Free dhotis, saris for Villupuram arrive

VILLUPURAM: For Pongal festival a total number of 17,40,206 free dhotis and saris will be distributed in Villupuram district.
Stocked in godown

Of these, the district has already received 14.70 lakh dhotis and saris and these have been stocked in the Tamil Nadu Civil Supplies Corporation godown, according to R.Palanisamy, District Collector.
Stocks inspected

He inspected the stocks today to verify whether all the dhotis and saris carried the Co-optex seal.

Later, he told the reporters that the dispatch of these goods to taluk headquarters had already started.

The allotment to the taluks is as follows: Villupuram – 3,60,744 dhotis and saris; Vanur – 91,892; Tindivanam – 2,31,436; Ginjee – 2,27,984; Thirukkoilur – 2,09,078; Ulundurpet – 1,67,644; Kallakurichi – 2,39,428, and, Sankarapuram – 2,11,800.

Voter list verification from Wednesday

VILLUPURAM: Door-to-door verification of voter list will be carried out in the district from December 16 as part of the exercise for preparation of supplementary electoral rolls, according to R. Palanisamy, District Collector.

Officials would verify as many as 18 factors such as photographs, names, gender, relationship, address, etc. Names of those who would attain 18 years of age as on January 1, 2010 would be included. Names of the dead and those who had displaced would be deleted.

The Collector was addressing a meeting of officials attached to 1,501 polling stations across the district. After verification the officials would obtain the signatures from one member from every household and also paste the Election Commission stickers on the doors.

The officials would be imparted training as follows: for those in Villupuram and Kallakurichi – on Monday, and, for those in Tindivanam and Thirukkoilur on Tuesday.

Those who attended the meeting included P. Kuppusamy, Chief Educational Officer, Mahboob Ali, Personal Assistant (General) to Collector and other officials.

Counselling for teachers of 13 districts begins

TIRUCHI: A two-day counselling session for candidates to be recruited as secondary grade teachers for government schools in 13 districts in the State began in the city on Thursday.

The Department of School Education was to fill up 2,079 vacancies in government schools in 15 districts and the teachers were to be recruited based on the seniority list of candidates furnished by the Department of Employment.

The Teachers Recruitment Board had forwarded a list of 1,958 eligible candidates based on their seniority.

Of the total vacancies, 631 vacancies were filled up at the counselling sessions held in the respective districts on Wednesday.

Vacancies in two districts were filled up during the district level counselling.

Counselling was held here for the remaining vacancies in the 13 districts of Perambalur, Tiruvarur, Dharmapuri, Krishnagiri, Coimbatore, Salem, Erode, Tiruvannamalai, Pudukottai, Cuddalore, Villupuram, Nagapattinam and Kancheepuram. M. Kuttralingam, Secretary, School Education Department, K. Devarajan, Director, School Education, Muthu Palanisamy and S. Karmegam, Joint Directors, supervised the counselling sessions.

On the first day, counselling was held first for physically challenged candidates. According to Mr. Devarajan, among those selected were 54 physically challenged candidates, 835 women and 426 men. After the candidates selected their choice of place of work, from the list of vacancies, they were issued allotment orders after completion of other formalities. The candidates would be issued the posting orders on Monday at their respective District Education Officers.

Answering a query, Mr. Devarajan said that the new recruits would soon be provided training in active learning methodology and activity based learning.

Cash prizes for SC, ST students

CHENNAI: Deputy Chief Minister M.K. Stalin on Tuesday distributed cash prizes to 13 students belonging to Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes/Adi Dravidars converted to Christianity, who scored high marks in the public examinations for Standard X and XII in March this year.

Toppers in the examination for Standard X were given Rs.10,000 each. They are B. Revathy of Palayamkottai, Tirunelveli district; K. Nurpavi of Cheyyar, Tiruvannamalai; S. Karthick Kumar of Tenkasi, Tirunelveli; R. Tharani of Ponmalai Patty, Tiruchi; J. Jishanth of Nagercoil, Kanyakumari; J. Gnana Deepa Priyadarshini, Pallavaram, Kancheepuram and Joel Prabu of Tindivanam, Villupuram.

Those who emerged toppers in the examination for Standard XII were given Rs. 25,000 each.

They are N. Kabilan of Uthangarai, Krishnagiri district; R. Abirami of Keeranoor Valasu, Namakkal; B. Sujith of Thindal, Erode; R. Charanya of Puzhuthivakkam, Kancheepuram; S. Nivya Premkumari of Brammapuram-Tirupattur, Vellore and T. Veeramani of Royappanpatti, Theni.

Mr. Stalin also gave away assistance to beneficiaries of various economic development schemes being implemented by the Tamil Nadu Adi Dravidar Housing and Development Corporation.
Land deeds

Under the agricultural land purchase scheme for women, 23 beneficiaries were given land deeds. Financial assistance would be provided to 400 beneficiaries under the loan scheme for individuals and 27 persons under the youth self-employment scheme.

As of now, 30 beneficiaries were given autorickshaw vehicles. Besides, 1,182 members of self-help groups were covered under the revolving fund and 912 persons given economic assistance.

The Deputy Chief Minister also gave away financial assistance to 86 SC candidates, who are preparing for the Civil Services main examination after clearing the preliminaries.

Cell phone users flock centres for IMEI numbers

VILLUPURAM: Those who own unbranded cell phones continue to flock GII (Genuine IMEI Implant) centres in Villupuram and Cuddalore to get the mandatory 15-digit International Mobile Equipment Identity numbers.

The centres obtain the IMEI numbers over the Internet from an authorised dealer for a fee. While the official fee for getting the IMEI is Rs.199, some centres are collecting Rs.250 per handset.

For handsets with dual SIM cards, they charge Rs.500, much in excess of the stipulated fee, allege cell phone owners. It normally takes 10 minutes to implant the IMEI numbers, but some centres are taking 10 days and the reason for the delay is not clearly spelt out.

The new stipulation has come in handy for unscrupulous traders to recycle the IMEI numbers of scrapped cell phones, according to E. Senthil Kumar of S.K. Teleshope in Villupuram, an authorised GII centre. Mr. Kumar told this correspondent that certain handsets might have become dysfunctional owing to immersion in water or other factors. Exploiting the situation, some money-minded traders were handing out the IMEI numbers of the “dead sets” to unsuspecting customers.

Mr. Kumar said that after cell phone owners gave the identity proof along with the prescribed fee his centre would get the IMEI numbers from the main dealer in Chennai.

In such an instance, a printout carrying the IMEI number would be given to the customers, whereas those running the clandestine trade would not issue any receipts. He said that mostly handsets with the “Made in China” and “Made in Korea” labels came without the IMEI numbers.

The customers were attracted to these sets because of their range of features at lesser cost. Mr. Kumar further said that once the IMEI number was duly obtained the cell phones would get automatically activated and therefore there was no need to approach the service providers concerned.

There was no time limit for obtaining the IMEI numbers and the November 30 deadline was for decommissioning the cell phones without the IMEI numbers, he added.

World AIDS Day observed in Cuddalore, Villupuram

CUDDALORE: Rallies and administering oaths marked the World AIDS Day observance in Cuddalore and Villupuram districts on Tuesday.

District Collectors P.Seetharaman and R.Palanisamy administered the oath to the gatherings at the Camp Office and the Collectorate respectively to the effect that nothing would be done to hurt the feelings of the HIV/AIDS patients.

They conveyed the message that self-discipline was dearer to them than life and all would join together in the endeavour to create HIV/AIDS-free India.

The para-medical staff took out a rally in Cuddalore from the Camp Office to the main bus stand.

They carried placards calling upon the patients to focus on achieving something great, underscoring the need for donating and infusing safe blood and loyal to the spouses. A cultural troupe also set out on a van to stage skits to create awareness among the people about the scourge.

At Villupuram about 1,000 students, N.S.S. volunteers and representatives of non-governmental organisations took out a rally from the Collectorate to the old bus stand. Those who were present at the flag-off point included Joint Director (Health) R.Dharmalingam, Deputy Director (Health) K.Krishnarajan and Personal Assistant to Collector Ganesan.

TNEB to introduce automated fault reporting system

CHENNAI: The tiresome ritual of calling the local Tamil Nadu Electricity Board (TNEB) official during powercuts could soo be a thing of the past, if a new experiment of the board clicks.

The system, which is part of remote monitoring of transformers being taken up by the TNEB, involves a modem attached to transformers. The modem detects repairs, if any, to the transformer and automatically sends messages to the computers and mobile phones of the assistant engineer. The first such modem has been fixed to a transformer on Bishop Hall Road off CIT Colony. The TNEB will fix modems in over 150 distribution transformer meters across the State in five feeders situated in Chennai, Villupuram, Madurai metro and in Coimbatore for the pilot study which will start from February 2010.

The Society for Applied Microwave Electronics and Research Engineering (SAMEER) is helping the TNEB in making the modems. "The messages from the modems would be sent also to the mobile phones of the local engineer and to the computers of senior officials in the TNEB. The SMS will be automatically deleted only after the fault is repaired. This facilitates early rectification of the problem and also keeps a check on the efficiency of the staff," said a senior TNEB official.

These devices will also send out messages to the officials in case the load factor in a particular transformer increases or decreases beyond a limit. When the load in a transformer increases abruptly, the officials can investigate the cause and find out if there has been any power theft. "During meetings and festivals, the power is illegally drawn from the transformer. The modem then messages the area engineer about the overdrawing and the theft can be detected and stopped immediately," said the official.

This will also help identify line loss while the generated power is being transferred from the production point to the sub-station and later to the distribution transformers. "The main aim of the research is for energy accounting. We will know how much power is supplied and how much is distributed," the official said.

The modems are indigenous and have been made to suit the specific needs of TNEB. "They are on a par with the imported modems, but costs less," said the official.

Read more: TNEB to introduce automated fault reporting system - The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chennai/TNEB-to-introduce-automated-fault-reporting-system/articleshow/5334331.cms#ixzz0ztfXTtrd

Heavy rain in most parts of coastal areas

CHENNAI: The Meteorological department on Thursday announced the onset of north-east monsoon with most places of the coastal belt of the State receiving rainfall.

According to a bulletin, Kollidam (Nagapattinam district) recorded heavy rainfall of 7 cm during the 24-hour period that ended at 8-30 a.m. on Thursday.

Chengalpattu (Kancheepuram) and Gingee (Villupuram) registered 6 cm each; Sriperumpudur (Kancheepuram), Cuddalore, Puducherry airport, Tiruvarur and Sirkali (Nagapattinam) 5 cm each and Chennai, Uthiramerur (Kancheepuram), Cholavaram, Chembarampakkam and Tamaraipakkam (all Thiruvallur district), Chidambaram (Cuddalore), Vanur (Villupuram), Muthupet (Thiruvarur), Ramanathapuram, Sathankulam (Tuticorin), Sathanur dam (Tiruvannamalai) and Kodaikanal 4 cm each.

15,375 candidates take exam for constable posts

CUDDALORE: A total of 15,375 candidates took examinations conducted by the Tamil Nadu Uniformed Services Recruitment Board for the Grade II constable posts in Cuddalore and Villupuram districts on Sunday.

They sat for the examinations in six centres in both the districts, including at St Joseph’s Higher Secondary School and St Anne’s Higher Secondary School in Cuddalore, and, at Elumalai Polytechnic College, Theivanai Ammal College for Women, V.R.S.College of Engineering and Ramakrishna Higher Secondary School in Villupuram.

Though a total of 16,659 candidates had originally applied for the posts in both the districts there were 1,284 absentees.

Over 2,000 women candidates also appeared for the examinations.

Based on the results of the examinations the candidates would be called for physical tests, interview and medical tests before being inducted into the police force.

The arrangements were made by Deputy Inspector General of Police (Villupuram range) Masanamuthu, and Superintendents of Police A.Amalraj (Villupuram) and Ashwin Kotnis (Cuddalore).

At all the centres heavy police bandobust was posted.

800 students take part in drawing contest

PUDUCHERRY: A drawing competition on a running train is not a novel event; it has featured in Puducherry’s calendar for nine years now, yet enthusiasm certainly has not diminished. Over 800 students from 54 schools in Puducherry, Cuddalore, Villupuram, Neyveli, Panruti and Chennai, participated in the 10th Annual Drawing Competition organised by the Pondicherry State Artists’ Society, on a running train from the Puducherry Railway Station and the Villupuram Railway Station.

Organisers said that the names of the prize winners will be announced in ten days, followed by a prize distribution ceremony.

Students from Standard IV to X took part in the contest by obtaining special tickets, and received participation certificates at the end at the Villupuram Railway Station. And in commemoration of ten years of the contest, all participants were also given lunch hampers this year.

The contest started with the commencement of the journey from Puducherry Railway Station at 7.45 a.m. on Sunday. The children soon settled down to create the picture of a family doing away with a pollution-causing device, particularly relevant in the wake of Diwali.

Villupuram ring road proposal under study

VILLUPURAM: State Highways Minister Vellakoil M. Saminathan has said that the proposal to construct a ring road in Villupuram and a bypass road at Valavanur are under consideration.

Mr. Saminathan, along with Higher Education Minister K. Ponmudy and Collector R. Palanisamy, inspected some of the road improvement works at Tindivanam, Mayilam Kootterpattu, Vikkiravandi, Mundiampakkam and Ginjee on Saturday.

Later, he told reporters that the widening and repairing of 61,641-km road network in the State had been taken up and 85 per cent of the works completed. Of this, 1,613 km had been converted into six-lane roads.

In the past three years, a total length of 45,971 km of roads, including bridges, had been improved at a cost of Rs. 8,318 crore. In Villupuram district, 2,743 km of roads and 55 bridges were set right at a cost of Rs. 585 crore.

For the current year, a sum of Rs. 315 crore had been sanctioned to take up works on 836 km length of roads and 77 bridges, Mr. Saminathan said. Conceding the demand of Mr. Ponmudy, Mr. Saminathan said a service road would be laid at the Thirukkoilur overbridge.

World Bank experts study new paddy cultivation system

VILLUPURAM: Two water resource management experts from the World Bank visited Villupuram on Saturday to study the implementation of the System of Rice Intensification (SRI).

The experts namely Maxie and David A. George met Collector R. Palanisamy and elicited information about the extent of area covered under the SRI.
SRI system

The Collector said that the SRI system was being implemented through the World-Bank aided IAMWARM (Irrigated Agriculture Modernisation and Water Bodies Restoration and Management) project in the district.

Of the 1.60 lakh hectares of cultivable lands in the district SRI system was adopted in 60,000 hectares so far.

The farmers were evincing keen interest on the new method of paddy cultivation and they were encouraged by the State government and the agriculture department.

The World Bank experts visited some of the farms at Pagandai and V. Mathur where the SRI system was in vogue.

They interacted with the farmers asking them about the concessions or grant given by the government, availability of bank loans and the advantage of the system.

K. Arunachalam, a progressive farmer, said that the Collector had been propagating the new agriculture concept through all forums and public functions.

The farmer further said that he also heard from his peers about the advantages of the SRI system.
Comparison

Under the traditional system of paddy cultivation 30 kg of seeds would be required for an acre, but under the SRI system just three kg of seeds were enough.

By using the rotor mechanism weeding operation could be carried out with three persons instead of the usual 15 persons.

Water consumption would also be much less, whereas, the yield would be almost double that of the regular farming method, Mr. Arunachalam said.

Impressed by the enthusiasm of the farmers the experts called upon the officials to post details of the latest technological advancement in the sphere of agriculture on website to create awareness among the new generation of farmers and the youths.

They appreciated the efforts put in by the Collector in popularising the concept.

Those who accompanied the team included P.J. Pandian and V.K. Ravindran of the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, N. Ramamurthy of the Tindivanam Oil Seeds Research Centre and P. Ramalingam, Joint Director of Agriculture.

Rahul Gandhi’s flying visit to Tamil Nadu cost over Rs.1 crore

CHENNAI: “As a politician, you have a duty to be austere,” Rahul Gandhi told reporters here last week during his tour of Tamil Nadu. But the travel bill the Congress general secretary toted up during his three-day visit down south ran to seven figures, not exactly a sum the word “austerity” conjures up. At about Rs.1.5 lakh an hour for a helicopter, and Rs. 1.1 lakh an hour for the Beechcraft aircraft that Mr. Gandhi used for most of the long haul, his Tamil Nadu darshan would have cost the Indian National Youth Congress over Rs. 1 crore in helicopter and fixed-wing aircraft hire charges, The Hindu has established.

The 2006 Beechcraft King Air 350 aircraft, operated by the New Delhi-based Air Charter Services Private Limited, has a 10 per cent plus service charge too. The crew in both instances need to be looked after by the persons hiring the aircraft. Added to this is the expense of the SPG, which tailed the Pawan Hans helicopter in an Army helicopter.

Mr. Gandhi, who was on a day-long whirlwind tour to southern districts on September 8, used a Pawan Hans helicopter from Thiruvananthapuram after arriving there in the Beechcraft (VT-ACD).

On his way back from Coimbatore, Mr. Gandhi took an eight-seater Falcon 2000 aircraft to New Delhi. It belonged to the Mumbai-based TajAir. According to the Taj website ( http://www.tajaironline.com), a New Delhi-Coimbatore one-way trip costs Rs. 20,31,250. “All flights originate from Mumbai. Thus, the fare is calculated ex-Mumbai and back,” the website explains.

The Congress leader hopped from Thiruvananthapuram to Nagercoil to Tirunelveli to Virudhunagar and to the Madurai Kamaraj University on the first day. After an overnight halt at the Circuit House in Madurai, he left for Thanjavur by the Beechcraft on day two. According to back-of-the-envelope calculations by airport sources, with the Thiruvananthapuram-Madurai trip and the overnight halt of the helicopter, the total cost incurred would be close to Rs. 15 lakh.

On day two, he landed at the Indian Air Force strip in Thanjavur. After meeting people and Youth Congress workers, he left by the same aircraft for Puducherry where he met PCC office-bearers. He hopped on to a helicopter for Villupuram and Vellore. Later in the day, after his engagements at Vellore, he flew into the nearby Naval Air Station in Arakkonam, INS Rajali, in a helicopter, before taking the B-350 to Chennai.

From Chennai to Hosur, Mr. Gandhi travelled by the same B-350. A TNCC source said the party paid Rs. 7,500 for landing and parking to Taneja Aerospace for the use of a private airstrip at Hosur. Mr. Gandhi took the same aircraft to Salem and from there to Coimbatore.
Foolproof security

Salem airport authorities said all charges for the landing and ground handling at Salem were paid in Chennai itself, as the Salem airport did not have normal operations. The same aircraft was used to reach Coimbatore. For landing, parking, and route navigation, the Coimbatore airport collected a total of Rs. 6,800 from both the operators. Besides, Rs. 1,500 was paid to a private firm for ground handling.

A senior police official, when contacted, said Mr. Gandhi’s movement by road was restricted to the extent possible in Tamil Nadu. Foolproof security arrangements were imperative in the backdrop of heightened threat to the VVIP perceived by Central and State intelligence agencies.

Besides having in place a three-tier security shield for Rahul Gandhi, who is also protected by the elite Special Protection Group (SPG), the State police chalked out an elaborate scheme for his protection based on specific inputs.

Citing reports of the Ministry of Home Affairs, the police official said a handful of top Sikh militants and cadres of the Lashkar-e-Taiba met at an undisclosed destination in Pakistan recently and allegedly decided to target Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Bharatiya Janata Party leader L.K. Advani, and Mr. Gandhi.

Further, reports of the Intelligence Bureau (IB) and the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) indicated the movement of a suspected Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam cadre and a sympathiser along the south-eastern coast of Tamil Nadu.

The last communication was intercepted in the last week of March 2009 and it appeared the suspects were organising the movement of Sri Lankan Tamil refugees. “Reports in a section of the media that appeared in the United Kingdom alleged that India had extended military support to Sri Lanka in the war against the LTTE. The resentment has surfaced as hostility to Rahul Gandhi,” the official added.

Dolmen with petroglyphs found near Villupuram

A big dolmen with four petroglyphs that portray men with tridents and a wheel with spokes has been found at Kollur, near Tirukoilur, 35 km from Villupuram in Tamil Nadu.

The discovery was made by K.T. Gandhirajan, who specialises in art history, when he led a team to that area. Petroglyphs are engravings made with a tool. What is special about the latest find is that while two men have been shown having tridents in their hands, a third is brandishing unidentified weapons. Unusually, these figures have been chiselled on the dolmen’s capstone — that is roof-slab. While the pre-historic artist has provided a geometrical pattern to the two men with tridents and other weapons, he has chiselled the third man, with an ornament on his chest, in a free-flowing manner.

This is the second time that a dolmen with petroglyphs has been found in Tamil Nadu. The earlier discovery in the Nilgiris district was also made by Mr. Gandhirajan. But it was a circular dolmen with a petroglyph on the slab wall (The Hindu, May 24, 2009).

“The three figures belong to different periods. But the two men holding tridents are chronologically close to each other,” Mr. Gandhirajan said. He estimated that while the dolmen itself was 2,500 years old, the petroglyphs might be about 2000 years old. The tridents could have been hunting or fishing weapons. Their depiction showed that the engravings belonged to the Iron Age (circa 1000 B.C. to 300 B.C.). The engraving of a wheel was significant because the men who erected the dolmen had the knowledge of wheels.

Six more dolmens were found nearby, on the banks of a lake at Kollur. In addition, three dolmens were situated on the bed of the lake which was built at a later period. The site had been discovered earlier, but not the petroglyphs. The team that visited the site on September 13 comprised G. Chandrasekaran, retired principal of the Government College of Fine Arts, Chennai, and K. Natarajan and D. Ramesh, both academicians.

Dolmens are normally box-like structures made of granite slabs and a roof slab.

The entrance slab sometimes has a perfectly round porthole. Dolmens are found where there are no natural caverns. While in many places, they were erected over cist-burials, dolmens have also been found without cist-burials. Mr. Gandhirajan argued that it was not necessary that the dolmens be erected over cist-burials only; they had been found on rocky mounds.

Dolmens could have been used as shelters by tribals during rains or winter. Sometimes, dolmens had paintings of red ochre or white kaolin.

“Hundreds of megalithic dolmens were once found in Tamil Nadu. Urban development and extension of agricultural land led to locals smashing them up or carting away the granite slabs for use in their houses. The Tamil Nadu Archaeology Department must make a survey of the surviving dolmens, and it should fence them. For these sites are directly connected with the pre-Sangam or Sangam age culture of Tamil Nadu,” Mr. Gandhirajan said.