PIO TV PARTNERS WITH CNN AND PTI FOR CONTENT

IPTV service PIO TV (www.piotv.com)has been launched on August 23. The channel has partnered with CNN as broadcast affiliate to use audio, visual and text for its news as well as with PTI for text and photo content. It has also partnered with Sanchar Bharti, one of the leading producers of audio content, for PIO Radio section. PIO TV is aimed at providing live news in 24x7 format, news update, entertainment, movies, culture, tourism, cuisine related news and much more.

The channel has also ventured into a distribution agreement with Airchord Televentures Pvt Ltd to distribute the live television stream of PIO TV to cellular and mobile users in India and overseas. PIO TV is a digital platform that integrates media of all types and offers a variety of content on a live, archived and on demand basis with a choice for immediate or later viewing.

Munish Gupta, Chairman and CEO of PIO TV, said, "The content would be available free except those on demand. The PIO centric channel would cater to the needs of 50 million PIOs abroad who look out for news and information that affects their lives. All content would be trimmed and re-purposed for the PIOs."

The channel, headquartered in Los Angeles, also has offices in Delhi and Mumbai. The channel would cover events from North America, UK, Europe, Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, South Pacific, South and Eastern Africa, South America and the Caribbean.

"Our platform encourages forming and forging communities, connecting people to people, businesses to businesses, government to people, ensuring a flow of information and interactivity thus far not established in the global PIO community," Gupta added.

The channel's other alliances include that with media groups like Northeast India, Positiv TV, Positiv Radio and group of individuals, production houses, labels and banners from Bollywood. The channel also has plans to make available a library of more than 1,500 Indian feature films, music videos, audio versions of these songs and religious and devotional music videos.

CHILDREN'S RAISES FUNDS FOR ITS CHARITABLE WORK

Children's Hope India is a volunteer organization of Indian women professionals in New York dedicated to raising funds for children's causes since 1992. Children's Hope Prayas covers an entire slum - Kathputli Colony on the outskirts of Delhi - which has been transformed by CH initiatives such as informal education, nutritious meals, a health clinic, a computer center and vocational training for the children, adult workshops and self help groups to facilitate micro-credit and income generation for the parents.

On October 7^th, the group did successful fundraiser at a dazzling sold out evening of riveting music, sumptuous Indian cuisine and world renowned special guests made this year's Children's Hope India Crystal Ball  at New York City hot spot Pier Sixty featuring Pulitzer Prize Winner Jhumpa Lahiri, live music performances by Vishal Vaid and Karsh Kale, and revered actress Sarita Choudhury as emcee. Hot on the heels of last year's fundraiser, this year's Crystal Ball marking 15 years of Children's Hope Crystal Ball raised about $500,000 benefiting children.

Proceeds go towards health and education initiatives in Delhi, Mumbai, Calcutta, Bangalore, Bhuj, Pune, Jabalpur and several villages in Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu. Children's Hope will honor Raphael and Linda Benaroya, friends of India and philanthropists, with the Lotus Award for their outstanding support of children's causes. The Making a Difference Award was presented to entrepreneur Benita Singh, co-founder of Mercado Global, who was named among 'The 15 People Who Make America Great' by Newsweek Magazine. Special guests included culinary chef and actress Madhur Jaffrey, as well as Consul General of India in New York Neelam Deo.

For more information on Children's Hope, please visit www.childrenshopeindia.org or contact Dina Pahlajani at 516-625-0754 or 516-570-6294. Tax deductible donations can be sent to: Children's Hope India, 7 Edgemere Drive, Searingtown, NY 11507, E-mail: PAHLAJANI@aol.com

NRI DOCTORS SETTING UP HOSPITAL NEAR HOWRAH

About 20 twenty medical doctors from Britain and the US are pooling their resources to set up a hospital near Howrah with the aim of providing quality healthcare at a low cost to the poor. KJnown as Sanjiban, it will offer specialized services in fields like pediatrics, cardiology and ENT and will be operational by April 2008.

According one of the initiators Dr. Subhashis Mitra, Sanjiban was an idea that was conceptualised during his college days in the early 1980s. Dr. Mitra has been in Britain for nearly 13 years, is all set to give up his job as a senior surgeon in Glasgow and come back to India to head Sanjiban.

"We have always thought that healthcare is not a business, but a service. We honestly believe that the concept of private healthcare should be changed so that even poor people can get access to this facility in West Bengal," Mitra said.

Mitra is also president of the Chikitsa Broti Udyog, the trust behind the Sanjiban initiative. Social activist Prafulla Chakraborty is general secretary of the trust.

"Since we are targeting a particular section of society, we are trying to help them with medical insurance. Talks are on with the National Insurance Company Ltd. for a medical insurance tie-up," Mitra said.

He said the hospital had joined hands with a low-priced generic drug manufacturing company, Locost, and taken the help of a Vadodara-based consultancy firm, MSP Consultant, to bring down the cost of its services.

The hospital will have a captive power plant and a green house energy reservoir. Mitra said the hospital would be able to reduce the operational cost by about 40 percent by using renewable energy.

INDI CORPS SEEKS APPLICATIONS FOR SERVICE FELLOWSHIPS

Since 2002, Indicorps has engaged talented young Indians from around the world on the frontlines of India's most pressing challenges with the aim of nurturing a new brand of socially conscious leaders with the character, knowledge, commitment, and vision to transform India and the world. Towards this goal, Indicorps provides a grassroots service fellowship for young professionals of Indian origin for one to two years.  Fellows take individual personal responsibility to execute and complete projects, defined in partnership with local development organizations that address particular community challenges. Individuals are able to choose from a variety of projects to fit their own interests and skills.

The Indicorps fellowship is a profound personal experience and an opportunity to understand participatory development through intense voluntary service. The structured program encourages participants to leave their comfort zones, place others' interests before their own, test their own potential to affect change, explore their relationship with India, and understand what it means to lead by committing themselves to innovative grassroots projects.

Thirteen fellows are currently working on different development projects to contribute to positive change throughout India, from improving the livelihoods of bamboo artisans in rural Maharashra to raising nutritional awareness in the hills of Tamil Nadu, to encouraging the civic engagement of youth in Bangalore. There are two fellowship cycles, beginning in January and August. There are over 20 projects for the January 2008 fellowship, ranging from encouraging technology based entrepreneurship with Vigyan Ashram in Karnataka to promoting youth leadership in rural Maharashtra and the city of Ahmedabad, Gujarat.

The application for the January fellowship (available at www.indicorps.org/apply) is due October 15, 2007. If you would like more information on the fellowship and specific projects, please visit www.indicorps.org, or contact Ketki Sheth at ketki@indicorps.org (+91-9377699953).

MORE INDIANS TOUR AROUND THE WORLD

The number of Indian travelers holidaying abroad has been growing exponentially. The rise of rupee against the US dollar, surge in budget flights and economical travel packages has prompted many Indians to spend their holidays overseas.

Indian tourists also use the opportunity for shopping. Although India claims that everything is now available there, yet Indian travelers spend liberally on their shopping abroad. Singapore, Dubai and London have become typical shopping destinations for Indian tourists. Some countries such as Ireland, the Netherlands, and South Korea have opened tourist offices in India to attract Indians to make their country as holiday destination and thus increase their tourism revenue.

India has also to build decent airports and infrastructure and develop retail and entertainment business at the airports to attract shopping revenue from the foreign tourists. The domestic traffic in India has also been rapidly growing.  With increasing incidences of flight delays, travelers are forced to spend more time at the airports. The Airports Authority in India should develop attractive shopping areas, bevy of eateries and entertainment centers to increase the airport revenue.

REPLACING U.S. GREEN CARD

The United States Permanent Resident Card, popularly known as Green Card, is issued to an immigrant with the right to live and work in the United States. 

Since August 1989, the card has been issued for ten years and the holder is required to renew at the expiration of ten years from its issue date. Prior to August 1989, "Green Cards" were issued with no expiration date. Cards issued prior to 1977 were recalled while Cards issued between 1977 and 1989 are still in circulation.

The US Government requires all card holders without an expiration date to replace their cards before their validity is terminated. The holders of such cards can obtain form I-90 from http://www.uscis.gov/files/form/i-90.pdf and send to the USCIS with necessary documents.

KERALA OFFERS TO SET UP NRI UNIVERSITY

Kerala Chief Minister has offered to set up a university for non-resident Indians in his state. The proposed university will have 50% of the seats reserved for children of non-resident Indians and the rest for Indian residents.

The federal cabinet recently cleared the proposal under the University Grants Commission Act, and decided the university would be located in a Special Economic Zone (SEZ). NRI/PIO children from developing countries which do not offer higher and/or quality educational facilities, can take advantage of the proposed university.

FIRST STATE-FUNDED HINDU SCHOOL TO BE OPENED IN BRITAIN

Britain's first state-funded Hindu school has been granted planning permission by the London borough of Harrow, and the first batch of students is expected to start in September 2008. The 236-capacity, one-form entry school is located in Edgware, which is in the heart of the highest concentration of Hindus in Britain. About one third of the local residents practice the Hindu faith.

The school, named 'Krishna Avanti Primary School', will be built at a cost of $10 million English Pounds and is being built by the I-Foundation, a leading Hindu charity organization. The plan for the Hindu school was announced by the Department of Education and Skills in November 2005, as stated by indiaedunews.com. The school received overwhelming support from the local Hindu community.

Nitesh Gor, director of I-Foundation said, "This is an incredibly exciting moment for the UK's Hindu community," adding, "It is the first time the choice of a faith-based education will be extended to Hindus alongside Christians, Muslims, Jews and Sikhs." According to Gor, all major Hindu groups in Britain have expressed support to the school, including the Hindu Forum of Britain, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Chinmaya Group and the Hindu Council. Gor stated that, "The primary school aims to give Hindu parents a choice of school that is consistent with their faith. At present, voluntary aided schools exist for every other major religion in the UK and it is right that the Hindu community is not denied this option in the education of their children."

SEMINAR ON GYPSIES IN EUROPE AND ANCESTRAL RELATIONS WITH INDIA

The Diaspora Cultural Resource Center of the Indira Gandhi National Center for the Arts in New Delhi, India, held an interactive session on Gypsies (Romas) in Europe and their ancestral cultural relations with India. The session was held at Lecture Hall No.5, Dr. Rajendra Prasad Road in New Delhi on Wednesday, 4 October 2007 starting at 4:00pm.

Worldwide there is an estimated population of at least 15 million. As early as 200 years ago, cultural anthropologists hypothesised an Indian origin of the Roma based on linguistic evidence. The Roma are believed to have originated in the Punjab and Rajasthan regions of the Indian sub-continent.

The interactive session involved Mr. Valery Novoselsky, Editor, Roma Virtual Network and Consultant to the European Roma Information Office. Details can be obtained for the Diaspora Cultural Resource at www.ignca.nic.in and email: diaspora@ignca.org

KHALSAKIDS.ORG TO HELP SIKH STUDENTS TO FIGHT BULLIES

A New York based community organization Sikh Coalition has started Khalsakids.org in response to an incident earlier this year in which a Sikh boy's turban was forcibly removed and his hair cut by a schoolmate in New York's Queens area. The boy has since changed schools for safety reasons and a jury has indicted the culprit. The website dedicated to helping Sikh students fight bullying in school. Designed as an interactive resource tool, it features a discussion forum, videos, and downloadable presentations. Parents and teachers can also use the website's sample lesson plans and games to teach others about the Sikh community.

Earlier, the Sikh Coalition had issued a civil rights report "Hatred in the Hallways" on the problems Sikh children face in school. The report, based on a survey of New York City Sikhs, revealed that nearly 75 per cent of Sikh boys in the Queens borough, which has a concentration of Sikh households, are harassed or intimidated because of their long hair and turban. People call them "Osama bin Laden" or "terrorists", often threatening or physically harassing them. According to its founder, the new website will help sigh children to feel proud of their identity and to give them the tools to combat bias in school.

MALAYSIAN INDIANS TAKING UK GOVERNMENT TO COURT

Hindus in Malaysia are taking the British Government to court for years of alleged atrocities. A Kuala Lumpur based solicitor P Waytha Moorthy has filed a litigation (PIL) at the Royal Courts of Justice in London last month. He has three months to serve a notice to the Foreign Office for damages worth over £1 million for each of the country's two million Hindus.

His move has been supported by Britain-based Hindu Human Rights (HHR), which organized a protest outside the Malyasian High Commission in London on Friday (31) to mark the country's 50th year of independence from the British.

Mr. Moorthy told Eastern Eye: "Ma­laysia supposedly became indepen­dent 50 years ago but the Hindus of the country have never experien­ced independence. They are denied the right to practice their religion, their temples are desecrated, they are forcibly converted and are subjected to unbelievable atrocities.

"The British Government must take responsibility for their treatment as these Hindus were brought into Malaysia forcibly as indentured labor during the British Raj in India. Before independence was declared for Malaysia, the British Government assured that the peculiar position of the Indians would be protected.

"But that never translated into action, which is why on the eve of this anniversary we have decided to file this case."

The PIL is also demanding that the Malaysian constitution be declared null and void, all Hindus be granted British citizenship and the Malaysian government be referred to the international court of justice and the international criminal court at The Hague for human rights violations against minority Indians.

HHR spokesman Arjun Malik added: "Already subject to heavy discrimination in employment, study and general walks of life, Hindus in Malaysia have begun to suffer in more specific ways. Hindu temples are destroyed and desecrated regularly with the full backing of the government.

"Hindus are denied the right to follow their own faith, and even in death, denied the right to a decent Hindu funeral. Forced into the economic and social margins, Hindus have become the prime victims of religious and racial hatred, which few commentators and human rights organizations even bother reporting on. This petition and our protest is aimed at drawing attention to their plight."