Bollywood superstar Amitabh Bachchan feels that India's rapid economic stride is largely responsible for the recognition that Indian films are getting in foreign countries.
"India's economic progress is largely responsible for the Indian films getting recognised abroad. When the economy is doing well, everything connected with the country, its food, culture, colour, art and films get noticed," Bachchan said on Wednesday night at a function in London in connection with the International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) Awards to be held in Yorkshire from June 7.
He said over the years, IIFA has grown in stature and it has become an occasion for celebration of Indian Cinema and meeting of minds. "This year IIFA is going green, adopting the Global Cool campaign to create awareness of the effects of climate change and how to minimise it," he said.
Referring to the vast changes witnessed in the Indian cinema, the Bollywood superstar said "we have become ambassadors of friendship and this year's IIFA awards assumes importance because the country is celebrating 60th year of its independence." Speaking on the occasion, London's mayor Ken Livingstone said no country in the world could ignore the emergence of India.
Livingstone said he would be visiting India in November and open offices of the London Mayor in Mumbai and New Delhi in an effort to further improve ties.
The mayor, will be leading a delegation including leading film personalities, said he also envisaged co-production of films between the two countries.
Courtesy : Expressindia.com
India's economy behind Bollywood success
March 30, 2007, 10:01 amHasta la Vista Baby! say PC makers
March 30, 2007, 9:59 am
After all the hype surrounding its January launch, Microsoft's new Vista operating system has yet to brighten the outlook for PC makers and could even lead to oversupplies for those who had built up inventory.
Top PC makers, such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Lenovo, may now have to resort to sales of lower-margin computers in emerging markets such as China, Eastern Europe and Latin America for their growth this year.
Featuring high-definition video and audio functions and three-dimensional graphics, Vista is being billed as a major upgrade of its predecessor, Windows XP.
But the software, which runs on more memory and superior graphic cards, has not taken off as fast as some had hoped, leading to concerns of potential inventory woes for makers of those products, analysts and industry players said.
"Vista has had no big help," said Acer's President Gianfranco Lanci, adding that PC makers are really not counting on Vista to drive high demands for the industry.
Samsung Electronics, the world's top memory chip maker, also said that demand for DRAM computer memory chips from Vista hasn't materialised as fast as it had predicted.
"We had expected the 'Vista impact' on DRAM around April, but now we see it being delayed into the second half," said Hwang Chang-gyu, semiconductor business president of Samsung Electronics.
But many PC vendors were already skeptical on fresh demand from Vista even before the product's launch in January, better preparing them for a potential disappointment, said JP Morgan analyst Charles Guo.
Major PC players like Asustek Computer Inc., also the world's top motherboard maker, said Vista might have warmed up the market but significant results have not been seen.
"We aren't seeing any effects yet and compatibility issues will take at least six months to resolve," said an executive at Asustek, who declined to be identified.
He added that many corporate customers -- who tend to buy in much larger volumes than individual consumers and therefore can make a bigger impact -- were staying on the sidelines for now as individuals accounted for new buying.
"We've carried out numerous surveys recently with IT managers and they've all said they are not planning to migrate to Vista, and we are not expecting a major influx anytime soon," said Bryan Ma, an analyst at IDC, expressing a similar view.
Different forms of Microsoft's various Windows operating systems now run more than 90 percent of the world's PCs.
Computer makers are now looking to strong buying from emerging markets such as China, Eastern Europe and Latin America to boost business.
Dell announced earlier this week a super cheap computer costing as little as 2,599 yuan ($336) specifically for China, now the world's second largest PC market by unit sales.
Growth driver
"Emerging markets are still a key driver for growth in the PC sector. Global PC shipments this year should grow by low double digits, in the 10 percent range," said Acer's Lanci.
The comment by Acer, which is trying to overtake China's Lenovo as the world's No. 3 PC maker, was in line with the outlook for the broader industry.
IDC expects worldwide PC shipments to reach about 253 million units this year, up 11 percent from 228 million in 2006. That 2007 growth rate is up from the 9.6 per cent posted last year.
Vista's newness aside, analysts also say the right computing platform, which is needed to run the operating system smoothly, is a main factor that will determine whether the software will be accepted in the near term.
"Intel's main Santa Rosa platform needed to support Vista features won't be launched until May 10, and in the last five to 10 years, the biggest PC driver is still price," said JP Morgan analyst Alvin Kwock.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates said last month that Vista has been well received and that PC vendors have seen a nice lift in their sales.
A week before his comments, Chief Executive Steve Ballmer had said that Vista would only create a "small surge" in PC sales for its fiscal year starting in July, and would not spur a big increase in normal growth rates.
"Vista was very popular in the first couple of weeks, but let's not just focus on that. Dell and Hewlett-Packard don't even advertise much on PCs with Vista," said JP Morgan's Kwock.
Courtesy : Expressindia.com
Top PC makers, such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Lenovo, may now have to resort to sales of lower-margin computers in emerging markets such as China, Eastern Europe and Latin America for their growth this year.
Featuring high-definition video and audio functions and three-dimensional graphics, Vista is being billed as a major upgrade of its predecessor, Windows XP.
But the software, which runs on more memory and superior graphic cards, has not taken off as fast as some had hoped, leading to concerns of potential inventory woes for makers of those products, analysts and industry players said.
"Vista has had no big help," said Acer's President Gianfranco Lanci, adding that PC makers are really not counting on Vista to drive high demands for the industry.
Samsung Electronics, the world's top memory chip maker, also said that demand for DRAM computer memory chips from Vista hasn't materialised as fast as it had predicted.
"We had expected the 'Vista impact' on DRAM around April, but now we see it being delayed into the second half," said Hwang Chang-gyu, semiconductor business president of Samsung Electronics.
But many PC vendors were already skeptical on fresh demand from Vista even before the product's launch in January, better preparing them for a potential disappointment, said JP Morgan analyst Charles Guo.
Major PC players like Asustek Computer Inc., also the world's top motherboard maker, said Vista might have warmed up the market but significant results have not been seen.
"We aren't seeing any effects yet and compatibility issues will take at least six months to resolve," said an executive at Asustek, who declined to be identified.
He added that many corporate customers -- who tend to buy in much larger volumes than individual consumers and therefore can make a bigger impact -- were staying on the sidelines for now as individuals accounted for new buying.
"We've carried out numerous surveys recently with IT managers and they've all said they are not planning to migrate to Vista, and we are not expecting a major influx anytime soon," said Bryan Ma, an analyst at IDC, expressing a similar view.
Different forms of Microsoft's various Windows operating systems now run more than 90 percent of the world's PCs.
Computer makers are now looking to strong buying from emerging markets such as China, Eastern Europe and Latin America to boost business.
Dell announced earlier this week a super cheap computer costing as little as 2,599 yuan ($336) specifically for China, now the world's second largest PC market by unit sales.
Growth driver
"Emerging markets are still a key driver for growth in the PC sector. Global PC shipments this year should grow by low double digits, in the 10 percent range," said Acer's Lanci.
The comment by Acer, which is trying to overtake China's Lenovo as the world's No. 3 PC maker, was in line with the outlook for the broader industry.
IDC expects worldwide PC shipments to reach about 253 million units this year, up 11 percent from 228 million in 2006. That 2007 growth rate is up from the 9.6 per cent posted last year.
Vista's newness aside, analysts also say the right computing platform, which is needed to run the operating system smoothly, is a main factor that will determine whether the software will be accepted in the near term.
"Intel's main Santa Rosa platform needed to support Vista features won't be launched until May 10, and in the last five to 10 years, the biggest PC driver is still price," said JP Morgan analyst Alvin Kwock.
Microsoft founder Bill Gates said last month that Vista has been well received and that PC vendors have seen a nice lift in their sales.
A week before his comments, Chief Executive Steve Ballmer had said that Vista would only create a "small surge" in PC sales for its fiscal year starting in July, and would not spur a big increase in normal growth rates.
"Vista was very popular in the first couple of weeks, but let's not just focus on that. Dell and Hewlett-Packard don't even advertise much on PCs with Vista," said JP Morgan's Kwock.
Courtesy : Expressindia.com
State NGO bags US award for reducing MMR
March 30, 2007, 9:56 am
For Nirmalaben, a midwife working in Borindra village of Jhagadia taluka in Bharuch district for almost a decade now, nothing is more painful than watching young women die in her arms during delivery.
She and the organisation she works for — Society for Education, Welfare and Action-Rural, known as Sewa-Rural but not associated with Ahmedabad-based SEWA — have helped bring down the maternal mortality rate (MMR) by 35 per cent and the neo-natal death by 45 per cent.
But, she says, a reproductive health training and resource centre could have reduced the MMR further.
On Friday, the society got closer to setting up the much-needed centre when it got the MacArthur awards for Creative and Effective Institutions. The award, instituted by a US foundation, comes with US $ 350,000.
For Nirmalaben and her organisation, the award is a recognition of 35 years of service.
Dr Pankaj Shah, a trustee of the organisation, told the Indian Express that while there were 19 deaths of mothers and 150 neo-natal deaths during 3,500 deliveries three years back, the figure went down to 10 and 90 respectively in 2006.
Shah said that in rural India since most child births take place at home, Sewa-Rural has started providing an intensive family-centered maternal care services at the doorsteps of 168 villages of Jhagadia taluka covering a population of 1.7 lakh.
“Our field staff try to create birth preparedness and complication readiness at the community level, which results into community sensitivity towards the care needed by a pregnant mother,” Shah said.
He further pointed out that the organization has 250 birth attendants, 175 frontline workers called Arogya Sakhis and 25 mid-level supervisors for healthy and trouble-free deliveries in the region.
One of the managing trustees of Sewa-Rural Dr Lata Desai said she and some of her friends wanted to work for the under-privileged.
“Though we wanted to work, who would have trusted us?” says Lata, adding that to add to their credentials and earn some money before they plunged into the venture, they migrated to US in 1971.
“We visited Gujarat a number of times after that. We visited the backward areas like Bharuch, Panchmahal and Kutch and finally zeroed upon Bharuch as people here were completely bereft of any medical service,”Lata added.
It was at this point, Kasturba maternity home, which was being run by a local charitable trust and facing financial crisis, was contemplating closing down. Appreciating the vision of these young professionals, the trust decided to let them handle the management of the maternity home and handed it over to them initially for seven-and-a-half years. The maternity home was then converted into a 40-bed community hospital. Today, this hospital has morphed into a 100-bed hospital with services like obstetrics, pediatrics, ophthalmology and general medicine. “In the last one year, we had 8,000 admissions in the hospital, with about 8,000 general surgeries and 1,000 deliveries," said Dr Shah, adding that most patients are treated free of cost.
“We will use the award money to set up a reproductive health training and resource centre at Sewa-rural campus, five km from Jhagadia at Gumandeo.”
Courtesy : Expressindia.com
She and the organisation she works for — Society for Education, Welfare and Action-Rural, known as Sewa-Rural but not associated with Ahmedabad-based SEWA — have helped bring down the maternal mortality rate (MMR) by 35 per cent and the neo-natal death by 45 per cent.
But, she says, a reproductive health training and resource centre could have reduced the MMR further.
On Friday, the society got closer to setting up the much-needed centre when it got the MacArthur awards for Creative and Effective Institutions. The award, instituted by a US foundation, comes with US $ 350,000.
For Nirmalaben and her organisation, the award is a recognition of 35 years of service.
Dr Pankaj Shah, a trustee of the organisation, told the Indian Express that while there were 19 deaths of mothers and 150 neo-natal deaths during 3,500 deliveries three years back, the figure went down to 10 and 90 respectively in 2006.
Shah said that in rural India since most child births take place at home, Sewa-Rural has started providing an intensive family-centered maternal care services at the doorsteps of 168 villages of Jhagadia taluka covering a population of 1.7 lakh.
“Our field staff try to create birth preparedness and complication readiness at the community level, which results into community sensitivity towards the care needed by a pregnant mother,” Shah said.
He further pointed out that the organization has 250 birth attendants, 175 frontline workers called Arogya Sakhis and 25 mid-level supervisors for healthy and trouble-free deliveries in the region.
One of the managing trustees of Sewa-Rural Dr Lata Desai said she and some of her friends wanted to work for the under-privileged.
“Though we wanted to work, who would have trusted us?” says Lata, adding that to add to their credentials and earn some money before they plunged into the venture, they migrated to US in 1971.
“We visited Gujarat a number of times after that. We visited the backward areas like Bharuch, Panchmahal and Kutch and finally zeroed upon Bharuch as people here were completely bereft of any medical service,”Lata added.
It was at this point, Kasturba maternity home, which was being run by a local charitable trust and facing financial crisis, was contemplating closing down. Appreciating the vision of these young professionals, the trust decided to let them handle the management of the maternity home and handed it over to them initially for seven-and-a-half years. The maternity home was then converted into a 40-bed community hospital. Today, this hospital has morphed into a 100-bed hospital with services like obstetrics, pediatrics, ophthalmology and general medicine. “In the last one year, we had 8,000 admissions in the hospital, with about 8,000 general surgeries and 1,000 deliveries," said Dr Shah, adding that most patients are treated free of cost.
“We will use the award money to set up a reproductive health training and resource centre at Sewa-rural campus, five km from Jhagadia at Gumandeo.”
Courtesy : Expressindia.com
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