British to the core

Summary: While British summer fruit harvests are having a bumper year, apple growers are watching their crops closely in case the drought in parts of the UK worsens. The British eat their way through billions of apples each year, and it's the nation's love affair with the fruit that has made it so popular today, writes horticulturalist Chris Beardshaw.

For centuries the apple has captivated us, but it's tricky to cultivate because apples are promiscuous by design. They have a more complex genetic make-up than any other fruit. If you were to plant the pips from the Cox in your lunch box they almost certainly wouldn't turn into trees bearing fruit anything like the original. Apples require pollinators to take the pollen from one plant and transfer it across into the flower of another. It's that crossing of pollen that creates the most wonderful genetic exchange. Every single pip is potentially a new variety that could fall anywhere in the spectrum of small and sour to big and juicy. Some of the world's best-loved apples, like the Braeburn and the Bramley, were discovered growing as chance seedlings, gifts from nature that just happened to taste good. The Granny Smith was discovered growing out of a rubbish heap in Australia. So while the apple seeks only to multiply rather than reproduce the same delicious fruits, man had to fathom how to clone it with an ancient process known as grafting, which remains the same to this day. With the discovery of grafting we could clone our favourite apple trees again and again. The Bramley, one of Britain's most prosperous and time-honoured apples, was planted 200 years ago in Nottinghamshire. That first tree was grown from a pip by a young woman, Mary Ann Brailsford, between 1809 and 1815. Since then every single Bramley apple ever eaten and tree planted has originated from it. That's a lot, with the Bramley apple industry is worth £50m today. The pip most probably came from an apple on a tree at the bottom of her garden. The seedling produced such fine apples that in 1837 a local nurseryman asked the next occupier of the house, Matthew Bramley, for his permission to graft scions from the tree. Bramley agreed as long as the apples bore his name. Ms Brailsford never knew the fame her apples achieved. This original Bramley tree still stands today and the proud custodian is Nancy Harrison. Aged 90, she has spent many years admiring the tree. She grew up next door and such was her enthusiasm for it she bought her neighbour's house when the opportunity arose - and with it her beloved tree. "I paid £500 for the house," she says. "We knew it was a wonderful apple because there's nothing cooks like it, we always loved it. We've never climbed the tree or anything, nobody's been allowed to damage the Bramley at all." The 1944 fruit census tells us by that time there were already more than two million Bramley trees in existence. While the Bramley was a chance seedling, many apples owe their existence to a process known as cross breeding - taking two desirable fruits and creating a hybrid. Breeding frenzy One of Britain's greatest contributions to the history of the apple was the result of ferocious Victorian one-upmanship amongst head gardeners, who were seeking perfection in the kitchen gardens of the nation's great stately homes. One man in particular changed the course of the apple's future - Thomas Andrew Knight, later president of the Royal Horticultural Society. He didn't want to simply grow perfect specimens, he wanted to be able to control the taste, colour, texture and size. He believed he could engineer and improved apples by playing the part of the bee. With meticulous precision he set about impregnating the seed of one variety with the pollen from another. After decades of patient trial and error the first hybrid apples were born. What followed was a breeding frenzy as head gardeners everywhere began to produce new and wondrous breeds to dazzle their masters. It was a cut and thrust business. "The fear factor was the main motivator," says Mike Thurlow, head gardener at Audley End House in Cambridge. "That's why head gardeners were always looking to be able to deliver something new, a novelty to the table." Thanks to the passion and dedication of Victorian gardeners Britain once produced more varieties of apple than anywhere else in the world. There were well over 2,000 varieties to choose from, including Hoary Morning, Blenheim Orange, Knobby Russet and Laxton's Epicure. You could have eaten a different one every day for more than six years. These days we are most familiar with just a handful of varieties. We may produce billions of apples a year in Britain, but sadly 70% of those are imported. The old Victorian varieties have dwindled, many lost to the hedgerows. But we can breath a sigh of relief for the 2,300 varieties of apple preserved in the orchards of the National Fruit Collection. With the rising demand for British produce the future for UK commercial apple production is looking good. But if these exquisite heritage varieties, like the Keswick Codlins and the Pitmaston Pineapple's that I grew up with, are to keep going then the responsibility lies largely with the British public to be their custodians and guardians for the future.

जबकि ब्रिटिश ग्रीष्मकालीन फलों की कटाई में एक बंपर वर्ष चल रहा है, सेब उत्पादक ब्रिटेन के कुछ हिस्सों में सूखे की स्थिति में अपनी फसलों को बारीकी से देख रहे हैं। बागवानीविद् क्रिस बियर्डशॉ लिखते हैं कि अंग्रेज हर साल अरबों सेब खाते हैं, और इस फल के साथ देश का प्रेम संबंध है जिसने आज इसे इतना लोकप्रिय बना दिया है।


Violent backdrop for crucial Pakistan elections

Summary: The most critical elections in Pakistan's history are taking place amid an orgy of killings - minority groups, civilians and military personnel have all been targeted by a variety of extremists, writes Ahmed Rashid.

With the number of targeted assassinations of leading politicians expected to increase by the time of the elections in the second week of May, there are no signs that the government or the army are prepared for a deterioration of security. The sense of instability is not made any better by the worsening economic crisis. An average of 10 to 20 people a day are being killed in the major cities - Karachi, Quetta, Lahore and Peshawar - as the country is gripped by violence. On a bad day as many as 100 people can be killed by suicide or car bombs. Intolerance unchecked Those suffering most are the minority Shia population, who are being targeted by Sunni extremists. On 9 March, Christians were attacked and their homes ransacked in a poor locality of Lahore by a rampaging mob. Pakistan endured one of its worst days of violence on 10 January when 115 people were killed - including 93 Shias belonging to the Hazara ethnic group in Quetta. A month later on 16 February another 84 were killed and 200 wounded in a similar massacre in the city. For days Shia Hazaras refused to bury their dead and many prepared to leave Pakistan for ever. The plight of some Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Ahmedis and Shias has forced many to flee the country as intolerance unchecked by the government escalates. On 3 March another 50 Shias were killed and over 100 wounded in a massive truck bomb that exploded in a Shia locality of Karachi. Pakistani Shia naval officers and Shia doctors have likewise been killed. Last year more than 400 Shias were killed in Pakistan by Sunni hardliners. Already more than 200 Shias have been killed in the first two months of 2013. The killings are being carried out by Lashkar-e-Jhangvi - a Sunni militant group which has already been declared a terrorist organisation. But the government's only reaction so far has been to place its former leader Malik Ishaq under house arrest. He has been arrested and freed several times before. Test of democracy It appears to many Pakistanis that the militants are more powerful than the army or the government. Yet these elections are critical, for it will be the first time in Pakistan's history that an elected government will hand over power to another elected government. It will be the biggest test of Pakistan's democracy, but at the same time none of the major political parties is prepared to take on the extremists. Karachi is dissolving into chaos. It is not only besmirched by the Shia killings, but also by a vicious, multi-sided turf war between ethnic and sectarian groups, mafias and land grabbers. Almost every day some part of the sprawling metropolis is shut down because of gunfire, murders or citizens' protests. On 13 March one of the country's top aid workers - Karachi-based sanitation expert Parveen Rehman - was shot and killed in the city. According to the independent Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), at least 2,284 people died in violence in Karachi in 2012. Meanwhile, journalists continue to be targeted across the country - two were killed within 72 hours in early March. In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province the Taliban carries on bombing civilians in Peshawar and attacking army posts in the mountains. The militants have launched multiple suicide bombers against police stations in populated areas. On 28 February militants in the north-western tribal areas bombed four boys' schools in the Mohmand agency - bringing to more than 100 the number of schools they have destroyed in the tribal areas since 2011. In Balochistan a separatist insurgency claims more lives every day. Not surprisingly there are serious doubts as to how elections will take place in many areas where there is no law and order. The army has made it clear that it cannot deploy at every polling station and the police appear to be demoralised and unwilling to ensure law and order in many parts of the country. Electioneering will be muted and large gatherings will be impossible because of the fear of suicide bombings. HRCP head IA Rehman has pointed out that half of the National Assembly seats fall in "the fear zone" where voters will be too scared to turn out in sufficient numbers or candidates may withdraw. In other areas candidates may seek endorsement from the extremists to avoid getting killed. Moreover, according to the constitution, the government must resign by mid-March and dissolve the national and provincial parliaments. It must nominate a caretaker government and a prime minister to oversee the elections. But such an interim government will be weak and will not be mandated to go after the extremists. Covert support People are asking why the army does not do more. Army chief General Pervez Kayani says the civilian law enforcement authorities controlled by the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) government needs to carry out its tasks more efficiently. Gen Kayani says that the army will only act if it is requested to do so by the government - something the PPP is loathe to do because it will show abject weakness just before the elections. The PPP-led government has over the years allowed the extremists to flourish by refusing to go after them. Other political parties have given them refuge and covert support. Almost all the extremist groups have a home in Punjab province, run by the opposition Pakistan Muslim League (PML). It has had no scruples about forging electoral alliances with religious groups known for extremist views. If the PML comes to power on the back of such alliances, it will be even more unlikely to crack down on them. Meanwhile, the Asian Development Bank has warned that Pakistan faces a severe balance of payments crisis and would need to borrow at least US $9bn (£6bn) from the IMF before the year is out. The country's foreign exchange reserves have fallen to cover only two months of imports. Ultimately elections will take place. So it behoves all parties - the army, the politicians, the police and the media - to ensure that violence is reduced so that the vote is as free and fair as is possible. But even that looks like a long shot at the moment.

अहमद राशिद लिखते हैं कि पाकिस्तान के इतिहास में सबसे महत्वपूर्ण चुनाव हत्याओं के तांडव के बीच हो रहे हैं-अल्पसंख्यक समूहों, नागरिकों और सैन्य कर्मियों को विभिन्न प्रकार के चरमपंथियों द्वारा निशाना बनाया गया है।


School closures in Hampshire and IoW

Summary: Click on the name of your local authority below to find out information on schools affected by the public sector strike on Thursday.

If you are in doubt, we advise you to contact your child's school to find out more. Go to BBC Hampshire and the Isle of Wight or listen to Radio Solent for the latest updates. HAMPSHIRE For more information go to the council website. ISLE OF WIGHT For more information go to the council website. PORTSMOUTH For more information go to the council website. SOUTHAMPTON For more information go to the council website.

गुरुवार को सार्वजनिक क्षेत्र की हड़ताल से प्रभावित स्कूलों के बारे में जानकारी प्राप्त करने के लिए नीचे दिए गए अपने स्थानीय प्राधिकरण के नाम पर क्लिक करें।


Sri Lankan journalist 'must be' released

Summary: The international pressure group, Human Rights Watch, has called on the Sri Lankan government to release the prominent Tamil journalist, J.S. Tissainayagam.

Human Rights Watch said Sri Lanka was using anti-terrorism laws to silence its peaceful critics. Tissainayagam was arrested in March and charged with inciting violence in articles published in his magazine, the North Eastern Monthly. The magazine has been closed and the journalist is being held in prison in Colombo. Human Rights Watch also called for the release of the Tamil publisher, N. Jasiharan, and his wife, who were also arrested in March.

अंतर्राष्ट्रीय दबाव समूह, ह्यूमन राइट्स वॉच, ने श्रीलंका सरकार से प्रमुख तमिल पत्रकार, जे. एस. टिसैनयगम को रिहा करने का आह्वान किया है।


Should there be more Muslim state schools?

Summary: Will there be a new wave of Muslim state schools opening?

Sean CoughlanEducation correspondent Is the best way to guard against radicalisation to make sure Muslim pupils are in religious state schools that are robustly regulated? When the government unveiled its plans for schools in England, the headlines were taken by the controversy over grammars. But there was another shift in policy which would make it easier for an increase in faith-based free schools. This was presented in the context of allowing more Catholic schools, with Prime Minister Theresa May commending them for high achievement often in areas of deprivation. And, she said, "there is growing demand for them". But expanding faith schools will not be limited to one religion or denomination. And in terms of "growing demand", one of the biggest gaps must be for Muslim faith schools. There are more than 6,800 faith schools in the state school system - but only 28 of them are Muslim, with two more in the pipeline. In terms of the Muslim population, estimated at 2.7 million and with a third aged 15 or under, the number of Muslim state schools is disproportionately small. But the absence of Muslim schools in the state sector does not mean that there are not Muslim schools - it means most of them are low-cost private schools. Even further away from public scrutiny are an unknown number of entirely unregulated, unregistered schools. There have been repeated warnings from Ofsted over the past year about the risks posed by such illegal schools. Would such places exist if there were more Muslim schools in the state sector? Farhan Adam is head of the Madani schools in Leicester, one for girls and one for boys, and he says that for every pupil getting a place, another four have to be turned away. These are part of the state system and he is applying to open another two Muslim free schools, to meet unmet parental demand. He is worried about where some Muslim pupils end up being taught, saying they could be in places "where there are safeguarding issues and questions about radicalisation and extremism". There are also seem to be pupils entirely "missing from the system". Mr Adam says Muslim state schools are able to provide a bridge between parents who want a religious ethos and the need for a good quality education in a place that is safe. Within a state school, he says teachers can make sure that young people have a proper understanding of their religion and how it is compatible with living in a diverse, modern society. The threat of radicalisation comes from young people going online by themselves and getting a "warped version", he says. Ghulam Abbas, an education consultant and former Department for Education official, says there is a need for more Muslim state schools - but the quality is more important than the quantity. He says that in the past, applications for Muslim free schools have been turned down because too much attention was paid to the religious aspect and not enough to the quality of education. The lack of Muslim schools so far has been about a lack of expertise in the community in running successful schools, he says. But he says a new generation of outstanding and outward looking Muslim state schools could be a positive answer to the problem of Muslim youngsters with a "poor understanding of their faith" and who are vulnerable to radicalisation. The east London schoolgirls who headed off to Syria were not in faith schools and the schools caught up in the Trojan Horse claims did not have a religious affiliation. But if ministers want to have more Muslim schools inside the fold of the state system, there will be accusations of segregation and cultural isolation. "Opening up more Muslim faith schools will be divisive - risking further harm to integration by fuelling religious and ethnic segregation," says Stephen Evans of the National Secular Society. "Schools paid for out of public money should be inclusive schools where all children are educated together, irrespective of their faith backgrounds." If there are problems with independent Muslim schools, he says the answer is "to better regulate the independent sector, not to open up more Muslim faith schools in the state sector". Mr Evans also says that even if Muslim parents had an option of a faith school, many would still prefer to send their children to a non-religious school. It's also the case that some Muslim families choose to send their children to other types of faith school. There are Catholic schools where changing demographics mean that a majority of pupils are Muslim. There is a big philosophical dividing point here. England's education system has traditionally had strong links with religious groups and been open to incorporating the religions of new arrivals. This is very unlike a system such as France, which has remained staunchly secular. But which works for integration? By international standards, measured by the OECD, England's schools are successful. In fact, they're very unusual in that the children of migrants are more likely to go to university than children of native parents. The OECD has also measured how much the children of migrants feel as though they belong in the host country. And the country with the lowest sense of "belonging" in their schools is among migrant families in France.

क्या मुस्लिम सरकारी स्कूलों के खुलने की एक नई लहर आएगी?


Forced to fish: Slavery on Thailand's trawlers

Summary: Thailand is the third largest exporter of seafood in the world, supplying supermarkets in Europe and America, but it's accused of crewing fishing boats with Burmese and Cambodian men who've been sold and forced to work as slaves.

By Becky PalmstromBBC News, Thailand Military music is pumping out into the tropical sunshine. In front of us are some 100 police officers standing in rows, and two heavily armed SWAT teams standing at attention. General Chatchawal Suksomjit, deputy chief of police, is walking down the lines, shaking hands, nodding and saluting. With his dark glasses, slicked-back hair and shiny grey uniform he oozes importance. He ushers us on to some waiting police boats and out into the waters of the Malacca Straits, along the border with Malaysia. The general is head of a new committee set up to deal with the trafficking of men into the fishing business - an industry he describes as "dirty, dangerous and difficult". Human rights groups claim the Thai fishing fleet is much worse than this. Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch, who wrote a report on it for the International Organization for Migration says the use of forced labour is "systematic" and "pervasive". "The biggest problem we've seen is that if people can't work, people aren't useful on board, they can be killed and thrown overboard," he says. "It doesn't happen on every boat but it does happen enough to raise serious questions about the lawlessness in this industry." There is also a recruitment crisis. By the Ministry of Labour's count, fishing boats in Thailand are short of 50,000 men. One captain at the port of Chonburi says they are desperate. "Because Thai fishing is difficult, some people we have to force on to the boat," he says. Many boat owners and captains rely on brokers to recruit their workers, but the brokers are often unscrupulous, tricking young men from neighbouring countries into a job from which there is no escape. As the police boats charge out towards the border with Malaysia, we approach four battered fishing boats. The SWAT teams surge on to the deck of the first boat, but meet no resistance. "The focus of the mission today is to find trafficked and forced labour," announces the general in Thai, before ordering the mainly Burmese crew down on to the deck. The crew have holes in their shirts or no shirts at all. Most are barefoot. We slide around on the nets, scales and fish guts on the deck. When I talk in Burmese they speak quietly, glancing nervously at the captain and the crew master. One group say they didn't know they were coming on to a boat when they left Rakhine State in the west of Burma, or Myanmar as it is also known. They owe a broker $750 (£450) for bringing them here. One man glances out from under a mop of salt-soaked hair. "It's been seven months," he says. He still hasn't been paid. With my basic Burmese and the crew's reluctance to talk, it's hard to assess the situation but brokers, deception and debt often go hand-in-hand with forced labour. Typically an illegal worker from Cambodia or Burma meets a broker and is offered a factory job. He accepts and finds himself passed from one broker to another, taken to a port and put on a fishing boat. The victim is then told he owes a lot of money. It's a well-sprung trap. If he escapes, then as an undocumented migrant the police will arrest and deport him. One Cambodian man I spoke to was trapped for three years on a boat without any wages, while he "paid off his debt". He was never told how much he owed. The general and his team cannot talk directly to the Burmese-speaking crew because they haven't brought a translator so determining whether the men are trafficked is not possible. After 20 minutes the general ushers us off the boat. "Wouldn't it make your job easier to have a translator?" I ask. He replies that usually they rely on someone on board who can speak Burmese, such as the crew master. However, it's often the crew master who is accused of the worst cases of abuse and violence. "How do you know there was no forced labour or trafficking here?" I ask. "From what we saw, there was no lock-up or detention room," he says. "We saw no signs of harm on their bodies or in their facial expressions. By looking into their faces and their eyes they didn't look like they had been forced to work." It didn't seem like a foolproof system. When the authorities do rescue trafficked men they often end up in a government-run detention centre on the outskirts of Bangkok. Ken is one of these men. He explains that he was promised a good job in a factory but was forced on to a tiny boat in the open sea where he fished 20 hours a day, seven days a week. When he talks, his rough fingers run over the word L.O.V.E, which is clumsily tattooed across his knuckles. The broker said Ken owed a lot of money for being found a job and taken to the port. Months passed but Ken, like so many others, was never paid. "People said, anyone who tried to escape had their legs broken, their hands broken or were even killed," he says. Desperate to escape, Ken jumped ship and swam for six hours in the open sea, until he was picked up by a yacht and dropped off in the resort of Pattaya. Like many trafficked men, he felt ashamed to return home empty-handed so when the police found him and deported him, he crossed the border illegally again to find work in Thailand. This time he was told there was a job for him in a pineapple canning factory, and he agreed. But there was no factory, just another boat and another insurmountable debt. Fortunately for him, other crew-members managed to smuggle a phone on board to call for help and he was rescued as part of a special operation by Thailand's Department of Special Investigations. Puntrik Smiti, the Deputy Director General at the Ministry of Labour, admits that men like Ken are vulnerable. "There are some good fishing operators who are trying to improve the treatment of workers," she says. "The problem is there are small operators who are unregistered and don't want to come into the system." Only one in six boats is registered, she says, and most of the workers are illegal. She also points out that existing labour laws are inadequate. In fact Thailand's Labour Protection Act exempts workers employed in the fishing industry, while other ministerial regulations exclude boats with a crew of less than 20, or those that travel outside Thai waters for more than a year. Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch says it is on these long-haul boats that the worst abuses take place. "If you're talking about a fish caught on a Thai boat that has gone overseas, that has gone to Malaysian waters, Indonesian waters or further afield, you're definitely talking about a fish tainted with forced labour," he says. "If you're talking about a fish caught in Thai waters, the chances might be less. But there are much fewer fish caught that way. And now the major exporting is coming from the overseas catch." The effect of local over-fishing is forcing Thai boats to go as far afield as Yemen to maintain an export business worth $7bn annually. Mother ships refuel boats far from shore and transfer crews, ice and fish at sea. Trapped at sea, workers cannot escape or complain about their conditions. The system also muddies the supply chain because fish are mixed at sea, and often again at the ports and processing plants, before being sold to larger companies for export. Max Tunon of the International Labour Organisation, who published a report on the industry in September, says it is "close to impossible" to disentangle Thailand's fish supply chains. Consumer pressure may one day force the industry to make these supply chains more transparent. Mackerel, sardines and other Thai fish are bought by some Western supermarkets and restaurants, while household brands such as John West and Chicken of the Sea are both subsidiaries of the largest exporter of Thai seafood, the Thai Union Group. For its part, the Thai Union Group says it only sources fish from boats that are properly registered, with crews that have proper working documents. A representative says the company works with its partners to "take meaningful steps to promote human rights" in all its business operations. Mackerel and sardines accounted for only 6% of its revenue in 2012. Tuna is caught by a different fleet of boats. A few days later in Burma, we sit on the floor of a bamboo shack in Bago, 100km (60 miles) north of Rangoon. This is Ken's home. Although idyllic, the poverty is palpable. Ken's parents haven't heard anything from their son, who is now 32, for four years. His father is thin, with a gaunt face and red teeth from chewing betel nut. His mother is plumper and has a comb holding up her grey hair. I show them a video of Ken. "That's him! That's my son," his mother cries in recognition. She raises her hands to her face and weeps, while her husband places his hand close to hers. "We didn't know anything," she says. "We heard nothing." "I am so happy, so happy," Ken's father says, unable to tear his red-rimmed eyes from the screen. It's hard to know just how many more families like Ken's are waiting for sons and husbands trapped at sea. With some vessels spending months or even years away, without being checked, the system encourages abuse. Ultimately, as one fishing boat captain told us, if the Burma or Cambodian economies boom and there are jobs for men back home, the Thai fishing fleet will be in trouble. This could also force the industry to change its ways, quite aside from any consumer pressure. For now though, the flow of men trafficked into slavery on fishing boats continues.

थाईलैंड दुनिया में समुद्री भोजन का तीसरा सबसे बड़ा निर्यातक है, जो यूरोप और अमेरिका में सुपरमार्केट की आपूर्ति करता है, लेकिन उस पर बर्मी और कंबोडियन पुरुषों के साथ मछली पकड़ने वाली नौकाओं को बनाने का आरोप है जिन्हें बेचा गया है और दास के रूप में काम करने के लिए मजबूर किया गया है।


Cruz v Trump: Puppies and pledges

Summary: When is a pledge not a pledge?

Anthony ZurcherNorth America reporter@awzurcheron Twitter That's the question hanging over the heads of two former presidential contenders here in Cleveland - the last two men Donald Trump vanquished on his path to the Republican nomination. Both Ohio Governor John Kasich and Texas Senator Ted Cruz joined their fellow candidates in signing cards promising to endorse their party's eventual nominee "no matter who it is". The gimmick was devised by Republicans back in September to prevent Donald Trump - who they never thought would win the nomination - from undermining the party and possibly launching an independent presidential bid in the general election. Instead, it's become a cudgel that Mr Trump has used to bludgeon those - like Mr Cruz and Mr Kasich - who have not fallen in line (despite his own hinting, at times, that he would not honour the same pledge if he wasn't treated nicely by the party). "They signed a pledge saying they will abide, saying they will back the candidate of the party," Trump said at a Maine campaign stop in June. "They broke their word. In my opinion, they should never be allowed to run for public office again because what they did is disgraceful." "Disgraceful" is one of the kinder words that Trump supporters are using to describe Ted Cruz's speech before the National Convention on Wednesday night, in which he pointedly refused to embrace the party's standard-bearer. As boos showered down on the Texan, he urged listeners to "vote their conscience" - with hardly a word of praise for Mr Trump. New Jersey Chris Christie, the first and most vociferous of the former rivals to endorse Mr Trump, said the speech was "awful" and "selfish". New York Congressman Peter King called the Texas senator an anatomical expletive. Trump son Donald Jr accused Cruz of "total disloyalty". On Thursday morning, Mr Cruz - who had been on the receiving end of numerous personal attacks from Mr Trump in the last days of the Republican primary season - fired back. "I am not in the habit of supporting people who attack my wife and attack my father," he said. "That pledge was not a blanket commitment that if you go and slander and attack Heidi, that I'm going to nonetheless come like a servile puppy dog and say thank you very much for maligning my wife and maligning my father." During primary season, Mr Trump had implied that Mr Cruz's father could be tied to the 1963 assassination of President John F Kennedy and tweeted out an unflattering picture of Mrs Cruz. The Texan added that he could have taken an easier option, to "turn tail and run and don't come to the convention. There are a bunch of people that did that. I ain't one of them." That was a shot at some of the other Trump rivals - including Jeb Bush, Rand Paul and Mr Kasich - who had avoided the convention hall altogether. Mr Kasich, however, has been in around Cleveland all week. And while he's kept his distance from the convention site, he didn't avoid his own spat with the Trump team. Paul Manafort, Mr Trump's campaign chair, called the popular governor of this key general election swing state "petulant" and "embarrassing to his party in Ohio." "That's a dumb, dumb, thing,'' Manafort said during a breakfast on Monday hosted by Bloomberg Politics. "Will John Kasich finally grow up? Maybe. If he does, we'll welcome him." Former Trump advisor Roger Stone said Mr Kasich was a "pathetic stoner" who is "acting like a child". Last month, Mr Kasich had compared breaking his endorsement pledge to a "divorce" - an unpleasant but occasionally necessary action. "Look, I'm sorry this has happened. We'll see where it ends up," he said. "But at this point, I can't do it." Although Mr Kasich never set foot in the convention hall, the Ohio delegation was full of supporters - many of whom said they appreciated what their governor was doing. "You cannot make comments about Muslims and about the handicapped and about women and not expect that at some point that pledge gets thinner and thinner until it breaks," said former Ohio Attorney General Betty Montgomery. "I think he took a principled stand and I respect him for that." Many delegates were less forgiving. "One thing about Republicans, we may disagree on candidates, but at the end of the day we believe in values and morals and ethics," said Georgia delegate Rachel Little, who at one point supported Mr Cruz. "Those men owed it to their supporters, owed it to their party, owed it to the families, owed it to their own core to honour that pledge." Even Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus said the pledge is "more than a piece of paper". "This is a data exchange agreement that campaigns have signed with the RNC," he said in a television interview on Wednesday. "In other words, 'I want your stuff and your data' and in order to get that stuff and data, what we ask them is that you actually agree to support the Republican nominee." On Thursday morning, Mr Trump took to Twitter to respond to Mr Cruz's speech and the signs of strain his party was seemingly showing. "Other than a small group of people who have suffered massive and embarrassing losses, the party is VERY united," he wrote. "Great love in the arena!" The arena may love Mr Trump, and they may shower him with cheers when he accepts the nomination on Thursday night. For now, however, some prominent politicians are not playing along - pledges be damned.

प्रतिज्ञा कब प्रतिज्ञा नहीं होती है?


Gravitational waves: So many new toys to unwrap

Summary: Whenever there's a big science discovery, it's always nice to get a historical perspective. And so here goes with the remarkable observation of gravitational waves emanating from the merger of two dead stars, or neutron stars, some 130 million light-years from Earth.

Jonathan AmosScience correspondent@BBCAmoson Twitter It's 50 years since the existence of these stellar remnants was confirmed (July 1967) by the mighty Northern Irish astronomer Jocelyn Bell Burnell. It's more than 40 years since we realised neutron stars might occur in pairs, or binaries, as we call them. "And from that time, it's been clear that occasionally they would approach closer together and have a spectacular splat of some kind," says English Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees. Well, on 17 August this year, at precisely 12:41:04 UTC, a pair was duly observed to do just that. To have a big splat. Gravitational waves - Ripples in the fabric of space-time The big fuss is that the event was recorded first from its gravitational wave signature, the way it warped space-time (a major breakthrough); and then through its light emissions at many different wavelengths - from gamma-rays all the way through to radio waves - over subsequent days. This combination of observations has never been possible before and it provides significant new insights into the workings of neutron stars where the density of matter is theorised to be perhaps a few hundred thousand to a few hundred million tonnes per cubic centimetre. Weird stuff. "The neutron star is a laboratory for extreme physics; it's exotic material, very neutron-rich; and when it's torn apart you get exotic radiation and very rapid neutron-capture processes that produce elements like gold. So, it's very exciting," enthuses Sir Martin. The detection of gravitational waves by the LIGO labs in the US and the VIRGO facility in Italy really is opening up a new era in astronomy. One very smart calculation from the 17 August event is the determination of the Hubble Constant, which describes the expansion rate of the Universe. The further away you look, the faster galaxies are receding from us. Ever since the American Edwin Hubble first detailed this relationship in 1929, astronomers have meticulously tried to put a value on it because it helps us gauge the size and age of the Universe. It's been done by measuring the distance and velocities of a large number of stars in a good sample of galaxies. The stars have all been so-called "standard candles" - objects that shine with a known power output. If you understand this absolute quantity and compare it with the stars' apparent brightness on the sky, you can figure out their distance from Earth using the inverse square law. But it's not easy because no one standard candle will do the job; you must use one type to calibrate the next in a series of steps. "It's like taping a large number of rulers together. Every time you do it, there's a chance for a little bit of wobble, and a little bit of extra uncertainty creeps in,” explains Will Farr from the University of Birmingham. "[But] because gravitational waves can directly measure distances, we don't need to tape rulers together." Simply put, they neatly package the distance information for us. "The absolute intensity of an event is encoded in the signal shape, and the apparent intensity is what you measure with your gravitational wave detector - and from 'one over r squared', you can then tell how far away it was," says Karsten Danzmann from the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics. You still need a velocity measurement to go with the distance, and that is obtained from analysing the light associated with the event that generated the gravitational waves. Hence, the thrill we’ve seen this week from astronomers in being able to sense gravitational waves AND light from the same source at the same time. Bernie Schutz from Cardiff University first proposed working out the Hubble Constant in this way some 30 years ago. "It's amazing to have done it after all this time," he told me. "From this event, we get a value of 70 kilometres per second per megaparsec." What does that mean? Well, a megaparsec is 3.26 million light-years, so it follows that cosmic expansion increases by 70km/second for every 3.26 million light-years we look further out into space. Now, this is just one data point with a fair bit of uncertainty associated with it (the range goes from 62 to 82), so no-one is yet yelling from the rooftops. But there is good confidence that as more and more gravitational wave observations are made, the error bars will narrow significantly. The speculation is that within 10 years or so, sufficient observations could have been acquired to provide an independent check on the conventional technique. The American Nobel Laureate Adam Riess told me: "This feels like Christmas. Gravitational waves are giving us so many presents; there is even something under the tree for cosmologists! "I think this is a very promising technique, especially for the near future after LIGO collects a few tens of these and we can begin reaping the dividends of averaging." Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

जब भी कोई बड़ी विज्ञान खोज होती है, तो एक ऐतिहासिक परिप्रेक्ष्य प्राप्त करना हमेशा अच्छा होता है। और इसलिए यहाँ पृथ्वी से लगभग 130 मिलियन प्रकाश वर्ष दूर दो मृत सितारों, या न्यूट्रॉन सितारों के विलय से निकलने वाली गुरुत्वाकर्षण तरंगों के उल्लेखनीय अवलोकन के साथ जाता है।


Local elections 2021: What is the financial future for West Northamptonshire?

Summary: In 2018 Northamptonshire County Council effectively went bankrupt - twice. The government ordered the authority to be scrapped. With elections for the unitary councils that replaced it taking place, the BBC asked candidates in one of them - West Northamptonshire - if it would fare any better?

In his damning report on debt-ridden Northamptonshire County Council, the government-appointed inspector Max Caller said "living within budget constraints is not part of the culture" of the authority. Written in 2018, his report said the Conservative-run council should be scrapped. The government listened. Along with the county council, which was called the "worst-run" authority in the country by Conservative MP for Kettering Philip Hollobone, the area's seven borough and district councils were also axed. Fast-forward to 2021, and elections are taking place for the two successor organisations which replaced the various councils. The new councils, both unitary authorities, are West Northamptonshire Council and North Northamptonshire Council. But back in 2018, another theory to the one put forward by Mr Caller had been in play. Many, including the then county council leader Heather Smith, who had appealed to the government for fairer funding the year before, felt there simply was not enough money available for the ever increasing costs of services, particularly in adult social care. Financial pluses and minuses of the new councils £520mCounty council debt to be split between the new unitaries £85mTotal savings associated with the transformation into two new authorities £49mTransformation savings already delivered £36mSavings still to be delivered. Local government expert Professor Tony Travers believes West Northamptonshire Council will fare better than its predecessor - but only because it has to. Mr Travers, a senior lecturer at the London School of Economics, said it will face "the same demand and financial difficulty" that helped bring down the county council. "There is no likelihood of any let up," he says. "The new authorities can look forward to flat spending on services other than social care. "That means reductions. "Do the new authorities manage their money better? Almost certainly. "The hope and expectation is they will balance their books." He said services such as libraries, street lighting and roads "will remain under pressure for years". Labour's Danielle Stone was the opposition leader on now defunct Northampton Borough Council and a county councillor. "The Local Government Association says children's and adult social care has been starved of money," she says. "The government hasn't played fair by local authorities and has starved them of cash. "We were victims of insufficient funding, but that was compounded by the ideological basis of the Conservative administration at the county council - that low council tax is more important than services and outsourcing is a panacea. "Those were ideological decisions. It wasn't just financial mismanagement." Mrs Stone fears the new authority's finances "are precarious". "In the first year it is benefitting from the reserves it has inherited. That's not sustainable." Saving for future pressure at West Northants Council £95mWest Northamptonshire Council's reserves - money for a rainy day £14.8mEstimated budget deficit 2022/23 £13.3mEstimated budget deficit 2023/24 £11.3mEstimated budget deficit 2024/25 Liberal Democrat Sally Beardsworth pointed to the amount of money wasted by the county council. Most notable, she says, was the "obscene cost" of its new Northampton-based headquarters, One Angel Square. Having spent £53m building it, the authority was forced to sell the building and rent it back. But she also says adequate funding was "the crux of the problem" and warns it will be again. "Government has withdrawn money since austerity," she says. "The only thing that will end up happening is we will just do our statutory stuff. There will be no jam, just bread and butter." Green Party spokesman Steve Miller is equally worried. "Fairer funding is still not in sight," he says. "National government has left local authorities out to dry. "The social care budget deficit is just going to grow. "I don't see how the two ends of national government cutting funding and increased service costs can meet without more council tax." He says while it can be argued fairer funding was not the cause of the county council's collapse, "even if you have a council going all guns blazing and focused on running the best services it can, there's still going to be a funding gap". West Northamptonshire Council's budget for 2021-22 £712.7mTotal budget of the new unitary £113.7mCost budgeted for adult social care, community and wellbeing £76.6mThe amount West Northants will have to pay to the new Children's Trust ZeroThe amount of cuts being made in 2021-22 Conservative Jonathan Nunn, the former leader of Northampton Borough, acknowledges the pressure local government remains under, but has "a much higher level of confidence" in the West Northamptonshire authority. He admits issues such as an economy recovering from a post-Covid world which could put a squeeze on council tax and business rates income will likely lead to "a worsening poverty situation". But he points to the new authority's budget for 2021-22 which does not feature any service reductions. He insists the work done at county-level in the years since its financial collapse has been vital. Government appointed commissioners oversaw the authority as it managed to balance its final budget. "Everything was examined with the commissioners," Mr Nunn says. "It was a continual journey to find savings and do things better with less money." Ultimately, he says, thinks have to improve: "The basic premise is a huge amount of resource has gone towards creating a unitary council. "After all this, it has to be better." Find BBC News: East of England on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. If you have a story suggestion email eastofenglandnews@bbc.co.uk Related Internet Links West Northamptonshire Council

2018 में नॉर्थम्पटनशायर काउंटी काउंसिल प्रभावी रूप से दिवालिया हो गई-दो बार। सरकार ने अधिकार को समाप्त करने का आदेश दिया। एकर जगह लेने वाली एकात्मक परिषदों के लिए चुनाव होने के साथ, बीबीसी ने उनमें से एक-वेस्ट नॉर्थम्पटनशायर-में उम्मीदवारों से पूछा कि क्या यह बेहतर होगा?


Challenger banks: Why breaking up will be hard to do

Summary: If you've lost faith with your bank because you blame it for the financial crisis, or are upset with corporate greed, or have just had enough of their IT problems, you don't really have many alternatives.

By Katie HopeBusiness reporter, BBC News The UK's biggest five banks - Barclays, Lloyds, HSBC, RBS and Santander - dominate the marketplace. Excluding Santander, the other four banks together have 85% of the personal current account market. Labour leader Ed Miliband wants to reshape the banking landscape. He is calling for existing banks to be forced to sell off hundreds of branches, thereby increasing the number of main UK banks by adding at least two new "challenger" banks. Mr Miliband's view is that more banking competition would lead to more consumer choice and ultimately lower charges. The UK did once have a much more diverse banking landscape. But wholesale demutualisation of building societies in the 1990s, together with the subsequent 2008 financial crisis, has seen many of the mutuals and the competition that went with them disappear as they were absorbed into bigger companies. Last month, business secretary Vince Cable described the building societies' demutualisation as "one of the greatest acts of economic vandalism in modern times", leading to commercial banks "abandoning locally based relationship banking in the decade before the recent financial crisis". Britain now has just 47 building societies, from the biggest - Nationwide and the Yorkshire - to small, local societies that have only a few thousand members. That's a far cry from the 481 that existed in 1970. To get back to this level of banking variety, observers say actions will need to go a lot further than Mr Miliband has suggested. Ambition required Lydia Prieg, a senior researcher at independent think-tank the New Economics Foundation and former banker at Goldman Sachs, says even if the proposals are implemented, the UK landscape will not change fundamentally. "We need to be much more ambitious. It is not just about increasing the number of banks, but increasing the different kinds of banks," she says. According to Ms Prieg, the UK is an international anomaly. In Canada, Germany, France and Austria, to name but a few, different kinds of institutions thrive, including: The different kinds of ownership structures of such banks create different behaviour incentives, according to Ms Prieg. "Our banks are listed on the stock exchange, which means they are focused on the latest quarter to maximise shareholder returns. Whereas a credit union is a local bank with a specific mandate, in sync with local members. It's relationship banking." Ms Prieg suggests that the government could dramatically increase the market share of these kinds of banks by forcing two High Street giants - RBS and Lloyds Banking Group, in which the government holds significant stakes following the financial crisis - to sell off their branches completely. Disgruntled customers But with the government showing little inclination to take this kind of action, most analysts believe the impact of existing building societies and more recent upstarts, such as Virgin Money, remains limited. "I don't expect the challenger banks to have a meaningful impact for the prices and services of existing banks," says Investec banking analyst Ian Gordon. Mr Gordon also points out that customer inertia remains a major issue, with most customers opting to remain with the same bank they started out with, however poor the service. But there are signs that the recent spate of banking scandals is prompting disgruntled customers to finally vote with their feet. Two separate issues have put banks and the services they offer firmly in the spotlight. Firstly, the software update at NatWest which saw customers denied access to core services. And secondly, Barclays' payment of a £290m fine for allegedly fixing the London interbank lending rate (Libor), which underpins trillions of pounds' worth of loans. Last Friday, the Co-op reported a 48% increase in online current account applications for the past two weeks compared to the previous two weeks. Nationwide says it has seen a 45% rise in people transferring their main account to the Society in the past fortnight. Meanwhile, the Cumberland Building Society has reported that current account applications are running 50% higher than the normal weekly average. "Customers now want to think about a different way of doing banking," says Hilary McVitty, head of external affairs for the Building Societies Association. Signs of change And increasingly there are alternatives on offer. In 2010, Metro Bank became Britain's first new High Street bank in more than 100 years. It now has 10 stores, as it calls them, across greater London. Co-founder Vernon Hill, who created Commerce Bancorp in 1973, describes Metro Bank's proposition as "local bankers making local loans". "Small and medium-sized companies in particular want one person who knows their whole business," he says. On an even smaller scale, Burnley Savings and Loans Ltd officially opened its doors in September 2011. The company was created by David Fishwick, a local entrepreneur who started the firm under the slogan "Bank on Dave!" after finding many of his customers were struggling to obtain loans from their High Street banks. The firm now issues loans ranging from small personal loans to finance for businesses. It may be small, but there are signs that the banking landscape is finally shifting once more.

यदि आपने अपने बैंक पर विश्वास खो दिया है क्योंकि आप वित्तीय संकट के लिए उसे दोषी ठहराते हैं, या कॉर्पोरेट लालच से परेशान हैं, या अभी-अभी उनकी आईटी समस्याओं का सामना करना पड़ा है, तो आपके पास वास्तव में कई विकल्प नहीं हैं।


Coronavirus crisis 'could help ease Gulf tensions' - UAE

Summary: Countries in the Gulf region - Iran and the six Gulf Arab states - will emerge "weaker, poorer and damaged" from the coronavirus pandemic, according to the UAE's Minister of State, Dr Anwar Gargash. Speaking to the BBC from Abu Dhabi, he said the answer was for the whole region to try to de-escalate its tensions.

By Frank GardnerBBC security correspondent The United Arab Emirates (UAE), one of the wealthiest countries in the world, made early preparations for the onset of the pandemic, buying in testing kits and setting up production lines for face masks. Out of a total population of nine million, it has so far registered 23,358 cases and 220 deaths. Iran, just across the waters of the Gulf, has been the worst-hit country in the region with over 122,000 cases registered and more than 7,000 deaths. The UAE has sent medical aid to Iran, as well as to the UK. "We knew back in January this was coming our way, that it was not going to stay in China, so we moved very quickly to prepare for it," says Dr Gargash. As far back as late January, he says, the UAE's national security advisor warned that the coming pandemic was going to completely overshadow concerns about the ongoing war in Yemen, where the UAE deployed forces against the Iran-aligned Houthi rebels for years before scaling back its involvement. With the virus being a common enemy for everyone, Dr Gargash said he was hopeful it could lead to a de-escalation of some of the regional disputes and tensions that have dogged the region. Yemen, for example, has experienced more than five years of civil war that has dragged in outside countries and shattered that country's already fragile healthcare system. The UAE, like all its Gulf Arab neighbours, has a large, fluid population of expatriate workers mainly from poorer countries in South Asia. Many live in crowded conditions or shared rooms and one area of Dubai, the UAE's second city, initially showed such a high level of infections it had to be temporarily cordoned off and sanitised before being reopened. Wearing a mask everywhere in public is mandatory. "You just get used to it," says James, a Briton living in Dubai. "It makes us feel a lot safer and there's tonnes of testing going on. The secret police are everywhere [so people are complying]." Between 30-40,000 tests are now being carried out each day using a nasal swab and there are still around 700 new infections registered daily. The UAE is also working on a pioneering stem cell therapy, so far tested on 73 patients, that Dr Gargash says has shown some encouraging results. "We had a patient in ICU [intensive care unit] in a coma," he said. "After the treatment they recovered." Dr Gargash believes the pandemic will lead to greater investment in healthcare technology - including Artifical Intelligence - but also to austerity. "The biggest challenge is going to be an economic one. We have had the double-hit of the pandemic and falling oil prices." Governments in the region, he says, will be judged on how they manage the coming austerity measures.

संयुक्त अरब अमीरात के राज्य मंत्री डॉ. अनवर गर्गश के अनुसार, खाड़ी क्षेत्र के देश-ईरान और छह खाड़ी अरब राज्य-कोरोना वायरस महामारी से "कमजोर, गरीब और क्षतिग्रस्त" होकर उभरेंगे। अबू धाबी से बीबीसी से बात करते हुए, उन्होंने कहा कि इसका जवाब पूरे क्षेत्र के लिए था कि वह अपने तनाव को कम करने की कोशिश करे।


Dark sky stargazing at Long Mynd

Summary: A Shropshire beauty spot is staging its first stargazing event since being awarded dark sky status.

Four locations on the Long Mynd and in Carding Mill Valley have been given the highest Dark Sky Discovery Site (DSDS) classification as the Milky Way can be seen with the naked eye. An exhibition about the sites' status was held on Saturday ahead of an observation event in the evening. "This recognition is a great achievement for us," a spokesman said. The dark sky status was awarded in August after an application was submitted in March.

एक श्रॉपशायर सौंदर्य स्थल डार्क स्काई का दर्जा दिए जाने के बाद से अपना पहला स्टारगेजिंग कार्यक्रम आयोजित कर रहा है।


Harvard's so-called 'white privilege' class

Summary: It was the kind of story tailor-made for the right-wing echo chamber. Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government wanted all its first-year students to attend a mandatory orientation session to consider their "power and privilege". To "check it", even.

By Anthony ZurcherEditor, Echo Chambers After all, just a few weeks ago Princeton freshman Tal Fortgang became a cause celebre on the right with his college newspaper essay - reprinted in Time magazine - in which he refused to apologise for his economic and race-based privilege, arguing that it was the result of the hard work of his forebears. The only problem, it seems, is that the Harvard story is not exactly accurate. In the latest round of what has been an increasingly contentious debate about class- and race-based identity in US society, New York magazine's Kat Stoeffel wrote an article about a Harvard government school activist group, HKS Speak Out, that claimed the administration agreed to incorporate training - she originally wrote that it was a "class" - in understanding privilege as part of its new student orientation. "Checking Your Privilege 101", Stoeffel called it - a line that caught on so quickly that a few subsequent news stories appeared to think that was the actual name of a class. She quoted Reetu Mody, a first-year master's student pushing for the new requirement, who served up some red meat for conservatives intent on finding examples of Ivy League liberal bias. "We're at one of the most powerful institutions in the world, yet we never critically examine power and privilege and what it means to have access to this power," Ms Mody told Stoeffel. Stoeffel explained how the drive to add the training first began: Mody and other students began to organise for privilege training in the fall, when they bonded over their shared experiences of classroom hostility toward racial critiques. (Mody herself once walked out of a class on implicit cognitive biases when the professor told her, "This isn't a discussion about racism.") The group held meetings to share stories of "racial insensitivity" and created a webpage to allow students to anonymously discuss their experiences. Ms Mody said that privilege awareness is an essential part of an Ivy League education: If you don't have an understanding of sociology, political science, critical race theory, feminist critique and revisionist history, it's going to be very difficult to talk about certain groups' experiences, and why these other groups continually have this advantage in society. Conservatives responded with indignation. Harvard is making "white privilege training mandatory", wrote the Daily Caller in its article headline. The story was picked up by the Drudge Report. Fox News pundit Bill O'Reilly dedicated a segment of his television programme to the topic, calling Harvard's reported "far-left" orientation session "inherently racist". Noah Rothman of Mediaite said that ivory tower redoubts like Harvard were threatened by Fortgang's much-publicised essay: Higher education is now engaged in a petulant circling of the wagons around the bankrupt notion that the accidents of birth absolve one of fault for their failures or rob them of responsibility for their successes. The American Thinker's Rick Moran says that while there is "nothing wrong" with challenging "personal assumptions about race and privilege," that's not what Ms Mody was suggesting: The problem becomes apparent when, as the young activist so perfectly illustrates, one disagrees with the dominant racial narrative that everyone is a racist - even if they are unaware of it on a conscious level - and that such attitudes must be exposed, criticised, and eventually expunged - even to the point of suppressing speech. On Wednesday Harvard tried to throw cold water on the controversy. "There appears to be false information in the media being conveyed by reporters who have not contacted Harvard Kennedy School officials to verify the accuracy of the information," Kennedy School director of media relations Doug Gavel wrote in a statement. "Contrary to one article that has been picked up by others, the school is not planning to offer classes, coursework, or sessions devoted specifically to 'power and privilege'." He wrote in an email to the BBC that the administration had "told the students categorically" that it had "no intention of offering" such a mandatory session. He added: We have conveyed that we are committed to revamping our current session on diversity offered at orientation to something that will help students better understand the broad impact of identity on their decision making as future policy makers and equip them with the tools necessary to engage in constructive dialogue. On Friday morning, HKS Speak Out issued a press release in which it reasserted that the school administration had agreed to a "required session during orientation", although it employed the same "broad impact of identity" language used by Mr Gavel. "HKS Speak Out firmly believes that without understanding the socio-historical context of power, students cannot become effective policymakers," the release states. One need only look at the firestorm generated by the New York magazine story to see that the phrase "check your privilege" and even the word privilege itself have moved outside the realm of rational discussion. It's not surprising, then, that Harvard has been reluctant to connect the term to whatever changes it may be making to its orientation programme. (For an interesting interview with the Wellesley professor who popularised the label in the 1980s, see this New Yorker article.) Most people who get into Harvard's prestigious Kennedy School could be called "privileged", as the programme churns out politicians and public policy leaders the way Kentucky does NBA basketball players. A little acknowledgement of that status, and an understanding of the responsibility it brings, would be welcomed by many. But that kind of discussion does not appear to be possible in today's highly charged partisan climate. A single article goes online, and it is unquestioningly repeated throughout the internet in a modern media game of "telephone". Maybe Harvard can make it a case study in a new class, "The decline and fall of modern US political debate 101".

यह उस तरह की कहानी थी जो दक्षिणपंथी प्रतिध्वनि कक्ष के लिए बनाई गई थी। हार्वर्ड विश्वविद्यालय के कैनेडी स्कूल ऑफ गवर्नमेंट चाहते थे कि इसके सभी प्रथम वर्ष के छात्र अपनी "शक्ति और विशेषाधिकार" पर विचार करने के लिए एक अनिवार्य अभिविन्यास सत्र में भाग लें। यहां तक कि "इसे जाँचने" के लिए भी।


Holocaust Memorial Day: Survivor recalls 'hell on Earth'

Summary: Aged 16, Frank Bright was taken to Auschwitz. He avoided the gas chambers, but his mother and father did not. Now 88, he visits schools in the UK to talk to pupils, in the hope that future generations will learn from the mistakes of the past.

By Andrew WoodgerBBC News Mr Bright can still remember the "terrible" stench of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the concentration camp where he arrived on 12 October 1944. "It was the stench of death," he says. "People had the power of life and death over you. It was hell on Earth." Mr Bright was living in Prague when he was sent to Auschwitz with his mother a fortnight after his father. He made it out. They never did. His parents were among an estimated 1.1 million people killed at the camp in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War Two. He has never forgotten their fate, and is determined that no-one else does, either. Now retired and living near Ipswich, Mr Bright still visits schools in the area to share his own terrible experiences with students. Born Frank Brichta in Berlin in 1928, he was brought up as the only child of Hermann and Toni Brichta. The Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, but it was not until 1938 that the Jewish family decided to leave. "Things started to get pretty bad. I remember a newspaper vendor on the corner had cartoons on his stand which were anti-Semitic," Mr Bright says. "The Nazi newspapers showed Jews with big noses either dressed as Russian communists or American capitalists in top hats. Either way you couldn't win; you were a menace." The family fled, but by Mr Bright's own admission, went "the wrong way". They headed east to Czechoslovakia because his father, who was born there, had a Czech passport, rather than attempting to emigrate to western Europe, the United States or Palestine. They settled in Prague when Mr Bright was 10, but the Germans were not far behind, occupying Czechoslovakia in March 1939. As Jews, the family faced restrictions on what they could do, although Mr Bright did attend a Jewish school until its closure in 1942. In July the following year, they were sent to the Jewish ghetto created in the military fort of Teresienstadt, north of Prague. By then aged 14, he was living in a separate part of the fort from his parents and working as a locksmith, although he was still allowed to meet up with them. But in October 1944, his father was put on a train to Auschwitz as the mass evacuation of the ghetto's inmates to concentration camps began. It was the last time Mr Bright saw him. A fortnight later, he and his mother made the same journey. Upon arrival, mother and son were separated. Mr Bright was declared fit for work, but he believes his mother was sent straight to the gas chambers. "My parents were murdered there: my father first and then my mother on the day she arrived there with me," he says. "I was turned to the other side for people chosen to work: not to work properly, but to be worked to death. "At the time I didn't know what was happening - we were confused, but I think my mother had an idea." A few hours later, when he spoke to fellow prisoners, he learned what the chimney fumes and smoke signified. "I remember wondering which came from my mother," he said. "As a method of mental preservation, an emotional curtain comes down - it doesn't sink in. "There were no tears at the time - you couldn't afford them if you wanted to survive. "My grieving came later in life." He left Auschwitz five days later to be put to work in a propeller factory in Friedland in modern-day Poland. "The aim of the SS was to kill us, too. The fact that they wanted to make use of us wasn't out of the goodness of their hearts." After seven months of slave labour, the 16-year-old was freed in May 1945 when Soviet troops pressed west and the Germans retreated. After making his way back to Prague into the care of the Red Cross, he eventually secured his passage to London where he was able to live with distant relatives, who he had only met once before. Eventually he was able to build a life for himself as a civil engineer in Canada before returning to the UK to work with local authorities, including Suffolk County Council. He married an English woman, Cynthia, and the couple have two daughters: Toni (named after his mother) and Miriam, who are both in their 50s. But his traumatic childhood experiences left an indelible mark. "My life was turned upside down, because it wasn't normal: you wouldn't normally spend your youth being marked as a Jew with a yellow star and you normally have an education, of which I was deprived," he says. "You aren't normally split from your parents in a ghetto where they are themselves split from one another. "You're not normally on your own after that in a slave labour camp. "When liberated, you know full well you have no parents left; you're on your own with no education and life will be very difficult." Mr Bright has no grandchildren, but for several years he has been sharing his experiences in schools. It "keeps me going," he says. The Holocaust is a compulsory part of the school curriculum. "It is extremely important that it is still taught, because it is the modern history of Europe and it can help you judge what Europe and Brexit is all about," Mr Bright says. "I'm very depressed about the current state of the world, because obviously people haven't learnt and, as some philosopher said, if people don't learn from the past, they will repeat their mistakes." Holocaust Memorial Day is on 27 January each year - marking the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

16 साल की उम्र में, फ्रैंक ब्राइट को ऑशविट्ज़ ले जाया गया। वह गैस चैंबर से बचते थे, लेकिन उनके माता-पिता ने ऐसा नहीं किया। अब 88 साल की उम्र में, वे छात्रों से बात करने के लिए यूके के स्कूलों में जाते हैं, इस उम्मीद में कि आने वाली पीढ़ियां अतीत की गलतियों से सीखेंगी।


Charlie Sloth: Radio 1 and 1Xtra DJ leaving station immediately

Summary: Charlie Sloth has left BBC Radio 1 with immediate effect.

It was announced earlier this month that The Rap Show host would be leaving the job after nearly 10 years on Radio 1 and 1Xtra. But Radio 1 has agreed with Charlie that he will not do the 10 remaining shows that were originally planned. Charlie had been in the spotlight for storming the stage and delivering a sweary, Kanye West-esque rant at an awards show last Thursday. He has since apologised on Twitter. The DJ's 1Xtra Rap Show was nominated in the best specialist music show category at the Audio & Radio Industry Awards (ARIAS), alongside Soundtracking with Edith Bowman. When former Radio 1 DJ Edith was announced as the winner, Charlie got on stage, took the mic and shared his thoughts. They weren't positive. Radio 1 and 1Xtra Controller Ben Cooper accepted the station of the year award on behalf of Radio 1 shortly after. "I'd just like to say Charlie Sloth has left the building and is leaving Radio 1 and 1Xtra. Apologies," he said. Charlie apologised for the rant on his Twitter account on Saturday. The DJ is yet to announce where he'll be heading after the BBC. When he announced his departure, Charlie said he'd decided to "seek a new challenge". One of the "moments that will live forever" he mentioned is Drake's Fire In The Booth. Charlie told Newsbeat at the time that getting the world's biggest rapper on to his freestyle segment on Radio 1 and 1Xtra was "four or five years" in the making. It involved sneaking Drake into New Broadcasting House at 2.30am, something so secret only Charlie's producer knew about it. Warning: Drake's full Fire In The Booth contains some strong language that you may find offensive. Earlier this month, Radio 1 Controller Ben Cooper thanked Charlie for being an "important part of Radio 1 and 1Xtra's history". "For nearly 10 years his passion and energy for his music and his shows has been second to none." Dev will be filling in hosting The 8th until Christmas. Radio 1 says new presenters will be announced for both of Charlie's shows in the coming weeks. Follow Newsbeat on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 every weekday on BBC Radio 1 and 1Xtra - if you miss us you can listen back here.

चार्ली स्लोथ ने तत्काल प्रभाव से बीबीसी रेडियो 1 छोड़ दिया है।


Tony Awards 2016: Winners list

Summary: A full list of winners from the 70th Tony Awards.

Best play Winner: The Humans Eclipsed The Father King Charles III Best musical Winner: Hamilton Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Waitress School of Rock: The Musical Bright Star Best revival of a play Winner: Arthur Miller's A View From the Bridge Arthur Miller's The Crucible Blackbird Long Day's Journey Into Night Noises Off Best revival of a musical Winner: The Color Purple Fiddler on the Roof She Loves Me Spring Awakening Best book of a musical Winner: Hamilton, Lin-Manuel Miranda Bright Star - Steve Martin School of Rock: The Musical - Julian Fellowes Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed - George C Wolfe Best original score (music and/or lyrics) written for the theatre Winner: Hamilton - music and lyrics: Lin-Manuel Miranda Bright Star - music: Steve Martin and Edie Brickell, lyrics: Edie Brickell School of Rock: The Musical - music: Andrew Lloyd Webber, lyrics: Glenn Slater Waitress - music and lyrics: Sara Bareilles Best performance by an actor in a leading role in a play Winner: Frank Langella - The Father Gabriel Byrne - Long Day's Journey Into Night Jeff Daniels - Blackbird Tim Pigott-Smith - King Charles III Mark Strong - Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge Best performance by an actress in a leading role in a play Winner: Jessica Lange - Long Day's Journey Into Night Laurie Metcalf - Misery Lupita Nyong'o - Eclipsed Sophie Okonedo - Arthur Miller's The Crucible Michelle Williams - Blackbird Best performance by an actor in a leading role in a musical Winner: Leslie Odom Jr - Hamilton Alex Brightman - School of Rock: The Musical Danny Burstein - Fiddler on the Roof Zachary Levi - She Loves Me Lin-Manuel Miranda - Hamilton Best performance by an actress in a leading role in a musical Winner: Cynthia Erivo - The Color Purple Laura Benanti - She Loves Me Carmen Cusack - Bright Star Jessie Mueller - Waitress Phillipa Soo - Hamilton Best performance by an actor in a featured role in a play Winner: Reed Birney - The Humans Bill Camp - Arthur Miller's The Crucible David Furr - Noises Off Richard Goulding - King Charles III Michael Shannon - Long Day's Journey Into Night Best performance by an actress in a featured role in a play Winner: Jayne Houdyshell - The Humans Pascale Armand - Eclipsed Megan Hilty - Noises Off Andrea Martin - Noises Off Saycon Sengbloh - Eclipsed Best performance by an actor in a featured role in a musical Winner: Daveed Diggs - Hamilton Brandon Victor Dixon - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Christopher Fitzgerald - Waitress Jonathan Groff - Hamilton Christopher Jackson - Hamilton Best performance by an actress in a featured role in a musical Winner: Renee Elise Goldsberry - Hamilton Danielle Brooks - The Color Purple Jane Krakowski - She Loves Me Jennifer Simard - Disaster! Adrienne Warren - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Best scenic design of a play Winner: David Zinn - The Humans Beowulf Boritt - Therese Raquin Christopher Oram - Hughie Jan Versweyveld - Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge Best scenic design of a musical Winner: David Rockwell - She Loves Me Es Devlin and Finn Ross - American Psycho David Korins - Hamilton Santo Loquasto - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Best costume design of a play Winner: Clint Ramos - Eclipsed Jane Greenwood - Long Day's Journey Into Night Michael Krass - Noises Off Tom Scutt - King Charles III Best costume design of a musical Winner: Paul Tazewell - Hamilton Gregg Barnes - Tuck Everlasting Jeff Mahshie - She Loves Me Ann Roth - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Best lighting design from a play Winner: Natasha Katz - Long Day's Journey Into Night Justin Townsend - The Humans Jan Versweyveld - Arthur Miller's The Crucible Jan Versweyveld - Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge Best lighting design from a musical Winner: Howell Binkley - Hamilton Jules Fisher & Peggy Eisenhauer - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Ben Stanton - Spring Awakening Justin Townsend - American Psycho Best direction of a play Winner: Ivo Van Hove - Arthur Miller's A View From the Bridge Rupert Goold - King Charles III Jonathan Kent - Long Day's Journey Into Night Joe Mantello - The Humans Liesl Tommy - Eclipsed Best direction of a musical Winner: Thomas Kail - Hamilton Michael Arden - Spring Awakening John Doyle - The Color Purple Scott Ellis - She Loves Me George C Wolfe - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Best choreography Winner: Andy Blankenbuehler - Hamilton Savion Glover - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Hofesh Shechter - Fiddler on the Roof Randy Skinner - Dames at Sea Sergio Trujillo - On Your Feet! The Story of Emilio and Gloria Estefan Best orchestrations Winner: Alex Lacamoire - Hamilton August Eriksmoen - Bright Star Larry Hochman - She Loves Me Daryl Waters - Shuffle Along, Or the Making of the Musical Sensation of 1921 and All That Followed Special Tony Award for lifetime achievement in the theatre Sheldon Harnick Marshall W Mason Special Tony Award National Endowment for the Arts Miles Wilkin Regional Theatre Tony Award Paper Mill Playhouse; Millburn, NJ Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award Brian Stokes Mitchell Tony Honours for excellence in the theatre Seth Gelblum Joan Lader Sally Ann Parsons

70वें टोनी पुरस्कारों के विजेताओं की पूरी सूची।


Nearly 160,000 refugees - UNHCR

Summary: The Sri Lanka office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) or any other UN agency will not pull out from the east, says Orla Clinton, spokesperson for the UN Resident/Humanitarian Co-ordinator in Sri Lanka.

"We are daily responding to the current situation there and this was a misinformed report that was published by a local newspaper", she told the BBC Tamil service. However, she said UNHCR was very much concerned about the situation. In the space of the past two weeks, Orla Clinton said, the internally displaced population (IDP) had increased by fifty per cent in Batticaloa district. "The number of IDP has now increased to almost one hundred and sixty thousand (160,000), and that is a quite high figure in this part of the country", she said. UNHCR is assisting the government in the best it can however, she said, there are gaps when it come to the distribution of food and supplementary food. "There will be breaks in the pipeline, and we are looking for more money. Certainly we will have to increase our capacity in this area", Orla Clinton said. LTTE intimidation She was also asked by the BBC Tamil service to comment on reports that LTTE has been pressurising and intimidating families taken refuge at Madhu Church to allow a family member to join the movement. "UNHCR is concerned about this situation. There is pressure for the refugees to leave but they do not want to move. They are afraid", she said. She said UNHCR is looking for assurances that they stayed where they are and will be protected. Just returned from the east, she said, it is not an easy situation. "The other issue of course is the insecurity created by daily shelling and occasional multi barrel rockets being launched. This creates more fear among the IDPs who have already been affected", added Orla Clinton, spokesperson for the UN Resident/Humanitarian Co-ordinator in Sri Lanka.

श्रीलंका में संयुक्त राष्ट्र निवासी/मानवीय समन्वयक की प्रवक्ता ओर्ला क्लिंटन कहती हैं कि शरणार्थियों के लिए संयुक्त राष्ट्र उच्चायुक्त (यू. एन. एच. सी. आर.) का श्रीलंका कार्यालय या संयुक्त राष्ट्र की कोई अन्य एजेंसी पूर्व से पीछे नहीं हटेगी।


CES 2012 Blippar 13 January diary: Organised chaos

Summary: The BBC followed the fortunes ofBlippar, a UK start-up which crossed the Atlantic to be a part of the 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. After winning a competition in November, the Blippar team was sponsored by the government's UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) agency. They were awarded free accommodation and a prime-site stand. It was a perfect spot for the company, which produces augmented reality apps, to stand out. As the week progressed, the team shared their thoughts on the event in the following blog.

14 January - Blipped out! Many said the final day at CES would be quiet - and whilst some businesses had departed from Eureka Parkzone on Thursday- how wrong they were! Friday was yet another frenetic day of activity and the sheer positivity of both exhibitors and visitors continued to shine through. International TV crews, brands, retailers and manufacturers were once again in eager attendance at the stand highlighting the importance of and commercial coming of age of business-to-consumer augmented reality for mobile devices. Perhaps the easiest way to sum up the whole CES experience from the Blippar perspective is to quote one visitor to stand #73410 who proclaimed us "the most blipping awesome thing" he'd seen at CES this year. Not bad given the prestigious company we have been keeping this week! It's testimony to the UK tech startups themselves but also to UKTI who worked tirelessly to feed the Blippar stand, and those of the other UK start-up businesses around us with an awesome volume of visitors, leads and future advocates. So as yet another CES finishes for the many established consumer global brands, here's hoping that with continued hard work, this will hopefully have been the first of many more for our company... Huge thanks to the UKTI for providing us with the opportunity to show off in Vegas and thank you also to everyone who took the time to drop by our stand. See you next year!! 13 January - Organised chaos CES is the perfect example of organised chaos. Tens of thousands of people running around like headless chickens and yet all is in order. Most CES stands have pretty girls showcasing cool gadgets. At the blippar stand: cool gadgetry? Tick. Pretty faces? Not so much - so the BD team raised their game today and choreographed a Blippar swan-dance demo routine which was well received (and certainly relieved our own demo monotony) Today we found time to visit the main central hall where all the big players are showcasing computing and entertainment hardware. Ultrabooks are a big talking point with Toshiba, Samsung, Acer, Lenovo all launching their Macbook air-style models. Most of them are very light weighing 1.7kg approximately. TVs are another big craze. They are getting thinner, smarter, faster, bigger and more real every year. The TV which made the Blippar team drool is LG's 4mm thin TV. Simply stunning. Samsung also launched some great large screen OLED TVs. Besides TVs, there are a lot of smartphones competing for the thinnest and fastest titles with Motorola's Droid 4 and Huawei handsets looking particularly impressive to us. The UKTI deserves a shoutout generally for being a brilliant supporter for Blippar at this event - tirelessly introducing us to key individuals and businesses during the show. It helps to have had so many important contacts pointed specifically in our direction. Our tweets and press mentions have rocketed sky-high over the last week. It is totally impossible to go around the entire of CES and it is utterly exhausting. In our opinion, there is a huge opportunity for coin-based foot massage kiosks next year; CES can have that idea for free. 12 January - Limos and quadricopters Yesterday, en route to CES, we saw a man in a diving suit sitting on the roof of a Lenovo branded moving limo, working on a laptop. No-one really blinked. I guess they were advertising some stability feature? So it was another fun afternoon for the Blippar team entertaining the crowds through augmenting ('Blipping') great British brands like Marmite and most people loved it. Some visitors even tasted Marmite out of curiosity after seeing the secret recipes although it would be fair to say they were less keen on the product than the tech, in the main! And some more time for exploring: a highlight of yesterday's recce was stumbling across the Parrot's AR Drone which is an iPhone-controlled quadricopter. The AR drone is faster and smoother this year with built-in HD camera recording. Very cool stuff (and just what every quadricopter needs). Automatic robot vacuum cleaners are also getting good attention from buyers and seems they will 'sweep up' in 2012 (sorry). The most common type of product being showcased in CES is smartphone accessories, especially covers. It's a huge industry and there are hundreds of companies marketing why their case is better or cooler. The whole trend clearly shows how precious phones have become - vital, yet fragile bearers of uncompromisable data. And of course, a form of personal expression through fashion accessories. Fujitsu have found a nice niche with the introduction of a range of normal-looking yet entirely waterproof phones. We ended Day Three with a Matchbox 20 concert at Qualcomm party celebrating with our new investors. 11 January - Buzz of the big match CES officially opened to the masses today - with thousands turning up in scenes reminiscent of a big football match. The Blippar team was alert and ready for the onslaught and we found ourselves surrounded by crowds of journalists, big brands, marketing agencies and general tech enthusiasts. All were eager to demo, test and interrogate - but many also wanted to just 'coo' at some of our cooler demos - all of which, our visitors were excited to realise, worked on their own devices. The UKTI stand was next to Blippar and they seemed particularly impressed with the buzz we were getting - justification of our win in their start-up competition and the prize of sponsoring our presence here, we hope! Today the team also found a bit of time to explore other emerging start-up technologies. Particularly impressive were displays of human hand motoring robotics, and collaborative television watching with Shelby. Kinect, who we saw yesterday, is not the only brand doing gesture recognition; similar gesture sensor technology is being harnessed by few other startups like Zienon to change TV channels or manage volume control just by moving your fingers in thin air. Brilliant cubes-based robotic toys startup called Cubelets are making robot construction kits for kids whereby each cube can add new shape and artificial intelligence to the toy. Off to bed now - absolutelycream crackered! 10 January - Vegas baby! So the Blippar team has arrived at CES in Vegas to take our place among our kindred nerds. Excited - if tired - after the long journey out. The show officially kicked off yesterday with press conferences from LG, Samsung, Nokia and more - but throughout the day, thousands of visitors from different parts of the world were pouring in to Vegas to see the trend-setters of the technology world in preparation for the exhibition's start tomorrow. Exhibitors, including us, were busy setting up stands to get ready to fight for the attention of almost 140,000 tech-savvy visitors who are expected over the next few days. The place is already teeming and bubbling over with energy. Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer's massively anticipated keynote received a mixed response - highlights were interactive television using Kinect, and the Nokia Lumia 900 smartphone (which looks pretty much the same as Lumia 800). But on a less positive note, Microsoft's announcement that they are quitting CES next year is being interpreted by some punters as CES's dying dominance of the tech industry. Well, watch this space throughout the week and we'll give our verdict - for what it's worth! After a busy day of setting up our stand in the UK showcase - as the UKTI start-up representative - and getting ready for the visitor onslaught, our evening ended with a few European tech startups hanging out in a nice bar at the Venetian sharing and cheering our experiences of the day. Recession? What recession? Vegas, baby...!

बीबीसी ने ब्लिपर के भाग्य का अनुसरण किया, एक यूके स्टार्ट-अप जिसने लास वेगास में 2012 के अंतर्राष्ट्रीय उपभोक्ता इलेक्ट्रॉनिक्स शो (सी. ई. एस.) का हिस्सा बनने के लिए अटलांटिक को पार किया। नवंबर में एक प्रतियोगिता जीतने के बाद, ब्लिपर टीम को सरकार की यूके ट्रेड एंड इन्वेस्टमेंट (यू. के. टी. आई.) एजेंसी द्वारा प्रायोजित किया गया था। उन्हें मुफ्त आवास और एक प्राइम-साइट स्टैंड से सम्मानित किया गया था। यह कंपनी के लिए एक आदर्श स्थान था, जो संवर्धित वास्तविकता ऐप का उत्पादन करती है। जैसे-जैसे सप्ताह आगे बढ़ता गया, टीम ने अगले ब्लॉग में इस कार्यक्रम पर अपने विचार साझा किए।


Work on North Norfolk Council offices to cost £750,000

Summary: More than £750,000 will need to be spent on the offices of a Norfolk council over the next five years to bring them up to scratch and meet safety standards, says a report.

A report to North Norfolk Council's cabinet warns of safety concerns at the authority's headquarters in Cromer. The council officer report says that immediate work to comply with health and safety rules will cost £200,000. It also raises concerns about fire exits as some open into flower beds. Heating pumps and electrical wiring need fixing as well at the offices, which have been open for just over 20 years. The report adds that about £1.6m will need to be spent on the building in total between 2011 and 2036.

एक रिपोर्ट में कहा गया है कि अगले पांच वर्षों में नॉरफ़ॉक परिषद के कार्यालयों पर £750,000 से अधिक खर्च करने की आवश्यकता होगी ताकि उन्हें खरोंच तक लाया जा सके और सुरक्षा मानकों को पूरा किया जा सके।


Man killed after being hit by car on A96 in Moray is named

Summary: A pedestrian who died after being struck by a car on the A96 in Moray on Monday has been named by police.

He was 48-year-old Nicky Whyte, who lived in the Huntly area. The accident happened on the road between Keith and Huntly at about 02:30 on Monday. The driver of the black Mini Cooper involved in the collision was not injured. Police said an investigation into the incident was ongoing and have appealed for witness to contact them. Sgt Alexander Bowser-Riley, from the North East Road Policing Unit, said: "Our thoughts remain with the family and friends of Mr Whyte."

मोरे में सोमवार को ए96 पर एक कार की चपेट में आने से मरने वाले एक पैदल यात्री का नाम पुलिस ने लिया है।


Apps and autism

Summary: New technology can be inspiring, exciting or sometimes infuriating - but I can't ever remember it being really moving. Until, that is, I met Ruby Dunn, whose life is being changed by a piece of software.

Rory Cellan-JonesTechnology correspondent@BBCRoryCJon Twitter Ruby, who was born 14 weeks premature in 2006, has autism and has never spoken. She does, however, attend her local school - Sandford Primary in Somerset - and is well integrated into every aspect of school life. But it is an app which she uses on an iPod and an iPad which is making a big difference. Ruby uses the app, Proloquo2Go, to communicate with her teachers, her family and other children. She taps on symbols, constructs a sentence and out it comes, spoken in a child's voice. So in the playground, she taps "head, shoulders" to choose a game. At lunchtime she chooses "lasagne" and "carrots" adds "please" and "Tina" and hands it to the dinner lady. And in the classroom she reads a story and then taps out answers to questions about it via the iPad version of the app. Pauline Hoy Green, Ruby's one-on-one learning support assistant, explained to me that the app had replaced a less hi-tech communications tool - a book with stick-on pictures of various objects. The app, which has been updated recently and features the voices of two British children, eases the frustrations of a child who seems desperate to make the world understand her. "It's given her a voice," Pauline says. Spending a day watching Pauline and Ruby at work was fascinating. All my assumptions about the capabilities of a child with autism were challenged as she used the app in all sorts of sophisticated ways. Ruby appeared to be more confident with the technology than many an adult and that was confirmed by her father Craig when he arrived to pick her up at the end of the school day. He told me that his daughter used the app at home to "twist me round her little finger," and that IT in general was a big part of her life. "She's even shown me how things worked on Sky+ that I didn't know about." Now as apps go, Proloquo2Go is pretty expensive - £129.99 - and there is plenty of cheaper software, for a range of devices and operating systems, aimed at helping children with autism. But for Ruby's family and for many others getting access to the right technology is now a priority. I talked to Carol Allen - who's worked in this field for a long time. She says that if an app can give children a voice it is worth the expense. "Why can't we see that it is the same as giving a wheelchair to someone who can't walk?" "People are going app crazy," Carol said, explaining that they were beginning to have a really big impact on the way children with all kinds of special needs were taught. Some teachers were even creating their own apps, tailored to the needs of a specific child. But she also had some words of caution. "You have to start with the needs of the learner, and the teaching - not with the shiny kit." And she pointed out that new technology did not always match up to expectations. "Look at electronic whiteboards - people said they were the solution to everything. But they didn't work for the visually impaired." In all areas of education, a lively debate is under way about the contribution that new technology can make, and just how much needs to be spent on it. But children like Ruby Dunn - and the people who work with them - are giving everyone else an example of how life-enhancing the right technology can be.

नई तकनीक प्रेरणादायक, रोमांचक या कभी-कभी क्रोधित करने वाली हो सकती है-लेकिन मुझे कभी याद नहीं आता कि यह वास्तव में दिल को छू लेने वाली थी। जब तक कि मैं रूबी डन से नहीं मिला, जिसका जीवन सॉफ्टवेयर के एक टुकड़े से बदल रहा है।


Conwy mansion Kinmel Hall sold to mystery buyer

Summary: A Victorian mansion described as the "Welsh Versailles" has been sold for nearly £1.5m in a deal signed minutes before it was due to be auctioned.

Kinmel Hall at St George, Conwy, was bought by a businessman who already has "substantial interests" in Wales. Property consultants Lambert Smith Hampton said the businessman bid closest to the £1.5m guide price. Spokesman Simon Rigall said the buyer - who lives in Wales and London - "intends to create more jobs". The 122-room building was withdrawn from Wednesday's auction in London just 20 minutes before the start of the sale. Two international hotel groups had also shown interest in buying the 1850's mansion, which has planning permission for redevelopment as a luxury hotel. Mr Rigall added: "I can't say much about the buyer at this stage, but he is already a substantial investor in Wales and intends to create more jobs." Related Internet Links Lambert Smith Hampton

"वेल्श वर्साइल्स" के रूप में वर्णित एक विक्टोरियन हवेली को नीलामी से कुछ मिनट पहले हस्ताक्षरित सौदे में लगभग 15 लाख पाउंड में बेचा गया है।


Four released after Stoke-on-Trent's man's death

Summary: Four people arrested in connection with the "sudden" death of a 47-year-old man have been released under investigation.

Emergency crews were called to Wainwright Walk, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent at about 19:25 GMT on Thursday. A post-mortem examination proved inconclusive and further inquiries were needed to establish the cause of death, Staffordshire Police said. Three men aged 45, 37 and 27, and a woman, aged 47, all from Stoke-on-Trent, have been released. The force said formal identification would take place early next week and the death was not being treated as suspicious. Follow BBC West Midlands on Facebook, on Twitter, and sign up for local news updates direct to your phone.

47 वर्षीय व्यक्ति की "अचानक" मौत के मामले में गिरफ्तार किए गए चार लोगों को जांच के तहत रिहा कर दिया गया है।