NRIs Corner

Police in Canada have arrested an Indo-Canadian man on charges of manslaughter in connection with the death of a 19-year-old Indian student, Harmanjit Singh.

Dashminder Deol, 37, has been arrested and charged with manslaughter and offering an indignity to human remains, Canadian CBC reported Thursday.

Singh’s decomposed body was found floating on a flood basin in Stoney Creek, a community in the Canadian province of Ontario, in November last year.

An American woman who was arrested at the Airport here allegedly with 25 live imported cartridges has been sent to judicial custody today, police said.

Manjita Kaur Dhillon (52), whose grandparents hailed from Punjab, was arrested yesterday at Guru Ram Das International Airport (Rajasansi Airport) when she was preparing to board a Jet Airways flight to Delhi.

Yesterday, on being questioned about the recovery of live cartridges in her luggage, the woman has expressed ignorance.

A woman teacher in an Indian school in Qatar’s capital Doha has reportedly been forced to quit her job after she posted a caricature of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on her Facebook page, media reported Thursday.

According to the report in The Peninsula daily, the incident took place last week triggering a big controversy among a section of the expatriate Indian community who said the Photoshop caricature was an insult to Modi.

In the caricature, a picture of the Indian prime minister is superimposed with that of a black-and-white striped dog emptying its bladder.

In an unusual inflight rescue, a 21-year-old Indian-American student who lost his father in the 911 attack here has come to the aid of a stricken attorney of the alleged Pakistani planner of the world’s deadliest terror strike.

Tufts University senior Robert Mathai provided firstresponder service aboard a flight from Camp Justice at Guantanamo Bay to army captain Brian Nicholson, an army lawyer for mastermind of the 911 attacks Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

In an unusual in-flight rescue, a 21-year-old Indian-American student who lost his father in the 9/11 attack here has come to the aid of a stricken attorney of the alleged Pakistani planner of the world’s deadliest terror strike.

Tufts University senior Robert Mathai provided first- responder service aboard a flight from Camp Justice at Guantanamo Bay to Army Captain Brian Nicholson, an Army lawyer for mastermind of the 9/11 attacks Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

A 30-year-old Indian-American physical therapist along with a patient recruiter has been convicted in a US $1.6 million Medicare fraud scheme, federal prosecutors said.

As many as 6,443 Indians are detained in jails in 71 countries for various offences and 74 missing defence personnel, including 54 prisoners of war, are believed to be in Pakistani jails since 1971, Lok Sabha was informed today.

While the maximum number of 1,534 Indians are detained in Saudi Arabia followed by 833 in UAE, as many as 352 of them are in Pakistan and 73 in Sri Lanka.

“6,443 Indian nationals are detained in jails in 71 countries,” External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said in a written reply in Lok Sabha.

An Indian-origin former German lawmaker, who was put on trial on charges of acquiring and possessing child pornography, has been offered a deal to suspend the proceedings against him if he pleads guilty.

The offer was made by the prosecution on the opening day of the nine-day trial of Sebastian Edathy yesterday at the regional court in the town of Verden, in northern Germany.

After a short hearing, the trial was adjourned till next Monday.

An 18-year-old student from India has been arrested in the US on charges of rape after he was accused of entering the room of another student and sexually assaulting her.

Abhay Pant, who hails from New Delhi, is a student at The State University of New York in Oswego in New York state.

According to campus newspaper The Oswegonian, Pant was arrested for first-degree rape last week by the University Police.

A 45-year-old Indian national who was attacked by armed robbers in Nigeria has succumbed to his injuries here, a media report said on Monday.

Srivastava Kumar was attacked by armed robbers while working on an agricultural farm in Eleko, Ajah, on the Lekki-Epe Expressway.

Kumar was stabbed in the hand and the chest during the robbery on February 11. He died in hospital on February 14, Nigeria Daily Post reported.

Kumar was also the plant manager of a food processing company.

There was no proof of 39 Indian nationals, who were taken hostage in war-torn Iraq last June, being “dead or alive”, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj told their families when they met her here today.

However, she said the government, on the assumption that they were alive was making efforts to secure their release.

After her sixth meeting in the last nine months with the relatives of the 39 Indians, Swaraj said she has conveyed to these families, who are from Punjab, that the government has spoken to every country and individual who could help in securing their release.

An Indian-American, who developed an environment friendly field analyser for checking toxic arsenic levels in water, has been awarded a prestigious award for his special contribution in the field of chemistry.

Purnendu Dasgupta, a Jenkins Garrett professor of chemistry at The University of Texas at Arlington, has been awarded the 2015 American Chemical Society Division of Analytical Chemistry J. Calvin Giddings Award.

The world is looking at India with renewed respect and enthusiasm and the government is keen to harness the energy of the country’s large youthful population who can make their presence felt through innovation and initiatives, External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said here Friday.

A 45-year-old Indian-American has been named the first chief data scientist by the White House to shape policies and practices that will help the US remain a leader in technology and innovation.

Dhanurjay ‘DJ’ Patil joins the White House following “an incredible career as a data scientist – a term he helped coin – in the public and private sectors, and in academia,” said Megan Smith, chief technology officer, the White House.

He would also be the Deputy Chief Technology Officer.

The White House has named Dhanurjay ‘DJ’ Patil as its first chief data scientist to help shape policies and practices to help the US remain a leader in technology and innovation.

In a memo to the American people Thursday, Patil, 45, noted that “the Obama administration has embraced the use of data to improve the operation of the US government and the interactions that people have with it.”

After seven long years, five Indian ‘guest’ or temporary workers who were allegedly defrauded and exploited in a labour trafficking scheme have won $14 million in compensatory and punitive damages by a US court.

The workers were allegedly exploited by Signal International, an immigration lawyer and an Indian labour recruiter who lured hundreds of workers to a Mississippi shipyard with false promises of permanent US residency.

An Indian-American dentist has been charged with homicide a year after the death of a patient who became unresponsive while having 20 teeth pulled and several implants installed, according to a media report.

Connecticut dentist Rashmi Patel, who turned himself in to Enfield police Tuesday, a year to the day that Judith Gan died in his office, was charged with criminally negligent homicide and tampering with evidence, according to New York Daily News.

Indian-American Rashad Hussain has been appointed Special Envoy and Coordinator for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications to expand global engagement and partnerships of the US to counter violent extremism, the state department has said.

37-year-old Hussain is currently the Special Envoy of the US to Organisation for Islamic Countries (OIC).

Indo-Kuwait Friendship Society, a non-resident Indian association in Kuwait has sent a letter of appreciation to the Chief Justice of Indian Supreme Court for staying the arrest warrant of Teesta Setalvad, an Indian civil rights activist and journalist and the secretary of CJP (Citizens for Justice and Peace) an organization who formed for fighting for justice for the victims of communal violence in the state of Gujarat in 2002. Teesta has for years taken on the Gujarat government while fighting for riot victims.

A noted Indian-American lawyer has sent a letter to US Secretary of State John Kerry to issue a humanitarian visa to the wife of an Indian grandfather assaulted by an Alabama policeman.

New York based lawyer Ravi Batra has sent another letter Air India’s Regional Manager to fly in free the wife of Sureshbhai Patel, 57, who was slammed to the ground Feb 6 while out on a walk outside his son’s house in Madison, Alabama.

On February 15, 2015 Chicago Aam Aadmi Chapter celebrated the Delhi election victory. Mr. Minhaj Akhtar, one of the speakers associated with Aam Aadmi Party since its establishment, said in his speech that there is value in NRI’s, especially coming from the United States. NRI’s involvement hold importance the same way when President Obama visited our homeland. We have seen and witnessed in Obama’s speeches that he changed the voters’ direction even though the opposition had their own intentions by inviting President Obama before the elections so they can obtain credit to win the election.

The Governor of the US state of Alabama has apologized for the “unfortunate” use of excessive force by police against an Indian grandfather early this month that left him partially paralysed.

Governor Robert Bentley also ordered the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency to launch a parallel investigation the Federal Bureau of Investigation has already started its own probe into the use of “excessive force” against Sureshbhai Patel, 57 on February 6.

External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj has praised the Indian community in Oman for boosting the economy of Gulf nation.

Addressing the Indian diaspora in Muscat yesterday, Swaraj said the contribution of hard working Indians in lifting Oman’s economy could not be neglected.

The largest ethnic organization of physicians, representing over 100,000 physicians of Indian origin, would hold a Legislative Day here in March to brief lawmakers on their views regarding healthcare issues.

A large number of US senators and House members are expected to attend the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin’s (AAPI) Legislative Day and governing body meeting from March 26 to 28 in Cannon caucus room on Capitol Hill.

As many as 140 Indians involved in labour issues in Basra in Iraq are coming back tomorrow after intervention by the Indian embassy there.

“Labour issues resolved, coming back now. 140 Indians whose labour issues were resolved by Embassy are coming back from Basra, Iraq tomorrow,” the Spokesperson of the External Affairs Ministry tweeted today.

There are several hundred Indians working in various fields in Iraq including steel mills, oil companies and construction projects.