Power shutdown on Friday
Chennai:5.09.2019

Power supply will be suspended in the following areas from 9am to 4pm on Friday for maintenance work. Supply will be resumed before 4pm if the works are completed.

Kottivakkam: VGP Layout, Anna Salai, Palavakkamkuppam, Sankarapuram, Seashell Avenue, Radio Colony, Chari Avenue, Ram Garden, Jaisankar Nagar, ECR Road, Poonga Street and Ambedkar Street.

Selaiyur: Madambakkam, Palayakara Street, Maruthi Nagar, ALS Nagar, Ramana Nagar, Madambakkam Main Road, North Side, North Mada Street, East Mada Street, Manicakam Avenue, Alamelupuram, Esther Garden, Padmavathy Nagar, Selaiyur of Agaram Main Road, Vedachalam Nagar, Janakiraman Street, Indira Nagar West, Ex-Servicemen Enclave, Avvai Nagar, New Balaji Nagar, Bharathi Nagar, Bajanai Koil Street, Madha Koil Street, Palayathan Street, Ranganathan Nagar, Harrington Road, Burma Colony, Ranganathan Street, Karnam Street, Ramasamy Street and Eswaran Koil Street.

Telangana to raise retirement age of staff

04/09/2019 , HYDERABAD

In a significant announcement, Telangana Chief Minister K.Chandrasekhar Rao has said that the retirement age of State government employees will be increased to 60 or 61 years in line with the election promise. He also directed officials to prepare promotion charts of employees. The unhealthy practice of lobbying for promotions should go, he said.

Guest lecturers in govt. colleges demand reservation in recruitment 

They have highlighted the assurances made by former CM Jayalalithaa and the Higher Education Department

04/09/2019 , Pon Vasanth B.A, CHENNAI

With the Teachers’ Recruitment Board issuing a notification for filling 2,340 vacancies for the Assistant Professor post in government arts and science colleges in Tamil Nadu, the guest lecturers who have been working on a temporary basis in these colleges for the past many years have appealed for special reservation for them in the recruitment process.

They have highlighted the assurances made by former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa and the Higher Education Department in the past on giving priority to guest lecturers during recruitment.

Between 3,500 and 4,000 guest lecturers are engaged by the Higher Education Department on a consolidated pay of ₹15,000. Their contracts are renewed every year to technically mean they are recruited only for one academic year. Different associations representing guest lecturers said there were people working on a temporary basis in government colleges for the past 15 years.

“Provided they possess necessary qualifications, it is only fair that they are given preference during the recruitment,” said V. Thangaraj of the Tamil Nadu All Government College UGC Qualified Guest Lecturers’ Association. “Let the government reserve a percentage of seats for the guest lecturers,” he added.

Echoing his view, A. Kathali Narasinga Perumal, State president, Tamil Nadu Constituent Colleges Guest Lecturers' Association, said injustice was meted out to guest lecturers for the past several years.

“In recent times, there has been an emphasis on qualifications prescribed by the University Grants Commission (UGC). However, UGC regulations are never followed in our salary,” he said.

Another guest lecturer from a Chennai-based college, speaking on condition of anonymity, pointed out that while UGC prescribed ₹50,000 as salary per month, the guest lecturers received only ₹15,000. “This is after the revision in 2016. Until then, we were getting only ₹10,000.” he added.

Process postponed

Mr. Thangaraj said the government must either implement reservation for guest lecturers in the recruitment or compensate them for not paying UGC-prescribed salary for the past many years.

The Teachers’ Recruitment Board has postponed the commencement of the process of receiving applications for recruitment to fill 2,340 vacancies in Assistant Professor posts in government arts and science colleges. The receiving of applications, to be submitted online, was scheduled to commence on Wednesday (September 4).

An announcement by the TRB on its website said the online registration had been postponed due to “technical reasons”. The new date will be announced later, it said.

Five States to get new Governors 

Arif Mohammed Khan sent to Kerala

02/09/2019 , SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, NEW DELHI 



The Centre on Sunday appointed new Governors for five States. A communiqué from the Rashtrapati Bhavan said President Ram Nath Kovind appointed new Governors for Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala and Telangana.

Former Union Minister Arif Mohammed Khan, who walked out of the Rajiv Gandhi government in 1986 after it decided to overturn the Supreme Court’s Shah Bano judgment, was appointed Governor of Kerala.

Former Uttarakhand Chief Minister Bhagat Singh Koshyari has been named the Governor of Maharashtra, while Tamil Nadu BJP president Tamilisai Soundararajan will be the new Governor of Telangana.

Former Union Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya will be the Governor of Himachal Pradesh in place of Kalraj Mishra, who has been given the charge of Rajasthan, replacing Kalyan Singh.

Critic of triple talaq

Mr. Khan, an ardent critic of instant triple talaq and advocate of reforming the Muslim personal law, will be replacing Justice P. Sathasivam (retired).

Another prominent appointment is that of Ms. Soundararajan, who will be replacing Telangana Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan, a former Director of the Intelligence Bureau.

Redesigning medical education 

In addition to raising the standards of medical professionals, the system should innovate

02/09/2019 , Krishna Reddy Nallamalla

Despite tremendous changes in health systems over the last century, medical education curricula have remained mostly outdated. The key elements that define today’s global health systems include ageing populations; demand for quality, equity and dignity; transition from communicable to non-communicable diseases and from episodic illnesses to lifelong ailments; double burden of disease in some countries; and disruptive advances in medical knowledge, IT, and biotechnology.

Medical education is the bedrock on which the needs of ‘human resources for health’, one of the major building blocks of any health system, are met. Today’s health professionals are required to have knowledge, skills, and professionalism to provide safe, effective, efficient, timely, and affordable care to people. They are required to: be proficient in handling disruptive technologies, understand the economics of healthcare, have the skills to work in and handle large and diverse teams, be ethical, demonstrate empathy, and be abreast of rapid developments in medicine.

Today’s medical education should be able to groom such professionals to face medicine of the 21st century. In addition to raising the standards of medical professionals, the system should innovate to meet the growing shortage of health professionals to serve ageing populations with lifestyle and lifetime ailments.

Required reforms

First, there is a pressing need to revisit the existing guidelines for setting up medical schools and according permission for the right number of seats. Methods of education across fields are undergoing changes on account of advances in e-learning methods and tools, including remote learning, virtual classrooms, digital dissections, and simulation systems for imparting skills. Extending teaching privileges to practising physicians and allowing e-learning tools will address the shortage of quality teachers across the system. Together, these reforms could double the existing medical seats without compromising on the quality of teaching.

There are ongoing innovations in medical education to prepare professionals for the complex and rapidly changing healthcare system. In fact, The Lancet report, ‘Health Professionals for a new century: transforming health education to strengthen health systems in an interdependent world’ (2010) outlines key recommendations to transform health professional education. According to a study by Densen P. (2011), “it is estimated that the doubling time of medical knowledge in 1950 was 50 years; in 1980, 7 years; and in 2010, 3.5 years. In 2020 it is projected to be 0.2 years — just 73 days.”

At this pace of change, a student can be prepared to process information that is readily available than to know past knowledge. Periodic re-certification based on continuing learning systems may become essential to keep up with the fast pace of change. Virtual learning tools eliminate the need for didactic classrooms. Dynamic curricula designed around specific health systems will become more relevant than the systems designed for the classical hospital-based care. Since health professionals work in teams, inter-professional combined learning methods are being introduced. Even the concept of the teaching hospital is changing from a single, large hospital to a network of hospitals and community health centres.

For a more responsive system

The Medical Council of India has been mired in controversies, resulting in deterioration in the quality of education. Also, its policies and strategies were delinked from the rapid changes happening in health systems within India and globally. By monopolising control over every aspect of medical education, it bred the culture of deep-rooted corruption. However, if MCI splits its functions into four well-defined areas, and stipulates fixed and rotating terms to key people, it could enable the creation of a more responsive system.

Krishna Reddy Nallamalla is a senior cardiologist and currently Country Director, ACCESS Health (India)

Jailed convict celebrates birthday, 7 suspended

 02/09/2019 , Sitamarhi

Seven prison officials have been suspended after a video of a murder convict celebrating his birthday in jail went viral online on Saturday. In the video, Pintu Tiwari, who is serving a life sentence for killing two engineers in Darbhanga, is seen cutting a cake and serving mutton curry to other inmates on his birthday as the ‘invitees’ recorded the celebration on mobile phones. PTI

Aadhaar system for NRIs in 3 months 

‘It will do away with 180-day wait’
 
02/09/2019 , PRESS TRUST OF INDIA, New Delhi

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has said its systems will be ready within three months to issue Aadhaar cards to NRIs with Indian passports without the mandatory 180- day waiting period, as announced in the Budget.

The legal measures would be notified soon, UIDAI CEO Ajay Bhushan Pandey said.

“We are working to make the appropriate technological changes and we will provide an appointment facility where people outside the country also can apply for a time slot and specify the place they would like to go to get their Aadhaar made... as soon as they come to India they can, very conveniently, go and get their Aadhaar made,” Mr. Pandey said.

Sources privy to the development said a notification by the IT Ministry was awaited.

The UIDAI — which has made operational two more Aadhaar Seva Kendras (ASKs) in Bhopal and Chennai after the fourth centre in Hisar was launched recently — is confident of meeting its target of opening 114 such centres in the coming months at an estimated cost of ₹300-₹400 crore to facilitate enrolment, updation and other activities.