Regional

Srinagar, Sep 6 (IANS) After remaining suspended for more than 33 years, the annual Urs of Sufi saint Syed Qamar-ud-Din Bukhari will be observed in J&K's Ganderbal district from Wednesday.

The four-day long Urs has a historical background and it had to be suspended because of opposition from followers of radical Islam.

Despite the strait jacket concept of Islam advocated by the Ahle Hadis school of thought, the iconic Urs at the Sufi's shrine in Ganderbal stands out to prove that Sufism has deeper roots in Kashmir.

Till its suspension, the Urs at Ganderbal would attract hundreds of devotees who would come to pay obeisance at the saint's mausoleum.

Sweetmeat sellers, fruit sellers, garment stalls and entertainment avenues for children would be the other highlights of the Urs.

The water transport from Srinagar through Jhelum and Sindh stream would enable scores of people who would come in 'Dongas' (non-luxury houseboats) to attend the Urs.

These Dongas would remain stationed on the Sindh stream for around a week when people from Srinagar would spend sometime away from city's hustle and bustle.

Authorities have made arrangements this year to facilitate the movement of Dongas to revive this important aspect of the Urs.

People living in villages close to the shrine would invite relatives and friends on this annual Urs while family get togethers gave an important value addition to the devotees' prayers.

The Urs formally begins Wednesday evening with nightlong prayers and chanting of 'Doruds' (prayers of the Holy Prophet).

"We had to restrict the Urs for the last 33 years because of turmoil. We would, however, perform the nightlong prayers at the shrine during all those years.

"This year, the grandeur and gaiety for which Syed Qamar-Ud-Din Bukhari's Urs is known throughout the Valley is again returning to Ganderbal," said a member of the shrine's management committee.

One significant highlight of this Urs in the past used to be the participation of Kashmiri Pandits alongside their Muslim brethren.

While it is not known from where the saint came to this village, folklore has it that the entire area would get devastated because of the annual floods in the Sindh stream.

"Locals implored the saint to save them from the vagaries of annual floods and after this the saint started praying by the banks of the Sindh stream (where the shrine is located today).

"After he stationed himself by the banks of the stream, there were no annual floods. Pleased with the saint's blessings, locals decided to celebrate the Urs at the shrine each year," said the management committee member.

Whether the saint's miracle or the extensive flood protection works undertaken by the government after Independence prevented the annual floods in the Sindh stream, the fact remains that the reverence for the saint has withstood all tides of fundamentalism and radicalisation in Kashmir.

--IANS
sq/arm

Chennai, Sep 6 (IANS) Tamil Nadu's ruling DMK is set to celebrate September as a Dravidian month.

The party has taken the decision in line as the ideologues of the Dravidian movement, E.V. Ramaswamy Periyar and C.N. Anandurai were born this month and the anniversary of the DMK's launch is also takes place in September.

A walkathon will be conducted through Robinson park, Chennai, where the party was launched.

The DMK IT wing has also planned a series of online programmes, including Twitter discussions with the second-rung leaders of the party.

Senior functionaries of the IT Wing said that the party needs to reintroduce the ideals of the former leaders and clarity of organisational thoughts as several youths were getting influenced by the right-wing campaigns.

The IT wWing is creating a Twitter space to enter into discussions with like-minded people. The second rung of leaders of the party will take part in ideological discussions on this platform and will explain the need for a progressive Dravidian movement in the present scenario through which the country is moving ahead.

It will also be showcasing past leaders of the party and their struggles through short documentaries. This includes the fights these leaders had carried out for social justice and social equality.

Several leaders of the party with ideological moorings will also take classes on the Dravidian thoughts and how progressive the society could be taken forward through this movement and the ideological clarity it offers.

--IANS
aal/ksk/

Chennai, Sep 5 (IANS) Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, M.K. Stalin launched the 'Pudhumai Pen' scheme here on Monday while his Delhi counterpart Arvind Kejriwal unveiled 26 schools of excellence and 15 model schools, opened by the state government emulating the schools set up by his Aam Aadmi Party government in Delhi.

Under the Moovalur Ramamritham Ammaiyar Higher Education Assurance or "Pudhumai Pen" scheme, girl students who studied from Class 5 to Class 12 in state government schools would be provided a monthly assistance of Rs 1,000 till they complete their graduation or diploma.

Kejriwal, in his inaugural address said: "We might be belonging to different political parties, but there is so much good work that each government in each state is doing. It is extremely important that we learn from each other."

He also said that it has to be the right of every child in the country to have a good and free education and it was the duty of each government to provide free education with high quality to the children.

The Delhi Chief Minister also said that if all the state governments start programmes like what Tamil Nadu and Delhi have done, and with the support of Central government, all the government schools in the country can provide the best quality education.

Stalin, in his address, underlined the reforms initiated by the Dravidian movement as also the various schemes launched by the DMK governments for the welfare of women and children.

He also announced that 25 schools run by Municipal corporations in the state would be elevated as Schools of Excellence in the first phase at a cost of Rs 171 crore.

Stalin also said that the classrooms in these Schools of Excellence would be upgraded and modernised, and art, literature, music, dance, and sports would be promoted among the students.

He also called upon the students to pursue education at the highest levels and not to stop with one degree.

--IANS
aal/vd

Lucknow, Sep 5 (IANS) Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Monday ordered a joint probe by the Divisional Commissioner and police Commissioner of Lucknow into the hotel fire incident.

The injured will be given proper and free treatment, he added.

A major fire broke out in the Levana hotel in Hazratganj area of the state capital this morning.

More than 20 persons have been shifted to a hospital in an unconscious state, sources said.

--IANS
amita/shb/

Chennai, Sep 5 (IANS) Tamil Nadu's special police team has started a detailed investigation into the arrest of 13 Sri Lankan Tamils arrested from Kollam, Kerala on Monday morning. Special police teams including sleuths from the elite 'Q' branch of the Tamil Nadu police are in Kollam to interrogate those who are under the custody of the Kerala police.

A senior officer with the Tamil Nadu police told IANS that the investigation is centered around two agents who were involved in bringing these people from Sri Lanka to India. The central intelligence agencies have given tip-offs about some people who have landed in Chennai and other airports of Tamil Nadu being missing even after their visit visa period had expired.

While only 13 people are under the custody of Kerala police for trying to illegally move to Australia, Tamil Nadu police suspect that there may be more people in hiding as illegal human trafficking by the sea route is not possible with 13 people.

It may be noted that a fishing boat comprising of 243 people including children and pregnant women had illegally left the shores of India from Maliyankara boat jetty near Munambam in Kochi on January 12, 2018. There was no information about the boat or its occupants including the kingpins of the racket who had also left in the boat. The intelligence bureau had then given inputs that the 243 had left for Australia but whether they have reached the shores of that country or whether they perished in the sea is still a mystery.

The central agencies and the Tamil Nadu 'Q' branch police do not want a repeat of such a situation and have already swung into action to prevent any illegal trafficking from the shores of Kollam.

Sources in Tamil Nadu police told IANS that there is proper coordination between the police of Kerala and Tamil Nadu and that the investigation is on track.

--IANS
aal/uk

Hyderabad, Sep 5 (IANS) The craze to shoot a video of him walking close to a high-speed train nearly cost the life of a 17-year-old youth in Telangana.

The youth was injured when he was hit by the train from behind as he was walking very close to the track near Kazipet Railway Station in Hanamkonda district.

The video of the incident went viral on social media. With his hands in pockets, he is seen walking along the track with a train approaching from behind. In a couple of seconds he was hit by the train and was thrown aside. His friend, who was recording the video on a mobile phone, is heard warning the youth before he was knocked down.

Chintakula Akshay Raju (17) sustained grievous injuries and was admitted to the MGM Hospital in Warangal. A resident of Vaddepally village of Hanamkonda district, he is an engineering student.

While walking with his friends along the railway track near a pond, he came up with the idea of capturing the high-speed train in a video to upload on a social media platform. However, the craze nearly cost him his life. He suffered grievous head injury and also injuries to his leg and hand.

--IANS
ms/dpb

Bengaluru, Sep 5 (IANS) Incessant rains continued to batter Silicon city Bengaluru on Monday and authorities crossed their fingers as the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) issued a yellow alert till September 7 for Bengaluru.

Heavy rains lashed Bengaluru throughout Sunday night inundating many residential areas and arterial roads.

Lakhs of vehicle riders and drivers had harrowing time reaching offices due to inundated roads at many localities in Bengaluru on Monday. The Richmond Road constructed under the Smart City Project is facing the problem of water-logging and people are left fuming against authorities.

The Ecospace, hub of IT companies in Marathahalli in Bengaluru, is also inundated with water causing inconvenience for the movement of software professionals.

HAL Airport Traffic police have given a traffic advisory of heavy water-logging near the Eco World and Outer Ring Road traffic movement is very slow. "Travellers be aware of this. Our staff is clearing the traffic, if it is possible please avoid this route," the advisory released on Monday says.

Kala Krishnamurthy, DCP Traffic (East) has stated, "Commuters before venturing out today (Monday), expect slow moving traffic in a lot of places in the city because of continuous rains and water-logging. Please plan your travel accordingly. Traffic police are on their job, easing and regulating the traffic," she stated.

The Outer Ring Road Companies Association has already sent a memorandum to the Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai complaining about crumbling infrastructure in the stretch which houses hundreds of top IT and BT companies and warned him that tech companies will have to move out if the government turns a blind eye towards it.

The Silk Board Junction, one of the major junctions connecting the Electronic City, one of the major tech-hubs of Bengaluru, is also facing the problem of water-logging.

The villages in border district Chamarajanagar are facing the threat of floods as a result of heavy rainfall. The rains have been lashing the border district since Sunday evening and continued on Monday as well.

The yellow alert has also been issued to Bengaluru Rural, Chikkaballapur, Chikkamagalur, Chitradurga, Davanagere, Hassan, Kolar, Ramnagar, Kodagu, Chamarajanagar, Mandya, Mysuru, Shivamogga and Tumakuru districts.

--IANS
mka/uk

Belagavi (Karnataka), Sep 5 (IANS) A prowling leopard in this north Karnataka district managed to retreat into a nearby forest area giving a slip to more than 300 personnel who were trying to trap it for a month.

The education department has directed the 22 schools in the city to reopen and function normally from Monday following the forest department declaring the end of operations.

According to sources, the operation was trolled as the leopard managed to stay put in the 250-acre Golf Club even as more than 300 personnel from the forest, police department, sharpshooters, two elephants, anesthetic experts, wildlife experts and local hunter tribes worked day and night yielding no results.

On several occasions, the big cat had managed to escape with netizens, prompting hilarious comments from netizens on social media, who called him an "honourable citizen" waiting to return to forests after the Ganesh festival.

Now, the authorities have declared that the big cat has managed to sneak into the Mundoli forest area. However, the trap cameras, CCTVs installed at various places in the Golf Club and cages will be kept for a few more days. The two elephants -- Arjun and Ale -- brought from Sakrebailu Elephant Camp in Shivamogga will be sent back.

Authorities have explained that they could not find traces of leopard for a week. A total of 23 trap cameras and 8 towers were put up to watch the leopard's movements. Crackers were bursted and the whole premises combed to confirm that the big cat has managed to escape.

Chief Conservator of Forests Manjunath Chouhan has stated that the leopard has sneaked back into the nearby forest. Authorities have also confirmed with locals who have seen the it moving towards Mandoli forest area.

The authorities had used a honey trap method to catch it. More than 350 personnel carried out combing operations with JCB, elephants, sharpshooters, anesthetic experts every day for almost a month.

Since the prowling leopard continuously gave a slip to authorities, the 22 schools and colleges around in the areas switched over to the online mode of teaching. Nearly 20,000 students were affected by the leopard menace.

The authorities had laid traps with dogs inside in a few places. Later, they were forced to change the places of 8 small cages, one big cage and CCTV cameras as the leopard changed its place of movement.

The prolonged operation had created public outrage with the opposition Congress demanded the resignation of the Forest Minister Umesh Katti. A group of local women had challenged the authorities that if they are not able to catch the prowling leopard, let them in and they will catch the leopard, causing severe embarrassment to the authorities.

Social media campaigns were also taken up, kindling the authorities for their failure to catch the leopard.

The leopard had attacked a construction laborer in Jadhav Nagar on Aug 5.

--IANS
mka/shb/

Hyderabad, Sep 4 (IANS) Megastar K. Chiranjeevi on Sunday revealed that he set up Chiranjeevi Blood Bank as he was moved by the death of many people due to blood shortage in 1998.

Stating that he had many fans who were ready to do anything for him, he said he wanted to use this love and affection for the benefit of people.

Chiranjeevi was speaking at an event at Raj Bhavan, where Telangana Governor Tamilisai Soundararajan felicitated and distributed free life insurance policies to volunteers for donating blood for more than 50 times at Chiranjeevi Eye and Blood Bank.

The actor said so far 9.30 lakh units blood has been collected and 70 per cent of this was provided to the poor free of cost while the remaining was given to private hospitals.

He said the problem of blood shortage has been resolved to a large extent in the two Telugu states.

Chiranjeevi revealed that 2,000 to 3,000 people are frequently donating blood. He said the 'Chiru Bhadratha' scheme was started by the Chiranjeevi Charitable Trust (CCT) to provide security to donors.

Under the scheme, each frequent blood donor has been insured for Rs 7 lakh and the premium was being paid by the trust.

The Governor, in her speech, said that blood donation is a noble cause. She recalled that when she was the house surgeon, even family members of patients were reluctant to come forward to donate flood

She lauded Chiranjeevi Charitable Trust for immense efforts in collecting 9,30,000 units of blood and 4,580 pairs of eyes.

Appreciating Chiranjeevi for being inspirational and brand ambassador for blood donation, she said that this is an unprecedented monumental initiative by any film star in India for encouraging their fans to contribute to a noble cause for the betterment of society.

She said a blood donation programme was being undertaken by Raj Bhavan. An app has been developed to ensure that the needy get the blood on time. She requested the CCT to become part of this initiative.

--IANS
ms/vd

By Vishnu Makhijani
New Delhi, Sep 4 (IANS) She's a traditionalist who loves to preserve the heritage of a bygone era - be it recipes, textiles or crafts - and believes "the woods are lovely, dark and deep and I have miles to go before I sleep". Freelance writer, food columnist and broadcaster Sabita Radhakrishna's latest offering, "Paachakam - Heritage Cuisine of Kerala", could not be better timed, coming as does in the midst of the Onam season.


There's a double bonus in this book - not only does it lead you through the varied cuisine of God's Own Country but there's also a double-page spread of the 24-items that make up the Sadya feast served on Onam and other special occasions and their precise positioning on a plantain leaf.

"I am a foodie, and my idea was to retrieve old recipes which would die with the people who cooked them and I started to document all my mother's recipes in 'Aharam' which was my first book on traditional cuisine. For one thing, I love to preserve recipes of a bygone era, and I am a traditionalist and do not like precious heritage items to languish, be it textiles, craft, or the craft of cooking food," Radhakrishna told IANS of "Paachakam" (Roli Books).

"My idea was not to write 'just a cookbook'. I needed to learn and understand the history of origin of the food, in this case Kerala, and to study the different communities and food habits. It was also a learning curve for me and I enjoyed it. I talked to women who were excellent cooks and chose one from each community who would be the central figure representing her community and who would guide me through.

"I am grateful to all those women from different regions who shared their family recipes. It was a long route just trying to standardize and test the recipes, and retrying if they didn't turn out right. It took me about one-and-a-half years before I submitted my manuscript," Radhakrishna explained.

This was just one part of the research that went into the writing of the book.

"I belong to an old school where I research in the conventional way, going to libraries and looking at archival material and reading books by other authors. I do not believe in just going to the internet and collecting material. I used to visit the library of (Chennai's) DakshinaChitra (heritage museum) though it is quite far away, and went through food history. Another valuable source and very good reading was the book by (food scientist and nutritionist) K.T. Achaya on the history of food in general.

"This is a challenge that every writer faces when you write about a culture alien to you. You research extensively, you talk to experts in the field and it is a long process of learning and understanding a different kind of cuisine. I decided to cover the major communities in Kerala, and their diversity and food habits were a revelation and so very interesting. I met many women who cooked traditional Kerala food," Radhakrishna elaborated.

The book focuses on major communities like the Nairs, Syrian Christians, Nambuthiris, Poduvals, Thiyas and Cochin Jews.

"I chose foodies who were very conversant with the pan-Indian recipes which today are diluted and sometimes changed drastically. I wanted no less than the original at least as close as possible," Radhakrishna said of her quest.

"I have found that in Kerala, most women who cook stick to original recipes though understandably they switch to short cuts which are inevitable," she added.

The recipes apart, the author also provides pen-sketches of the communities featured in the book.

Kanjee is the staple food of the Nairs, sometimes consumed thrice a day. Coconut, jackfruit, bananas and mangoes feature prominently in their cooking. Fish is preferred to chicken and fowl but beef is taboo.

Essentially non-vegetarian, Syrian Christians eat meat anytime, starting with their breakfast. Short red rice and tapioca are a must almost every day. The use of 'kodam puli' (tamarind), with its tangy flavour, makes the curries stand out.

While most of Kerala is predominantly non-vegetarian, Nambuthiris and Poduvals are pure vegetarians, also abstaining from garlic, onion and alcohol.

The history of the Thiya community of Malabar is shrouded in conjecture. Some converted to Islam around the ninth century due to the influence of Arab traders. A section of the Travancore Royal Family moved to North Kerala, where they cultivated rice and local vegetables while the larger community lived on a largely seafood diet. The advent of colonial rule saw the hot curries, for instance, gave way to stews, while the French introduced baking.

The food of the Cochin Jews is kosher - meat and dairy products cannot be mixed; pork is banned, as also fish cooked with fins and scales. The staple food of the Cochinis is unpolished parboiled rice which takes on many incarnations like dosa, idli, appam puttu. In this cuisine, large quantities of onions are browned, and the vegetables and other ingredients are cooked in onion juice instead of water, which gives them a distinct and special flavour.

In exploring the diverse foods and customs, interviewing community leaders, and researching preferred spices and flavours, Radhakrishna uncovers special commonalities between them that serve to define Kerala cuisine as a whole.

One thing that Radhakrishna was very insistent about is hone ground spices.

"There is no comparison between home ground masala powder and the commercial variety. At home we are careful to broil each ingredient separately and make just enough to last for a short time. Commercial powders are produced in large quantities, and preservatives have to be added for longer shelf life. I make my own powders at home, even today and definitely it contributes to a better taste. Flavours are undoubtedly better and the food is tastier with home ground spice powders," Radhakrishna maintained.

However, "the market today is flooded with readymade spice powders, and if you are a young working woman it is too tempting as these people do not have the time or patience to make powders at home", she added.

"Paachakam" is Radhkrishna's fifth book, two of which have won international award, but there's no letting up for her.

She also runs an NGO, Udhavi, which she founded nine years ago, "providing company for elders living alone and connecting them to services which they might need. I wrote a small book called 'Handbook for Silvers', less than 100 pages and it is selling very well".

"I am now compiling a book of recipes I have tried over and over again, which my friends and family love. I know people can get recipes from the Net, but nothing like a book with time-tested recipes. They are a mix of the old and the new and is called 'Amma's Kitchen'. It is my legacy to my children and their children who have always enjoyed my cooking.

"Would I be doing another regional cookbook? I really do not know as it requires so much work.

"Yes, the woods are lovely dark and deep and I have miles to go before I sleep," Radhikrishna concluded, quoting the American poet Robert Frost.

(Vishnu Makhijani can be reached at vishnu.makhijani@ians.in)

--IANS
vm/shs