Mulaqat

Gujarat is witnessing a rise in number of women willing to work as intelligence officers with state CID (intelligence), the key factor being the ‘aura’ associated with the job.

During the last (year) enrolment of the state police, out of 57 aspirants directly recruited as IOs, 30 per cent were women, which is the highest so far for undercover agents, officials said without giving the exact number.

Those recruited include housewives, employees of corporate firms, engineers among others, chairman of recruitment board for sub-inspectors, Ashish Bhatia said.

After anti-BJP parties, the country’s civil society has taken on Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi in cyberspace.

The new attack on the BJP leader comes via a website dedicated to “expose the daily scented droppings of a PR machine” apparently working for Modi.

Named Pheku, a popular Twitter hashtag used to describe Modi, the site went live on Friday.

Britain”s broadcasting watchdog Ofcom has fined an Islamic television channel 85,000 pounds for inciting violence.

It ruled in December that Noor TV had breached broadcasting codes after a host said it was acceptable or even the duty of a Muslim to murder anyone who disrespected the Prophet Mohammed.

According to the BBC, Ofcom said the fine imposed now was so large due to the serious nature of the breaches, but did not revoke the channel”s licence.

The programme in question, Paigham-e-Mustafa, was broadcast on 3 May 2012.

Sujai Karampuri :Imagine it is 1956. As Telanganas we are quite apprehensive about a merger with Seemandhra. We are not sure how things will pan out for us in the merged state. We have already experienced how Andhras came in flooding (1948-52) to take up the positions made available in our region. We fear that our jobs, our resources, our funds will be exploited by them once we become united.

She used to spend her days posing in her underwear but now glamour model Carley Watts, 24, is to cover up after falling in love with Tunisian lifeguard, Mohammed Salah, 25.

The model, from Dearham in Norfolk, met Salah during a holiday in Tunisia in April and says she is so serious about the lifeguard she is set to Islam to become his wife.

From October, Carley and her daughter Alannah, two, will live close to his family in the city of Monastir, where she will spend six months learning about the faith – and planning their wedding.

After almost four years of hard work by successive governments in Kerala, the first state-supported Sharia-compliant financial institution, Cheraman Financial Services Ltd (CFSL), has become a reality.

The authorised capital of CFSL has been pegged at Rs.1,000 crore.

The company will not indulge in any interest-based funding nor in activities prohibited under Sharia, including the liquor business, gambling, movies or tobacco.

CFSL has also decided that individual investors cannot exceed nine percent contribution, and the total foreign holding shall not exceed 24 percent.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is a worried man these days. He can no longer claim a communal violence-free state as one of the achievements of his nearly eight-year rule.

This follows Hindu-Muslim clashes in Nawada town last week and early this week that claimed two lives and left nearly a dozen people injured, leading to the imposition of curfew.

On Sunday August 08, 2013 Muslims from all over the metropolitan chicago area joyfully bustled into the Holiday Inn, 5300 Touhy Ave, Skokie, IL to join in on the global celebrations of Eid Ul-Fitr. While there were various venues that held Eid prayers throughout the region, one of the largest turnouts was at the Holiday Inn. The block was quite a sight to passersby. Groups of individuals in vibrant Indian-Pakistani clothing flooded the parking lots as they made their way to the exquisite banquet hall to commemorate the glorious day.

As the media remains focused on a few miscreants trying to exploit the one-off communal flare-up in Kishtwar, saner voices and sentiments of the overwhelming majority of the people of Jammu region go unheard.

Jabeen Akhtar, 48, wife of a retired police officer, passed away in Marble Market locality here Tuesday after battling cancer. The area, like others in this winter capital, has been reeling under strict curfew enforced with the army’s assistance after communal clashes last week claimed three lives.

My mother was a strange woman. Instead of telling me to obey the elders she taught me to question everything. I wish she was a follower of one of the new age swamis, and would have just learnt to follow instructions herself and taught me the same. Follow the Guru, all your problems are solved.

Unfortunately for me that didn’t happen and when I asked her as a child does the God make the Sun rise? Unlike all sensible mothers she bluntly told me NO. She said the Sun doesn’t rise, it only gives the impression that it is rising,

‘Id al-Fitr

The aspect of Shawwal is that it has been chosen by Allah Almighty for the celebration of ‘Id al-Fitr, one of the only two annual festivals recognized by the Shari’ah. This joyous day is intended by the Shari’ah to serve as a sign of gratitude by the Muslims on the accomplishment of Ramadan and as an immediate reward by Allah for those who spent the month of Ramadan in fasting and performing other forms of ritual worship.

A senior official of Abu Dhabi Municipality has warned that black henna contains toxic chemicals which can cause burns, allergic reactions and can be fatal if used extensively.

Khaleefa Al Romaithi, public health administration director at the Municipality told XPRESS that through their awareness campaigns, they are trying to spread the message that ‘traditionally there is nothing called black henna,’ the Gulf News reported.

He said dangerous chemicals and even petrol, car oil and hair dye are mixed with henna to give a black tint to the natural reddish-brown colour of henna.

Reasons for frequent suicides among American military personnel are primarily due to gay sex, depression and alcoholism than battle stress, a new study has claimed.

Despite universal access to healthcare services, mandatory suicide prevention training, and other preventive efforts, committing suicide is one of the leading causes of death in the U.S. military in recent years.

Beginning in 2005, the incidence of suicide deaths in the U.S. military began to increase sharply.

Earlier, stress and unfavourable combat deployment were cited as factors responsible for suicides.

A blind couple, from Hanford, Stoke-On-Trent, is set to walk down the aisle after they were drawn together by their love-struck guide dogs.

Claire Johnson and Mark Gaffey, both in their 50’s, first met during a two-week guide dog training course, Metro News reported.

Venice, Johnson’s dog, fell in love with fellow service dog Rodd, and the canines quickly becoming inseparable.

Claire and Mark, brought together by Venice and Rodd’s romance, soon became romantically involved themselves and 11 months later the duo have decided to settle down with each other.

The British mother of US soldier Bradley Manning has called her son a ‘Superman,’ urging him not to give up hope.

Manning is facing up to 136 years in prison for disclosing hundreds of thousands of secret US documents.

In a rare interview, Susan Manning said he should know she considered him her ‘Superman’.

According to news24, she asked her son to not give up hopes, adding that he will be free one day, though she may not be able to see him again.

Susan, a 59-year-old from Wales, is divorced from her husband, Brian, and is suffering from unspecified health problems.

For 18-year-old Shweta Katti, who grew up as the daughter of a devdasi in the infamous red-light area of Kamathipura in the city, getting scholarship to study in the US is a dream coming true.

Shweta, who once studied in a civic school, flew to New York on Thursday to pursue a course in psychology at Bard University.

“Shweta has got the opportunity to study in the US. I don’t know what she would be studying there. But I feel proud of her,” her mother Vandana, a devdasi, told PTI here today.
Devdasis are girls who are ‘dedicated’ to a life of sex work in the name of religion.

A 20 minute brisk walk every day could help beat dementia, as it not only boosts memory but also improves the walker’s brain function, a new study has revealed.

Dr Laura Phipps, of Alzheimer’s Research UK said that while there is currently no way to prevent dementia, the best evidence shows that regular exercise, along with eating a healthy diet, not smoking and keeping the blood pressure and cholesterol in check can help lower the risk, the Daily Express reported.

The union cabinet Thursday approved an amendment to the Right to Information (RTI) Act which aims at keeping the political parties out of its ambit, said informed sources.

The issue has been in the news after a recent central information commission (CIC) order which had stated that six political parties were public authorities and hence were liable to declare their accounts under the RTI Act.

Most parties were opposed to the order saying they were not public authorities.

Many activists had Wednesday urged the government not to amend the RTI act on the issue.

Britain’s first Muslim MP, Mohammed Sarwar, has renounced his British citizenship to become the governor of Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous province.

Sarwar, a close aide of Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is a former Labour party MP from Glasgow in Scotland. He will now lead over 90 million people in Pakistan’s largest province.

Sarwar was forced to renounce his British nationality as Pakistan’s law forbids ministers and senior officials from holding dual nationality.

A 63-year-old jeweller in Rajasthan has penned religious books including Surah Yasin Sharif, said to be the heart of the Holy Quran, literally in golden words.

Bhomraj Soni, a resident of Bikaner town in the state, some 350 km from Jaipur, used gold to pen down Yasin Sharif and Hanuman Chalisa – a prayer for Hindu god Hanuman – on paper.

He used 45 grams of gold in writing the holy books, which are of 17 pages each.

Soni, a jeweller by profession, had to practise for months before actually getting down to the ‘holy’ work.

In an exclusive interview with Asian News International (ANI), Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi has revealed the importance of social media in creating awareness among voters in the country.

Question: Mr. Modi there has been a lot of buzz in recent days on the use of Social Media by you as well as by the BJP as an organization. What role do you see Social Media playing in this campaign?

India’s Hepatitis burden is rising due to the use of infected injections and unsterilised medical equipment as well as unsafe blood transfusions.

In India, nearly two-thirds of the injections being used are unsafe, posing health hazards for the recipients. Unhygienic use of needles in acupuncture and tattooing also has a significant role in spreading hepatitis, according to experts.

A precocious middle school going teenager from East Bay has breezed through the SAT exam in Unites States.

Varun Jain got a perfect 2400 score on the trio of tests that make up the SATs- the exam that leaves hundreds of high schoolers across the nation cringing, the ABC News reported.

Vivek Jain- father of Varun- told the publication that if anybody in the United States can get a perfect score in middle school, it has to be his son.

Only 360 students did it in 2012 out of more than 1.6 million high school students, who took the tests that year.

Saba Raes, a middle-aged Muslim housewife, has her hands full seven days a week with household chores and her children but takes an hour out every Monday to record Hamd-o-Naat, a series of hymns in praise of Allah, for Radio Jamia. It’s the invocation that begins the daily broadcast of the campus radio station of the Jamia Millia Islamia, one of India’s oldest universities, here.

Vijay Phadnis landed at Karachi airport and were rushed to a private hospital. Airport authorities allowed them to enter the country without any visas or travel documentation. PHOTO: FILE

An elderly Indian man travelled to Pakistan with his wife and brother in-law without a visa and received emergency medical treatment in a Karachi hospital last month, the Mumbai Mirror reported on Friday. The treatment helped saved his life, the newspaper said.