Chandrayaan-I

India's maiden moon mission Chandrayaan-I has reached a major milestone as scientists completed the integration of all instruments onto the spacecraft and are aiming to launch it by September 19..Space scientists at ISRO last week completed the integration of the 11 instruments, six indigenous and five under international cooperation, onto the spacecraft which is no bigger than a typical office cubicle.Chandrayaan-i will be launched atop a polar satellite launch vehicle (PSLV), India`s workhorse rocket with a streak of nine consecutive flawless missions.The spacecraft will also carry near infrared and x-ray spectrometers and a laser altimeter to determine the altitude of the lunar craft for spatial coverage of various instruments. These payloads will help researchers ascertain the composition and topography of the lunar surface.The probe will relay video imagery, altitude information and spectral data back to earth through the Chandrayaan mothership, which will be in a lunar orbit 100 km away.The mineral composition will be determined by the hyperspectral imaging spectrometer operating in 400-900 nanometer band with a spectral resolution of 15 nm and spatial resolution of 80 metres with a swath of 20 km.The deliveries of Chandrayaan 1`s five other international instruments began last August, when NASA`s moon mineralogy mapper was flown to India from the jet propulsion laboratory in Pasadena, California.Nicknamed m3, the 15-pound imaging spectrometer will map the moon`s natural resources through visible and near-infrared wavelengths at higher resolutions than any instrument before.

India needs 203 bn dollar by 2012 for healthcare

Access to quality healthcare in India is gradually diminishing, and to solve the crisis the sector would need an investment of about $202.75 billion over the next five years, says an industry body.India's healthcare situation requires a much faster growth rate as it would require about 2.2 million beds and the investment needed for that is almost $77.9 billion, the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) said in a presentation to the government.FICCI has suggested a five-pronged PPP (public-private-partnership) model to bridge this huge deficit.

India most expensive equity market in Asia-Pacific

India is the the most expensive equity market in Asia-Pacific region for 2007, excluding Japan, though the country can give the second-highest returns to investors after Indonesia, says a study by the global brokerage firm Citigroup.According to a new report from Citigroup, India is the overall most expensive market in the region for 2007 after considering various metrics such as price-to-earnings ratio,book value, dividend yield, cash flow, return on equity and enterprise value.Citigroup has termed India more expensive than China, Hong Kong, Philippines and Australia, while it has named Thailand, Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia and Malaysia as the cheapest.

Unique bone marrow transplant in Chennai

A hospital has scripted medical history by successfully conducting a unrelated bone marrow transplant in an eight-year-old Ugandan boy using the cord blood cells from an American donor, at a fraction of what the procedure would internationally.Howard Kafeero from Uganda suffered from Fanconi anaemia (FA), a genetic disease that could have been fatal. Seven months ago, he was brought to the Apollo Specialty Hospital here.The doctors successfully networked an unrelated but compatible American donor whose cord blood matched Howard's needs and carried out the bone marrow transplant that saved the boy's life. Doctors say that Howard is now almost 100 percent normal.

Hatshepsut’s mummy

Egyptologists at the University of Manchester have carried out a DNA test on the mummy discovered by an Egyptian archaeological team earlier, and confirmed that it did belong to Queen Hatshepsut, Egypt’s greatest female pharaoh.An archaeological team led by Zahi Hawass, Egypt's Secretary General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, recently located her mummy in Luxor’s Valley of the Kings, following a one-year study.They used CT scans to link distinct physical traits of Queen Hatshepsut to that of her ancestors, and narrow the search for the Pharaoh to the couple of female mummies in the KV60 tomb.

First step to register pregnancy

The Union Health Ministry and Women and Child Development Ministry will start registering pregnancies in 10 blocks shortly.The project — a first of its type which received flak from many women’s organisations — will be used to prepare a database of pregnancies and keep a track on the number of pregnancies that ultimately result in childbirth.The government expects that by October 2007, the pilot project will be implemented in 10 blocks with a high child malnutrition rate and skewed sex ratio. The WCD ministry will also implement a new scheme for girl children in these 10 blocks. Under the scheme, the girl child will get over Rs 7,000 and an insurance cover of Rs one lakh immediately after birth.Thereafter, the government will pay for her immunisation charges and education expenses till she clears her class X examinations. And after she is 18 years old, the government will give another small amount to make her financially stable.

First proof of water found on planet outside Earth’s solar system

At about 370.3 trillion miles from the Earth, the best evidence to date has been found concerning the existence of water on an extrasolar planet, or a planet circling a star other than our Sun. And, the abundance of water on such planets is key to finding alien life.Astronomers using an infrared camera onboard NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope have identified clear signs of water on a planet that is 63 light-years (about 370.3 trillion miles) from the Earth. HD 189733b is a planet classified as a gas giant, sometimes also called a Hot Jupiter because of its similarity with the planet Jupiter.Hot Jupiters are also similar to Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, which also reside in our own Solar System. They are a class of extrasolar planets (exoplanets) whose mass is equal to or more than Jupiter.However, Hot Jupiters are normally within 0.05 astronomical units (AU, or about 4.6 million miles) of their parent star, unlike Jupiter, which is about 5 AU (or about 464.8 million miles) from the Sun.

India, Ethiopia sign five pacts

India and Ethiopia, Africa's second largest country signed five pacts to intensify their relations as Addis Ababa came out strongly in support of India's bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council.The agreements were signed in the presence of External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, who is currently on a four-day visit to Ethiopia, and his Ethiopian counterpart Seyoum Mesfin.Three agreements were signed on bilateral investment protection, establishment of a joint ministerial committee and foreign office consultations between the two countries.Two more pacts were signed in the area of science and technology and education, said an external affairs ministry statement here.The minister will launch pilot projects of India's dream project in Africa - the Pan-African e-network being built with Indian funds and technical assistance - that will bring benefits of tele-education and tele-medicine to the entire African continent.

All Efforts On To Acquire Gandhi Letter

The Indian government has launched all out efforts to acquire a rare letter Mahatma Gandhi wrote 19 days before his 1948 assassination which is up for auction in London next week.In the Jan 11, 1948 letter written for the 'Harijan' newspaper, which he edited, Gandhi makes an emotive appeal for tolerance towards Muslims.'My view remains unalterable especially at this critical juncture in our history. It is wrong to ruffle Muslim or any other person's feeling when there is no question of ethics,' Gandhi wrote, just 19 days before Nathuram Godse shot him dead.The rare letter is part of a collection titled 'the Albin Schram Collection of Autograph Letters', a personal collection by Albin Schram, a Switzerland-based collector. It also includes some of the greatest letters written by legends like Napoleon, Winston Churchill, Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, Charles Dickens and Oscar Wilde.

Memorial to come up for 1857 martyrs

The Haryana government announced that a memorial would be set up at Ambala in memory of those who sacrificed their lives in the country's first war of independence in 1857.He was addressing a public meeting organised to observe the martyrdom day of Ch Udmi Ram Nambardar of village Liwaspur, who was crushed to death along with his wife and 22 others of the village, as the villagers had killed some British soldiers who were going to join troops at Ambala from Delhi in 1857.

Red Fort is World Heritage site

The Red Fort, the imposing 17th century Mughal architectural marvel in the capital, was Thursday declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco - a rare honour expected to attract more tourists to the fortress from where the Indian tricolour is unfurled on Independence Day.The honour to the Red Fort, located in old Delhi, makes it the third for the Indian capital - after Qutub Minar, the 239 ft-high sandstone minaret completed in the 13th century, and the 16th century Humayun Tomb.The planning of the palace is based on Islamic prototypes, but each pavilion reveals architectural elements typical of Mughal buildings, reflecting a fusion of Persian, Timurid and Hindu traditions, Unesco underlined.

Millionaire club expands to 1,00,000

India has added over 17,000-dollar-millionaires in 2006, recording the highest growth in high net worth individuals (HNIs) after Singapore. At the end of the year, the number of millionaires in India rose to 1,00,000 from 83,000 in the previous year.This comes in the back of a record 8.8% real growth in gross domestic product, second only to China. Also, there has been a sharp increase in the asset values with the Sensex being among the best performing in emerging markets. According to the 11th annual world wealth report brought out by Capgemini and Merrill Lynch, Singapore, India, Indonesia and Russia witnessed the highest growth in HNI populations

IPOs market

India's IPOs market According to the study, India's increasing number of larger deals has been driven by the growth of Indian corporations and their need for additional capital for potential acquisitionsemerged as the eighth largest with $7.23 billion (Rs 30,000 crore) in net proceeds through 78 public issues, global research and consultancy firm Ernst & Young said in its Global IPO report.Across the world, the companies raised $246 billion, up from $167 billion in 2005, through a total of 1,729 IPOs, led by Chinese companies at the top with net proceeds of $56.6 billion.However, the biggest number of IPOs came from the United States with 187 offerings, followed by Japan with 185 and China with 175 IPOs.According to the study, India's increasing number of larger deals has been driven by the growth of Indian corporations and their need for additional capital for potential acquisitions.

UNESCO's Memory of the World Register

The Rig Veda manuscripts from Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune, have been selected for inscription in UNESCO's Memory of the World Register, 2007. India has had three other nominations inscribed on the Register, The IAS Tamil Medic Manuscript Collection (1997), Archives of the Dutch East India Company (2003), a Dutch nomination, and the Saiva Manuscripts in Pondicherry (2005).The Rig Veda, oldest of the four Vedas, is among the 38 items of documentary heritage of exceptional value which have been added to the prestigious World Register, bringing the total number of inscriptions since 1997 to 158.The Memory of the World programme seeks to guard against collective amnesia, calling upon the preservation of the valuable archival holdings and library collections all over the world, ensuring their wide dissemination.The Vedas are the first literary documents in the history of humankind, and they transcend far beyond their identity as scriptures.The Rig Veda, oldest among the four Vedas and a collection of 1028 hymns of exceptional literay qualities eulogising the Vedic deities, is the fountain source of the Aryan culture in all its manifestations that spread beyond the Indian subcontinent to large parts of South and South East Asia as well as parts of Central Asia.Out of the total number of 28,000 Manuscripts housed at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, Pune, the 30 manuscripts of the Rig Veda form a valuable part of the collection.Besides the Rig Veda, the list of 38 items of documentary heritage includes Unpublished Papers of Christopher Okigbo, considered one of the most renowned African poets of the 20th century, killed during the civil war in Nigeria.

e-passports

India's largest IT-ITeS firm, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), is all set to
tap the emerging business for e-passports across the world, and the company has already bid for pilot projects in a couple of countries.An e-passport makes the document machine-readable making the passport not only tamper-proof but also enabling quick processing at airports.e-passports come with in-built security (biometric) features including an IC (integrated circuit) chip embedded in the back cover that stores the data (including photo) that is typically displayed on the photo page of a regular passport.As of now just 4-5 countries, including the US, use the RFID (radio frequency identification) technology, which at best helps their own countrymen on their return for speedy identification and processing of their documents since it is not universally applicable.

Astrosat

India's multi-wavelength astronomical observatory "Astrosat" will be launched in 2008.Orbiting 600 km above the earth's surface, the Rs 200 crore Astrosat would facilitate study of astrophysical objects ranging from nearby solar system objects to distant stars and objects at cosmological distances.Since most astronomical objects in the known universe emit radiations from long wavelength radio emission to extremely short wavelength gamma rays, understanding of the physical processes causing frequency dependent, time-variable phenomena would require near simultaneous multi-frequency observations.Astrosat would also enable timing studies of variables from pulsations of the 'hot white dwarfs' to active galactic nuclei with time scales ranging from millisecond to few hours to days.

food park

The government is likely to accord special economic zone (SEZ) status to the proposed mega food parks that come up during the 11th Five-Year Plan (2007-12).
Each food park is expected to see substantial investments in cold storage, refrigerated vans, transport services, grading centres, laboratories as well as other supporting services.In a proposal sent to the Planning Commission, the ministry has also said that since food processing units are not typically spread over a large area, the minimum area limit applicable for food SEZs should be relaxed.The ministry of food processing industries has envisaged an initial investment of Rs 120 crore for setting up the common infrastructure in a park. It is of the view that by providing a grant of Rs 1,500 crore for 30 parks, Rs 50 crore for each, the private sector would be encouraged to invest up to Rs 9,000 crore in various parks across the country.Considering the higher risks involved in the food processing sector, the central government will also provide a subsidy of Rs 50 crore per park to private investors. Thus, the total financial outlay proposed for 30 parks, to be spread across 1,50,000 hectares in next five years, would be Rs 1,500 crore. The government has also appointed Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services Ltd (IL&FS) as a consultant to look into the infrastructure constraints for the project. IL&FS has been given two months to submit its report to the government.

industrial growth

industrial growth in April this year stood at a massive 13.6 per cent against 9.9 per cent in the same month last year.Manufacturing sector led the surge — figures for which were released today in the index for industrial production (IIP) — expanding by 15.1 per cent in April against the 11 per cent growth in April 2006. Manufacturing, which makes up about 15 per cent of gross domestic product and nearly 80 per cent of industrial output, has the highest weight in the index.The index also gave revised data for March, showing annual growth of 14.5 per cent instead of a provisional 12.9 per cent. While the mining sector recorded a flat 3.4 per cent growth, there was a slight improvement in the power generation sector, which recorded a 8.7 per cent growth this April against 5.9 per cent in April last year.

KPO

India is likely to capture 15 per cent of over 54 billion dollars in the upcoming Knowledge Processing Outsourcing (KPO) industry by 2010.Pointing out that India is one of the few economies expanding at fast pace, Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath said the country has huge potential in the KPO sector.

global warming

Indians are far more concerned about global warming than any other nationality, despite the emerging economy being accused of resisting the need to tackle climate change, a global survey has said.Indians cared most about carbon emissions, with 55 per cent describing themselves as "very concerned" about the issue while just 32 per cent of Britons felt the same way, the survey conducted by Seattle-based research group Global Market Insite found.While emerging economies like India and China are often accused of resisting the need to tackle climate change, the survey suggested that people of these two countries are more worried about climate change, the survey said.