Sunday, July 31, 2005

Find web pages which link to a particular URL / real?

Find web pages which link to a particular URL

You can find web pages which reference a particular URL using this search
method on Google:

link:url-you-want-to-know-about-here.com

So, for example, a Google search of "link:http://www.aunty-spam.com" turns
up web sites which link to Aunty.

Note that there is no space after the "link:"

Find web pages which have your search terms in the title

A really useful way to quickly zero in on that for which you are searching
is to limit your search to pages which have your search terms right in their
title. You can do this with the "intitle:" limiter. For this search you must
put the full search string in quotes:

"intitle:term1 term2 term3?

Example:

A Google search of "spam blockers" turns up 637,000 hits. (A search without
the quotes turns up a whopping 1,150,000.)

By contrast "intitle:spam blockers" (note again the lack of a space between
the ":" and the first search term), turns up 730 hits, all of them highly
focused, as they are pages whose titles contain the term "spam blocker".

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Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Containers from Kerala used in London attacks? / Fasting ascetic passes away


Containers from Kerala used in London attacks?

G. Anand

British police say the containers were manufactured and supplied by a
Thiruvananthapuram firm

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: An important clue to the recent terrorist attacks in
London may lie in plastic food storage containers exported from Kerala to
the U.K. and sold through retail outlets in that country.

A Thirvananthapuram-based company, which exports moulded plastic articles to
the U.K., was contacted by the London Metropolitan Police investigating the
bomb attacks. The BBC reported the Anti-Terrorist Branch's claim that all
five bombs that failed to explode "were placed inside dark-coloured
rucksacks or sports bags" and "all of them were made using the same type of
plastic food storage containers."

The British police have now found that the 6.25-litre containers were
manufactured and supplied by `Family Plastics,' a manufacturer of injection
moulded plastic articles at Manvila here. The company is a Rs. 4-crore
manufacturing and export unit owned by Simson A. Fernandez, a local
resident. London shopkeepers stocking similar containers have been asked to
contact the police if they had sold five or more such containers recently.

---

Fasting ascetic passes away

A Jain nun (right) and others sit around Ratan Bai, who was performing
"sallekhna" or voluntary death, in Ganj Basoda, near Bhopal. Bai died after
fasting for six months.

BHOPAL(M.P.): Thousands of people flocked to the cremation of a 75-year-old
woman here after she gained attention by slowly fasting to death over six
months in a rare example of an ancient salvation rite of the Jain religion,
her family said. Ratan Bai died on Friday in Ganj Basoda, a small town in
Vidhsha district, 120 km north of Bhopal, her son-in-law, Satish Jain, said.

Like Hindus and Buddhists, Jains believe in reincarnation. Salvation is
obtained by personal effort - leading austere, non-violent lives. A few
Jains undertake "sallekhna," or voluntary death, a ritual for ending the
cycle of death and rebirth. They stop eating and meditate until they die. In
July last year, Ms. Bai decided to undergo "sallekhna." Accompanied by her
three sons and three daughters, she visited the head priest of the Jain
religion, Brahmanand, in nearby Katangi town, Mr. Jain said. The head priest
gave his approval for her to undertake the ritual.

She formally became an ascetic 20 days ago at a ceremony, he said. ``She
voluntarily stopped the intake of solid food six months ago. She took only
fruit juices and water. She stopped taking even fruit juices 12 days ago and
restricted herself to drinking small quantity of water everyday until she
died on Friday,'' said Deepesh Jain, her 19-year-old grandson. Ganj Basoda
has a population of more than 100,000, but many people travelled from nearby
villages in recent weeks as Ms. Bai's fast got extensive media attention.

``This was a way of ultimate purification of the soul,'' said Kiran Godre, a
Jain nun, who looked after Ms. Bai during her ritual. ``She became a saint
in the eyes of the Jain community and hundreds of people visited her during
her fasting days to pay their respect.'' -

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Saturday, July 23, 2005

Saturday, July 16, 2005

Terrible tragedy at Bharat Bhavan / Verdict in Mavoor toxic effluent case upheld /


BHOPAL: Nearly 300 paintings, including priceless ones by J. Swaminathan and
M. F. Husain, have been destroyed following flooding of the basement of
Bharat Bhavan, the massive multi-arts complex here, in the wake of a
cloudburst.

Bharat Bhavan Director Pawan Jain said on Wednesday the damage was
extensive. Over 10,000 paintings - oil on canvas and watercolour - were
stored in the basement.

There was a sudden cloudburst on Monday evening, and a section of the
basement was flooded. Most of the material kept there was soaked. According
to Mr. Jain, 200 to 300 paintings, including the ones by Husain and
Swaminathan, were destroyed. Well over 2,000 paintings were damaged.

Criticising "construction and detailing" of the Bharat Bhavan complex,
designed by the renowned architect Charles Correa, Mr. Jain said: "Care had
not been taken to prevent seepage or protect the building from the Bhopal
Upper Lake's backwater thrust, which is a major cause of seepage at the
floor level. A committee of technical experts that was set up to study the
problem of seepage had raised this issue."

---

Verdict in Mavoor toxic effluent case upheld

Staff Reporter

Firm's officials have to undergo SI of one-and-a-half years

KOZHIKODE: The Kozhikode District and Sessions Court on Wednesday upheld the
verdict of the Chief Judicial Magistrate's (CJM) Court sentencing the
defunct Mavoor unit of Grasim Industries (Pulp Division) president R. N.
Saboo, and three other top officials to simple imprisonment of
one-and-a-half years and imposing a penalty of Rs.5,000 each for allowing
toxic effluents to flow from the factory into the Chaliyar river.

District Court Judge Thomas P. Joseph endorsing the lower court's verdict of
November 13, 2003, convicted the other officials, including the factory
Technical Wing joint executive president C. Kochukrishnan, the Technical
vice-president C. L. Gathani and the Processing Department general manager
M. P. Raja.

While dismissing the appeal of the accused against the CJM court verdict,
the District Court also issued summons asking them to appear before the CJM
court on August 8 to enforce the conviction. It confirmed the findings of
the CJM court that the factory had discharged untreated and toxic effluent
into the Chaliyar river causing injury to public health and aquatic
organisms.

This was also the first time top management officials of a industrial unit
in the State had been convicted on account of discharging untreated
effluents from a factory into a river. The verdict was based on a case filed
by the Kerala State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) environmental engineer
A. K. Hansraj on October 3, 1998.

---

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Wednesday, July 13, 2005

London bombers 'were all British' / Indonesian Maid Miyati Sent to Jail / Worldcom ex-boss gets 25 years


http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4676577.stm

London bombers 'were all British'

Detectives now believe the London bombings were carried out by four
British-born men in what were possibly the country's first suicide attacks.
Security sources said it was likely at least three of the men, said to
be of Pakistani descent, are dead, after belongings were found at the
scenes.

The details emerged as explosives were found in Leeds and Luton after
a series of raids. One man has been arrested.

The BBC's Frank Gardner said an expert may have offered the bombers
guidance.

===

Indonesian Maid Miyati Sent to Jail
Maha Akee l, Arab News

JEDDAH, 12 July 2005 - Nour Miyati, the Indonesian maid who was severely
injured and lost limbs as a result of alleged torture by her sponsor - has
been jailed. She was removed from hospital yesterday evening and taken to an
unspecified public jail. Her embassy was not informed. Indonesian labor
attache, M. Sukiarto, confirmed that the embassy was not informed of this
development. "I'm very disappointed. I don't know why she was sent to jail,"
he told Arab News.

In March, Miyati was taken to a Riyadh hospital by her sponsor in critical
condition and severe injuries causing gangrene to her fingers, toes and part
of her right foot; some of her fingers and toes had to be amputated. At
first she claimed that her sponsor tied her up for a month in a bathroom and
beat her severely injuring her eyes and knocking several of her teeth out.

A report in May said that M iyati had retracted earlier accusations that her
sponsor tied her up and tortured her. Consequently she was charged with
making false allegations against her sponsor.

The embassy was surprised by that report and asked for a reinvestigation
because they claimed that Miyati was mentally unstable and under pressure
because the embassy staff, her lawyer and the National Society for Human
Rights were denied access to her during the investigation. Her sponsor and
his wife were charged with assault and mistreatment; he was released from
jail on bail and both are awaiting trial.

---

Former Worldcom boss Bernard Ebbers wept openly as he was sentenced to 25
years in jail for his part in the scandal which brought down the firm.
Mr Ebbers was found guilty of fraud and conspiracy in March, following
revelations of an $11bn (£6.2bn) accounting fraud at Worldcom in 2002.

The 63-year-old was also guilty of seven counts of filing false documents.

The sentence was handed down by federal judge Barbara Jones, who earlier
this week rejected his bid for a new trial.

The sentence was the toughest yet in a string of corporate scandals in the
US.

Mr Ebbers did not address the court. Instead, he wiped his eyes with a white
tissue. Meanwhile, Kristie Ebbers, his wife, cried quietly.

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Monday, July 11, 2005

Daily /NRI who guided Deep Impact to its success / Pak renovates Hindu temple / 1979: Skylab tumbles back to Earth / Indian arrested in Malaysia

NRI who guided Deep Impact to its success

S. Rajagopalan

Washington, July 5, 2005

When he watched Halley's Comet through binoculars many years ago, Shyam
Bhaskaran used to wonder if he would be able to pursue his cosmic passion.
Little did he realise then that the hand of destiny would lead him to the
centrestage of a comet mission.

On Monday, the second generation Indian American scientist led the
navigation team of NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft that flawlessly crashed
into comet Tempel 1 as part a grand project to gain insights into the
origins of the solar system.

Bhaskaran has now worked as a navigator on several NASA missions at the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) n Pasadena, California.

Even so, the Deep Impact was something very special, he said in a telephone
interview amid widespread relief and satisfaction that everything has worked
to clockwork precision.

Compared with sending a spacecraft to Jupiter, landing rovers on Mars and
even Stardust's technical feats, Deep Impact presented unprecedented
challenges, recalls Bhaskaran.

The kind of precision needed here was unimaginable, with the impactor having
to hit the comet at a speed of 23,000 miles per hour.

---

Pak renovates Hindu temple

Work has begun on a $20,000 project to renovate and expand the sole Hindu
temple in Lahore that was damaged in the wake of the Babri mosque demolition
in 1992.

The Evacuee Trust Property Board is overseeing the repair work on the
Krishna temple, which some believe is at least 80 years old.

"The lone temple had been in a dilapidated condition since the locals
attacked it in the wake of Babri mosque destruction. The mob not only
removed the idol of Lord Krishna but also damaged the main rooms after which
cracks appeared in the main walls," The News reported on Saturday.

The local Hindu community, led by Manohar Chand, had long been demanding the
renovation of the temple. However, the paucity of funds and the anger of the
locals over the Babri mosque razing had been holding up the project, the
newspaper added.

The restoration work involves refurbishing the main prayer room and two
adjacent rooms, the construction of two new halls, a community kitchen and a
four-room hostel.

---

ON THIS DAY

* 1979: Skylab tumbles back to Earth *
The space laboratory¸ Skylab I¸ plunges to Earth scattering debris across
the southern Indian Ocean and the sparsely populated Australian desert.
Full story:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/-/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/july/11/newsid_3867000/3867739.stm

1979: Skylab tumbles back to Earth
The US space laboratory, Skylab I, plunged to Earth this evening scattering
debris across the southern Indian Ocean and sparsely populated Western
Australia.
All week there has been mounting speculation over where the spacecraft would
come down. It has been in orbit six years - for the past five of those it
has been unoccupied.

Skylab's last signal was recorded at 1611 GMT. Less than an hour later a
tracking station at Ascension Island in the South Atlantic confirmed the
solar panels were beginning to peel off as the craft descended.

The 77.5 ton Skylab could break into as many as 500 pieces, including a
5,100lb (2,310kg) airlock shroud and a 3,900lb (1,767kg) lead safe to
protect film from radiation, which are expected to survive the heat of
re-entry into the earth's atmosphere.

Head of the Nasa task force monitoring Skylab, Richard Smith, said they had
already received reports of hot debris, which had lit up the night sky, from
several points in Western Australia.

'Edge of Cornwall'

Dozens of residents reported seeing debris falling near Kalgoolie, 370 miles
(595km) northeast of Perth.

---

AutoHotkey

We perform several tasks repeatedly (loading our favorite word processor,
accessing search engines and the like). We can be a little more productive
if we can perform these tasks by just pressing specific key-combinations.
For instance, if we can access Google by pressing the key combination
`Ctrl-g,' life can probably be much smoother. If you share this view, have a
look at the free open-source program, AutoHotkey
(http://www.autohotkey.com/), which can be used to assign keystrokes to
invoke a program or a set of programs. The software allows you to write
scripts for assigning keystrokes for automating a set of tasks. Before you
start using the program, go through the tutorial
(http://www.autohotkey.com/docs/Tutorial.htm) that lucidly explains the
procedure to be followed for creating/running scripts.

Distance calculator

Need to calculate the distance between any two cities in the world or
distance between any two countries in the world? Check out the on-line
service, Distance Calculator at: http:// www.mapcrow.info/.

J. Murali

E-mail the author at:jmurali@gmail.com

---

Indian arrested in Malaysia
Monday, 11 July , 2005, 10:07
Kuala Lumpur: Malaysian police have arrested an Indian in connection with
the theft of 8,000 documents from the country's Immigration Department in
Kuantan province, a media report said on Monday.

District police chief Kamal Pasha said the suspect had an Indian passport
with a pass sticker number which was believed to be stolen from the
Immigration Department in Kuantan last year.

"His passport number was found to be the same as that of the stolen
passport," the police official said at the end of a search operation against
special crimes in the capital here.

The man, who was not identified by the 'New Straits Times' daily, was stated
to be 42-year-old and detained in Kuala Lumpur's Jalan Masjid area.

Last May, some men broke into the Kuantan Immigration Department and fled
with 8,000 ringgit (Rs 90,000) as well as 8,000 documents belonging to the
Malaysi

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Saturday, July 09, 2005

Compensation for woman kept in custody

Staff Reporter

HIGH COURTROUND-UP

KOCHI: The Kerala High Court, on Wednesday, directed the State Government to
pay P.E. Arifa of Perumbavoor a compensation of Rs.50,000, with 8 per cent
interest from May 24, 1997, for being kept in police custody illegally for
80 hours.

Justice A.K. Basheer issued the directive while allowing a writ petition
filed by Ms. Arifa. According to her, her husband, a wholesale dealer in
fabrics, had given her brother a certain quantity of fabric on credit.
Later, the latter refused to pay the money, and a criminal case was filed
against him.

When she came to her parental house to participate in a ceremony organised
in connection with the death of her father, her brother threatened her and
demanded that the case be withdrawn. He called the police who took her to
the Ernakulam Vanitha Police Station as she refused to accede to the demand.

http://www.hindu.com/2005/07/07/stories/2005070713790400.htm

---

New York Times journalist jailed

Gary Younge

NEW YORK: The New York Times reporter Judith Miller was on Wednesday night
sent to jail for refusing to reveal her source in an investigation into the
leak of an undercover CIA agent's name.

But in a dramatic conclusion to a two-year saga, her fellow defendant, the
Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper, avoided the same fate when he agreed
to testify in an 11th-hour volte-face.

Mr. Cooper told a federal judge that the source had released him from his
commitment to keep his identity secret.

``Last night I hugged my son goodbye and told him it might be a long time
before I see him again,'' Mr. Cooper told the district court judge, Thomas
Hogan.

---

`Medical visa' for foreigners soon

Special Correspondent

Available to all seeking treatment in specialty hospitals

NEW DELHI: Recognising the rapid growth and changes in the health care, the
Government has decided to introduce a `medical visa' for foreigners who come
to India for medical treatment and are here for an extended period.

The medical visa" would be admissible to all foreigners seeking medicare in
recognised specialty hospitals or treatment centres. The initial period of
such a visa will be one year or for the period of treatment whichever is
less. Unlike the tourist visa, this can be extended and the State
Governments and FRROs have been given the powers to extend such a visa.

---

The Word of the Day for July 08 is:

fete \FAYT\ noun
1 : festival
2 a : a lavish often outdoor entertainment *b : a large elaborate party
Example sentence:
Nigel's 50th birthday was celebrated with an impressive fete, featuring an
abundance of delicious food, an open bar, and endless music and dancing.
Did you know?
"Fete" is a word worth celebrating. It's been around since Middle English,
when it was used in a manuscript to refer to "fetes, spectacles and other
worldly vanytees." Since the 19th century, it has been doing double duty,
serving both as a noun (as we've used it here) and as a verb meaning "to
honor or commemorate with a fete." You can honor "fete" by remembering that
it entered English from Middle French, and that it derives ultimately from
the Old French "feste," meaning "festival" - a root that, not surprisingly,
also gave English the word "feast." (Because of its French ties, you will
sometimes see "fete" spelled with a circumflex ( ^ ) above the first "e," as
that's how it appears in that language.)

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