Ichhapur (Barrackpore subdivision of North 24 Parganas District), WEST BENGAL :
Kuntal and Sahabuddin during the Everest expedition
KOLKATA:
Forty eight hours after they had scaled Mount Everest on Sunday, Shaikh Sahabuddin and Kuntal Karar were flown off to Kathmandu. Families of both of them are now praying hard for the speedy recovery of Karar whose tryst with the mountains has left him battling serious frostbite. However, Karar has assured his family that all is well and he would be back soon to savour home-cooked ‘doi chicken’ with naan.
Sahabuddin, who works in the Metal & Steel Factory of Ichhapur, has become a big hero for his colleagues. “Having scaled many mountains, my husband was always a hero in office. But with the Everest mission, he has become a bigger hero. His office colleagues and bosses are in Kathmandu to receive and congratulate him. Even my father is hoping to come down on May 28 from Kashmir to wish him,” said Sahabuddin’s wife Ruksana, who hails from Kashmir.
His younger brother, Shaikh Salauddin, works as a heating ventilation air conditioning engineer and is proud of his sibling’s achievement. Apparently, two months before the expedition, Sahabuddin underwent a surgery. Yet, nothing could stop him from wanting to reach the Everest. Salauddin is waiting to begin the celebrations back home once he returns. “Whatever happens, we were always sure that he would make the summit,” said Salauddin, who also dreams of scaling the Everest one day.
The family has been told that Sahabuddin is perhaps the first Indian Muslim mountaineerto have scaled the Everest. “We have been living in Ichhapur for 30 years. For us, divisions based on religion, caste or creed don’t matter,” he said.
Sahabuddin’s two-and-a-half-year-old son Shaikh Uzair is excited. He keeps on telling everyone he meets about his father having reached the top of the world. “On Tuesday morning, my husband made a video call at 8.30am. Both of us started crying. There were tears of happiness. He kept on saying that it was our collective good wishes that had helped him reach the Everest. My son was asleep when the first call came. When he later called at 11 am from Kathmandu, the entire family spoke to him,” Ruksana added.
Initial euphoria of having reached the summit died down when the Karar family heard about Kuntal’s frostbite. On Monday evening, the family got tense after news trickled in about Kuntal being seriously ill. “We couldn’t sleep the whole of Monday night. In the morning, we were thinking of organising funds so that we could reach Kathamandu. But thankfully, he called up at 8.30 in the morning and assured us that he is fine. He even sent us photos from the hospital,” said Kuntal’s sister-in-law Mamomi from their Howrah residence.
Mountaineering has been an addiction for Kuntal. After completing his diploma in engineering, he took up a job before shifting to his own business. “Kuntal’s teacher Anol Das had died in the mountains. A year later, Kuntal had rescued his body. However no amount of persuasion could dissuade him from being smitten by the mountaineering bug,” said his brother, Kanchan.
While at the summit, Kuntal had wanted to use a satellite phone to speak to his family. “But a fellow-mountaineer who had the phone was too exhausted. Kuntal couldn’t ask him to lend the satellite phone so that he could speak to us from there. That’s his only regret,” she said.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Kolkata News / by Priyanka Dasgupta / TNN / May 23rd, 2017
Launching learning into cyberspace, the Maulana Azad National Urdu University’s YouTube channel for higher education went live on Tuesday.
The channel, an initiative of the university’s Instructional Media Centre (IMC), is expected to reach over 80,000 students who have enrolled in various courses which are different stages of completion in the distance mode.
University Vice-Chancellor M. Aslam Parvaiz underscored that while the large number of its students stand to benefit through the YouTube channel, the initiative would also reach a larger number of Urdu speakers who are not students.
“The books which we give in form of study material is insufficient these days as there is no teacher. This channel takes the teacher to the student’s house,” Dr. Parvaiz said. The Urdu speaking diaspora of the country in Europe and the USA too would benefit.
Describing the launch of the YouTube channel as a day of liberation of Urdu, Dr. Parvaiz opined that the language has been confined to ‘literary ramps’ and would now be associated with knowledge.
Taking questions from the media on the frequency of generating content, he said that each department is given a schedule to record its videos. The IMC, he said, generates 30 such videos each month. “That is more than one per day. There is a good collection which already exists. This too will be made available,” he said. The IMC will also start making 3-D films soon.
Touching upon how MANUU’s schools would benefit, he said that the second phase of content generation would deal with this aspect.
Also launched at the event were the IMC logo, Cinematheque MANUU Signature Film and MANUU Knowledge Series.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Hyderabad / by Staff Reporter / Hyderabad – December 13th, 2017
In an inspired moment, the street in Alwarpet was named after two giants of the legal field, K. Bhashyam Iyengar and Basheer Ahmed Sayeed
Fellow heritage enthusiast and writer, Dr G. Sundaram, wondered as to the origins of Bashyam Basheer Ahmed Street in Alwarpet. Have the signboard painters got it wrong he wondered. But for once they had it right. It is indeed Bashyam Basheer Ahmed Street. And as for its Vaishnavite-Muslim name combination, the explanation is simple — it commemorates two men — K. Bhashyam Iyengar and Basheer Ahmed Sayeed. Both were giants of the legal field.
Bhashyam enrolled as an advocate in 1906. He apprenticed under his father-in-law, the legendary Sir VC Desikachariar, and later worked with leaders such as VV Srinivasa Iyengar and S. Srinivasa Iyengar. He was greatly successful in independent practice as well. He wrote a classic commentary on the Negotiable Instruments Act, while still in the early days of his career and is even now referred to at times as NI Act Bhashyam to distinguish him from the other, Sir V Bhashyam Iyengar.
But it is his services to social causes that earned him immortality. Active in the freedom struggle he was beaten by the police and also sentenced. He took to representing in court, people charged for participating in the independence movement. He was to be a member of the Syndicates of the Madras and Annamalai Universities, a councillor, a member of the Legislature and a minister in the Prakasam Ministry of 1946-47. He died in 1959.
Basheer Ahmed enrolled in the High Court in 1925. An expert in languages and also Islamic law, he rose quickly in practice and was later made a judge of the Madras High Court. He was confirmed as a judge in 1950. Like Bhashyam, he too was actively involved in social causes, one of the prime beneficiaries being the Music Academy, of which he was a member of the executive committee.
It was at his prompting that the Academy purchased its present property. Justice Basheer Ahmed, in 1951, set up the Southern India Education Trust along with a few other prominent Muslims of Madras.
Sixteen acres of land were purchased in the Teynampet area and in 1955, Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru, who greatly admired Basheer Ahmed’s legal acumen and learning, laid the foundation stone of the SIET College, the first of the many SIET institutions. Justice Basheer Ahmed Sayeed died in 1984.
K. Bhashyam lived in Champaka Vilas, at the intersection of Luz Church Road and Mowbrays (now TTK) Road. That property is a rabbit’s warren of flats now. The other side of Mowbray’s Road, was mainly paddy fields, with the vast Sudder Court (native courts of the 18 century) in the distance. The main court building, Sadr Gardens, was Basheer Ahmed Sayeed’s residence. It still exists, a magnificent pile.
When the surrounding area was developed in the 1940s, roads were laid and one connected Sadr Gardens to Mowbrays Road. In an inspired moment, it was decided to name it after both men and so we have it, Bashyam Basheer Ahmed Street.
Happily, it remains so.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai> Hidden Histories / by Sriram V. / January 02nd, 2013
A 100-member team of archivists is digitising over 10 crore documents to prevent further loss. The first phase of the project is expected to be completed in two years.
A letter from General Lake Sahib to Zaibun Nisa Baigum dated 8 October 1802 at Delhi archives.(Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)
On March 9, 1858, a British court declared Delhi’s last king, Bahadur Shah Zafar, guilty of rebellion, treason and murder before exiling him to Rangoon in the then British-controlled Burma. The trial was approved and confirmed a month later by N Penny, major general commanding, Meerut division.
One hundred and fifty nine years later, the 42-day trial conducted at Diwan-e-Khaas of the Red Fort by British prosecutor Major F Harriott lies preserved word for word at the Delhi archives in the form of a hardbound book comprising 262-pages.
Apart from the handwritten trial papers, the Delhi archives is a repository of over 10 crore rare documents comprising Mughal firmans (imperial orders), maps, land acquisition award statements, jail records, manuscripts and government orders narrating the historical and political journey of Delhi since 1803.
So far accessible to only researchers, the treasure trove will soon be just a click away for those interested in the history of the national capital. An ambitious ‘digitisation and microfilming of archival records’ project started by Delhi government is underway with the target of converting 4 crore documents in the first phase by 2020.
An official with a copy of the trial of Bahadur Shah Zafar. (Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)
“Some of the records are so old that they might get damaged. So, it is required to preserve them in digital and microfilm formats for posterity,” said Sanjay Garg, the chief archivist of the archives. The Delhi Archives is city’s second repository of records from early 19th century after the National Archives of India.
Mughal firmans to land acquisition for Lutyens Delhi
In September 1803 East India Company’s forces under general Gerard Lake fought the Marathas in what is popular as Battle of Delhi, or Battle of Patparganj — named after the area now in east Delhi.The earliest documents at the Delhi Archives relate to this battle. Thought the British emerged victorious, they allowed Shah Alam II — the blind emperor of Delhi — to issue firmans in Persian language, many of which are also preserved at the archives.
“There are different sizes of royal seals in Persian language depending on the hierarchy in the Mughal courts on the firman with gold marks,” said Ashutosh Kumar Jha, assistant archivist pointing at ‘A letter from General Lake Sahib to Zaib-un-Nisa Baigum’ dating October 8, 1802.
The transfer of power to the British crown in 1958 followed setting up of a new administration and eventually the construction of the new capital, Delhi, in 1912. The Archives also have records of land acquisition during this historic shift of the national capital from Kolkata to Delhi.
“From photographs to award statements of land acquired from the owners, we have rare documents that bear testimony to how the present day Delhi came up,” said Sandeep Singh, assistant archivist. In one of the records dating March 1913, an individual named Ram Das was awarded a compensation of Rs 172, two paisa and nine annas for his 285.38 acre of land acquired by the government in Khanpur. The deal was signed by Kamruddin, revenue assistant, Delhi province.
Documents being scanned for digitisation at Delhi archives. (Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)
The repository at the archives includes pictures of construction of historical buildings housing Parliament and Rashtrapati House in early 20th century. Originally called House of Parliament, the Sansad Bhawan was designed by the British architect Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker in 1912-1913 and was constructed between 1921 and 1927.
A poster of a debate being organised by Delhi Students’ Federation on May 29, 1937 at Arabic College Hall (Ajmeri Gate) is in the section of rare documents showing how teachers would support students’ concerns. The debate on why “the proposed scheme of educational reconstruction of Delhi University will be detrimental to the best interest of the students’ community and the cause of education in the country”, had C Eyre Walker, principal Arabic college, S Dutt, principal Ramjas College, and BB Gupta, principal Ramjas inter college among speakers.
A rare document dated April 7, 1912 is testimony to how ‘Khan Bahadur’ title was awarded to one Chaudhari Nabi Ahmed on the occasion of ‘His Majesty, the King- Emperor’s Birthday’.
The Delhi archives is a repository of over 10 crore rare documents comprising Mughal firmans, maps land acquisition statements, jail records, manuscripts and government orders. (Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)
Digitising 10 crore rare documents
The project, billed as the largest in Asia, envisages digitisation of 10 crore records stored in the four specially constructed floors of the Delhi Archives building in Qutub Institutional Area. In the first phase, four crore records are expected to be ready and uploaded on the website of the Delhi archives over a span of 30 months at a cost of Rs 25.4 crore.
The project was fist conceived in 2011 but was taken up by the incumbent government on August 31 this year. Led by Garg, a 100-member team of archivists, scholars and employers are busy with the digitisation task using computers and high-end German-made scanners.
“We have got eight scanners for now. We digitise about 50,000 pages each day,” Garg said
A collection of old newspapers at the archives includes a copy of Hindustan Times, Evening News, published on September 25, 1948. (Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)
Once digitised, the records would be transformed into microfilms.
“The thumbnails of the records with some information would be available on the website. For higher resolutions, one has to pay,” Garg said
A welcome move
“It’s a welcome move to preserve and digitise records particularly Bahadur Shah Zafar’s trial. The public will know who sided with British and who was with revolutionaries in the first war if Independence,” said historian Rana Safvi, who has translated Zahir Dehlvi’s Dastan-e-Ghadar which comprises eyewitness account of the 1857 uprising against the British
An old invite of Delhi Student Federation, now DUSU (Delhi University Student Union), at Delhi archives. (Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)
Established in 1972, the Delhi archives is a repository of non-current records of Delhi government under the department of art and culture. It is responsible for preservation of the archives and making them available research and references.
“We are committed to make knowledge more accessible to the common people. This is an important step towards preserving our precious heritage. While digitisation will ensure preservation of documents, making them available to a larger audience through a website and outreach events will play a key role in dissemination,” said Manish Sisodia, the minister of Art, Culture and Languages.
source: http://www.hindustantimes.com / Hindustan Times / Home> Cities / by Gulam Jeelani, Hindustan Times / December 14th, 2017
In times of death and destruction, the lotus of communal harmony has bloomed in the muck of flood-ravaged Dhanera in Banaskantha, a district which has lost 64 lives and is still counting its dead.
In this Hindu-dominated town, some 3,500 Muslims from Dhanera, Deesa, Palanpur and nearby villages trooped in to the aid of the town, cleaning places of worship and residence alike, after waters started receding slowly. The town was submerged under 10ft of flood waters that coursed its way through thousands of homes, leaving behind a trail of destruction, tonnes of earth, sand and scare of an epidemic.
Their first mission was to remove muck from 22 temples and three major mosques in Dhanera town. “In this difficult hour, we felt that people needed hope and spiritual support to help them pull back their lives. This is why we began cleaning the temples first with the help of locals. Floods have brought each one of us together,” says Mohammed Rafiq Memon of Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind.
The volunteers under the aegis of JUH cleaned some major temples in Dhanera like the Ganapati, Hanuman, Satimata, Lilashah and Ashapura Mata temples in the first two days itself with the help of a few locals.
Dhanera Nagapalika vice-president Jagdish Thakkar told TOI, “It took our Muslim brothers close to six to eight hours to help us clean temples including the 115-year-old Lord Ganapati temple and three others. The locals joined hands and helped cleaning three mosques, including Khureshi Masjid, not far from the Ganapati temple in Khatkiwad. Besides religious places, volunteers also cleaned the Nagarpalika office, post office and homes,” says Thakker.
Abdul Hassan Sewani, a volunteer from Sidhpur, told TOI, “Calamity sees no religion and neither did we. In the end, we are humans, brothers in distress who helped each other. We cleaned temples and mosques so the troubled could find some solace,” says Sewani, who continues to camp in Dhanera and is helping authorities with the massive clean-up operations to prevent disease outbreak.
“Floods had swept away everything, including one’s home and confidence to put it all together. Together, we realized we could help each other tide over these difficult times,” says Memon.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Ahmedabad News / TNN / August 02nd, 2017
Thirty senior folk artistes, one from each district, and two folk experts will be presented the Karnataka Janapada Academy awards for 2017. While the artistes will get a purse of ₹25,000 and a citation, the folk experts will get ₹50,000 and a citation.
Announcing the names of award winners here on Monday, academy chairman B. Takappa Kannuru said they had chosen these artistes at the general body meeting on October 30. The awards will be given to them at a two-day district folk convention to be held from December 28 at Sagar in Shivammoga district.
The ex-students of Vile Parle’s Mithibai College will hold their seventh reunion Saturday December 9 at Club Millennium, Juhu.
“We will felicitate composers Sajid-Wajid, film director Vikram Bhat, stage artiste Paritosh Painter and Afroz Shah who initiated the Versova beach clean-up,” said Krishna Hegde, convenor,Mithibai Ex-Students Association (MESA).
The glamour quotient coupled with social messages makes the Mithibai alumni meet an awaited event. This year, performances by Purani Jeans, Cutting Chai and An Evening Down Memory Lane are on schedule.
Mithibai College has among the largest number of students worldwide and approximately one million alumni in different countries.
Hegde said, “It has been a tradition to felicitate outstanding ex-students for their achievements at our reunions. We are very excited with the names selected for this year’s MESA Hall of Fame 2017.”
The previous edition of the reunion saw a turnout of over 500 alumni. Senior media professional Balakrishna Pillai’s batch is celebrating its silver jubilee since passing out. He said, “Our reunions are one of the largest and grandest in India. For us, reunions are not just about get-togethers but also celebrating the success of our college mates and being socially responsible. Since MESA was founded about 19 years back, besides getting the students together at regular intervals, it has arranged various blood donation drives, health camps, fund raising for Kargil jawans, supporting the education of underprivileged and other activities.”
“It is not uncommon to spot a film star, industrialist or sportsperson at other college reunions but at ours, celebrities seem to outnumber the average alumni! Ex-students like Ajay Devgan, Raveena Tandon, Vivek Oberoi, Praveen Amre attend the reunions frequently,” said Khalid Khan, MESA president.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Mumbai News / by Bella Jaisinghani / TNN / December 07th, 2017
Mohd Azharuddin has got an order to send 7,000 silk lotuses to Gujarat
A Muslim weaver from Varanasi, the Parliamentary constituency of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is sending about 2,000 specially designed silk ‘Kamal ke Phool’ (Lotus, which is the symbol of BJP) to Gujarat for the second phase of the Assembly elections.
Mohd Azharuddin said that he has already sent 5,000 silk lotuses to the BJP’s state headquarters in Gujarat before the first phase of polling. “I had got an order of 7,000 lotuses. We are sending the second lot tomorrow to Gujarat for the second phase of polling,” he told DNA.
The Varanasi weaver got the order by chance. He wanted to present his creation (a silk lotus) to Prime Minister Narendra Modi during his last Varanasi visit on October 22. While he was not allowed to reach the dais for security reasons, a Muslim Manch leader, Pushpendru Updhyaya, was impressed by his creation and gave him the big order.
Azharuddin claimed that he got the idea of weaving Lotus on silk thread when he saw Prime Minister and other senior BJP leaders wearing badges of party symbol Lotus tugged on their kurtas.
“Our weavers worked for several days and came out with a better design. It is weaved with different coloured silk threads and the carving is done with genuine stones which never turns black. It takes about two to two-and-half hours to weave one lotus,” said the Muslim weaver.
Azharuddin, who runs a powerloom, said his efforts were aimed at supplementing their income through the new creation following a slump in demand for world famous Varanasi sarees. Besides the lotus, they have also weaved a Tricolour which they are trying to sell to all political parties and for occasions like Republic Day and Independence Day.
He said it costs him about Rs 150 each to make a lotus or a Tricolour. He said sold the lotuses to the BJP for Rs 200 making a profit of Rs 50 per piece. “This additional income helps us support our children’s education when the loom business is down.”
A resident of Shankar Talaab in Varanasi, Azharuddin said that about 20 weavers worked overnight to complete the order of the Muslim Manch, an outfit of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. “We are now expecting a bigger order from the BJP for 2019 Lok Sabha polls.”
A staunch supporter of BJP and Modi, Azharuddin is confident of BJP’s victory in Gujarat. “We are patriot Muslims. The prime minister is doing a great job for the nation. I am sure BJP will win Gujarat again and we all will vote for Modji in 2019. I will present a silk lotus to Modji when he visits Varanasi after winning the Gujarat polls.”
source: http://www.dnaindia.com / DNA / Home> India> Ahmedabad / by DNA Correspondent / December 11th, 2017
Mr Saleem Peerzada popularly knows as Lovy peerzada passed away due to cardiac attack in New Delhi today. He was great thinker,statesman and chairman of Parcham party.
According to family sources he breathed his last at Apollo Hospital Delhi. He suffered a stroke on December 11th and was admitted at JNMC, later he was transferred to Ganga Ram Hospital Delhi and later sent to Apollo.
He could not be operated as his condition had deteriorated,understandably due to time lapse during transfers between hospitals. He had a successful open heart surgery 2 years ago.
A frank and bold he was,as a young AMU student and a Politican until he wrote his last words yesterday on face book.He was a prolific writer and an excellent orator.
It is a legacy that spans 40 years, including the stand-off with administration,corruption and the resistance against the nepotism,religious fanaticism and communalism. He was a Politician with ideals with unparalleled knowledge of history and mesmerizing vocabulary oratory skills.
His demise has created a vacuum in the “ ideological politics”,which may not be
replaced.
May his soul rest in peace
source: http://www.theindianawaaz.com / The Indian Awaaz / Home /December 12th, 2017
Students of Paramita High School in Karimnagar who have been selected to participate in international competitions in the USA. | Photo Credit: Byarrangement
Two students of Paramita High School to fly in May 2018
Two students of Paramita High School (IIT) in Mankammathota of Karimnagar town have been selected to participate in the international robotic presentation which would be organized jointly by Lawrence Technologies, Michigan and RILE university, West Florida in the USA in May 2018.
Class IX students K. Aneesh and Md. Aziz, who participated in the National-level Robo Making Challenge and its functioning analysis organized by Novatech Robo Institute in Bengaluru at Christ University from December 7 to 9, have bagged the first prize in the competition in which more than 300 students from reputed schools across the country participated.
Incidentally, another set of students from the school — Meghana and Nikitha — participated in the International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) in Arizona in USA in May 2016.
Two students of the school Paramita Schools chairman E. Prasada Rao said that the Atal Tinkering Lab set up by the Union government in their school in 2016 had come in handy for the students to have hands on experience in the robotic designing and participate in the national and international competitions.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Hyderabad / by Special Correspondent / Karimnagar – December 12th, 2017
