Spicy girls of West Bengal

They are just five and seven years old, but it's not chocolates and chips that Joshna and Shanti are after. Both the sisters in this seaside village love to eat three kilos of green chillies each every day!

Shanti and Joshna, the daughters of fisherman Jatin Sadhu, are considered "miracle children" in their village, about 200 km from Kolkata.

"Shanti started having chillies when she was two years old and Joshna had her first chilli at the age of four. They never complain that the chillies are hot, nor do they ever develop a sore mouth. Every day they need 2-3 kg of chillies each," Jatin said.

"They chew on chillies as if they are having toffees and juicy fruits."

There's never a dearth of chillies, as Jatin's brother-in-law Arun Mondal is a chilli farmer.

"Often Arun takes my daughters to his chilli farm. One day he saw Shanti plucking chillies one after another and eating them. He thought the child would soon scream but no such thing happened. After that Shanti got addicted to chillies. Joshna too joined her sister soon," Jatin said.

Neighbours say the sisters are "blessed" and that is why they do not find the chillies hot.

"The Sadhu sisters are blessed. Else how can they do such a miracle every day!" wondered neighbour Laxmi Sadhukhan.

Jatin took the girls to a local doctor for a thorough checkup.

"But the doctor, Swapan Samadder, found them fit," Jatin said.

Samadder said the taste buds of the girls were apparently unable to distinguish anything hot.

"Their taste buds seem not to detect the taste of anything hot. But it's surprising that even their livers and other internal organs are not affected after eating so many chillies every day. It's a very rare case in medical science.

"Nevertheless, I have requested the father to keep his daughters away from chillies because I am sure in the long run it will affect their health," Samadder said.

Jatin said he did try to keep his daughters away from chillies.

"As a result my daughters stopped eating and started vomiting. Only after I gave them chillies did they become normal!"


source :
http://www.zeenews.com/

Might keep Gurez open to tourists longer: JK Gov

Efforts will be made to keep the scenic Gurez valley, known for its Habakhatoon hill, open to tourist traffic for longer duration, Jammu and Kashmir Governor N N Vohra said here today.

Located on the Line of Control and usually remaining cut off for most part of the year owing to heavy snowfall, Gurez was brought in the tourist map early this year.

The Gurez-Tulail road would be kept open for longer duration to ensure speedy development of this border sub division, Vohra said while interacting with locals and officials.

He said the issue would be raised with the Border Roads Organisation, which maintains the vital highways and roads in the valley.

In view of the tourism potential of the area, he said an amount of Rs three crore has already been sanctioned for infrastructure development.

Vohra indicated a special recruitment drive by the police could be carried out after Eid-ul-Fitr and directed that winter stocking of rations and diesel be completed by October five.

He announced the release of Rs 70 lakh for the procurement and stocking of diesel, as the area is entirely dependent on generators for power. An amount of Rs 50 lakh has already been earmarked for this purpose.

Reviewing the pace of progress on various projects at a meeting with district and senior level officers, the governor sanctioned Rs one crore for the new 'Dak' Bungalow, Rs 65 lakh for construction of the Wanpora bridge and an additional Rs 30 lakh for the hospital complex currently under execution.


source : http://www.zeenews.com/

India joins Asiavision song contest

Asia is to have its own version of the Eurovision song contest in 2009 with India and at least six other countries and territories taking part, a Hong Kong news report said on Monday.

China, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore and Hong Kong have all committed to taking part in the contest which will be telecast across the region, the South China Morning Post said.

Contests to select the entries from each of the participating destinations will be held early next year before a three-hour finale at a venue yet to be decided, the newspaper said.

Asiavision, the company set up to arrange the event, said that unlike Eurovision, which launched the international careers of acts like ABBA, the Asian contest would feature existing pop stars.

"We are aiming at having established artistes," said spokesman Mishal Varma. "It's like the Olympics for music."

Varma said the organizers of Eurovision had been consulted about the idea and partnerships would be formed with broadcasters in each of the participating countries and territories.

The Eurovision song contest has run for 53 years and is as famous internationally for its naff tunes and heroic failures scoring "null points" as its famous graduates like Lulu and Cliff Richard.


source :
http://music.ndtv.com/

4 Indian-origin men on Forbes' richest Americans list

Tech guru Vinod Khosla and three other men of Indian origin are on the 2008 list of the 400 richest Americans prepared by Forbes magazine.

The list, released on Wednesday, is topped by Microsoft founder Bill Gates, followed by legendary investor William Buffet with fortunes of about $57 billion and $50 billion respectively.

Oracle Corp founder Lawrence Ellison, worth $27 billion, is in the third position.

While Khosla, co-founder of Sun Microsystems and a venture captialist, is ranked 355 with a personal wealth of $1.4 billion, the other three Indian Americans on the list are Google investor Kavitark Ram Shriram (rank 281), Syntel founder Bharat Desai and family (321), and Amar Bose (also ranked 321) of Bose sound systems.

All four are self-made billionaires. To get on the Forbes' list, the minimum net worth needed was $1.3 billion this year.

Shriram, 51, with a personal wealth of $1.7 billion, is a Chennai-born entrepreneur who started at Netscape in 1994. Later, he created shopping site Junglee, which he sold to Amazon in 1998.

An early investor and a board member of Google, he still owns 1.3 million shares worth $600 million. Today, the Californian backs some Indian and US startups and sits on the board of Indian job site Naukri.com.

Khosla, 52, also based in California, is an Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) product from India with an MBA from Stanford. He co-founded electric design automation company Daisy Systems in 1980.

Two years later he joined others to form Sun Microsystems. He served as its chief executive before turning to finance full-time in 1996. In 2004, he started Khosla Ventures, which funds "science experiments" like solar panels and clean technology.

Florida-based Desai was born in Kenya 55 years ago, but moved to India at age 11. After getting an IIT degree, he moved to the US in 1976 to work at TCS. He founded Syntel with wife Neerja Sethi, taking it public in 1997. Today, the firm outsources client's IT and BPO overseas, mostly to Asia.

Bose, now 78, started repairing radios in high school. He earned a Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Techonology (MIT) and started research on hi-fi sound before starting Bose Corp in 1964.

He built his brand on groundbreaking loudspeaker design. Today, Bose iPod docks, surround-sound home entertainment speaker systems and noise-cancelling headphones dominate the market. Based in Massachusetts, he was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame last year.

A man of Sri Lankan origin is also on the Forbes list. Raj Rajaratnam (rank 262), with a wealth of $1.8 billion, founded hedge fund Galleon Group in 1997, making big bets on health care and technology companies. Today the firm manages $7.5 billion across six funds.

Economic woes have claimed some members of Forbes' ranking of the 400 wealthiest Americans.

Dropouts this year include former American International Group (AIG) chief executive Maurice Greenberg and former eBay chief Meg Whitman.

With an average net worth of $3.9 billion, the 400 richest Americans collectively have a net worth of $1.57 trillion, exceeding Canada's gross domestic product.

source : http://www.ndtv.com/

Indian unity defies terror

Indian Capital Delhi once again thrilled up when five serial bomb blasts were made by the terrorists at three most important places in the capital. More than two dozen peoples lost their lives in these blasts and more than one hundred & fifty peoples were injured in this tragedy.

Ignoring the terrorist's inhuman activities, the festival season is in full swing now in India, as India is well known for its festivals of the different castes & communities. The Indian Hindu community recently organized its religious festival Ganesh Pooja with full devotion, whereas the Muslims were busy in its pious month of Ramzan. In the next few days there are preparations to celebrate the famous festivals of Dushehra, the DurgaPooja and the Ied-Ul-fiter.

This country presents an example of unity among diversities and the festivals of all the communities are associated with the religious importance. At the same time these festivals present a rare example of communal harmony and equality for all the religions. Perhaps no country in the world can show such a thing. Surprisingly, these examples are seen in India even at the time when the terrorists and communal powers are doing their best efforts day and night, to break the communal harmony Let us see, such events, associated with Indian communal harmony.

In Barara, a town in Haryana, there is its fame for making the highest effigy of Ravana on the Dushehra day during last years. Even this year they are trying to set a record for the Asia's highest effigy of Ravana on the Dushehra festival eve. The president and founder of the Ram leela club Rana tejinder singh chauhan, with the help of his hundreds of companions, has been doing his best to get the highest effigy of Ravana prepared for last four months.

To help him in this project, a Muslim family of Mohammad Usman has come from famous Taj city, Agra. After covering a distance of 500 km. from his hometown, Mohamand Usman and his family members are staying at Barara as special guests for the last four months, with Tejinder Singh Chauhan.

Muhammad Usman has a deep desire from the care of heart to help Tejinder Singh Chauhan in establishing the record in the country and after that now in the world. During the preparation of this huge effigy of Ravana the holy month of Ramzan also passed. Mohammad Usman and his family keep Roza 'fast' in a regular way.

Tajinder Singh Chauhan makes complete arrangement with full devotion for his Roza's. Not only this, when his wife felt a need for the Quraan sharif (A holly Islamic Book) in the beginning of Ramzan, Chauhan himself took the trouble to go to book stall that kept the religious books and get it for the wife of Mohd. Usman. He fulfilled other religious necessities for completing the religious ceremonies. Usman himself accepts the fact that he gets the highest regards and religious freedom while doing his work at the directed structure of Ravana here at Barara.

Perhaps that regard and freedom he may not get among his own community members. That is why he happily accepts the invitation from Chauhan every year and comes to Barara with his skilled workers and his family. In this regard Tejinder Singh states that he feels happy to do his duty to fulfill the religious necessities of Mohammad Usman and his relatives. He feels in this work as doing Indian custom of 'the guests are the gods' Chauhan says that he is attempting to get the world record of making the huge effigy to be entered in the guinnies book of world records. The effigy is being prepared by Mohammad Usman under his directions. If it is so, the Ravana effigy for this year in the town Barara will not only set a record for its height and giant ness but it will also set a rare example of Indian communal harmony.

Similarly the festival of Ganesh pooja, like other years, is presenting an example of communal harmony, this year too. Where the great hero of Indian film industry, Salman khan was seen celebrating Ganesh pooja with full devotion at the same time, in many parts of India, the Ganesh pooja festival was organized by the Muslim community. Not only this, in many Ganesh pooja organizations the Ganesh statue was setup by the Muslims in their houses and these were properly worshipped. In the festival Ganesh pooja Visarjan many persons from the Muslim community took part in it, in large number. Another famous film actor, shahrukh khan too celebrate all the Hindus and the Muslims festival with great zeal in his house, by celebrating all the festivals such as the Holi, the Diwali, the Id, and the baqrid, with his near and dear ones, he shows an examples of a real Indian.

These functions of all religious and communal harmony are celebrated not only by the rich and wealthy or famous persons but the poor and helpless people in India; too have the strong feeling of celebrating these festivals with great zeal. For example, 19 districts of Bihar state in India are badly affected because of severe floods that were caused by the Kosi river dam breakage. The victims without any religious discrimination took part in religious festivals of one another and provided shelters to the victims. The collective functions and prayers were organized at many places to get rid of the disaster. These prayers from both the communities were done under one roof at many places. At the time of flood in the month of Ramzan, the Hindus helped the Muslims and at some places these are news that the Hindus too observed the Roza .

As there is news that the Muslims are involve in most of the events of terrorism in India. For this there are news of bad attempts for polarization of votes by the Hindutvawadi powers in Gujrat and at the same time the examples of communal harmony easily makes one to understand that on this holy land of Ramanand, Kabir, Nanak, Chishti, Khusroo, Baba Farid and bulleshah the attempts to spoil the communal harmony cannot succeed. No terrorist organization can uproot the plants of communal harmony in this country of saints and hermits.

source :
http://www.westender.com.au/