Performing in India after 18 years, world famous music composer and instrumentalist Yanni enthralled audience at an event here which was telecast live in 156 countries.
He and his team of musicians left 9,000-Strong audience captivated at a concert in the majestic Lakshmi Palace last night. The event was organised as part of a four-day Vadodara International Art and Cultural Festival (Vadfest) 2015 that began yesterday.
The renowned Greek musician greeted the people by saying “Hello India, hello Vadodara and kem cho” (how are you? in Gujarati), drawing loud applause from the gathering, which consisted of fans from across India and nearly 20 countries.
“The palace is absolutely gorgeous. We are here only for few days but felt so comfortable. We got so much love, respect, warmth and hospitality that we felt we are part of your family…That is why I love coming to India,” said the 60-year-old pianist, keyboardist, composer and music producer.
He played about a dozen numbers with a team of talented musicians from diverse backgrounds. The concert lasted for more than two hours, spanning a mix of musical styles adapted to a flamboyant orchestra comprising brass, strings and drums. Most numbers were fast-paced and energetic.
Yanni was an absolute rock star – conducting, gesturing, hitting every one of his eight keyboards in tandem, running across the stage. Performing to a packed audience in grand style, he played all his classics from ‘Felita’ to ‘Nightingale’.
Saurabh Patel, Gujarat Finance Minister who attended the event, said the concert was telecast live in 156 countries. “Perhaps it is for the first time that Yanni’s concert has been telecast live in so many countries.”
This was a huge boost to the Gujarat Goverment’s efforts to promote Vadodara, through the festival, as a global hub for cultural events and tourism, he said.
The musical messiah, whose real name is Yiannis Chryssomallis, had last performed in India at the historic Taj Mahal in March 1997.
Defending champion Saina Nehwal is just one step away from retaining her women’s singles title, while world No. 5 Indian K Srikanth too reached the finals of the USD 120,000 Syed Modi International Badminton tournament, on Saturday.
Olympic bronze medallist Saina didn’t have to break much sweat as she disposed off fourth seed Nichaon Jindapon of Thailand 21-10 21-16 at the Babu Banarasi Das Indoor Stadium.
The 24-year-old will take on the winner of the match between two-time World Championship bronze medallist P V Sindhu and reigning World Champion Carolina Marin of Spain.
World No 5 Srikanth also continued his rampaging form and entered the finals for the second successive time with a hard- fought victory over compatriot H S Prannoy, who had clinched the Indonesia Masters last year.
The top seed Indian dropped the opening game before beating Prannoy 12-21 21-12 21-14 in a match that lasted for an hour and four minutes in the men’s singles competition.
In doubles, it was curtains for fifth seeds Manu Attri and B Sumeeth Reddy as they were defeated by fourth seeds Vladimir Ivanov and Ivan Sozonov of Russia 12-21 18-21.
New Delhi: All Jan Dhan bank accounts should be linked to Aadhaar, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Saturday while asking bankers to speed up this process and redouble efforts on financial literacy.
He wrote an email to all bankers to appreciate their “exceptional work” done to implement the Jan Dhan Yojana and said 99.74 per cent of all households in the country have been covered, surpassing the target.
The government will ensure that many more schemes utilize the Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) platform, he said.
“It gives me great pleasure to have seen the exceptional work done by you all in ensuring the success of the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana. The target set for opening bank accounts for all households has been surpassed well ahead of the target date of 26 January, 2015,” he said in the email.
“By opening 11.5 crore new accounts in a very short span, we have achieved a coverage of 99.74 per cent of all households in the country. I congratulate you for your extraordinary efforts,” the Prime Minister wrote.
Contending that the bankers had proved sceptics wrong, he said it should motivate them further.
“We need to redouble efforts on financial literacy.
Aadhaar seeding needs to improve further. Bank Mitras need to be enabled to carry out RuPay card and Aadhaar enabled transactions in villages itself,” he told the bankers.
“I want you to work to ensure that each account holder enrols for Aadhaar and seeds it in the bank account. This needs to be done for all accounts. I am sure you will do this seeding with the same zeal you showed in driving bank account opening,” he added.
Freight rates for nine-tonne pay load section declined up to Rs 1,000 in the local truck transport market today following excess availability of trucks in the markets against restricted cargo movements.
Transporters said restricted cargo movements against huge position of trucks mainly pulled down freight rates for selective destinations.
Delhi to Guwahati, Pune, Kanpur, and Ahmedabad freight rates dropped by Rs 1,000 each to Rs 49,000, Rs 27,000, Rs 16,000 and Rs 20,000.
Rates to Mysore, Hyderabad, Ludhiana and Chandigarh also moved down by Rs 1,000 each to Rs 67,000, Rs 53,000, Rs 16,000 and Rs 15,000.
Following are today’s freights per nine-tonne load (in Rs):
Jaipur 14,000 Hyderabad 53,000 Chandigarh 15,000 Vijayawada 56,000 Ludhiana 16,000 Bangalore 63,000 Kanpur 16,000 Chennai 62,000 Indore 19,000 Mysore 67,000 Ahmedabad 20,000 Pondicherry 64,000 Baroda 23,000 Coimbatore 68,000 Patna 24,000 Kochi 73,000 Surat 25,000 Thiruvananthapuram 77,000 Mumbai 26,000 Goa 48,000 Pune 27,000 Gwalior 14,000 Kolkata 29,000 Guwahati 49,000.
Hong Kong (AFP) – Hong Kong police say they are hunting a girl aged between 12 and 14 years old over the theft of a diamond necklace worth more than HK$36 million (US$4.6 million) from a luxury jewellery store.
Police say she helped carry out the audacious theft with two women and a man, all aged between 30 and 40.
The adults “pretended to be customers choosing items from the shop” police said, while the girl stole the necklace.
The gang of four then left the store before a staff member realised it was missing.
The necklace was 100-carat gold embedded with more than 30 diamonds, the South China Morning Post said, and police confirmed it was worth HK$36 million.
The young girl managed to steal a key from a drawer to open a cabinet while staff were distracted, the SCMP said, citing an unnamed police source.
“The three adults posed as big spenders and demanded employees show them jewellery in an apparent move to divert staff attention,” the source said.
Local media reported that the theft was from the Emperor Jewellery store in the Tsim Sha Tsui shopping district, but the store would not confirm it had been targeted when contacted by AFP.
The girl was caught on CCTV as she left the mall, the SCMP said, showing a picture of a girl dressed in black trousers, a blue shirt and a grey hooded top.
Police described her as “slimly built”.
The gang spent around half an hour in the shop and staff did not notice the necklace was missing until later in the day, the SCMP added.
The lives of people in poor countries is expected to improve faster in the next 15 years as innovation and technology drives optimism for a sustainable future, says leading philanthropist Bill Gates.
The world will have the “tools” to reduce the incidence of malaria and AIDS significantly, he said.
According to Bill Gates and Melinda Gates, Co-Chairs, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, USA, there is optimism for a sustainable future and that is mainly driven by innovation and technology.
“We get economic growth, but the fundamental basics have improved as well. The wonderful thing about the fundamentals improving is that it will continue for the next 15 years,” Bill Gates said.
They were speaking at the 45th World Economic Forum annual meet here.
Bill Gates said “in the next 15 years, we will have the tools to reduce (the incidence) of malaria and AIDS by 95 per cent to 100 per cent.
Melinda Gates said that vaccines are “a miracle cure”. Today, eight out of 10 children are getting vaccines, she added.
According to her, one out of 10 children used to die before the age of five. Thanks to the development of new vaccines and treatments, the percentage of children who die before the age of five has been cut in half, she said.
Moreover, countries such as Vietnam, Ghana, Ethiopia and Rwanda are reporting 90 per cent vaccination coverage.
The important breakthroughs would be driven by innovation and technology, ranging from new vaccines with universal coverage, better agricultural yields due to better seeds, better nutrition, cheaper smart phones and new ways to deliver these benefits to more people.
Cheap smart phones are a game-changer. “In the next 15 years mobile phone coverage will go up, the price will come down, gender equity will improve and online software will be flourishing,” Bill Gates said.
This will revolutionise everything: agriculture, access to digital payments, low transaction costs, women’s empowerment and education, he said adding “if you want to pick one thing in an economy, education is a master switch of economic improvement.”
Poverty has been halved because of innovation, he said.
“Countries are following others that have done it right. Economic miracles start with agriculture, education and then they can participate in the world economy.” Gates said and cited the example of China, which is now a middle-income country.
Bill and Melinda said they believe with innovation in agriculture, within 15 years Africa will be able to feed itself, with access to latest seeds adapted to African regions.
Hans Rosling, Professor of International Health, Karolinska Institute, Sweden echoed similar sentiments and said “we have made tremendous progress in this world”.
PATNA: BJP President Amit Shah on Saturday asked people to be “cautious” about the news dished out by a private Hindi TV channel apparently helping Aam Admi Party to win the Delhi assembly elections.
“The TV channel is having an agenda to launch Aam Admi Party and help Kejriwal win election in Delhi…there cannot be a bigger example of yellow journalism than this,” Shah told reporters here.
The BJP chief’s statement came in response to a question by the channel reporter as to why the party has “borrowed” Kiran Bedi for Delhi election.
When some media persons mostly of TV channels asked angrily as how he could decide which channel public should watch, Shah said “I have expressed my opinion and its on the people whether to take it or not.”
He defended inclusion of Kiran Bedi into the party and said BJP had always been in favour of inclusion of eminent personalities from different walks of lives into its fold.
On a question about taking cricketer Saurav Ganguly in the party to take on Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal, Shah said it was not yet decided.
“Party leader Sidharth Nath Singh has already clarified from party side on its approach on Saurav Ganguly,” he said.
New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today made an appeal for ending discrimination against the girl child and ensuring that they get equal opportunities to shine.
“On National Girl Child Day, I salute the unparallelled accomplishments of the girl child. Their role in nation building is paramount,” Modi tweeted.
“Let us affirm to end discrimination against the girl child & ensure our daughters get equal opportunities to shine,” he added.
Only two days back, the Prime Minister launched ‘Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao’ (save daughter, educate daughter) scheme and said discrimination against girls was a reflection of “mental illness” in the society.
He had said that discrimination against the girl child shows a mindset which is worse than that in the 18th century and harmful for the future of the nation.
Locked in the Panaji bye-election battle, rivals BJP and Congress have made offshore casinos as their poll plank with both the parties mudslinging at each other on the issue.
While Congress Goa Chief Luizinho Faleiro had on Thursday said that they will suspend licences of all offshore casinos issued by Corporation of City of Panaji, if voted to power in the by-poll, the BJP said the issue would boomerang on their political rival.
Congress attacked the ruling-BJP pointing out that they failed to shift offshore casinos, which is spoiling the beauty of river Mandovi.
Chief minister Laxmikant Parsekar counter attacked the rival party, saying that casinos (offshore) were brought in the state by Congress only and that their statement (on casinos) will boomerang on them.
Panaji by-poll is scheduled on February 13 after the seat fell vacant following resignation of former chief minister Manohar Parrikar, who was elevated as the Union defence minister.
BJP has fielded its senior party worker Siddharth Cuncolienkar as the candidate, who will face Congress’s Surendra Furtado.
Parsekar, defending the casino business said that the state government cannot suspend their licences as it will send wrong signal to corporates investing in Goa.
“We will shift the offshore casino vessels away from the city if we find the place, but, we cannot suspend their licences,” he had said.
Goa has five offshore casinos which are currently operating in river Mandovi near here.
White House says Mr. Obama would travel to Saudi Arabia and meet new Saudi king.
U.S. President Barack Obama has cancelled the Agra leg of his India visit, Agra District Magistrate has confirmed.
The President, who will be the chief guest at the Republic Day celebrations in New Delhi, was scheduled to visit the Taj Mahal with his wife, Michelle Obama, on January 27.
A statement from the White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said: “The President regrets that he will be unable to visit Agra during this trip.” It added that Mr. Obama and the First Lady will travel to Riyadh on Tuesday to pay respects to King Salman bin Abdulaziz and the family of the late King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz. “We adjusted the schedule in coordination with the Indian Government so that the President would be able to depart India following his speech on Tuesday to stop in Riyadh during the return trip…”, said the statement.
The Uttar Pradesh Government has been informally informed about the change of plans and the American security team has already left Agra.
Uttar Pradesh Principal Secretary Navneet Sehgal told the media that the American security team, which was camping in Agra to ensure an unprecedented security cover for the Obamas, has left the city.
Surprised and upset
Senior State officials camping in Agra were both surprised and upset at the cancellation of Mr. Obama’s visit.
“It’s possible that he might leave India earlier,” a government source said, adding that no reason had been given for the cancellation of the Agra visit.
Officials in the Agra administration told The Hindu on condition of anonymity that there were “certain differences” between the Indian security officials and the U.S. Security team.
Refusing to divulge more details, one of the officials said, “The security agencies from India and the US were not on the same page when it comes to certain minor details about Barack Obama’s visit to the Taj. But the cancellation of the visit is surprising.”
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