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“Father of the Pentium” Vinod Dham, philanthropist Vijay Amritraj, and Silicon Valley entrepreneur B.V. Jagadeesh are among recipients of the NRI Institute Achievement Award, the globally recognized New Delhi-based nonprofit announced on Wednesday.

The awards ceremony is part of the NRI Global Summit 2009 where some of Silicon Valley`s biggest entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and academics are coming together on Saturday, October 24 to debate emerging trends and network. The summit is being held at the India Community Center in Milpitas, California.

Vinod (Vin) Dham spent 16 years at Intel where gained fame as the “Father of the Pentium” microprocessor. After Intel, Vinod joined microprocessor start up NexGen and engineered the group`s merger with Advanced Micro Devices. He also served as president and CEO of Silicon Spice Inc. that was acquired by Broadcom Corporation. In 1999, Vinod was named as one of the top 100 most influential Asian Americans of the decade and in 2000 he was appointed to the U.S.President’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.Currently, Vinod is at the helm of NEA-IndoUS Ventures.

Joining Dham as awardee is former Wimbledon player and philanthropist Vijay Amritraj, who also served as a “United Nations Messenger of Peace” in 2006. The Vijay Amritraj Foundation, established after the tennis star`s stint with the U.N., supports numerous charitable causes in India.

Silicon Valley veteran B.V. Jagadeesh, CEO of 3LeafSystems, receives the award for entrepreneurial success. Prior to 3LeafSystems, Jagadeesh was at the helm at Netscaler, which was acquired by Citrix in an over $325 million deal. Jagadeesh`s first venture was as co-founder of Exodus Communication, which pioneered the concept of Internet data centers and grew from a two-man company to an over 3000 people operation in just six years.

Other awardees include, America`s Got Talent stars Ishaara; dance pioneer Giju; teenage entrepreneur Anika Iyer; Venture Director at Clearstone Ventures Vish Mishra; founder-chairman Sankara Eye Foundation, Murali Krishnamurthy; and danseuses Neena & Veena.

The summit, themed India-U.S.: Upturn in a Downturn, highlights the significant economic, political and commercial trends affecting the India-U.S. ties.

Source:Business Wire

Read more :www.NriGlobalSummit.com.

Lal Bahadur Shastri the second Prime Minister of the Republic of India and a significant figure in the Indian independence movement shares his date of birth with Mahatma Gandhi.Not only this Lal Bahadur Shastri was greately influenced by Mahatma Gandhi and contributed in national struggle for independence with full vigour by taking  part in the Satyagraha  and Quit India Movement.

During his tenure as the Prime Minister of India he did stupendous work by handling many challenges including India’s war with Pakistan.and drving movements like ‘Jai Jawan Jai Kisan’ unifiing two leading forces of India – farmers and soldiers.The war ended on the 17th September, 1965, with the United Nations’ mediation. After the ceasefire between India and Pakistan he signed the Tashkent Declaration on 10th January 1966. However,the very next day Lal Bahadur Shastri died of a heart attack. His contribution as a Prime Minister of India in his short tenure of work was indispensable and sowas posthumously honored with the .

Let’s acknowledge this great leader’s achievement and celebrate his anniversary along with Mahatma Gandhi.

After Thursday’s important discussion between India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Pakistan’s Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Pakistan can consider having an upper hand. Manmohan Singh delinked terrorist talks from the composite dialogue process. The two prime ministers had a cordial and constructive meeting. They considered the entire gamut of bilateral relations with a view to charting the way forward in India-Pakistan relations. Both leaders agreed that the two countries will share real time credible and actionable information on any future terrorist threats. India has opened up possibility of finding out any information on threats in Balochistan and other areas. On Friday Manmohan Singh said that the starting point for “any meaningful dialogue” will depend on actions by Islamabad to end cross-border terror and hoped there would be “forward movement” in the coming months. India has definitely walked an extra mile to take this situation calmly. But not raising the Kashmir issue in the talks is something that could be questionable.

The action that has to be taken against terrorism should not be linked to the composite dialogue process and therefore cannot await other developments. Hillary Clinton, US Secretary of State who is scheduled for a four-day visit to India liked the way Mr Singh handled the whole situation. She called it an “Impressive” way of at the return to the dialogue table. She also stated that the Obama administration’s commitment to the Indo-US civil nuclear agreement but said she would like to discuss this with Indian leaders. The ways to prevent the “proliferation of nuclear material and weapons to state and non-state actors that pose a threat to India, to the US and to the many countries around the world.” Although she also mentioned that the US did not pressurize India to return to the dialogue table with Pakistan.

We believe this dialogue between India and Pakistan is certainly one that could only be pursued with the agreement and commitment of the two countries and their leaders. However, one cannot discount what President Zardari said in a statement recently that ‘the terrorists of today were the heroes of Pakistan until 9/11 happened and that Pakistan has had a policy of encouraging terrorist groups to secure its own national objectives’.

Sources:- TimesofIndia

We had earlier written about how NRIs were hoping to vote in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. There was significant lobbying from the NRIs to implement a bill that would allow NRIs to vote. As rightly pointed out, NRIs too are Indians and the governance of the state is a major cause of concern for all citizens. Unfortunately, it could not occur. It should be noted that there is already a bill pending in the law ministry regarding NRIs and their voting rights. A parliamentary standing committee report on a Bill proposing to give voting rights to NRIs has been pending with the Union Law Ministry for nearly three years.

The bill was introduced in the Rajya Sabha in 2006 and was then passed on to the standing committee. It was announced by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in 2006 and Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) in North America welcomed the announcement Pravasi Bharatiya Divas meet in Hyderabad. However, after 3 years, the bill is yet to see the light of day. Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi said Law Ministry was “examining the report” presented by the Standing Committee. Mr. Ravi said the Bill permits Indian citizens residing outside India to get their names registered in the electoral roll of their respective constituency and cast their votes in the elections in case they are present in their area of residence during elections. What does this mean for NRIs? For one, they can be an active part of the nation’s decision making process.

The right to vote is granted to every Indian individual, and residing abroad should not make a difference. However, the difficulty is applying the concept of which constituency. As of now, a person who has lived in an area for more than 5 years can vote at the region. This would obviously not apply for NRIs. NRIs are already responsibly for a major chunk of India’s GNP and the remittance sent from countries in the Gulf region, Europe, North America and Australia account for a sizeable amount of the income of several Indian families. If NRIs are responsible for the economic growth of the nation, why not for the political as well?

Source : Hindu

Human trafficking is a major issue across the world nowadays. Recently Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said “India is a source,destination, and transit country for men, women, and children trafficked for the purposes of forced labour and commercial sexual exploitation.” quoting the 2009 trafficking in Persons Report released by  June 16 as a source.

For the first time, India, China, Russia, Sri Lanka and Egypt and other countries that have been on the on Tier 2 watch list for two years, face the prospect of being automatically moved to the Tier 3 blacklist next year without a presidential waiver if they fail improve their trafficking record. India is among 52 countries on the watch list of nations that have failed to meet the minimum anti-trafficking standards but are making efforts to do so.

The blacklisted countries are subject to US sanctions if they don’t make greater efforts to fight trafficking. However, Home Minister for India P Chidambaram said he wasn’t too worried about the report. “We don’t take cognizance of the US report. There are 52 countries named. We don’t need to attach too much attention to the report,” Chidambaram said during question hour at the Rajya Sabha. “At the same time, we should do what is expected of us as an enlightened nation,” he added.Whether the report has its effect or no, India has decided to get cracking on the human trafficking problem. Mr. Chidambaram said the Home Ministry had formed a nodal cell through which it was coordinating on matters relating to trafficking in human beings with other Ministries and State governments. Noting that a bulk of human trafficking cases was directly related to women and girls, he said out
of 4,087 cases in 2007 related to trafficking, 3,568 cases were concerned with immoral trafficking. He said that States should take steps to address social reasons behind immoral trafficking and the Centre could help them. He also said “The ministry for women and child development is piloting amendments in the Immoral Traffic (Prevention) Act 1956 to enhance its scope for introducing stringent punishment against traffickers.” Hopefully the initiative taken by the Center and States will reduce the problem of Human Trafficking in India.

Sources: livemint.com, hindu.com, zeenews.com

Climate change is the new fear poised on everyone’s mind. Recently,the G8 which consists of the United States, Japan, Russia, Germany,Britain, France, Italy and Canada met to chart the future of the international community in matters regarding Global Warming, the Global Economic Crisis and other issues.

The G8 meetings provide an opportunity to discuss global issues in an informal setting and they are not a negotiating forum. The G8 that started out as an exclusive club of the industrial nations has over the years expanded its reach to bring in other countries into the dialogue process. The major dialogue partners are the G5 countries – Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa. In addition, Egypt has been invited to this year’s meetings. Australia, Indonesia and South Korea are being brought into the meetings to constitute the major economies forum along with the European Commission and the major multilateral organisations. In all,the leaders meeting in Italy represent 90 per cent of the world’s economy. The G8 agreed on Wednesday to try to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius and cut its greenhouse gas emissions by 80 percent,but it failed to persuade China and India to join a bid to halve world emissions.

With only five months until a new U.N. climate pact is due to be agreed in Copenhagen, climate change organizations said the G8 had left much work to be done and ducked key issues. India and China,now part of a growing entity called BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India,(China) are poised for a lot of growth. The take of India and China is simple. The developed countries have done their damage. They have the technology and resources to reduce pollution now that their levels have reached extremely high levels. In India however, fossil fuels are still required to give impetus to the nation. Cutting down on a lot of fuels in an attempt to reduce greenhouse gas reduction might pressurise the Government to cut down on a lot and with a growing fiscal deficit of 6.8%, further cost cannot be incurred by the Government. In the past, countries like the USA have often defied the Kyoto Protocol and other informal mandates. How India can influence the growing pollution rules and regulations remains to be seen.

Sources : hindu.com, reuters.com, economictimes.com

Gone are the days when women were confined to a purdah in a secluded kitchen in an Indian household. Though, not all, but still Bharatiya Mahila of today’s time is empowered and educated. This is reflected with the govt putting women in top positions across all sectors. From the first women president Pratibha Patil, To speaker Meira Kumar, and now Nirupama Rao who will be the new Foreign Secretary. In addition to that, Senior advocate Indira Jaisingh will be the additional solicitor General, first female to do so.

Now with 59 women MPs in the parliament and Women’s Bill in the pipeline, looks like India is heading for Women Empowerment.

Source: In.com

After 40 years of planning, finally it has come into effect. The Bandra Worli Sea Link, Christened Rajiv Gandhi Bridge by Mr. Sharad Pawar and inaugurated by Mrs. Sonia Gandhi is now open to public. On the eve of the inauguration day there was a beautiful fireworks and laser show, which mesmerized a huge audience. The bridge will reduce the time drastically from Bandra to Worli from 40 minutes to just 6-8 minutes.

The project, though conceived years ago received stiff opposition to its building, but it’s finally here. It was unveiled 2 days ago with much pomp and revelry with loads of fireworks. The bridge however, though visually appealing, was not as useful as people hoped it to be. Reports are coming today that people are actually stuck in a traffic jam – the very thing they hoped to avoid. For the first five days, the sea link will be free from commuters after which they will be charging a toll for its utility. It seems the Maharashtra Government has more such bridges and highways and flyovers in store for Mumbaikars. Hopefully, it won’t be long before driving was no longer the frustrating experience it is now.

Source: In.com

The Central Government has finally taken the much needed step of banning the Communist Party of India(Maoist) better known as Naxalites under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act(UAPA), declaring the entity as terrorist organization. The move is huge as now the organization comes in the same league as LeT and SIMI, and hence any person who is found to be related to the organization can now be tested under the stringent Prevention of Terrorism Act(POTA). They are also sometimes termed as Left wing extremists.

The pioneer of the whole Maoist concept was Mao Zedong, the legendary Chinese leader. Maoism or Mao Zedong the thought in simple words means revolutionary struggle of the vast majority of people against the exploiting classes and their state structures which Mao termed People’s War. The Naxalism usually involves peasants, its military strategies have involved guerrilla war tactics focused on surrounding the cities from the countryside, with a heavy emphasis on political transformation through the mass involvement of the basic people of the society. Their ‘aim’ as told by them is to have a government law and order which would be equal for all. They are also sometimes termed as Left wing extremists. They now have a presence in 40 percent of India’s geographical area, and are especially concentrated in an area known as the “Naxal Belt,” comprising 92,000 square kilometers. According to India’s intelligence agency, the Research and Analysis Wing, 20,000 insurgents are currently in operation.

How can you talk about equality with a gun in your hand? Killing thousands of innocent people, hundreds of policeman, is that equality? Gandhi was one of the foremost advocate of equality for all, did he ever inspire masses to raise arms against the law and order? The Naxalites now rule India’s most fertile and the most mineral rich regions. The country loses a lot of natural and human resources to this menace. People in these regions are unemployed and unable to sustain their families. Is this equality? I still doubt, but I totally endorse government’s ruling. Its never too late to take a step which could save the people.

Source: In.com

We, as Indians have always prided ourself on one thing. It doesn’t matter if we have poor infrastructure, if our government is teeming with corruption, if our sports teams play for money as oppposed to nationalistic fervour; we might not pay much heed to the poverty-stricken who thrive on our streets, and our sense of justice, right and wrong may be modified with a Rs. 100 note, but we ignore all that as mere trivialities in the larger picture of things. After all, compared to what some countries undewent in 300 years of independence, we have done pretty decently in 60 years. Why? We, as a nation may turn a blind eye to the faults listed above because beyond all that fake jingoistic chauvinsim one may present, most Indians know the one thing that they can definitely boast about – the fact that we are a democracy. After 60 years of turmoil, our Election Commission is still dependable, our Judiciary still maintains decently high standards and we have a Free Press. Despite all odds and predictions, we as a nation are still democratic! The very foundation of a democracy comes from the voice of its people, a voice that should not, nay cannot be repressed under any circumstances. We as a nation have always protested against any Orwellian measures that have threatened to down out the din of the common man wanting justice, we as a nation have always stood for free choice, the recent RTI act bears testimony to India’s prowess as a nation for, by and of the people. Hence, it was extremely alarming to see this in the Hindu – news of internet censorship.

In light of terrorist attacks and growing malpractices in the IT world, the Department of IT has enacted a policy which amends the IT Act to make them more effective (supposedly). Mr. Raja, the telecom minister proposed to enact laws that will permit them to do the following :

1) Intercept email, under Section 69 of the Act.
2) Block websites and web content, under Section 69A.
3) Monitor and collect traffic data relating to a website, in the name of ensuring cyber security, and foiling cyber security incidents. Under Section 69B.
4) Set up an Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-IN), whose constituency “shall be the Indian cyber community”, under Section 70B (1).
5) Define the liability of Network Service Providers, under Section 79.

Basically, under the new IT Act, any Government official or policeman will be able to listen in to all your phone calls, read your SMSs and emails, and monitor the websites you visit. And he will not require any warrant from a magistrate to do so.

The article in full details the scope, juridiction and laws regarding when and by whom the above can be initiated. What is striking, is the lack of definitions. It was Voltaire who remarked, “If we must argue, let us first begin by establishing definitions.” During the formation of our constitution, great heed was paid to the semantics in all the clauses, for it is the spirit of these lines and the appropriateness of the chosen words that alter laws. A similar case history is present in the Indian Telegraph of 1885, where phone tapping was permitted. However, a petition filed in the Supreme Court in 1991 by the People’s Union for Civil Liberties, challenging the constitutional validity of the same claiming phone tapping was against the right to privacy. The extended article is present here.

In December 1996, phone tapping was made illegal as “unless a public emergency has occurred or the interest of public safety demands, the authorities have no jurisdiction to exercise the powers”. They went on to define them thus: a public emergency was the “prevailing of a sudden condition or state of affairs affecting the people at large calling for immediate action”, and public safety “means the state or condition of freedom from danger or risk for the people at large”. Without those two, however “necessary or expedient”, it could not do so. But Section 69 of the amended IT Act drops all references to public emergency or public safety, meaning that the government’s powers have been vastly extended.

Section 69 of the new IT Act enhances the scope from the 2000 version to include interception and monitoring. It also broadens the scope of surveillance to include the investigation of any offence, whether cognisable or not.

Without proper rules in place, without explicit definitions of what crimes a person might commit, and under specific safeguards set to respect and uphold the privacy and the right to opinion of an individual, any such measure is a rightful step towards a totalitarian regime. Can a person by the above be held liable for any negative talks about India done in a chat conversation? Can we criticise our ministers without Big Brother looking down on us? We as a nation allow our government to establish laws on us under the pretext of national security, but only once the basis, necessity, the regulation and checks and balances have been duly explained. Why is the media silent about this? Internet may not be as popular as cricket in India, but surely the above warrants more discussion than us losing the ICC T20? Is the above not in violation of Act 21 of the Constitution? — “no person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law.”

The act in all its grandeur is present for the perusal of all at this website.