Various features of the (Royapuram) railway station were submitted to the Minister. We requested the Minister to consider our report, spread over an area of 72 acres near the Harbour, Royapuram will house Chennai’s fourth terminal, following Central, Egmore and the upcoming terminal at Tambaram.

The pre-feasibility study was decided on, following several representations, former minister for Railways Dinesh Trivedi informed the Parliament, while presenting his Railway budget for the year 2012-13 on March 14.

It may be recalled that a high level committee led by executive director (coaching) of the Railway Board Mukesh Nigam inspected the station to explore the possibility of converting it into a full-fledged terminal. The panel held discussions with representatives of the local people on several issues involved in the process on January 21.

It is expected that mini buses are likely to be operated in the city from narrow lanes where around 100 families live, based on the recommendation to be made by the District Collector. Mini bus scheme was started during the previous DMK regime and in the first phase license was given to 4,000 mini buses and permission for 3,000 more buses could not be given as one of the mini bus owners got a stay order from a court.

The Transport Minister KN Nehru had on May 10, 2010, said that school students can’t use their passes in mini buses to be introduced in the city soon.  Already, students in other parts of the State have not been allowed to use in the mini buses. Scheduled services Transport Minister Senthil Balaji also announced that in accordance with the Vision 2023 unveiled by Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa recently which envisages all basic infrastructure facilities to the people of the city, the number of scheduled services would be increased from 3,140 to 3,500 during 2012-13.

Actor Vishal won the jury award for best actor for his performances in director Bala’s Avan Ivan. Actor-director Sasikumar and actress Richa Gangopadhyaya were adjudged the best actor and best actress respectively for their roles in Poraali and Mayakkam Enna in that order. As reported earlier, the Festival was held in the Norwegian capital of Oslo from 25-29 April and concluded on Sunday.

The concluding day witnessed a colorful ceremony which was preceded by the announcement and giving away of awards to Tamil film personalities under various categories. Directors Sargunam and Gaurav, actress Richa, actor Sunil, music director Sundar C. Babu, producers Geetha and Kesavan and playback singers Charulatha Mani, Srimathumita, Vijitha Suresh and Prabha Balakrishnan took part in the function on the concluding day.

Amid thunderous applause by the audiences, the awards were announced and given away.

]]> http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/norway-tamil-film-festival-2012-awards/feed/ 0 http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/rising-school-book-fees-upset-parents/ http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/rising-school-book-fees-upset-parents/#comments Mon, 30 Apr 2012 11:52:38 +0000 Senthil http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/?p=693 Tamilnadu News: From this academic year parents are worried lot with the rising price of books. Book fees for 2012-13, at PSBB Millennium School for pre-KG to class IX, range from Rs. 5,000 to Rs. 11,000, going by the rates published on an Indian parenting website. Posted by a parent, the message reads, this is looting parents. Rs. 7,850 for second standard books. Do all schools charge the same? In several private schools, the average price of textbooks and notebooks is above Rs. 2,000. At Sacred Heart Matriculation Higher Secondary School, Church Park, the fee is between Rs. 2,505 and Rs. 3,200, which is inclusive of textbooks, notebooks and stationery for classes VI to IX.

Printers and publishers blame this on the rising cost of paper and logistics that add to their costs. Besides textbooks, increasingly, private schools are asking for learning resources to enhance students understanding of a subject. For instance, a class I student going to Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Anna Nagar, has been prescribed 11 textbooks and 26 notebooks. In English, a student has a course book, a work book, a literature textbook and value education. When compared to LKG where we spent over Rs.3,000, this time it is a little less. I think it is still justified in UKG as most of them are activity books – my son had three in English alone. She adds that as it is, the note books go waste, even if they are only 60 pages each, as only half the pages are used by the end of the year. While the price of textbooks is still justified with the colorful images, elements, graphics, a vibrant layout design and the printing cost involved, a few parents wonder why notebooks are so expensive.

With schools generally revamping textbooks or trying new publishers, chances of handing over textbooks to a junior in school are also ruled out. According to publishers, there is an increase in the price of books every year. The average cost of a book ranges between Rs. 100 and Rs. 120. In most cases, the publisher supplies directly to the school or through a distributor, where margins are charged. Schools agree that there is some profit for then but argue this is necessary especially after they were asked to abide by the fee structure prescribed by the Private Schools Fee Determination Committee. Between the price we pay the publisher and the amount we charge parents, we make a margin of 30 per cent on textbooks.

]]> http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/rising-school-book-fees-upset-parents/feed/ 0 http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/bypoll-for-pudukottai-on-jun-12/ http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/bypoll-for-pudukottai-on-jun-12/#comments Wed, 25 Apr 2012 05:28:23 +0000 Senthil http://www.tamilselvi.com/kollywood-news/?p=691 Tamilnadu News: The by-election to the Pudukkottai Assembly Constituency in Tamil Nadu would be held on June 12. Tamil Nadu Chief Electoral Officer Praveen Kumar, in a release here, said the Election Commission of India today announced the poll schedule for the By-election to Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly from Pudukkottai Assembly Constituency, which fell vacant following the death of CPI MLA P Muthukumaran in a tragic road accident recently.

With the announcement of poll schedule, the model code of conduct has come into force in Pudukkottai District with immediate effect. As per the schedule, filing of nominations would commence from May 18.

The last date for filing nomination would be May 25 and the scrutiny would take place the next day.

The last date for withdrawal of candidates was May 28 and the polling would take place on June 12 from 0800 hrs to 1700 hrs.

This was part of the Information and Communication technology initiatives of his department for the year 2012-13, he told the state Assembly. Further, a SMS-based application to monitor teacher attendance has been developed and this will be integrated with the Education Management Information System (EMIS) which will have the entire database of schools, teachers, students and officials by end of 2012-13.

The (SMS) application will be activated when schools reopen on June 1, 2012. The attendance of teaching and non-teaching staff will be communicated by the Headmasters to the central server which will in turn transmit the information to all higher officials of the department. Another technological initiative, the government also proposed was a Smart Card system for school students.

From June 1, 2012 all children in government and aided schools will be provided with the Smart Card which will consist of details pertaining to the child who will be stored in a central server. This complete data of children will be very useful for providing all the facilities to the children. Among others, he proposed filling of over 20,000 teaching and non-teaching vacancies.

According Chennai Metro Rail Limited (dCMRL) officials, this is the first of four shipments arriving for the track work. Each rail segment will be about 18m long. Fastenings to be used along the tracks are being sourced from the United Kingdom and China. The very first consignment will be used in laying the stretch from Koyambedu to Vadapalani, and the rest for the depot coming up in Koyambedu. CMRL officials say they want the work from Koyambedu to St. Thomas Mount to progress swiftly as its completion will help commence trial runs by the end of 2013. Residents of the city are presently enduring traffic diversions and prolonged commutes necessitated by Metro Rail work.

The Metro Rail project, coming up at a total cost of Rs.14, 600 crore, seeks to initiate a radical shift towards public transportation by integrating other modes of public transport in the city. In that context, the CMRL initiated a multi-modal study in August 2011, and is about to finalize its report based on feedback from different government agencies who are stakeholders in this initiative.

Once put together, the report is expected to serve as a valuable document that will project Metro Rail as a public transportation system that integrates MRTS, suburban EMU service and MTC bus service. This integration ought to be not just physical. The agency envisions a system where a commuter taking the metro could find a connecting bus right at the metro station itself and possibly use the same smart card for the entire commute.

The film’s release has been pushed to June second week due to the IPL matches. With the IPL going on till May 25th, the filmmakers do not want to take a risk and have planned out a June release.

Billa 2 stars Ajith in the title role with Parvathy Omanakuttan, Bruna Abdullah, Vidyut Jamval and others in the star cast. Yuvan Shankar Raja has scored the music for this film.

She said domestic consumers consuming 100 units for two months will have to pay Rs one per unit as against Rs 1.10 announced in the revision last week. Domestic consumers consuming up to 200 units for two months will need to pay Rs 1.50 as against Rs 1.80 announced by the Tamil Nadu Electricity Regulatory Commission last week.

Similarly, domestic consumers using between 201 to 500 units will have to pay Rs two against Rs three for first 200 units and Rs three against Rs 3.50 from 201 to 500 units. Jayalalithaa’s announcement was welcomed by ruling benches amid thumping of desks even as opposition DMDK, DMK earlier staged a walkout after Speaker D Jayakumar denied permission to discuss the issue.

The government move was necessitated following public demand for a rollback of power tariff hike though the state government did not have the powers to withdraw the revision as it was announced by TNERC involving the public in the consultation process prior to the hike, she said.

Jayalalithaa maintained that financial mismanagement in the previous DMK regime had pushed the TNEB into a debt trap and this government was already taking steps to set right both the financial health of the department and implement more power generation projects. The TNERC had announced a 37 per cent hike in the power tariff to fetch an additional Rs 7,874 crore and bail out the electricity board which is in the red.

The State Government, which had been getting huge revenue through sale of liquor by state-owned TASMAC shops, also hiked the VAT for liquor to get more revenue. He said alcoholic liquor of all kinds for human consumption which were purchased, procured and brought from outside the State other than foreign liquors falling under item 3 of the second schedule of the TNVAT Act, will be taxed at the rate of 14.5 per cent at the second point of sale in the State and alcoholic liquor of all kinds for human consumption other than liquors falling under items 1 and 3 of the second schedule will be taxed at 14.5 per cent, at the third point of sale.

Mr Panneerselvam said the exemption granted from VAT on vegetable oil for the turnover up to Rs five crore per year will be withdrawn to prevent tax evasion and VAT will be levied at the rate of five per cent on sale of vegetable oil. The Finance Minister said the government proposed to rationalize tax rates on tourist taxis, maxi cabs, private service vehicles, spare stage carriers, construction equipment vehicles and other State contract carriers and to double the charges collected for advance booking of fancy numbers. He said as the State was losing huge revenue due to non-revision of guideline values after substantial increase in the market value of properties, we have decided to implement the revised guideline values with effect from April 1 this year.

Simultaneously, to give relief to the public, it was proposed to bring down the Stamp Duty on instruments of sale and other instruments from six to five per cent. The Minister also proposed to increase the present levy of infrastructure and amenities charges collected through local planning authorities by 50 per cent. On tax sops, Mr Panneerselvam said to promote environment friendly products, the rate of VAT on electrically operated two-wheelers (E-bikes) would be reduced from 14.5 to five per cent.

Keeping in mind the increasing incidence of diabetes, to reduce the price of insulin, it will be fully exempted from the present levy of five per cent VAT, adding wheat and oats would be fully exempted from the present levy of two and five per cent VAT respectively. Mr Panneerselvam said to improve the health status of women and children, the present rate of 14.5 per cent VAT on sanitary napkins and diapers would be reduced to five per cent. Feeding bottles and nipples will be fully exempted from five per cent VAT.

The present VAT of 14.5 per cent on handmade locks will be completely removed. To promote traffic and industrial safety, the present levy of five per cent VAT on helmets will be completely removed. He said to promote energy efficient devices; VAT on compact fluorescent lamps (CFL) including compact fluorescent tubes would be reduced from 14.5 to 5 per cent.