Identifying Mumbai's unsafe spots

Identifying Mumbai's unsafe spots

Santosh Andhale / DNA

December 28, 8:15 IST

http://www.dnaindia.com/mobile/report.php?n=1782078

Mumbai: A group of women, along with students, has started identifying spots/areas in the city that are unsafe for women.

They have selected five civic wards and they will 'map' the areas where crime against women mostly happen by organising a safety walk.

Five social organisations — Akshara Centre, Stri Mukti Sanghthana, Bhartiya Muslim Mahila Aandolan, Mahila Vikas Parishad, and Parivartan Sansthan — have joined hands with students of 12 colleges to document such spots over the next three months.
Areas which have witnessed maximum instances of teasing or groping or molestation in other forms will be mapped. These organisations have come up with a host of reasons behind such incidents — poorly-lit roads that are also deserted, lack of police patrolling vans as well as police chowkies.

"We will take the help of 200 students from 12 city colleges to identify unsafe spots for women in the city," a source said. The safety walk will be organised in the G/south (Prabhadevi), F/south (Parel), G/North (Dadar), H/East (Bandra), and M/East (Chembur) and F/south (Parel) wards.

"Once the mapping is done, we will share our findings with the police and the civic authorities," said a member of one of the organisations. These five organisations are being headed by the Akshara Centre, an NGO working for the development of women.
"We will talk with women who face problems daily in these areas. The action plan will be submitted to the authorities," Nandita Shah, co-director of Akshara Centre, said.
The centre has also made a documentary to highlight and sensitise people

 

Saral Money debit cards launched

Saral Money debit cards launched

Saral Money, an innovative payment product which ensures that everyone with an Aadhar number automatically has an Aadhar-linked instant account in a bank, was launched by Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit on Wednesday.

People would be able to purchase the Saral Money debit card across the counter from grocery shops and bank branches. It would facilitate instant account opening, simplified documentation and accessibility and reach.

The project has been launched in a collaboration by the UIDAI and five banks -- Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, ICICI, Indian Overseas Bank and the State Bank of India and Visa Card.

Under the scheme, an Aadhar number holder can purchase a card for a nominal fee to operate the account.

Ms. Dikshit said the new scheme would bring banking to the door step of the citizens. The Delhi Government, she said, has decided to implement cash transfer mode with the help of Aadhar numbers for its most ambitious food security programme, Delhi Annashri Yojna, which would be launched by UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi here on December 15.

With Saral Money, the Government and other institutions would be able to send money to anyone using only an Aadhar number, irrespective of whether the beneficiary has a bank account. The beneficiary would then be able to withdraw the money from any ATM or any Micro ATM using biometric authentication provided by Aadhar.

UIDAI Chairman Nandan Nilekani described the scheme as a truly innovative step. He said it would contribute substantially in making Delhi a role model in cash transfers.

Would enable Aadhar beneficiaries to have an instant bank account

http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-newdelhi/saral-money-debit-cards-launched/article4194178.ece

Ration card holders in Maharashtra to get kerosene subsidy directly

Ration card holders in Maharashtra to get kerosene subsidy directly

Under the new scheme, ration card holders would get kerosene at market rates from PDS shops, while the government would deposit the subsidy amount directly into their bank accounts

 

Mumbai: To check the black marketing of cheap kerosene sold through the public distribution system (PDS), the Maharashtra government has decided to deposit subsidy on the fuel directly in the bank accounts of intended beneficiaries, reports PTI.

 

Maharashtra Food and Civil Supplies Minister Anil Deshmukh said that other measures to stop black marketing had been ineffective. "We feel directly depositing the subsidy amount in bank account will prove effective," he said.

 

Under the new scheme, ration card holders would get kerosene at market rates from PDS shops.

 

"The PDS office will be informed about the purchase by the dealer. After the verification, reimbursement of the subsidy amount will be done directly in the bank account of the beneficiary (ration card-holder)," Deshmukh said.

 

The scheme was first to be implemented, on a pilot basis, in Nashik district, but following a presentation to the Union Food and Civil Supplies Ministry, it was decided to implement it all over the country, he said.

 

In the first phase, Mumbai-Thane, Amravati, Nashik, Wardha, Pune, and Nandurbar districts of the state will be covered.

 

The district collectors would see to it that joint accounts of the beneficiaries (husband and wife) are opened in nationalized banks.

 

"If the female head of family already has an account in a nationalized bank, she need not have a new one. But the male head of the family, even if he has an existing account, will have to get a new joint account with the wife. If he is a widower, the joint account will have to be with the senior female family member," the Minister said.

 

The collectors have been asked to complete the process of opening of accounts before 30th September.

 

Ref: http://www.moneylife.in/article/ration-card-holders-in-maharashtra-to-get-kerosene-subsidy-directly/28335.html

 

Aadhar online Appointment: http://appointments.uidai.gov.in/

Aadhar Print Application card: http://eaadhaar.uidai.gov.in/

 

12th language added in online dictionary

12th language added in online dictionary

Vaishali Balajiwale / DNA

December 13, 3:53 IST

http://www.dnaindia.com/mobile/report.php?n=1776928

Mumbai: Digital dictionary khandbahale.com added the 12th language to their database and launched the-first-of-its-kind Indian language dictionary online on 12.12.12 at 12:12:12pm.

Founder of the site Sunil Khandbahale made the launch atIMRT college in Nashik in a laboratory. The exact time was counted down by 12 known personalities in the city. “The launch was planned to resemble a satellite launch to show that language can also be exciting,” he said. Khandbahale.com already operates online word dictionaries in 11 languages. With the addition of Urdu, the website has 12 languages with 16 domains and 60 lakh words.

 

2 more suspected dengue cases put schools on alert

2 more suspected dengue cases put schools on alert

Maitri Porecha & Puja Pednekar / DNA

December 11, 22:34 IST

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Mumbai: Two more children from the Malwani MHADA colony, suspected to have dengue, were admitted to Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital in Andheri on Tuesday. Alarmed city schools are on alert.
Brothers Mohammed Faiz, 17, and Mohammed Faiz Idris, 15, were admitted to the hospital after their condition worsened in a private nursing home in Malad over the past two-three days. Idris is a Std IX student at Ryan International School, Malad.
Schools, especially those in the western suburbs, are taking preemptive measures to ensure that dengue, and other such diseases, don’t spread among students. With BMC’s help, school authorities are conducting fogging sessions on their premises.
Yogesh Patel, director of Swami Vivekananda International School in Gorai and Borivli, said, “School premises need to be completely safe and germ-free for children. Suburbs have a big mosquito problem. The BMC is supposed to do fogging regularly, but it doesn’t. Hence, we have scheduled fogging sessions in the next few days.”
Avnita Bir, principal of RN Podar School, Santa Cruz, said as such mosquitoes are found in stagnant pools of water and dusty corners, such as under the benches, they have alerted their housekeeping staff to clean classrooms well.
Schools with a sprawling green campus, such as Rajhans Vidyalaya and Holy Family School, in Andheri, have doubled their efforts to maintain a safe, mosquito-free environment for students. Father Francis Swamy of Holy Family School, said, “Ever since reports about dengue have resurfaced, we are taking care to ensure that students don’t fall sick. We held fogging sessions and took other preventive measures as well.

 

Mobile net service all set to be faster

Mobile net service all set to be faster

Kanchan Srivastava / DNA

December 11, 7:00 IST

http://www.dnaindia.com/mobile/report.php?n=1775953

Mumbai: Are you fed up with mobile service providers whose claims of high internet speed don’t match what you receive? You don’t have to worry anymore as the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) has finally come up with stringent rules which will force operators to maintain the quality and speed of wireless data services available on your phone.

Through a notification released on December 4, TRAI has made it mandatory for all operators to maintain the quality of services provided by them and, more importantly, to set up a system to keep trackof a user’s data transmission details, download/upload attempts from a test server, minimum download and output speed from a test server covering all tariff plans, data drop rate etc.

The notification states: “Operators will have to compulsorily maintain a test set up comprising of servers and test probes to cover the entire licensed service area.”

The move aims to force the providers to have a ‘reporting tool’ to track and maintain the quality of wireless data services. Rajan Srivastava, a telecom expert associated with an MNC, says, “This will also make consumers more aware about the value for their money, as they usually get fooled by advertisements which claim to give a certain data speed, which is never provided.”

Rajan Mathews, director general, Cellular Operators Association of India, says, “India is the second-largest market in the world, so it’s good that we are coming up with a system which others can follow. Operators are already maintaining the quality, but with the new tool, consumers will have clarity on what to expect from providers. They will know about minimum, maximum and average speed now.”

Mathews added that the tool is already integrated into the system. “We will now have to report on the basis of parameters set by TRAI.”

Trai has also mad eit compulsory for service providers to publish on their websites, the details of all data services offered along with tariffs, clearly indicating the cities and towns where such data services and tariff plans are applicable. The service providers shall not offer new data services or modify the existing data services without publishing it on the website

 

BMC's dengue drive goes up in smoke

BMC’s dengue drive goes up in smoke

Maitri Porecha / DNA

December 10, 6:04 IST

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Mumbai: Five deaths and at least 1,000 cases of dengue since January this year has spread panic among residents in the city. Residents of Mhada colony in Malwani complain that even though two persons from their locality succumbed to the deadly disease in the last week alone, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has failed to step up measures to control the situation.

Tariq Jafri (32), a resident of Samuha (society no 136) in Malwani, succumbed to dengue shock syndrome on Wednesday, while his four-year-old daughter Tasneem died three days later.

In the past one month, nine persons from the society fall ill due to dengue. BMS student Bhavna Kamble (18), who stays two blocks away from the Jafris, was detected positive for dengue last month. She was admitted to Surana Hospital for 15 days.

"I had to miss my semester exams. I was vomiting incessantly and had high grade fever. There is a high proliferation of mosquitoes in and around the houses," said Bhavna.

Doctors say Dengue Shock Syndrome can fatally affect an individual within as less as three days of contracting it.

Even as the probability of residents contracting dengue in the Mhada colony is very high, the residents complain that the BMC has not made them aware as to how to prevent the disease. Close to 35,000 residents reside in 6,000 tenements in the Malwani Mhada colonies.

"After two deaths in the colony, BMC officials hung two to three posters. They did not even distribute temephos insecticide to kill larvae of mosquitoes. There is no awareness programme," rued Akhtar Khan, a resident.

"The residents should take care that no stagnant water collects in potted plants or buckets," said Dr Mangala Gomare, epidemiology head, BMC.

 

4-yr-old still critical with dengue

4-yr-old still critical with dengue

Maitri Porecha

December 8, 4:51 IST

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Mumbai: Four-year-old Tasneem Jafri, daughter of Malwani resident Tariq who died of dengue on Wednesday, is also suffering from the deadly disease. She was shifted from the paediatric intensive care unit (PICU) of Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital to the BMC-run Nair Hospital on Friday evening.

Deceased Tariq, 32, his widow Shakila, 30, and Tasneem have been suffering from dengue since December 1. “Tasneem is in respiratory distress and has also fluid accumulation in her right chest. She is in the intensive care unit,” said a doctor from Nair Hospital adding that the mother, Shakila is stable.

Tasneem's mother Shakila has been admitted in the general ward. “Tasneem's liver is swollen heavily, and she is on oxygen support in the ICU at Nair Hospital. We are praying that she will recover,” said Tasneem's uncle Sakib.

At least 11 residents from a Mhada residential colony in Malwani have contracted dengue over the past month. After the sudden death of Tariq within five days of acquiring high grade fever, BMC workers were seen fogging the houses in the colony.

The residents are upset that it took a death for the civic body to wake up. “The BMC has done nothing to educate the masses as to how to prevent dengue. It was only after Tariq's death that the officials fumigated the area for the sake of it,” said a resident, Akhtar Khan.

 

Dengue in Malwani puts the fear of death in residents, 11 take ill

Dengue in Malwani puts the fear of death in residents, 11 take ill

Maitri Porecha / DNA

December 7, 3:46 IST
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Mumbai: At least 11 people from a Mhada residential colony in Malwani, Malad (west) have contracted dengue over the last month. Of these, three are from one family, one of whom died on Wednesday.

With the sudden spurt in cases, residents of the colony have demanded that the municipal corporation pull up its act.

The deceased, Tariq Jafri, 32, his wife Shakila, 30 and their 4-year-old daughter baby Tasneema had been down with dengue for the last one week.

Doctors at Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani hospital in Andheri, where Jafri had been admitted said that he died due to ‘dengue shock syndrome’ on Wednesday. The syndrome, said doctors, can kill a person in just three days.

His daughter is in a critical condition in the hospital’s paediatric intensive care unit while his widow Shakila, 30, took discharge against medical advice on Wednesday to attend her husband’s funeral, said hospital sources.

The hospital’s chief executive officer, Dr Ram Narain, said that Jafri had been admitted to the intensive care in an extremely critical condition.

A neighbour of Tariq, Akhtar Khan, said that the Tariq died, two other people from the vicinity had been admitted to Siddartha hospital in Goregaon, which is run by the municipal corporation.

Nearly 35,000 people live in 6,000 ground-plus-one tenements constructed by MHADA in the locality. Local corporator Gulistan Shaikh said that more awareness of dengue was the need of the hour in the locality. “We also need to distribute the insecticide teme phos to residents to pre-empt the rise of dengue,” said Shaikh.

Dr Mangala Gomare, head of the BMC’s epidemiology department, said they were presently distributing the insecticide only in slum areas.

 

Boy crushed in front of mom

Mumbai: A six-year-old boy died on the spot when a BEST bus driver moonlighting as a private school bus driver ran him over in a no-entry zone at the T-junction near the Kandivli Recreation Club around 12.30pm after school ended for the day on Wednesday.
His mother who tried to rescue him fractured her right leg.

Lata Naidu, 35, had picked her son, Gautam, a Class I student of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel Vidyalaya, up after school hours at 12.25pm. The two were crossing a vehicle no-entry road outside the school when the boy wriggled free and ran across. The mother ran after him. Just then, Jokhanlal Yadav, 54, a BEST bus driver who had been temporarily hired by a travel bus agency to run a private school bus, drove the vehicle with 81 students of the school onto the road.

“The mother and son were not aware that the bus had entered the no-entry zone. Gautam was running while crossing the road when he was hit by the bus,” said Hareshwar Pimple, senior inspector at the Kandivli police station. He died on the spot. “Lata, who was chasing him, was also hit by the bus and fractured her right leg,” added Pimple.
As soon as he hit the boy and his mother, Yadav fled the spot. Both Lata and Gautam were rushed to the Bhagwati Hospital in Borivli.

The police arrested Yadav at his house at the BEST quarters in Malwani and booked him under sections 279 (rash driving or riding on a public way), 338 (causing grievous hurt through an act endangering the life or personal safety of others) and 304-A (causing death by negligence) of the Indian penal code as well as under relevant sections of the Motor Vehicles Act.

They also sent him for a medical test to ascertain if he was drunk behind the wheel at the time of the accident.

Yadav was recently hired by a private school bus contractor, Mehta Travel Bus Agency, after its driver went on medical leave.

DNA Correspondent

December 6, 5:51 IST

http://www.dnaindia.com/mobile/report.php?n=1774028

Many can't afford school bus facility

Mumbai: The bus that ran over the six-year-old Gautam Naidu in Kandivli was not meant to ferry children to school. It was a private, contract run bus that did not have permission to ferry schoolchildren.

It was hired by those parents who could not afford the bus service provided by Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel School.The safety norms prescribed by the transport authorities do not apply to such 'illegal' buses.

The Kandivli school offers bus service only for pre-primary section. The extra fees for bus facility starts from Rs600 a month depending on the area, many parents belonging to a low-income background and are unable to afford it.

Sangeeta Srivastava, principal and chief academic officer of Kandivli Education Society that runs the school, said: "We had offered parents a choice to hire BEST bus service, but they preferred a cheaper alternative. Often as many as 150 children are packed into a bus."

The School Bus Owners' Association said such "illegal" buses continue to run as they are hand in gloves with the transport authorities. Unlike regular school buses, such buses do not have any agreement with the school and do not have a permit to carry schoolchildren.

"Every school has at least 8 to 10 such illegal buses, since they are cheaper. But these buses flout all safety norms, yet no action is taken against them," said Santosh Shetty, school bus owner in Navi Mumbai.

Anil Garg, president of the SBOA, said principals are reluctant to sign agreements with regular school buses as it puts the responsibility of safety on them. "Illegal buses are plying across the city because schools can shirk responsibility in case of a mishap," he said.

Puja Pednekar / DNA

December 6, 4:10 IST

http://www.dnaindia.com/mobile/report.php?n=1774017