Need to check religious conversions in India: Rajnath Singh

By Basudev Mahapatra on October 31, 2009

BJP President Rajnath Singh has said that there is a strong need in the country for amending the constitution to check large scale religious conversions allegedly being carried out by foreign forces through inducements.

Extra-marital affairs happen: Ajay Devgn

By Basudev Mahapatra on October 31, 2009

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Extra-marital affairs happen: Ajay Devgn

Harassed husbands call for gender-neutral laws

By chimala on October 31, 2009

Shruti Badyal The Asian Age While much has been discussed about domestic violence against women, are there enough laws drafted to protect men in case of harassment as well? To seek answers for the same, Save the Family Foundation organised a protest against the Domestic Violence Act in the capital recently. According to many activists, the act is full of loopholes and is increasingly being misused by many women. Victims and NGOs working in the city to help harassed husbands now call for gender-neutral laws and highlight the loopholes in the existing laws. “Section 19 of the Domestic Violence Act says that on the sole testimony of the victim (woman), the judge may presume that some domestic violence may have happened, without listening to the accused. And the judge may also pass a protection order. This is against the basic human rights. Shouldn’t a man be given the chance to prove himself?” says Neeraj Aggarwal, coordinator of the Save Family foundation. Another section which favours women is Indian Penal Code’s (IPC) section 498A. Niladri Das, secretary, Gender Human Rights Society explains, “Section 498A is a non-bailable offence which protects married women from cruelty subjected to her by her husband or in-laws mainly for the purpose of dowry. And a case can be filed on mental and physical cruelty under this section. Since it’s non bailable, women have misused this law to settle scores in bad marriages and husbands are put behind bars without any evidence. At least this should be made a bailable offence.” Interestingly, NGOs working in the field stress on the need for many more measures to ensure that there are no loopholes in the law and both genders enjoy equal rights. “Stringent penalties should be imposed on people who misuse this law to discourage its abuse by women, arrests should be made ‘only’ if there is irrefutable evidence of grave physical harm, the trial for 498A must be time bound and completed within 6 months to a year and all anti-dowry laws should be gender-neutral since both giving and taking of dowry are punishable offences,” concludes Dr Anupama Singh, president, Rakhsak, India. Male victims who have suffered domestic violence blame factors other than just law for the injustice they are subjected to. “Cops play a major role in the process and often harass men without any evidence. My wife filed a case against me, complaining that I beat her but the dates she mentioned in the complaint were days when I wasn’t in Delhi. So when cops knew I had evidence to save myself, they secretly asked them to change the dates and filed a fake chargesheet against me,” says Ashish Kumar Sinha, a software engineer.  

Frequent changes irk Facebook users

By tdomf_c8305 on October 31, 2009

Age Correspondent The Asian Age Most people these days are hooked to social networking websites and spend much of their time online posting comments and photos. But the frequent style changes on the homepage of Facebook is irritating most users and many of them are now threatening to leave the social networking site. To top the list of being the “most innovative” website, the administrators of Facebook keep updating the landing page every now and then. A lot of people across the globe who are members of Facebook have now created groups like “Enough Facebook. No more changes” and “Facebook changes” etc to express their irritation. Pooja Gulati, a Facebook user, says, “It’s very annoying to see the home page change every other week. By the time we get used to the old format and modify it according to our requirements, the website administrators change it and we’re back at square one.” Many people have given a thumbs down to the changing homepage of Facebook and feel that it’s irrelevant to keep updating the format so often. Nitin Goswami, a Delhi University student says, “I think I’ll leave Facebook very soon because I’m tired of getting used to the updated versions every other fortnight. Earlier they used to show so many unwanted updates on my home page and information about friends’ friends and other useless matter. I had blocked all the unnecessary applications, but again they changed the format and all the unnecessary matter is now popping up on my homepage all over again.”  

Anti-hunger pill, a fitness rage

By shimaa hamdi on October 31, 2009

Age Correspondent   In what seems to be yet another addition to the list of solutions that promises instant weight loss, several fitness-conscious young Chennaiites are now opting for hunger-suppressing pills. These tablets are believed to have become popular among international celebrities like Tom Cruise, Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt and Oprah Winfrey and are referred to as appetite killers that allow a person to go hungry for almost days on end. In fact, the demand for such fixes is quite significant in Chennai as fitness experts say that many people are in search of a readymade weight-loss solution without investing too much time on dieting, exercising and so on. But professionals in the fitness industry are absolutely against the use of such fast-acting remedies. Srivikas U, the brand and e-business manager with Bodyfuelz, a firm which is into the manufacturing and marketing of sports performance nutrition products says, “Our regular diet might not be able to encompass all the nutrients that our body needs. Hence people consume dietary supplements to balance out the nutrition levels in their body. But in contrast, appetite suppressants are a total no-no. The stomach is supposed to perform its functions like any other part of the body and these suppressants will only damage the stomach’s functioning.” He adds, “It is a well-known fact that such remedies are popular among the celebrity and high fashion circles. However, we do not encourage its usage as the resultant damage to health is not worth it.” In fact, many spurious operators have also found legal loopholes in order to sell these products in the market without prescription. When contacted, a highly-placed official from the pharmaceutical industry says, “Weight loss has turned into a big-business proposition today, especially considering the growing number of obese individuals in India. To cash in on this trend, several Indian manufacturers camouflage these drugs under a common food license label and sell them all over the country.” He adds, “Priced between Rs 2,000 and 3,000 for a set of about 10 tablets, these suppressants are available with several grey market vendors who also stock various high priced foreign variants as well.” There are also youngsters who take additional pains to get their fixes imported from other countries. Sanjeev Balasubramanian, a financial research analyst who works out at a popular gym in the city says, “Many of my acquaintances and people I meet in the gym aim for a size zero. As they’ve to cut down on their eating habits, they opt for hunger suppressants. In fact a friend of mine, who is also a model, gets them specially imported from Thailand.” But others opine that it’s not only the hunger suppressants that one has to be careful about but also supplements that are available commonly over the counter as well. Nutritionist Shiny Chandran says, “I personally do not recommend even fat burners to anyone.In the long run, they are known to cause anxiety, sleep disorders and other ailments.” Dr Ravindran Kumeran senior surgical gastroenterologist at Apollo Hospitals says, “Appetite suppressants have to be taken only under the guidance of a registered practitioner. As far as I know, there is only one drug Sibutramine which is legally allowed to be sold in India as an appetite suppressant. The bottom line is that one must go for a thorough body check-up before starting off on any such medication as there can be long term repercussions to doing so without prescription.”  

‘More terror attacks from Pak to be retaliated’

By admin on October 31, 2009

Taking a tough stance, Home minister P Chidambaram has warned Pakistan against meddling in India’s affairs and said any more terror attacks from that country will be retaliated “very strongly”.

Any more terror attack from Pak will be retaliated: Govt

By zakopanelimba on October 31, 2009

Taking a tough stance, Home minister P Chidambaram has warned Pakistan against meddling in India’s affairs and said any more terror attack from that country will be retaliated “very strongly”.

Bollywood babes look hot in dhoti

By Basudev Mahapatra on October 31, 2009

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Bollywood babes look hot in dhoti

Romancing a forgotten hero

By farr on October 31, 2009

Age Correspondent Even with the invasion of foreign comics and graphics novels, Indian, mythology-based characters remain just as popular. Vimanika Edutainment hope the same will ring true, now that they’ve released their graphic novel The Legend of Karna. Written by Deepam Chatterjee, it is the sixth graphic novel Vimanika has launched under the theme “Forgotten Heroes”. Why this theme? “The thought of portraying someone from history who has been forgotten by many, is exciting in itself!” says Karan Vir Arora, the managing director of the publishing company, who has also conceptualised and created the work himself. Launched at Crossword, Kemps Corner recently, the story focuses on mytho-character Karna’s life in terms of his romances and conquests. “The reason we chose Karna this time is because lots of people do know about Lord Krishna and Arjuna or Yudhistra. But very few people know about Karna. He is a forgotten hero,” says Arora. The creator believes that despite the rise of animation films, comics have a special place. “Yes, people choose to go for reading in spite of the animation movies. In the case of children, it is a source of recreation — it gives them a break from reading their academic books. So we thought of making an interesting story around these characters and plot, and present it to them. In fact some schools in China have comics and animated characters in their school curriculum, like Naruto,” says Arora. Nevertheless, there are some who believe that comics make only for “trash reading”. “There is no such thing as trash or good. It is subjective. For me, modern art is trash but for others it is beautiful. Also, a comic does have an impact on its readers, but it depends on the author and creator of the comic. If their objective is to send a clear and good message, then it has a good impact. We send two important messages through our comics to our readers — one is courage, and the other hope!” he says.  

Centre to launch anti-Naxal operations in affected states

By farr on October 31, 2009

The government is all set to launch the much-awaited full-fledged anti-Naxal operations at three different areas, considered trijunctions of worst Naxal-affected states.

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