Jun 02 2017 : The Times of India (Chennai)

Railways to provide `book now pay later' option

New Delhi: TIMES NEWS NETWORK AGENCIES





Railways has decided to provide the “buy tickets now and pay later“ service for any Express trains, an IRCTC official said on Thursday .According to the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) Ltd official, soon passengers would be able to buy tickets from the IRCTC website and pay later.
IRCTC spokesman Sandip Dutta said: “IRCTC has collaborated with a Mumbai-based firm ePayLater for adding the new service option.“
“Through this service a passenger can book a ticket five days prior to the journey with a service charge of 3.5% and pay it in the next 14 days,“ Dutta said.
He also said that this option was valid only on etickets.
Elaborating on the new feature, Dutta said, “The way a credit card is issued after evaluating the CIBIL score of a customer, same procedure will be followed.“





Jun 02 2017 : The Times of India (Chennai)

Docs perform open-heart surgery on premature 

baby

Umesh Isalkar

Pune





In a rare feat, the city doctors successfully performed an open-heart surgery on a premature baby weighing only 1.5kg. The baby was suffering from an extremely critical congenital heart defect, which made the surgery a necessity for the newborn's survival. According to the hospital, this is the first successful open-heart surgery performed on such a small baby in the country .The baby was born premature at 33 weeks at a hospital in Baramati, where doctors noticed low oxygen levels in his blood. Upon investigations, the baby was diagnosed with a serious heart condition where the veins bringing oxygenated blood from the lungs were connected to the liver instead of the heart.The baby was immediately shifted to Ruby Hall Clinic in Pune. In the third week after his birth, surgeons performed the open-heart surgery on his “walnut-sized“ heart successfully last week.The child is recuperating and will be discharged in another two weeks. Consultant paediatric cardiac surgeon Srinivas M Kini, who performed the surgery , said, “His was a case of Infracardiac Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Connection where the veins bringing oxygenated blood from the lungs were connected wrongly to the liver instead of the heart.“
The “extremely high-risk surgery“ was a huge challenge. “Clockwork precision was the need of the hour. The size of the baby's heart was equivalent to a walnut. Without the open-heart surgery , the baby had no chances of survival,“ Kini said.
The baby was operated on `Total Circulatory Arrest' where the body was cooled to 18°C against the normal body temperature of 37°C. The infant was put on a heart-lung machine and blood circulation was stopped to allow a bloodless field during surgery . “The abnormal connection of veins to the liver was disconnected and reattached to the proper site at the back of the heart. After the surgery was completed, the blood circulation was started again and the baby was rewarmed to normal body temperature,“ Kini, who carried out the surgery on May 22, said.
The baby was taken off ventilator on May 27. He started breathing on his own within a week of the surgery .





Jun 02 2017 : The Times of India (Chennai)

All govt college seats taken in PG counselling

Chennai: TIMES NEWS NETWORK





At the end of the single-window counselling for postgraduate medical and dental admissions on Wednesday , all the seats in government medical colleges were taken.The highest vacancy fell in the management quota in selffinancing medical colleges, followed by medical institutions run by deemed universities.
While 19 seats fell vacant in the former category , 137 seats remained unoccupied against the total 598 seats allotted in the latter.
There were also vacancies in the government quota provided in self-financing medical colleges with 14 seats yet to be filled. In the dental stream 2, the highest vacancy fell in the management quota of selffinancing colleges and deemed universities.

Jun 02 2017 : The Times of India (Chennai)

Don't bother about stamping baggage at airport 

any more

Chennai: TIMES NEWS NETWORK





The Chennai airport has done away with stamping of tags for cabin baggage from Monday after the Central Industrial Security Force implemented the nobaggage stamping policy.A senior official of Airports Authority of India said the first day went off without a hitch as the authorities had already completed a weeklong trial in the first week of last month. “The move has eliminated an unnecessary inconvenience for the passengers. Now, they can just walk in for security check after checking in and getting a boarding pass from the airline counter,“ he added.
Earlier, passengers who missed tagging a piece of cabin baggage were sent back by the CISF men to the counter to obtain tags. This created confusion and anxiety among passengers, airport director G Chandramouli said, “We got the order to implement the system on Wednesday.“
With this, Chennai airport has joined other airports where baggage stamping was done away with in April. The AAI is working on modernising many procedures at the airport and also upgrading infrastructure.
A team of officials would be visiting Chennai from Delhi on Friday to hold discussions on phase II expansion of the airport which will include straightening of a taxiway and building new terminals.

Jun 02 2017 : The Times of India (Chennai)

Shop at your own risk: Most structures unsafe

TIMES NEWS NETWORK





With the embers may die the fear of stepping into those colossal showrooms in T Nagar, but don't forget this: Many of them still don't adhere to fire safety norms or have firefighting equipment. The Chennai Silks showroom, which has turned into a skeleton of iron beams after a massive fire gutted the structure, did not possess the mandatory completion certificate.B Kannan, secretary, T Nagar residents' welfare association said building resgulations were blatantly flouted in the commercial hub.“Leading retailers are installing heavy airconditioning machines on the terrace, the load of which the buildings cannot support,“ he said.In the event of a disaster, shoppers will have to pay the price as there are no emergency exits in many of the buildings.
A fire safety audit conducted by the fire and rescue department in 2015 found gross violations in the popular retail shops that dot the area. The audit found that the basic firefightinmg equipment like the automatic sprinkler and wet riser systems were missing from some of the buildings.
Moreover, residents say they have not witnessed mock drills in the multistoreyed buildings. Quality assurance auditor Kesavan Pandian said the Wednesday fire accident has exposed that such accidents are waiting to happen in poorly-equipped commercial complexes. “There are fire safety standards for industries and mock drills should be conducted once in 30 days. Have you ever heard of any such mock drill in commercial complexes that is thronged by thousands?“ he asked.

Jun 02 2017 : The Times of India (Chennai)

Moderation? CBSE awards up to 11extra marks in a 

subject

Manash Gohain

New Delhi:





Board Also Raised Grace Limit To 10

Ordered by the court to restore moderation of marks in Class XII this year, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) seems to have gone way beyond reasonable limits of the policy while awarding marks.Up to 11 extra marks were given in accountancy , 10 in mathematics and eight each in physics and chemistry, documents accessed by TOI reveal.
This is apart from set-wi se moderated marks awarded due to difference in difficulty levels and other discrepancies. The spiking, evidently done in anticipation of other boards doing the same, is bound to reopen the moderation debate.
One expert called it “not moderation, but competitive inflation“ of marks. Others said spiking of marks was putting an otherwise progressive policy (moderation) under a cloud, with all boards getting into competitive mode. CBSE also gave up to 10 marks as grace for candidates who failed to get qualifying marks.
TOI accessed documents on CBSE's moderation process this year for the all India sets of question papers for 18 subjects of Class XII. In addition, there were set specific extra marks given to the same question paper(s).For example, while physics has been awarded eight marks as moderation, for `set 2' and `set 3', an additional one each has been awarded.
Speaking to TOI, former CBSE chairman Ashok K Ganguly said that such variability in mean marks amongst different sets of question papers should not have arisen in the first place.“These cannot be moderation of marks if the process has been done properly . Earlier, moderation of one to three marks used to be adequate,“ he said.
Stating that moderation is a necessity for a national board such as CBSE, Ganguly said it should be done judiciously .“State boards should not be moderating at all,“ he added.
CBSE had stated it would not moderate marks this year. However, on May 22, 2017, the Delhi high court overturned the decision. Following the court's order, CBSE continued with its “moderation policy“ and the Class XII results were notified on May 28, 2017. The board's grace marks policy (for those candidates failing in a subject) too was `liberalised' this year. As per CBSE documents with TOI, atotal of 10 marks were awarded to candidates as grace. According to a former controller of examination, “grace marks used to be three or maximum four till around 2009“.
In the wake of this year's moderated marks, a former CBSE chairperson has called for reviving the Council of Boards of School Education in India (COBSE), a voluntary association of all the school boards.

ஒரு மாதமாக மீட்டர் தட்டுப்பாடு : புதிய மின் இணைப்புக்கு சிக்கல்

பதிவு செய்த நாள்01ஜூன்2017 23:17

சிவகங்கை: மின் வாரியத்தில் ஒரு மாதமாக மீட்டர்களுக்கு தட்டுப்பாடு உள்ளதால், புதிய மின் இணைப்புக்கு சிக்கல் ஏற்பட்டுள்ளது.
தமிழகம் முழுவதும் இலவச இணைப்பை தவிர்த்து, 2.40 லட்சம் மின் இணைப்புகள் உள்ளன. கடந்த காலங்களில் மின் பயன்பாட்டின் அளவை கணக்கிட 'எலக்ட்ரோ மெக்கானிக்கல்' மீட்டர்களை வாரியம் வழங்கி வந்தது. இதில் பல குறைபாடு இருந்ததால் வருவாய் இழப்பு ஏற்பட்டது.
இதையடுத்து சில ஆண்டுகளாக மின் அளவை துல்லியமாக கணக்கிடும் வகையில் 'டிஜிட்டல்' மீட்டர்கள் வழங்கப்பட்டு வருகின்றன.
இதுவரை ஒன்றரை கோடி இணைப்புகளுக்கு மேல் புதிய மீட்டர்கள் பொருத்தப்பட்டுள்ளன. தொடர்ந்து பழைய மீட்டர்கள் பழுதடையும்போது, புதிய மீட்டர்களே பொருத்தப்பட்டு வருகின்றன. அவற்றை கொள்முதல் செய்வதில் ஏற்பட்ட தாமதத்தால், மாநிலம் முழுவதும் ஒரு மாதமாக தட்டுப்பாடு நிலவுகிறது.

இதனால் கட்டடங்கள், வணிக வளாகங்களுக்கு புதிய இணைப்பு கொடுப்பதில் சிக்கல் ஏற்பட்டுள்ளது. அதேபோல் பழுதடைந்த மீட்டர்களையும் மாற்ற முடியவில்லை. புதிய மீட்டருக்காக ஒரு லட்சம் பேர் காத்திருக்கின்றனர்.
மின்வாரிய அதிகாரி ஒருவர் கூறுகையில் ''மீட்டர்களை கொள்முதல் செய்ய நடவடிக்கை எடுக்கப்பட்டுள்ளது. ஓரிரு வாரங்களில் வந்துவிடும். சீனியாரிட்டி படி இணைப்பு கொடுக்கப்படும்,'' என்றார்.