Aishwarya's grand baby shower

MLA asset details on web !!

The Bihar state government today moved ahead with its policy for "transparency" in public life by making declaration of movable and immovable assets mandatory for legislators by December 31 every year.

Speaker Uday Narayan Choudhary made the announcement today, the final day of the monsoon session of the Assembly.

"There is a need for maintaining transparency in public life and therefore, this year onwards, all MLAs would be required to submit their returns to the Assembly secretariat by December 31. These will be displayed on the official website of the Assembly," Choudhary said. The members of the state legislative council (MLCs) would also have to submit their yearly returns.

Choudhary said persons contesting elections for the Assembly and the council have to submit a list of their assets to the Election Commission (EC).

"MLAs will be required to submit their declaration in the same format they submit to the EC," the speaker clarified amid thumping of desks by the ruling party MLAs.

Incidentally, Leader of Opposition Abdul Bari Siddiqui had asked the government to clarify during the Question Hour if the land allotted by Bihar Industrial Area Development Authority to the kin of VVIPs was mentioned in the returns submitted by them. The chief minister, however, refused to give any statement on the land issue till the chief secretary submitted his report. ( )

When the Nitish government had returned to power, one of the first decisions taken by NDA-II government was getting members of the ministry to submit their annual returns and post it on the website.

The NDA-II government has followed this step by asking all its officials and employees, right from Grade I to Grade III, to declare their assets by February 28 and threatened to suspend salaries of those employees who failed to submit their declaration. Despite strong objections by a section of IAS officers on the pretext of violation of privacy, the government uploaded the asset declarations of all its employees and put it on the official web.

"Yearly declaration of assets by legislators was just a logical step," said chief minister Nitish Kumar.

In the last Lok Sabha and Assembly elections though the Election Commission put the declarations of candidates on the web, questions were raised at the sudden steep rise of wealth of certain politicians.

Triple eclipse to be seen in a month !

A triple eclipse treat -- two partial solar and one total lunar eclipse in a month beginning from tomorrow, is in store for sky gazers.

The first of the three, which will be a partial solar eclipse will be seen on June 1.

The eclipse, however, will not be visible from India.

It will be visible from high latitudes in the Northern hemisphere, starting at sunrise time over Siberia and Northern China, Alaska, Nova Scotia. In fact, the eclipse begins at 00 55 18 IST on June 2.

Eclipse chasers in the country should not be a disheartened lot as a total lunar eclipse will be visible on June 15.

The eclipse will be visible from the Indian region, Middle East, East Africa, South America, Australia.

During the lunar eclipse the moon will be completely covered by Earth''s shadow from 11.52 PM on June 15 to 2.32 AM on June 16.

The last of the triple eclipse will be another partial solar eclipse on July 1.

It is the first of the two total lunar eclipses in 2011, the second occurring on December 10. Earlier on January 4, a partial lunar eclipse was seen.

The last of the three eclipses is another partial solar eclipse.

This partial solar eclipse will also not be visible from India. It will be visible from southern latitudes, Antarctica. Its magnitude will be 0.097.

Source: http://goo.gl/6ie6e

Five Fruits to keep you Cool this Summer

These are time of scorching heat. Sun is ruthless and the heat wave unsparing. But these are also the time when exotic fruits bloom in plenty.

And these fruits can have an immensely chilling effect on us. But the problem comes when an entire generation falls for Coke and Pepsi and gets estranged with the bounties of nature. People are quite oblivious about the health properties of these fruits. And even if they know, few care about procuring them.

MensXP recommends these five summer fruits to beat the heat this summer:

Black Plum or Jambul

The fruit is useful in spleen enlargement. The seed of the fruit is well-known diabetes. It reduces the quantity of sugar in the urine and quenches the maddening thirst. The fruit is also a good source of antioxidants.
Litchi

The luscious litchi/lychee or Chinese Hazelnut is a very delicious fruit. People eagerly wait for its arrival during the summers. May-June is the best season for the fruit. This sub-tropical fruit has very good cooling, demulcent and aphrodisiac properties. It is also a good thirst-quencher.
Mango

It's not for nothing that Mango is called the 'King of Fruits' in India. The vastly delicious fruit is a storehouse of vitamins A and C. The ripe mango tones the heart, improves complexion, stimulates hunger, improves vision and is greatly helpful in liver disorders, loss of weight and physical abnormalities. The popular mango powder (amchur) made from green/unripe mango is very beneficial in scurvy and pyorrhea.
Muskmelon

Muskmelon is a popular tropical fruit which is readily available during the summers. The fruit contains Vitamin A, B, C and minerals like magnesium, sodium and potassium. It has zero cholesterol and is safe for blood cholesterol patients. When consumed with jaggery, it helps in the curing of skin diseases. It greatly reduces the body heat when consumed regularly.
Watermelon

The succulent, scarlet-red watermelon is a delicious and health-building fruit. It contains large quantities of easily assimilable sugar. Being an alkaline fruit, it can be easily enjoyed by persons with acidosis. Its juice quench the thirst like anything. Rich in vitamin A,B, and C, products based on its juice can serve as wonderful cooling drinks. The fruit is also beneficial for combating hypertension.
Source: http://goo.gl/mrnYR

Mamata Banerjee created history in West Bengal !!

The 34-year-old regime of the Left front has finally crumbled. Mamata Banerjee has created history by winning a majority in West Bengal. It's goodbye to the world's longest serving communist government in a multi-party democratic set-up. Bengal is all set for its first woman chief minister.

Firebrand Mamata impressed West Bengal's poverty-weary citizens with a call for change. Bengalis wanted their state to prosper like the other states of India. Tired of strikes and lockouts, they rejected the red symbolism that had burdened them for decades. They were desperate for some of growing India's shine to rub off on them.

People were so fed-up of Left rule that they blamed the Communists for every malady in Bengal. Left Front rule allowed Bengal to stagnante in agriculture and industry.

So how did Mamata manage a landslide? Not all credit goes to Mamata. The Communists made some huge mistakes. They banned computers, saying it would take away jobs. They also banned English in schools, a step that pushed the state back at least 20 years from where other states stand today. The World Bank in 2009 said Kolkata was the worst major city in India to do business in.

As a result of these blunders, the Bhadralok were fed up with the administration, and many Bengalis felt that they were not equipped to face the challenges of the 21st century.

Today's Calcutta... ooops Kolkata... is a pale shadow from what it was in its glory days. Voters saw the government caught in a time warp, with no intention of moving ahead.

Cities such as Hyderabad and Bangalore surged ahead, attracting India's new breed of entrepreneurs. And what happened in Bengal is baffling: it produced only 16,000 engineers every year, as against a lakh in Tamil Nadu. What was worse, Bengal had no industries to employ them. So it was only natural that Bengal suffered a brain drain.

Clad in a white sari and rubber slippers, Mamata has managed what many in Bengal thought was impossible: bring down the deeply entrenched Left government. Her angry denunciation of the Left's admistration made her an instant hit with the struggling Bengali. She systematically mounted protests against forced land acquisitions.

Once a campaigner against Tata projects in Nandigram and Singur, Mamata today promises Bengal that industry will be a priority. Her manifesto includes some romantic promises: introducing cruises on the Ganga on the lines of what is offered on the Thames in London, converting West Bengal's tea-growing Darjeeling district into the 'Switzerland of the East', and so on.

Let's remember these are not promises that powered her to victory. What brought her to power are (a) the follies of the Communists; and (b) the people's desire for change.

As railway minister, she has showered Bengal with projects. That gave the people a glimpse of what she could do in Bengal if they gave her a chance.

In 2011, Mamata gifted new trains and projects to the six districts of north Bengal. She then proclaimed: "The Railways have invested more funds in these six districts than the State has for the development of all of north Bengal".

With her fiery speeches, she got the Kolkata public on her side. She decried economic stagnation, slammed corruption, and accused the communist government of perpetrating political violence.

'Didi', or Big Sister as she is fondly called, strategised her campaign against the Communists with an emotionally charged slogan -- Maa, maati, maanush (mother, motherland, and people). She positioned herself as a crusader against all that is wrong in Bengal today: wrongful land acquisitions, bad infrastructure, and corruption and stagnation. She went to the aam janta with these issues and promised to set things right.

Read more: http://goo.gl/ltkKR

Curruption issues in Indian Politics !!

Consider this man: He runs a village in rural Maharashtra as if it is his personal fiefdom, like an authoritarian feudal lord. He is a fan of Shivaji, and admires him for once chopping off the hands of a man who committed a crime. In that vein, he passes an order that anyone found drinking alcohol will be tied to a pole in front of the village temple and publicly flogged. Several men undergo this, one of whom, a vice sarpanch of the village, says: "I was drinking. I was ... tied to the pole and flogged two-three times. It is normal. [He] will try to make you understand once or twice and thereafter, he will beat you badly." He believes in "rigid implementation" of family planning, including forced vasectomies. Male labourers in his village are paid Rs 50 a day, while female labourers get just Rs 30. He supports Narendra Modi, and is politically active, routinely resorting to a form of blackmail known as threatening to fast unto death until his demands are met. He believes that corrupt people should be hanged -- literally hanged to death. He is Anna Hazare.

In the last month or so, the 71-year-old Hazare has become a middle-class hero and a "youth icon" in India. This is baffling, given the biographical details in the above paragraph. (I got them from Hartosh Singh Bal's article for Open magazine and Mukul Sharma's piece in Kafila.) Hazare is popularly described as Gandhian, but, as Bal points out, if the forced vasectomies are anything to go by, he brings Sanjay Gandhi to mind more than Mahatma Gandhi. Sure, he is fighting against corruption, but both his method (of blackmail via the hunger fast) and his remedy (creating an alternative center of power and discretion instead of tackling the root causes of corruption) are dubious. Then why has middle-class India turned him into such a hero?

I believe it is because we are lazy. It is true that we are disgusted by corruption. We are sick of reading about the telecom scandal, the Radia tapes, the Commeonwealth games. More than that, corruption has become a virus that plagues our everyday lives, and we're appalled by it. But we're too damn lazy to go out and vote and actually participate in our democracy. We're apathetic, and believe, perhaps correctly, that our feeble middle-class vote won't make a difference. And yet, we want to express our disgust at the way things are, take the moral high ground, and feel like we really are doing something, because hey, that helps our self esteem. Then along comes this venerable activist who wears khadi, lives a spartan life, speaks out against corruption in high places, and goes on a hunger strike to influence the implentation of a bill that aims to tackle corruption. Naturally, we make him the repository of our hopes and our values, speak out in his defence at parties and cafes while hanging out with friends, and even light candles in his support. And there, our job as citizens is done.

The intellectual laziness here is obvious. We make him our hero though we know little else about him, and when his weird history comes to light, we rationalise it away. We ignore the fact that the Lokpal Bill, which he is fighting for, does nothing to tackle the root causes of corruption, and might actually be a step in the wrong direction. We treat attacks on our new hero -- if the behaviour of some of his defenders on TV is anything to go by -- as personal attacks on us. We start dealing in absolutes, as if anyone against Hazare must, by default, be a supporter of corruption and the status quo.

The Anna Hazare phenomenon is what one could term the Rorschach Effect in Politics. A couple of years ago, Barack Obama wisely pointed out, "I am like a Rorschach test." During his presidential campaign, his supporters saw in him whatever they wanted to: an anti-Bush, a liberal messiah, a pragmatic and non-partisan moderate, and suchlike, some of it without any evidence, some of it contradictory. (Similarly, his opponents projected their fears or fantasies onto him.) Needless to say, when he did come to power, he disappointed many who had voted for him, because hey, he couldn't possibly live up to being everything to everybody. (For example, lefty pacifists were disappointed that he stepped up the war in Afghanistan, even though that's exactly what he said he'd do while campaigning.) He was a blank slate no more.

Hazare is a similar beneficiary of the Rorschach Effect. Although he has been an activist for decades, he's exploded into the national consciousness in just the last few weeks. And a politically powerless middle class has projected its hopes, its self-righteousness and its sense of moral superiority onto him. But Hazare is no Mahatma Gandhi, and I think disillusionment, both with the man and the Lokpal Bill, is bound to set in sooner or later. Unless indifference and apathy precede it.

* * * *

Another of Rorschach's children is Rahul Gandhi. He's been hailed as a youth icon and the face of new India, and Page 3 celebs routinely describe him as one of their favourite politicians. But apart from the fact that he's good looking and belongs to the Nehru-Gandhi family, we know very little about him. What are the values that he stands for? What are his views on economic freedom and the license raj? What are his views on freedom of speech? (If he supports it, is he then in favour of repealing the ban on Satanic Verses?) What does he feel about reservations? (He has spoken out against the caste system, and reservations do, after all, perpetuate discrimination on the basis of caste.) He has spoken out for inner-party democracy, which India needs so badly, but is he doing anything to drive the Congress towards a system where party leaders are elected from below, not anointed from above? Does he hope to be prime minister one day? If so, why? What kind of a person is he, really?

Gandhi is as blank a slate as you can get, in the sense that he won't address any of these issues, and most of the public pronouncements we hear from him are platitudes that express good intention, which is meaningless. If that is a deliberate political strategy, it is masterful. Whether it will work, in this age of identity politics when votebanks are fragmented and all politics is local, is uncertain. But I guarantee you one thing: he'll have middle-class support.
Read more: The Rorschach Effect in Indian Politics

Indian Cricket Team wins Glorious World Cup after 28 yrs !!

First of all, Congrats ! Indian Cricket team for winning the world Cup 2011, Well done !
Gautam Gambhir and MS Dhoni's stellar partnership paved the way for India to end its 28-year wait for a World Cup title even as Mahela Jayawardene's century and Muttiah Muralitharan's swansong ended in hurt and despair.

Chasing a target of 275, India were pegged on the back foot as early as the second ball of their innings when Lasith Malinga trapped Virender Sehwag plumb in front, and though the Indian opener asked for a referral, it was upheld. Malinga then struck again in the seventh over when he had Mumbai's icon Sachin Tendulkar caught behind in the seventh over. But, the title was sealed when Dhoni hit the first ball of the 49th over for a massive six to put the icing on the cake and send a billion people into raptures.

And, to make things even sweeter for India, Yuvraj Singh was named Man of the Series for his 15 wickets and 362 runs. This win has also completed the career CV of Tendulkar, who didn't contribute to the final as much as he may have liked to, but his innings in the lead-up to the final, not least in the semi-finals against Pakistan, It was also the perfect send-off for coach Gary Kirsten, who has now ended his tenure with the Indian team.

Coming back to the loss of those two early wickets, Gambhir and Kohli got the run chase back on track with a 83-run partnership as the Delhi boys got India right back into the match taking minimal risks and milking the Sri Lankan bowling to the fullest. And, even after Kohli was caught off his own bowling by Dilshan, Dhoni and Gambhir took the chase forward.

Dhoni has not been in the best of forms with the bat in the World Cup, but he potentially played the knock of his career in the final as he remained unbeaten on a 79-ball 91 and shared in a 109-run partnership with Gambhir as they snuffed the fight out of the Sri Lankan attack and broke their spirit with each run they made. And, even though Gambhir was bowled going for a massive hit when on 97, India wasn't denied to be a win and it was fitting that Dhoni and Yuvraj, who have shared in so many monumental partnerships were in the middle, when the mission was finally achieved.

Malinga (2-42) made the early dents, but wasn't able to make any more inroads in his subsequent overs. But, however, the most telling blows was felt by the Sri Lankan spinners, Suraj Randiv and Muralitharan, who bowled 17 overs for 82 runs without taking a wicket; and that's really where Sri Lanka lost the match and plot.

Earlier, Jayawardene scored his 14th one-day international century as his unbeaten 103 helped Sri Lanka set India a target of 275 to win the final of the 2011 World Cup at Mumbai's packed Wankhede Stadium.

Jayawardene was the anchor in Sri Lanka's innings as he scored at more than a ball without taking too many risks and he also strung together important partnerships with his skipper Kumar Sangakkara, Thilan Samaraweera, Nuwan Kulasekara and Thisara Perera to negate the good work done early in their innings by Indian pace spearhead Zaheer Khan, who bowled three maiden overs on the trot at the start of the match.

Sreesanth, who shared the new ball with Zaheer, bowled reasonably well in his first two overs, but Tillakaratne Dilshan it him for a couple of boundaries over midwicket and to the midwicket boundary to break the shackles the left-arm pacer had sprung on the Sri Lankan opening batsmen. In between, Zaheer had Upul Tharanga caught by Virender Sehwag at first slip. Tharanga was all at sea against Zaheer and was beaten on more than one occasion; in fact the Sri Lankan opening batsman was unable to score a single run off the 18 deliveries he faced of Zaheer before he was put out of his misery. Zaheer's first spell figures read 5-3-6-1 and he was the main reason Sri Lanka scored only 31 for 1 in their mandatory power play, their lowest score in this spell of play in the entire tournament. Zaheer's bowling apart, exceptional fielding by Yuvraj Singh and Suresh Raina at point and cover point respectively further shackled the Sri Lankan top-order.

Earlier, Sangakkara won the toss and elected to bat. However, there was some controversy as the toss took place twice as no one including match referee Jeff Crowe had heard Sangakkara's call first time round. India made only one change with S Sreesanth coming in for the injured Ashish Nehra; but Sri Lanka made four changes as Chamara Kapugedera, Thisara Perera, Suraj Randiv and Nuwan Kulasekara replaced Chamara Silva, the injured Angelo Mathews, Ajantha Mendis and Rangana Herath.

Dilshan was kept uncharacteristically quiet thanks to Zaheer and with Munaf Patel also keeping things tight at the other end it was tough going for the Sri Lankan opening batsman and Sangakkara. Dilshan did all the hard work and just when he looked as though he would play yet another big innings in the 2011 World Cup, he was unfortunate to get a glove as the ball lobbed back and ht the stumps as he was out for a 49-ball 33. Dilshan though ended the World Cup on exactly 500 runs, and became only the fifth batsman to score so many runs in the mega-event after Sachin Tendulkar (twice), Matthew Hayden, Ricky Ponting and Jayawardene. Sangakkara and Jayawardene then looked untroubled during their 62-run partnership for the third wicket in just over 11 overs before 'golden arm' Yuvraj Singh had the Sri Lankan captain caught behind by Dhoni for a well-made 48 in 67 balls.

Jayawardene, who continued to look as though he was batting on another pitch, was in full control even as Samaraweera led a charmed life in his 34-ball 21 before he was trapped in front by Yuvraj, who finished the 2011 World Cup with 15 wickets. And, though, Zaheer dismissed Kapugedera with a slower ball soon after, Jayawardene continued on his merry ways and was well supported by Kulasekara and the pair added 66 runs for the sixth wicket in quick time.

Jayawardene got to his half-century off 49 balls and then accelerated thereafter bringing up his ton off 84 deliveries. Sri Lanka also took maximum advantage of the batting power play scoring 63 runs for the loss of only Kulasekara's wicket with Jayawardene getting to his century in the space of three deliveries in the 48th over bowled by Zaheer including back-to-back boundaries. Perera then finished the Sri Lankan innings off in style scoring 16 runs including two boundaries and a six as he finished unbeaten on 22 off only 9 balls.