Out of the dark ages?

India’s most comprehensive National Family Health Survey-III, has revealed that as many as 40 per cent of women reported being beaten by their husbands; and worse, around 54% justified on one ground or the other. G C Chaturvedi, director, National Rural Health Mission, says, “In India, the worst problem we face is that victims in almost all states don’t feel victimised, both in case of dowry or spousal violence. They feel being beaten up or tortured by their husband is all right. They have been groomed to believe that.’’

Statewise state

Meanwhile, NFHS-III has made some other shocking observations. While 1 in 10 have experienced sexual violence, 1 in 6 experienced emotional violence by their husbands. Bihar has been found to be the worst state with abuse rate as high as 59%. About 63% of these incidents of violence on women were in urban families. Bihar was followed by Rajasthan (46.3%), Madhya Pradesh (45.8%), Manipur (43.9%), Uttar Pradesh (42.4%), Tamil Nadu (41.9%) and West Bengal (40.3%). Compared to this, some states reported low incidence of violence against married women. While the figure stood at 6% in Himachal Pradesh, 12.6% was reported from Jammu and Kashmir, 16.3% in Delhi, 16.4% in Kerala, 16.5% in Sikkim and 16.8% in Goa.

Education, Class and Caste...?

Low levels of education plays a considerable role in this horrifying trend. Over 47% women who suffered spousal violence had no education. The number stood at 16% for women who studied till standards X or XII. Women belonging to SC/ST communities were the worst affected with one in three women experiencing domestic violence. Buddhist women reported the highest level of violence (41%) followed by Muslim and Hindu women (34-35%) and Sikh and Christian women (26-28%). Women from the Jain community reported the lowest level of violence (13%).

Domesticated violence... not really!

Among all the women who faced spousal violence, 36% reported cuts, 9% dislocations and 2% severe burns. The worst violence was faced by women aged 25-29 years (24%).

Interestingly, most of the women assaulted by their husbands were less than two years into their marriage. According to the figures, 62% experienced physical or sexual violence within the first two years of marriage while 32% experienced violence in the first five years. Slapping was the most common act of physical violence by husbands. More than 34% women said their husbands slapped them while 15% said their husbands pulled their hair or twisted their arm. Around 14% of the women had things thrown at them.

Source: Times of India, Friday, 12th of October 2007.

On His Blindness

When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide
Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest he returning chide,
"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies: "God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts: who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed
And post o'er land and ocean without rest:
They also serve who only stand and wait."

-- John Milton

Wildlife photography in India

Until recently, wildlife photography had few takers in India. Hardly anyone wanted to shoot in the wilds and there were no endorsements or platforms for such photographs. But in the past few years, as the issues related to wildlife conservation have been raised off and on thanks to ‘Sariska’ and ‘Ranthambhor’ (also Salman Khan and Nawab Pataudi), awareness about them has increased. More people are now interested in wildlife and its conservation when compared to the last decade. Celebrities’ participation and endorsement is also the reason for this new attention. Unfortunately, all this hoopla has hardly done anything to protect the poor creatures from selfish poachers and negligent caretakers, be at the sanctuary or at the zoo. Authorities are as indifferent as ever and organizations like PETA are almost unimpressive in India. But, this new interest in wildlife has brought about good opportunities for those who love to shoot in woods, but with the camera. Also, with a considerable drop in prices of digital cameras, more and more people are becoming interested in nature photography. A number of websites have come up, showcasing India’s wildlife treasures. Some of these are indeed a treat for the eyes:

http://www.photosafariindia.com/
http://www.indianwildlifephotos.com/default.asp
http://www.indianwildlifeimages.com/product.php
http://www.indianaturewatch.net/
http://www.babinets.com/authors/india.html

If you too are interested in wildlife photography, this website can prove to be of help. It provides some useful information on photogenic destinations in India: http://www.wildphototoursindia.com/default.htm .

What's common among them?

This month, the World Conservation Union (IUCN) released the Red List of Threatened Species for 2007. The western lowland gorilla, the freshwater dolphin and the Egyptian vulture are some of the latest additions to the list of endangered animals. Since 2006, the annual assessment of the planet's imperiled wildlife has grown by more than a thousand species and now totals 41,415. Many great apes end up on the list, as their habitat is continually under threat from human activities. The Western lowland gorilla populations in central Africa have collapsed due to the commercial bushmeat trade and the Ebola virus; and in Indonesia, orangutans are critically endangered because of forest logging and clearing land for palm oil plantations.

The 'baiji', or Chinese river dolphin— deemed "functionally extinct" by a team of scientists in December 2006—has been downgraded from "endangered" to "critically endangered (possibly extinct)" on the IUCN's 2007 Red List. Populations of the light blue-gray animal, which lives in China's polluted Yangtze River, have plummeted over the last 30 years. A possible sighting in August 2007 is currently being investigated by Chinese scientists, but even if one or two dolphins are found, the baiji is almost certainly doomed. “Freshwater dolphins are very vulnerable, because rivers tend to be heavily used by humans and there is nowhere else for the dolphins to go,” says Caroline Pollock, a Red List program officer.

The Egyptian vulture, a new addition to IUCN's 2007 Red List, has declined along with many other vulture species. Five species of vulture, including the Egyptian, have been reclassified to a higher threat level since 2006. Asian vultures have declined rapidly over the last eight years due to the use of a livestock drug called diclofenac. African vultures are struggling due to habitat loss, a lack of food, and collisions with power lines. The scavengers are also being killed by insecticide-laden carcasses, which have been deliberately baited to poison livestock predators such as hyenas.

Mexico's Santa Catalina Island rattlesnake has been classified as critically endangered on the 2007 IUCN Red List. The snake, found on just one island, sports highly desirable patterned skin that has made it a collector's item for hunters. New reptile surveys are revealing the fragile nature of many reptile populations. For instance, a major survey of North American reptiles has bumped up the region's Red List reptile species to a total of 738. The main culprit behind their decline is habitat loss due to expanding cities.“Unlike birds and mammals, we haven't assessed all the reptiles on the planet,” Pollock added.

The Banggai cardinal fish's popularity as a pet for the home aquarium has landed it on the 2007 IUCN Red List. In the wild, the striped fish is only found in the Banggai Archipelago off Indonesia. Human pressures such as the aquarium trade are the main reason for the fish's decline, with habitat loss and climate change also posing major threats. Fish stocks are in free-fall all over the world, both from overfishing and the aquarium trade. Scientists estimate current extinction rates are at least a hundred to a thousand times higher than natural rates.

Reptiles such as the gharial are becoming more prominent on the IUCN's Red List each year. Despite its fearsome appearance and lengths of up to 19 feet (6 meters), the Indian gharial is not a man-eater and prefers to eat fish. Its long, thin snout, which makes it easily distinguishable from a crocodile, also allows it to quickly capture fish. Habitat loss and poaching is driving this animal toward extinction.

For the first time, corals are added to the Red List. A recent scientific survey on the Galápagos Archipelago has added ten corals to the list, including the Floreana coral. In the 1980s, frequent El Niño weather patterns—which made ocean temperatures fluctuate—likely led to the poor state of the Galápagos corals. Some scientists worry that global warming may make El Niño events more regular and prevent corals from recovering. Until recently, scientists had not properly assessed the health of the world's tropical corals. Coral reefs in the Indian and Pacific Ocean, for example, are vanishing faster than rain forests and scientists estimate that human activities such as pollution, global warming and sedimentation could kill 30 percent of reefs in the next three decades.


Source: The National Geographic

Sad Tigger!!

The tiger in India and all around the world is becoming extinct, especially due to the selfish and self-centered policies of some so called top world governments, like China & the US, UK etc. Chinese medicines, mostly based upon animal bones, are in fact no medications, but a misleading mixture of herbal Ayurvedic mixtures,

stolen from age old Indian Ayurvedic scriptures, and animal flesh pieces & bones.Its the herbal part of the mix that makes the patient feel well after consuming them, as the other biological part of the mix is neutral.

Wake Up!!

Have you fallen asleep?

Rise,O rise,O striver!

promises you;ve to keep..

by you pass

when you were down

many up the hill you want

you've competants

die hard contestants

and time so fast to creep!

Walks down the lonely road

of life, so hard and wrought

even a beggar

who has to bear

upon what others have got.

Walks along ,the similar roads

a filthy turtle small

who has nothing

but a nutshell as all

and speed,ever so smaller

but hopes held high

it walks along

and wins above the taller!

So,dont you watch

wait for none

and think before you speak

and in the dusk

sure,you will find

plenty joys to reap.

-Himadri

I am Nobody.

"I am nothing special; of this I am sure. I am a common man with common thoughts, and I've led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten, but I've loved another with all my heart and soul, and to me, this has always been enough." ~ Nicholas Sparks from The Notebook.

I am Nobody.

I am a common man

and have had a common life

have had a little house

two children

have had a loving wife.

I am a common man

have had no meticulous thoughts

have had cup of tea each evening

not even dreamt of a rich wine glass.

I am a common man

no special have had ever treats

I am a common man

no knighthood, no wisely traits.

I am a common man

and have died now

no tombs will be there, raised

no stones at squares.

But I know somehow

that He is there

watching me

and simplicity He has praised.

-Himadri.

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

The title of this blog is taken from a classical work by Robert Frost, the oft-quoted American poet. Frost often wrote about the rural life of New England. He was very popular and won four Pulitzer prizes during his lifetime. This poem was written in 1922 and published in 1923 in his New Hampshire volume.

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there's some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Did you know?

Black mambas use their incredible speed to escape threats, not to hunt prey. They get their name not from their skin color, which tends to be olive to gray, but rather from the blue-black color of the inside of their mouth, which they display when threatened.

BLACK MAMBA

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Order: Squamata
Suborder: Serpentes
Family: Elapidae
Genus: Dendroaspis
Species: Polylepis

Black mambas are fast, nervous, lethally venomous, and when threatened, highly aggressive. They have been blamed for numerous human deaths, and African myths exaggerate their capabilities to legendary proportions. For these reasons, the black mamba is widely considered the world’s deadliest snake.
Black mambas live in the savannas and rocky hills of southern and eastern Africa. They are Africa’s longest venomous snake, reaching up to 14 feet (4.5 meters) in length, although 8.2 feet (2.5 meters) is more the average. They are also among the fastest snakes in the world, slithering at speeds of up to 12.5 miles per hour (20 kilometers per hour).
Black mambas are shy and will almost always seek to escape when confronted. However, when cornered, these snakes will raise their heads, sometimes with a third of their body off the ground, spread their cobra-like neck-flap, open their black mouths and hiss. If an attacker persists, the mamba will strike not once, but repeatedly, injecting large amounts of potent neuro- and cardiotoxin with each strike. Before the advent of black mamba antivenin, a bite from this fearsome serpent was 100 percent fatal, usually within about 20 minutes. Unfortunately, antivenin is still not widely available in the rural parts of the mamba’s range, and mamba-related deaths remain frequent.
The black mamba has no special conservation status. However, encroachment on its territory is not only putting pressure on the species but contributes to more potentially dangerous human contact with these snakes.

All for love ...

Edward VIII abdicated throne for marrying the woman of his choice (click to enlarge and read)

I am safe :)

Shading her eye with an ear, an elephant rests lying down, a sign that she feels safe. Once called the Valley of Elephants, Luangwa suffered a poaching onslaught during the 1970s and '80s, when nearly 100,000 animals were killed. Today they number perhaps 10,000 and are generally holding their own. In a few game management areas outside the parks, trophy hunting resumed in 2005, raising fears that the last few mature bulls in the valley could be shot.

Source: The National Geographic (Photograph by Frans Lanting).

Nature's art or ...

Image: The underside of a skate shimmers off the coast of Spain in the Mediterranean Sea. Related to rays, skates look similar but don’t have the ray’s barbed tail and are harmless to humans.

SOURCE : Kaleidoscopic Cousin, From Visions of Earth, National Geographic, May 2007.

Indian music

There is a parable attributed to the Buddha: A group of blind men are led to an elephant, each to a different part of the animal's body, and asked to describe what they feel. One feels the head; the next the ears; another, a tusk; the next, a foot; another, the tail, and so on. Each is told that the part to which he has access is the elephant, and so each man insists that he knows what an elephant is, when he can't see the entire animal.

So it goes with Indian music: Hearing any one of the dozens upon dozens of styles of popular, classical or folk music from India won't give you a full picture of Indian music. Each genre has its own history, evolution and performance style, and the music you hear in, for example, the temple dance tradition of the far eastern state of Orissa doesn't sound much at all like what you might hear a Rajasthani brass band play for a wedding in the northwest. Similarly, even the two main branches of classical music, Hindustani (North Indian) and Carnatic (South Indian) music are distinctly different entities, though both at their core are built on the twin principles of raga/ragam (melody) and tala/talam (rhythm).

And of course those descriptions don't even begin to broach the impact that filmi (movie) music has as the day-to-day soundtrack for well over a billion lives, the subcontinent's immensely rich and diverse folk music traditions.

When many European and North American world music fans think of Indian music, however, their thoughts most likely turn immediately to the work of artists like Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan and their students, who have done so much to popularize the sounds of India in the West. However, these artists' main tradition is only one current's worth of music—in fact, Shankar and Khan come from the same gharana (school) of playing, and learned from the same teacher. To this day, it's far easier in North America to find recordings and attend concerts of Hindustani classical music in mainstream outlets and venues than it is for any other Indian style, unless you venture into local "ethnic" community haunts. That is slowly changing, however. Indian music is so rich and diverse that once you are drawn in and get acclimated, you find endless pleasure...

New dinosaur species found in India

A new species of dinosaur is announced by Indian and American scientists: a 30-foot (9-meter), horned carnivore that hunted other dinosaurs 65 million years ago. A reconstruction of the dinosaur's skull (see photo ) may shed light on how the continents drifted into their present positions and what might have caused the extinction of the dinosaurs.
When paleontologists Paul Sereno and Jeff Wilson arrived in India in 2001 to study a mixed collection of dinosaur bones gathered by Indian scientists 18 years earlier, they found the bones spread out on an office floor. Sifting through the collection, they separated out the bones of a theropod, or meat-eating dinosaur. When they found the center part of a skull, they recognized a horn resembling those of dinosaurs found in Madagascar. Their search continued, yielding a left hip, then a right hip, then a sacrum. Sereno and Wilson consulted detailed, hand-drawn maps drafted by their Indian counterparts and discovered the bones had been buried next to each other, as if they had been connected.
"There was a Eureka! moment when we realized we had a partial skeleton of an undiscovered species," said Sereno, a paleontology professor at the University of Chicago and a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence.


65-Million-Year-Old Bones :
The bones were collected in 1983 by Suresh Srivastava of the Geological Survey of India (GSI) and Ashok Sahni, a paleontologist at Punjab University, during a search for dinosaur eggs and nests. Srivastava drew a detailed map to document the position of the fossil bones as they lay in the field. The scientists then stored the 65-million-year-old bones at a GSI office, where they stayed until Sereno and Wilson arrived. Working with Indian experts, Wilson and Sereno reconstructed the skull of the new species, a stocky, 30-foot-long (9-meter-long) carnivore named Rajasaurus narmadensis, which means "regal dinosaur from the Narmada," the river region in western India where the bones were found. The project was supported in part by the National Geographic Society.
"We knew of fragments and bones [in India]," said Sereno, who has discovered new dinosaur species on five continents. "But this skull reconstruction offers the first glimpse into the lost world of the Indian dinosaur."
"We know that there were carnivorous and herbivorous dinosaurs in India through individual bones, but we really don't know just how they looked because no two bones can be reliably said to belong to one individual," said Wilson, who is of the University of Michigan. "Rajasaurus is important because it represents a partial skeleton and preserves many details that clue us into its evolutionary relationships."
The reconstructed skull is missing some parts, but it has the most important pieces: the jaws and the brain case. Between 25 and 30 feet (7.6 and 9 meters) long, the Rajasaurus was heavy and strong, and walked on two legs.
"There are several anatomical details that make Rajasaurus a new species," said Wilson. "Perhaps the most striking is the horn it bears on its head. The horn was probably rather subtle. It may have been low and rounded."


A Carnivorous Family :
The carnivorous Rajasaurus, which lived in the Cretaceous Period at the end of the dinosaur age, preyed on long-necked titanosaur sauropods, herbivorous dinosaurs that also roamed the Narmada region. Bones from both dinosaurs were found together.
Indian paleontologists recently found coprolites (fossilized dung) that provide additional clues to the diet of those titanosaurs.
"Large theropod eggs have also been described by our group from the area where the skeleton of Rajasaurus has been recovered, but it's difficult to relate the theropod eggs specifically to Rajasaurus," said Sahni.
The scientists believe the Rajasaurus is related to a family of large carnivorous dinosaurs, most of which had horns, that roamed the southern hemisphere land masses of present Madagascar, Africa, and South America.
"People don't realize dinosaurs are the only large-bodied animal that lived, evolved, and died at a time when all continents were united," said Sereno.

The Continental Drift :
The Rajasaurus was likely like its contemporary, Tyrannosaurus rex—one of the last species to live before a catastrophe occurred some 65 million years ago. What exactly caused the death of the dinosaurs is a matter of great debate. But the burial site of the bones found in India could provide a clue.
"The sediments in which these dinosaurs were found are closely associated with one of the biggest volcanic activities recorded in the last 500 million years on planet Earth," said Sahni.
As much as a third of India's land mass is covered with lava. That makes it particularly difficult to find dinosaur bones. The task is made even more difficult because India is so heavily populated.
"The best place for a paleontologist to work is an empty desert," said Sereno.
Dinosaur discoveries could also help researchers improve their relatively scant knowledge of how India separated from Africa, Madagascar, Australia, and Antarctica and later impacted Asia to form the Himalaya.
"The details of the timing and route of India's northward migration are not well resolved," said Wilson. "Dinosaurs are good organisms to study the effects of continental drift because they cover continent-scale distances. That is, they seem to record connections between continents fairly well."
The new species will be described in the August issue of the Contributions of the Museum of Paleontology of the University of Michigan. Casts of the dinosaur's skull will be donated by the team to Punjab University and the Geological Survey of India.



Source: The National Geographic channel

About The Author....& a bit of page.

Sprawling Greens
Unfeathered Sky Aloft
Cool Air, Fresh
Gliding Rivoulet's Craft...


Well,Friends,this is what I tend to comment about this pager,which reflects the owners' closeness and splendid urge towards nature,and its creations.

I wish her good luck in life.
God Bless.







-Himadri

For the pictures on the right

The photographs on the right column are from my Mysore visit, covering places from Mysore city, Chamundi hills (one of the eight most sacred hills of South India), and Srirangapattanam (the erstwhile capital of Tippu Sultan).

All the pictures under the title "FRUITS OF EFFORTS" are taken at the Infosys Campus, Hootagalli, Mysore. I went to see this campus with two of my friends, Harshit and Mousumi, who work at the Infosys as senior software engineers (you cannot visit any Infosys campus for sightseeing unless you've someone with an Employee ID accompanying you!). No doubt, Infosys is famous for its "architectural wonders" the world over and this campus is regarded as the best in Asia for any software company.

"GRANDEUR" shows the Mysore palace situated in the heart of the city, built by the Wodeyar rulers of the Mysore state. Known as "Amba Vilas", it is one of the largest palaces in India. The original palace built of wood, got burnt down in 1897 and was rebuilt for the twenty fourth Wodeyar Raja in 1912.Its main dome (visible among the side ones) is gold plated.

I met "INNOCENCE" at the Chamundeshwari Devi temple, while waiting in the queue for darshan. :)

"INNOCENCE 2" is the one who took us everywhere at Srirangapattinam. :)

"INDEPENDENCE" was captured at the Infosys campus at Mysore, "FRESHNESS" at Tippu's summer palace and "BEAUTY" at Tippu's tomb at Srirangapattinam.

We also visited the Kaveri sangam at Ganjam, where "LOKPAAVANI KAVERI" was shot.

While "ON THE WAY TO SRIRANGAPATTINAM", I saw many beautiful landscapes with coconut and banana trees and paddy fields; this is one of them that I shot from the bus.

National Geographic

Splendor of ruins

Baalbek, Lebanon, Date Unknown (Photograph by George F. Mobley)

"Awe-inspiring even in ruin, the splendor of Baalbek [40 miles (64 kilometers) northeast of Beirut] must have defied description in its time of glory. Rome began erecting the huge sanctuaries in the first century A.D., on a site previously dedicated to the Canaanite god Baal."

(Text from and photograph shot on assignment for, but not published in, "Lebanon: Little Bible Land in the Crossfire of History," February 1970, National Geographic magazine)

My Sunset

Here it comes

the lonely dusk of

one like the other days.

far and far

there stretched are

silences' sways..

dust swings its calmly gown

as it smiles down the earth

warm air swirls and roasts my dry heart

in its invisible hearth

paints my self ,brown.

and makes myself still more lonely

towards the night so lovely

to all hail & hearty

sorrow on my part.

As I watch the setting sun

poets admire

the red ball of fire

drippling down the rippling waters of Ganga

I see the same reflected inside self

huge ball of ire

slipping down the throat of my Shelf.

I get up on the sands

ready to go back

I feel the last shines

of the Gobblet

setting behind the pines.

My footsteps dim

& the horizon darkens

muting all the rhymes.

-Himadri

My Dream One Day

The whole world cries
outside me
saddens me all round.
My environs seem running to me
like a million roaring sounds.
I run here ,
and I run there
but no shelter was found
and I was torn to pieces
by a hoard of hungry hounds!
They tore apart
each limb and flesh
& I opened my eye:
Oh!
I was asleep
And had got up:
It was a dreams’ long bounce..


-Himadri