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Uday Kumar (IIT B grad.) with the symbol of Indian Rupee that he designed
Until now the Indian currency "Rupee" has been denoted by the abbreviation 'Rs' or INRs to distinguish it from neighboring countries like Pakistan and Sri Lanka which also have rupees as their currencies.
From now onIndia will have the Hindi character closest to 'R' with a horizontal line crossing the middle as the symbol of Indian currency "Rupee".
The new design will now be incorporated into India's IT systems and feature on computer keyboards.
Introducing it into commercial use is expected to be expensive – the advent of the euro in 1999 is believed to have cost companies more than $50 billion.
Ambika Soni, India's information minister, said the new design will "distinguish the rupee from other currencies."
The symbol will catapult the rupee into the company of four ‘elite’ currencies which have similarly distinct identities — the US dollar, euro, yen and British pound.
The symbol has been designed by D Udaya Kumar, an IIT Bombay post-graduate , who has just joined as a teacher at IIT Guwahati. Kumar will receive a prize money of Rs 2.5 lakh for his efforts. The symbol will standardize the expression for the Indian rupee in different languages, both within and outside the country.
‘‘ It’s a big statement on the Indian currency. It would distinguish the rupee from those countries whose currencies are also designated as rupee or rupiah, such as Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Indonesia,’’ I&B minister Ambika Soni said after the Cabinet meeting. The symbol, she added, would reflect the strength and robustness of the Indian economy.
an Indian government official showing the symbol of Indian Rupee
Recently came across this "Commemorative" issue of the current-affa magazineFrontline which they had released in celebration of their 25th anniversary.
*Frontline (ISSN 0970-1710) is a fortnightly English language magazine published by The Hindu Group of publications from Chennai, India. Narasimhan Ram is the Editor-in-Chief of the magazine. As a current affairs magazine, it covers domestic and International news. Frontline gives a prominent place to various issues of development and hindrances in the Indian states. Apart from topics of politics and political economy, it also covers a wide range of topics including Arts, books, cinema, Science and English language.
N Ram is the editor-in-chief of Frontline Magazine. awarded the Padma Bhushan by the Government of India. He is referred to as a left-wing editor and known to believe in left/communist ideology.
Barack Obama, a 47-year-old first-term senator from Illinois, shattered more than 200 years of history by winning election as the first African-American president of the United States. He is the 44th US Head of State and defeated Republican Senator John McCain. One of his first decisions was to set a year's deadline to close the Guantanamo Bay prison where captured Al Qaeda suspects were kept.
Velupillai Prabhakaran - father of LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) KILLED & End of Sri Lanka's Cataclysmic Civil War - Velupillai Prabhakaran (November 26, 1954 – May 18, 2009) was the founder and leader of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (the LTTE or the Tamil Tigers), a militant organization that sought to create an independent Tamil state in the north and east of Sri Lanka. For over 25 years, the LTTE waged a violent secessionist campaign in **Sri Lanka that led to it being designated a terrorist organization by 32 countries. Prabhakaran was wanted by Interpol for terrorism, murder, organized crime and terrorism conspiracy. He also had arrest warrants against him in Sri Lanka and India.
Methane was found by NASA on Mars planet proving that the Mars planet is either biologically or geologically alive.
Water in form of Hydroxyl molecules (one oxygen atom with one hydrogen atom) was found by NASA's "Moon Minerology Mapper" instaled atop India's "Chandryaan"
The Indian student community witnessed a spate of attacks in Australia in 2009. One of the first attacks to be reported was that of Shravan Kumar, who received serious head injuries. He was attacked on May 23 by a group of Australian teenagers armed with screwdrivers. Soon after about 4,000 Indian university students staged demonstration in central Melbourne to get the attention of both Indian and Australian govts against the violent and racist attacks on Indians in Australia.
US President Barack Obama has been awarded the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel Committee said he won it for "his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and co-operation between peoples". In his speech at Oslo, Obama defended the US role in Afghanistan and said that the use of force could bring lasting peace.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected as head of state in June 2009. Observers and Ahmedinejad's rivals, mainly key opponent Mir Hossein Mousavi, alleged that the polls were managed to ensure the incumbent's victory. Popular protests broke out in several parts of the country leading to many countries expressing their concern over the repressive measures taken by Iranian security agencies to quell the demonstrations.
Pop star Michael Jackson died in Los Angeles at the age of 50. He is survived by his three children, Prince Michael, Paris Michael Katharine Jackson and Prince Michael (II), popularly known as Blanket. As confirmed by the Los Angeles coroner, his death was a homicide, primarily caused by the powerful anaesthetic Propofol. It is being suspected that his personal physician Conrad Murray administered the drug to him. His funeral was televised across the globe. MJ's film This Is It that maps the last days of the star received a massive opening.
North Korea says it has staged a successful underground nuclear test, prompting international condemnation. It is being said that it was more powerful than the previous one in October 2006.
Hamid Karzai got another term as Afghanistan's president when his only opponent, former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, withdrew from a run-off in November. The run-off was scheduled since Karzai had won just over 50 per cent of the popular vote in an election that was marred by charges of irregularities.
On Feb 11, 2009, the Zimbabwean Opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai, was sworn in as the Prime Minister and he agreed to share power with his arch rival, Robert Mugabe. Less than a month after his appointment as PM, Tsvangirai's wife was killed in a car crash in which he was also slightly hurt.
Just when the world thought that the worst of the recession was almost over, Dubai crisis came as a shocker and it put the global markets in a spin. In the last week of Nov, the Dubai govt announced it was planning to ask creditors to freeze repayment of debt worth billions of dollars to two of its flagship firms - Dubai World and real estate developer Nakheel. Dubai World, which runs 49 ports around the world, is the conglomerate that spearheaded the Emirate's breakneck growth. It has USD 60 billion in liabilities and will seek a six-month standstill on its debts with all lenders. Nakheel was the builder of the famous three palm-shaped islands off the coast of Dubai.
A country torn apart by terror, Pakistan found a reason to smile by winning the ICC World Twenty20 in 2009. Under Younus Khan's refreshing hands-on leadership, the mercurial team recovered from a poor start and found form just at the right time. In the semis, they choked favourites South Africa. In the June 21 final at Lord's, they decimated Sri Lanka, thanks to the seasoned Shahid Afridi's all-round exploits. It was a poignant moment in the country's history. Last ICC World Twenty20 cup was won by INDIA.
In late 2008, Facebook approached the trendy microblogging site about a potential merger. Zuckerberg offered Twitter company stock — about $500 million worth — but in March 2009, Facebook confirmed the rumors that Twitter had turned down the offer of the merger.
Heath Ledger's was awarded the Academy Award for Best supporting Actor's role of the "Joker" in the film "Batman : The Dark Night". It was decided that the Joker's chrachter will now never be enacted by any other actor on-screen.
One of the biggest trends in online video was the emergence of demand — and supply — for live video. Live online video particularly suited daytime news events (when people are at work in front of computers). Millions online watched the inauguration of President Barack Obama and the funeral of Michael Jackson.
Windows 7 's activation code was cracked by OEM master key
A huge sandstorm engulfed the Saudi capital of Riyadh on March 10. Authorities announced that visibility in the city had dropped to zero. The blinding storm also enveloped neighboring Kuwait.
The largest egg in the world in London on March 2 was showcased. The now extinct Great Elephant Bird of Madagascarto laid the egg in the early 17th century. It was on sale for $7,340 at the Chelsea Antiques Fair beginning March 26.
In April, police in Sydney, Australia, released this X-ray of the skull of Chen Liu, 27, who died after being shot in the head with a nail gun 34 times. Liu's bound body was found in a river in November 2008. The photo was released as part of a public plea for more information in the case.
A montage pictures former President George W. Bush morphing into President Barack Obama was put up by a student during an April 9 event in Tehran, Iran, marking the anniversary of the U.S. freezing diplomatic ties with the nation. The U.S. broke off diplomatic ties with Tehran during the 1979-81 hostage crisis in which a group of militant Iranian students held 52 U.S. diplomats hostage at the American Embassy for 444 days.
Australian performance artist Stelarc showed his third "ear" at a science festival in Edinburgh, Scotland, on April 13. Stelarc, whose real name is Stelios Arcadiou, had the piece of human cartilage surgically implanted on his arm in 2006. He said he hopes to install transmitters in his new ear, so people can listen to what it is hearing online.
Sultan Kosen, 27, from Mardin, Turkey, was named the world's tallest man on Sept. 17. He is 8 feet, 1 inch tall. Guinness World Records gave him the title after a rival candidate, Ukrainian Leonid Stadnyk, refused to be measured.
Joel Waul, 28, climbed atop his rubber band ball outside his home in Lauderhill, Fla., Oct. 23. Waul had spent the past six years building the 6-foot, 7-inch-tall, 9,032-pound behemoth, but now his work is done. A team from Ripley's Believe It or Not hauled the ball away in a large, flatbed truck. It will be featured in one of the company's museums.
Guinness World Records named Titan, a 4-year-old Great Dane, the world's tallest dog. The pooch stands 42.25 inches from floor to shoulder and weighs 190 pounds. Owner Diana Taylor says Titan is blind, deaf and epileptic, and undergoes acupuncture and chiropractic adjustments every three weeks.
In one of the stranger save-the-Earth campaigns, a Brazilian environmental group asked people to save water by peeing in the shower -- a move that could save 1,000 gallons of water annually, or so the group claimed in public service announcements.
the broken down Pakistan: The country that poses the greatest threat to U.S. security may be neither of those in which the U.S. is embroiled. Beset by feckless leadership, riven by class divisions, preoccupied with its rivalry with India and dotted with militant groups that claim sprawling hinterlands as theirs, Pakistan devolved into a miasma of terrorism and political malaise. The death of firebrand Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud in an August drone strike ratcheted up the stakes. After months of planning, Pakistan launched Operation Path to Deliverance in October, sending 28,000 troops into insurgent-infested South Waziristan to confront a confederation of militant groups. As threatened, extremists responded by unleashing a torrent of attacks throughout the country.
H1N1 Flu was detected in USA. This story is far from finished as the year ends. Scientists warn that the virus could mutate into a far deadlier form. With the world already grappling with a pandemic of 2009 H1N1 influenza, no treatment was more hotly anticipated or more in demand in the U.S. (and the rest of the northern hemisphere) than the new H1N1 vaccine when flu season officially kicked off in the fall. Despite the fact that the vaccine had proved effective in trials with one dose — rather than two, as researchers had originally expected — the vaccine supply from U.S. manufacturers still couldn't keep pace with demand in the first weeks of October, when the first million or so shots rolled off production lines. In many places around the country, there was not enough vaccine even to cover members of priority groups targeted by the government, including young children, pregnant women, health care workers, parents of infants younger than 6 months and those with underlying conditions such as asthma or diabetes. And yet according to the latest polls, 55% of Americans said they would not get the new vaccine — which was created and tested in record time after H1N1 first appeared last spring — because of worries about its safety.
Northwest Flight 253 terror attack was foiled. Suspect Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab is in detention.
Tiger Woods infidelity became public forcing the golf icon to apologize and quit golf indefinitely. He remains aloof from the media.
In a field that has seen more failure than success, experts received the news of an effective new AIDS vaccine with a fair share of skepticism. In September, a $105 million trial of a novel combination of two older vaccines was the first to show protection against HIV infection. The results of the trial, which involved more than 16,000 volunteers, suggested that the vaccine was 31% effective at preventing infection among those who were inoculated. It was a modest outcome, given that behavior-based prevention methods, like condom use, can be equally if not more effective. The volunteers were also largely heterosexual and monogamous, putting them at low-to-moderate risk for HIV infection — rather than high-risk, like intravenous drug users — and prompting questions about how impressive the results of the study really were. But given that no other inoculation has shown any effect against the AIDS virus, it was reason to celebrate — cautiously.
New Species were discovered: Ratzilla, Teeny T. Rex, Glow-in-the-Dark 'Shrooms, Land of the Pink Iguana, New Spiders from New Guinea, Frog Bonanza in Madagascar, Dinosaur Named Zac, The World's Weirdest Fish "Histiophryne psychedelica " & Himalayan Hoard.
In the deadliest assault on a military base in the U.S. in history, Major Nidal Malik Hasan rampaged through Fort Hood in Texas on Nov. 5, killing 13 people — including 12 troops — and wounding more than 30. An Army psychiatrist charged with caring for soldiers scarred by a war he was scared to join, Hasan was cast by some as a shattered loner driven to madness by the prospect of fighting against fellow Muslims in Afghanistan. Others feared that he was a harbinger of the future of terrorism: single-person cells activated by little else than virtual adherence to an extremist creed headquartered in a cave. But as critics noted, before Hasan snapped, he hoisted a series of warning signs, including a PowerPoint deck castigating U.S. foreign policy, Internet posts glorifying suicide bombers and e-mail exchanges with a radical Yemeni cleric. Critics have suggested that Army officials failed to respond to the barrage of red flags because they feared accusations of racial profiling.
After six years of chasing elusive dark matter in the depths of northern Minnesota’s old Soudan mine, researchers reported in December that they have detected two signals from what could be the mysterious particles believed to function as invisible glue that binds the universe.
A pregnant Muslim woman from Egypt, Marwa al-Sherbini, 32, was stabbed to death in a German courtroom before her husband and young son. Marwa al-Sherbini, 32, was killed by a man whom she had testified against for verbal abuse due to her wearing an Islamic headscarf. The circumstances of the death of El-Sherbini, who was pregnant at the time, resulted in widespread international reactions. The assailant was subsequently sentenced to life imprisonment.
Controversial husband of assassinated former Pakistani Prime minister Benazir Bhutto who is the President of Pakistan lost his indemnity under NRO – a controversial amnesty package declared illegal by the country’s Supreme Court.
U.N. Climate-Change Summit: Climate insiders call it the COP, or Conference of the Parties, but the climate-change summit in Copenhagen isn't likely to be anyone's idea of a fiesta. It was meant to be the culmination of two years of hard negotiations toward a new, effective global-climate treaty that would supplant the expiring Kyoto Protocol. But expectations for Copenhagen have been tamped down, as developed nations and developing countries continue to disagree over who should bear the bulk of the responsibility for cutting carbon. That doesn't mean Copenhagen will be a total failure, though. Sleep-deprived negotiators were still planning to address issues like deforestation, and they might even construct the basic architecture of a legally binding deal. But fleshing out the deal will require.
The term "Unfriend" used to describe the act of removing someone from a Facebook friend list was officially listed in the New Oxford American Dictionary on Nov. 17. Added to the dictionary, along with a number of technologically inspired terms such as hashtag (a Twitter term) and "sexting" (the sending of suggestive text messages), unfriend was also named Oxford's Word of the Year. Grammarians complain that the term should be defriend, not unfriend. Facebook's stance? "The folks at Oxford are the experts on language," they said in a statement to New York magazine. "We'll leave it up to them to decide.
A survey revealed that Twenty-seven million slaves exist in the world today, more than at any time in human history. Globalization, poverty, violence, and greed facilitate the growth of slavery, not only in the Third World, but in the most developed countries as well. Behind the façade in any major town or city in the world today, one is likely to find a thriving commerce in human beings.
If you post a photo to Facebook, the company is allowed to use it for promotional purposes (within the realm of your personal privacy settings). But once you delete your account, the content belongs to you again. At least, that's how it used to be. In February, Facebook changed its Terms of Service (TOS) agreement to claim ownership of any content posted to a profile — even after the user deletes it or closes the account. Naturally, people were outraged. Nearly 45,000 Facebook members joined site groups to protest the new TOS rules, and for once, angry Web rants actually made a difference. Facebook apologized and reverted to its old rules. Your embarrassing party photos are still yours to keep.
A news revealed that begining in April 2003, one month after the invasion of Iraq, and continuing for little more than a year, the United States Federal Reserve shipped $12 billion in US currency to Iraq. The US military delivered the bank notes to the Coalition Provisional Authority, to be dispensed for Iraqi reconstruction. At least $9 billion is unaccounted for due to a complete lack of oversight.
Facebook has a quirky sense of humor. After the technology website TechCrunch poked fun at the social-networking giant once too often, it responded by changing the responsible reporters' personal Facebook pages to include a "Fax this Photo" option. When befuddled scribe Jason Kincaid e-mailed the company to inquire about the ridiculous new feature, a member of Facebook's p.r. team responded, "We already faxed you a statement on this. Didn't you get it?" Facebook claimed they'd been working on the feature since 1992. Kincaid immediately wrote about the photo-faxing feature. "Maybe I'm missing something here," he wrote on TechCrunch, "but I'm not sure why Facebook would do this." He pointed out that faxed photos are of notoriously bad quality and that e-mail works much better, concluding that the new feature was "a stupid idea." Facebook finally admitted that it was having a laugh at Kincaid's expense, and TechCrunch issued a correction. It seems there was even an office bet going to see how long it would take someone to write about it.
Chief of Pakistan's terror organization Tehreek-i-Taliban Baitullah Mehsud is killed by a drone strike.
It's just as well that Titanoboa cerrejonensis went extinct nearly 60 million years ago. A forebear of modern anacondas and boa constrictors, this long-gone snake weighed in at a ton and stretched 45 ft. or more in length — far bigger than the biggest snake alive today. It was so big, in fact, that when paleontologists first dug the bones out of an open-pit coal mine in Colombia, they thought they had found a crocodile. the extinct "Titanoboa" snake - far bigger than the biggest snake alive today - made its formal debut in the journal Nature in February. The prehistoric snake is important not just for what it says about snakes but for what it says about climate: to survive at that size, the average equatorial temperature had to have been between 86°F and 93°F, compared with today's 82°F. That could be where our climate is heading in the future. And if it is, the last thing we'll need to worry about is the return of Titanoboa.
Top 10 Gadgets launched in market 1. Motorola Droid 2. The Nook 3. Dyson Air Multiplier 4. iPhone 3GS 5. Canon EOS-1D Mark IV 6. Dell Adamo XPS 7. FinePix Real 3D W1 8. Casio G-Shock GW7900B-1 9. Beats Solo by Dr. Dre 10. Panasonic G10 Series Plasma HDTVs
Facebook just keeps getting bigger. The social network that started 2009 with 150 million members signed up No. 200 million in April, and by September it had amassed 300 million — an average growth rate this year of about 550,000 new members a day. And with that growth came new demographics: 71% of Facebook users now live outside the U.S., and many of them are older than the site's original college-age demographic. But even more surprising than Facebook's exponential popularity was the announcement that, for the first time ever, the company was making money. Not too shabby for a start-up run by a 25-year-old Harvard dropout.
It was eight years in coming — which felt like eons to some researchers — but on March 9, President Obama rescinded his predecessor's Executive Order prohibiting the use of federal money to fund research on stem cells. A congressional law still prevents scientists from using government funds to create new lines of embryonic stem cells, which can develop into any of the body's tissues, but at least scientists are now free to use that money to study the hundreds of stem-cell lines already in existence. Before embarking on such research, however, scientists had to wait for a working group at the National Institutes of Health to vet the stem-cell lines and ensure that they were generated responsibly, according to stringent ethical and scientific principles. In December, the first lines to pass this test became available. The birth of yet another laboratory mouse is hardly worth noting — unless the furry creature is the first to be developed from stem cells that do not involve embryonic cells. That deserves to be called a breakthrough. The new pups, whose creation in two separate labs in China was announced in July, were the first to be bred from induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. These are adult cells (usually skin cells) that scientists reprogram back to their embryonic state by introducing four genes. The reprogrammed stem cells are then programmed again to develop into mice, a feat that has been accomplished before only using embryonic stem cells. Breeding an entire mouse that is itself capable of reproducing — as the mice did in one of the Chinese labs — is a strong sign that iPS cells may be as useful as embryonic stem cells for a potential source of treatments for disease, scientists said.
New Drug for Osteoporosis: Halting osteoporosis, the inevitable weakening of bone, is the best way to avoid the hip and spine fractures that are the leading cause of health problems in the elderly. Current drugs for osteoporosis work by blocking the effect of bone-destroying cells, which increase in number as people age. But a new compound under review by the FDA tackles the problem in a different way — by curbing the formation of the bone-gnawing cells. That tilts the balance in favor of bone-building. In two studies published in August, the experimental compound denosumab was shown to reduce the risk of fractures in postmenopausal women as well as men being treated for prostate cancer, the two largest patient populations at risk for bone loss. What's not clear, however, is how the new drug, if approved, would compare with existing osteoporosis drugs like Fosamax, Boniva and Reclast.
Top 10 Best Business Deals 1. Berkshire Hathaway–Goldman Sachs 2. JPMorgan Chase and the Deals It Didn't Do 3. BB&T-Colonial 4. Berkshire Hathaway–Burlington Northern 5. Ford's $23.6 Billion Loan Grab 6. BlackRock–Barclays Global Investors 7. HP-EDS 8. Google-AdMob
The Sri Lankan government finally triumphed in its bid to destroy the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) when its sustained assault on LTTE territory led to the killing of Tigers chief Velupillai Prabhakaran. The bullet-ridden body of the LTTE chief, who was also an accused in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, was telecast over and over to rub the point home.
After the Lok Sabha fiasco, the turmoil in the BJP plumbed to new depths with all-round attacks on L.K. Advani's leadership. The (RSS) Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and its chief Mohanrao Bhagwat had to step in for course correction, seeking a return to the core identity of Hindutva.
The Congress's good showing in the Lok Sabha polls were reflected in the party's re-election in the assemblies of Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Haryana and Arunachal Pradesh. The party, however, could not turn the tide in Sikkim and Orissa, where the Sikkim Democratic Front and the Biju Janata Dal returned triumphant respectively. A few months after scripting the Congress victory in AP, CM Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy died in a helicopter crash along with four others in early September.
Pushed to the backfoot by the fast unto death of Telangana Rashtra Samithi chief K. Chandrasekhar Rao, the Centre finally consented to carving up Andhra Pradesh by creating a separate Telangana state. The move, however, was met with widespread protests from MLAs and MPs from non-Telangana regions. Praja Rajyam Party chief Chiranjeevi added his bit to the united Andhra cause by submitting his resignation form the Tirupati MLA seat.
Congress leader Jagdish Tytler was set to contest from Delhi's North-east constituency when journalist Jarnail Singh threw his shoe at Home Minister P. Chidambaram in protest against the injustice to victims of the anti-Sikh riots of 1984. Tytler's ticket was withdrawn by the Congress along with that of another 84 riots accused MP-nominee Sajjan Kumar.
The Supreme Court ordered the Special Investigation Team, led by former CBI chief R.K. Raghavan, to probe the involvement of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and his ministers in the post-Godhra riots of 2002. The decision came on the plea of Zakia Jafri, widow of former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri who was hacked dead by a mob outside Gulbarg Society, Ahmedabad.
West Bengal's Lalgarh in West Midnapore district turned into the latest Maoist hotspot when Naxals cashed in on anti-government sentiment following police excesses in a crackdown to ferret out information on attempts to kill Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya. Senior Maoist leader Kobad Ghandy was arrested in New Delhi on September 20. The Centre also announced Operation Greenhunt to combat Maoists.
The ghosts of the Babri Masjid demolition returned to haunt the BJP again as the Justice M.S. Liberhan Commission of Inquiry's report was leaked in the media just before the Winter Session of Parliament. The report held BJP leaders including Atal Bihari Vajpayee, L.K. Advani, M.M. Joshi and others responsible for the act. The report absolved the PV Narasimha Rao government, leading to the BJP questioning the commission's impartiality.
Veteran BJP leader Jaswant Singh was expelled from the party for comments praising Pakistan founder M.A. Jinnah in his book Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence.
The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) got five more years at the country's helm with a good showing at the hustings beating the strong claim of the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) in the General Elections 2009.
Bajaj's announcement to shut down its scooter business marked the end of an era for many, especially the older generation. For the company, it was result of a gradual transition from scooters to bikes as part of its plans to cater to the youth. Its advertisement campaign 'Hamara Bajaj' will live long in the memories of the people, although the scooter would fade away.
Tata Motors launched its small wonder 'NANO' in March this year. Since its introduction, the Nano has received great media attention - be its low price or its manufacturing address. Originally to be manufactured in West Bengal's Singur district, it got a new home in Gujarat's Sanand district following violent protests that forced Tata Motors to pull out from Singur. Now, Nano owners have to deal with the attention on the roads.
In the country's biggest corporate fraud involving Rs 7,000 crore, iconic IT company Satyam was hurtling towards disaster following the shocking disclosure of accounts fudging by its founder Ramalinga Raju, who then quit as chairman - leaving an uncertain future for the company and its 53,000 employees. Raju, who is being housed in Hyderabad's Chanchalguda jail, is facing criminal charges for fraud, forgery, cheating, embezzlement and insider trading.
Talks over a proposed partnership between Bharti Airtel and South Africa's MTN were called off, with Bharti Airtel saying that the South African government is not ready to "accept the deal in its current form."
India may boast of a negative or near zero inflation for most part of 2009, but price rise of essential food items made this year the worst for common man. The price situation that was result of worst drought and floods made the cost of living expensive for many. The Congress-led UPA faced the ire of the political parties for the rising cost of living. With rates of essential items still going up, year 2010 will be watched with lot of expectations.
When the world was reeling under the worst economy downturn, India emerged as a strong economy. The government announced number of packages this year for the Indian economy to bounce back. It did work, but the recovery has been slow. Whether inflation would hurt the economy or the growth would continue is something that will be keenly followed in 2010.
Eyeing the strong Indian auto market, Germany's Volkswagen and Suzuki Motor entered a deal. Under the deal, Volkswagen will buy one-fifth stake in Suzuki for $2.5 billion, tapping the Japanese firm's expertise in small cars and its strong hold in India. They plan to develop a small car for the Indian market. Volkswagen is a new entrant in the Indian market, whereas Suzuki's association with India is very old. It is to be seen how their joint product would do in the competitive Indian market where there are already many small car options to choose from.
Jai Ho composed by A.R. Rahman of Slumdog Millionaire becomes the anthem in 2009. The Slumdog Millionaire film won Oscar'Academy Award' in Best Original Song category for this track. A version featuring the Pussycat Dolls was released with English lyrics.
The Bandra Worli Sea Link 'Rajiv Gandhi Sea Link' is a cable-stayed bridge which links Bandra and the western suburbs of Mumbai with Worli and central Mumbai. The bridge was dedicated to the public on June 30, 2009 by Congress president and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi.
Singur gained international media attention since Tata Motors started constructing a factory to manufacture their $2,500 car, the Tata Nano at Singur. The small car was scheduled to roll out of the factory by 2008. But the project faced massive opposition from displaced farmers. The unwilling farmers were given political support by West Bengal's opposition leader Mamata Bannerjee.
Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee introduces Duronto Express trains in her budget speech. These are a set of specialised rail services by Indian Railways like Rajdhani Express and Shatabdi Express trains. These are the non-stop point to point rail services introduced for the first time in the history of India.
UID (Unique Identification Number) is an initiative by the government of India to create and manage a centralised identification system for all the adult citizens and residents of India, which can be utilised for a variety of identification purposes. Nandan Nilekani former co-chairman of Infosys has been appointed as the head of Unique Identification Authority of India and will have a ministerial rank.
Shedding their reluctance in the face of intense public glare, the Chief Justice of India and all the 20 Supreme Court judges have furnished details of their assets.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) is formed after P. Chidambaram takes over as the new home minister. The agency is seen as a tool to pre-empt 26/11-like attacks.
The Delhi High Court deliveres a historic judgement to amend a 149-year-old colonial-era law- Section 377 of the IPC - and decriminalises private consensual sex between adults of the same sex.
Bollywood's glam couple - Aishwarya Rai-Bachchan and Abhishek Bachchan - is on a roll. Soon after appearing on Oprah Winfrey's show, they bagged their first endorsement together. Aishwarya Rai-Bachchan and Abhishek Bachchan featured in a Lux advertisement for a whopping amount of Rs 7.5 crore. Abhi-Ash's new plush contract makes them the highest-paid pair in the Indian ad world. In their first TV campaign, the Bachchans show their never-seen-before mischievous side. The commercial is set to go on air later this month.
Aamir Khan was seen in an animated avatar for the first time on television commercial for Coca Cola. Conceptualised by adman-turned-lyricist Prasoon Joshi along with Ashish Chakravarty, the ad has been shot by Abhijit Choudhary for the 'Coca-Cola Open Happiness' communication initiative. The ad showcases two girls searching for their friend (Aamir) who is so engaged in playing video games that he has become a part of the virtual world. But when the girls open a bottle of the aerated beverage, Aamir starts to lose his focus from the game and is tempted to come out in real life. The ad ends with Aamir's rival from the game, another animated character, also stepping into the real world to taste the drink.
Swine flu hits various parts of India in 2009. Soon after the outbreak of H1N1 virus in the United States and Mexico in March, the government of India started screening people coming from the affected countries at airports for swine flu symptoms. The rate of transmission of the flu increased in the beginning of August and with the first death due to swine flu in India in Pune, panic began to spread. As of August 14, 2009, 1193 cases of swine flu has been confirmed and 719 people have been discharged with 20 deaths.
Two Supreme Court judges, Justice R.V. Raveendran and Justice Markandey Katju, withdrew from two separate cases related to the Ambani brothers citing conflict of interest.
Human Resource Development Minister Kapil Sibal let the cat loose among the IIT aspirant pigeons when he said the cut-off marks for the IIT entrance test should be increased. Kapil Sibal said, "The present criterion is that students need to secure 60 per cent in Class XII for appearing in IIT-JEE (IIT-Joint Entrance Examination). This is not acceptable. The minimum marks required for IIT-JEE could be raised to 80 to 85 per cent (in the Class XII board examinations). A day later, he changed tack altogether and said the proposal was his "personal view". He said, "The govt has no role to play. The eligibility criteria to appear in the JEE is decided by the IITs themselves."
An FIR was filed against the staff of Continental Airlines as they frisked former president Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, who was boarding a carrier for Newark, US, for breach of protocol. Faced with criticism the airline apologised to Kalam and said it did not intend to offend the former President or the sentiments of the people of the country.
Authorities remain clueless about the glitch in the online Common Admission Test (CAT). The computer crash prevented about 2,000 students from taking the test meant for admissions to the country's leading management institutions. Twenty-four of the 104 CAT centres had reported systems failure.
Manu Sharma, the convict in the 1999 murder case of model Jessica Lall, was granted 30-day parole from jail, on the grounds that Sharma needed to attend to his ailing mother. Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit came under criticism for granting parole to Manu Sharma after media reports of him visiting night clubs in Delhi emerged. As a result of strong public reaction to Manu Sharma's parole, Delhi Government had to cancel his parole and on November 10, Manu returned to Tihar Jail after violation of his parole was confirmed.
The Central Forensic Laboratory in Hyderabad released an information that Aarushi Talwar's vaginal samples were substituted with those of an unknown woman. The correct samples could have helped to establish the killer of the teenager and whether she was sexually assaulted before being stabbed in May, 2008. Delhi Police also recovered the missing mobile phone of Aarushi from Bulandshahr.
A Russian woman, aged 25, has alleged that she was raped by a local Congress politician John Fernandes in Goa in the wee hours of December 2, 2009.
The bogus employees scam hits the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). The biometric attendance system of the civic agency has revealed 22,853 bogus employees, drawing a monthly salary of Rs 17 crore.
The Raj Thackeray-led MNS remained in news for all the wrong reasons in 2009. On October 2, 2009, MNS workers disrupted the screening of the film Wake Up Sid on its release in a few Pune and Mumbai theatres, after a rabble-rousing Raj objected to the city being referred to as 'Bombay' instead of Mumbai. On November 9, 2009, during the Oath taking ceremony of the Maharashtra State Legislative Assembly, MLAs from MNS started a physical confrontation with Samajwadi Party MLA Abu Asim Azmi after he began his oath in Hindi instead of Marathi.
The year saw the release of the most anticipated movie Delhi-6 starring Junior B. Directed by Rakeysh Om Prakash Mehra of Rang De Basanti fame, the movie failed to strike the right chords with the audience. But nevertheless, one of its song Masakkali Masakkali written by Prasoon Joshi & composed by A.R.Rehman became a huge hit.
This year began for Big B with Delhi-6, in which he did a cameo. Then came Sujoy Ghosh's Aladin in which Big B played Genius - the Gennie. But sadly, Aladin didn't manage to impress either the young or the old. Then came Paa, Amitabh Bachchan played the role of a 13-year-old boy suffering from progeria. This is undoubtedly Big B's best ever. This movie also showcased the best makeover of any Indian actor in any movie.
The former boy-next-door Shahid Kapur has become the pin-up boy of Bollywood post Kaminey. Last year (2008) Shahid had just one film Kismat Konnection, which didn't do well at the box office. The actor bounced back with the release of Kaminey in which Shadid Kapoor played a double role. His six-pack abs became the talk of the town. Girls too couldn't stop raving about Shahid and his new persona. The Dhan-te-nan songwritten by Ghulzar & composed by Vishal bhardwaj became an instant top-of-charts hit.
Bollywood's new lucky boy Abhay Deol stole our hearts as Lucky in Dibakar Banerjee's Oye Lucky, Lucky Oye last year. This year saw Abhay Deol playing a modern day Devdas in Anurag Kashyap's Dev D. The movie was embraced by the media, critics and public alike, and is considered to be amongst path breaking films in Hindi for the way it presented itself. Abhay Deol became the latest sensation in Bollywood with this movie. The Emosanal Atyachaar [Emotional Torture] songpenned by Amitabh Bhattacharya, sung by Bony Chakarvarthy & composed by Amit trivedi became an instant hit and a household phrase.
Yuki Bhambri is the future of Indian tennis. On January 31, the former world boys No. 1 won the junior title at the Australian Open, becoming the first Indian to win a singles title at the championship. He graduated from juniors to the senior circuit this year, jumping over 800 ranking spots to 337. He's just 17. And while he appears frail compared to the big-boned and powerful Russians and Hispanics, he could well be the singles champions India have long looked forward to.
India had a very productive year in tennis. Mahesh Bhupathi and Sania Mirza won them the Australian Open mixed doubles. Leander Paes and his Czech partner Lukas Dlouhy then won the French Open men's doubles. The pair followed that up with the US Open title, beating Mahesh Bhupathi and Mark Knowles in an emotionally charged pride-at-stake final. Paes is 36, and Bhupathi 35, but given their passion for doubles, you could mark them down for a few more titles in 2010.
Adam Gilchrist's Deccan Chargers turned the Indian Premier League upside down in the second edition. As the action shifted to South Africa, the bottom-scraping side from Hyderabad powered into the final against Anil Kumble's Royal Challengers, another side that had staged an against-all-odds recovery. Chargers prevailed by six runs in the May 24 final.
Saina Nehwal needed to stamp her authority was a big win. The moment arrived on June 21, when she beat world No. 3 Wang Lin to win the Indonesian Open - India's first Super Series title. The feisty Hyderabadi shuttler is ranked No. 8 at the moment. With another productive year, she could be within sniffing distance of No. 1. The Chinese had better watch out.
Some may discredit the Indian football team by saying they play against low-ranked opponents. But Bhaichung Bhutia's men had to punch above their weight to retain the Nehru Cup 2009. Syria, their opponents in the final, were ranked 64 places above India. The final remained goal-less for 114 minutes. Then, Renedy Singh put India in front. Syria equalised seconds before the whistle. In the penalty shootout, goalkeeper Subrata Pal eyeballed the powerful Syrian strikers, standing before them like an inpenetrable wall. His saves won India their second straight Nehru Cup title.
There are multiple views on the effectiveness of the Indian cricket team. But even their staunchest critics would agree that MS Dhoni's boys have played some great cricket in recent times. This would be the year that the team became No. 1 in ODIs and Tests, both for the first time. In September during the Champions Trophy, India were No. 1 briefly, before being quickly pushed down to No. 2 by Australia. But they would finish 2009 as the No. 1 Test side after thumping the higher-ranked Sri Lanka 2-0.
The Master blaster Sachin Tendulkar completed an incredible 20 years in international cricket on November 15. He promptly followed up that amazing feat with his 17000th run in one-day internationals during a goose bump-inducing knock of 175 against Australia. Days later, he completed 30,000 runs in international cricket. Where would he stop? We can only guess.
It's getting harder to find adjectives to describe Virender Sehwag. Genius? Freak? God-man? Madman? On December 3, the India opener Virender Sehwag plundered Sri Lanka for a mind-boggling 284 runs in a day, while we searched for words to describe his audacity. The next day, he fell short of being the first man ever to score three Test match triple hundreds. But here's some consolation: he's the only man since Don Bradman to cross 290 thrice in Tests. Some feat.
A video that emerged during the Lok Sabha election campaign allegedly showed BJP leader Varun Gandhi making communal remarks at an election rally following which he was served with an Election Commission notice and was arrested and jailed. The Maya government also slapped the National Security Act (NSA) on him. Later, the NSA was revoked. Varun in the rally had said ‘I; swear by Bhagwad Geeta; will cut the hand that will raise a finger against Hindus’
On July 12, 2009, a section of an overhead bridge under construction at Zamrudpur, near East of Kailash, gave way and crushed five workers to death; 15 were injured. The accident took place due to a "problem in the design" of the pillar, according to Delhi Metro officials. The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation, led by the 77-year-old E. Sreedharan, has enjoyed strong government support so far. Despite the controversy, the Metro entered Uttar Pradesh's Noida in November.
The CBI's decision to give a clean chit to Ottavio Quattrocchi in the Bofors scandal triggered a political storm during the election season. The BJP alleged the Congress used the CBI to exonerate Quattrocchi, who is considered close to the Gandhi family.
Suresh Kalmadi, who heads the New Delhi 2010 Commonwealth Games organising committee, had demanded that the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) should remove its chief executive officer Michael Hooper from his operational role and accused him of being an "impediment to functioning". But CGF rejected this call.
On January 24, 2009, activists of the Shri Ram Sene, founded by Pramod Muthalik, barged into a Mangalore pub and beat up a group of young women, claiming that they were 'violating traditional Indian values'. Muthalik also announced an action plan to target couples on Valentine's Day. After this declaration, a group of women calling themselves the consortium of pub-going, loose and forward women launched a campaign to send pink chaddis to Muthalik.
Actor Shah Rukh Khan was detained and grilled for at least two hours at the Newark airport in the United States. During his detention, Bollywood star's appeal to allow him to speak to his contacts in the US, was unheard by the authorities. During the episode, it also came to light that former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam was also a victim. But Kalam didn't make it an issue and waved it away.
Virender Sehwag and Yuvraj Singh stirred the hornet's nest by accusing the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) and Punjab Cricket Association (PCA) respectively of corruption in selection. They have since then made peace with the cricket bodies.
Akshay Kumar walked the ramp during Lakme Fashion Week for designer Tarun Tahiliani during which he asked his wife Twinkle Khanna to unbutton his jeans. This act brought in cheers and roar from the crowd but a certain section was shocked and considered it obscene and in bad taste.
Differences cropped up between Sanjay Dutt and Priya Dutt during the Lok Sabha elections as Priya is a Congress MP while Sanjay joined the Samajwadi Party (SP). Sanjay tried to contest polls from Lucknow on an SP ticket. The political rivalry took its toll on their relationship.
Actor Om Puri publicly lambasted his wife, journo Nandita Puri, for revealing the actor's sexcapades in a tell-all biography titled Unlikely Hero: The Story of Om Puri. Lashing out at her, he said, "My wife has reduced a very important and sacred part of my life to cheap and lurid gossip."
Uttar Pradesh Congress chief Rita Bahuguna Joshi was arrested and charged under the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989, for allegedly making derogatory remarks against UP Chief Minister Mayawati. Ms Joshi criticised the award of 25,000 rupees (£310) each in compensation to several Dalit rape victims in Uttar Pradesh and said that the women should “throw the money at Mayawati’s face and tell her ‘you should also be raped and I will give you ten million rupees’ ”.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah submitted his resignation to Governor N.N. Vohra after PDP leader Muzaffar Beig linked him to the infamous sex scandal that had rocked Srinagar in 2006. The governor, however, refused to accept Omar's resignation. In an emotional outburst in the Assembly earlier, Omar Abdullah said," I can't bear this kind of humiliation. I am innocent until proven guilty."
In an unprecedented incident, MNS MLAs attacked Samajwadi Party legislator Abu Azmi inside the Maharashtra Assembly for taking oath in Hindi and not in Marathi. As Azmi continued to take the the oath in Hindi, MNS's Ramesh Banjle uprooted the microphone and threw it away. Other MNS members came and surrounded Azmi, pushed and punched him and an MNS member, Ram Kadam, was seen on live television slapping and hitting him on the chest and shoulders.
Legislators of ruling Akali Dal and the opposition Congress party got into scuffle with each other in the State assembly of Punjab over the violence in Ludhiana city. It may be recalled that the industrial town wintnessed violence between migrant labourers from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, and locals.
Samajwadi Party general secretary Amar Singh got into a scuffle with Bharatiya Janata Party's S.S. Ahluwalia in the Rajya Sabha after some of the BJP members raised slogans like 'Jai Shri Ram'.
Congress MP Beni Prasad Verma used unparliamentary language against former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee during the debate on Liberhan Commission report. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had to apologise in Lok Sabha for the offensive words Verma used against the BJP stalwart.
The usually tranquil Thakur 'Jaswant Singh' first stirred up a hornet's nest in the BJP by shooting off a missive seeking accountability for the Lok Sabha debacle. Then came his book on Mohammad Ali Jinnah, a man who had already claimed one scalp in the BJP in the recent past.
In the year gone by, Anil Ambani has gone back to doing what he does best-crying foul over his brother reneging on the family settlement, under which his Reliance Natural Resources is supposed to get gas for 17 years. The two corporate behemoths, controlled by either, are battling it out in courts yet again. With elder brother Mukesh's companies totting up a market capitalisation of $70 billion and Anil's accounting for $22 billion, it's clearly not just about gas.
From a labourer in the depths of one of Jharkhand's iron ore mines, Madhu Koda went on to become not just the chief minister of the state but, if the many charges against him turn out to be true, one of the richest men in Jharkhand. Currently lodged in a Ranchi jail on charges of amassing disproportionate assets and committing money laundering worth Rs 4,000 crore, Koda leapt out of his humble origins to script a staggering success story by milking opportunities out of every crisis situation.
Since Mohan Bhagwat took over earlier this year as the RSS sarsanghchalak, Bhagwat has said and done things that aim at ideological correction. Three months ago, he created a flutter in the BJP by saying that the party was in urgent need of drastic surgery and asserted that the new party chief would not be from its established leadership. The elevation of Nitin Gadkari as the new party chief not only marks the end of the Vajpayee era, when the RSS played second fiddle to the BJP, but is also proof that Bhagwat means business.
Often referred to as a photocopy of his uncle Bal Keshav Thackeray, this Raj Thackeray has clawed his way to legitimacy, with some tacit support from the ruling Congress. Love him or hate him, but you cannot ignore him anymore. With his party winning 13 Assembly seats this year, the Xerox copy has finally got the stamp of approval from the electorate. Large sections of Maharashtra's population, the Marathi manoos, believe that he stands up for their rights.
Rakhi Sawant is a perfect example of the marriage of celebrati-obsessed news TV with self-promoting reality shows, Sawant made headlines with every act, whether it was choosing her partner on national TV on Rakhi ka Swayamwar and getting an opening rating of 4.1 TRP, or trying to raise a succession of variously aged dependents on Pati Patni Aur Woh much to Minister of State for Women and Child Development Krishna Tirath's ire. She broke up, made up, broke up again with her sometime fiance Elesh Parujanwala, made speaking English in plural a fashion statement, and single-handedly kept afloat the wedding lehenga industry.
On the evening of June 14, 2009, actor Shiney Ahuja's maid lodged a complaint with the Mumbai Police alleging that he raped her. The maid further claimed that the actor threatened to kill her if she tried to disclose the incident. Shiney was arrested on June 15, 2009.
Manmohan Singh becomes the first Indian Prime Minister since Jawaharlal Nehru to return to power after completing a full five-year term in 2009. Under his leadership, the UPA returned to power after securing a little less than majority in the 15th Lok Sabha polls.
The 3 most awaited movie releases were: Avatar, 2012 & Transformers
TATA's DOCOMO changed the telecom billing market forever by providing it's users a pay-per-second service. DOCOMOis a Tata Teleservices Limited's (TTSL) cellular service provider on the GSM platform-arising out of the Tata Group's strategic joint venture with Japanese telecom giant NTT Docomo in November 2008. Tata Teleservices has received a pan-India license to operate GSM telecom services, under the brand "TATA DOCOMO" and has also been allotted spectrum in 18 telecom Circles. TTSL has already rolled out its services in various circles.
the 5 most popular songs of 2009 were
masakali - delhi 6
jai ho- slumdog millionaire
haule haule - rab ne bana di jodi
dhan te nan - kaminey
emosanal atyaachar - dev d
The 3 controversial & popular book launches were
Unlikely Hero: The Story of Om Puri
3 States
Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence
The major TV shows that ruled the screens were
Star Plus' reality show Sach ka Saamna was an adaptation of the internationally-acclaimed show The moment of truth. Sach ka Saamna was a show where people answered some extremely personal questions on aspects of their lives which they had always been silent about. These questions are bound to embarrass them and break the hearts of their loved ones. But if they want to win, they will have to answer the questions. The show's formatt comprises of 21 questions. At each level, the contestant wins money for answering the questions. One thing's for sure, the prize money of one crore, was not an easy earn. But it was difficult to lie, because a lie detector will tell whether the contestant is lying or not. Answering really heart-breaking questions in front of loved ones, certainly shook up both the contestant as well as the audience.
Set in rural Rajasthan, the show Balika Vadhu of Colors is a story of child bride Anandi, who is married off to an equally young boy Jagdish. The girl is torn away from the joys of childhood and estranged from her parents, to be bound by her in-laws' customs. The latest Television Rating Points (TRPs) of the show released by TAM reveal that it has notched up an average rating of 4.60 for channel Colors, quite a high TRP for the evening prime time slot from 8 to 8.30 p.m. Normally, in (other) serials, people are scheming and plotting against each other, but in Balika Vadhu everyone is correct in their own light. The characters are very well etched out and they have given a lot of attention to details
Dance India Dance is a reality dance show which is known to be India's biggest dance reality show until present. The show is choreographed by some of the most popular Indian choreographers, such as Terrance Lewis, Remo D'Souza and Geeta Kapoor. The Bollywood actor, Mithun Chakraborty was the grandmaster of the show. The show have raw talents of age group 15 to 25 from all over India. Once chosen, the contestants will be trained by professional Bollywood choreographers. Thereafter the participants' will compete against each other. Some of the dances that will be taught to contestants' will be Ballet, Acrobat, Shadow dancing, & Mid-air dancing.
Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa is an Indian version of BBC's Strictly Come Dancing and ABC's Dancing with the stars. The show's voting pattern follow a 50: 50 ratio for the judges and audience. In the overabundance of reality shows and surplus of celebrity dance shows it is Jhalak Dikhla Ja 3 is a cool breeze. Over the past season this show has maintained its professionalism unlike few others that have crossed all limits to gather publicity.
After successfully thrilling your senses with gorgeous beauties, dangerous stunts and a dashing Akshay Kumar, Fear Factor - Khatron Ke Khiladi was back with Idea Khatron Ke Khiladi Level 2. The show took a roller coaster ride of extreme stunts, galloping emotions and never before seen action on Indian television.
MTV Roadies is a youth-based unscripted popular reality television show on MTV India. The Roadies auditions are held in various major cities in India. People who fill their online form and get short-listed undergo a group discussion, following which, selected candidates are chosen for personal interview conducted by the MTV panel. The MTV panel constitutes of experts from MTV. There is no limit as to how many times a person can audition. The aim of the program was to find a boy or a girl who could be resilient enough in overcoming back-to-back travails of daunting adventures and peer conspiracy. The show brought to us the guile of Nikhil Chinappa, an MTV icon in his own rights, and Raghu Ram, whose fierce eyes and stoic appearance seemed enough to unnerve even Prometheus.
After the spectacular success of Rakhi ka Swayamvar, NDTV Imagine brought Pati, Patni Aur Woh, a groundbreaking show that puts the 'real' back into 'reality' programming. This show removed 5 unique celebrity couples from their glamorous lives and thrust them into the 'real' world where they become parents! Pati, Patni Aur Woh is an adaptation of the hit international format by Love Productions called Baby Borrowers and will be produced by BBC Worldwide Productions India.
Every boy's dream to have a perfect bride and every mothers dream to have the perfect bahu came alive on Star Plus. Viewers privy to a 13 week journey of 10 beautiful girls and 5 eligible boys as they came together in search of India's Perfect Bride, along with the boy's mother for company. In an attempt to impress the boys and their mothers, the 10 eligible girls best foot forward through tasks that got them closer to winning the coveted title while viewers continued to support them with their votes. The boys also displayed their grit by undergoing various tasks that will test their physical and emotional abilities to win the Perfect Bride. Keeping a close watch on the participants; relationship experts and mentors Amrita Rao, Shekhar Suman and Mallaika Arora Khan were guiding the participants in making key decisions in shortlisting their ideal match, while gorgeous Megha Gupta and handsome Vishal Malhotra anchor the show.
Rakhi Ka Swayamwar a reality show broadcast on NDTV Imagine. The show started on 29 June 2009 and was hosted by actor Ram Kapoor. In the final episode Rakhi Sawant selected Elesh Parujanwala, a Canadian businessman from Toronto, as her future bridegroom from among the three finalists. They exchanged garlands and bridal rings, thus being "engaged". Although the show's original premise was that the couple would marry immediately, they have decided in favour of postponing their marriage for an indefinite period of time. The show that traces the journey of a bride-to-be from selecting her groom, to the marriage ceremony and all this will be captured on television!! Well, the lucky girl and the bride in waiting is none other than Rakhi Sawant, and the show was aptly titled, Rakhi Ka Swayamvar. The show promised to reveal a seldom seen side of Rakhi and also provided an insightful glimpse of her life. The ultimate selection of the groom was made by Rakhi herself with the active help and participation of the audiences. 15 prospective grooms were found from across the length and breadth of the country through an extensive search
Raaz pichhle janam ka – trying to unravel the past life of people.
Bigg Boss, a popular reality TV show whose third edition is currently on air in Colors channel, is drawing closer to a dramatic finish. As the show inches towards an intriguing climax keeping the viewers hooked. And this year, Bigg Boss gets even bigger, with the big boss of Bollywood, Amitabh Bachchan, playing Pop Philosopher. Season 3 will make its presence felt on television with a special music trailer with a song sung by none other than Amitabh Bachchan.
Dance premier League - another dance reaality show
India's Got talent - an adaptation of the internationally-acclaimed Got talent
Entertainment ke liye kuchh bhi karega - again on the lines of India's Got talent but with the restriction that you have to entertain the audience & the judges within 1 minute.
1) Bill Gates' mysterious new company - Months after leaving his full time gig at Microsoft the software billionaire forms a new entity called bgc3. The website of this company is: http://www.bgc3.com/
bill gates
logo of bgc3
2) After a four-month pursuit, Microsoft said on June 12 that it was abandoning its efforts to acquire all or part of Yahoo, prompting Yahoo to conclude an advertising partnership with their mutual rival, Google.
Microsoft logo
After withdrawing a $47.5 billion offer for Yahoo on May 3, Microsoft began talking with Yahoo again about a more limited deal. On May 30, the company submitted a formal proposal, according to people knowledgeable about Microsoft’s thinking, who agreed to speak on condition that they remain anonymous. Under the proposal, Microsoft would have taken a 16 percent stake in Yahoo at $35 a share, bought Yahoo’s search business and established a revenue-sharing agreement for searches coming from Yahoo, these people said. The deal would have delivered an estimated $1 billion or more in additional operating income for Yahoo, they said. The companies’ chief executives, as well as Yahoo board members and top Microsoft officials, met on June 8 to consider the proposal. Four days later, Yahoo said that it had concluded that selling its search business alone to Microsoft would not be in its best interests over the long term and that all talks with Microsoft were over. “Clearly it is time to move on,” Jerry Yang, Yahoo’s chief executive, said in a conference call. “This agreement with Google helps us to do so.”
Google logo
Yahoologo
3) Microsoft reported flaws in their product "Internet Explorer" - world's most used web browser.
IE
4) The global financial crisis of 2008–2009 is an ongoing major financial crisis. It became prominently visible in September 2008 with the failure, merger or conservatorship of several large United States-based financial firms. The underlying causes leading to the crisis had been reported in business journals for many months before September, with commentary about the financial stability of leading U.S. and European investment banks, insurance firms and mortgage banks consequent to the subprime mortgage crisis. Beginning with failures of large financial institutions in the United States, it rapidly evolved into a global crisis resulting in a number of European bank failures and declines in various stock indexes, and large reductions in the market value of equities (stock) and commodities worldwide. The crisis has led to a liquidity problem and the de-leveraging of financial institutions especially in the United States and Europe, which further accelerated the liquidity crisis. World political leaders and national ministers of finance and central bank directors have coordinated their efforts to reduce fears but the crisis is ongoing and continues to change, evolving at the close of October into a currency crisis with investors transferring vast capital resources into stronger currencies such as the yen, the dollar and the Swiss franc, leading many emergent economies to seek aid from the International Monetary Fund. The crisis was triggered by the subprime mortgage crisis and is an acute phase of the financial crisis of 2007–2008.
6) On June 17th 2008, Firefox set the Guiness Book of World Record for the most downloaded software within 24 hours. Mozilla foundation urged its users the world over to update their browsers by downloading the latest version namely Firefox 3. click here to read more
Mozilla's Firefox
7) at 1:30 a.m. CDT; Wednesday, Sept. 10, when the world's largest scientific instrument began it's operation. That's when scientists will flip the switch on the world's most powerful particle accelerator in an attempt to begin answering some of the oldest scientific quandaries. Large Hadron Collider, and its purpose is simple but ambitious: to crack the code of the physical world; to figure out what the universe is made of; in other words, to get to the very bottom of things. click here to read more
LHC
8) The 23-year-old swimming sensation Michael Phelps stormed into the record books with an 11th gold medal, his fifth at these games at the Beijing Olympics. click here to read more
Phelps
9) Usain Bolt CD (born 21 August 1986) is a Jamaican sprinter. Bolt holds the Olympic and world records for the 100 metres at 9.69 seconds, the 200 metres at 19.30 seconds and, along with his teammates, the 4x100 metres relay at 37.10 seconds, all set at the 2008 Summer Olympics. Bolt became the first man to win all three events at a single Olympics since Carl Lewis in 1984, and the first man in history to set world records in all three at a single Olympics. His name and achievements in sprinting have earned him the media nickname "'Lightning' Bolt".
Bolt
10) After 13 years on top, Bill Gates is no longer the richest man in the world. That honor now belongs to his friend and sometimes bridge partner Warren Buffett.
Warren Buffett
Nationality - American Occupation - Chairman & CEO, Berkshire Hathaway Salary - US$100,000 Net worth - US $62 billion (2008)
11) The year saw Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar surpass Brian Lara to become the worlds most prolific Test run scorer of all times.
Tendulkar is the highest run scorer in both Test matches and ODIs, and also the batsman with the most centuries in either form of the game. On October 17, 2008, when he surpassed Brian Lara's record for the most runs scored in Test Cricket, he also became the first batsman to score 12,000 runs in that form of the game, having also been the third batsman and first Indian to pass 11,000 runs in Test cricket.
Tendulkar
Brian Charles Lara (born 2 May 1969) (nicknamed "The Prince of Port-of-Spain", "The Prince of Trinidad" or simply "The Prince") is a retired West Indies cricketer. He has topped the Test batting rankings on several occasions where he holds the record for highest individual innings. He also holds the record for the highest individual score in first-class cricket, with a total of 501* for Warwickshire against Durham at Edgbaston in 1994, as well as the highest individual score in a test innings with 400 not out. Lara played his international career with the West Indies cricket team.
Lara
12) Sourav Chandidas Ganguly, (Nicknamed : Dada, Prince of Kolkata, Bengal Tiger, Maharaja)the former Indian Skipper retired after the series against Australia. In a rare moment of glorious send-off for an Indian cricketer, he ensured that he left on a high with some excellent knocks against Australia, including a century, also completing 7000 runs in Test cricket becoming only the fourth Indian after Sachin, Gavaskar and Dravid to do so. As of October 2008, he was India's most successful Test captain to date, winning 21 tests out of 49 tests he captained and leading India into the 2003 World Cup finals. An aggressive captain, Ganguly is credited with having nurtured the careers of many young players who played under him. The left-handed also has over 11,000 ODI runs to his credit.
During the final match of the 2002 Natwest Trophy held in Lords after a stunning performance by team mates Sourav Ganguly took off his shirt in public and brandished it in the air to celebrate India's winning of the match.
His Records: Ganguly is the seventh Indian cricketer to have played 100 Test matches. He is currently the 4th highest overall run scorer for India in Tests. He is the fourth Indian to have played in more than 300 One Day Internationals.In terms of overall runs scored in ODIs, Ganguly is the second among Indians after Sachin Tendulkar (who has the highest ODI runs in the world) and the fourth in the world. Ganguly has scored 16 centuries in Test matches and 22 in ODIs. He is one of only seven batsmen to score more than 10,000 runs in ODIs. Ganguly has 22 centuries in ODIs, in terms of number of centuries in ODIs, he is only behind Sachin Tendulkar, Sanath Jayasuriya and Ricky Ponting. Sourav, along with Sachin Tendulkar, formed by far the most successful opening pair in One Day Cricket, having amassed the highest number of century partnerships (26) for the first wicket. Together, they have scored more than 7000 runs at an average of 48.98, now with Sachin he is a world record holder for creating most no. of 50 run partnership in the first wicket(44 fifties). Ganguly is the fourth player to cross 11,000 ODI runs and third player to cross 10,000 ODI runs and so far the fastest in ODI history, after Sachin Tendulkar. He also reached 6000, 7000, 8000 and 9000 ODI runs milestones in the fewest number of matches. Sourav can bowl medium-pacers as well, taking 31 wickets in 99 matches, at an average of 52.47. As of 2006, he is the only Indian captain to win a Test series in Pakistan (although two of the three Tests of that series was led by Rahul Dravid). He is also one of the 3 players in the world to achieve amazing treble of 10,000 runs, 100 wickets and 100 catches in ODI cricket history, the others being Sachin Tendulkar and Sanath Jayasuriya.
Sourav
13) The Tata Nano is a proposed city car — a small, affordable, rear-engined, four-passenger car aimed primarily at the Indian market — first presented by India's Tata Motors at the 9th annual Auto Expo on January 10, 2008, at Pragati Maidan in New Delhi, India. Tata targets the vehicle as the least expensive production car in the world — aiming for a starting price of 100,000 rupees or approximately $2000 US. Newsweek identifies the Nano as a part of a "new breed of 21st-century cars" that embody "a contrarian philosophy of smaller, lighter, cheaper" and portend a new era in inexpensive personal transportation — and potentially, "global gridlock". The Wall Street Journal confirms a global trend toward small cars, which includes the Nano.
Its designer are Girish Wagh, Justin Norek of Trilix, Pierre Castine.
Tata Motors Limited's Chairman "Ratan Tata" with Nano Tata motors was formerly known as TELCO (TATA Engineering and Locomotive Company)
IBN mentioned: “The ambitious Nano car has not rolled out of the assembly line of the makers Tata's plants yet. But it is already in the Guinness book as the world's cheapest car."
Tatalogo
Its immediate competitor is Bajaj Auto-Renault-Nissan ULC (no prototype has yet been presented). Bajaj Auto says its $2,500 car, which it is building with Renault and Nissan Motor, will aim at a fuel-efficiency of 30 km/litre, or twice an average small car, and carbon dioxide emissions of 100 gm/km. The Bajaj venture will have an initial capacity of 400,000 units, while Tata expects eventual demand of 1 million Nanos. Other Rival car makers including Fiat, General Motors, Ford Motor, Hyundai and Toyota Motor have all expressed interest in building a small car that is affordable to more middle-class consumers in emerging markets. The bulk of demand there is for small cars because people are much more sensitive to fuel prices. Honda and Toyota are leading the way on so called cleaner gasoline-electric hybrids, and some environmentalists argue getting prices down on these technologies is where efforts should be concentrated. Inexpensive and eco-friendly electric-cars like Tara Tiny, Oreva Super (both reportedly even cheaper than Tata Nano) and REVA pose even more significant danger to Nano.
14) Anil "Jumbo" Kumble, the former Indian Skipperretiredafter the series against Australia. Kumble was appointed the captain of the Indian Test cricket team on 8 November 2007. He is one of only two bowlers ever (the other being Jim Laker) to have taken all 10 wickets in a Test innings.
Kumble
15) J. Craig Venter, an American biologist and businessman, is on verge of creating life in laboratory- look out for him in 2009.
Craig
16) Eldrick Tont "Tiger" Woods, an American professional golfer is currently the World No. 1. He was the highest-paid professional athlete in 2007, having earned an estimated $122 million from winnings and endorsements. He won the 2008 U.S. Open.
Woods
17) We also saw creation of "The Indian Premier League" (also known as the "DLF Indian Premier League" and often abbreviated as IPL), - a Twenty20 cricket competition created by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and chaired by the Chairman & Commisoner IPL, BCCI Vice President Lalit Modi. The first season of the Indian Premier League commenced on 18 April 2008, and ended on 1 June 2008 with the victory of the Rajasthan Royals (led by the austrailian veteran Shane Warne) in the final at Mumbai.
Warne
IPL logo
We also saw some action at the Indian Cricket League (ICL), a private cricket league that runs parallel to the Indian Premier League (IPL). (Players participating in this league have been banned by the cricket boards of their respective countries as the IOCl is regarded by them as unsanctioned rebel league). The 2008 Indian Cricket League 20-20 Indian Championship, 2008/09 season was the second ICL tournament of the year, as well as the second season of the 20-20 Indian Championship. The season commenced on 10 October 2008, with the final match to be held on 16 November 2008. Both the opening and closing fixtures will be played in Hyderabad, India. The league consists of 9 teams.
ICL logo
18) University of California announced they'd invented an invisibility cloak. Using nanowires grown inside a porous aluminum tube to create a sheeting 10 times thinner than a piece of paper, they proved that they could wrap an object in the material and bend light waves around it, making it effectively invisible.
(the target) invisibility
19) Penn State biochemistry professor Stevan Schuster announced that he had reconstructed 80% of the genome of the long extinct woolly mammoth, using clumps of hair from the remains of several of the giant critters. The job involved not just piecing together more than 3 billion DNA sequences, but making sure none of the material that was used came from bacteria or other organisms clinging to the fur. The work raises the inevitable Jurassic Park question and the answer is, no, we won't see wooly mammoth–populated theme parks any time soon. But the key word is soon. Stephan doesn't rule out the possibility forever.
Stevan Schuster
the mammoth
20)
Viswanathan Anand is an Indian chess grandmaster and the current World Chess Champion. Anand won the FIDE World Chess Championship in 2000, at a time when the world title was split. He became the undisputed World Champion in 2007 and defended his title against Vladimir Kramnik in 2008. With this win, he became the first player in chess history to have won the World Championship in three different formats: Knockout, Tournament, and Match. He will next defend his title in the World Chess Championship 2009 against the winner of the challenger match between Veselin Topalov and Gata Kamsky. Anand is one of four players in history to break the 2800 mark on the FIDE rating list. He was at the top of the world rankings five out of six times, from April 2007 to July 2008. In October 2008, he dropped out of the world top three ranking for the first time since July 1996. In 2007 he was awarded India's second highest civilian award, the Padma Vibhushan. He is also the first recipient of Rajiv Gandhi Khel Ratna Award in 1991-92, India's highest sporting honour.
Anand with India's President
21) 2008 U/19 Cricket World Cup was held in Malaysia from February 17, 2008 to March 2, 2008. The opening ceremony took place on February 15, 2008. The final was played between India and South Africa, which India won by 12 runs by D/L Method. Previously also India had won the world cup in 2000.
22) The White Tiger is the debut novel by Indian author Aravind Adiga. It was first published in 2008 and won the Man Booker Prize for the same year. The novel studies the contrast between India's rise as a modern global economy and the main character, who comes from crushing rural poverty.
Other Indians who have won Booker till now:
in 1981 Salman Rushdie for Midnight's Children
in 1997 Arundhati Roy for The God of Small Things
in 2006 Kiran Desai for The Inheritance of Loss
in 2008 Aravind Adiga for The White Tiger
Salman Rushdie for Midnight's Children was also awarded the "Booker of Bookers" Prize and the best all-time prize winners in 1993 and 2008 to celebrate the Booker Prize 25th and 40th anniversary.
23) Iraqi Journalist hurled shoes at Bush and denounced him on TV as a ‘Dog’.
USA's president George W Bush being attacked by Iraqi journalist, Muntader al-Zaidi, 28, a correspondent for Al Baghdadia
BAGHDAD - December 14, 2008 - President Bush made a valedictory visit on Sunday to Iraq, the country that will largely define his legacy, but the trip will more likely be remembered for the unscripted moment when an Iraqi journalist hurled his shoes at Mr. Bush’s head and denounced him on live television as a “dog” who had delivered death and sorrow here from nearly six years of war. The drama unfolded shortly after Mr. Bush appeared at a news conference in Baghdad with Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Malikito highlight the newly adopted security agreement between the United States and Iraq. The agreement includes a commitment to withdraw all American forces by the end of 2011. The Iraqi journalist, Muntader al-Zaidi, 28, a correspondent for Al Baghdadia, an independent Iraqi television station, stood up about 12 feet from Mr. Bush and shouted in Arabic: “This is a gift from the Iraqis; this is the farewell kiss, you dog!” He then threw a shoe at Mr. Bush, who ducked and narrowly avoided it.
