Tag: mumbai

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2 dead, five injured as car takes wrong turn at Bandra

The Honda Accord missed a turn and rammed into five other vehicles, killing two. Driver of the car was arrested.

A horrifying accident took place at Bandra’s Linking Road near the famed Amarsons store this morning, when a Honda Accord reportedly took a wrong turn after missing a No Entry sign. The accident caused a smashup of at least three cars in all, apart from an autorickshaw and a bike.

Two people were pronounced dead, while five others suffered serious injuries and were being treated at the Bandra-based Bhabha Hospital. One woman was being treated at Lilavati Hospital.

The errant car is said to belong to a foreigner who was in the car at the time of the accident. The driver of the car has also been admitted to hospital after being arrested for rash and negligent driving.

More details are awaited.

(Picture courtesy ibnlive.com)

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Undetected eye problems taking toll on city’s children

A field study shows that 10% of Mumbai students have undetected refractive errors. Lack of awareness is a major problem.

As many as 20 per cent school going children in Mumbai and Thane suffer from refractive errors and amblyopia, as per a field study (titled ‘Children’s Refractive Error and Eye Ailment Management, CREAM) conducted by Aditya Jyot Foundation for Twinkling Little Eyes (AJFTLE).

“Over 25 per cent of the country’s population is of school-going age (six to 14 years). Refractive errors and amblyopia (lazy eye disease) are the commonest and most serious eye diseases (153 million patients as estimated by WHO, 2006) in this age group. It affects nearly seven to 12 per cent children in the community. It is more common in urban areas and in our pilot study on 15,000 children in the schools of Thane and Mumbai, we found a prevalence rate of 20 per cent,” says their study report.

Ironically, the Foundation adds, 10 per cent of these are either not recognised or not appropriately treated. “The early detection and treatment of these eye diseases can very effectively prevent the visual impairment. The diagnosis of both these conditions is simple and the results of the treatment are dramatic.

As many as 10 per cent of the children in the schools of Mumbai were found to have uncorrected refractive errors. This is because the children usually do not complain due to lack of recognition of their poor vision and lack of awareness amongst the parents or school teachers, and a lack of a regular vision screening strategy. This is why only a handful of cases are detected at an early stage where appropriate treatment is helpful. The affordability of the spectacles is also an issue for socio-economically deprived class of students.”

The AJFTLE recently partnered with the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) to undertake awareness building and eye screening camps for underprivileged children mainly in rural and urban slum areas for prevention of avoidable blindness, and wants many more partners to work with them on the project.

Sushil Muhnot, CMD of SIDBI, said, “As part of our CSR initiative, we are associating with Aditya Jyot Foundation for Twinkling Eyes, which is planning to work for slum children and parents in Mumbai and Maharashtra and create awareness about avoidable blindness. Today, India needs an affordable healthcare industry model. There are three growth models—primary, affordable and luxury – and in the eye care industry and finance from institutions can flow into the industry provided there is a business model with an appropriate revenue stream. The proposed Government plan to impose two per cent compulsory spending on CSR will make it easy for NGOs and Foundations to augment financial resources for social services.”

(Picture courtesy omlog.org. Image used for representational purpose only)

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Maken wants to safeguard home buyers’ rights

Union Minister says that proposed real estate regulatory bill would give home buyers a greater say in the purchasing process.

Home buyers may soon get a bigger say while buying a house, as per the provisions of the proposed Real Estate Regulatory Authority Bill, which is to be tabled during the forthcoming Union Budget. Ajay Maken, Union Minister for Housing and Poverty Alleviation at the ongoing International Conference in Mumbai on ‘Governance of Megacity Regions’ organised by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and Center for Policy Research (CPR), said that the Bill would aim to safeguard the interests of customers.

Maken said, “The proposed Bill will greatly reduce the prevailing rampant corruption in the real estate and housing sector. Not only will it protect the rights of home buyers, but it will also bring in greater transparency. Developers will be restricted from channelising funds collected from customer for one project to another one, which will provide better security to the home buyers’ investments. Even the property agreement documents, which are prepared and executed by the developers, will not remain one-sided, thereby not favouring the developer alone.”

The Union Minister is contemplating providing ‘Infrastructure sector’ status to the affordable housing segment, which will enable banks to come forward to providing loans to the urban poor, and provide an unprecedented boost in this segment. Banks will be able to provide long-term loans and also with the change in industry status, the ratio of Non-Performing Asset (NPA) from this category will reduce. “The poorer section will receive easy financing options augmenting the affordable housing market and in totality giving a boost to the real estate industry,” he said.

On his suggestion to the Government of Maharashtra for raising the Floor Space Index (FSI) policy, Maken said, “We had a deliberation with the State Government and it has shown interest in considering this option for improving the living standards of poor and hutments in the urban establishments.” Another recommendation he has made it to have mega plans for inclusive development and community participation for Mumbai city’s metropolitan region, as one of the solutions to heightening urban evolution challenges.

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Event

Kashmiri MBA students create mock tourism company

CII event counselled Kashmiri MBA students on tourism and its career opportunities, at an event held in the city yesterday.

Today, the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) held the event ‘Udaan’ in association with Godrej, to address MBA students from Kashmir. The subject of the seminar was ‘Tourism, its scope and the career opportunities if offers’. This is an annual six-week programme.

The session was presided over by co-founder and director of Ecomantra, Ravi Goel. He was among 12 other speakers chosen to address the students, and he has taken the last three batches of ‘Udaan’. This particular batch had 36 MBA students (21 boys and 15 girls) from two top universities in Kashmir.

“It has been a very engaging two-hour session with the students. It was a pleasure sharing ideas with such bright students from Kashmir; I have always found them very committed and sincere. We are very impressed by Udaan’s initiative in creating a real learning experience for these students. (As part of the interaction), I made the new batch start a tourism company from scratch. Some of them came up with very good ideas and I was surprised by the quality of concepts they had. These kids were very, very good,” Ravi said later.

The interactive session required the students to create a tourism business plan based on concepts of demand and supply, dynamic pricing, etc. Earlier sessions had dealt with tourism and how Kashmir can do things differently, the idea of experiential tourism as against mainstream tourism, among others.

Udaan was a programme initiated to integrate Kashmir and its youth in the mainstream economy of India. It was conceptualised to address unemployment in Jammu and Kashmir and was launched by Union Home Minister P Chidambaram in 2010.

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What the BMC’s planned for the city this year

Surplus budget announces ‘Banner Free Mumbai’ and a 24/7 helpline for the mentally distressed, among a slew of other things.
by The Editors | editor@themetrognome.in

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has several designs on the city this year, and it announced its plans for Mumbai through its Budget 2013-2014 today at the BMC headquarters. BMC chief Sitaram Kunte presented the surplus Rs 27,578 crore budget; this is the highest municipal corporation budget in the country.

Budget 2013-2014 exceeds the previous budget by over Rs 1 crore.

The following are some of the announcements for this fiscal year:

– Rs 6,443.76 crore has been assigned for water supply and drainage works.

– Rs 45 crore has been proposed for the widening and cleaning of Mithi and other rivers.

– Road concretisation and building of new flyovers will get Rs 2,650.74 crore.

– On the health front, the BMC Commissioner announced such ambitious measures as the setting up of a 24/7 helpline for the mentally distressed, a Rs 20 crore corpus for a state of the art diagnostics facility at KEM Hospital, and the setting up of a University of Health Sciences, among other things.

– 26 new fire brigade stations will be set up in the next five years. The Fire Brigade’s equipment is also to be upgraded.

– It is proposed to set up four new water tunnels on the Malabar Hill-Cross Maidan, Powai-Vairavli Maidan, Maroshi-Ruparel via Vakola and Gundavli-Bhandup routes. This will cost Rs 1,069 crore. Two new water tunnels are also proposed from Chembur to Trombay and Chembur to Wadala.

– Rs 82.11 crore to be set aside for beautification and development of gardens.

– The BMC proposes to set up a permanent laser show display at Powai Lake.

– An entertainment and activity centre for senior citizens has been proposed.

– The BMC chief has announced a ‘Banner free Mumbai’ and a continuation of the zero garbage policy for the city. Instead, the BMC is mulling the idea of designated zones for hoardings and banners.

(Picture courtesy scamsleak.blogspot.com)

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Event

Maharashtra NCC cadets win PM’s banner for 16th time

They won for the fourth consecutive year at the Republic Day camp in Delhi recently; State Governor feted the cadets.

The Maharashtra Contingent of the National Cadet Corps (NCC) won the prestigious Prime Minister’s Banner for the fourth consecutive year at the Republic Day camp held in New Delhi recently. This win is the 16th for the Maharashtra NCC, a record on its own.

On Saturday, State Governor K Sankaranarayanan feted the victorious Corps at his official residence in Mumbai, the Raj Bhavan. Speaking on the occasion, the Governor congratulated the National Cadet Corps for shaping the character of the youth by inculcating in them discipline, patriotism and an urge for social service. He expressed the hope that the NCC would mould the character of several more youth in the country.

Maj General S Sengupta, Additional Director General of Maharashtra NCC, informed the gathering that the strength of the Maharashtra NCC is being increased from 1 lakh to 1.20 lakh cadets this year onwards. He also added that Maharashtra NCC has bagged the Champion Directorate Trophy for the 16th time during the last 22 years.

 (Picture courtesy Raj Bhavan, Mumbai)

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