India, South Africa sign three bilateral agreements

June 4, 2010 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi, June 4 (ANI): South African President Jacob Zuma met Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh on Friday and the duo signed three bilateral agreements to give a fresh boost to economic, trade and investment relationships.

During their meeting, the two leaders held talks on a wide range of bilateral and global issues.

“Our strategic partnership with South Africa is based on mutuality of interests, common aspirations and close mutual understanding. Today, President Zuma and I have decided to impart a fresh, forward-looking character to these ties and to further broaden our co-operation,” said Dr Singh.

The two nations signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on agricultural cooperation, an air services pact and an MoU between the Foreign Service Institute of India and the Diplomatic Academy of South Africa.

Dr Singh further said that the two countries would also diversify cooperation in the area of science and technology, agriculture, Human Resources Development and security.

“India remains willing to work with South Africa in addressing the sheer challenges of capacity building, skill development, jobs creation and combating disease, which are essential for achieving inclusive, balanced growth,” he added.

The visiting President expressed his gratitude towards India”s hospitality and concluded the discussions to be fruitful.

“We have had a very fruitful discussion. We have discussed very critical strategic issues as well as our issues with regard to global issues and bilateral issues,” said President Zuma.

The two leaders also decided to support each other”s candidature for rotating non-permanent seats in the United Nations Security Council for 2011-12.

“We have agreed to support each others candidature for the non-permanent seat of the Security Council for the 2011-2012 term,” said Dr Singh.

The South African President, who is on his first official trip to Asia, arrived in New Delhi from Mumbai on Thursday.

He is accompanied by a high profile business delegation to promote and strengthen the historical and business ties between both countries. (ANI)

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

India a great and emerging global power: US

May 27, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Ahead of Indo-US Strategic Dialogue, an Obama Administration official termed India as a “great and emerging global power” and said the talks, next week, will take the relationship between the two nations to a new level.

“I think the strategic dialogue speaks for itself. India is a great and emerging global power. Our range of interests are significant in terms of the environment, in terms of regional security, in terms of counterterrorism, economic issues,” State Department spokesman P J Crowley told reporters here.

Leading a high-power delegation of several Cabinet Ministers, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna is scheduled to arrive in Washington in the next couple of days for the first Indo-US Strategic Dialogue from June 1 to June 4.

While the names of the Indian delegation has not been announced yet, it is expected that it would include Human Resources Development Minister Kapil Sibal; Deputy Chairman of Planning Commission Montek Singh Ahluwalia; Minister for Science and Technology Prithvitaj Chauhan; and Foreign Secretary, Nirupama Rao.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton – who returned from her week-long three-nation Asia trip from Japan, China and Seoul — would lead the American delegation.

During Clinton’s visit to India, last year, it was decided that the strategic dialogue should be launched between the two countries.

“We have very strong cultural ties to India, so we look forward to the strategic dialogue. It’s something that the Secretary and the President (of the US) felt important to elevate the level of our coordination and cooperation. So we look forward to the dialogue,” Crowley said in response to a question.

“I think our relations with India have never been stronger. We are talking about the relations between the largest and oldest democracies in the world. We have a great deal in common and we look forward to the meetings next week,” Crowley said.

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Journalism has a vital role to play in progress of a nation: Kapil Sibal

March 22, 2010 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi, March 22 (ANI): Union Minister for Human Resources Development Kapil Sibal on Monday said that the journalism has a vital role to play in the progress of a nation.

Addressing during a programme related to the giving away of IPI-India Awards for Excellence in Journalism for the year 2009 in the national capital, Sibal said that the two key entities for democracy were Free Press and Free Judiciary.

On the aspect of freedom of speech, Sibal reminded the journalists that it does not merely mean passing adverse comments on any issue, event or a person but speaking for those millions who do not have the voice to express their grievances and make them heard.

In the same vein, Sibal also had a dig at politicians when he mentioned that a majority of the leaders do have the voice to say that they rarely use and it is the media that lets them speak. That is how he would define freedom of speech, Sibal stated.

Touching about the ‘Trial by Media’, Sibal said it has emerged due to the failure of the obligatory machinery of law.

Further, Sibal regretted the fact that these days several editors assign beats to journalists who lack the basic knowledge of the subject matter.

As such, he suggested, the journalists should cultivate commitment, passion, and attitude in their profession.

Earlier, Dr. Justice A. S. Anand, former Chief Justice of India had raised the topic of trial by the media.
He said that two odd trends in the media of late are against journalistic ethics namely; the media trial and the paid news.

The IPI-India Award for the year 2009 were presented to Bidisha Ghosal of The Week magazine for her in-depth coverage on sexual exploitation of the widows in Vidarbha region of Maharashtra after their farmer husbands had committed suicide.

The other award winner was Indian Express. It was conferred for the daily’s exposition of radical Hindus being the masterminds in the Malegaon blasts.

IPI-India is the Indian chapter of the Vienna-based International Press Institute, a forum of editors, media experts and journalists, and it is committed to free press. (ANI)

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

First installment of CAMPA to be released to eight States today

August 18, 2009 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi, Aug 18 (ANI): The first installment of the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority (CAMPA) will be disbursed to eight states in the country today.

The states who have opened their State CAMPA account will receive this fund.

These states are Uttarakhand, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Karnataka, Sikkim, Goa, Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Assam.

Minister of State for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh said as per CAMPA guidelines, states who have opened their CAMPA accounts will get electronic transfer of the fund.

Ramesh said the forest sector is getting historic opportunity to get funds from six different channels.

Apart from the CAMPA, it is the NAREGA, intensification of infrastructure management, traditional national afforestation programme and integrated development of wildlife habitats.

Besides regeneration of forests, this amount will be used for human resources development, recruitments of new posts and data management.

It is the State who has to decide how much funds it can absorb for regeneration and betterment of forests and allied sectors, Ramesh said.

He also appealed to come out of the mindset to bring 33 per cent of geographical area under forests.

He explained that we should now concentrate on regeneration of degraded forest area in such a way that it migrates to medium density forest cover, medium density forest area to high density area and put efforts for conservation and preservation of high density forest area which will turn into heavy carbon sink.

Presentations were made on the Forest Conservation Act, 1980, new scheme initiatives, strategies for increasing forest and tree cover, Tribal Right Act and wildlife conservation.(ANI)

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Malay Indian restaurants to have no more cooks from India

August 13, 2009 By Leave a Comment

Kuala Lumpur, Aug 13 (ANI): Malaysia’s Human Resources Minister S. Subramaniam has said that Indian restaurants will mostly have Malaysian, and not Indian cooks.

He said there has been an encouraging response from locals to being trained as cooks under a ministry programme.

“We hope to reduce the number of cooks from India in stages, especially in Indian restaurants, once the first batch of locally-trained chefs graduate,” he told reporters after visiting the CQ Tec College here yesterday.

The college received its first batch of 25 trainees for an intensive, six-month programme in June, The Star reported.

Subramaniam said the fees for the trainees were borne by the ministry through the Human Resources Development Fund, adding that they would also receive monthly allowances.

“Once they graduate, they will be able to open their own restaurants,” he said, adding that the future was promising for Indian youths of Malaysian origin.

He said Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak, who wanted the ministry to train local chefs and not depend on cooks from India, mooted the idea.

Another training programme undertaken by the ministry was hair styling, to replace barbers from India.

“We want the two sectors (restaurants and hair salons/barber shops) to rely less on foreign workers and employ locally-trained people,” he said. (ANI)

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

IHRD ~ IHRD Exam Result 2009 ~ IHRD Kerala Engineering Lecturer Result 2009 ~ Institute of Human Resources Development ~ IHRD Kerala Engineering Lecturer Result

July 12, 2009 By Leave a Comment

IHRD ~ IHRD Exam Result 2009 ~ IHRD Kerala Engineering Lecturer Result 2009 ~ Institute of Human Resources Development ~ IHRD Kerala Engineering Lecturer Result

Institute of Human Resources Development (IHRD) Board of engineering lecturer Education, Kerala publishes recruitment results of engineering lecturer for EC, CS, IT, EE & BE departments Result 2009 on July 10, 2009.

Kerala publishes recruitment results of engineering lecturer 2009.

The Link for Results :

http://www.ihrd.ac.in/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=114&Itemid=28

All The Best !!!

Filed Under: Educational News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Foreign diplomats need student visa to study in India

April 6, 2009 By Leave a Comment

CHENNAI: Foreign diplomats who wish to study in Indian universities can no longer pursue their academic interests using the diplomatic visa.

“It has been decided by the government of India that foreign diplomats wishing to study in Indian universities will be required to undergo a change in their visa status i.e. they will be permitted to pursue studies on a student visa only and not on a diplomatic visa,” University Grants Commission joint secretary Chander Shekar Meena has said.

In a letter addressed to vice chancellors of all universities in the country, Meena has urged them to bring the decision of the government of India to the notice of all colleges and institutions affiliated to the respective universities so that they could insist on a student visa from foreign diplomats.

This follows an office memorandum issued by the union ministry of external affairs earlier in February this year.

The external affairs ministry was asked to clarify the position with regard to the visa status of foreign diplomats who sought admission into regular academic courses including PhD research programmes in universities in India. After examining the issue relating to the procedure to be followed in such cases, the ministry “with the approval of the minister for external affairs” concluded that the diplomats must change their diplomatic visas into student visas for the purpose.

Later, Anil Kumar Anand, joint secretary (coordination) ministry of external affairs issued an office memorandum requesting the department of higher education in the ministry of human resources development to convey the decision to the University Grants Commission and all universities in India “for strict compliance.”

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Students and parents protest against fee hike in Delhi schools

February 2, 2009 By Leave a Comment

New Delhi, Feb 1, (ANI): Hundreds of school students and parents on Sunday protested near Mahatma Gandhi Samadhi at Rajghat against the Delhi government’s decision to allow private schools to hike the fees.

Recently, the Delhi government had allowed the private schools to increase the monthly fees upto Rs. 500.

The protest was organised under the banner of Delhi Parents Council (DPC).

Upset over this, the Delhi Parents Council (DPC) organised this mass protest rally outside Rajghat.

“The way Delhi Government is burdening us with hike in fees that we cannot tolerate. When government has accumulated so much in the name of the education, why do not they hike the salaries of teachers with that money only. Parents are not only burdened by the hike in fees but they also have to pay the arrears of teachers that have been increased since 2006,” Delhi Press Council chairman, Praveen Khandelwal added.

Terming education as their fundamental right, the students expressed resentment against the decision of the Government to allow schools to hike fees.

Dimple, one of the students stated the middle class as most prominent class of the society in Delhi.

“Students will definitely be affected. There are not many parents who can afford. If there are adequate facilities in government schools parents won’t send their children to private schools. The way the fee has been hiked is totally wrong.

The Delhi Parents Council (DPC) has decided to take up the matter to the Human Resources Development Minister Arjun Singh and Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit. (ANI)

Filed Under: International News Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,