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The Hindu : SUDHINDR.A.B.

The celebrations that marked six decades of India as a democratic republic were intense and joyous.

The colours of freedom: At Ryan School and National Public School (below)

A moment of solemn pride and quiet reflection accompanied the celebrations of six decades of India being a democratic republic, by the students of schools that are part of The Hindu’s NIE programme.

Renewed faith

At Ryan International School, Kundalahalli, the students renewed their faith in the principles of justice, liberty, equality and fraternity which marked the many successes that Indians have achieved and with which we will address the many challenges that will determine the destiny towards which our nation is steered. As the Tri-Colour fluttered high in the sky, the school ground blossomed with myriad colours of freedom as the students put up drill displays and tableaux based upon patriotic songs in Kannada and Hindi. The school choir added their melodious voices to set the mood for a glorious remembrance of harmony and fostering in a sense tolerance and forbearance. A synchronised march past symbolised the strides of the nation into a future redolent with the dreams of our martyrs and the pride of our constitution-framers that is helping us reach the stars

At the National Public School, Koramangala, the students of Std. XI began the celebrations. The event had a humble start, with an extract of the famous speech by Dr. Babu Rajendra Prasad, the first President of Independent India, outlining the various aspects of the Constitution.

The classical dance performance the tune of “Vande Matram” showcased an artistic unfurling of the National Flag. The short skit on the army protecting and serving their country and countrymen selflessly, sacrificing their lives, filled the hearts of people with the sense of patriotism.

Special music

The celebratory dance on the number “Jai Ho” followed by the song “Yeh To Desh Hai Tera” filled everyone with the pride of…More

The Hindu : y>

Sizzling stars Watch Urmila ‘s best movies on Thursday

This February, enjoy an array of blockbuster premieres and romantic films on Star Gold. The romantic flavour starts with ‘Dil Se’, a week long Valentine special festival. In the course of the festival, many popular romantic movies such as “Just Married”, “Honeymoon Travels”, “Baabul”, “Pyar Ke Side Effects”, “Bluff Master” etc. will be screened from February 8 to 14. The festival will conclude with the premiere of “Hey Baby” starring Akshay Kumar and Vidya Balan at 8 p.m. on Valentine’s Day.

The blockbuster of the month “Wanted”, starring Salman Khan, Ayesha Takia and Mahesh Manjrekar will be aired on February 28 at 8 p.m. The channel will also telecast the best movies of the stars on their birthdays. Catch Urmila in action in movies such as “Ek Hasina Thi”, “Jungle” and “Deewangee” on February 4. Abhishek Bachchan will bring his real life romance alive on reel life in “Dhai Akshar Prem Ke” starring Abhishek and wife Aishwarya on February 5.

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Fostering a newborn kitten

Years ago, we rescued two orphaned kittens that did not make it despite our best efforts. Shattered, we began to take a particular interest in what was needed to help tiny kittens survive until they can fend for themselves and find homes. To save the life of the next orphaned kitten or a litter of them, you need:

A small room, safe from dogs or other cats, snug and warm in the cool season but well ventilated and cool during summer.

A cardboard box or cat carrier lined with soft cloth – an old dupatta or towel will do.

Feeding bottle and diluted milk. Cotton wool and water to gently wipe the kitten’s rear end – they pass tiny quantities of urine and stool and rubbing induces the action, and they are easily cleaned.

Do not bathe them but wipe with damp towels and dry them off. If the kitten feels cold, hold the kitten against your skin for the warmth to flow from you to the kitten. Feed only after it has become warm. Stroke them gently and talk to them. Every day, kittens are cruelly discarded in dustbins or left on the street. If a handful of volunteers came forward to care for them, we can save many animals from certain death.

DEVIKA KHAZVINI

Hero of the week

Prema, 78-year-old, is differently-abled and takes care of 10 dogs – three as pets at home and seven on the street. She cooks for them and feeds and bathes them herself. Prema lives by herself and strongly believes that the dogs keep her going.

Know of a hero who has performed of an act of kindness to animals? Write to petpalsbangalore@gmail.com

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The Hindu :

Size and weight don’t matter — eating right does, says celebrity nutrition expert Rujuta Diwekar

Photo: R.V. MoorthyA balanced diet Helps you enjoy life to the fullest

Much ado was made about Kareena Kapoor’s ‘size zero’ vital stats, but the woman who helped her achieve that doesn’t believe much in numbers. “It was only when people started asking me how Bebo came down from 60 kgs to 48 that I knew. You know, I don’t even have a weighing scale in my office,” says celebrity nutrition expert Rujuta Diwekar (Anil Ambani and Karisma Kapoor are clients too). Rujuta’s philosophy is simple; eat right, eat often, not necessarily less.

Despite being anti-numbers, there’s something she has meticulously arranged in order — the five major mistakes people make in a bid to lose weight.

Mistake 1

Owning a weighing scale. “Do you want to look better or do you want to look a certain number on the weighing machine?” asks Rujuta. “There’s nothing like a target weight.”

Mistake 2

Eating tasteless food.

Mistake 3

Trying to eat a small quantity. “If you starve yourself, your body is going to ask for those calories sooner or later,” Rujuta warns.

Mistake 4

Going by set standards. “Once you start eating often, you empower your stomach to talk to you often. Eat according to a pattern that suits you,” she adds.

Mistake 5

Not eating according to season. After her bestselling “Don’t Lose Your Mind, Lose Your Weight”, Rujuta is in the process of finishing her second book, expected to be launched mid-year. “This one is going to be for women specifically,” she reveals.

During her talk, Rujuta doles out other useful tips: The right time to have a sweet? “10 a.m. or 4 p.m.”

“What if you feel like having one after lunch or dinner,” asks someone. “Your body is already high on sugar after a meal. If you have a sweet then, you body is just going to…More

The Hindu :

This fortnight at indiaplaza.in

The Untouchables (1987)

Cast: Kevin Costner, Charles Martin Smith, Andy Garcia, Robert De Niro, Sean Connery

Director: Brian De Palma

Screenwriter: David Mamet (from a novel by Oscar Fraley, Eliot Ness and Paul Robsky)

Director of photography: Stephen H. Burum

Composer: Ennio Morricone

Price: Rs. 499

What is not to like about this film? The high-octane cast, super-stylistic shot-taking and the smooth-as-silk score all combine to make a film that has classic stamped all over it.

From the first shot of Prohibition’s famous gangster, Al Capone, swathed in a towel getting shaved while his underlings just wait around for their god to make a move through the incredible steady-cam shots leading to the explosive violence, the phenomenally powerful baseball pep talk, the celebrated baby carriage sequence to the final showdown on the roof of the courthouse, this film does not make a single wrong move.

Based on the television show about the efforts of a treasury official, Eliot Ness, to bring down the unofficial mayor of Chicago, Capone, David Mamet’s script re-images “The Untouchables” into a whole new movie altogether.

Ness teams up with a Jimmy Malone, a tough Irish beat policeman. In a scene reverberating with biblical influences, in a church, the two men sign a blood oath to end Capone’s reign. As the police and the politicians are all owned by Capone, Malone suggests going “to the tree to avoid the rotten apples.” They recruit George Stone, a young Italian police academy trainee. The fourth member of the elite squad is Oscar Wallace, an accountant on loan to the treasury department. Wallace has a novel plan to arrest Capone — on his income tax returns.

And so the untouchables (so called because they cannot be bribed) set out to war. The losses are heavy on both sides but Ness manages to put Capone behind the bars.

The movie is an exhilarating ride through the familiar cops and…More

The Hindu :

May be it’s education, may be it’s career; or, just the need for independence. As young women postpone marriage, the queue of men waiting to be wed gets longer

Photo: AFPthere is loads of time Tying the knot can wait…

There was a time when parents with daughters were a pitied lot — it was considered a Herculean task to ‘get girls married off’ or ‘find a good groom for the girl’. This idea has, of course, been whipped threadbare in countless Tamil films. But now, looks like it’s time for a remake — with a twist.

Check out matrimonial sites and centres, and you will find that today it is brides who are hard to get. Many matrimonial centres have a long list of grooms waiting for brides, while it’s not the case with brides. For every 200 boys registering for marriage every month, only about 50 women register, says Rukmini Sriraman of Divyadhampadigal, a 30-year-old horoscope-matching centre.

“It is good, isn’t it?” asks Murugavel Janakiraman, founder-CEO, BharatMatrimony.com. “It merely reflects the changing socio-economic status of women. Twenty years ago parents called the shots in marriage,” he says. But now girls are exercising their rights and do not flinch from saying ‘no’. And, why not?

Broad outlook

Girls are educated, work, earn and have a broad outlook on life. Parents too understand that they can’t force their decisions on their daughters. Not that these girls want to leave their parents out of the picture. Far from it. In fact, many girls want the couple to stay with the bride’s parents after the wedding.

“Girls refuse to move to the cities where the boys live, not willing to give up their families or careers. Many of these girls ask the boys to give up or change jobs, and move to their home cities,” says Rukmini.

However, the chief reason for this wait for brides is the declining sex…More

The Hindu :

Cut down on salt and step up your health

Photo: AFPRestraint Say no

In decades past, when companies wanted to test-market a product meant to enhance health and well-being, they often tried it first in California — where people were reputed to be the most health-conscious in the country. But now companies might be wise to consider field-testing their wares in New York City.

If he can take credit for nothing else, the city’s mayor, Michael R. Bloomberg, can rightfully claim to have launched a national effort to help people live more healthfully. He began with a prominent campaign to curtail smoking, the single leading killer of Americans, by banning it in restaurants and bars, and followed that with a campaign to get heart-damaging trans fats out of packaged and restaurant foods.

Next Bloomberg attacked rampant obesity (though New York, being a walking city, is leaner than most other metropolitan areas) by promoting a requirement that chain restaurants prominently display the calorie content of all their offerings.

In a scientific analysis published last week in The New England Journal of Medicine, researchers at the University of California, San Francisco; Stanford University; and Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons calculated that if Americans reduced their salt intake by half a teaspoon a day, or 3 grams (the equivalent of 1,200 milligrams of sodium, the health culprit in salt), the nation would save up to $24 billion a year in health care costs.

The research team, led by Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, an epidemiologist and biostatistician at UCSF, concluded that even a much more modest reduction — one gram a day, achieved gradually by the year 2019 — “would be more cost-effective than using medications to lower blood pressure in all persons with hypertension.”

And money is not the only thing that would be saved. The researchers calculated that the half-teaspoon reduction would “reduce the annual number of new…More

The Hindu : y>Senorita Das talks about the need to follow road safety norms

Roads in our country have proven to be as life threatening as a terror attack, communal riots, natural disasters or even pandemics like swine flu. Road accidents account for a huge number of mortalities every year.

Most of these deaths are a result of poor maintenance of roads, with the numerous potholes being responsible for many a mishap. Improper illumination and absence of speed breakers in front of public places are also major causes for many accidents.

Moreover, traffic signals, that are the key for safe traffic movement is also badly managed. This results in a great deal of confusion and chaos.

The responsibility to drive safe also depends on the people. Many of us just prefer to race on the road with no consideration for the rest of the traffic and pedestrians. The public buses and autos are one of the primary culprits behind many accidents.

Most of the accidents can be avoided with improved road safety management and accident relief services.

The traffic department should also initiate public awareness programmes to wipe out corruption among the traffic police and the license providers. Safe driving is a social responsibility. As members of this civilised society, we must join hands to ensure that unsafe roads do not become another cause for terror.

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The Hindu :

Cycling is not just fun, but a purse-friendly way to get into shape

PHOTO: ASHOKE CHAKRABARTYHEALTH ON TWO WHEELS Cycling is an eco-friendly way to fitness

The greatest joy of parents after seeing their kid stand up must be watching him/her get onto a tricycle and pedal away. Soon, the kid makes its wobbly entry into two-wheelerdom, and even as mom screams, takes hands off the bars and rides into cycling bliss. Going to school on it isn’t the same, but that’s when he/she collects rich stories of bicycle cliques, races, doubles, punctures, loose chains, cycle shops and greasy hands.

Look what happens to us as adults. We kick off the ladder we grew up on. Motorised, poison-spewing vehicles fill our canvas, the bigger the better. And we forget the joys of cycling — to work or for leisure. Ask Gokul, software pro at Fidelity Information Services. He’s on his bicycle most of the time, backpack hitched to his shoulders. “I strongly believe riding a motorbike/car within a five km radius is unjustified,” he said. “I’ve been trying to persuade colleagues to go pedalling.” They do make approving noises, “know it’s good for their own and environmental health, but find it embarrassing to ride a cycle.” There.

The irony is hilarious. We buy expensive, accessorised bikes for our brats. We spend thousands on racing, rally and mountain bikes. We crowd our bedroom with an exercise bike or drive across the city to the gym to pedal a stationary one. But no, we won’t be seen jumping off a cycle at our workplace. Is it because maids, teawallahs, newspaper and courier boys are seen astride it?

Rahul Prabhakar, software again, has been covering the two-and-a-half km to work on a slim, geared bicycle the last two years. “It’s a no-cleaning-no-cost-no-tension workout,” he said. When stuck in traffic, he simply lifts his transport on to the footpath…More

The Hindu :

Urban Indian women are ready to buy beauty at any price

PHOTO: RAJEEV BHATTFACE FACTSWomen, these days, are trying out expensive cosmetics and treatments to look beautiful

Beauty is a word that has a powerful impact on women in society.

But men too, especially those who enjoy success in their career or on the financial and social fronts, are becoming increasingly conscious of their looks.

A four-metro national survey by AC Nielsen and Kaya Skin Clinic reveals that affluent urban Indian women are ready to buy beauty.

The study throws up two interesting findings — the modern, affluent Indian woman feels age is no bar to beauty, and there are a number of adult women who derive confidence from their looks.

More than 90 per cent of these women co-related beautiful skin with confidence, and this feeling was especially strong in Mumbai and Delhi.

These women believed that having beautiful skin made people notice them. And they were willing to pay whatever the price to have glowing skin.

Beauty salons across the country now offer a dizzying range of skin treatments.

Anti-ageing services

There are specific services for acne, acne scars, pigmentation, dark circles, skin lightening, hair care and hair removal and anti-ageing.

Women can choose from peels, lasers, botox, fillers, mesotherapy and radiofrequency.

“The most popular services sought at Kaya are laser hair reduction and various types of peels,” says Sangeeta Amladi (head-medical), Kaya Skin Clinic and editor, Forum for Aesthetic Dermatology.

Moving to a weighty issue… A whopping 70.5 per cent of women in Chennai felt they were not overweight.

In Delhi, the survey found that more than half of the women felt they were overweight and wanted to lose weight.

But few women, on the whole, thought of sports as a way of staying in shape.

And less than nine per cent thought of going to a gym, doing yoga, or aerobics to maintain their figure.

Some walked in order to keep fit. Most…More