For the rest of the world, Sridhar Vembu is the founder of Zoho Corporation, a Silicon Valley star valued by Forbes at nearly $2.5 billion who decided to take the unusual step of moving to a small village in Tenkasi in southern Tamil Nadu last year. But the man himself says he is more of a teacher these days, wearing the traditional veshti and moving around on a bicycle in Mathalamparai.
READ | Silicon Valley star is now teacher in Tamil Nadu, says busy with new start-up — rural school
What started six months ago as home tuition for three children that took up “about two-three hours” of his spare time, Vembu says he now has four teachers and 52 students in the fold, mostly children of farm labourers from the village.
The 53-year-old is now all set to take this “lockdown experiment” to the next level: “a rural school start-up” that will provide free education and food, a model that doesn’t believe in marks or degrees or conventional affiliations for certificates, or “credentials” as he calls it.
Also Read | Andhra begins distributing school kits to limit drop-outs
The Telangana government, while issuing Unlock 5 guidelines Wednesday, said it would issue separate orders regarding the date of opening of schools and coaching institutions as well as cinemas, theatres, multiplexes, entertainment parks and other public places. In its latest order, the government said that online or distance learning shall continue-to be the preferred mode of teaching and ‘shall be encouraged’ in colleges and Higher Education Institutions.
READ | Telangana to issue separate orders for opening of schools and cinemas
Only those Higher Education Institutions with research scholars (Ph.D.) and postgraduate students of technical and professional programmes requiring laboratory or experimental works are permitted to open from October 15.
DMK president M K Stalin has 'wishful thinking' of top AIADMK leaders O Panneerselvam and Edappadi K Palaniswami parting ways so that he may gain political mileage, but the party's collective leadership cannot be broken, senior leader K P Munusamy asserted on Saturday. The DMK chief's hopes would be of no avail as the AIADMK is led by the collective leadership built by the hard work of cadres, which cannot be broken at all, he said.
Munusamy was responding to Stalin's charge that the two leaders have joined forces "only for corruption", following the announcement of EPS as the CM nominee for the 2021 Assembly polls on October 7.
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Stalin's repeated allegations of graft against the government was baseless and unfounded, Munusamy, the AIADMK deputy coordinator and former Minister, said. It was only DMK's late patriarch M Karunanidhi who "sowed the seeds of corruption", the Rajya Sabha MP alleged, adding that Stalin hence does not have the moral right to speak of corruption.
"Conspirators" unsuccessfully attempted to "divide us" by creating doubts about the Chief Ministerial choice since Opposition parties could hope to win only if the AIADMK became a divided house, he said. Against this background, the party unanimously nominated Palaniswami as the CM candidate since the government led by him has been delivering good governance, he said.
For the rest of the world, Sridhar Vembu is the founder of Zoho Corporation, a Silicon Valley star valued by Forbes at nearly $2.5 billion who decided to take the unusual step of moving to a small village in Tenkasi in southern Tamil Nadu last year. But the man himself says he is more of a teacher these days, wearing the traditional veshti and moving around on a bicycle in Mathalamparai.
What started six months ago as home tuition for three children that took up “about two-three hours” of his spare time, Vembu says he now has four teachers and 52 students in the fold, mostly children of farm labourers from the village.
The 53-year-old is now all set to take this “lockdown experiment” to the next level: “a rural school start-up” that will provide free education and food, a model that doesn’t believe in marks or degrees or conventional affiliations for certificates, or “credentials” as he calls it.
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In a world where greenhouse gas emissions, mainly carbon dioxide, are on the rise, can the crops that ensure food and nutrition security remain unaffected? A group of researchers at a Hyderabad-based premier crop research institute have made findings that suggest not. Underscoring the problem, their findings also shed light on the solution.
Two research groups at the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) studying the physical and molecular manifestations of increasing carbon dioxide (CO 2) on certain crops have found that the gas significantly and negatively alters chickpea under stressed conditions. Chickpea or channa, is an important legume crop and a staple protein source in India and many other parts of the world.
For their study, researchers at ICRISAT’s Center of Excellence in Climate Change Research for Plant Protection, led by Dr Mamta Sharma, cultivated two popular varieties of chickpea (desi chickpea JG 11 and kabuli chickpea KAK 2) in ambient conditions (380 ppm, the current ambient CO 2 level) and under two higher levels of 550 ppm and 700 ppm to stress the plants and mimic rising levels in the world.
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The Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) conducted 422 fever clinics in Chennai on Friday. A total of 20,078 people attended the clinics, with swabs collected from 1052 people. 1052 people with ILI symptoms were identified, while others were provided with medication for minor ailments.
The most number of camps were held in Teynampet (Zone 9) where 51 camps were set up, while Manali (Zone 2) had the least with six camps.
Telangana recorded 1,811 new COVID-19 cases, taking the infection count to 2.10 lakh even as the recovery rate in the state climbed to over 87 per cent. The toll mounted to 1,217 with nine more fatalities, a state government bulletin said on Saturday, providing data as of 8 PM on October 9.
The recovery rate stood at 87.01 per cent, while it was 85.7 per cent in the country, the bulletin said. The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) accounted for 291 of the 1,811 fresh cases.
It said 50,469 samples were tested on October 9. Cumulatively, the number of samples tested was 35 lakh. The samples tested per million population was 94,046.
The number of recoveries on October 9 was 2,072 as against 1,811 fresh cases. The cumulative recovered cases stood at 1.83 lakh, while 26,104 were under treatment. The case fatality rate in the state was 0.57 per cent, while it was 1.5 per cent at the national level, it said.
After undergoing treatment at a Covid-19 hospital in Rajkot for around 40 days, Rajya Sabha member Abhay Bhardwaj was airlifted to Chennai via an air-ambulance on Friday for further treatment.
“We are shifting Abhaybhai to the MGM Hospital in Chennai. His condition is stable and good but for further treatment of his lungs after keeping him on ECMO (extracorporeal membrane oxygenation), we are shifting him to MGM Hospital where he would be under care of super specialist Dr Bala (Dr KR Balakrishnan),” Bhardwaj’s younger brother Nitin Bhardwaj told media at the Rajkot airport before the air ambulance took off on Friday afternoon with the 66-year-old MP on board.
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A total of 1.33 lakh candidates have qualified in EAMCET out of 1.56 lakh students appeared. The pass percentage for the Engineering stream touched at 84.78 per cent
A total of 69,000 candidates have qualified in Agriculture stream taking the pass percentage at 91.77 per cent. Over 75,000 candidates had appeared in entrance.
The Osmania University, Telangana will conduct the exams for undergraduate, postgraduate, and PG diploma students from October 13 onwards. While the postgraduate diploma courses exams will begin from November 2, the ME/MTech all branches exams will be held from October 13. Exams for BA CBCS semesters will begin from October 20. The MSc exams will be held from October 19 onwards, as per the schedule released by the varsity.
The university has announced to hold exams amid strict precautions due to the pandemic. It is mandatory for students to wear masks during the exam. Social distancing norms including staggered entry rules will also be followed. No candidate will be permitted to wait anywhere in the centre except in the allotted examination hall or room. Candidates experiencing cough, cold, fever, or other symptoms will have to inform the chief superintendent.
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A 13-year-old autistic child missing from his home for the last five years was reunited with his family Friday. Thanks to Telangana Police’s facial recognition tool called ‘Darpan’, the boy, hailing from Handia in Uttar Pradesh, was traced to a state-run child home at Goalpara in Assam.
Additional DGP (Women Safety) Swati Lakra said the Telangana Police upon identifying the child, informed the station house officer (SHO) of Handia police station who in turn informed the parents of the missing child. They immediately rushed to the child welfare center at Goalpara in Assam and identified him.
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A total of 125 flights will be operated between Chennai and major cities today, with 62 arrivals and 62 departures scheduled at the Chennai International Airport.
Tangedco has announced a powercut in parts of Chennai from 9 am to 2 pm today to carry out maintenance work.
Here are the affected areas:
Three persons, including the managing partners of the business venture, have been arrested by police Friday after the death of a 21-year-old woman at a go-karting track in Hyderabad. The woman died after her hair got entangled in the wheel shaft of an open-wheel car she was riding at the Hasten Go-Karting in Gurram Guda.
Police found multiple violations on part of the management and, based on their request, authorities have seized Hasten Go-Karting.
According to police, the accused, Gurram Lohith Reddy (29) and Modini Kiran Kumar (30), have been operating the go-karting track without any valid license from authorities concerned and did not take safety measures. Kongara Srikanth (23), another accused, according to police, allowed customers negligently without providing or inspecting safety measures, said a police press note. Further, police found that they have not followed the guidelines issued as part of the Covid-19 pandemic.
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Tamil Nadu recorded 5185 positive cases of COVID-19 on Friday, bringing the state tally to 6,46,128. Among these, Chennai reported 1288 positive cases, bringing the city’s total to 1,79,424. The state recorded 68 deaths on Friday, putting the state toll at 10,120. 64 of them had succumbed due to comorbidities.
As of Friday, the number of active COVID-19 cases in Tamil Nadu is 44,197. Till date, 3,90,244 males, 2,55,853 females and 31 transgenders have tested positive for the virus in the state.
The state discharged 5357 patients following treatment, putting the total number of recoveries at 5,86,454.
According to a bulletin released by the Health and Family Welfare Department of Tamil Nadu, 81,41,534 samples from the state have been sent for testing till date, with 97,087 samples having been sent yesterday.
Good morning!
Welcome to the live blog from Chennai and Hyderabad where we bring to you the latest updates on COVID-19, lockdown in Tamil Nadu, lockdown in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and more across Chennai and Hyderabad. Follow the blog to stay up to date with the state in real time.
A 21-year-old woman was killed in Hyderabad after her hair got entangled in the wheel shaft of a go-kart she was riding earlier this week. However, the management of the track claimed that the accident took place because the deceased had removed her helmet to click selfies.
Police said the incident took place when Srivarshini, a B.Tech third-year student, had gone to the go-karting track at Gurram Guda in Meerpet along with her family on Wednesday evening. As she was driving the vehicle, her helmet came off and her hair got entangled in the wheel shaft connecting the tyres and the engine located behind the seat.
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Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami on Friday thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for heeding his plea to include Master's degree in Tamil as a minimum qualification criteria for a two-year Post-Graduate Diploma in Archaeology course in a Noida institution. The chief minister had earlier written to Modi on the matter, seeking that Tamil be included as one of the minimum qualification criteria for the course at the Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya Institute of Archaeology in Noida, Uttar Pradesh.
"I would like to express my heartfelt thanks for the immediate response to my request to include Master's degree in Tamil as one of the minimum qualification criteria for the two-year Post-Graduate Diploma in Archaeology course," Palaniswami said in a letter to the PM.
On Thursday, citing a recent ASI advertisement listing Pali, Prakrit, Arabic or Persian too under the classical language category alongside Sanskrit, Palaniswami had pointed out to Modi that among the listed languages, only Sanskrit was declared a classical language in 2005 by the Centre. "Tamil, which was the first language in India officially recognised as a classical language in 2004, has been completely ignored (in the admission process)," he had alleged.
Meanwhile, DMK President and Leader of Opposition, MK Stalin, also welcomed the inclusion of Tamil. In a Facebook post, he said languages are the cultural base in pluralistic India and warned the BJP against showing "step motherly treatment" in dealing with them.
The Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) has identified 70 containment zones in Chennai till date.
Here are the names of the containment streets across the city's 15 zones as of Friday:
53/55 Manali New Town, No. 38 Kuttiyappan Street Manali, Lake View Apartment and 16/1 Ma.Po.C Street
Andal Nagar (Iswarya Nagar), 15th West Cross Street, 19th Cross Street Rajeev Gandhi Nagar,MR Nagar 3td Street, Nandhanar Street, MKB 16th West Cross Street, Sasthiri Nagar 3rd Street, MKB Nagar 19th Central Cross Street, Keerai Thottam, Thulasingam Street and Shanthi Nagar 3rd Street
Swamy Street and Ayyaswamy Street
Kolathur - Anjugam Nagar 2nd Street and Poompuhar Nagar 25th Street
Ambattur - Lenin Nagar 9th Cross Street; EVR Street Vinayagapuram Oragadam, New Anna Nagar 4th Cross Street, Pillaiyar Koil Street East Banu Nagar, 24th Avenue Banu Nagar, Mariamman Koil Street Oragadam, Cholapuram - 6th Main Road; 1st Main Road Thendral Nagar, Korattur - Pandiyan Street Thathanakuppam, TNHB, Station Road; Athipet - New Century Road; Padi - Yadava Street, Park Road, North Park Road, Mettukulam, Sathya Nagar; Anna Nagar West Extension - TVS Avenue; Thirumangalam - TNHB Flat; Mogappair West - 3rd Block, Mogappair East - Vellalar Street, 12th Block Pachaipparsalai, VGN Raksha Church Street, Venu Gopal Street; and Mogappair - Trinity Church Road Golden George and Mohan Ram Nagar
Ayanavaram - New Street, Palayakara Street and Metu Street
Choolaimedu - Ameerjohn Street and Triplicane - Akbar Street, Vallabha Agraharam and Thandavarayan Mudali Street
Rukamani Street, Kiruba Shankar Street and Annamalai Nagar 3rd Street
Phase I 17th Cross Street
Mugalivakkam - Suba Shree Nagar 4th Street; Adambakkam - Surendar Nagar 4th Street; Suprabatha Flat C1 Ram Nagar 4th Main Road and Nanganallur - Voltas Colony 1st Street and Hindu Colony 1st Street
Velachery - Gandhi Nagar, ASK Nagar 1st Cross Street; Adambakkam - Mahalakshmi Nagar 7th Cross Street and Kalaignar Nagar 4th Street
Neelankarai - Periya Neelankarai Kuppam and Kadaikuttaimedu - Gandhi Nagar
Amid speculation about Andhra CM Jagan Mohan Reddy-led YSRCP joining the NDA, the CBI has booked the party’s rebel MP Kanumuru Raghu Ramakrishna Raju and his wife in connection with alleged bank loan fraud.
Raju has been named along with his wife Kanumuru Rama Devi and nine others in an FIR that alleges that a consortium led by Punjab National Bank had been defrauded by him and his company of Rs 826 crore of loans.
The agency carried out searches at around 11 locations in Hyderabad, Mumbai and West Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh on Thursday in connection with the case.
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Nag Ashwin’s yet-to-be-titled film, featuring Deepika Padukone and Prabhas, has got a ‘legendary’ addition to its cast. The multilingual movie will also star Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan.
Vyjayanthi Movies took to social media to make the big announcement. The production house tweeted, “Welcoming with a full heart, the pride of a billion Indians. The Amitabh Bachchan. Our journey just got BIG-ger!”
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Telangana logged 1,891 fresh COVID-19 cases on Thursday, taking the tally to 2.08 lakh while seven more deaths pushed the toll to 1,208. Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) accounted for the most number of cases with 285, followed by Medchal Malkajgiri 195 and Rangareddy 175 districts, a government bulletin said on Friday.
The cumulative recovered cases stood at 1.80 lakh, while 21,801 people are under treatment.
As many as 53,086 samples were tested on October 8. Cumulatively,34.49 lakh samples have been tested. The samples tested per million population was 92,690, the bulletin said.
The COVID-19 case fatality rate in the state was 0.57 per cent, while it was 1.5 per cent at the national level. The recovery rate in Telangana was 86.77 per cent, while it was 85.5 per cent in the country.
The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Thursday observed that the comments against the judiciary made by some ruling YSR Congress leaders in social media were perilous to democracy and criticised the state government for not filing cases against them.
The court orally observed that comments of Assembly Speaker Tammineni Sitaram, Deputy Chief Minister Narayana Swamy, MPs V Vijayasai Reddy, Nandigam Suresh and other leaders of the ruling party in the state in the social media, amounted to an attack on the judiciary.
A division bench, comprising Justices Rakesh Kumar and Uma Devi, said they would be left to feel that cases were not registered against the YSRC leaders only to save them. "If some ordinary person makes any comment against the government, cases are promptly registered against such persons. When persons in positions made comments against the judges and the courts, why have cases not been filed? Looking at things, we are left to infer that a war has been declared on the judiciary,” the bench commented.
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Tamil Nadu Deputy Chief Minister O Panneerselvam condoled the demise of Union Minister for Consumer Affairs and Food, Ram Vilas Paswan, who passed away on Thursday following cardiac ailments and a kidney shutdown.
Taking to Twitter, OPS expressed shock on the demise of the Lok Jan Shakti party founder and offered his condolences to the minister's bereaved family.
The Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) conducted 423 fever clinics in Chennai on Thursday. A total of 19,877 people attended the clinics, with swabs collected from 924 people. 924 people with ILI symptoms were identified, while others were provided with medication for minor ailments.
The most number of camps were held in Teynampet (Zone 9) where 50 camps were set up, while Manali (Zone 2) had the least with six camps.
One tweet sparked a massive debate among Indians on Twitter over whether idlis were boring, and following that, which state makes the best sambar.
It all started when a professor of history in the UK answered a question by a food delivery service on what food people found the most boring. “Idli are the most boring things in the world,” Edward Anderson wrote.
Soon, the tweet garnered a lot of attention, with opinions divided on the platform. While idli lovers were quick to slam Anderson for his opinion, many agreed with him and said a lot depended on what was served with the idlis.
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The National Investigation Agency (NIA) has arrested two men from Tamil Nadu and Karnataka for allegedly recruiting for Islamic State (IS) and for “funding” the travel of the recruits to Syria.
Ahamed Abdul Cader, 40, from Ramanathpuram in Tamil Nadu and Irfan Nasir, 33, from Frazer town in Bengaluru were arrested by the agency on Wednesday after their names cropped up during investigations in caseS related to the Islamic State. NIA sources said while Cader is a business analyst at a bank in Chennai, Irfan Nasir is a rice merchant based in Bengaluru.
The NIA, which registered a case in the matter on September 19, has called it the “Bengaluru-ISIS module”. NIA said it has arrested the two “for having affiliation with the banned terrorist organization ISIS/ISIL/Daesh and for entering into a conspiracy to radicalize and motivate Muslim youth of Bengaluru to join ISIS, and for raising funds to facilitate their travel to Syria”.
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Tangedco has announced a powercut in parts of Chennai today from 9 am to 2 pm to carry out maintenance work.
Here are the affected areas:
A total of 131 flights will be operated between Chennai and major cities, with 66 arrivals and 65 departures scheduled at the Chennai International Airport today.
The Andhra Pradesh government is hoping to increase enrollment in government schools and reduce drop-outs by distributing school kits to students from class 1 to 10.
The kit comprises cloth to get three pairs of uniforms stitched, a pair of black shoes, two pairs of socks, text books, notebooks, a belt and a bag.
“The kit will prepare the student for the new academic year, every year. Earlier, many students would drop out of school as their parents were unable to purchase uniforms, textbooks and notebooks. This kit will help low income households a lot,” Education Minister A Suresh said.
The distribution of these kits began Thursday at Punapadu government school in Krishna district. Officials said that 42,34,322 kits would be distributed across the state at an estimated cost of Rs 650 crore before schools reopen.
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Tamil Nadu recorded 5088 positive cases of COVID-19 on Thursday, bringing the state tally to 6,40,943. Among these, Chennai reported 1295 positive cases, bringing the city's total to 1,78,108.
The state recorded 68 deaths on Thursday, putting the state toll at 10,052. 60 of them had succumbed due to comorbidities. The state discharged 5718 patients following treatment, putting the total number of recoveries at 5,86,454.
As of Thursday, the number of active COVID-19 cases in Tamil Nadu is 44,437. Till date, 3,87,080 males, 2,53,832 females and 31 transgenders have tested positive for the virus in the state.
According to a bulletin released by the Health and Family Welfare Department of Tamil Nadu, 80,44,447 samples from the state have been sent for testing till date, with 87,341 samples having been sent yesterday.
Good morning!
Welcome to the live blog from Chennai and Hyderabad where we bring to you the latest updates on COVID-19, lockdown in Tamil Nadu, lockdown in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and more across Chennai and Hyderabad. Follow the blog to stay up to date with the state in real time.