Jul 25 2014 : The Economic Times (Delhi)

Sensible Proposals on Labour Reform





The Apprenticeship Act calls for change

The government plans to amend three labour laws: on minimum wages, apprenticeship and child labour. This is welcome. India's labour laws must be aligned with the needs of the 21st century . These laws must protect workers' interests, sure, but also give employers the leeway to adjust to market needs. The outdated apprenticeship law is one reason why India has only 3,00,000 formal apprentices, while Germany has six million. Arbitrary rules on how many apprentices and in what ratio to the workforce, etc, hamper skill acquisition by young people rather than protect them. The licence raj on nationwide permissions for national employers makes no sense and should also be scrapped.Apprenticeships are not jobs. The government should desist from any change in the law that will force employers to absorb apprentices. A pragmatic way is for employers to formulate their own hiring policies. The training period varies from six months to four years now. A maxi mum training period of three years, as proposed by an inter-ministerial group, seems sound, for both employe rs and apprentices. Employers who vi olate the law should face fines rather than prison terms. Stipends for appre ntices are too low, and should be rais ed. However, the entire cost need not be borne by the employer: the state can chip in, if it is serious about skill development and job creation. The point is to have a robust law that will help greatly expand formal apprenticeship as part of a flexible market for skills.
Amendments proposed to the Minimum Wages Act -such as setting a floor for minimum wages across professions, revision every five years based on NSSO's Consumption Expenditure Survey -will raise salaries of workers in the unorganised sector and is, therefore, welcome. The amendment to the Child Labour Act to bar children between 14 and 18 years from taking up hazardous occupations is in order. But at a more fundamental level, the political class should intervene at the grassroots to change the socioeconomic foundations to send children to school, rather than to work.

Jul 24 2014 : Mirror (Pune)

Till human voices wake us

EUNICE de SOUZA





T S Eliot was a significant poet who wrote wonderful lines, but led poetry into a dead end

I taught T S Eliot's poetry for several years, but have only just begun to wonder if he is the great poet I thought he was. Obvious ly he was a significant poet, and wrote some wonderful lines, but I also think he led poetry into a kind of dead end, as Joyce did with his Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake. Startling as writing, but where could one go from there?
He seemed to be intent on going against the grain by publishing a poem such as The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, in 1917 during the World War. In contrast to the war poems of Wilfred Owen, Isaac Rosenberg, Edward Thomas and others, Prufrock is entirely an “internal“ poem, in which a diffident middle-aged man, spends his time mumbling and grumbling to himself about his inadequacies, the inadequacies of the high society to which he belongs.Prufrock, despite his stodgy name, feels immersed in his life of fantasy, lyrical longings, until the voices of ordinary society make him feel as if he is drowning in the banal. He hears the magic voices of mermaids till ordinary human voices with their mundane preoccupations make him “drown.“
“I have measured out my life in coffee spoons,“ he says memorably on one occasion. It seems oddly self-indulgent for a writer who denounced the Romantics, and felt that poetry should be “impersonal.“ This word “impersonal“ has been used as a stick with which to beat women writers, for their apparently “bare all “ writing, while many male writers have been read differently from women writers talking about the same thing. Think of Nissim Ezekiel who wrote about a failed marriage and other such without any critic commenting on the fact.
It is easy to fault Prufrock. On the other hand, what is one supposed to do when the world appears to be falling apart? It's an endless debate. Is there something one can do, or is it best to concentrate on playing chess, writing poems, avoiding news on TV and in newspapers? Friends who work in foreign-funded NGOs are often frustrated by the insolence of the donors, and give up their jobs despite their very high salaries. Best to concentrate on coffee spoons?
Prufock is a poem more relevant to our experience than the much-touted The Wasteland.
The Wasteland is a significant poem, full of cultural references. But these are references to which the average person has no access. Not that a poet has to tailor his references to the average person. An academic can certainly work out the puzzles, but what is the point if a poem becomes a chore for the reader? Would anyone want to buckle down and read it for the good of one's soul?
The pity is that such work has overshad owed truly memorable and accessible poems such as Auden's Shield of Achilles, in which, he talks about the state of the world, and laments the fact that we have never learned to weep when others wept. The second-last stanza reads A ragged urchin, aimless and alone,Loitered about that vacancy; a birdFlew up to safety from his well-aimed stone.That girls are raped, that two boys knife a third,Were axioms to him who'd never heardOf any world where promises were kept,Or one could weep because another wept.
That's a poem worth treasuring, not just reading as a culturally significant chore.

Jul 24 2014 : The Times of India (Delhi)

After UGC's failure, CBSE to conduct NET

Manash.Gohain

New Delhi





Central Board of Secondary Education, the country's largest exam conducting body , is all set to add another test to its bouquet, the National Eligibility Test. The inclusion of the test from this year will make the board the biggest exam conducting body , with the number of CBSE candidates set to cross 65 lakh in a year.After failing to conduct the test without hiccups, the University Grants Commission, with the HRD ministry's consent, has asked the CBSE to conduct the test. The decision was taken at the full commission meeting on Tuesday with near unanimity . The NET is conducted twice a year for grant of junior research fellowship and eligibility for assistant professor in institu tions of higher learning.
With the addition of NET, the CBSE undoubtedly becomes the largest exam conducting body globally . Apart from conducting the Classes X and XII Board exams for its affiliate schools, it also conducts the pre-medical entrance test, joint engineering entrance (main) and the central teachers eligibility test. It also conducts the Class X optional pro ficiency test.
In a year, the CBSE has been conducting different qualifying, eligibility and entrance tests for over 63 lakh candidates. With NET, its number is likely to go beyond 65 lakh. In the June 29 2014 NET exam, over 33,000 candidates appeared for the test, which is up by 25% from that of the test conducted in December 2013.

Jul 24 2014 : The Times of India (Delhi)

TCS first Indian co to top Rs 5 lakh cr

Reeba.Zachariah @timesgroup.com

Mumbai:





World's Second Most Valuable IT Services Firm

Outsourcing giant Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) became the first Indian company to cross the Rs 5 lakh crore mark in market capitalization on Wednesday .
In the process, TCS also became the second most valuable IT services company in the world, ahead of Accenture but behind IBM. TCS's market valuation rose to about Rs 5.1 lakh crore (about $84 billion), the highest since its listing l0 years ago, well ahead of Accentu re's $51 billion, but way behind IBM's $193.7 billion.TCS's market cap is bigger than the combined market cap of the other four do mestic IT players in the pecking order, Infosys ($31.7 billion), Wipro ($23.3 billion), HCL Technologies ($17.9 billion) and Tech Mahindra ($8.5 billion). The software services firm's market cap is also bigger than the combined market cap of the other 31 listed Tata group companies ($57.2 billion).
Shares of TCS have risen nearly 9% since it announced robust first quarter earnings last week -$845 million net profit on $3.69 billion revenue. Several “buy“ ratings on TCS have been issued by analysts, who expect an eventful FY15 for TCS as its global customers up spending on IT services. The $13-billion TCS, established in 1948, which counts Cisco and HewlettPackard among its clients, won seven large deals in Q1 FY15.
Several brokerages have raised target price for the stock to Rs 3,100, 20% higher than Wednesday’s closing price of Rs 2,587.

Jul 24 2014 : The Times of India (Delhi)

Germany hot new destination for Indian students

Ramya.M@timesgroup.com

Chennai





For an increasing number of Indians, Germany is emerging a favoured higher education destination overseas. nation overseas.
There has been a 114% increase in the number of Indian students enrolling for higher education courses there since 2008, according to the latest figures released by the regional office of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD).The number of students enrolled has increased from 3,516 in the 2008-09 academic year to 7,532 in 2012-13. The US, UK, Australia and Canada have been the most favoured destinations for Indian students, partly due to the absence of a language barrier.
But Germany , which has the fifth biggest Indian student population on campuses, has sought to bridge the gap by introducing courses in English and easing visa norms to allow students to look for jobs there after completion of studies.
Engineering courses were the chosen area of study for nearly half the number (close to 48%), followed by mathematics and natural sciences (19.8%).
Information technology (13.8%), law, economics and social sciences are the other courses sought after by Indian students in Germany . Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Franziska Lindhout, director of the DAAD Information Centre in Chennai, said Germany encourages Indian students to sign up for masters and research in engineering as not many natives show an interest in the discipline.
“It’s least taken up by those in Germany, and the country needs students in these areas, so Germany is interested in cooperation with Indian technical higher educational institutions,” she said.
Lindhout said efforts were being made to internationalize German institutions. “It’s no longer a prerequisite to learn German to study there. We invite Indian students to pick up the language to help them adapt better. But it is not required to pursue a masters or for the visa procedure. It is part of the internationalization process, and DAAD has been pushing for it,” she said.
Germany has made a conscious effort by sponsoring initiatives aimed at enabling Indians to study in that country. Since 2009, 46 new co-operation projects have been forged between Indian and German universities.
For the full report, log on to http://www.timesofindia.com

Jul 23 2014 : The Times of India (Delhi)

One in every three child brides is from India, says UN

United Nations: PTI





India has the sixth highest prevalence of child marriage in the world with one in every three child bride living in India, a United Nations report said.Child marriage among girls is most common in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa and India is among the top 10 countries with the highest rates of child marriage, Unicef said in a report titled “Ending Child Marriage Progress and prospects.“
“South Asia is home to almost half of all child brides worldwide; India alone accounts for one third of the global total,“ the report said. Worldwide, more than 700 million women alive today were married as children or before their 18th birthday. More than one in three, about 250 million, entered into union before age 15, the report said.

Jul 23 2014 : The Times of India (Delhi)

Don't sit tight on flight, it can kill you

DurgeshNandan.Jha

New Delhi:





If you have a long flight, drinking plenty of water and maintaining body movement can spare you a lot of trouble. The story of a 23-year-old trainee cabin crew member from Kenya and that of a 42-year-old businessman from Delhi--the former had a severe clotting of blood in the leg veins, leading to Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT), while the latter suffered a cardiac arrest--should serve as a warning. But for timely medical intervention, they would not have survived, doctors said.Bezavit Gabre, the young Kenyan patient, was recently treated at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital (SGRH), and the other patient was admitted to Fortis Escorts Heart Institute (FEHI).
Gabre was inducted into a private airline a few months ago. Being a beginner she had to sit in the cabin for hours and observe other crew members. About 15 days ago, she noticed a swelling on her left leg accompanied by breathlessness.
Her brother, a paediatrician in Nairobi, said they got her admitted to a local hospital, where she was diagnosed to have Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT).
In the absence of advanced medical facilities in Nairobi, the family flew her to SGRH. Dr V S Bedi, head of the department of vascular and endovascular surgery, said the patient had extensive swelling in the left leg and thigh when she arrived. “The clots had gone to her lungs as well and she needed early endo-vascular intervention to prevent chronic swelling and further complication,“ he said.
According to Dr Bedi, DVT is fairly common among long-distance air travellers--those who spend more than eight hours in a flight.
“It is also known as the Economy Class Syndrome as these travellers are unable to stretch their legs and sit in a cramped position for long.
Since their fluid intake is generally less during a flight, a combination of dehydration and stasis (no mobility) leads to thickening of the blood and clot formation.
In extreme cases the clot can migrate to the lungs which can be fatal,“ Dr Bedi said.
“This, many a time, is labelled a heart attack. In Gabre's case, too, the cause of swelling and breathlessness was clot formation during the flight. Fortunately, she reached on time and could be saved,“ he added.
Gabre underwent multiple procedures to prevent dislodgement of the blood clot to the lungs along with catheter-directed drawing of blood from the clots. She will be discharged on Tuesday.
Delhi-based businessman Ranjit, who remained in the ICU for over 10 days, went through worse, according to Dr Aparna Jaswal, principal consultant, invasive cardiology at FEHI.
He boarded a flight from Australia to Delhi via Singapore on June 20.
He kept watching one movie after another and hardly moved from his seat. He was so preoccupied that he even forgot to take fluids at regular intervals.
During the stopover at Singapore, he developed breathlessness but he didn't take it seriously.
Ranjit suffered a cardiac arrest due to the blood clot and was taken to a neighbourhood nursing home, where doctors threw up their hands. The family rushed him to FEHI. “We found that Ranjit had developed a clot in his legs be cause of no movement and less fluid intake during the journey. This resulted in pulmonary embolism--when one or more pulmonary arteries in the lungs become blocked--which ultimately led to the cardiac arrest,“ said Dr Jaswal.
Drinking adequate fluids, especially non-alcoholic beverages, is a must during long flights, she added. “Airlines should also have a system to educate passengers about the need for fluids and leg movement,“ she said.