An
exotic spot
K.D.Mami
The renowned milky coloured water
fall, Noori Chammb is situated exactly on Mughal
Road near historic Behramgala village in Panj
Saran Valley. This place is 45 Kms on the Eastern
side of Poonch city and lies on foothills of Pir
Panchal Pass (11600'). Some peaks around this
sport remained covered with snow throughout the
year. Its southern side is surrounded by
beautiful belt of Fir and Devdar forests. The
valley of seven lakes is approachable from this
very spot. The view of Panchal range from Noori
Chammb is very charming.
The sources of Noori Chammb water fall are Luck
Sar and Kol Sar lakes located on the altitude of
13000' near Panjtari Marg in Panchal range. The
water of these lakes flows down in the shape of
stream and passes through the forests of
Hassanthamb range. Near Behramgala village this
stream falls from 90' high mound and takes the
shape of water fall by converting the whole
stream into milky colored vapours. These vapours
spread all round the area, giving pleasure to
visitors. Presently the water fall has gone
inside the mound after cutting through the rocks.
No doubt that old status of Noori Chammb has been
eroded with the passage of time. Still the
natural spot is quite attractive and pleasant. .. .. . .....more
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Hits and
Flops of 2007
A C Tuli
Only a few days are
now left for the year 2007 to be rung
out, and we have before us an almost full
account of how Bollywood has fared during
the last twelve months. Considered in
terms of cinematic values, the films
which were released in 2007 were a rather
mixed bag. While some experimental films
made on a modest budget, and also
considered good cinema by the
cognoscenti, fared not very successfully
at the box-office, most of the big-budget
flicks which were touted to contain a
heady mix of all those ingredients that
the entertainment hungry viewers nowadays
demand, also did not exactly draw packed
houses wherever they were released.
The year started with an absurdity
entitled ‘Kudiyon Ka Zamana’.
It left a rather bad taste in one’s
mouth. One could not imagine anything
more preposterously silly than the idea
of presenting a 54-year-old Rekha as
‘kudi’ in a film that hardly
made any sense. Deservedly, the film sank
more quickly at the box-office than it
takes a pebble to sink in a pool.. ... .. ....more
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Good returns may be
just an hour away!!!
Neha Aggarwal
What's Bullish, What's not?...
All these sayings sound familiar with the Growing
but Volatile Financial Markets these days. But,
Are the common, unexperienced investors
benefitting from the growing Indian economy??
Many questions hit investor's minds everyday
while thinking about making some fresh
investments in the market. The problem further
increases if he is a first time investor. Mutual
funds offer professional services but they swipe
away some part of your returns as their fees for
managing assets, loads, etc and not to talk about
the cost of hopping from one scheme to other.
Leaving all aside, Investing in markets directly
can offer better returns provided the investor
puts some common sense , some efforts in terms of
time and some time horizon of atleast a year.
It is also said that an Investor Invests in
particular stocks, not in Index which shows that
there is always some scope for investing and
earning good returns. However, it is not possible
for common investors to locate undervalued
stocks, which is a corollary for today's highly
informative and discounting market.. . ......more
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Preserving beauty
of lutyens Delhi
Prakash Taneja
Two friends, the apocryphal story
goes, met at a school reunion after years and
ended up exchanging notes. One, now a business
magnate, couldn't stop bragging about the good
things in life he had earned. Imported cars,
houses in the metros, vacations in the
Mediterranean-the list went on and on, before he
stopped and asked: "What do you have?"
The other friend was an honest bureaucrat and had
nothing much to brag about. But he stared his
friend in the eye. "I have a Lutyens
bungalow," he replied.
While it still doesn't quite compare to staking
claim to a 'Ma', Bollywood style, a Lutyens
bungalow in central Delhi is perhaps among the
most-desired possessions to figure on the
priority lists of India's rich and mighty. Those
splendid, single-storeyed, white colonial
mansions, some 800 of them, spread across 550
hectares in the heart of New Delhi, fit into a
verdant urban jigsaw that a British architect
called Edwin Lutyens had put together almost
100-years ago. Part Baroque, part Victorian, they
stand-nestled in their green surroundings-as mute
witnesses to the imperial history of the capital,
bearing premium addresses that any
self-respecting achiever would want to flaunt.
Only a handful of the houses were sold to buyers
and now change hands for a fortune-one recently
went for about Rs. 170 crore. The rest still
remain with the government and serve as
residences for top politicians and bureaucrats,
with some doubling as party offices. The rent on
one of these bungalows would vary according to
location, construction and area. Reckons Sunil
Bedi, managing director of JMD Builders,
"One could safely say that it would be in
the range of around Rs. 15-40 lakh a
month."‘ .. ........more
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A New
Synergy
Sushma Thapliyal
As the year 2007 is
coming to a close, a strange
thing is being noticed in Indian
sports arena. For some
inexplicable reasons, suddenly
sports and cinema are aligning
themselves together. That too,
such a thing is happening in a
country where hardly any
international trophies are won.
India is yet to win any gold
medal in Olympics, except for
that hockey gold in yester years.
Nor any of our super sports stars
even won any major title, other
than squash and billiards. The
lone P.T. Usha managed to join
some gold at regional level and
managed to reach finals in 400
meters race. But still India
spend almost Rs. 2000 crores on
sports and games every year. And
to cap it all we have a sports
ministry at the centre and in
almost all states. Nobody takes
any responsibility for this
miserable performance of India in
sports and games.
At another level, India produces
about a thousand movies per year
in Hindi language alone. If we
add up the films produce in
regional languages the number
will add up to another thousand.
For all this mass production of
cinema, in the international
arena we have only one person
known for his creativity in
cinema-Satyajit Ray. The only
consolation is, Indian cinema
industry managed to compete with
the Hollywood and provide a
wholesome entertainment to the
masses. . ... ......more
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School mate killers
Aditi Singh
Child psychologists, teachers and
social scientists are busy analysing how a class
VIII student could pull the trigger to kill his
school mate. The question being asked is: What
makes a child turn violent, or even into a
killer? Less than a week after Abhishek Tyagi of
Gurgaon's Euro International School was killed,
there is a great deal of introspections how such
happenings could take place. Are there signs that
a child may be treading the dangerous path of
extreme violence in contemporary India?
Delhi-based consultant psychiatrist Giriraj
Kishore is not the least bit surprised that a
child can turn into a killer. "Children are
capable of extreme violence and can go to the
extent of killing. Children have used wickets and
bats to attack each other and have even killed,
and tried to hide the corpse," he says.
Experts say the signs of violent behaviour are
visible from an early age. "Such children
are easily irritable, have poor concentration,
are destructive by nature and insensitive to
others' feelings," says Bhavna Barmi, senior
psychologist, Escorts Hospital, Delhi.
In a competitive, performance-driven society
where inter-personal relations have taken a
beating, violence is sometimes the easy way out
for the young. "I see children as young as
four with such behavioural problems," says
Barmi. She argues that when parents have little
time to spend with their children, a child feels
it can draw attention with aggression-which
initially starts with a tantrum.. . ..........more
A store house of
knowledge
Salman Nizami
 The library is both a
service agency and a kind of academic department.
It is of unique kind. It is indeed an integral
part of an academy's teaching and learning
process. The purpose of an academic library is to
help a student to learn selectively- and train
oneself in application of knowledge. It calls for
competence for acquiring multi and
interdisciplinary knowledge in various areas. One
has to learn how to control and use information.
Use of existing knowledge is as important as the
discovery of new knowledge. A library service
helps a seeker to identify the topic for
research, and the procedure for understanding,
the knowledge already known and duly documented.
A well arranged and organized library will help
users and researchers to bring in new ideas, and
will help their efforts to exploit utility
products and services.
It is an established fact that the Library is the
centre of any academic setting. While classroom
teaching provides a glimpse of knowledge, the
libraries disseminate a wide range of knowledge,
which are required to attain intellectual
heights. Libraries supplement the instructional
work of classrooms and carry forward the ideals
of education. Real education can only be achieved
through the libraries. Thus, the libraries are
the providers of informal education, guiding the
learners to search vast range of material
available. The libraries are gradually being
recognized for their academic services, and they
are occupying prominent position in Educational
programs, through out the world if the case . ......more
A Great
Vaisnava Acarya
 During
the time of Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura's
stay on this planet starting from Feb 6th
1874 the pure religion of Vaishnavism
taught by the Supreme Lord Sri Krishna
Caitanya Mahaprabhu was essentially lost.
The Thakura was very sad in his heart to
see this and with a desire to present the
actual teachings of Sri Caitanya, he
wrote and published many books in
Bengali, Sanskrit and English which
conclusively presented to the world and
to the people of India specifically the
real teachings of Sri Caitanya Mahaprabhu
and His genuine followers. He also
traveled to many parts of India preaching
and giving lectures to many people whose
hearts became changed by seeing his pure
character and shining example. Thakura
Bhaktivinoda practically single-handedly
revived the pure movement of
Nama-sankirtana (the congregational
chanting of the holy names of God) and
presented the glories of Lord Caitanya to
all learned men of the world.
At the age of ten, while attending the
Serampore Missionary School, he was
initiated by his father into the Hare
Krishna mantra and a Narasimhadeva
mantra. In school he invented a novel
kind of phonetic alphabet which he called
Bikranti or Bicanto. Later on he attended
a special Sanskrit college where he
became expert in Sanskrit grammar, Vedic
shastra and different views of
philosophy.Due to his lifelong celibacy
he had such a clear memory that even in
his last days he could reproduce word for
word any passage of any book he had read
fifty years back.. . .. .
...more
The best
medicine
Laughter, they say, is the
best medicine. Going by the ever-growing
popularity of comedy in show business
today, people are taking that advice
quite seriously, reports
Brinda
Dasgupta
Peter Ustinov, noted writer
and actor, had certainly known what he
was talking about when he had said,
"Comedy is simply a funny way of
being serious." For comedy is a look
at life through rose-coloured glasses- a
gentle jab at its many complexities. Time
enough to worry about mundane everyday
things- comedy lets you put your feet up,
relax, and shut out the outside world.
Comedy, apart from "keeping the
heart sweet" (in Mark Twain's
words), has recently been making waves in
Bollywood. Hollywood and television
sit-coms across the seas have always had
a special place for comedy. Geniuses like
Charlie Chaplin and entertainer Bob Hope
pioneered the comedy movement. Its
culmination is everywhere to see today.
Back home, everyone is cashing in on the
comedy frenzy that has overtaken
practically the rona-dhona kind of films.
All one needs to do is just switch on the
television set and there is either some
kind of laughter challenge showing, or a
hit sitcom. Funny movies are, of........
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