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Archives for August 2018

Asiad 2018: Indian teams in mixed double TT pre-quarters

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The Indian mixed double teams advanced to the pre-quarters of the table tennis competition at the 2018 Asian Games here on Wednesday.

In the first Round of 32 match, Indian pair comprising Anthony Amalraj and Madhurika Patkar defeated Donny Aji and Lilis Indriani of Indonesia 3-1, at 11-4, 11-13, 11-8, 11-9.

In an another Round of 32 affair, India’s Sharath Kamal Achanta and Manika Batra hammered Malaysia’s Javen Choong and Karen Dick 3-0.

The Indian pair thrashed the Malaysians 11-2, 11-5, 11-8 to enter the pre-quarters.

The Indian teams’ pre-quarters will be held later on Wednesday.

7.1-magnitude quake hits Pacific island New Caledonia

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An earthquake measuring 7.1 on the Richter scale has struck 209 km West of the Ile Hunter off the coast of New Caledonia on Wednesday, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The quake occurred at 0351 GMT and was initially determined to be at 22.066 degrees south latitude and 170.050 degrees east longitude at a depth of 26.7 km.

Despite the high intensity of the tremor, no tsunami warning has been issued so far.

US Open: Kvitova, Ostapenko advance to 2nd round

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Czech Republic’s Petra Kvitova, the No. 5 seed, rolled to a 6-1, 6-4 win over Belgium’s Yanina Wickmayer, advancing to the second round at the US Open in Flushing Meadows here.

On Tuesday, Kvitova, a two-time Wimbledon champion, had to overcome the intense heat and Wickmayer, a US Open semi-finalist in 2009, reports Efe news.

Up next for Kvitova will be the winner of the match between China’s Yafan Wang and Slovakia’s Anna Karolina Schmiedlova.

In other action on the women’s side, Latvia’s Jelena Ostapenko, the No. 10 seed, defeated German veteran Andrea Petkovic 6-4, 4-6, 7-5.

Denmark’s Caroline Wozniacki, the No. 2 seed, beat Australia’s Samantha Stosur, the 2011 US Open champion, 6-3, 6-2.

Wozniacki’s next opponent will be Ukraine’s Lesia Tsurenko, the world No. 42, who beat Belgium’s Alison Van Uytvanck 6-3, 6-2.

Wozniacki, the Australian Open champion, has a 1-0 career record against Tsurenko.

On the men’s side, Portugal’s Joao Sousa defeated Spain’s Marcel Granollers 6-2, 6-2, 6-3, while Croatia’s Marin Cilic, the No. 7 seed, beat Romania’s Marius Copil 7-5, 6-1, 1-1 (retired).

Serbia’s Laslo Djere beat Argentina’s Leonardo Mayer 6-4, 6-4, 4-6, 2-1 (retired).

England’s Jamie Vardy to retire from international football

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English striker Jamie Vardy has decided to retire from international football according to an interview published in The Guardian newspaper.

The Leicester City’s striker who will turn 32 in January, has played 26 times for England scoring seven times and has been part of every national squad since he first picked to represent his country in May 2015, reports Xinhua news agency.

Vardy has communicated his decision to English coach Gareth Southgate two weeks ago.

“To be honest with you, this has been on my mind for a while,” he commented on Tuesday, explaining he had told Southgate it was “best to bring youngsters in who he thinks have got the ability and start nurturing them into international football.”

He admitted that the fact he is always likely to be substitute to England captain, Harry Kane had also “had an impact” in his decision.

“When you get selected, you want to be playing. If you’re playing week in, week out for your club, you want to be going to England to play as well.

“And if it’s not happening, then for me personally now, at this age, it’s better to be at home, spending that time with my family and training with my club, preparing for the next game after the international break,” he said.

Vardy has played at every level of English football and commented that he had first thought about his international retirement after the World Cup, although he described Southgate as a brilliant coach and added that if England suffered a serious injury crisis, he would return if he was needed.

Congress flays government over excise duty on petroleum products

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Hitting out at the Narendra Modi government for the rise in petroleum prices, the Congress on Tuesday said even though prices of petroleum products across the world have gone down with the international prices declining, excise duties have been increased many times.

“During the UPA government, the international crude oil prices were double the present rates, but our excise duties were much lower.

“Now the excise duties have been increased many times and even as the international prices have gone down, the petrol and diesel prices are soaring,” said Congress spokesperson Jaipal Reddy.

“All over the world the prices of petroleum products have gone down as the international prices have gone down,” he added.

Reddy further said: “Arun Jaitley (Finance Minister) earlier said they are not getting adequate tax collection.

“The fact is dishonest people are not paying taxes and you want to punish the poor and honest middle class people. How does he advance such an argument in public? This government has become utterly insensitive to public opinion,” said Reddy.

Fuel prices continued to rise on Tuesday, with diesel prices rising to fresh record levels across metros and petrol crossing the Rs 78-per-litre mark in the national capital.

Maneka asks Indian Envoy in Spain to send abandoned girl back

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Union Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi on Tuesday asked the Indian Ambassador in Spain to send back the adopted girl who was abandoned by her foster parents in the country.

She was reacting to a recent media report according to which a Spanish couple had abandoned the 13-year-old girl they adopted from an agency in Madhya Pradesh after they were allegedly deceived about her age.

The couple was reportedly told that the girl was seven-year-old at the time of adoption earlier this year.

“It is very unfortunate that the adopted girl has been abandoned in Spain. I have requested our Ambassador in Spain D. B. Venkatesh Varma to immediately send her back to India where we will ensure her rehabilitation and safe custody,” the Minister said.

Gandhi also expressed her concern for the girl who is currently in foster care in some institution in Madrid and added that the Ministry is in the process of fixing the responsibility for the lapses which happened on the part of the Child Care Institution in Bhopal.

(IANS)

Women activists urge PM to ban on illegal GMO imports

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Environmental activist and scholar Dr Vandana Shiva on Tuesday urged the Prime Minister to ban “illegal GMO import” and stop unnecessary imports to support Indian farmers and strengthen the country’s sovereignty.

In a joint letter to PM Narendra Modi, Shiva of Navdanya and founder of Guild for Service Dr Mohini Giri pointed out how our country is “unnecessarily importing roundup-sprayed pulses and processed food with Genetically Modified Organism (GMO)” technique.

“While our farmers grow a diversity of safe, healthy, GMO-free food, we are unnecessarily importing roundup-sprayed pulses and processed food with GMOs. We can feed two times India’s population with bio-diverse nutrition-sensitive organic agriculture,” the letter said.

It further said that illegal imports of GMOs and roundup-ready food grains are destroying the livelihood of our farmers and women in the indigenous food economy and health of the people.

“Our government seems to be in a rush to put the profits of MNCs above the food sovereignty of India, the livelihood of Indian farmers and women, and the right to safe and healthy food of the Indian people,” it said.

Shiva and Giri then called upon Modi to stop the entry of GMO foods and roundup-laced pulses and edible oils, and “build on indigenous alternatives which can provide fair incomes to our farmers and a healthy diet to the last child”.

In another letter to Minister of Environment, Forest and Climate Change Dr Harsh Vardhan, Shiva implored the Minister to investigate Bt Cotton (genetically modified crop) for criminal fraud, accusing Monsanto — an agrochemical and agricultural biotechnology corporation — of deceiving Indian farmers by making unscientific and fraudulent claims.

“Over the two decades since Monsanto entered India, it has violated laws, deceived Indian farmers by making unscientific and fraudulent claims, extracted super profits through illegal royalty collection by violating India’s Patent and Intellectual Property laws, pushed farmers into debt, and, as a consequence of the debt trap, to suicide,” Shiva said.

“Monsanto cheated Indian farmers by claiming that its Bt cotton will control the bollworm. The claim of Bt cotton being a pest control technology has been proven false with the emergence of resistant pests and farmers are being forced to use pesticides. Farmers are now dying due to pesticide poisoning,” she added.

Lynching bad for India’s reputation: Alphons in China

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Incidents of lynching have hurt India’s image, Tourism Minister K.J. Alphons, who is in China to draw in more tourists, has admitted.

The minister, however, said that the ban on beef has not affected tourism in the country and sought to debunk a survey showing India as the most unsafe country for women in the world.

“Well, it (lynching) shouldn’t happen. Simple. And, the Prime Minister (Narendra Modi) has called them criminals. And, he told the states you have to take action because law and order is a state subject,” Alphons said on Tuesday interacting with Indian journalsits.

Asked if incidents of lynching have affected tourism in India, the Minister said: “Well, not on a big time basis…not really. But anything happening like that is bad for the reputation of the country. We won’t say it’s good for the reputation of the country.”

Has the ban on beef kept foreign tourists away from India, Alphons said that was not the case. “Not really… you see there are states like Kerala, Goa and the Northeast… these are all beef eating states.”

“These are all big tourism destinations… So people would go wherever they are comfortable

“I think we need to respect the sentiment of the people anywhere… that’s so fundamental.”

India has witnessed incidents of lynching over cow slaughter and beef eating in the country. The majority of Hindus in the country consider the animal as sacred.

Alphons is visiting China to attract Chinese tourists who currently generate some 21 per cent of tourism receipts in destinations in the world. He opened a road show in Beijing on Tuesday and will visit Shanghai and Wuhan.

Despite swelling number of outbound Chinese tourists, Indian receives only a very small fraction of them.

“Last year, 144 million Chinese were abroad, but only 300,000 came to India,” the minister said.

He said India plans to get at least 14 million Chinese tourists in the next three years.

Asked about women’s safety, an issue which is among the prime concerns among Chinese to visit India, Alphons said it was “a perception battle”.

He tore apart a recent survey by Thomson Reuters which said India is the most unsafe country for women.

“Thomson Reuters put out a story saying it’s (India) unsafe. We asked them how? They say they interviewed 540 people or something out which 43 from India.”

“You can’t ask the 43 so-called knowledgeable people of India whether India is safe or not because most of these so-called feminists would be anti-government … it is the politics of it,” he said.

(IANS)

Congress to protest against sealing of non-polluting industries

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Delhi Congress chief Ajay Maken. (File Photo: IANS)


The Congress Delhi unit on Tuesday said that it will protest at Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s official residence here against the “illegal” sealing of non-polluting industrial establishments in the capital.

In a statement, Delhi Congress chief Ajay Maken said that on August 31, the party will hold a demonstration at Kejriwal’s residence in support of their charter of six demands.

Maken demanded that the Centre and the Kejriwal government give permission to run non-polluting industries in Delhi without any delay.

He said that due to laxity of both the governments, the “sword of sealing” was hanging over such establishments.

According to the 6th Economic Census 2013, there are 8,75,308 industrial establishments in Delhi, of which 1,55,950 are manufacturing units, said Maken.

The Congress demands that the central government put small non-polluting industries in the category of household industries.

(IANS)

She made our world a better place: Taylor Swift on Aretha Franklin

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Days ahead of Aretha Franklin‘s funeral in her hometown, singer Taylor Swift honoured the late Queen of Soul.

On Tuesday evening, the Reputation singer, 28, performed at Detroit’s Ford Field where she asked the sold-out crowd to pay tribute to Franklin with a moment of silence, reports people.com.

“Last week we lost an irreplaceable force. Aretha Franklin did so much for music, she did so much for women’s rights, she did so much for civil rights,” Swift told concertgoers as heard on videos shared by fans on social media.

“She was one of those people where no matter what you said, no matter what glowing positive thing you said about her, it would be an understatement. Words could never, ever describe how many things she did in her lifetime that made our world a better place. And this is her home.

“I would like it if we could have a moment of silence so that every single one of us could reflect on our love and respect for her and everything that she did in her life. So if we could please cut the lights, we’ll have a moment of silence for Aretha. We love you Aretha,” the pop star added.

Franklin died at age 76 of pancreatic cancer on August 16.

On Tuesday, the day of her funeral, which is open to the public, hundreds of people, some of whom spent the night on the sidewalk to save their spots in line, showed up to pay their respects at the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History, the Detroit Free Press reported.

(IANS)

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