Monthly Archives: December 2015

City boy wins ‘renowned national shooter’ title

Sports

Lucknow :

City boy, Ishan Kalhans, student of class IX in La Martiniere College has become a ‘Renowned National Shooter’ under the National Rifle Association of India (NRAI). He scored points much above the threshold in the category at the 59th All India Shooting Championship 2015 on Sunday. Along with this feat, Ishan is now eligible to appear in selection trials for the Indian rifle shooting team.

Ishan scored 580.5 points at the championship held at Dr Karni Singh Shooting range in Delhi in the under 18 ‘Youth’ category in the 10 meter air rifle shooting. “The player needs to score above 570 points to be able to achieve this title. I have become a national qualified shooter now,” said Ishan. After this, he will be participating in the KSS tournament scheduled at Kerala in February 2016, where trials for the Indian team will also be held.

The young boy was inspired by his father Siddharth Kalhans, who had earlier been an air rifle shooter. In 2014, when Ishan’s principal introduced the sport in the school, he started practising and participating. Taking up target practice for three hours daily, he first took part in the Uttar Pradesh State Shooting Championship in 2014 and won bronze medal. This year, he won silver medal in the same championship and also won silver medal in 10meter air rifle team in Uttarakhand State Shooting Championship, 2015.

He owns a German air rifle and wants to take up air rifle shooting along with Indian Civil Services in future. Ishan aspires to represent India at the Olympics.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Lucknow / TNN / December 15th, 2015

Benaras boy Yatharth Ratnum wins first edition of The Stage India

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Records, All

In the finale aired on Sunday night, Yatharth won a Renault car, a contract with Universal music plus a 10-city tour.

BanarasboyLUCKNOW15dec2015

Yatharth Ratnum, a 19-year-old boy from Benaras, has won The Stage India, the country’s first English singing reality show. “I know it is a crazy thing to get into English music growing up in Benaras. I had trained in Hindustani classical music for six years since I was seven, and that had stood me in good stead in whatever genre I have chosen to pursue ever since,” said Yatharth, who lists pop, R&B and soul as genres he loves singing the most.

In the finale aired on Sunday night, Yatharth won a Renault car, a contract with Universal music plus a 10-city tour. Not many may remember but Yatharth was the budding teenager who finished as a runner-up on Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Challenge 2009.

“That was a different space. This is unlike anything that has ever happened in the Indian reality scene. The response we got on social media plus the comments, and shares that came our way have been heartening,” he said, adding that participation in the show happened purely by accident.

“I met up with a friend for coffee and she informed me she would proceed to audition for this reality show of English songs that was about to be launched. I decided to tag along because I had been involved with English music for around the last couple of years, writing and creating music in Los Angeles,” he pointed out.

The LA trip, he says, happed because of his Li’l Champs sojourn. “I got a call to perform at the Young Artist Award because they loved my Hindi songs!” he laughed.

His switch from Hindi to English happened because of two reasons. “I don’t want to be contained in India. At the awards do, I realised I could reach out to a wider audience if I wanted to. Plus, I tried writing in Hindi but could not.” He recalls he was just five when he heard AR Rahman’s Dil Se, an experience that had a strong impact on him. “My dad was in the audio distribution business, so I would a chance to listen to a huge variety of music. That let me develop a varied sense of sounds,” said Yatharth, who counts Led Zeppelin, Michael Jackson and Rahman as a few of his inspirations.

Meanwhile, he has also bagged a film deal. “I have signed up for a Hindi film titled Blue Mountains, which also features Ranvir Shorey and Gracy Singh. I play the male lead and have also sung four songs in the film. Acting is something that lets me be who I am not.”

Music, though, will be his first love. “Music is music. I wake up and go to sleep with it,” he signed off.

source: http://www.indiatoday.intoday.in / Home> News> Mail Today / by Vinayak Chakravorty / Varanasi – December 14th, 2015

Senior SP Leader Yashpal Singh Dead

Leaders

Senior Samajwadi Party leader and former state Minister Chaudhary Yashpal Singh passed away in a Delhi hospital, his family members said.

He was 94.

Singh’s son, Chaudhary Rudrasen said that his father was admitted to Delhi’s Escorts hospital due to some respiratory problems about a month and half ago.

He breathed his last at 11 pm yesterday.

The body of the former national vice president of SP has been kept at his home at Titro for public to pay their last respect.

Before joining the SP in 2011 Singh also worked with the BJP and Congress party.

In 1977, when he was in the Congress, he was the only leader from the party to win a MLA seat in the entire Meerut-Saharanpur division.

He was also at the forefront when Indira Gandhi relaunched her comeback campaign after the 1977 drubbing.

source: http://www.outlookindia.com / Outlook / Home> News / Sahranpur – December 13th, 2015

PGI to roll out eyebrow transplant facility soon

Records, All, Science & Technology

Lucknow :

The plastic surgery department at Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences performed its first eyebrow hair transplant last week. The facility, available in high-end plastic surgery centres in the metros, would soon be rolled out to the public at a much lower cost.

“Loss of hair in the eyebrows, technically known as madarosis, is common after the age of 40 years. It starts with the side and proceeds towards the midline. It also leads to thinning of eyebrows. Bushy eyebrows are a symbol of beauty and their loss leaves a negative impact on a person,” said Dr Rajeev Agarwal, head of the plastic surgery department at SGPGIMS.

The procedure is time-taking and requires expertise. “Eyebrow transplant is different from regular hair transplant as the hair are to be planted in a slant orientation,” explained Dr Agarwal.

He added that a transplant was better than the cosmetic procedures available in the market.

“Options like cosmetic darkening of the eyebrow or tattooing create a camouflage but can never return the natural look, which is the biggest advantage of transplant,” he said.

The only disadvantage with a transplant is that one needs to get the eyebrows trimmed regularly as transplanted hair grow faster than normal hair. “Anyone who gets it done has to visit the beauty parlour regularly but then the advantage is quite satisfying,” said Rita Saha, relative of the patient who went under the knife for the transplant.

The team at SGPGI said that their rates would be at least one-third of what is being charged in private hospitals, where anything between Rs 200 and Rs 300 per hair are charged.

“An eyebrow transplant involves insertion of at least 300 hair per brow. This means that a patient would spend Rs 60,000-Rs 90,000 per brow in the private sector. Though the rates at our centre are yet to be finalized, they would be one-third of the market rate,” said Dr Agarwal.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Lucknow / by Shailvee Sharda / December 08th, 2015

KGMU orthodontic dept’s golden jubilee

Education, Records, All, Science & Technology

Lucknow :

As students, they walked through King George’s Medical University’s iconic administrative block umpteen number of times, but students from orthodontic department’s first batch never felt so overwhelmed as they did here on Saturday.

Aboard a golden chariot to take a ride of their campus, the alumni relished each moment of their golden jubilee. The ride ended at Browne Hall which had marked the beginning of their journey as specialist dentists.

First student Dr DN Kapoor, who was given a special welcome, said the face of his college has changed but the spirit remains the same. “We all owe our best to this campus… Once a Georgian, always a Georgian,” he said.

The day also marked 50 years of in orthodontics in the medical university. “We began with just one room in 1965 and today, it is a full-fledged department from where over 200 post graduate students have passed out and are working in different parts of the world,” said head of the department and also the organizer of the event Prof Pradeep Tandon.

A 50-minute video capturing department’s journey from its inception was also screened. It included bytes from scores of teachers and students. The department is the only Orthodontic Centre in India which has exclusively rendered orthodontic teaching and treatment.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Lucknow / TNN / December 06th, 2015

Bird watching festival organised in Kanpur zoo, 741 migratory birds sighted

Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Green Initiatives / Environment, Nature, Travel
Painted storks at Kanpur Zoo - TOI photo
Painted storks at Kanpur Zoo – TOI photo

Kanpur :

For the first time a bird watching festival was organised by Kanpur zoo on Friday wherein the birders, nature lovers and the visitors were given a unqiue experience of witnessing the zoo lake and its catchment area. The idea behind the festival was to enable the people to see a number of migratory birds nesting on the trees in the lake area. The unique festival had been organised by Kanpur zoo under the aegis of Social Forestry department on the instructions of the chief minister Akhilesh Yadav.

The visitors to the zoo were an amazed lot to see colonies of a number of birds on the tree tops. A total of 741 birds were spotted in the lake area which belonged to 44 different species. The different bird kind included Pied Kingfisher, orange headed thrush, painted storks, little egret, great cormorant, open bill stork, black headed ibis, waterhen, whistling teal, grey hornbill to name a few.

Chief Conservator of Forest, Kanpur division, KR Yadav on the occasion said that Kanpur zoo is a natural place with a distinguished lake which attracts a number of migratory birds each year. He said that the way pollution is rising in the city there is no place left for these birds here except the lush green and natural look alike jungle area in Kanpur zoo which attract birds towards it every year.

Kanpur zoo director, Deepak Kumar said that a total of 741 birds were spotted belonging to 44 different species which in itself is a record. He said that not only the number of the birds spotted was huge but also their varieties were witnessed in a big number.

On this occasion, a number of school children participated and they saw the birds chirping and making sound. The children were guided to the lake area and shown the entire lake. The two watching towers on this purpose were used to witnessing and capturing birds. The bird lovers made use of their high-tech cameras to capture the birds and each of their little activities. The children also had the best of their time as they picnicked in the woods and close to the lake in the presence of their teachers and the forest officers.

District Forest Officer Ram Kumar on the occasion said that the children had been given the access in the Safari area which has lake to make them aware about the birds and their species.

Zoo vets Dr RK Singh, Dr UC Srivastava, Dr Mohd Nasir were present who guided the students and explained them about the birds.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News Home> City> Kanpur / by Abhinav Malhotra, TNN / December 04th, 2015