Month: June 2015

Twin blasts have rocked N’Djamena, the capital of Chad, killing 11 people, said witnesses.

According to Fox News, the first explosion was heard early today in the Dinguessou neighborhood of N’Djamena while the second took place six minutes later, said Souleymane Brahim, a local resident.

He said that the first explosion which took place at around 5:10 a.m. was followed by gunfire.

The residents said that the bodies of five police officials were among the 11 bodies counted after the blasts.

Fans will now relish the Wimbledon Championships more as English wine will be served along with strawberries for the first time in the glorious 138 years history of the mega event.

White Pinot Gris 2014, from the Bolney estate in East Sussex, is the chosen wine that will be served as a ‘perfect match for strawberries and cream’ in the championship starting from today.

The wine, which is to be retailed at 16.99 pounds, will be served at catering outlets and hospitality areas throughout the 2015 tournament.

Steered by a young woman, the first train of the Chennai Metro Rail chugged off from Alandur Station on Monday after being flagged off via live video from the State Secretariat by Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa.

The first train which left at 12.15 PM from Alandur to Koyambedu was driven by A Preethi, a 28 year old diploma holder in engineering from Government Dharmambal Polytechnic College in Chennai. She was trained for a year and half like others in Chennai and in Delhi for the purpose.

Amazon has announced that it will be launching a program which will provide loans to new businesses.

According to thenextweb.com, the idea is to help them get started and gain market share.

Reuters reports that selected sellers in Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Spain and the UK will be eligible for the loans from later this year.

The service has been in limited testing in the U.S. and Japan for a number of years. It offers three to six month loans of USD 1,000 to USD 600,000 to help new sellers buy inventory.

Uber has launched a new intercontinental service this week.

According to the Verge, the users can now hail an UberBoat to take them across the Bosphorous, the strait that divides the European and Asian halves of the city.

The company says in a blog post that users will see UberBoat service offered whenever they are near the waterside. The speedboats are owned and operated by a Turkish company Navette.

Rides could cost anywhere from roughly USD 20 to USD 150 depending on the destination.

Xolo has uploaded a new video on YouTube which shows its new device ‘Xolo Black’.

Xolo Black is shown as a smudge and stain free device.

According to the in.techradar.com, the new video gives a glance of the dual rear cameras as well as the SIM card tray placed on the left hand side of the handset.

It also shows that the device will be launched on Flipkart.

Xolo, which drew flak from the social media users for intentionally leaking out some hardware details of its phone, will want to put all that behind and unveil the phone as early as possible.

The global Jewish population has reportedly grown as large as it was before the Holocaust, an annual report released by an Israeli think tank has said.

The Jewish People Policy Institute said that there were 14.2 million Jews in the world. According to the report, if individuals with one Jewish parent and others who were partially Jewish were factored in, the current figure would approach 16.5 million- the Jewish population on the eve of the World War II, reported Fox News.

Almost six million Jews were exterminated by the Nazis and their collaborators during the Holocaust.

There is a new technique to improve the blood flow in preterm infants delivered by Cesarean section, claims a new research.

According to the National Institutes of Health study, the technique, known as cord milking, consists of encircling the cord with thumb and forefingers, gently squeezing, and slowly pushing the blood through the cord to the infant’s abdomen.

Secretary (East) in the Ministry of External Affairs, Anil Wadhwa, on Monday said that India and Thailand have signed an MoU on Double Taxation Avoidance (DTA) agreement during the joint commission meeting held here.

“We have signed a very important MoU today on Double Taxation Avoidance (DTA) agreement which is going to help our investments. We also exchanged the ratification for the extradition treaty,” he said.

Wadhwa further said security is one important aspect of the relationship between both sides.

The Government of Andhra Pradesh has directed all medical colleges in the state to make Wifi facility available to students immediately. This decision was taken by the Chief Minister during the second meeting of the State Medical Advisory Board at Secretariat on Monday.

With healthcare systems in the state in shambles in the last 10 years due to lack of proper direction and focus on public healthcare, human development indices have worsened, leading to high maternal mortality and infant mortality rates.

The Hyderabad High Court on Monday quashed the petition moved by nominated MLA Elvis Stephenson seeking the judge to rescue himself from hearing a petition filed by J Muthaiah, an accused in the ‘Cash for Vote’ case.

The skies darkened and the lights came on as Jammu witnessed heavy rainfall on Monday afternoon.

“It was very hot for the past three or four days. Today it has started raining and it looks like the monsoons have finally reached Jammu. Now, the temperatures have finally dropped,” said Sunil, a local.

Chandra Mohan, another resident, felt that the rains would help the agriculture sector as well.

“Now that it has rained, we have some relief from the rains. We want the rains to continue, want the farmers to also benefit from the rains,” he said. (ANI)

The Society for Cyberabad Security Council (SCSC) on Monday rolled out ‘She Shuttles’, an exclusive women only transport system for the transit safety of women employees in the Cyberabad IT Corridor.

The best-selling book ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ author EL James raked in almost 20 million pounds in 2014, with a profit of 9.8 million pounds.

The legal accounts of the 52-year-old British author showed that the she took a dividend of 2.6 million pounds from the company in 2014, whereas she pockets 3.2 million pounds in 2013, the Guardian reported.

The accounts cover the period before the sex trilogy author earned royalties from her book and do not include any share of her royalties from the first Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson starrer film.

Ramadan is here and this time it’s not only about the delicacies that are served during the Muslim fest but also about the fashion trends that taking a new turn during this period.

The dates for Ramadan change every year as it is based on a lunar calendar but for the past few years the summer shopping season has coincided with Ramadan and this has trended new styles for the Muslim community, reported the Guardian.

TV18 and CNN will successfully conclude their 10-year licensing arrangement in January 2016 for CNN IBN.

The conclusion of the arrangement will enable each company thereafter to chart its own growth trajectory independently.

“The last decade has seen a lot of momentum in the Indian media industry and has been particularly exciting for us. During this time we witnessed two media houses coming together to redefine the way news is presented to a demanding audience. We at TV18 have benefitted from this relationship with CNN,” said A.P. Parigi, Group CEO, Network 18.

Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Babulal Gaur fuelled another controversy with his remarks that drinking liquor is a “fundamental right” and that it is a status symbol too.

The 85-year-old Gaur made the remarks while asserting that crime rate doesn’t go up by consuming alcohol.

“Alcohol does not increase crime. People lose their consciousness after consuming alcohol and that’s how it causes crime. The person who drinks within control does not cause crime,” he said, adding,” one should not overdrink. It is one’s fundamental right. Drinking is a social status symbol these days”.

The Hyderabad High Court on Monday dismissed a petition seeking implementation of Section 8 of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act in Hyderabad.

The Confederation of Real Estate Developers Association of India (CREDAI), Hyderabad announced its newly elected office bearers and members of the Executive Committee, who will be responsible for spearheading and strengthening the CREDAI initiatives for the development of the real estate sector in Hyderabad.

Chief Secretary I.Y.R. Krishna Rao held a meeting on Monday to discuss on organizing Protocol Services in all the districts in Andhra Pradesh.

The Chief Secretary has directed the officers concerned to take an immediate action to establish a Special Wing particularly for Protocol without involving the Revenue Department. Structure the Protocol wing quickly with the co-operation of District Collectors to design the staff pattern particularly for protocol by allocating separate head of account, he said.

Chad has reportedly nabbed 60 suspected militants and busted a terror cell involved in the twin suicide bombings that took place in the African nation’s capital, N’Djamena, the chief prosecutor of the central African nation said.

Prosecutor Alghassim Khamis said that those arrested were from Chad, Cameroon, Mali and Nigeria, reported News24.

The blasts that targeted the police headquarters and one of its academies in N’Djamena killed 34 people, including four suspected Boko Haram militants, and injured dozens others. It was the largest attack of its kind in Chad.

A Bangladesh high court has reportedly cleared way for a lower court to continue proceedings against Bangladesh Nationalist Party ( BNP) chairperson Khaleda Zia in the Zia Orphanage Trust corruption case by striking down a petition filed by the opposition leader.

The petition asked the court to expunge the deposition of the investigation officer (IO) in the case, reported The Daily Star.

The verdict was passed by a bench comprising Justice Mohammed Moinul Islam Chowdhury and Justice JBM Hassan, who said that recording the statement of the IO in the graft case was not illegal. (ANI)

The Hyderabad High Court today delivered a severe blow to those advocating the need for invoking Section 8 of AP Reorganization Act in the joint capital of Hyderabad by dismissing a petition in this regard.

The Settlers’ Forum knocked the doors of the High Court fearing threat to those hailing from AP State living in the capital and pleaded for invoking the section. However, the court observed that their plea does not hold water and dismissed the petition.

The Special Court for ACB Cases here on Monday extended the judicial remand of Telangana TDP MLA A. Revanth Reddy and two others, the accused in the cash-for-vote scandal, till July 13.

Revanth Reddy along with his accomplices Uday Simha and Sebastian were arrested by the ACB sleuths on May 31 after a sting operation for allegedly trying to woo nominated Anglo-Indian MLA Elvis Stephenson with money to vote in favor of TDP nominee Vem Narender Reddy in the recent MLC elections.

A special protein in the brain’s tiniest blood vessels may affect people’s risk of suffering a stroke, a new study has found.

The research led by Peter Carlsson, professor in genetics at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden, studied how the blood-brain barrier develops and what makes the capillaries in the brain different from small blood vessels in other organs.

The brain’s smallest blood vessels differ from those in other organs in that the capillary walls are much more compact.