coming in of women's suffrage, the civil rights triumphs and the conquest of the moon.

Punctuating each example with his campaign slogan Yes We Can Obama credited his spectacular triumph to the millions who donated their time, money and energy to his campaign. Nearly three million people donated $600 million. For their part Obama supporters used his website to get up thousands of phone-banking events and galvanize affinity groups in local neighbourhoods....Continue

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