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Girl students are at the receiv ing end of this neglect, as some of the prestigious girls' schools in South Kolkata are found to be flouting the basic requirements of sanitation system.

City Level Programme For Street Children, an NGO working to enhance the sanitation system in the schools, has surveyed 375 schools in six districts of the state.

"We have recently inspected the schools in Nadia, South 24 Parganas, North 24 Parganas, Hooghly, Howrah and Kolkata.

None of the schools had the requisite facilities," said Achintya Bhattacharya, an official of the NGO. Nearly 90 per cent of these schools do not keep any stock of sanitary nap kins, a must for sanitation system in any girls or co-education institution. The NGO found that the percent of absenteeism is more among the girl students.

The post-mortem of the panchayat poll results has made two things clear. The party can neither afford to backtrack from the new industrial policy nor can it go the whole hog in acquiring land for industry. Ground reality now forces the Buddhadeb to adopt a middle path go for the land acquisition only after taking consent from the farmers.

The word of caution came from none other than party general secretary Prakash Karat, who, while advocating for Bengal's speedy industrial rejuvenation, underscored the urgent need for taking farmers' into confidence before initiating any move to take away their land.

Karat, who stayed throughout the meet listening to the district leaders, emphasised that the party has to take steps to protect the interest of farmers and handle the issue with extreme care. According to party insiders, Karat also dwelt upon the minority issue in his address, stressing on the need to ensure that sentiments of the minority community members are not at all hurt whenever there is a land acquisition move.

Sources said that Karat has also highlighted organsational weaknesses in certain areas (read three districts where the party suffered defeat) where the party-government combine failed to make the stand clear to the public. The mantra from the general secretary is to take careful move. He highlighted that the party has fared well in areas where acquisition took place only after ontaining villagers' consent. Karat has also cautioned the party leaders not to undermine the strength of opposition alliances formed at the ground-level.

The state government has planned a seven kilometre elevated road between Jinjira More and Batanagar and the funds will come from the developers of the Calcutta Riverside project. It has asked Riverbank Holdings, the developer of the 260 acre-township in Batanagar, to fund the construction of this long stretch. PWD, which currently maintains the stretch, is all set to identify the land for the road.

The road, essentially a toll way, will be built on a build, operate and transfer basis. The developer will realise the cost of the project through the toll tax collected over a period of time and then hand it back to the government.

"We are willing to give the land to this private company for construction of the road. We have held some meetings already and are keen on having the road built by the developer of the township," said PWD minister Kshiti Goswami.

''The institute has many plans to meet the goal with round-the-year activities and in achieving the objective, IIM-C deliberated upon the issue at a two-day workshop which ended on March 26'', an IIM-C release said.

Speakers at the workshop, including its Director Shekhar Chaudhuri, asked the employees to come forward and initiate action towards usage of Hindi ''for which all necessary supports will be provided''.

"Apart from the vacant posts, almost 2,000 schools do not have any teachers. We are in a position of no admission to these schools," Mr Bose said.

Currently the state is fighting a case to recognise those teachers' training institutes which are not affiliated to the National Council for Teacher's Education (NCTE), under the revised Act. "It should be noted that our institutes are affiliated to the West Bengal Primary Education Act, 1973, which is not dissolved yet, hence they cannot be termed as unrecognised," ABPTA general secretary Radhaballav Das said.

"The scheme will be reopened in 2008. The scheme was closed for review. The scheme will stay open for the 11th Plan period," MSME (Development Wing) Development Commissioner Jawhar Sircar said here today at a CII organised seminar on SME.

The scheme was targeted at the small and micro sector for upgradation of technology. The government will pay 15 per cent of the cost as subsidy once banks approved the upgradation project.

"Some 40 sectors are covered under the scheme and later the scope might be increased by the government," Sircar said.

He said the government had received application of about Rs 225 crore under the scheme.

Meanwhile, West Bengal Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Minister Manabendra Mukherjee said that in the 11th Plan period the ministry has projected to create 26 lakh jobs in the state.

He added that an apparel management institute would be open but did not say when or where.

Things did not work out after the state government announced that fuel stations would not give fuel to vehicles without pollution clearance. A year after the announcement, state environment secretary M L Meena on Thursday reiterated the government's decision at the Environment Partnership Summit '08. He assured that the government will approach oil companies in 10 days to enforce the order.

According to Meena, only 25% of the state's vehicular population has valid pollution-under-control (PUC) certificates. Now, the state environment department has decided to prohibit petrol pumps from selling fuel to vehicles without a PUC. The government also intends to clamp down on autos and taxis not operating on LPG. But the reality is that a few taxis, which switched to LPG, have gone back to diesel-run taxis.

"Our enforcement agencies are poor. We will place restrictions on the registration of vehicles and issue directives to oil companies prohibiting those from selling fuel to vehicles without PUCs through their retail outlets," Meena said.

"There is no LPG. We will operate on LPG if it is available," said state Citu president Shyamal Chakrabarty. Kishore Ghosh, leader of the Citu-affiliated autorickshaw operators' union, too, echoed the same. "We are trying to convert autos to LPG."

"We have notified the transport department that autos and taxis should either convert to LPG or vanish from the city," said Meena, while addressing the summit, organized by the Indian Chamber of Commerce.

The state environment department has earmarked Rs 2 crore from its budget for conversion of 5,000 autos to LPG. It has also decided to give a 50% subsidy for conversion, Meena added. It has already earmarked Rs 3 crore to convert 10,000 autos by 2009. The state has invited tenders from various companies to supply LPG kits, which is a major problem of late. By next year, we will try to convert all taxis to the LPG mode, he said.

"Taxis and buses in other states are less polluting than those in Kolkata. The CNG initiative was started by the state. I am not quite clear why it stopped," said Simon Wilson, British deputy high commissioner.

Expansive glass and steel terminals, sprawling lounges, top-of-the-line passenger amenities -- come 2010 and Kolkata airport promises to be the perfect gateway to the City of Joy.

"Citizens of Kolkata will be proud of the airport. It will bring smiles to millions of faces," said S P S Bakshi, the man in charge of the airport modernization programme. "Passengers will breeze through. The logjam at the airport will be a thing of the past," reiterated Praful Patel.

There's every reason to believe what they say. Given the massive augmentation in terminal capacity from just six million a year now to 20 million after the revamp, travelling through Kolkata airport should be a pleasant experience.

And not just for a few years. The airport will be able to operate comfortably for the next 25 years.

It all sounds very impressive. But scratch the surface and what emerges beyond the glitz is a weak link that could jeopardize all calculations and leave passengers stranded beyond the terminal area. It's the most vital area of an airport; and also the most neglected -- the runway that lies beyond public scrutiny.

Tuitions still form the backbone of school education right from Class I, especially in states such as West Bengal, Bihar and Kerala, an annual survey has shown.

Barring a few states, children attending private schools need more tuitions than those going to government schools.

Interestingly, in states with a good educational track record such as Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, dependence on tuitions is less among students of both government and private schools.

Pratham's Annual Survey of Education Report (ASER), 2007, was released on Wednesday by Planning Commission deputy chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia. He said the report was a testimony to the fact that flagship programmes such as Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan and mid-day meal scheme were on the right track.

The huge transition within one year had also answered cynicism over such programmes, he added.

ANA will deploy the B737 currently operated on Mumbai-Tokyo route with a configuration of all Business class seats (36) for flights to Chennai or Kolkata. The airline will deploy B787 Dreamliner on the Mumbai-Tokyo route. The airline operates six flights a week on the route.

"Once B787 is inducted on the Mumbai route, the airline will introduce two class configurations - First and Business class," says Kenji Sugino, Director, Administration, Marketing and Sales, ANA. The airline will have a configuration of eight First class seats and 80 Business class seats for the Mumbai route. Currently the airline registers a load factor of 70 per cent with around 80 per cent of the traffic coming in from Mumbai, Pune and Goa with the rest from Bangalore, Hyderabad and Delhi.

Business traffic between India and Japan is increasing by 10 per cent on a yearly basis and the airline is looking at increasing traffic on the Mumbai-Tokyo route by 40 per cent by 2009-10. "In future, we are also intending to launch our website, although we don't know when this development will materialise," informed Sugino.

Since all opposition parties, including the Congress and Trinamool Congress, and the major partners of the Left Front, namely, the CPI and RSP, had strongly opposed the setting up of the chemical hubs at Nandigram and Haldia, the government now shifted the venue to the nearby Newchar islands on the sea bed in West Midnapore district as a third choice.

But it is yet to be decided if such chemical hub proposal could be executed at Newchar islands before getting the expert opinion of the Geological Survey of India (GSI) and other environmentalists.

An expert team of the GSI, accompanied by the state industries department officials, visited the islands yesterday and made an on-the-spot survey of the areas and studied the nature of the land and other related matters.

Herbal tea 1: Effective against respiratory allergies, this tea is brewed using a mixture of herbs. Take 250 gm of green tea leaves, 50 gm Banapsha, 25 gm Mulethi (licorice), 12.5 gm black pepper, 12.5 gm cinnamon, 25 gm green tulsi leaves, 12.5 gm saunth (dry ginger powder). Mix all the ingredients in a copper or earthen utensil and ensure that there is no concentration of a specific herb in one part of the concoction. Stir well to make sure that the mixture is evenly distributed. Then store it in a glass jar. Take one teaspoon of this mixture in a ceramic or glass cup and pour hot water in it. Cover and let the tea brew for 5 minutes. Sip without sugar or milk. This mixture remains potent for up to 60 days.

Thyme tea: This tea is a very effective immunity booster especially against viral, fungal and bacterial infections and can be had at any time of the day. Take 8-10 leaves of the thyme plant and steep in hot water as described above. Dry thyme can also be used but the quantity of herb should be doubled in that case.

Herbal Tea 2: Accumulation of mucous is usually a symptom of an aggravation of Kapha
Dosha. To counter this take half a teaspoon of ginger powder, 1/4 teaspoon clove powder, 1/2 teaspoon of powdered cardamom seeds and a pinch of cinnamon. To this mixture add a cup of boiling water. Cover and filter after five minutes. You can sweeten this with honey or misri and drink three to four times a day.

"The expansion includes adding 250 MW to our existing plant at Budge Budge by 2009," RPG Group Vice-Chairman Sanjiv Goenka said.

CESC has also received clearance for the 2,000-MW plant in Haldia, for which work would begin soon. "We have already got the green signal from the state government for our Haldia plant and we plan to begin work very soon," Goenka said. Apart from Haldia, CESC would be starting a 1,000 MW plant in Jharkhand and a 1,000 MW plant in Orissa. "We are expanding in the power generation segment in a big way and would be investing Rs 16,000 crore in setting up these additional utilities," Goenka added.

FALLOUT OF EXPOSURE TO MERCURY

Elemental (metallic) mercury can be hazardous in vapour form. It can be absorbed through the lungs. These exposures can occur when elemental mercury is spilled or products that contain elemental mercury break and expose mercury to the air.

Symptoms

• Impaired neurological development

• Tremors

• Emotional changes (such as mood swings,              
  

• Insomnia

• Neuromuscular changes (such as weakness, muscle
  

• Headaches

• Disturbances in sensory perception (pins and
  

• Changes in nerve responses

• Lowered mental function

• High and longer levels of exposure can cause kidney failure, respiratory failure and death.

• Foetal exposure impairs the child's memory,  attention, language, and fine motor and visual spatial skills

Chemical form of mercury (methylmercury is more toxic than elemental mercury)

• Quantity of mercury

• Age of the person exposed to mercury (the foetus is the most susceptible, followed by infants and children)

• Route of exposure - inhalation, ingestion or skin contact

• Health of person at time of exposure