Malala Thanks For Support

Malala Yousufzai, the Pakistani schoolgirl activist who was shot in the head by the Taliban, has expressed gratitude to the people around the world who have supported her as she recovers from the traumatic attack.

"Thank you so much for the outpouring of love and support," Malala said. "I thank the people that supported me without distinguishing religion and color."

Malala has been campaigning for girls' right to education in a conservative area of Pakistan for years.

In her message, she praised girls in northwestern Pakistan "who are continuing their studies despite threats from militants."

She is now at a hospital in Britain, where she was transferred to soon after the assassination attempt in northwestern Pakistan in October. Examinations there revealed that she had suffered no major neurological damage, but she still faces a long struggle to recover from her injuries.

Malala is reading books and walking in the hospital in the city of Birmingham, according to her father, Ziauddin Yousufzai.

Her story generated a huge amount sympathy and support in Pakistan and across the globe.

The Pakistani Taliban have threatened to go after her again, but Malala appears to be undeterred from her campaigning.

"People have actually supported a cause, not an individual," she said in her message. "Let's work together to educate girls around the world."

Rework Offers For IITians

The IIT campus placements this year show many firms have wisened up to the trend of fresh recruits moving on other jobs, sometimes a few months after joining.
So, instead of higher signing bonuses and relocation expenses, companies are giving stock options to the extent of close to 100% of the base salary.
Facebook , a social networking company, has offered students a base salary of $100,000, a bonus, a relocation bonus of $20,000 and stock options of $120,000 if they stick on for two years. Similarly, Twitter, Google, Amazon and American Express have beefed up their compensation packages by tucking in stock options.
An IIT-Bombay student, who got placed on day one of the placement, said, claimed that a couple of social media networks have offered stock options to students.
"Though the institute mainly presents us with the base salary, A couple of companies in the social networking sector have offered stock options of a lump sum amount and it is looking attractive."
The scene at IIT-Kanpur is also the same. Some of the companies, mainly start-ups, have offered stock options to students as their package.
Shadab Mohammed, a member of the core team for placements at IIT-Kanpur, said, "Some of the companies have offered stock options at our campus too. The reasons vary from retention of talent to an incentive to motivate young recruits and also to give them a sense of responsibility." Many start-ups like Flipkart are offering stock options, he said.
Vice-president on the placement committee at IIT-Kharagpur (IIT-Kgp) Rinshul Chandra said, that over time, companies offering stock options to fresh graduates of the IITs have indeed increased in count. The reasons for the change are many: start-up companies wanting to spruce up their offer, a bad economy that is forcing the way hiring is done and organisations wanting to cut down attrition.
"The number of firms offering stock options, though about 10% of the total, has increased over the years. It is a lot more this year as compared to last year."IIT-Kgp placed 188 students on day one and many of them are today shareholders.Former placement chairman Ravi Sinha who described the stock options as "golden handcuffs" said there was one major trend that had pushed more employers to offer stock options. "IITs have been able to attract globally leading companies and those in the highly competitive sector offer stocks to attract talent," he said. However, Avijit Chatterjee, the professor in-charge for placements at IIT-B, said, "We usually give students the base figure or the assured amount. We do not get into the variables and mention only the taxable amount."
The deputy registrar of placements at IIT-Madras said, too, echoed his views. "We offer students only the taxable amount. Some companies , however, have offered retention bonuses to students."
Samsung US/Korea has made the highest offer at IIT-Madras of $1,50,000 to four students.
"They offered six posts; only four students have gone for it," added the registrar. At the end of the first two days of placements on the Powai campus, which started on Saturday, around 260 offers had already been made. A total of 64 firms have already visited the campus in the last two days. Companies that visited the Powai campus on Monday include: Intel, Morgan Stanley, Microsoft, Gulf Talent, Analog Device, PayPal, Broadcom, Morgan Stanley (IT), Alshaya, Cisco Systems, Lucy, Eaton Technologies, Intel, JP Morgan Chase, Ariste Networks, Flipkart, Edelweiss, Britannia, Ibibo, Ernst and Young."

Indian Govt Makes Easy of Visa For Tourists

The government has eased restrictions on tourist visas which had mandated a two-month gap between consecutive visits by foreign nationals.

However, nationals of Afghanistan, China, Iran, Pakistan, Iraq, Sudan, Bangladesh, foreigners of Pakistani and Bangladeshi origin and "stateless persons" will continue to come under the 60-day gap rule. The move is likely to breathe fresh life into the tourism industry and comes just ahead of the peak tourist season. India's share of international tourist arrivals in 2011 was a mere 0.64%.

Fall in tourist inflow led to govt rethink

The tourist visa restriction, which was relaxed on Monday, was introduced in November 2009 in the aftermath of the Mumbai terror attacks when it was found that Pakistani-American David Coleman Headley had succeeded in breaching security norms to visit India several times over a period of 3-4 years.

A decision to review the visa restrictions was taken by the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) in January 2012 after concerns were raised by the tourism ministry that the negative perception following the move had affected flow of tourists to India.

The PMO had asked the ministries of home and external affairs to review the restrictions, including the possibility of bringing in more countries under the visa-on-arrival scheme and improving conditions at major airports.

The order dated November 23 issued by the ministry of home affairs said, "The provision relating to the two-month gap between two visits of a foreign national to India on a tourist visa has been reviewed by the government. It has now been decided... to lift the restriction of two-month gap on re-entry of foreign nationals coming to India.''

According to latest data, foreign tourist arrivals this year till October showed a marginal increase of 6.2% compared to last year. Tourist arrivals till October were 52.19 lakh.

Foreign exchange earnings from January 2012 to October 2012 were Rs 74,215 crore with a growth of 22.1% over last year when earnings were Rs 60,780 crore. Industry watchers are hoping that lifting of the 60-day restriction will encourage foreign tourists to visit India and use it as a hub while visiting southeast Asia and neighbouring countries.

Tunnel Collapse In Japan

The mangled wrecks of cars being carried out of Japan's Sasago Tunnel suggest there was little motorists could do to escape the sudden collapse of the ceiling above them.

A day after the disaster, one main theory has emerged as to what caused the collapse, which killed nine people who were trapped in their cars by rubble or the flames that broke out shortly after.

At a press briefing on Monday, the executive officer of the tunnel's operator said it appeared that some "anchor bolts" used to secure concrete slabs to the tunnel ceiling were missing.

"There were parts of concrete (slabs) where bolts had fallen off," Ryoichi Yoshizawa said, according to a spokesman for Central Japan Expressway Company or NEXCO-Central.

"The aging of the bolts or the concrete slabs could be a potential cause (of the collapse)," Yoshizawa said. He did not say how many bolts were found to be missing or how they came to be loose.

Yoshizawa added that while regular checks had been performed on the tunnel, they were visual checks and there was no physical testing.

Emergency inspections have been ordered on 49 tunnels across the country with the same ceiling structure, according to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism.

There are 1,575 highways tunnels in Japan and around a quarter of those are more than 30 years old, including the Sasago Tunnel which opened in 1977, the ministry said.

The tunnel's ceiling gave way on Sunday morning at around 8 a.m. local time. Witnesses recalled the horror of smoke filling up the tunnel as huge concrete slabs rained down on traffic below. Japanese highway police said Monday the section of concrete that fell was 110 meters (360 feet) long.

Charred bodies were pulled from the debris, including five from a single station wagon. Three others were in a burned vehicle, according to a police spokesperson, while another body was found in a truck.

"It was terrifying. I don't think I could ever drive through the tunnel again," one shaken survivor told TV Asahi, as black and white video released by NEXCO showed rescue workers in flashlight-topped helmets stepping over rubble.

The aging of the bolts or the concrete slabs could be a potential cause (of the collapse)
Ryoichi Yoshizawa, NEXCO-Central

The tunnel has been closed for the removal of debris and while experts ascertain the risk of a secondary accident. NEXCO says it's unsure how long the process could take.

Speaking to reporters at the scene, Motohiro Takamisawa, the chief of NEXCO's Otsuki Safety Center, also referred to a potential problem with the bolts securing the tunnel's ceiling slabs.

"At this moment we're presuming that the top anchor bolts have come loose," he was reported as saying. Takamizawa added that the bolts hadn't been changed since the tunnel first opened in the late 1970s. However, a company spokesman told CNN that Takamizawa's comments should not be interpreted as the company's official statement and that it could not confirm whether that was the case.

One expert told Asahi TV said that it's possible that years of traffic vibrations had contributed to the tunnel's collapse.

"Over the course of 35 years, all the shaking caused by cars has probably caused the bolts and nuts in the tunnel to loosen. As a result they fell off," said Hiroshi Chikahisa, head of the Geosystem Engineering Institute at Yamaguchi University.

Immediately after the disaster, a company spokesman said the Sasago Tunnel, located about 80 kilometers (50 miles) west of Tokyo, was subject to annual inspections with more detailed checks every five years. It had been checked in the last couple of months.

At the company's Monday briefing, a NEXCO spokesman said, "There was no record that we have conducted the tapping inspection at top of the ceiling in the tunnel."

He was referring to a method used to identify potential damage within concrete structures that was mentioned in the company's 2011 annual report.

It says, "although hammer tapping test is commonly carried out to investigate concrete structures, it takes enormous time and cost to conduct the test on all concrete structures we have."

Instead, it says the company inspects concrete structures using infrared cameras, an inspection technology which measures the difference in temperature between "sound conditions and damaged areas" to detect potential weak points. There as no explicit reference to testing carried out on tunnels.

The Sasago Tunnel runs for 4.7 kilometers along a stretch of the Chuo Expressway which runs for 367 kilometers, through a mountainous region, connecting Tokyo with the Nagoya in the Chubu region of Japan.

Its operator, NEXCO-Central is one of three companies started in 1995 after the privatization of Japan's Highway Public Corporation. NEXCO-Central manages more than 1,700 kilometers of expressways in Tokyo and the Chubu, Hokuriku and Kinki regions, used by almost 1.9 million cars on any given day.

Precaution For Black Day

As a precautionary measure, prohibitory orders have been imposed in the city ahead of the Babri Masjid demolition anniversary.

"Reliable information has been placed before me that certain groups are trying to create disturbances on December 6 on the anniversary of demolition of the disputed structure at Ayodhya," Hyderabad police commissioner Anurag Sharma said in an official release issued on Monday.

With a view to maintain public order, police have imposed prohibitory orders under section144 CrPC from 6 am on December 5 to 6 am on December 8, banning every kind of procession, dharna, rally or public meetings.

Babu Blames YSR Cabinet For GO's

HYDERABAD: While all the six ministers who were directed by the Supreme Court in the Y S Jaganmohan Reddy assets case maintained that there was no wrongdoing on their part in issuing the controversial 26 GOs that allegedly enriched the Jagan firms, the 8 IAS officers notified by the apex court said that they issued the GOs only after they were cleared by the cabinet. They filed separate affidavits in the apex court on Monday to this effect.

The ministers in their affidavits said that the decisions of persons like Nimmagadda Prasad to buy Sandur Power shares or entities like India Cements buying shares in Jagan's Bharati Cements are commercial decisions and that they have got nothing to do with such deals. The apex court had sought the replies of the 6 ministers and 8 IAS officers following a petition by a Nellore advocate Sudhakar Reddy.

Srilakshmi seeks time to file affidavit

The ministers who were served the notices are Kanna Lakshminarayana , Mopidevi Venkata Ramana, Sabita Indra Reddy, Ponnala Lakshmaiah, J Geetha Reddy and Dharmana Prasada Rao.
The IAS officers who were given notices include CVSK Sarma, SV Prasad, Y Srilakshmi, B Sam Bob, K Ratna Prabha, Adityanath Das, M Samuel and Manmohan Singh. While CVSK Sarma and Ratna Prabha had filed their affidavits earlier, five officials filed their affidavits on Monday.

"Stating that such exemptions would adversely affect the revenue of the state, I had even recorded my objections to the same," she said in her affidavit. However,the matter was referred to the state cabinet which ultimately granted the exemptions and this resulted in the issuance of GO Ms No 1435 on December 4, 2008, Ratna Prabha said.

The ministers reportedly maintained in their affidavits that theirs was a collective responsibility of the cabinet and that all the decisions were taken in pursuit of their goal to take the state forward industrially.

The IAS officers maintained that the contention of the petitioner that the IAS officers are being spared by the CBI was negated due to the arrest of Srilakshmi and BP Acharya and the naming of Samuel, Manmohan Singh and others as accused in the Vanpic case, and sought the dismissal of the petition.

Lines Man dies after an attack by teenage players

A volunteer Dutch soccer official died on Monday after being beaten up by teenage players following a match the previous day.Richard Nieuwenhuizen was pronounced dead at 5.30 p.m. local time in the hospital of Nieuwegein, according to his club Buitenboys.

The 41-year-old had been a linesman in an amateur game between Buitenboys and Amsterdam-based Nieuwe Sloten in the city of Almere.He was attacked after the match by three Nieuwe Sloten players, who were arrested at their homes in Amsterdam on Sunday according to the Dutch News website.

"The KNVB is deeply shocked ... After intervention of the police and the arrival of an ambulance, he was in critical condition and transported to a hospital. There he died Monday afternoon," reported the website of the Royal Dutch Football Association (KNVB). 

Its director of amateur football, Anton Binnenmars, added: "Let me, on behalf of the entire KNVB and all its members, offer my sympathy to the families and friends of the victim. It is outrageous that someone enjoying a hobby can be victim of such aggression."

Nieuwe Sloten issued a statement on its website saying the club would help with the police investigation, and that anyone involved in the attack would be expelled."Violence should not be on the football fields. And certainly not against referees, linesmen and all those others who volunteer each year to over a million amateur footballers. We must do everything possible to eliminate these excesses," it said.