Ministry approves Amrita Express stoppage at Udumalpet railway station

STAFF REPORTER

COIMBATORE, FEBRUARY 03, 2019 00:00 IST

The stoppage for Amritha Express (16343/16344) plying between Thiruvananthapuram Central – Madurai at Udumalpet railway station was commissioned on Saturday by C. Mahendran, MP.

Mr. Mahendran, said the stoppage for the train at Udumalpet was a long-pending demand of rail-users from the region and the Ministry of Railways accorded approval for it on an experimental basis.

According to him, the public have been raising a demand for an additional train in the sector over the past few years. Representations were made to the Ministry of Railways for introduction of more trains, duly providing stoppage at Udumalpet railway station. He requested the railway authorities to complete the electrification work on the route.

Divisional Railway Manager Neenu Ittyerah said that the experimental stoppage provided at the station will be very useful for the public and temporary stoppage will be extended based on passenger response. Already two passenger trains and two express trains have halts at the station. “The Udumalapet railway station has a patronage of 663 passengers on an average per day and fetches earnings of Rs. 64, 000 per day, an increase of over 87% than last year. The station will soon get an ATM and parking facility,” she said. Lalit Kumar Mansukhani, Additional Divisional Railway Manager, Southern Railway,

Over 11,000 candidates qualify in PG NEET

R. Sujatha

CHENNAI, FEBRUARY 03, 2019 00:00 IST



Doctors hopeful that 50% seats of all-India quota will be filled by T.N. students

Nearly 65.1% of the candidates from the State who appeared for the Postgraduate NEET have qualified, indicating that participants from Tamil Nadu have done well this year.

The exam results were released on Wednesday and of the 17,067 candidates who took the test 11,121 qualified. The synopsis of the results by the National Board of Examinations shows that Kerala (75.1%) and Delhi (75.7%) are the two other regions that have done well. This performance has led the doctors’ associations to believe that in the coming year, the 50% seats that are surrendered under the all-India quota would be taken by students from the State.

More specialists

Tamil Nadu has the most number of government medical colleges and it has evolved a public healthcare system that encourages students to study speciality medicine.

This helped the State build its medical facilities considerably. When the Central government introduced NEET as the sole entrance for all PG seats, there was much opposition. Some doctors associations, however, maintained that in just a few years students from the State would manage to grab all the seats despite NEET.

K. Senthil, president, Tamil Nadu Government Doctors Association, said, “Earlier, students from the State occupied only the 1,800 seats that the State could offer. Less than 50 students got seats under the AIQ. This year, at least 4,000 students from the State will get into PG programmes across the deemed universities and self-financing colleges. With merit, the scope for getting a seat has widened.”

According to him, with the inclusion of the rural category along with difficult and remote, doctors in the public sector were likely to get 70-75% seats in the State quota this time.

However A. Ramalaingam, who represents the Service Doctors Association, believes fewer students will opt for clinical subjects. “Last year only 65% of service candidates were admitted. The number of such PGs in general medicine in the Stanley Medical College was three. This number could fall further this year. Before NEET, we used to have seven to eight candidates,” he said.

Incentive marks

But the Tamil Nadu Medical Officers Association has a different take. The incentive marks offered for the service quota enabled compartmentalisation of speciality medical seats, which improved public health facilities, said secretary J. Kathirvel.

The association wanted objective geographical classification of the healthcare facilities.

Candidates who have worked in remote and difficult areas should get 10% additional marks; while candidates working in rural areas should be given 8% more marks; those in urban PHCs should get 6% more marks; and candidates employed in government medical colleges should be awarded an additional 4% marks.

Passenger carrying leopard cub detained at airport

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

CHENNAI, FEBRUARY 03, 2019 00:00 IST



In transit:Customs officials found the animal to be in a state of shock.Special Arrangement


Animal rehabilitated in the Arignar Anna Zoological Park


Authorities at the international airport on Saturday detained a passenger who was carrying a leopard cub in his baggage.

He was handed over to the Tamil Nadu Forest Department for further inquiry.

Based on intelligence that prohibited wild animals were likely to be smuggled from Thailand, officers of the Air Intelligence Unit (AIU) were on special alert at the Customs arrival hall.

The team noticed a nervous male passenger rushing out after collecting his luggage. A faint sound was heard coming from his luggage.

Passenger intercepted

He was intercepted and brought to the AIU room for questioning. The passenger was identified as Kaja Moideen, 45, who had arrived from Bangkok by a Thai Airways flight. Inside his luggage, they found a pink plastic basket, in which a leopard cub was found. The animal was in a state of shock and appeared to be weak. The Customs officers fed milk to the cub through a feeding bottle. This seemed to revive the animal.

Commissioner of Customs Rajan Chaudhary said, “Officials of the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau (WCCB) were called and they identified the animal as a leopard cub of the Panthera pardus species. To ascertain the health status of the cub, a veterinary doctor was called from the Arignar Anna Zoological Park. They inspected the cub and told us that it was a one-month-old female, weighing 1.1 kg, measuring 54 cm and that it was in good health. The leopard cub was seized under provisions of the Customs Act, 1962, read with the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).”

The cub was rehabilitated in the Arignar Anna Zoological Park, Chennai, and the Forest Department will take appropriate action under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, against the passenger.

U.S. visa fraud: India demands release of students

Suhasini Haidar

NEW DELHI, FEBRUARY 03, 2019 00:00 IST

Worried about the condition of 129 Indian students arrested in the United States for visa fraud, the government issued a demarche to the U.S. Embassy in Delhi on Saturday, demanding that the students be released from detention and not summarily deported.

“Our concern over the dignity and well-being of the detained students and the need for immediate consular access for Indian officials to the detainees was reiterated,” an Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) statement said, adding that it had urged the U.S. government to “release them from detention at the earliest and not to resort to deportation against their will.”

The MEA has set up helplines for all those arrested, currently in detention centres across states. Indian consulate officials in Texas met with detainees in San Antonio, Conroe and Alvarado, the consulate said.

Letting vastu do its bit without any demolition

Times of India 03.02.2019

One is always looking for that magic wand that could eliminate all life’s problems and wellknown vastu expert Vimal Jhajharia, says, “You can experience this magic in your life with the help of the Vastu Shankh Yantra, an original conch shell filled with metallic elements and charged and pran prathisthit with positive energies. It is a divine gift from my guruji, the Great Himalayan yogi, Swami Murghanandji.”

Jhajharia is being helped by his son Vikas, (an MBA from Australia) who has recently returned from his successful half-yearly tour of the USA. Vikas says, “If the entrance of the house or office is in south/ southwest, it leads to financial instability. Also toilets, if situated in the north-east corner of the plot, can have disastrous effects on the minds of the family members. This can be rectified using the Vastu Shankh Yantra, which ensures flow of positive energy within the area, helping overall prosperity.”

Industrialist Raghav Agarwal endorses Vikas’s views and says, “We were facing a lot of financial issues in one of our factories. I came to know about Vimalji and Vikasji through one of my friends and when I showed them the factories we were told that all our south-facing areas were open and we had our machines placed in the wrong direction. Vimalji placed the shank yantra in different locations to rectify this defect without any demolition or changes and miraculously, the problems were all resolved one by one. It was hard to believe, and so, we tried the same yantra in our house. And there, too, health and relationships improved; peace and harmony returned.”

The Jhajharias are said to be providing their services in more than 50 countries across the globe. Vikas adds, “It is not magic, it is simple science; you need to try to believe it.”

Contact Vikas on 9839704470 / 7388578888 / 8017793423 Or Email: jhajhariavikas@hotmail.com , Website:

www.vastukalp.com

Follow on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/ Vastukalp Instagram - Vastukalp_

Vikas and Vimal Jhajharia

The Vastu Shankh Yantra

Times of India 03.02.2019

Why climbing stairs is good for your heart

According to a recent report, a few minutes of stair climbing at short intervals throughout the day can improve health

Times of India 03.02.2019

Are you sitting comfortably? Perhaps you shouldn’t be. In the UK alone, one in three Britishers are now couch potatoes who put their health at risk by spending too much time on their backsides. In India too, spending up to nine hours every day sedentary — at work, in a car, or in front of the TV — is putting many of us at risk of a life-threatening heart attack and an early death. It might be tempting to take that easy escalator or lift, but climbing the stairs is a great way to squeeze extra exercise into your day. And to maximise the benefits take one step at a time, rather than two. The research published in the journal Applied Physiology suggests that virtually anyone can improve their fitness, anywhere, any time by ditching elevators and taking the stairs.

“The findings make it even easier for people to incorporate ‘exercise snacks’ into their day. Those who work in office towers or live in apartment buildings can vigorously climb a few flights of stairs in the morning, at lunch, and in the evening and know they are getting an effective workout,” said Martin Gibala, lead author of the study.

“We know that sprint interval training works, but we were a bit surprised to see that the stair snacking approach was also effective. Vigorously climbing a few flights of stairs on your coffee or bathroom break during the day seems to be enough to boost fitness in people who are otherwise sedentary,” said Jonathan Little, co-author. The findings of the study suggested that in addition to being more fit, the stair climbers were also stronger compared to their sedentary counterparts and generated more power during maximal cycling.

— ANI



Vigorously climbing a few flights of stairs during your break can help