This will help with loading and unloading activities at the yard and also boost gypsum trade from Chennai Port to Bidadi, nearly 30 km from Bengaluru.
The goods shed surface improvement was planned for 600mx15 m area. In the first phase, 390m x 15 m areas has been made ready.
Bengaluru :
A total of 8,000 disposable railway sleepers have been put to efficient use by the Bengaluru Railway Division by building a goods shed at Bidadi from scratch within a month.
This will help with loading and unloading activities at the yard and also boost gypsum trade from Chennai Port to Bidadi, nearly 30 km from Bengaluru.
Thousands of railway sleepers are released by the Railways annually as new sleepers are laid when tracks are renewed.
This is the third such goods shed made in the Division with the previous ones made at Nelamangala and Penekonda.
Speaking to The New Indian Express, Divisional Railway Manager A K Verma said, “The Pre-Stressed Concrete (PSC) sleepers have been utilised to develop a 360 metre unloading platform. This has been done on the request of the Chennai Division of Southern Railway.”
The three goods sheds have been developed from scratch by utilizing 30,000 released sleepers, he added.
Sleepers are sturdy and can withstand a great load which makes them excellent material to develop roads or any surface which is likely to carry much weight.
Saint Gobain has a huge manufacturing facility at Bidadi.
“Gypsum from Chennai Port can be transported here. There is a potential of loading 2,00,000 Metric Tonnes per year,” he said.
“We got rich dividends in the form of substantial increase in NMG loading and first ever Roll On–Roll Off service of South Western Railway,” Verma added.
Senior Divisional Commercial Manager A N Krishna Reddy said, “Usage of sleepers is cost effective. Being M55 PSC, the surface can withstand movement of heavy machinery and loaded lorries. It has saved us much transportation cost.”
The goods shed surface improvement was planned for 600mx15 m area. In the first phase, 390m x 15 m areas has been made ready.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Cities> Bengaluru / by S. Lalitha / Express News Service / September 30th, 2020
Aadi Swaroopa displaying her writing skills. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Swaroopa toys with nine other forms too, including simultaneously writing in Kannada and English
15-year-old Aadi Swaroopa can write with ease using both the hands in unidirectional way. She has also mastered writing in nine different ways including speed writing with right and left hand, reverse running writing and mirror image writing.
Daughter of Gopadkar and Sumadkar, Ms. Swaroopa recently secured a certificate from Uttar Pradesh-based Barelia Lata Foundation for writing 45 words in a minute in an unidirectional way.
Ms. Swaroopa, who is writing the SSLC examination this year as a private candidate, picked up writing with left hand two years ago during a summer camp conducted by her parents, who manage Swaroopa Adhyayana Kendra – a centre that promotes self-learning.
It’s during the lockdown, when there were not much children at the Kendra, that Ms. Swaroopa started practising different forms of writing using both hands. “It’s continuous practice that helped me to improve my speed,” said Ms. Swaroopa, who started writing at the age of three. “I keep on adding new forms of writing.”
On Monday, Ms. Swaroopa demonstrated her skill before reporters by writing the line “See the line where the sky meets the sea ..” unidirectionally. She then wrote the same sentence in the opposite direction, followed by speed writing with right and left hand separately and also writing the mirror image of the sentence. She also showed her heterotopic style of writing, and the hetero linguistic style that involved simultaneously writing in Kannada and English. She showed dancing form, exchange form and her blindfolded writing skill too.
Ms. Swaroopa, who has already come out with a short story book in Kannada and a fiction book in English, said writing with both hands has had positive effect on her creativity. “I am now writing my second novel,” said Ms. Swaroopa, who is a voracious reader, an Yakshagana artiste, a Hindustani classical singer and an artist. She loves mimicry and performs beatbox.
Gopadkar and Sumadkar said they have liberated their daughter from the pressure of learning in a classroom. “She has all the skills to become a good writer,” said Sumadkar.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> States> Karnataka / by Special Correspondent / Mangaluru – September 23rd, 2020
The app, which will be available on Android to begin with, has online training modules for voice artistes and people who will benefit from voice improvement/ development training.
Bengaluru :
Shakiness of voice, weakness of sound or pitch, or volume-related issues… If you’ve faced these but have not dealt with them hands-on, voice artiste and therapist Divya RT (36) is providing tools to do so, through her app VoxCoach, which will be released this week. A former Chemistry lecturer at Mount Carmel College, Divya has been running Voxcoach, a venture dedicated to professional voice training, since 2017.
“I’m hoping that users will understand the science and exercises applied to singing, speech and voice therapy. People who suffer from vocal nodules, or have lost their voices for a period of time, etc can come to us for direction on how to get their voices back,” says Divya, adding that among the advisors is Sridhar Ranganathan, CEO and founder, Shankar Mahadevan Academy.
The app, which will be available on Android to begin with, has online training modules for voice artistes and people who will benefit from voice improvement/ development training. “Training is delivered through a series of voice exercises,” she says. But it’s not just for singers and voice artistes. “It is for anybody who wishes to get past their voice-related roadblocks, with issues like running out of breath while speaking and singing.
It is for anybody who wishes to learn about how voice behaves and which parts of the body are involved,” explains Divya. This will be done through exercises that will make the voice flow better and stronger. “The first part of our three-part course is about breath control and vocal flow,” she adds.
The existent format on the website is live online and has full certificate courses. The app includes recorded courses and subscription material voice tools. “The target audience is kids, teenagers experiencing voice changes, adults, people with voice disorders, singers, voice-over artistes, and actors, etc,” says Divya.
Besides Divya, the coaches are singer Madhura Gowda and rapper Karthik Gubbi. In-app subscription models are being worked on. Incidentally, the idea for the app was brewing before the pandemic hit. While there are other such apps too, Divya feels hers differentiates itself by not providing self-help tools. “We do a lot of handholding, and at the end of it, a user can check if, for instance, if his pitch has improved,” she says.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Cities> Bengaluru / by Express News Service / September 12th, 2020
Picking up the thread of my last week’s narration about the historic Lushington Bridge at Shivanasamudra and my dismay at its botched up restoration in the present era, I would like to take you back by two centuries and give you some refreshingly different and very interesting information from its glorious past.
You may recall that I had said last week that I had written about this bridge once before some years ago. Yes I had and very soon after I wrote about it I received a phone call from Mrs. Tara Ravikumar, a seventh generation descendant of Ramaswami Mudaliar, an officer under the British Government who nearly two centuries ago had almost rebuilt and restored the bridge across the Cauvery River with the expertise and skills of the local stone masons. She had called up to say that her family still had in its possession the Sanad or endowment document that gave Ramaswami Mudaliar a large Jagir or permanent endowment of many villages and vast stretches of land as a reward for the good act of public service that he did in his time, now making him a Jagirdar. She had added that she also had in her possession a medal of honour given on behalf of the then British Governor General.
Although I had told her that I was most eager to see these two extremely valuable artefacts, I somehow never got around to doing it. Though the two of us would occasionally meet each other at functions like weddings and book releases and she would always remind me about my pending visit to her place, my visit itself had never materialised. That was until last Thursday when it had to materialise if I had to write about the bridge the next day! So my wife and I hurriedly dropped in on her to see the two objects which have been preserved remarkably, in mint condition even as they have travelled through six generations!
1. The inscription on the obverse of the medal. 2. The image of the bridge engraved on the face of the medal. 3. The idols of Ramaswami Mudaliar and his wife at Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple.
The Sanad written in a most beautiful and flawless longhand, without a single correction whatsoever is an imposingly large scroll of crisp parchment which I was scared to touch or handle for fear of spoiling its pristine condition, although Tara most graciously asked me to go ahead and take a closer look! But I did not have the courage and decided that I would just quickly click a few photographs of it while she and my wife carefully held it open.
It places on record not only the grant of the absolute rights and the title of the Jagir granted to Ramaswami Mudaliar by the Governor General at Madras but it also extensively lists in great detail the names and locations of the villages and the extents of the lands around them with their survey numbers!
The document is authenticated by an impressive wax seal of authority which although naturally a little cracked by the passage of the two centuries it has silently seen, is still completely intact! Just to safeguard the two of her most priceless possessions I told Tara to desist from showing them to the many eager people who may naturally approach her for the favour after reading my article about them. I only hope she will be able to do it!
The golden medal too is no less impressive, being a large and heavy nugget, hand crafted and hand engraved painstakingly, with a synopsis on one side of what the document says in much greater detail. On its other side it has an engraving of the curved bridge itself with the towers of the two temples that still stand with it even to this day.
The curve is crucial here because the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society places on record the fact that Ramaswami while writing to his superiors about the design of the bridge has made a mention of it as a feature he has incorporated in its design to enable it to better resist and withstand the onslaught of floodwaters during the peak of the monsoon. A really marvellous incorporation indeed in a bygone era of an engineering technique that we now find in almost every one of our dams built in the modern era which happen to be invariably curved rather than straight!
The inscription on the medal reads: “Political Department, Bangalore, 9th, October, 1834. His Excellency the Rt Honourable Govr GENERAL of India in council Being desirous of testifying his sense of the public spirit manifested by Ramasawmy Moodelliar at having at a great Expense restored the ancient Bridges across the Cauvery River at Siva Samoodram has been pleased to resolve that the Individual & his lineal descendants shall be permitted to be eligible to affix to their names the TITLE of “Iunapacara Curtas” signifying One who Confers a Benefit on the public. In COMMEMORATION of which this Medal has been struck and is presented to RAMASAWMY MOODELLIAR by his sincere friend John Sullivan during whose official charge of the province of Coimbatoor these useful works were undertaken.”
Now my friends, that is not all. This was what an appreciative and grateful administration did to recognise and place on record the services of a sincere and hard-working officer for going beyond the call of his duty and doing much good to his people. But I feel that the way in which the humble inhabitants of the Island of Shivanasamudra to whom he provided some much needed connectivity with the rest of the world, went a step further and honoured the man merits a mention here.
They made him a demi-God and placed him alongside their principal presiding deity, whom they all worshipped, day in and day out. That is why if you happen to visit the imposing Ranganathaswamy Temple at Shivanasamudra you will still find the images of Ramaswami Mudaliar and his wife, both carved from a single stone, standing there, draped in silken attire. The villagers adorn them with fragrant flowers and worship them too, even to this day, just like they have been worshipping their God over the centuries, with bowed heads, trembling lips and folded hands! That is the kind of simple and humble gratitude that dwells unchanged over the centuries in our rustic souls!
e-mail: kjnmysore@rediffmail.com
source: http://www.starofmysore.com / Star of Mysore / Home> Columns – Over A Cup of Evening Tea / by Dr. K. Javeed Nayeem M.D. / August 28th, 2020
The National Institute of Technology – Karnataka (NIT-K), Surathkal, has been ranked fourth globally in the list of universities with the most accepted students for Google Summer Code (GSoC) – 2020.
The GSoC is a global programme organised by Google Open Source team with an aim to introduce students to open source software development. The students are paired with mentors from open source organisations to work on a programming-intensive project. This year, the programme is running from June – August 2020, the institute said in a release.
It said that 23 students from NITK got selected for GSoC 2020 in some of the best open source organisations across the world. A total of 1,198 students from 550 universities globally are participating in GSoC 2020.
Over the past three years, there has been a voluntary and organised effort led by Mohit P. Tahiliani, Assistant Professor, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, and interested students from various departments of NIT-K to structurally plan out open source activities in the institute. The first batch which was a part of the effort resulted in seven selections in GSoC and the number has increased in the past two years, thereby showing the growth of NITK in the field of open source contributions, the release said.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> States> Karnataka / Mangaluru – August 21st, 2020
Dr P R S Chetan, additional chief officer, commanding Quick Response Team (QRT), Civil Defence and his team rescued hundreds of flood victims in the State last year.
Bengaluru :
Dr PRS Chetan, additional chief officer, commanding Quick Response Team (QRT), Civil Defence and his team rescued hundreds of flood victims in the State last year. These include 186 people stranded at the Hippie Islands along the Tungabhadra River.
Dr Chetan has been awarded with the President’s Civil Defence Gallantry Medal for saving several lives in 2019 in the Tungabhadra River Flood Rescue Operation. This is the first Gallantry Award to Civil Defence in the last 50 years.
Dr Chetan narrated to TNSE his experiences running rescue operations and his own near-death experience in the crocodile-infested river. “Around 200 people — mostly foreigners — were stranded at the Hippie Island in Virupapura Gadde. The only option was to either airlift or ferry them across the river to safety. We rescued 186 people and the rest were airlifted,” he said.
The rescue team had members from the Civil Defence (12) and the National Disaster Response Force (20). “Four of us were in a boat, which capsized. Two caught hold of a lifebuoy and floated to the shore, one caught hold of a tree and was airlifted by a helicopter. I was washed away and struggled to swim ashore for four-and-a-half hours.
Fortunately, I was wearing a life jacket, else I would have drowned within minutes. There were strong undercurrents. I couldn’t hear and my eyes started getting tired. I thought I would die when suddenly my legs got entangled in weeds. I got something to hold on to and managed to swim ashore. I blew the whistle, but no one heard it.
I was injured and my body was sore. I walked for 2km, when villagers spotted me. I was taken to the nearest hospital,” said Dr Chetan. Two days in the hospital and on August 14, 2019, he went back to work. “I faced death in those hours in the river. I would like to rescue as many people as I can. It’s my service to the country,” said Dr Chetan.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> States> Karnataka / by Bala Chauhan / Express News Service / August 16th, 2020
The city has a long history of revolts and expressions of resentment against the British
Remembering them: A memorial at Mysore Bank Circle in Bengaluru to commemorate some of those who died in the freedom struggle. | Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Mysore Bank Square, August 17, 1942. For the ninth consecutive day, thousands of Bengalureans came out to protest peacefully in response to Gandhiji’s Quit India call. People surged and flowed along Avenue Road and slogans suffused with hope and anger rented the air: “Quit India!”, “Inquilab Zindabad!”
But that Monday, some protesters set fire to a post office at Aralepete; others broke into a police station and tried to attack the post office at Chickpet. When the police issued warnings, defiant protesters barricaded the road with carts and boulders and then hurled soda bottles at the policemen, while others threw stones from their rooftops.
The police opened fire, six people died and more than 30 were injured. Bengaluru has a long history of revolts and expressions of resentment against the British. Even in 1800, people were arrested for singing songs against the British and in praise of Tipu Sultan.
Attempted mutiny
Twenty-five years before the First War of Independence swept through India, there was an attempted mutiny in Bengaluru by soldiers who dreamt of overthrowing the British here and then inciting mutiny all over India; their plan was thwarted by a snitch.
From the late 1800s, like the rest of the country, Bengaluru too was gripped with nationalistic fervour. This was fanned by the activities of organisations such as the Vokkaligara Sangha, established in 1906, which did much to raise awareness and education in the community, and the Theosophical Society, which established a branch here in 1886.
Big stimulus
A big stimulus to the still-nascent freedom movement was the return of Mahatma Gandhi from South Africa in January 1915. His first visit to Bengaluru was in May 1915. His second visit in 1920 ushered in a movement for spinning khadi. Khadi sales were frequently held, as were other gatherings — to celebrate Gandhiji’s ending a fast, to mourn the passing of C.R. Das, or protest against a water tax. Such meetings usually began with Gandhians speaking about non-cooperation, Hindu-Muslim unity, against untouchability, and against alcohol.
Hundreds attended these gatherings which were held in the so-called Gandhi Maidan opposite Minto Hospital, Doddanna Hall, which was opposite Bengaluru Fort, and sometimes, even Tipu Palace. Many such meetings had an attendee whose job was to report on them to the Mysore administration: one such report by a spy in 1925 records the speeches made and then dutifully notes that khadi worth Re. 1 and 2 annas was sold.
Except for when he was here to recuperate from illness, Gandhiji’s visits had him criss-crossing the city, holding meetings at Mahila Seva Samaja, the RBANMs school and grounds, a home on Lalbagh Road, a shop at Commercial Street, and so on. Thousands thronged to listen to him speak passionately about non-violence and the evils of untouchability. A meeting in a house on Victoria Road, for example, drew 2,000 people, at National High School, 25,000 people. Many people who attended these meetings donated generously to the cause, sometimes even giving away their jewellery.
But not everyone was so moved: some people held meetings where they denounced Gandhiji’s anti-caste stand as “subversive of Hindu dharma”. The 1920s and 1930s also saw frequent student rallies, boycott of classes, and picketing of shops selling foreign cloth. In that pre-WhatsApp and social media era, when even telephones were uncommon, how did organisers get the word out about upcoming meetings? Enter the cheap flyer. Hundreds of these indispensable handbills were churned out at several small presses around the city and were then distributed door to door, in markets, and stuck on strategic lamp posts.
Turning point
A turning point in the freedom struggle in Bengaluru came in 1937 when K.F. Nariman, president of the Bombay Congress Committee, was invited to speak here. The Mysore government had banned him from addressing gatherings because of his earlier “incendiary” speeches. On October 24, at Banappa Park, as soon as Nariman came on to the stage to address a crowd comprising mainly students, he was arrested. The next day, when students gathered to protest his arrest, police opened fire on the unarmed protesters. One person was killed and 73 people were injured that day.
Little-known memorials at Banappa Park and at Mysore Bank Circle commemorate some of those who died in the 1937 and 1942 incidents.
(Meera Iyer is the author of ‘Discovering Bengaluru’ and the convenor of INTACH Bengaluru Chapter)
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Opinion> Columns / by Meera Iyer / August 14th, 2020
Her popularity as a Doctor was so much, some patients even named their daughters ‘Indra’
When Sam Cherian called me on Saturday morning and gave the news of Dr. Mrs. Indra Amla’s demise, I rushed to their house and paid my last respects to her. In the afternoon when I was sitting at home I remembered some of the events over four decades of association.
Dr. Indra Amla was always seen by us in CFTRI campus during 1972 (when I was a student) as a serious Doctor who spoke less and would go to her work at Cheluvamba Hospital and return for lunch and again go back to work in the evening in a Herald car, I think.
As a Doctor by profession, she was very busy as one could see. Her popularity as a Doctor was so much, I know some patients who have even named their daughters Indra in reverence to Dr. Indra Amla.
Over a period of time when I came back from the USA, Dr. Amla and family too had returned from USA after her stint at the World Bank. I was working as a Scientist at CFTRI and I saw her involved more with some of the Projects on Proteins and Nutrition at CFTRI and other Hospitals of Mysore, in spite of her busy schedule with the local Hospitals — especially pertaining to Nutrition and Paediatrics.
Many people at CFTRI came to know her more at that time. After I took over as Director, she used to bring us new thoughts with JSS Hospital involvement where she was working and after her retirement from Government service.
Her interest in the subject of ‘under-nutrition’ became more and more intense. We made a draft of a project towards that and sent it to the Government. But, like it happens to Governments, it did not move forward fast enough which frustrated Dr. Amla who once mentioned to me “How much does it cost? I will take care of the expenditure and let us move ahead.” It was a small project. That showed her commitment to children and women and to help them somehow. In the end, the project did not take off but Dr. Indra Amla’s passion to serve women and children did not die.
Over the years we used to visit Dr. Amla’s residence on Contour Road, Gokulam and later in Hinkal. She was an excellent host and conversationalist. And her conversations inevitably always led to something to do with service to society.
She had another side too — her love for animals, especially her two dogs Boney and Mint. After retirement the family settled in their own home near Hinkal in a small coconut grove. But the dogs were still attached to the CFTRI campus and would land up at the campus making their way from far off Hinkal. Dr. Amla, who would visit the campus for half-a-day would then meet the dogs on campus and indulge them in a sort of conversation, as if to know how their day went. She would then drive them back home, like a mother picking up her children after school !
Dr. Indra Amla was a committed worker not only during service but even after retirement. I feel with the passing of Dr. Indra Amla, the iconic era of exceptional women doctors who stood for a cause in Mysuru, has come to an end.
May her soul Rest in Peace.
source: http://www.starofmysore.com / Star of Mysore / Home> Feature Articles / by Dr. V. Prakash, Former Director of CFTRI and Distinguished Scientist of CFTRI / August 03rd, 2020
The United States dropped an uranium atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima on 6th August 1945. Nearly a lakh of civilians died instantly or were severely injured. Another plutonium atomic bomb was detonated over the city of Nagasaki on 9th August 1945 with a similar devastating effect. This resulted in Japan’s announcement of an unconditional surrender to the US Forces, on 15th August 1945. The supreme commander of the allied forces, Gen. Douglas MacArthur, received the formal instrument of surrender on 2nd September 1945 on the US naval ship Missouri, and he continued as the military administrator of Japan. The General arrested all the main decision-makers like the Prime Minister, Chief of Military and a number of others and imprisoned them. One of the main accused was General Hideki Tojo, Prime Minister of Japan (1941-44).
The US and the allied powers were keen to punish the top decision-makers in the Government and the military who started the war. They called them the war criminals. They constituted the International War Tribunal for the Far East, on the lines of the Nuremberg Trials of Germany. The Tribunal had eleven Judges drawn all over the Western world and British Commonwealth. The Judges came from England, France, New Zealand, United States, Philippines, India etc. Popularly known as the “Tokyo Trials”, the trials started on 14th May 1946 and lasted for two-and- a-half years. The final judgement was delivered in November 1948. The defendants included former Prime Ministers, Foreign Ministers and prominent military Generals who were involved in the decision- making to wage and continue the war.
The Tokyo War Trials were long and went on for more than two years. The trials had 816 sessions, more than 4,000 witnesses and 48,412 pages of transcripts. The sentences were pronounced in November 1948. Slowly each of the Judges pronounced the defendants to be guilty. The 11th Judge thundered “NOT GUILTY” and stunned ten other brother Judges and the whole Courtroom. The man who gave the dissent and exonerated all the accused was “Justice Radhabinod Pal” from India.
Justice Pal was born in a small village in present day Bangladesh and educated in Calcutta. He worked as a Professor of Law, retired as a Judge of Calcutta High Court and later was appointed as the Vice-Chancellor of Calcutta University. He was known for his legal erudition and expertise in international law. He was nominated as a Judge on the Tokyo War Tribunal by the then British Government of India in 1946. Justice Pal wrote a lengthy dissenting judgement of 1,250 pages. It seems that Jurist Pal rarely went out of his hotel room in Tokyo and personally typed his lone lengthy dissenting judgement. He felt that the trials themselves were illegal. He opined that like the European countries who had Colonies, Japan too was entitled to acquire its own Colonies. He pointed out that Japan cannot be tried for crimes against humanity. He felt that the large devastation and deaths inflicted by the American atom bombs were as much, if not greater, crime against humanity.
He gave a number of arguments terming the Tokyo War Trials as irregular and illegal. Justice Pal’s dissenting opinion was severely criticised all over the western countries. Pal’s view was “aggressive war was reasonable because it is about National Sovereignty”. He pointed out that the Western countries acquired their Colonies by brutal wars and hence did not have a moral right to stand in judgement. He was of the opinion that conquerors should not pass judgement on the conquered and the Tokyo trials were more of a victor’s revenge. In his judgement, Pal was very severe towards Japan too, but his criticism of the US was very serious.
The War Tribunal and the Western Governments did not like the dissenting opinion of Justice Pal and decided not to publish his 1,250-page-long judgement. Japan signed a Peace Treaty with the United States in 1952, and the military administration of Gen. Douglas MacArthur ended, and Japan was once again a sovereign free nation. Soon afterwards the Japanese Government published the 1,250-page-long dissenting judgement of Justice Pal.
Pal’s opinion that Japan was not legally culpable, was accepted and hailed by a large section and particularly the upper classes of the country. The Japanese society appreciated the courage and passion of Justice Pal. It is said thus Justice Pal’s opinion highly mitigated the shame and remorse felt by the Japanese people and particularly the ruling elite.
A group photo of the Judges of the Tokyo War Trials.
After the Tokyo Trials, Pal was elected to the UN International Law Commission, where he served illustriously from 1952 to 1966. Japan felt very grateful to Justice Pal. The Emperor bestowed on him the nation’s highest honour “Order of the Sacred Treasure” in 1966. He was invited twice more to Japan for lectures. The Government of India honoured him with the title “Padma Vibhushan.” After his death, the Japanese Government erected a memorial for Justice Pal in “YASUKUNI SHRINE”, which is a memorial for the National and War Heroes of Japan. When Prime Minister Abe visited India, he went to Calcutta to meet the son and family members of late Justice Pal.
For his dissenting judgement exonerating Japan, Jurist Pal was highly criticised and vilified all over the Western world. But Justice Pal had the courage of conviction to go against the opinion of all the ten of his fellow Judges and the wishes of the allied powers of the United Kingdom, United States and Russia. This Indian Judge showed exemplary courage in telling the world that in a war, there is no ‘good side’. Justice Radhabinod Pal is almost forgotten in India but remains a greatly admired and adored hero in Japan.
source: http://www.starofmysore.com / Star of Mysore / Home> Feature Articles / by Dr.C.D. Sreenivasa Murthy /August 03rd, 2020
Worried by multiple news reports of patients failing to get an ambulance or being charged exorbitant costs if they get one, the residents decided to gear up for an emergency.
After incidents where a shortage of ambulances led to the deaths of patients, a group of 37 residents welfare associations (RWAs) in Kanakapura in Bengaluru have rented an ambulance to cater to 3700 families.
Done under the banner of Change Makers of Kanakapura, the cost boils down to Rs 60 per month per family, with the vehicle on standby at Kanakapura road, Konankunte cross, with ICU trained nursing staff and driver at their beck and call.
“One resident who suffered a heart attack passed away as the hospital said their ambulance was preoccupied and could only reach him in an hour. In another case, a person who suffered a mild heart attack and was breathless could not get an ambulance because all hospitals feared it was COVID-19. Finally, the family had to drive him down in a car, where he was tested for COVID-19 and only after he turned negative was he sent for angioplasty,” said Abdul Aleem, member of the RWA federation.
Worried by multiple news reports of patients failing to get an ambulance or being charged exorbitant costs if they get one, the residents including apartment dwellers decided to gear up for an emergency.
The total cost is Rs 2 lakh per month and the ambulance is equipped with a ventilator, ambu bag, suction apparatus, bain circuit, PPE kits, cardiac monitor, infusion pump and oxygen cylinder provided by JK Ambulance Service.
It will cater to residents along the Sarakki signal to NICE road junction stretch. There will be 3 nursing staff on three 8-hour shifts and 2 drivers on 12-hour shifts.
They have even prepared for a scenario where a vehicle is required by more than one patient.
“In such a situation, the vendor has promised to give one more ambulance at the same time,” Aleem said, adding, “We will use it for all kinds of patients. If a patient is COVID positive or a suspect, the vehicle will be sanitized after transporting them. PPE kits will be provided to the patient and staff.”
This ambulance is a form of insurance for residents for the next six months, so they are not left helpless in case there is a medical emergency.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> States> Karnataka / by Ranjani Madhavan / July 17th, 2020
