Monthly Archives: June 2018

False terror charges against local youth inspires Bhatkal boy to become a lawyer

June 4, 2018Community Involvement / Social Issues, Education, Karnataka (under research project)Abdul Azeez Ekkery, Naushad Kashimji, Nehzan Ekkerympositiveone@gmail.com

Bhatkal (Uttara Kannada District) , KARNATAKA :

Bhatkal has got another young man as a lawyer as Mr. Nehzan Ekkery s/o Abdul Azeez Ekkery successfully completed his studies and is poised to step into legal practise soon. Nehzan completed his studies at the School of Law in the prestigious Christ University, Bengaluru and was awarded the BA LLB degree in an official ceremony at his college on Sunday.

At 22, Nehzan Ekkery strikes people as a typical Bhatkali boy with an outgoing demeanour and a disarming smile. It’s when he starts speaking that you get a glimpse into the depth of his mind, the clarity of his purpose and the seriousness with which he grasps the subtle realities of life.

As a young Muslim man, especially as a Bhatkali youth, Nehzan is no stranger to the ongoing violations of human rights by law enforcement agencies in India, who have rounded up hundreds of young Muslims, accusing them of being involved in terrorism. According to a DNA report, hundreds of Muslim youth have been named in terror cases without proof. While this has struck fear in the minds of many young men of the town, for Nehzan, it was the catalyst that put him on his current path. “The fundamental idea that every person is innocent until proven guilty is quite often put to shame by law enforcement agencies, and that was my propelling factor to pursue law as a profession.” He explains. “I was moved when youngsters were being falsely implicated in criminal and anti-terrorism laws consequently being deprived of the right to life and personal liberty for too long.” he adds.

The profile of Mr. Nehzan Ekkery appeals more to the locals and people of Bhatkal because he is one of them. He completed his primary education in Naunihaal Centra School and Anjuman Hami-e-Muslimeen’s Islamia Anglo Urdu High School, both prominent educational establishments in Bhatkal. He later enrolled at Ryan International School in Surat and in 2013, was selected to study at the prestigious School of Law at the Christ University. He completed the five-year integrated program of BBA + LLB (Honors) with flying colors.
Nehzan is up for a flying start as he is beginning his practise as junior of Advocate K. Diwakara (legal advisor for Karnataka’s State Government). He willl be working in the High Court and other lower courts of Karnataka and will be handling Civil, Criminal and Arbitration matters.

With an inspiring confidence, he states that “he wants to be the thorn in sight of injustice, be the necessary disruption, a distraction with the passion that transcends the confines of my own consciousness and play my part, howsoever little in reinstating the faith in justice system.” He has been an active proponent against the government endorsed absurdity, policy paralysis and excesses of law and aims to play an imperative role in socio-political system with the instrument of law.

The Bhatkali community has seen an encouraging rise in the number of lawyers among locals in the last few years. The number saw a significant rise after a famous lawyer of the region, Naushad Kashimji was gunned down in Mangalore in 2009. Naushad’s shocking death had united the community at that time and many young men ha d vowed that they will avenge his death by becoming lawyers themselves. The trend caught on and currently, the town has several young lawyers who have established themselves not only in their practise but also in the public sphere as socio-political leaders.

source: http://www.sahilonline.net / Sahil Online / Home / source: S.O. News Service / Coastal News – National News – Special Report / June 02nd, 2018

A miracle of faith, this Varanasi mosque was built in a night

June 4, 2018UncategorizedDr. Abdul Waheed Ansari, Ek Raat Ki Masjid, Ek Raat Ki Masjid - Benares, Ek Raat Ki Masjid - Varanasimpositiveone@gmail.com

Varanasi, UTTAR PRADESH :

Varanasi :

Ek Raat Ki Masjid – the name catches one’s attention immediately for its uniqueness.

Believed to have been built in one night, the mosque is located in a narrow lane of Varanasi’s Lallapura, an area famous for the master weavers who turn silk yarn into Banarsi sarees and stoles.

Some of the visitors, who walk through the lanes to watch sarees being woven on handloom, also go to see the mosque.

Dr Abdul Waheed Ansari, a local scholar, says, “The mosque is known as Ek Raat Ki Masjid since it was built in a night around 175 years ago. A faqir had taken the initiative for its construction and locals helped him implement his plan.”

Dr Ansari says many people express surprise when they learn the mosque was built in a night…

source: http://www.htsyndication.com / HTDS Content Services / Varanasi – June 02nd, 2018

Ramadan 1439: Shaista Yacoob

June 3, 2018Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Business & Economy, Karnataka (under research project)Book 'Heartbeat', Shaista Yacoob, Shaista's Little Kitchen - Bengaluru, Shaista's Little Kitchen - Founder - Shaista Yacoobmpositiveone@gmail.com

Bengaluru, KARNATAKA :

Shaista Yacoob, 43, is a writer, poet based in Bangalore. Born and brought up in Bangalore, she has been living in Benson Town since Childhood. She has done journalism in College. Recently, she started a small catering business called Shaista’s Little Kitchen.

“It has been a few years since I have been learning the Quran. It is very difficult to understand the true meaning of the Quran, unless you have someone to teach you. I have always read the Quran, but understanding it’s true meaning is very tough.”

“I really want to put in the effort of learning it. You have to understand the context of what was said and why it was said. There has been a reason, there has been a context, a moment in the prophet’s life when something has happened, and the revelations came on him. So we have to know the situation to understand what it is all about.”

I saw a friend of mine recently who is also learning the Quran. She found a few things in Quran which she thought were very demeaning to women. but then when she went and researched, she realised what she had been thinking is not what the Quran says. It was actually a very beautiful interpretation of a woman.”

Her earliest memory of Ramadan was of an old man who used to come to the locality to wake everyone up for Sehri. She says “I remember this old, frail man, so bent and concave, he used to come every morning with a duff. This year he did not come. I don’t know why, but he came every year without fail. It is a beautiful moment when you wake up in the morning for sehri. God has said that he is listening, and that there is no veil between you and him, at that moment.”

” It is a magical month, Ramadan. It leaves you with a new feeling. After it is over, it is a big turmoil, its very challenging. You are so much in the mode of this month. Your soul is peaceful and your desires limited that coming out of it is not easy.”

TCN Series: Ramadan 1439

source: http://www.twocircles.net / TwoCircles.net / Home> Indian Muslim> Lead Story> Women / by Poornima Marh, TwoCircles.net / June 02nd, 2018

Mohammad Kaif Mulla of Belagavi is the state topper in SSLC after revaluation

June 3, 2018Amazing Feats, Education, Karnataka (under research project)Harun Rashid Mulla, Mohammad Kaif Mulla, Mohammad Kaif Mulla - First from Belagavi to Top in SSLC in Karnataka, Mohammad Kaif Mulla - Karnatata State Topper - SSLC - 2018, Mohammad Kaif Mulla - St. Xavier's High School - Belagavi, Mohammad Kaif Mulla - Topper in SSLC - 2018mpositiveone@gmail.com

Belagavi, KARNATAKA :

He scored a perfect 625 out of 625

Belagavi :

Mohammad Kaif Mulla, student of St. Xavier’s High School has topped the state in the SSLC examination with 625 marks out of 625.

Kaif Mulla had secured 624 marks when the SSLC results were announced. While he had scored cent percent in all the subjects, he got 99 in Science. But Kaif was confident that he did not make any mistake in the subject and should get full marks, and applied for revaluation.

His confidence was proved true when he scored a perfect 100 out of 100 in Science after revaluation. With 625 out of 625 marks Kaif Mulla is the topper in the state. He is also the first from Belagavi District to top the state in SSLC examination.

Kaif’s father Harun Rashid Mulla teaches Kannada in a government high school, while his mother teaches Urdu in a government primary school. This topper wants to be a doctor and then pursue his dream to become an IAS officer.

source: http://www.english.varthabharati.in / Vartha Bharati / Home> Karnataka / May 30th, 2018

Prof. Durrani Passes Away

June 2, 2018Community Involvement / Social Issues, Education, Karnataka (under research project), LeadersDurrani Manzil - Mysuru, Masjid - e - Umar Khan - BN Road - Mysuru, Prof. M.I.K. Durrani - Founder Principal - MES First Grade College - Mysuru, Prof. M.I.K. Durrani - President - Muslim Education Society - Mysuru, Prof. Mohammed Ismail Khan Durrani, Prof.M.I.K. Durrani, Professor Durraini, Professor M.I.K. Durrani, Professor Mohammed Ismail Khan Durranimpositiveone@gmail.com

Mysuru, KARNATAKA :

Mysuru:

Prof. Mohammed Ismail Khan Durrani, popularly known as Prof. M.I.K. Durrani (91), passed away in the wee hours of today at his residence ‘Durrani Manzil’ on B.N. Road, Mandi Mohalla.

He leaves behind his wife, two daughters, grand-children and a host of relatives and friends.

Namaz-e-Janaza was offered at Masjid-e-Umar Khan, B.N. Road, at 11.30 am followed by burial at Old Khabarasthan, behind Central Jail, Mysuru.

Profile: Prof. Durrani used to occasionally write a column titled Recollections…which was very popular among Star of Mysore readers during 2012-2016.

Prof. Durrani joined University of Mysore as a Lecturer in English in 1950, immediately after getting his BA (Hons) degree. Except for about three years during which he worked as a Lecturer at Intermediate College, Mandya, Prof. Durrani taught English at the constituent colleges of University of Mysore for 35 years.

He was associated with Yuvaraja’s College as a Lecturer and later on as a Reader for a major part of his career (about 25 years). In the year 1983, he was transferred to University Evening College as Professor of English from where he retired in 1988.

During his career as a Lecturer at Yuvaraja’s College, Prof. Durrani also served as an NCC Officer apart from producing and directing several English dramas.

After retirement, he joined the Muslim Educational Society, Mysuru, as an Executive Committee member and became the Founder-Principal of MES First Grade College in 1995. He also served as the President of Muslim Educational Society which is catering to the educational needs of the community from nursery to college level.

source: http://www.starofmysore.com / Star of Mysore / Home> News / June 01st, 2018

Muslim Girl From Mandya Meets PM Modi: Thanks Him For His Help To Pursue MBA

June 2, 2018Community Involvement / Social Issues, Education, Karnataka (under research project)Abdul Iliyaz, Abdul Iliyaz - Mysore Sugar Mills, B.B. Sarah, BB Sarahmpositiveone@gmail.com

Mandya, KARNATAKA :

Bengaluru:

Karnataka Assembly election witnessed a heart-warming incident amid a communally polarised environment. A Muslim girl from Mandya met Prime Minister Narendra Modi to thank him for providing financial assistance to pursue her education. She came all the way from Mandya to say “thank you” to the Prime Minister whose personal intervention enabled her to fulfil her higher education dream.

B.B. Sarah and her family members met Narendra Modi on stage at an election rally in Bengaluru on May 8 and presented him the book, ‘The Buddha and His Dhamma.’ The Prime Minister was humbled by her gesture and turned emotional on stage. He blessed her and wished her good luck for her future.

Sarah had written to the Prime Minister about her poor financial condition and requested him to provide financial assistance to her so that she could pursue MBA. She dreamt to do a masters course after scoring 83% in B.Com.

Her father Abdul Iliyaz, who works in Mysore Sugar Mill, had not received his salary for months, which left Sarah unable to find Rs.1.5 lakh that she needed to pay her tuition fees. She tried applying for loans, but was rejected by several banks as the financial condition of her family was bad.

That is when she wrote to the Prime Minister. To her surprise, the PMO responded to her letter in about 10 days and had asked the then State Chief Secretary Subhash Chandra Khuntia to take necessary steps to help the girl. She was subsequently sanctioned a loan of Rs.1.5 lakh by Vijaya Bank.

Before she wrote to the Prime Minister, the Central Bank of India had turned down her loan application owing to her poor financial background. Even after the communication was received by the Bank, the Central Bank Manager allegedly told her “we have done our duty and you have also done your duty. But it is not possible to sanction the loan.” Later, moved by Sarah’s case, Vijaya Bank sanctioned the loan.

It may be recalled here that Star of Mysore, on Mar.21, 2017, had published Sarah’s story in a report titled “PM Modi opens door for Muslim girl’s education in Mandya; Directs Bank to provide educational loan”

“I would like to personally meet Modi and thank him for helping me with education loan at a time when I was in urgent need. I was watching ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ programme on TV and this inspired me to write to the PM. I wish that Modi will bring out a scheme to help talented students like me who want to get involved with higher studies but face financial constraints to do so,” she said.

After meeting the Prime Minister, Sarah said, “Despite being a national leader, he is attached with the population. Whatever schemes he has initiated, he has implemented them. He has not launched them just for name sake purpose,” Sarah said. The girl’s father echoing similar sentiments lauded the Prime Minister for his apt response. “It’s quite unbelievable that out of 125 crore population, he took notice of Sarah’s letter and helped her,” he said.

Sarah has now completed MBA flying colours has now been employed in a multinational company in Bengaluru.

source: http://www.starofmysore.com / Star of Mysore / Home> News / May 10th, 2018

With IIT-K startup’s help, Lucknow firm ready for drone delivery of food

June 1, 2018Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Business & Economy, Travel & TourismAhad Arshad, Ahad Arshad - CoFounder - OnlineKaka, Bilal Arshad, Bilal Arshad - CoFounder - OnlineKaka, OnlineKaka, OnlineKaka - Lucknow - Uttar Pradesh, Salmanmpositiveone@gmail.com

Lucknow, UTTAR PRADESH :

Kolkata/Lucknow:

In a first, an IIT-Kanpur startup, in association with a Lucknow-based food delivery firm, successfully flown in flasks of freshly brewed tea on the doorsteps of its customers in the city of nawabs.

TechEagle Innovations, founded and run by IIT Kanpur graduate Vikram Singh Meena, pilot-tested delivery of two litres of hot tea with the help of battery-powered and GPS-fitted drones on May 23. It has developed the specialised drone to drop-ship a consignment up to 2 kg within a 10-km-radius of its take-off station with just a single click of a mouse. TechEagle has joined hands with OnlineKaka, a Lucknow-based food delivery startup, for these test flights.

“We have successfully delivered world’s first chai via drone. Now, we would provide these mean machines to other food delivery startups like Zomato, Swiggy and Foodpanda. To begin with, we plan to venture out in north India,” Meena told TOI.

Talking about the drone-delivery model, Bilal Arshad, who founded OnlineKaka, along with friend Ahad Arshad and Salman, said: “It’s not like the customer will directly receive the order from the whirring gadget. The drones would be flown and received by our executives at different points and because they would not be commuting through the busy streets, it would cut down the delivery time drastically.” Although the cost implications would be known only after a full-fledged launch of the service, both Bilal and Ahad said they would try to ensure that there was no extra burden for the customer as they would be saving on commuting. At present, they charge Rs 59 per delivery.

Although the trial was conducted with DGCA’s permission, the firs is yet to get a nod for the regular service. “The DGCA had said the norms for drone delivery would be specified in January but it hasn’t come through. It is now expected sometime in July. In sync with the Civil Aviation ministry, the DGCA would mark zones for the drone flights and assign altitude, etc, besides issuing licence for each gadget. The pilots hired for the drones would be another factor to determine cost of operation,” said Ahad.

Interestingly, there are no active drone-based food delivery services in the world. UberEats, the largest grub-delivery platform which has recently opened shop in India, has recently tested a similar drone-based delivery in San Diego, US.

In October last year, global e-tail giant Amazon had filed patent for delivery of products via drones in India.

In 2014, an unmanned drone was used to deliver a pizza to a flat in a high rise in Worli, Mumbai. Another drone startup, based out of Kanpur, called Aarav Unmanned Systems, raised a bridge round funding In April 2016.

However, many firms and startups, who are raring to begin unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) or drone-based commercial operations (like door-to-door delivery, aerial mapping, infrastructure monitoring and product transport) across the country, have hit a regulatory roadblock as India’s sky watchdog, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), hasn’t yet formulated a final official policy for the same. Although, Goldman Sachs has estimated that drone industry will be worth $125 billion globally by 2020.

The founding members of TechEagle Innovations started designing and manufacturing since 2015 in the garage of IIT Kanpur hostel and formed the B2B tech startup only in January 2017.

“Our startup develops custom-made drones of both types — rotary wing and fixed wing — which can carry 500gm to 5kg payload. The wingspan ranges between 60cm and five-meter, flight time varies between 30 min and two hours,” added Meena.

“The drone-based delivery system came to our minds when we saw real-life problems like traffic jams affecting delivery services, especially food transportation. Then, we partnered with Online Kaka,” the TechEagle CEO said.

TechEagle plans to expand its services across the country based on need and resources. “We have analyzed that around 10-15 drones can be deployed in one city. Our drones can traverse 10 metres in one second and one single trip can last up to 20 minutes. So, it can fly up to 6km to deliver tea and come back to its take-off spot. We are doing research on batteries to increase the payload capacity and flight time,” Meena added.

On the likely cost of food or tea to be delivered via drones, Meena signed off by saying, “Quality and price of tea or any food items will be handled and decided by the food delivery firms, who will use our drones, instead of a bike or a motor van. We can’t disclose the exact selling prices of the drones at present. But when the service becomes fully functional, our drone delivery will definitely be cheaper than the current modes of transportation. We are in talks with quite a few food delivery startups.”

There was a time in the city when one could order little from home other than pizza. It was 2016 and while big names like food panda and zomato were foraying into the Lucknow market, a startup with just two delivery boys caught the fancy of locals, whose staple feast is the kabab-biryani fare. “Our shoestring budget did not allow a lavish ad campaign, so we relied more on word of mouth,” said Ahad Arshad, who founded OnlineKaka, along with friend Bilal Arshad, adding.

Founded in 2016, OnelineKaka is a popular service in Lucknow for delivery and is preferred for delivery from iconic joints from crowded Old City. “It saves people the trouble of commuting to the crowded, jammed areas and they could enjoy kabab-paratha, biryani, kulcha-nihari in the comfort of home,” Bilal says. Today, they have a 125-strong army of delivery boys and an equal number of vendors on their panel, with over 500 new joints in queue. From a turnover of Rs 20 lakh in their first year, they have notched Rs 5 crore and recorded a 15% growth per month, said the founders.

“There was a minimum-order rider in the beginning but now we deliver the smallest of orders,” said Ahad, adding that their latest offering was delivery of the city’s favourite chai and bun-makhan, anywhere. “The packing ensures you get your cuppa steaming hot but with a successful run of delivery by drone, we hope to pick up more orders in this segment,” he added.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> News> City News> Lucknow News / by Sovan Manna / TNN / June 01st, 2018