India today became the number one side in the ICC T20 rankings after whitewashing Australia in the three-match series here today.
India, who are also the number one in Tests, overtook the West Indies to reach the top sport in the shortest format. India have 120 rating points, two more than the Caribbean unit. Sri Lanka also have 118 rating points like the West Indies but they are third in the charts.
India have hit top form in the T20 format ahead of the World T20 to be held at home in March-April. They had famously won the inaugural World T20 in South Africa in 2007.
England (117 rating points) are fourth in the rankings ahead of New Zealand (116), South Africa (115), Pakistan (113) and Australia (110). Afghanistan (80) and Scotland (66) round up the top-10.
@Agency report.
WASHINGTON: Three major Indian IT companies — Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services and Wipro — have joined US President Barack Obama’s ambitious ‘computer science for all’ initiative as part of a public-private collaboration, pledging thousands of dollars in grants.
Obama announced his ‘Computer Sciences for All’ plan in his weekly address on Saturday as he emphasized on the need for teaching the subject as a “basic skill” to all children across schools in the country in a changing economy.
While Infosys has pledged a $1 million in donation, Tata Consultancy Services is providing support in the form of grants to teachers in 27 US cities, the White House said in a fact sheet, also issued on Saturday.
Wipro announced a $2.8 million grant for multi-year project in partnership with the Michigan University to involve over a hundred school teachers, with the aim of nurturing excellence in science and mathematics.
This would start with the public school systems of Chicago, Obama’s hometown.
According to White House, the TCS and Infosys pledge is part of the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) effort to collaborate with the private sector to support high-school CS teachers.
“Infosys Foundation USA will be a founding member of this public-private collaboration with a $1 million philanthropic donation, and, as an initial participant, Tata Consultancy Services is providing additional support in the form of grants to teachers in 27 US cities.
“This collaboration will ultimately provide opportunities for as many as 2,000 middle- and high-school teachers to deepen their understanding of CS,” said the White House.
A joint Wipro and Michigan University statement said the Wipro STEM Fellowship Programme will focus on building leadership in these disciplines in urban schools by leveraging on research validated expertise of the College of Education at the university in designing transformative and innovative instructional experiences.
New Delhi : Amid talks of a fresh spectrum auction soon, Congress has cautioned the Narendra Modi government against focusing on profit, insisting that “service and not profit” should be its motto as the purpose is to serve the common man.
“With respect to spectrum allocation, service not profit, should be the motto of the government.
“In the spectrum auctions, financially burdened Telcos will be shelling out inflated amounts for spectrum. And there are no prizes for guessing how and from whom they will recover this expenditure – the common man. That’s you and me,” the party said.
In a piece on its website, the party said, “Modiji, you are the PM of India, not its CEO. Your focus should be welfare, not profits.”
“What is the purpose of a government? Is it to provide governance and easy access to services for the largest number of people, or is it to increase profits of the government and benefits of a few private companies?” it asked.
Noting that seeking profit from spectrum auction could hurt development, it wondered how will the PM’s mobile-based pet schemes be implemented if tariffs rise.
“Modi thinks his policies are beyond criticism despite the fact that India is currently sitting in the middle of an economic crisis the burden of which is being felt not by the PM and his businessmen friends but by the other 99% people of India,” the party said.
The opposition party said the duty of the government is to create a conducive atmosphere for businesses to flourish and provide policy framework that encourages investment benefits of which are reaped by the maximum number of people.
“It is not their duty to behave like a large corporate house trying to increase profits. ”
It insisted that when governments run after profits, welfare suffers and people who need support of the government are abandoned, as ministers look at the bottom line. “Modi is the Prime Minister of India not its CEO. We are citizens and not shareholders. We require services not dividends.”
Reports had it that the government is planning for spectrum auction and it will help ease fiscal deficit in a big way. As per Budget 2015-16, the government had pegged Rs 42,865 crore revenue from communication which include spectrum sale and licence fee. If the government goes ahead with spectrum auction, Department of Telecom will definitely surpass its budget estimate, it was said.
The sudden replacement of Telecom Secretary has led to speculation about spectrum auction happening in March this year.
@Agency news.
New Delhi : A plea has been moved in the Supreme Court challenging the constitutional validity of the recently-passed juvenile law that allows delinquent minors of 16 years of age and above to be tried as adults if they commit heinous offenses like rape and murder.
The Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015, cleared in the winter session of Parliament, repeals and recasts the old Act.
The PIL, filed by Congress leader and activist Tahseen Poonawalla, said that the new law is unreasonable, arbitrary and in violation of Article 14 (right to equality) of the Constitution.
It challenges section 15 of the new Act which says in case of a heinous offense alleged to have been committed by a child, who has completed or is above the age of 16 years, the Juvenile Justice Board shall conduct a preliminary inquiry to determine whether a juvenile offender is to be sent for rehabilitation or be tried as an adult.
The plea said the impugned amended Act is “draconian and unconstitutional” which instead of providing care and protection to children deems them as adult in cases where the alleged commission of crime by them is heinous in nature.
It further said that the amendment goes against the letter and spirit of The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and is against the protection accorded to Child and adolescent criminals since 1800s.
On January 4, the President of India has accorded his assent to the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015.
The Act also allows that any 16-18-year-old who commits a less serious offense may be tried as an adult only if he is apprehended after the age of 21 years.
As soon as a child alleged to be in conflict with the law is apprehended by police, such a child shall be placed under the charge of the special juvenile police unit or the designated child welfare police officer who shall produce the child before the Juvenile Justice Board without any loss of time but within a period of 24 hours of apprehending the child.
@Agency report.
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Transgenders, who are striving hard to find a place in mainstream society, will soon turn entrepreneurs in Kerala with the launch of a taxi service which will be owned and operated by them, a first in the state.
@Agency news.
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force advice that all American adults should be screened for depression as part of their normal health-care routine. The Task Force also singled out maternal mental illness for the first time by suggesting that women be screened during pregnancy and after childbirth.
The new guidelines, updated for the first time since 2009 and published in the journal JAMA, are a recognition of the devastating toll mental illness is taking around the world. Researchers have noted a surge in diagnoses in recent years related to the stress of modern life and fears of terrorism, violence and poverty. The World Health Organization has predicted depression could jump from the fourth leading cause of death and disability to second place by 2020.
The task force, an independent body appointed by the Department of Health and Human Services, noted that major depressive disorder is associated with suicide and impaired ability to manage other health issues. An estimated $22.8 billion was spent on depression treatment in 2009, it said, and lost productivity cost an additional estimated $23 billion in 2011.
“Depression has a major effect on quality of life for the patient and affects family members, especially children,” the group noted in its report.
Screening for depression typically involves starting with a series of questions about individuals’ feelings about their lives.
If these initial screening tests show elevated risk for depression, providers are asked to conduct additional assessments to look for other issues such as anxiety panic attacks, substance abuse or other medical conditions.
The report recommends screening each adult at least once, but it notes that the “optimal frequency of such screening has not been established.”
The guidelines also go into significant detail about the risks for women during and after pregnancy — underscoring new research about just how big an effect postpartum depression can have on the well-being of a mother and her child. Risk factors listed for maternal depression include poor self-esteem, child-care stress, prenatal anxiety, life stress, decreased social support, single relationship status, history of depression, difficult infant temperament, lower socioeconomic status and unintended pregnancy.
For the first time, scientists have pinned down a molecular process in the brain that helps to trigger schizophrenia. The researchers involved in the landmark study, which was published Wednesday in the journal Nature, say the discovery of this new genetic pathway probably reveals what goes wrong neurologically in a young person diagnosed with the devastating disorder.
A number of people across the world suffer from schizophrenia – a disease characterised by hallucinations, emotional withdrawal, and a declining cognitive function, beginning in adolescence or early adulthood.
This might be one of the biggest medical breakthrough of this century. Scientists on 27 January said they have identified a specific gene and molecular process in the brain that helps to trigger schizophrenia.
The feat was achieved by genetic analysis of nearly 65,000 individuals.
Despite decades of research, scientists have made very little progress in treating schizophrenia – partly because it has been so difficult to narrow in on the cause.
The drugs available to treat schizophrenia soften some of its symptoms but do not touch the underlying cause.
According to the researchers, the new results provide the first ever biological clue on the ancient disorder. The findings may also help solve other mysteries – including why the disorder often begins in adolescence or young adulthood.
Researchers have found that people who carry a gene that speeds up or strengthens the normal developmental process of “synaptic pruning” in the brain are at a higher risk for developing schizophrenia.
Typically, the brain uses this process to shed weak or unneeded neural connections as it matures. This happens primarily during adolescence and young adulthood, and is concentrated in the prefrontal cortex of the brain, which is associated with high-level thinking, planning and decision-making.
But in people with schizophrenia, the synaptic pruning process goes into overdrive. This may explain why those individuals have been shown to have fewer neural connections in their prefrontal cortex, and why the disorder almost always shows up during adolescence or young adulthood.
“The great majority of schizophrenia cases present between the ages of 16 and 25, which has always been one of the mysteries of the illness,” Dr Steve McCarroll, the co-author of the research told the Huffington Post. “Why would it strike at this particular time in life?”
The researchers found that the gene associated with aggressive tagging of weak neural connections – meaning that more of these connections are eaten away by proteins than they are in a healthy brain – also carries the protein C4. The C4 protein tells another protein to attach to synapses, or neural connectors, in the brain.
“C4 is essentially placing the Post-it note on synapses that says ‘eat me,'” said McCarroll said.
Researchers say the findings will pave the path for more effective treatments and screening protocols for the disease – such as a test or a drug that could target runaway synaptic pruning.
However, they said the findings do not mean a new treatment will be found soon.