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New Delhi/ Faizabad/Allahabad, Sept 19 (ANI): The nine-day ‘Navratri’ festival began across India with religious fervour on Saturday.
Thousands of devotees queued up at various temples dedicated to Goddess Durga.
In New Delhi, devotees converged at Jhandewalan to offer prayers prior to dawn and observed fast throughout the day.
“We observe fast on the first day of Navratri. On the first day, we pray for the whole day and meditate on Goddess Durga,” said Madan Gehlot, a devotee.
Meanwhile, at Faizabad in Uttar Pradesh, people made a beeline to the temple of Goddess Badi Devkali.
The devotees believe their wishes are fulfilled if they pray to Goddess Badi Devkali during the festival.
“People believe that coming here redeems them from their sins. Since the Goddess Devkali is the deity of Lord Rama’s dynasty, her significance is all the more. That’s why people come here to offer prayers to the Goddess,” said Poonam, a devotee.
Earlier on Friday, a day prior to the commencement of Dusshera, a unique annual horse procession was taken out through the streets of Allahabad.
The belief is that the horse representing sage Vyasa would relate the Ramayana.
Musical bands led the attractively decorated white horse procession organised by a leading Ram Lila committee of the city.
“Legend says that when Maharishi Valmiki narrated the story of Lord Rama to Luv and Kush then this horse standing next to them also listened to the story. The horse in the form of sage Vyasa tells the story of Rama to people during the Navratri celebrations,” said Ajay Kumar Shukla, secretary, Ramlila Committee.
“Naaratri”, which literally means nine nights, is observed twice a year.
The festival lasts for nine days in honour of nine manifestations of Durga, goddess of power, and fall in the months of April-May and September-October.
It is believed that during the Navratri, Goddess Durga descends on earth to rid it of the demons and blesses her devotees with happiness and prosperity. (ANI)
London, September 19 (ANI): Michael Jackson’s completely new signature dance move in a new footage while rehearsing for his comeback concerts may soon become a rage amongst his fans.
The King of Pop, in the move, being called as the Penguin, was seen flapping his right arm up and down very quickly as his body shimmied while standing on the spot.
Jackson was spotted doing the hilarious Penguin in the video, thought to be from the This Is It movie rehearsal footage, as renowned choreographer Kenny Ortega coached and watched him over, reports the Sun.
The move was due to expand his signature repertoire of dance steps including the legendary Moonwalk, Anti-Gravity Lean, and Crotch Grab.
It would be no surprise if kids and adults tried to ape the Jackson Penguin, which West End star Ricko Baird said was not easy to imitate.
He said: “Michael was just so talented and he made it all look so easy. Some of his moves like the Moonwalk – and now the Penguin – are actually very difficult and need a lot of practice.”
Business analyst Christian Severina, 35, London, said: “I love Michael Jackson and I love his dancing. But this was really tricky to do it with the same grace and speed he does it. I ended up looking like I was having a fit.”
Hannah Turner, 16, of Essex, added: “Oh my god I look like such a wally. Only Michael Jackson can make that look cool.” (ANI)
Mumbai, Sep 18(ANI): Activists of Republican Party of India (RPI), a regional party in Maharashtra, on Friday ransacked the Congress office in Mumbai.
The activists were protesting against eviction of their senior leader and former Lok Sabha Member of Parliament, Ramdas Athawale from his official bungalow in New Delhi.
Athawale was evicted for overstaying after he lost the recently concluded Lok Sabha poll.
RPI activists raised slogans against Congress President Sonia Gandhi and broke windowpanes of the party office.
“I was in office of NSUI (National Students Union of India) when I came to know that alleged workers of RPI are ransacking Congress office. I was surprised that policemen standing outside remained mere spectator even though I told them they are attacking our office,” said Sadaf Aboli, President of National Students’ Union of India (NSUI), student wing of Congress.
According to reports, the police also arrested some of the activists. (ANI)
Kuala Lumpur, Sep 18 (ANI): A horny orang minyak, which is supposed to be a ghost in Malay culture, is said to be terrorising about 300 families in Sungai Petani, picking homes where there are young women.
According to Kosmo!, Nurshahirah, 17, revealed that she was awakened at 5.40am on September 14 after she felt a warm sensation on her left ear, and when she opened her eyes she saw an apparition with curly hair and thick moustache standing by her bed.
“I was even more shocked when the ghost took off his kain pelikat and started to fondle himself,” the Star Online quoted her as saying.
Nurshahirah, who lives in Taman Keladi, said she felt powerless to ward off the apparition who started to grope her body, and that it was as though a charm had been placed on her.
In another incident, housewife Fatimah, 42, revealed she heard her two daughters crying out when they were woken up at 5am by dark apparitions that molested them.
Her 15-year-old daughter told her that she had been “violated” by a ghost.
“At first I thought she was talking in her sleep but she insisted that she was molested by a ghost before it moved to the kitchen,” Fatimah said.
She said her 14-year-old, too, cried and ran from the living room, saying a dark apparition had molested her.
“My 14-year-old daughter said she managed to kick the ghost who wore a kain pelikat and black singlet when she felt her body being touched,” she revealed.
“She screamed and the ghost ran out of her room,” she added.
Fatimah said she gave chase with a parang but the apparition disappeared.
She also said the apparition could have placed a charm on her family because none of the neighbours heard her daughters’ screams. (ANI)
London, September 15 (ANI): In a new research, a scientist has found that prehistoric man navigated his way across England using a crude version of a satellite navigation system, which was based on stone circle markers.
According to a report in the Telegraph, the research, by historian and writer Tom Brooks, shows that Britain’s Stone Age ancestors were “‘sophisticated engineers” and far from a barbaric race.
Brooks studied all known prehistoric sites as part of his research.
He found that the prehistoric man was able to travel between settlements in England with pinpoint accuracy, thanks to a complex network of hilltop monuments.
These covered much of southern England and Wales and included now famous landmarks such as Stonehenge and The Mount.
New research suggests that they were built on a connecting grid of isosceles triangles that ‘point’ to the next site.
Many are 100 miles or more away, but GPS co-ordinates show all are accurate to within 100 metres.
This provided a simple way for ancient Britons to navigate successfully from point A to B without the need for maps.
“To create these triangles with such accuracy would have required a complex understanding of geometry,” said Brooks.
“The sides of some of the triangles are over 100 miles across on each side and yet the distances are accurate to within 100 metres. You cannot do that by chance,” he added.
“So advanced, sophisticated and accurate is the geometrical surveying now discovered, that we must review fundamentally the perception of our Stone Age forebears as primitive, or conclude that they received some form of external guidance,” he further added.
Brooks analyzed 1,500 sites stretching from Norfolk to north Wales. These included standing stones, hilltop forts, stone circles and hill camps.
Each was built within eyeshot of the next.
Using GPS co-ordinates, he plotted a course between the monuments and noted their positions to each other.
He found that they all lie on a vast geometric grid made up of isosceles ‘triangles’. Each triangle has two sides of the same length and ‘point’ to the next settlement.
Thus, anyone standing on the site of Stonehenge in Wiltshire could have navigated their way to Lanyon Quoit in Cornwall without a map.
According to Brooks, many of the Stone Age sites were created 5,000 years ago by an expanding population recovering from the trauma of the Ice Age.
“The triangle navigation system may have been used for trading routes among the expanding population and also been used by workers to create social paths back to their families while they were working on these new sites,” he said. (ANI)
London, September 7 (ANI): ‘Harry Potter’ star Emma Watson had magic tricks up her sleeves to charm her classmates on the first day of her college.
She showed how from a sitting position to magically raise yourself to standing without putting your hands on the ground, reports the Sun.
The 19-year-old beauty’s friends apparently had a hearty laugh on seeing the trick.
Watson is pursuing a degree in Literature at Brown University, in Providence, Rhode Island. (ANI)
Washington, September 3 (ANI): A team of engineers from the Stanford University has designed a new earthquake-resistant structural system for buildings, which will not only help a multi-story building hold itself together during a violent quake, but also return it to standing up straight on its foundation afterward, true and plumb, with damage confined to a few easily replaceable parts.
Professor Greg Deierlein, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Stanford University, used the world’s largest shake table to test a new structural design that lets buildings rock during earthquakes, then pull themselves into plumb when the shaking stops, confining damage to replaceable steel “fuses.”
During testing on a massive shake table, the system survived simulated earthquakes in excess of magnitude 7, bigger than either the 1994 Northridge earthquake or the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake in California.
“This new structural system has the potential to make buildings far more damage resistant and easier to repair, so people could reoccupy buildings a lot faster after a major earthquake than they can now,” said Greg Deierlein, professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford, who led the team that designed the new system.
The system dissipates energy through the movement of steel frames that are situated around the building’s core or along exterior walls.
The frames can be part of a building’s initial design or could be incorporated into an existing building undergoing seismic retrofitting.
They are economically feasible to build, as all the materials employed are commonly used in construction today and all the parts can be made using existing fabrication methods.
“What is unique about these frames is that, unlike conventional systems, they actually rock off their foundation under large earthquakes,” Deierlein said.
The rocking frames are steel braced-frames, the columns of which are free to rock up and down within steel “shoes” secured at their base.
To control the rocking and return the frame to vertical when the shaking stops, steel tendons run down the center of the frame from top to bottom.
These tendons are made of high-strength steel cable strands twisted together and designed to remain elastic during shaking.
When shaking is over, they rebound to their normal length, pulling the building back into proper alignment.
At the bottom of the frame sit steel “fuses” designed keep the rest of the building from sustaining damage.
“The idea of this structural system is that we concentrate the damage in replaceable fuses,” Deierlein said.
The fuses are built to flex and dissipate the shaking energy induced by the earthquake, thereby confining the damage. (ANI)
Wellington, Sep 2 (ANI): New Zealand fast bowler Kyle Mills doubts that skipper Daniel Vettori’s new role as a national selector will harm his relationship with the players.
Vettori and head coach Andy Moles officially became members of the four-man selection panel on Tuesday after New Zealand Cricket (NZC) heeded the duo’s desire for a more hands-on role in team selection.
Mills has already had the dreaded talk with Vettori and suggested the skipper’s standing among the group would not create problems when the axe fell.
On the eve of the first test against Australia in Brisbane last November, the fast bowler was told not only did he miss the team, but he was also being sent back to provincial cricket.
“I think that’s the hardest thing as a captain. I’ve been given the word by Dan before on previous tours. In Australia, he came up and told me I’d been dropped from the test side so he’s made those gutsy conversations,” Stuff.co.nz quoted Vettori, as saying.
“At the end of the day, I’d probably rather hear it from him than someone else I’ve played a lot of cricket with him from a young age, he’s a mate of mine and we still go for a beer,” he added.
Mills was also happy the tour finally had two selectors on board.
The NZC decision to appoint Vettori and Moles alongside convener Glenn Turner and Mark Greatbatch has been highly scrutinised since the announcement on August 23.
Concerns over Vettori’s new role centred on how his working relationship might change with players now he has an official say in their selection or demotion, Stuff.co.nz reported.
There were also fears about how the added responsibility would affect his workload and performance.
When he was appointed, Vettori admitted it could be difficult when he or Moles had to convey bad news. (ANI)
Haridwar, Aug 31(ANI): Rashtriya Swayam Sewak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat on Monday said that BJP leaders LK Advani and Rajnath Singh will decide on their role within the party.
Talking to reporters here, Bhagwat said, “Rajnathji, Advaniji and others will decide on their role in the party. Everything will be fine in the BJP in future.”
“There are people with moral standing like Advani and under their guidance, they will solve all problems. We have nothing to do with this,” he added
While the BJP had said that Rajnath Singh will not get an extension as party president beyond his three-year term that ends in December, there were reports that Advani may step down as Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha but the timing for it has been left to him.
Bhagwat had a breakfast meeting with Advani on Sunday and had discussions with other senior leaders.
Sunday’s breakfast meeting between Advani and Bhagwat was the second between the two. They had earlier met on Saturday afternoon for about two hours at the RSS headquarters Keshavkunj in Delhi to discuss various issues.
Saturday’s meeting took place amid reports that the RSS has readied a succession plan for the BJP. However, BJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar told reporters at a press conference that no succession plan was discussed.
The RSS is believed to have told the BJP leadership to set its house in order. That this is being given serious thought was evident when top brass of the BJP met at Advani’s residence yesterday morning for about two hours and briefed him about their discussions with Bhagwat on Friday.
Sources said the RSS has firmly asked BJP leaders to end the infighting in the party and reach consensus on a new party chief. (ANI)
Petaling Jaya, Aug. 29 (ANI): The Malaysian Indian Congress will have to regain Malay-Indian community’s confidence and work hard to prove that it is still relevant to the country, party chief president S Samy Vellu has said.
“There might even come a time when many won’t even realise that there is a party representing the Indians in the Barisan Nasional,” The Star quoted him, as saying.
Noting that a party could now be registered within a couple of days, Samy Vellu said it was difficult to register a political party in past.
“We must all realise that the party will be facing bigger problems and if we don’t work and are not aggressive, we might even be forgotten.
“We have to make sure that other people don’t bully us. We have to show that the MIC is a 64-year-old party, with vast experience and capable of standing on its own,” he said.
The MIC chief added that he had chosen delegates very carefully, and only those are endorsed who are really working for the community and the party. (ANI)
London, August 26 (ANI): A team of archaeologists has unearthed a Neolithic “cathedral” – a massive building of a kind never before seen in Britain, which go back nearly 5,000 years, easily predating the Egyptian pyramids.
According to a report in The Press and Journal, the “cathedral”, at 82 ft long and 65 ft wide, is placed between two of Orkney’s most famous Neolithic landmarks, the Ring of Brodgar and the Stones of Stenness.
Even the Ring of Brodgar and the Stones of Stenness would have seemed quite small in the presence of the cathedral-type building, which would have stood on the spot that has now been excavated.
Nick Card, from the Orkney Research Centre for Archaeology, who is leading the dig, said the building was effectively a cathedral for the north of Scotland.
“It’s spectacular,” he said. “There were hints at the end of last season that we had an enormous building here and now we are able to define it more,” he added.
What is interesting is that the shape and size of the building are visible, with the walls still standing to a height of more than three feet.
They are 16 feet thick and surround a cross-shaped inner sanctum where the excavation team have found examples of art and furniture created from stone.
It seems that the building was surrounded by a paved outer passage. This could have formed a labyrinth that would have led people through darkness to the chamber at the heart of the building.
“This is architecture on a monumental scale and the result is the largest structure of its kind anywhere in the north of Britain. It’s one of those finds of a lifetime,” Card said.
The building probably served as some kind of temple, maybe for remembering the dead. It may have been a place where sacrifices, even human sacrifices, were offered up.
Other buildings, over 50ft long and 30ft wide, have also been discovered.
According to Dr Colin Richards, a leading expert on the period, the building would have stood at the heart of Neolithic Orkney.
“A structure of this nature would have been renowned right across the north of Scotland – and is unprecedented anywhere in Britain,” he said. (ANI)
Washington, August 26 (ANI): Historians have said that Italian mathematician Galileo Galilei’s invention of the telescope was more commercial in nature than an attempt to contribute in scientific progress.
Galileo’s telescope is today remembered as a revolutionary stargazing tool that changed Earth’s standing in the heavens.
According to a report in the National Geographic News, historians have said that when Italian mathematician Galileo Galilei presented his version of the telescope to officials in the Italian city-state of Venice, he was simply seeking a career boost.
Galileo needed a pay raise, in part to support several illegitimate children, according to science historian Alan Chapman of the University of Oxford in the UK.
“He was a rather obscure professor on the make showing a novelty invented by somebody else to his bosses,” Chapman said.
A math professor at the University of Padua, Galileo based his optical instrument on spyglasses developed the previous year by Dutch spectacle makers.
The Venetian Senate was about to purchase one of the popular gadgets when Galileo stepped in with his own version.
Made of wood and leather, Galileo’s telescope had eight-times magnification, a convex main lens, and a concave eyepiece that-unlike other telescopes of the period-presented the image the right way up.
Venice’s interest in the telescope was commercial rather than scientific, according to science historian Alan Chapman of the University of Oxford in the UK.
“The maritime city’s wealth and power was based on overseas trade, and at the time its vessels were being attacked by the Turks,” Chapman said.
To demonstrate the enemy-spotting potential of his telescope, “Galileo took a number of senators up to one of the bell towers in Venice where you can see ships out in the lagoon,” he said.
In 1609, most Europeans accepted the Christian account of creation, which placed our planet at the center of the universe.
Galileo’s telescope overturned this idea by allowing the scientist to observe moon-like phases in the planet Venus, which could only be explained by a sun-centered solar system.
Galileo likewise discovered that Jupiter was orbited by its own moons.
“This established beyond a doubt that the Earth was not the only center of motion in the universe,” said Robert Massey of the Royal Astronomical Society in London.
Galileo’s telescope and astronomical observations also showed the surface of the moon wasn’t smooth, as was believed, and he was the first person to reveal that the Milky Way was composed of stars. (ANI)
New Delhi, Aug.24 (ANI): Thirteen of Canada’s elite universities will be in India from August 23 to September 4 to hold information sessions on Canada as a destination for higher education.
The delegation is led by Ginette Sanfaçon of HEC Montréal (Business school affiliated with the Université de Montréal) and Michelle Beaton of Ryerson University in Toronto.
The tour is organized by the Canadian Higher Education Committee under the aegis of the Council of International Schools (CIS).
The Council’s fifth annual tour to India will begin in Mumbai and continue in Pune, Delhi and Bangalore.
According to a Canadian High Commission press release, the tour is of special interest to Standard XI and Standard XII students who exhibit strong academic standing, their school guidance counselors as well as to their parents. The schedule includes school visits, information fairs, and an indepth Canadian university admission workshop for guidance counselors.
“India is a key undergraduate student market for Canadian universities,” said Ginette Sanfaçon of HEC-Montréal and Tour Director. “Indian students are sought for their academic strength and their rich contribution to student life on Canadian university campuses. In turn, increasing numbers of Indian students are making Canada their first choice for study – as evidenced on this tour.
Indian students are drawn to our universities’ common attributes of international reputation for academic excellence, state of the art resources, and safe campuses in welcoming locations,” Sanfaçon said.
Each year, tour organizers strengthen existing relationships with secondary schools in cities they visit and also expand outreach to new regions. For example, guidance counselors from schools in Dehra Dun, Hyderabad, Chennai and Chandigarh as well as Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are receiving invitations to attend the Tour’s counselor workshop in Delhi.
List of participating universities:
The University of British Columbia; Carleton University; Dalhousie University; HEC MONTRÉAL (Business School affiliated with Université de Montréal); Memorial University of Newfoundland; University of Manitoba; University of New Brunswick; Ryerson University; University of Saskatchewan; University of Toronto; Vancouver Island University; University of Waterloo; York University.
Canadian universities are engaged internationally as leaders in education through teaching, research and partnerships. Undergraduate education in Canada is a hybrid of US and UK styles offering breadth of program options, flexibility in choice and a degree that is ultimately recognized world-wide.
Indian students choose Canada because a strong education and a positive international experience is the foundation for their exciting and successful futures. The quality, affordability and renowned research opportunities are key factors in this decision. University campuses across Canada offer multicultural environments, beautiful spaces and friendly people. As a leader in business, political diplomacy, arts and culture and technology – Canada’s education system is at the core of its success and its graduates are players on the world stage. (ANI)
London, August 19 (ANI): A giant cupcake, standing 4ft tall and weighing 1,224 pounds, has entered the Guinness Book of Records.
The hefty cake beat the previous record of 151 lbs to become the world’s largest when unveiled in Detroit, Michigan, US.
The brainchild of American firm Gourmet Gift Baskets, the cupcake, with a mouth-watering circumference of 11ft, was baked over the course of 12 hours.
Made from 200 lbs of flour, 200 lbs of sugar, 200 lbs of butter and 800 eggs, the 2,000,000 calories dessert was covered with frosting and custard.
Ryan Abood, CEO of GourmetGiftBaskets.com, got together a “dream team”, including master-baker George Algarin, to begin work on the cake five days before the slated unveiling.
“We started off with a goal of a 7,000 lb cupcake but fate intervened on Friday morning when the baking was supposed to be complete,” the Telegraph quoted Abood as saying.
“The huge 8x8ft oven was opened and we found that the weight of the expanding batter crushed one of the main convection tubes blowing hot air into the heart of the cupcake causing cup-cake to ollapse,” Abood added. (ANI)
London, Aug.19 (ANI): The fifth Ashes Test, which begins at The Oval from tomorrow, will be a defining one for Australia captain Ricky Ponting.
Victory at The Oval will hand Ponting something that is demanded of any Australia captain worth his salt, a series victory over England, in England, reports Fox Sports.
A draw or worse and Ponting will have failed in two attempts to overcome the old enemy – each series with the world’s No.1 team.
That Ponting engineered only the second 5-0 Ashes whitewash in between times will be remembered fondly, but, unfairly, it will be overshadowed by his failings in England.
A stalemate will be enough for Australia to retain the Ashes, but the man they call Punter will have just one outcome in mind: victory.
Ponting’s standing as an all-time batting great is secure, but for a captain who’s leadership qualities constantly come under question, it’s not stretching things to say his legacy is at stake.
“The pressure is on. Your captaincy gets rated on series wins, but also on how we go against the old enemy. It wouldn’t please Ponting to have another series defeat in England on his CV,” says ex-captain Allan Border.
“I’ve said from the start about how much it would mean to me to win here. It’s a chance I’ve been waiting for this whole tour and a chance the whole team has been waiting for,” Ponting adds.
Should Australia lose, Ponting will join Billy Murdoch as the only captains of Australia to lose two Test series in England. It would be an immovable blemish on his record, and grist to the mill for Ponting’s numerous detractors.
“He’s probably not saying too much publicly, but privately it would be burning that he wants to right that wrong. He wants to come away as an Ashes-retaining captain,” Border told Fox Sports.
Pushing 35, this will almost certainly be Ponting’s last tour of England. The Oval might even be his last Test match against the Poms. He’s had a mixed series with the bat and as a tactician, all the while contending with the goading of British media and fans who have not forgotten Ponting’s ill feeling in 2005.
Ponting’s vice-captain and heir apparent, Michael Clarke, has meanwhile been in astonishing form. Probably the player of the series to date, Clarke led by example with two very Ponting-like knocks, backs-against-the-wall centuries, at Lord’s and Edgbaston.
Despite Ponting’s advancing age and Clarke’s obvious leadership potential, Border does not believe The Oval result will have any influence on Ponting’s position as captain of Australia.
“I get the feeling Ponting’s very comfortable with where he’s at, both as a player and as a captain,” said Border, who started Australia’s long-running hold over in England in 1989, and who was an Ashes-winning captain three times.
“Stepping down as captain and continuing as a player doesn’t work in our system. Ricky will know when it’s the right time to hand over the reins,” he adds. (ANI)
Gwalior, Aug 18 (ANI): The food and civil supplies department of the Madhya Pradesh Government has seized illegally stocked sugar from godowns across the state.
Food and civil supplies officials backed by state police have raided sugar mills and godowns across Madhya Pradesh in the last three days.
In the Gadai Pura area of Gwalior district, the officials of food and supplies department raided and seized 210 quintals sugar from a godown.
“We received information from the state police department that they have raided a sugar godown. We seized 205 sacks of sugar from the godown. Five more sacks arrived later in a truck and we even seized that. Overall, we seized 210 quintals of hoarded sugar,” said Vipin Srivastava, a food controller.
Meanwhile, in panic, sugar traders are trying to sell the hoarded sugar to people at low prices that has been illegally stored by them in godowns.
However, they claim they are doing it for the benefit of people.
People were seen standing in long queues to buy sugar at a price of rupees 28 per kilogram as opposed to the actual price of rupees 32 per kilogram.
“People have been screaming since the prices of sugar rose. So we thought whatever stock of sugar we have, we can sell it at low prices,” said Mahesh Kakvani, president, Trade Committee and Sugar Association.
The food department of the Madhya Pradesh Government has decided to issue licenses to sugar traders to keep a check on hoarding and prices. (ANI)
London, July 12 (ANI): Actress and activist Mia Farrow has revealed that an online spy is threatening to overturn her efforts to help refugees in Sudan, and has claimed that this won’t budge her from standing for the cause.
The ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ star has been working hard to highlight the plight of those effected by civil war in the country’s Darfur region, and encourage governments to do more to help them.
In fact, the actress had recently fasted to raise awareness of the cause and even runs a daily blog showing pictures as well as up-to-date news on the situation in the Sudan.
And now Mia fears that spies are targeting her blog and are tipping off the British government about her actions.
“I have been notified today that someone has been faxing the contents of this site to members of the House of Commons in England.” the Daily Star quoted the American actress as saying in her latest updates.
She added: “I hope whoever is doing this will cease as this sort of harassment is counterproductive to all we are hoping to accomplish for the people of Darfur… Shame on you.” (ANI)
Lima (Peru), July 2 (ANI): In a new study, a team of scientists have determined that the success of the Inca was boosted by a period of global warming that lasted more than four centuries.
The new study is called “Putting the Rise of the Inca within a Climatic and Land Management Context” and was prepared by Alex Chepstow-Lusty, an English paleo-biologist working for the French Institute of Andean Studies, in Lima, Peru.
The Inca Empire was the largest empire in pre-Columbian America. It began as a support group in the Cuzco area, where the legendary first Sapa Inca, Manco Capac founded the Kingdom of Cuzco around 1200.
According to a report in Living in Peru, a team of English and US scientists has analyzed pollen, seeds and isotopes in core samples taken from the deep mud of a small lake not far from Machu Picchu to determine that the success of the Inca was underpinned by a period of warming that lasted more than four centuries.
The four centuries coincided directly with the rise of this startling, hyper-productive culture that at its zenith was bigger than the Ming Dynasty China and the Ottoman Empire, the two most powerful contemporaries of the Inca.
“This period of increased temperatures allowed the Inca and their predecessors to expand, from AD 1150 onwards, their agricultural zones by moving up the mountains to build a massive system of terraces fed frequently by glacial water, as well as planting trees to reduce erosion and increase soil fertility,” said the scientists.
“They re-created the landscape and produced the huge surpluses of maize, potatoes, quinua and other crops that freed a rapidly growing population to build roads, scores of palaces like Machu Picchu and in particular the development of a large standing army,” they added.
According to Alex, the report “raises the question of whether today’s global warming may be another opportunity for the Andes.” (ANI)
Melbourne, June 25 (ANI): Victoria is set to add a second international cricketer to its squad in a bid to reach a fifth consecutive Twenty20 Big Bash final next summer.
The Bushrangers on Wednesday confirmed they had signed West Indies all rounder Dwayne Bravo for the 2009-10 series, and another big name is likely to be added to the squad before Christmas Day.
West Indies captain Chris Gayle, as well as several Sri Lankans, including opener Tillakaratne Dilshan, legendary spinner Muthiah Muralidaran, pacer Lasith Malinga, and veteran bowler Chaminda Vaas are in contention.
Dilshan’s performances in the World Cup and the Indian Premier League make him hot property, but given he played in the IPL for Delhi Daredevils, coached by Bushrangers coach Greg Shipperd, Victoria could be a good choice for the Sri Lankan.
Cricket Australia this year changed its rules to allow states to sign two internationals instead of just one. It is underwriting the cost in its desire to continue to improve the profile of the domestic Twenty20 championship, The Herald Sun reports.
The two Big Bash finalists qualify for the Champions Trophy tournament and Victoria is moving quickly to protect its standing as the most successful state in recent years. (ANI)
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