Daily Times India

Washington, May 1 (Xinhua) US space agency NASA will launch its space shuttle Atlantis on May 11 to upgrade the Hubble telescope.

The Atlantis and its seven crewmembers will depart from NASA’s Kennedy Space Centre at 2 p.m. EDT (Eastern Daylight Time) May 11.

The 11-day mission will include five spacewalks to renovate the Hubble space telescope with state-of-the-art science instruments, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said.

Atlantis’ launch date was announced after Thursday’s Flight Readiness Review, it said.

The renovation work will expand the telescope’s capabilities as well as its lifetime through at least 2014.

New Delhi, May 1 (IANS) For Delhiites, respite seems quite a distance away when it comes to the weather with the met department saying Friday that the heat wave is likely to continue.

“The minimum temperature recorded early today was 24.8 degrees Celsius, which is a notch above normal. The weather over the entire northern region is dry and therefore the heat wave is likely to continue,” an official of the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said.

Like the day before, the maximum temperature is expected to hover around 42 degrees Celsius Friday, a good three degrees above normal.

Toronto, May 1 (IANS) Canada will loan $3.8 billion to Chrysler in return for a two percent stake and a say in management as the troubled auto giant undertakes restructuring to survive.

The governments of Canada and Ontario province – where most auto plants exist – will jointly pick up the tab, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced here Thursday.

The Canadian announcement coincided with the bankruptcy filing by Chrysler’s parent company in the US as the Obama administration’s unveiled a $12.8 billion package for the auto sector Thursday.

Chrysler filed for Chapter 11 protection in New York after reaching a partnership deal with Fiat SPA.

Apart from yielding two percent stake to the two governments, Chrysler Canada will also give one seat to them on its nine-member board and pledge to maintain 20 percent of its total production from Canada.

Thursday’s announcements in Washington and here are part of a $15 billion bailout by the US and Canada to revive the sinking auto industry.

Since Canadian plants of the three auto giants account for about 20 percent of their overall production, the Canadian package of $3.8 billion is proportional to the $12.08 billion announced by the Obama administration.

Harper said Canada was left with no option but to participate in the restructuring of the auto sector once the US government under George Bush got involved in this process.

“Otherwise, through a politically directed restructuring in the United States, we would stand a serious risk of the complete restructuring of the industry outside of this country,” the Canadian prime minister said.

Outlining the stringent conditions for the loans, Harper said that if Chrysler fell below them, it will be considered to have defaulted on the loans and the government could seek repayment.

“Let not anyone suggest that the money we are giving today is a gift,” the prime minister said.

Chrysler will pay an interest rate of seven percent on the loans to be repaid over eight years.

The loan package includes an existing interim loan of $1.21 billion, a short-term working capital loan and a medium-term restructuring loan for Chrysler’s Canadian operations.

Chrysler Canada is unlikely to file for bankruptcy protection.

Washington, May 1 (IANS) The US has placed India, China and 10 others on its Priority Watch List of trading partners that do not provide an adequate level of intellectual property rights (IPR) protection or enforcement.

Besides India and China, Russia, Algeria, Argentina, Canada, Chile, Indonesia, Israel, Pakistan, Thailand, and Venezuela have been placed on the Priority Watch List and “will be the subject of particularly intense engagement through bilateral discussion during the coming year”.

“Our creative and innovative products can hit the global marketplace sometimes with just a keystroke,” said US Trade Representative (USTR) Ron Kirk Thursday as his office released an annual report on IPR protection by US trading partners.

“If we and our trading partners are not vigilant in protecting and enforcing intellectual property rights, they can vanish just as quickly,” he added.

India has made progress on improving its IPR infrastructure, including through the modernisation of its IP offices and the introduction of an e-filing system for trademark and patent applications, the report said.

However, the report said US “remains concerned about weak IPR protection and enforcement in India”.

The US continues to “urge India to improve its IPR regime by providing stronger protection for copyrights and patents, as well as effective protection against unfair commercial use of undisclosed test and other data generated to obtain marketing approval for pharmaceutical and agrochemical products”.

The US also encourages India to enact legislation in the near term to strengthen its copyright laws and implement the provisions of the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) internet treaties and improve its IPR enforcement system by enacting effective optical disc legislation to combat optical disc piracy.

Piracy and counterfeiting, including of pharmaceuticals, remain a serious problem in India, the report said. India’s criminal IPR enforcement regime remains weak.

Police action against those engaged in manufacturing, distributing, or selling pirated and counterfeit goods, and expeditious judicial dispositions for IPR infringement and imposition of deterrent-level sentences, is needed.

As counterfeit medicines are a serious problem in India, the US is encouraged by the recent passage of the Drugs and Cosmetics (Amendment) Act 2008 that will increase penalties for spurious and adulterated pharmaceuticals, the report said.

Urging India to strengthen its IPR regime, the report said US stands ready to work with India on these issues during the coming year.

The report also highlights “the prominence of IPR concerns with respect to China and Russia, despite some evidence of improvement in both countries”.

Los Angeles, May 1 (DPA) Police in Los Angeles identified a 72-year-old man as the city’s worst serial killer, charging him with two murders in 1972 and 1976 and linking him with 25 others.

Police Thursday said that DNA matching John Floyd Thomas Jr, an insurance adjuster, was found at three other murder scenes from the 1970s and 1980s and that detectives were examining his connection to other cases linked to the notorious Westside Rapist.

The killings and rapes took place in west Los Angeles in two waves, between 1972-78 and 1983-89. During the five-year gap, Thomas was serving a prison sentence after being convicted of rape. In 1989, Thomas took a job with a state insurance agency.

Most of the victims were elderly white women, many in their 70s and 80s, who were raped and strangled.

“When all is said and done, Thomas stands to be Los Angeles’ most prolific serial killer,” Richard Bengston of the Los Angeles Police Department told the Los Angeles Times.

Thomas was arrested April 2 at his Los Angeles home. Twice previously convicted of sexual assault, he was linked to the long-cold cases when his DNA was taken as part of an ongoing process to take swab samples from registered sex offenders.

New Delhi, May 1 (IANS) This is what it takes security agencies to arrange a campaign meeting of Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi in Purulia in West Bengal, or Anantnag in Kashmir or anywhere else in the country.

First an advance security liaison is done by the Intelligence and Tours division of the Special Protection Group (SPG) and the Intelligence Bureau (IB) to study the threat perception in the area Gandhi proposes to visit.

The state intelligence bureau is then informed so it is aware of the proposed trip, takes requisite precautions and informs the state police. An advance reconnaissance team of the SPG reaches the place to coordinate with the local unit. The team inspects the places where rallies will be held and the route Gandhi is likely to take and sanitises the area while the state police provides perimeter security.

Right through Rahul Gandhi’s journey either by car or on foot, his proximate security cover will comprise ring round teams, isolation cordons, the sterile zone around, rostrum and access control. If the area he chooses to campaign in is risk-prone, a bullet-proof car is positioned on the tarmac of the nearest airport.

Considering that Rahul Gandhi is likely to address over 150 election meetings in the five-phase poll, security agencies will be stretched as the logistics in organising these public meetings is truly formidable. The Congress party will pick up the tab for his travel expenses and arrangements.

Not only Rahul Gandhi but many senior politicians high on the hit list of terrorists are now criss-crossing the country addressing election rallies and campaigning, thus stretching security agencies to the utmost.

The security cover for nearly two dozen VVIPs is more stringent than before, given the series of terror attacks last year and recent events in neighbouring countries. The union home ministry has warned state governments that terrorists will try to target politicians, and all chief ministers are taking the warning seriously.

Right through the campaign period lasting over a month the state police, the SPG and IB sleuths are having a harrowing time arranging security and schedules of protectees.

“We have been on our toes for the last month and only three phases have got over. Our boys are fit and alert as election time is when we are extra careful,” said an SPG official.

The high-risk high-profile campaigners in this election include Congress president Sonia Gandhi, her children Rahul and Priyanka, opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader L.K. Advani, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah.

However, it is a different ball game when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh hits the campaign trail. In his case the provisions contained in the Blue Book, which lays down security guidelines for the protection of the prime minister, are strictly followed.

(Murali Krishnan can be contacted at m.krish@ians.in)

Bangalore, May 1 (IANS) Mohammad Mani alias Jabbar, from distant Malda in West Bengal, would not have thought when he arrived here a month ago in search of work that he would land in trouble over his age if he starts working.

Mani began working at the construction site of Bangalore Metro in the upscale locality of Jayanagar.

His luck ran out on April 26 when an NGO working for the cause of the environment organised a protest at the construction site as laying the metro line in the area would entail chopping hundreds of trees.

The protesters saw Mani and two others of his age working at the site and, as the three appeared to be child labourers, alerted Child Helpline, a nationwide network working for child rights.

The Helpline managed to rescue only Mani on April 28. He is now in the care of the Child Welfare Committee (CWC) and lodged in a government-run boys’ home.

Mani claims he is an adult. He adds that he came to Bangalore from a village (the name of which he is not certain) in Malda district of West Bengal, after writing his eighth standard exams, to work and earn during his vacation.

“It was during our protest rally at Nanda Theatre Road (in Jayanagar) against the proposed metro line through the heart of Lalbagh Botancial Garden that we saw children working as labourers at the construction site of Bangalore Metro.

“We immediately intervened and lodged a complaint with the Labour Commissioner and the CWC, as child labour is banned in India,” coordinator of the NGO Hasiru Usiru (Greenery is Life) Vinay Sreenivasa told IANS.

“We could not locate the other two boys as stated by Hasiru Usiru,” said a member of Child Helpline.

The CWC is trying to verify Mani’s age. If it is established that he is below the permissible age to work, action will be initiated against Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL) and Nagarjuna Construction Company which has bagged the contract for work in the area, a CWC spokesperson said.

“I am 18,” Mani maintained. “I have come to work in Bangalore during my vacation time. We’re poor people. I want to contribute to my family’s earning. To work and earn is no crime,” said Mani, in his broken Hindi, as he tried to reason with CWC officials quizzing him.

CWC chairperson Vasudev Sharma pointed to Mani at the boys’ home and asked IANS: “Does he look 18? He does not look more than 14.”

“It’s common. Whenever we rescue child labour, both the child and employer say that the child is 18 years old to avoid any legal action. Only poor children work and they have no other option but to earn their livelihood,” said V. Susheela, convener of the Karnataka chapter of Campaign Against Child Labour (CACL).

“Mani told us that back home he has his father, mother, two brothers and a sister,” said Sharma.

The CWC has begun looking into the angle of trafficking of children as, according to Mani, one man by the name of Ansur had given Mani’s father Rs.200 before bringing him to Bangalore and giving him work, said Sharma.

Mani claims that he was earning Rs.110 per day working at the construction site.

Currently 160 children are staying in the boys’ home. Most of them were rescued from their employers.

(Maitreyee Boruah can be contacted at m.boruah@ians.in)

Washington, May 1 (IANS) Oscar winning Indian music director A.R. Rahman of “Slumdog Millionaire” fame, his Sri Lankan co-performer M.I.A. of the hit “O Saya” song and Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani have made it to the Time 100 list of the World’s Most Influential People.

The new list to be published in the May 11 annual Time 100 issue is the pick of the magazine’s editors and may not be confused with the popular choice in TIME.com’s online poll that “just happened to be” won Monday by “moot – the mysterious 21-year-old creator of the influential Web message board 4chan.or”.

“In our annual TIME 100 issue, we do the impossible: name the people who most affect our world,” said the editors as they relegated moot to the 35th position and instead chose ailing Democratic senator Edward Kennedy for the top spot.

British premier Gordon Brown makes it to the second spot, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in the eighth place, Pakistan army chief Ashfaq Kayani is sitting pretty at the 19th position, just a spot ahead of President Barack Obama.

A.R. Rahman, who gets the 59th position in the editors list, “won two Oscars, a Golden Globe and a BAFTA for giving Slumdog Millionaire its frenetic sound”, notes Padma Lakshmi actress, author and the host of “Bravo’s Top Chef”, in an accompanying piece.

“In India, a country of a billion inhabitants, where film and pop music are one, A.R. Rahman, 43, dominates the music industry so totally that he has supplied the sound track for a whole generation,” she writes.

“A veritable Pied Piper, he has shaped modern India’s music for more than a decade. Now the ‘Mozart of Madras’ has the world’s foot tapping along with him,” adds Lakshmi, noting the award winning “Jai Ho” is now the campaign song for India’s Congress Party.

Vikas Swarup, the author of the novel “Q&A” that became the Oscar-winning film “Slumdog Millionaire”, describes Nandan Nilekani, placed 31, “as a middle-class kid from a small town, (who) rose to become a co-founder and co-chairman of Infosys Technologies and a key player in India’s growth story”.

“In a blog post about ‘Slumdog Millionaire’, Nandan Nilekani alluded to the film’s valuable subtext – that it doesn’t matter where you come from, only where you are headed,” he writes. “That could serve equally as an epigraph for Nandan’s own life.”

“As the new India, fuelled by its robust democracy and favorable demographics, seeks to make the transition from a developing nation to a developed one, it will need the vision and talent of people like Nandan Nilekani,” Swarup adds.

The great thing about M.I.A., as Maya Arulpragasam placed 43rd is known, “is that she doesn’t have some global plan”, writes producer director Spike Jonze.

“She just has things she cares about and is interested in, from all over the world… She reacts to whatever is in front of her: ‘Those are booming Indian drums’, ‘That is a dope producer’, ‘Those kids are making sick beats’.”

“And she has great taste. Anyone can hear all this stuff, but to be able to

curate it, you have to have taste, and Maya Arulpragasam, 33, has it,” he adds.

Chandigarh, May 1 (IANS) Congress MP Deepinder Singh Hooda has been touring the villages of Haryana’s Sonipat and Karnal districts despite the summer heat and dust. But that is not from where he is contesting the Lok Sabha elections.

Hooda, 31, is seeking re-election on the Congress ticket from Rohtak. But given his father-cum-Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda’s clout in that constituency, Hooda junior can afford to campaign for other Congress candidates in nearby Lok Sabha constituencies.

Sonipat Lok Sabha Congress candidate Jatinder Singh Malik, Karnal MP Arvind Sharma and others are benefitting from the younger Hooda’s decision to be away from his fiefdom.

“It is not easy for me to leave my constituency but I am doing this for the party,” Deepinder Hooda, a traditional scarf strapped on his head to protect him from the sizzling heat, said as he campaigned for Sharma in Karnal’s Jorasi village in Panipat district.

Every time Deepinder emerges from the sunroof of his vehicle, he greets people with a loud and clear “Ram Ram ji” and persuades them to vote for Congress candidates.

The suave and young Hooda, an MBA from Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business, was working as a senior manager with US company Sabre Holdings when he was recalled and pushed into politics in 2005 after his father resigned the Rohtak Lok Sabha seat on becoming Haryana’s chief minister.

Deepinder won the seat by an impressive margin of nearly 232,000 votes in an October 2005 by-election.

An engineer by profession, Hooda junior has earlier worked with the Reliance Group and Infosys Technologies.

Elections to Haryana’s 10 Lok Sabha seats take place May 7, and the ruling Congress is hopeful of doing well. The party had bagged nine of the 10 seats in the 2004 general elections.

“Deepinderji is sought by several Congress candidates. In between his own campaigning in Rohtak, he is touring elsewhere also,” Haryana Congress Committee’s spokesman Surender Singh Hooda told IANS.

While Deepinder can afford to leave his constituency during peak campaign time, his father is touring neighbouring states to campaign for Congress candidates as well.

Hooda senior has been to areas in western Uttar Pradesh’s Jat-populated Aligarh, Muzaffarnagar and Bulandshahr districts. Earlier, he had been to Rajasthan’s Jaipur, Ajmer and other districts.

He will be travelling to neighbouring Punjab and has also been called to campaign in Uttarakhand.

When he is not travelling to other states, Hooda senior is moving around in his special election vehicle to campaign for Congress candidates within Haryana.

With assembly elections in Haryana due in less than a year, the Lok Sabha polls are seen as a testing ground for Hooda’s four-year-old government. Though he claims the Congress will win all 10 Lok Sabha seats, it will not be easy to even repeat its nine-out-of-10 performance of 2004.

The Indian National Lok Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alliance and the new Haryana Janhit Congress (HJC) floated by former Congress leader Bhajan Lal are not going to let the Congress have a walkover.

(Jaideep Sarin can be contacted at jaideep.s@ians.in)

Washington, May 1 (IANS) A series of terrorist attacks on India by Islamic extremist groups like the one on Mumbai were aimed at creating a breakdown in India-Pakistan relations and impeding India’s economic resurgence, according to a US State Department report.

India, one of world’s most terrorism-afflicted countries in 2008, was the focus of numerous attacks from both externally-based terrorist organizations and internally-based separatist or terrorist entities, said the State Department’s annual report on global terrorism released Thursday.

India assessed that South Asian Islamic extremist groups including Pakistan based Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad, and Bangladesh based Harakat-ul-Jihad-i-Islami, were behind several of these attacks, the report said.

“The Government of India believed these attacks were aimed at creating a break-down in India-Pakistan relations, fostering Hindu-Muslim violence within India, and harming India’s commercial centres to impede India’s economic resurgence,” it said.

However, the report suggested that despite a clear commitment to combating violent extremism, India’s efforts to counter terrorism remained hampered because of poor coordination between regional authorities and an inefficient legal system.

“Although clearly committed to combating violent extremism, the Indian government’s counterterrorism efforts remained hampered by its outdated and overburdened law enforcement and legal systems,” the report said.

In the November 26 Mumbai terrorist attacks, described as “a pivotal moment that is now called ‘26/11′”, the terrorists appeared to have been well-trained and took advantage of technology, such as Global Positioning System trackers.

But “local and state police proved to be poorly trained and equipped and lacked central control to coordinate an effective response,” the report said noting India has not successfully prosecuted suspects in last year’s attacks.

It however praised a proposal by the government to reform its counter-terrorism apparatus.

India’s parliament has introduced legislation to restructure counter-terrorism laws and proposed creating a National Investigative Agency to build a national-level ability to investigate and prosecute alleged terrorist activity.

Since the Mumbai attacks, India has looked to improve counter-terrorism cooperation with the US and European Union, the report said.

The report noted that the Mumbai “attack was the most recent in a long list of lethal terrorist incidents this year” including the May 13 Jaipur serial bomb blasts, the July 7 attack on the Indian embassy in Kabul, Sep 13 serial bomb attacks in New Delhi and the Oct 30 bomb in Assam.

Illicit funding sources that may have been exploited to finance terrorist operations were being closely investigated by India, the report said.

Indian authorities believe that the Mumbai terrorists used various funding sources including credit cards, hawala, charities, and wealthy donors, it said.

In addition to the Mumbai attacks, the rise in terrorist attacks and their coordinated nature throughout India suggested the terrorists were well-funded and financially organized.