Graffiti campaigns that stuck in the mind

Summary: Years after a high-profile graffiti campaign proclaiming his innocence, George Davis has had his robbery conviction overturned. But his was not the only slogan to be sprayed across the UK's motorway and road bridges.

By Tom de Castella and Denise WintermanBBC News Magazine It made him a household name in the 1970s, as well as part and parcel of motorway journeys. While unauthorised graffiti was - and still is - illegal and treated as criminal damage, as well as often dangerous, it didn't stop George Davis's supporters. They daubed slogans including "G.Davis Is Innocent OK" and "Free George Davis" across railway and road bridges around the UK. It was one of the first incidences of high-profile graffiti on motorway and road bridges. But there have been others over the years. George Davis In 1975 George Davis was sentenced to 20 years in jail for a bank raid in Ilford. He protested his innocence and one of the defining graffiti campaigns was born. The phrase "George Davis is Innocent OK" began appearing around the east end of London, where he'd grown up, before ending up on motorway bridges on the M1 and elsewhere. His sentence was remitted two years later by Royal Prerogative, but he was later jailed for a separate armed robbery. Mail on Sunday legal affairs editor Robert Verkaik says the graffiti campaign meant he was never forgotten. "It had very little impact on his case, but it kept his campaign alive." The use of the word "OK" now reads strangely but was common in graffiti culture of the time, he says. The phrase endured and allowed him to rise above the average criminal. "It was an odd phenomenon given that he's a bank robber and basically an East End villain," says Verkaik. "It's amazing that nearly 40 years later people know who he is. It may be the original viral protest campaign." The 2004 Hunting Act, which banned fox and stag hunting and hare coursing, was always controversial. So were the tactics used by some of those who were against it. Hunt militants started a campaign of civil disobedience, including blockading motorways and daubing graffiti on motorway bridges, road signs and roundabouts. Slogans included "Rural Rebellion" and "Free Country".. A group calling itself the Real Countryside Alliance (RCA) claimed it was responsible for the action. Many hunt supporters were not in favour, with the Countryside Alliance distancing itself from the action. Things went too far for many people when the RCA painted a rider in full hunt regalia on a white horse at Kilburn in North Yorkshire, which dates from 1837. It also painted three white hounds and a rider on the Bronze Age white horse at Uffington in Oxfordshire. In the mid 1980s three words suddenly appeared on walls and bridges in Manchester - The Stone Roses. The new band were struggling for attention, says John Robb, a music writer but in those days part of a band, the Membranes, who shared rehearsal space with the Stone Roses. "Reni [the drummer] said he saw our name everywhere. I told him that in the days of punk you self-publicised, you put up your name everywhere. He thought that was amazing." A week later the graffiti appeared. It was sprayed in black every 50 yards on the road between Didsbury and Manchester city centre. Rumour has it lead singer Ian Brown and Reni were responsible. "It could have been a coincidence, or the roadies or the band who did it," says Robb. "It got them local notoriety - the music industry inner circle thought they were hooligans. But it started people talking about them and that's one thing you want as a band. And the Roses broke through in the end." At one point it was reportedly plastered over 150 motorway and road bridges, causing much head scratching among drivers trying to work out what it meant. Gouranga even spawned its own game, much like the Eddie Stobart lorry-spotting one. The word began to appear in the 1980s and is thought to derive from the Hare Krishna term Gauranga, meaning "peace my brother" or "be happy" - depending on translation. It became so well known that the word started to appear elsewhere. Indie band Half Man Half Biscuit's song Twydale's Lament contains the line: "Gouranga Gouranga, yes I'll be happy when you've been arrested for defacing the bridge." The phrase also features on the video game Grand Theft Auto. It's never been confirmed who did the graffiti, but one man claimed to be the instigator on the Guardian's Notes & Queries webpage. "I began in the north west in the late 80s," he wrote. "Gouranga is a state of mind that can be induced by simply saying the word. I was prompted to begin my campaign following a tragic loss of a loved one from which I thought I would never recover. Of course I did, and ever since I have wanted to 'pass it on'. Pass it on." The campaign group Fathers 4 Justice has used motorway gantry banners to raise awareness. In one case in 2009, Geoffrey Hibbert climbed onto a gantry on the M25 dressed as batman and proceeded to unfurl a series of banners. Police shut a section of the motorway, leading to long tailbacks. Fathers 4 Justice founder Matt O'Connor says the motorway tactic - inspired by the fuel protests - are an easy way to get publicity. He estimates that 15,000 drivers spotted the banner and a further four or five million saw the story in the media. The tactic is divisive, but he says it's a price worth paying. "Some people will hoot in support, others are annoyed. But we think it's worth taking the hit for the greater good." For drivers on the M25, they know they're between junction 16 and 17 in Buckinghamshire when they spot the seemingly random message "GIVE PEAS A CHANCE" on a motorway bridge. The person who did it chose a historic bridge. Built between 1902 and 1906, it is the only Edwardian brick bridge on the M25. A historic building report done by Oxford Archaeology says the slogan was painted in two stages. Firstly "PEAS" appeared, then "GIVE" and "A CHANCE" were added later. It says "PEAS" is the tag of a London graffiti artist and his tag can been seen in many other locations, particularly on bridges. The additional text changing the graffiti to read "GIVE PEAS A CHANCE" is thought to refer to his continual arrests. The north facing side of the bridge also has some graffiti, saying just "PEAS06". "The common misinterpretation of the inscription makes the bridge an interesting landmark to users of the M25," says the report.

अपनी बेगुनाही की घोषणा करने वाले एक हाई-प्रोफाइल भित्तिचित्र अभियान के वर्षों बाद, जॉर्ज डेविस ने अपनी डकैती की सजा को पलट दिया है। लेकिन ब्रिटेन के मोटरवे और सड़क पुलों पर छिड़का जाने वाला एकमात्र नारा उनका नहीं था।


Stephen Sutton: Fundraising cancer teenager goes home

Summary: Teenage cancer patient Stephen Sutton has been discharged from hospital.

The 19-year-old, who has raised more than £3m for the Teenage Cancer Trust, posted on his Facebook page that he was now home in Burntwood, Staffordshire. He said: "The recovery I've undergone recently is quite remarkable... but ultimately I now feel even more fortunate to just be here." On Friday, Prime Minister David Cameron praised him after visiting him at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. Mr Sutton's fundraising took off after posting a "thumbs up" photograph of himself on 22 April. He also wrote what he thought would be his final message before he died. He has incurable bowel cancer. 'Good to be home' In his latest Facebook post, Mr Sutton said that he would meet doctors in two weeks to see whether he can take part in a new drug trial. He said: "It would be a fifth different chemotherapy regime for me, with previous others having limited effect, so we will need to seriously discuss the efficacy of me trying it, but to even be talking about a few weeks time and having options is a great feeling. "This extra period of time I now have feels like a gift, one that I'm determined to use productively. "I'll be probably be straight back to doing some crazy stuff/events/etc soon, but for now, it just feels great to be home." Mr Cameron said Mr Sutton had inspired "literally millions of people" and that Stephen's Story film was "one of the most powerful things you will ever see".

किशोर कैंसर रोगी स्टीफन सटन को अस्पताल से छुट्टी दे दी गई है।


Ghana witch camps: Widows' lives in exile

Summary: When misfortune hits a village, there is a tendency in some countries to suspect a "witch" of casting a spell. In Ghana, outspoken or eccentric women may also be accused of witchcraft - and forced to live out their days together in witch camps.

By Kati WhitakerKukuo, northern Ghana A rusty motorbike speeds across the vast dry savannah of Ghana's impoverished northern region, leaving a cloud of reddish dust in its wake. Arriving at a small group of round thatched huts, the young motorcyclist helps his old mother to dismount to begin her new life in exile. Frail 82-year-old Samata Abdulai has arrived at the village of Kukuo, one of Ghana's six witch camps, where women accused of witchcraft seek refuge from beating, torture or lynching. The camps are said to have come into existence more than 100 years ago, when village chiefs decided to establish isolated safe areas for the women. They are run by tindanas, leaders capable of cleansing an accused woman so that not only is the community protected from any witchcraft but the woman herself is safe from vigilantes. Today they are still run by local chiefs, and accommodate up to 1,000 women in spartan huts with no electricity or running water, and roofs that leak. For water, the inhabitants of the Kukuo camp walk three miles each day to the River Otti, struggling back uphill with heavy pots of water. It's an intolerable way for an elderly woman to live, but it's a life they are prepared to endure so long as they are safe. They survive by collecting firewood, selling little bags of peanuts or working in nearby farms. Samata lived some 40km (24 miles) away in the village of Bulli. There she spent her autumn years caring for her twin grandchildren while her daughter worked in the fields. It was a happy, fulfilled existence, a gentle winding down after a long working life as a second-hand clothes trader. Then suddenly one day one of her brothers came to warn her that villagers had begun blaming her for the death of her niece, a young girl on whom Samata was accused of putting a spell. "I was confused and filled with fear because I knew I was innocent," she says. "But I know that once people call you a witch your life is in danger and so without waiting to pick up any of my belongings, I just fled from the village." The witch camps appear to be unique to northern Ghana. But Ghana shares with other African countries an endemic belief in witchcraft with illness, drought, fires and other natural disasters blamed on black magic. The alleged witches are nearly always elderly. An ActionAid report on witch camps, published this week, says that more than 70% of residents in Kukuo camp were accused and banished after their husbands died - suggesting that witchcraft allegations are a way of enabling the family to take control of the widow's property. "The camps are a dramatic manifestation of the status of women in Ghana," says Professor Dzodzi Tsikata of the University of Ghana. "Older women become a target because they are no longer useful to society." Women who do not conform to society's expectations also fall victim to the accusations of witchcraft, according to Lamnatu Adam of the women's rights group Songtaba. "Women are expected to be submissive so once you start to be outspoken in your views or even successful in your trade, people assume you must be possessed." One of Samata's younger sisters, 52-year-old Safia, is also living at Kukuo. She first came here to join her own mother and grandmother, both of them banished from the community for the same reason. "They are not witches," Safia says. "This is just hatred, jealousy and a way to get rid of you." Like most members of the witch camps, including Samata, Safia believes in the existence of witches but feels many women have been unfairly accused. Eccentric behaviour may also be interpreted as evidence of spirit-possession. "In traditional communities there is no real understanding of depression or dementia," says Dr Akwesi Osei, chief psychiatrist at the Ghana health service, who claims a majority of the women in the camps have some sort of mental illness. The Ghanaian government sees the camps as a stain on the reputation of one of the most progressive democratic and economically vibrant nations in Africa, and said last year it would move quickly to disband them, possibly in 2012. But sending the women back to their home villages now would be fraught with danger. "We have to do a lot of work with their communities so that they are able to return without being lynched or subjected to reaccusation, for example if a cow jumps over a fence and knocks down something," says Adwoa Kwateng-Kluvitse, ActionAid's country director in Ghana. "We are going to have to disabuse people's minds and that takes a long time." In her view, it will take 10 or 20 years. At Kukuo, Samata has to undergo a ritual which the entire community believes will determine whether or not she is guilty. She has to buy a brightly coloured chicken to offer the resident fetish priest. The old priest squats on the ground uttering incantations before cutting the chicken's throat. Samata waits anxiously as the chicken flutters in its death throes waiting to see how it falls. It lands on its back, a sign that Samata is innocent. With smiles all round, she sprinkles holy water over herself and those gathered to witness the ceremony. She now feels she has been vindicated. If she had been found guilty she would have been forced to submit to another, far worse ritual cleansing ceremony - drinking a concoction of chicken blood, monkey skulls and soil. A woman must consume this without falling ill within seven days, in order for the exorcism to be deemed effective. If not, she must take it again. But this doesn't mean Samata can go home. Even though she has been proved innocent, the beliefs which have condemned her to a life of exile are so deeply entrenched she may never be able to return safely. "When you are accused of witchcraft, it's a loss of dignity," says Samata. "And to be honest, I just feel like ending my own life." Her greatest sadness is that she will never see her grandchildren again. "I worry about who is going to look after the twins," she says in a quiet voice. "I was the one who bathed and put them to bed. Who will do that now?" Kati Whitaker's radio documentary No Country for Old Women is first broadcast on the BBC World Service on 1 September - check the schedule or listen again on the programme website.

जब किसी गाँव में दुर्भाग्य आता है, तो कुछ देशों में जादू-टोना करने वाली "चुड़ैल" पर संदेह करने की प्रवृत्ति होती है। घाना में, मुखर या सनकी महिलाओं पर जादू-टोना करने का भी आरोप लगाया जा सकता है-और उन्हें चुड़ैल शिविरों में एक साथ रहने के लिए मजबूर किया जा सकता है।


Everest: Disaster movie opens Venice film festival

Summary: Long before and after its summit was first officially conquered in 1953, scaling Everest, the world's highest peak, has been the ultimate dream of many mountaineers. Too often though, they have paid the ultimate price - more than 250 climbers are known to have died on its slopes.

By Emma JonesEntertainment reporter, BBC News, Venice On May 11 1996, eight climbers from several expeditions were killed during a severe blizzard as they returned from the summit. The movie of their story, also called Everest, and starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Keira Knightley, Josh Brolin and Zero Dark Thirty's Jason Clarke, has opened the Venice International Film Festival. Gyllenhaal, who plays an expedition leader, Scott Fischer, calls it "the antithesis of a Hollywood disaster movie where it's all about surviving". He continues: "This is an odyssey in the sense that you have to get home as well, and experienced climbers know that getting down from Everest is often more dangerous than getting up. "In real life, Mother Nature is almost always going to win, so it's not like in a typical film where a human or a superhuman beats all the odds, and that makes it a bit more real." The film was conceived by British production company Working Title, and shot in 3D; but despite its blockbuster potential, Everest's budget was around $70m (£45m), roughly the same as last year's Sin City: A Dame To Kill For. The film's director, Icelandic filmmaker Baltasar Kormakur, was mainly known outside Europe for 2013 police movie 2 Guns, starring Denzel Washington. Actor Josh Brolin jokes that it was his "midlife crisis" that got him involved in the project, adding that, "at the time I needed something like this in my life. I needed to be confronted with something more than the psychological roles I've done, I needed the physical as well. "A lot of the preparation was putting myself in very precarious situations, but through that I discovered adventure. This redefined me." But if that suggests the actors' safety was ever put at risk, director Kormakur denies he ever put his cast and crew into danger. Although he admits to facing "perilous situations every day. We shot at first in the foothills of Everest, we landed at Kathmandu, the world's most dangerous airport, and from there we basically walked to base camp. "We had the support of Sherpas, and yaks carrying the packs. But you can't work a twelve hour day at that altitude without difficulty. Crew, actors, and even the Sherpas were starting to get sick and eventually had to be evacuated by helicopter. From there we went to the Dolomites and shot in temperatures of minus 30 degrees Celsius. "I would say I put everyone through pain but not injury - no one went foolishly into danger. The struggle wouldn't be worth much however if the story of these climbers were not handled in a truthful manner." The tragic events of May 11, 1996 made global headlines - that year would produce the worst death toll on Everest until the avalanche of 2014, which killed sixteen Nepalese guides. But there is still much confusion around the doomed expedition led by Rob Hall, from New Zealand-based Adventure Consultants, and Scott Fischer from Mountain Madness in Seattle. They led their teams towards the summit in clear skies. On the way down, a violent storm hit them as they tried to scale a 40 foot wall known as Hillary Step, after Everest's first official conqueror, Sir Edmund Hillary. Rob Hall spent two nights exposed on the South Summit, unable to make the descent himself, and unable to be rescued from below. Jason Clarke, who plays him, calls the story " a great monumental whodunit, as we still don't truly know the chain of events that led to the tragedy. Yet holds up by itself; we don't need a Hollywood ending and it's not sentimental." But the film does point towards the fact that there were 34 climbers from different expeditions trying to get to the top that day, 29,000 feet above sea level; the cruising level of a 747 jet. "It's very odd to think that you would be waiting to get to the peak of Everest, that there could be scores of people on a rope queuing like they were in an amusement park," explains Jake Gyllenhaal. "The top of the mountain is known as the Death Zone for a reason - your body is shutting down and dying. People don't get to the top and party, they go straight back down. There are more difficult climbs in the world, but on Everest, you struggle with suffocation and losing air. Human beings just aren't meant to survive at that altitude, and that's why you have the death rate. "Even at the heights we got to, we experienced symptoms of sickness and our brains not functioning as they should." Since its premiere, Everest has received mixed reviews, with the Guardian calling it "a disaster movie that isn't a total success", while Time Out praises it "for leaving you breathless." In recent years, the opening film at Venice, which has included last year's Oscar-winner Birdman, Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity and Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan, has reaped rewards during awards season. Brolin dismisses any official recognition as "not the reason any of us did this. We all met the survivors' families and spent time with them; we know they are pleased with the movie and the way we have depicted their loved ones. "This is the story of people trying to tackle something impossible. The question comes up - why? Why would you ever put yourself in that situation? As someone once remarked, 'because it's there'. "But I think also it must be because those who do reach the top get to experience an unique and singular beauty at the top of the world that very few others get to share." Everest is released in the UK on 18 September.

1953 में इसके शिखर पर पहली बार आधिकारिक रूप से विजय प्राप्त करने से बहुत पहले और बाद में, दुनिया की सबसे ऊँची चोटी एवरेस्ट पर चढ़ना कई पर्वतारोहियों का अंतिम सपना रहा है। हालाँकि, अक्सर, उन्होंने अंतिम कीमत चुकाई है-250 से अधिक पर्वतारोहियों को इसकी ढलानों पर मरने के लिए जाना जाता है।


Biker killed in motorcycle crash in Colby, Isle of Man

Summary: A motorcyclist has been killed and two others have been hurt in a crash between three motorbikes.

Isle of Man Constabulary said the collision happened in Sloc Road, Colby, Isle of Man at about 10:30 BST. It said one of the riders involved, a 23-year-old man from West Yorkshire, died at the scene. The two other men were taken to Noble's Hospital with one of them - who has suffered series injuries - then flown to the UK for treatment. Police are appealing for anyone who witnessed the crash to contact the force.

तीन मोटरसाइकिलों के बीच टक्कर में एक मोटरसाइकिल सवार की मौत हो गई और दो अन्य घायल हो गए।


Reality Check: When should the US flag fly at half mast?

Summary: The White House flag is flying at half mast once again, following complaints it wasn't left in this position for long enough after the death of Senator John McCain. But what are the rules governing this mark of respect?

By Reality Check teamBBC News John McCain, a long-serving senator, former Republican presidential candidate and ex-prisoner of war, died on Saturday. The US flag above the White House was flown at half mast in commemoration. But by Monday the Stars and Stripes had been raised once again to its full height. Critics said this didn't show the usual level of respect for a public figure of Mr McCain's stature. So President Donald Trump appeared to change his mind. He issued a proclamation and the flag is once again at half mast. But what are the rules when it comes to marking major public figures in this way? Under the United States Code, when a president or former president dies, the flag should be flown at half mast above federal buildings for 30 days. Had Mr McCain beaten Barack Obama in the 2008 election, he would automatically have been accorded this honour. Following the death of a vice-president, the chief justice or a retired chief justice, a state governor, or the speaker of the House of Representatives the length of time flags should fly at half mast falls to 10 days. For a member of Congress like Mr McCain, who was a senator for Arizona from 1987, the flag need only be flown at half mast on the day of their death and the next day. So, the White House didn't break the rules, as Mr McCain died on Saturday and the flag was raised to its full height on Monday. But the president's executive powers allow him to override the rules for figures considered to deserve a longer-lasting display of respect. When long-serving Senator Edward Kennedy died in 2009, President Barack Obama issued a proclamation stating that the flag would fly at half mast until sunset on the day of his burial. This happened again when former astronaut and Senator John Glenn died in 2016. Mr Trump has now repeated this honour for Mr McCain, saying this recognised the "longstanding service" he had given. The president can also decide to give this mark of respect for leading figures in national life, whether political or non-political. In February, Mr Trump did so for the preacher Billy Graham, after he died aged 99. And, in April, he did so again for former First Lady Barbara Bush, describing her as "an outstanding and memorable woman of character". Another former First Lady, Nancy Reagan, was accorded the honour in 2016. Mr McCain will be laid to rest on Sunday, following a funeral ceremony at the National Cathedral on Saturday. Mr Trump, with whom he clashed on several occasions, has confirmed he will not attend. Read more from Reality Check Send us your questions Follow us on Twitter

व्हाइट हाउस का झंडा एक बार फिर आधा झुका हुआ है, शिकायतों के बाद सीनेटर जॉन मैक्केन की मृत्यु के बाद इसे लंबे समय तक इस स्थिति में नहीं छोड़ा गया था। लेकिन सम्मान के इस निशान को नियंत्रित करने वाले नियम क्या हैं?


Covid: Robert Gordon University to keep teaching online until April

Summary: Robert Gordon University in Aberdeen will continue to deliver the "vast majority" of teaching online until at least the end of April, it has announced.

RGU said this would "provide some certainty to students and staff" and allow it to make plans in an "uncertain external environment". The university said it had not taken the decision lightly. A "very limited" amount of on-campus activity will take place. RGU said it had considered evidence from public health experts and discussions between universities and the Scottish government. The university said in a statement: "While it is not the way we prefer to finish term two, we believe that this is in the best interests of our students and staff"

एबरडीन में रॉबर्ट गॉर्डन विश्वविद्यालय ने घोषणा की है कि कम से कम अप्रैल के अंत तक ऑनलाइन शिक्षण का "विशाल बहुमत" देना जारी रखेगा।


The Machine Stops: Will Gompertz reviews EM Forster's work ★★★★★

Summary: My wife was listening to a radio programme the other day and heard a man talking about artificial intelligence. He mentioned a science fiction novella by EM Forster called The Machine Stops, published in 1909. He said it was remarkably prescient. The missus hadn't heard of it, and nor had I. Frankly, we didn't have Forster down as a sci-fi guy, more Merchant Ivory films starring Helena Bonham Carter and elegant Edwardian dresses.

Will GompertzArts editor@WillGompertzBBCon Twitter We ordered a copy. OMG! as Forster would not have said. The Machine Stops is not simply prescient; it is a jaw-droppingly, gob-smackingly, breath-takingly accurate literary description of lockdown life in 2020. If it had been written today it would be excellent, that it was written over a century ago is astonishing. The short story is set in what must have seemed a futuristic world to Forster but won't to you. People live alone in identikit homes (globalisation) where they choose to isolate (his word), send messages by pneumatic post (a proto email or WhatsApp), and chat online via a video interface uncannily similar to Zoom or Skype. "The clumsy system of public gatherings had long since been abandoned", along with touching strangers ("the custom had become obsolete"), now considered verboten in this new civilisation in which humans live in underground cells with an Alexa-like computer catering to their every whim. If it already sounds spookily close for comfort, you won't be reassured to know that members of this detached society know thousands of people via machine-controlled social networks that encourage users to receive and impart second-hand ideas. "In certain directions human intercourse had advanced enormously" writes the visionary author drily, before adding later: "But humanity, in its desire for comfort, had over-reached itself. It had exploited the riches of nature too far. Quietly and complacently, it was sinking into decadence, and progress had come to mean progress of the machine." It's not lost on me that you are reading this on the internet on a man-made device over which we just about still believe we have mastery. Not for long according to Forster's story, nor, I suspect, some of the boffins behind AI today. We are in Frankenstein's monster territory, another literary warning we probably shouldn't ignore. Forster has no similar scary physical manifestation of science going wrong in The Machine Stops (the title says it all), but that brings it even closer to home. The tale's two protagonists, Vashti and her son Kuno, are normal people, just like you or me. She lives in the southern hemisphere, he lives in the north. Kuno wants his mother to visit. She isn't keen. "But I can see you!" she exclaimed. "What more do you want?" "I want to see you not through the Machine," said Kuno. "I want to speak to you not through the wearisome Machine." "Oh, hush!" said his mother, vaguely shocked. "You mustn't say anything against the Machine." She prefers social distancing and giving her online lecture on Music During the Australian Period to an unseen armchair audience who lap-up abstract historical information that has absolutely no relevance to their actual subterranean lives beyond being an illusory distraction from their hollowed-out existence (not dissimilar to lectures under lockdown, maybe). I won't say any more about what happens - it is a very short story that can be read in under an hour - other than to mention it is basically a machine-age take on Plato's The Allegory of the Cave. The Machine (or internet for us) is the airless, sunless, solitary cave in which we exist, the information it imparts the shadows on the wall. EM Forster published the story between A Room with a View (1908) and Howard's End (1910), two novels in which he explores similar philosophical themes around inner and outer worlds, truth and pretence. The Machine Stops first appeared in the Oxford and Cambridge Review in the same year as Filippo Tommaso Marinetti published his furious Futurist Manifesto in Le Figaro newspaper. The Italian poet was arguing for the very opposite to Forster's prophetic parable. Marinetti embraced the machine, arguing that a speeding car was far more beautiful than an ancient Greek sculpture. The past was a dead weight that needed destroying to make way for the future. He would have liked Vashti, who, when travelling by airship to see Kuno, pulled down her blind over Greece because that was no place to find ideas - an ironic joke by Forster given the idea for his story came from Plato's Athens. That's about it for jokes in a novella where there really is no such thing as community, or direct experience, and it is impossible to get away from the constant hum of the machine without asking the Central Committee for an Egression-permit to go outside. At which point you strap on a respirator and take your chances in the real world. As the man on the radio said, it's prescient. And very, very good. Recent reviews by Will Gompertz Follow Will Gompertz on Twitter

एक दिन मेरी पत्नी एक रेडियो कार्यक्रम सुन रही थी और एक आदमी को कृत्रिम बुद्धिमत्ता के बारे में बात करते हुए सुना। उसने ई. एम. फोर्स्टर के 1909 में प्रकाशित द मशीन स्टॉप्स नामक एक विज्ञान कथा उपन्यास का उल्लेख किया। उसने कहा कि यह उल्लेखनीय रूप से भविष्यवादी था। मिसस ने इसके बारे में नहीं सुना था, और न ही मैंने। सच कहें तो, हमारे पास फोर्स्टर को विज्ञान कथा वाले व्यक्ति के रूप में नहीं था, हेलेना बोनहैम कार्टर अभिनीत मर्चेंट आइवरी फिल्में और सुरुचिपूर्ण एडवर्डियन कपड़े थे।


Vending machines 'undermine' hospitals' good work'

Summary: Hospitals are, by definition, buildings that are dedicated to health. But in this week's Scrubbing Up, Dr Rachel Thompson, deputy head of science at World Cancer Research Fund, says that good work is being undermined by the contents of hospital vending machines.

By Dr Rachel ThompsonWorld Cancer Research Fund Whenever I visit hospitals, I am always struck by how the efforts of the dedicated healthcare professionals who work in them are being undermined by what is happening in the waiting areas. All too often, these waiting areas have vending machines that are filled with high-calorie foods and drinks such as chocolate bars, crisps and sugary drinks. But because these foods are a cause of obesity, they are part of the reason many of the people will have ended up in hospital in the first place. There is strong scientific evidence that excess body fat is a risk factor for cancer, as well as other non-communicable diseases such as heart disease and diabetes. And yet hospital vending machines are selling products that are a cause of obesity at the same time as the health professionals working there are trying to cope with its consequences. That is why hospitals should put an end to vending machines that sell high calorie foods and drinks. Little focus It is true that on its own this would be unlikely to have a serious impact on obesity levels. You would have to spend a lot of time in hospital waiting rooms for the contents of the vending machines to make much of a difference to your weight. But rather, the fact that hospital vending machines are filled with these kinds of foods and drinks is a symptom of how little meaningful focus there is on the obesity crisis. Across society, big changes are needed if we are to address obesity and the preventable cases of cancer and other diseases that result from it. The changes that we need are supported by common sense. If you prioritise the needs of motorised transport when you plan a town, it is to be expected that people won't walk or cycle enough. If you allow the food and drinks industry to market unhealthy products to children, then don't be surprised when children pester their parents to buy those products. But the fact that hospital vending machines are still stocked with high-calorie foods and drinks illustrates that we are not recognising the problem. There is no great mystery about what needs to happen. There is already a large evidence base for what works and doesn't work when it comes to policy changes. What we need to see is political will and a change to the mindset where we tolerate the things that promote obesity. This would not only mean the end of the kind of culture where the sale of unhealthy foods and drinks in hospital waiting rooms is seen as acceptable. It could also mean fewer people end up in those waiting rooms in the first place.

अस्पताल, परिभाषा के अनुसार, स्वास्थ्य के लिए समर्पित इमारतें हैं। लेकिन इस सप्ताह के स्क्रबिंग अप में, विश्व कैंसर अनुसंधान कोष में विज्ञान की उप प्रमुख डॉ. राचेल थॉम्पसन का कहना है कि अस्पताल की वेंडिंग मशीनों की सामग्री से अच्छे काम को कम किया जा रहा है।


Myanmar Rohingya: How a 'genocide' was investigated

Summary: Indiscriminate killing; villages burned to the ground; children assaulted; women gang-raped - these are the findings of United Nations investigators who allege that "the gravest crimes under international law" were committed in Myanmar last August.

By Roland HughesBBC News Such was their severity, the report said, the army must be investigated for genocide against the Rohingya Muslims in the western Rakhine state. The investigators' conclusions came despite them not being granted access to Myanmar by the government there, which has since rejected the report. This is how the investigators came to their conclusions. The build-up On 24 March 2017, the UN Human Rights Council agreed to form an independent fact-finding mission on Myanmar to look into "alleged recent human rights violations by military and security forces". Five months after the mission was formed, Myanmar's army launched a major assault on Rakhine state, following deadly attacks by Rohingya militants on police posts. The military's campaign became the main focus of the investigation, which also looked into rights abuses in Kachin and Shan states. The mission wrote to Myanmar's government three times asking for access to the country. It received no response. The interviews "The first rule was 'do no harm'," says Christopher Sidoti, one of the three people who headed the investigation. "Those people we spoke to had been heavily traumatised, and if our staff considered that an interview would be re-traumatising, it wouldn't have been conducted. "No evidence is so important that it warrants re-traumatising someone who has gone through all these experiences." At least 725,000 people have fled Rakhine state over the past 12 months, many to neighbouring Bangladesh. As a result, despite not getting access to Myanmar, investigators were able to gather a vast amount of testimony from people who had experienced violence at first-hand before fleeing. They spoke to 875 people in Bangladesh, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and the UK, and made a decision early on that the most valuable testimony would come from people who had not shared their stories before. "We didn't want to interview people who had been interviewed by other organisations," Mr Sidoti, an Australian human rights law expert, says. "We didn't want a situation where people's evidence could have been tainted. "We tried to get people from a wide variety of areas and when we became more and more focused later on, we would deliberately, through a community network, seek out others from that area to get a better picture of what went on." The evidence "We would never use just one account as proof," Mr Sidoti says. "We always sought corroboration from primary and secondary sources." Those sources included videos, photographs, documents and satellite images, which showed the destruction of Rohingya villages over several months in 2017. In one case, investigators had received several reports from refugees in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, that a village had been destroyed in particular circumstances at a particular time. Investigators were then able to source satellite images that corroborated what witnesses had said. Satellites images showed that: Getting hold of photographic evidence from the ground proved to be more of a challenge. "When people were leaving Rakhine state, they were being stopped, searched and deprived of their money, gold and mobile phones," Mr Sidoti says. "It seemed pretty clear this was an attempt to get video or photographic evidence they had recorded. "There wasn't much left but we made use of it." The accused The report names six senior military figures it believes should go on trial, including Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing and his deputy. How were investigators able to point the finger directly at these men? The case here is not based on a paper trail, or a recording, but instead on research. Investigators relied heavily on others' detailed understanding of how Myanmar's government works. Among them was a military adviser who had co-operated with war crimes tribunals in the past. "We have been able to access extraordinary international advice on various aspects of Myanmar's military," Mr Sidoti says. "The conclusion we have come up with is that the army is so tightly controlled that nothing happens involving the army in Myanmar without the commander-in-chief and his deputies knowing." While the people believed to have given the orders have been named, work is ongoing to identify the members of the military who may have committed atrocities. "We do have a list of alleged perpetrators on the ground and they will remain confidential for now," Mr Sidoti says. "Their names have come up frequently enough for them to be put on lists to face more investigation." The law Identifying what appears to be genocide and proving that what happened fits the legal definition of genocide are two different things. "Evidence of crimes against humanity was very quickly obtained and was quite overwhelming," Mr Sidoti says. "Genocide is a much more legally complex issue." As the report states, genocide is when "a person commits a prohibited act with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group". The key word is "intent". Investigators believe the evidence of that intent by the Myanmar army is clear. They cite statements by commanders and suspected perpetrators, and the degree of planning required to carry out such an operation. But still, identifying a genocide from a legal perspective took a significant amount of legal work. "We arrived at a position we had not expected to be in when we were beginning," Mr Sidoti says. "None of the three of us thought the evidence for genocide would be as strong as it was. That came as a surprise." The next step The report says that the six military officials should face trial. It also condemns Myanmar's de facto leader, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, for failing to intervene to stop attacks, and the UN's outgoing rights chief this week said she should have resigned as a result. The report also makes a series of recommendations, including the referral of the investigation to the International Criminal Court or to a new tribunal, and the imposition of an arms embargo. However, China has so far resisted strong action against its neighbour and ally Myanmar on the UN Security Council, where it holds a veto. Mr Sidoti acknowledges that officials in Myanmar are unlikely to investigate the allegations themselves. Last year, an internal investigation by the army exonerated itself of blame in the Rohingya crisis, and Myanmar's Permanent Representative to the UN last week told BBC Burmese the report was full of "one-sided accusations against us". "We have made recommendations and it is up to others to act on them," Mr Sidoti says. "I have a high expectation that the Security Council will act on its responsibilities. But I'm not naive."

अंधाधुंध हत्या; गाँव जला दिए गए; बच्चों पर हमला किया गया; महिलाओं के साथ सामूहिक बलात्कार किया गया-ये संयुक्त राष्ट्र के जांचकर्ताओं के निष्कर्ष हैं जो आरोप लगाते हैं कि पिछले अगस्त में म्यांमार में "अंतर्राष्ट्रीय कानून के तहत सबसे गंभीर अपराध" किए गए थे।


Japan disaster reopens nuclear debate in Europe and US

Summary: The immediate concern is how to contain the crisis in Japan's nuclear plants. But thoughts are also turning to the future and, in the world's two big industrial blocs, the politics of nuclear power has already changed.

By Stephen EvansBBC News, Berlin In Germany, there's already been a long debate about what to do with the country's 17 nuclear power stations. Last October, Chancellor Angela Merkel's government decided, with much opposition, to extend their lives by another 12 years so that the last one is now due to be closed in 2035. That fractious debate has now reopened. Mrs Merkel has announced a three-month pause in her previous decision to extend the lives of Germany's nuclear power stations. She said that nuclear power remained an important "bridging technology" between the current system and a greener system of power generation but, she added, "we cannot just go back to business as usual". "Events in Japan," she said, "teach us that risks that were thought to be completely impossible cannot in fact be completely ruled out." In two weeks, the voters of Baden-Wuerttemberg go to the polls. This is her natural territory. It has been controlled by the Christian Democrats for decades but Japan's disaster may now change that. On Saturday, a previously scheduled anti-nuclear demonstration in the region attracted tens of thousands more than expected. That evening, the chancellor met her ministers to discuss the Japanese events and announced that safety standards in Germany would be reviewed. But her dilemma is how to answer concerns without undoing her policy. Referendum call In France, too, the debate has changed. France gets 75% of its energy from nuclear power, exporting the excess and earning useful currency by so doing. In addition, some in government want to sell French reactors to emerging economies. Greenpeace immediately called for a reversal of this nuclear policy which France embraced in the 1970s after the "oil shock" when the price of oil jumped. The group Sortir du Nucleaire protested by the Eiffel Tower, unfurling banners saying "Nuclear is killing the future". Daniel Cohn-Bendit, who is a member of the European Parliament for the Green Party, told French radio that there should be a national referendum on the country's dependence on nuclear power. "It begs the question of the need for civil nuclear power," he said. "Is it not time to sound the alarm?" This is difficult for the government because France's dependence is so great. Three-quarters of its electricity is generated by nuclear power stations. The country has 58 reactors in 19 plants, second only to the United States in its use of nuclear. In addition, France has been eyeing markets in developing countries which might want to buy reactors. French industry minister Eric Besson pointed out that France did not have the same risk of earthquake as Japan: "All French nuclear plants have been designed with seismic risk and flooding risk factored in." But he added (in a phrase which may be a template for pro-nuclear politicians): "We don't wait for an accident to happen in Japan to raise the question over here - but this doesn't mean that we can't re-evaluate the situation." Austrian environment minister Nikolaus Berlakovich said he would ask his fellow ministers in the European Union to approve "a stress test of nuclear plants" - similar to stress tests on banks where extreme situations are imagined by computers. US debate In the United States, too, the debate has changed. At the moment, President Obama is in pro-nuclear agreement with Republicans. He believes that nuclear power provides a relatively cheap form of energy, and one which doesn't produce global warming gases like coal, gas and oil-fired power stations do. Even environmental groups in the United States, unlike in Europe, believe that nuclear power has a place because of its light carbon footprint. But this was a fragile consensus and it is hard to see how it won't now come under pressure. Over the weekend, Senator Joseph Lieberman told CBS programme Face The Nation: "I think it calls on us here in the US, naturally, not to stop building nuclear power plants but to put the brakes on right now until we understand the ramifications of what's happened in Japan." The New York Times quotes Jason Grumet, an adviser to President Obama, from the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington: "It's not possible to achieve a climate solution based on existing technology without a significant reliance on nuclear power." The United States has recently witnessed disasters with oil in the Gulf of Mexico and coal with the mining disaster a year ago in West Virginia which claimed 29 lives, and both underlined the cost of alternatives to nuclear. But Japan may tip back the balance of debate. As Mr Grumet put it: "The accident certainly has diminished what had been a growing impetus in the environmental community to support nuclear power as part of a broad bargain on energy and climate policy." The problem for pro-nuclear governments is that explosions at nuclear reactors in one of the world's most advanced economies must play strongly in the public mind, whatever the assurances of safety and cool calculations of costs, benefits and risk. The debate has changed.

तत्काल चिंता यह है कि जापान के परमाणु संयंत्रों में संकट को कैसे रोका जाए। लेकिन विचार भविष्य की ओर भी मुड़ रहे हैं और दुनिया के दो बड़े औद्योगिक गुटों में परमाणु ऊर्जा की राजनीति पहले ही बदल चुकी है।


Will we ever want to have sex with robots?

Summary: Meet Roxxxy, the sex robot with a triple XXX. Depending on your view, "she" is either at the cutting edge of the human-robot interface, or a modern reflection on some men's difficulties in relating to real-life partners.

By Tim BowlerBusiness reporter, BBC News While sex aids are nothing new, what makes Roxxxy different is that "we've taken artificial intelligence" and "combined it with a human form," says creator Douglas Hines. Of course, humanoid robots have been the stuff of science fiction for decades - ever since Fritz Lang's 1927 film Metropolis, or Isaac Asimov's I, Robot stories. The reality is somewhat more clunky. Walking robots currently have little commercial value - they are expensive and are prone to falling over if they are placed on anything other than a flat surface. One of the best of the bunch is Japan's all singing and dancing female robot, HRP-4C, from the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST). The main drawback of this type of robot is that they have a very short battery life - they only last for about 20 minutes. It is enough for a rather impressive dancing routine from HRP-4C says the team, but for little else. "One practical application for biped humanoid robots is the entertainment industry," says AIST "provided the robots can move very realistically like humans." Loving the robot In 2007, the British chess player and artificial intelligence (AI) expert David Levy said in his book, Love and Sex with Robots, we would be having sex with robots in five years - and be capable of falling in love with them within 40 years. His argument is based on improvements in robotic engineering and computer programming - and extrapolating from the income generated by the porn industry each year. Such robots would be a "terrific service" for mankind, he argued. As for Roxxxy, she weighs in at 60lb (27kg) is 5ft 7in (1.70m) high and comes with a variety of hair colours, moveable limbs and 'lifelike' skin. She is the brainchild of electrical engineer and computer scientist Douglas Hines, the founder of TC Systems and True Companion, who formerly worked in the artificial intelligence lab at AT&T Bell Laboratories. He says the sex robot developed from his firm's line of healthcare robots, which were designed to look after elderly or infirm patients. "Our skill-set is based on commercial and military robotics and what we did is we looked for an opportunity in the marketplace to apply that technology. "One very obvious market is healthcare - but there's a less-known which is gaining more and more momentum which is the sex industry." 'Exciting time' Mr Hines says his aim in developing his robot's artificial intelligence engine, was to go beyond a simple sex aid and to provide companionship. "The life experience with a partner goes beyond that - and that's really what we've gone for," he told BBC World Service's Business Daily programme. However, no matter how well-programmed a robot may be, it is still a machine, and he agrees a plastic and metal humanoid is not capable of replacing the real thing - yet. "We are getting closer and closer. The gap between what is robotic and mechanical and what's human-like will minimise, so it's a very exciting time." Roxxxy costs up to $9,000 (£5,700) and there is also a male version called Rocky. Later this year the company plans a more advanced model which it says will be mobile and autonomous. At the heart of our relationships with such machines, fictional or not, is the question of what it means to be human and to relate to others. While no machine, however well-engineered, can ever feel empathy - something which defines us humans - it might be able to simulate it well enough to allow us to play along and treat it as if it were a sentient being. Novelty appeal But will there ever be more than a fetish or novelty appeal in such robots? In a survey earlier this year, one-in-11 people - some 9% - told a YouGov poll for the Huffington Post in the US that they would be prepared to have sex with a robot. That works out at over 25 million Americans - which could translate into a lot of robot sales. Yet critics caution that we should not be too quick to embrace robots like Roxxxy. "It is time to reconsider the premise that a robot is better than nothing," says Sherry Turkle, psychologist and professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "Because, if you are trying to solve the problem of care and companionship with a robot, you are not trying to solve it with the people you need to solve it with - friends, family, community." Not promising "We may think we are only making robots," she told this year's meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, "but really we are re-making human values and connections. "The pretend self of a robot calls forth the pretend self of a person performing for it," she said. And that, she says is not promising "for adults trying to live authentically and navigate life's real, human problems".

ट्रिपल एक्सएक्सएक्स के साथ सेक्स रोबोट रॉक्सक्सी से मिलें। आपके विचार के आधार पर, "वह" या तो मानव-रोबोट इंटरफेस के चरम पर है, या वास्तविक जीवन के भागीदारों से संबंधित कुछ पुरुषों की कठिनाइयों पर एक आधुनिक प्रतिबिंब है।


Migrant crisis: Syrians explain why they came to the UK

Summary: The image of three-year-old Alan Kurdi photographed lying face down on a beach in Turkey has sparked an international outcry over the human cost of the refugee crisis. With the UK set to accept thousands more refugees into the country over the coming months, the BBC has been hearing the stories of Syrians who have already made it to the UK.

By Noel TitheradgeBBC News 'We were about to drown' When Mervat Alsman's home in Damascus was destroyed by bombs, she went to live with her parents. But even there, she found "no peace". "There was bombing, kidnapping, killing," she tells the BBC. "That's why I had to leave." She travelled to Europe by boat and lorry with her nine-year-old daughter in 2014. They moved initially to Egypt and then on to Libya, where she says she met a man who said he could organise travel to Europe. Having paid $1,500 (£985) each for her and her daughter, they undertook the journey across the Mediterranean after a month-long wait. Mrs Alsman says the boat had around 700 people on board but should only have taken 300, and that it became unstable at sea. "We were about to drown. Some people threw themselves in the sea," she says. "Everyone was screaming and crying and we thought we were about to die. I was very afraid. I was with my nine-year-old daughter and we were scared and crying all the time." The 40-year-old says she was saved by the coastguard and taken ashore to Italy. She then paid to be transported to Calais in a lorry. After another period arranging onwards travel, she finally made it to Dover in the back of another lorry. Asked why she wanted to travel to the UK, she says: "I have a brother here. If I went anywhere else, there would be nobody to help me." Mrs Alsman is now living in Bradford. She has three other children aged 15, 24 and 25, who she says have all been denied permission to join her in the UK. "All the time I am worried about them," she says. "Not only my children. We are afraid for everybody in Syria. "The situation is so bad, we don't know how we can help them." Memories of the journey continue to haunt her. "Whenever I see TV pictures of other accidents at sea like that one [where Alan Kurdi died], I remember that day," she says. "It was really difficult, I saw death in front of me. I was so afraid for my daughter. "It's very difficult when you see a child who should be playing and enjoying his life. I imagine my son, my brother's son. It's very, very difficult." 'People in Syria are suffering' Bushra Hajar has also left family behind in Syria. She fled from Aleppo to Egypt with a daughter who had leukaemia. She applied to the UN for help in reaching Europe. She says they told her she could travel to the UK with her husband and three of her five children. Her son remains in Damascus, while another daughter lives in Turkey. "I haven't seen my son in four years" says Mrs Hajar, who also lives in Bradford. "I want him to come here. The situation is so bad. I don't know if I will see him again. "The people in Syria are suffering so much. They must bring many people here." Her daughter is now receiving general care for her leukaemia. 'It saved our lives' Hayan, another refugee who travelled to the UK to escape the conflict in Syria, spoke to the BBC's Lucy Manning on the condition that only his and his wife's first names are used, as he has relatives who are still living in Syria. "The government in the UK should allow other people to come," he says. "People in Syria will try to escape from the war. They know they will die so have no choice." Having been moved initially to Wakefield, West Yorkshire, and then Stockton-on-Tees, County Durham, he was eventually settled in Manchester. Six months later he was joined by his wife and two young children. Hayan says local people have welcomed him and his family. "We've had no problems from any people in Manchester," he says. "They are good people. A lot of people tried to help us when we needed help." Hayan worked as a radiographer in Syria for eight years before the war, while his wife Hala worked in a bank. She says they were happy before the conflict began and only travelled to Europe when there was no other choice. "It saved my life, my children's lives," she says. "We had a very beautiful life in Syria before the war. We were forced to leave our country, our jobs, our homes, our parents, our friends, our everything to start a new life here. "I'm 35 nearly. I'm trying now to start a new life. It's not easy. I just came for my life, for my children's lives."

तुर्की के समुद्र तट पर तीन साल के एलन कुर्दी की तस्वीर ने शरणार्थी संकट की मानवीय कीमत पर अंतर्राष्ट्रीय आक्रोश को जन्म दिया है। ब्रिटेन के आने वाले महीनों में देश में हजारों और शरणार्थियों को स्वीकार करने के लिए तैयार होने के साथ, बीबीसी उन सीरियाई लोगों की कहानियाँ सुन रहा है जो पहले ही ब्रिटेन पहुँच चुके हैं।


Where are India's millions of missing girls?

Summary: India's 2011 census shows a serious decline in the number of girls under the age of seven - activists fear eight million female foetuses may have been aborted in the past decade. The BBC's Geeta Pandey in Delhi explores what has led to this crisis.

Kulwant has three daughters aged 24, 23 and 20 and a son who is 16. In the years between the birth of her third daughter and her son, Kulwant became pregnant three times. Each time, she says, she was forced to abort the foetus by her family after ultrasound tests confirmed that they were girls. "My mother-in-law taunted me for giving birth to girls. She said her son would divorce me if I didn't bear a son." Kulwant still has vivid memories of the first abortion. "The baby was nearly five months old. She was beautiful. I miss her, and the others we killed," she says, breaking down, wiping away her tears. Until her son was born, Kulwant's daily life consisted of beatings and abuse from her husband, mother-in-law and brother-in-law. Once, she says, they even attempted to set her on fire. "They were angry. They didn't want girls in the family. They wanted boys so they could get fat dowries," she says. India outlawed dowries in 1961, but the practice remains rampant and the value of dowries is constantly growing, affecting rich and poor alike. Kulwant's husband died three years after the birth of their son. "It was the curse of the daughters we killed. That's why he died so young," she says. Common attitude Her neighbour Rekha is mother of a chubby three-year-old girl. Last September, when she became pregnant again, her mother-in-law forced her to undergo an abortion after an ultrasound showed that she was pregnant with twin girls. "I said there's no difference between girls and boys. But here they think differently. There's no happiness when a girl is born. They say the son will carry forward our lineage, but the daughter will get married and go off to another family." Kulwant and Rekha live in Sagarpur, a lower middle-class area in south-west Delhi. Here, narrow minds live in homes separated by narrow lanes. The women's story is common and repeated in millions of homes across India, and it has been getting worse. In 1961, for every 1,000 boys under the age of seven, there were 976 girls. Today, the figure has dropped to a dismal 914 girls. Although the number of women overall is improving (due to factors such as life expectancy), India's ratio of young girls to boys is one of the worst in the world after China. Many factors come into play to explain this: infanticide, abuse and neglect of girl children. But campaigners say the decline is largely due to the increased availability of antenatal sex screening, and they talk of a genocide. The government has been forced to admit that its strategy has failed to put an end to female foeticide. 'National shame' "Whatever measures have been put in over the past 40 years have not had any impact on the child sex ratio," Home Secretary GK Pillai said when the census report was released. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh described female foeticide and infanticide as a "national shame" and called for a "crusade" to save girl babies. But Sabu George, India's best-known campaigner on the issue, says the government has so far shown little determination to stop the practices. Until 30 years ago, he says, India's sex ratio was "reasonable". Then in 1974, Delhi's prestigious All India Institute of Medical Sciences came out with a study which said sex-determination tests were a boon for Indian women. It said they no longer needed to produce endless children to have the right number of sons, and it encouraged the determination and elimination of female foetuses as an effective tool of population control. "By late 80s, every newspaper in Delhi was advertising for ultrasound sex determination," said Mr George. "Clinics from Punjab were boasting that they had 10 years' experience in eliminating girl children and inviting parents to come to them." In 1994, the Pre-Natal Determination Test (PNDT) Act outlawed sex-selective abortion. In 2004, it was amended to include gender selection even at the pre-conception stage. Abortion is generally legal up to 12 weeks' gestation. Sex can be determined by a scan from about 14 weeks. "What is needed is a strict implementation of the law," says Varsha Joshi, director of census operations for Delhi. "I find there's absolutely no will on the part of the government to stop this." Today, there are 40,000 registered ultrasound clinics in the country, and many more exist without any record. 'Really sad' Ms Joshi, a former district commissioner of south-west Delhi, says there are dozens of ultrasound clinics in the area. It has the worst child sex ratio in the capital - 836 girls under seven for every 1,000 boys. Delhi's overall ratio is not much better at 866 girls under seven for every 1,000 boys. "It's really sad. We are the capital of the country and we have such a poor ratio," Ms Joshi says. The south-west district shares its boundary with Punjab and Haryana, the two Indian states with the worst sex ratios. Since the last census, Punjab and Haryana have shown a slight improvement. But Delhi has registered a decline. "Something's really wrong here and something has to be done to put things right," Ms Joshi says. Almost all the ultrasound clinics in the area have the mandatory board outside, proclaiming that they do not carry out illegal sex-determination tests. But the women in Sagarpur say most people here know where to go when they need an ultrasound or an abortion. They say anyone who wants to get a foetal ultrasound done, gets it done. In the five-star clinics of south Delhi it costs 10,000-plus rupees ($222; £135), In the remote peripheral areas of Delhi's border, it costs a few hundred rupees. Similarly, the costs vary for those wanting an illegal abortion. Delhi is not alone in its anti-girl bias. Sex ratios have declined in 17 states in the past decade, with the biggest falls registered in Jammu and Kashmir. Ms Joshi says most offenders are members of the growing middle-class and affluent Indians - they are aware that the technology exists and have the means to pay to find out the sex of their baby and abort if they choose. "We have to take effective steps to control the promotion of sex determination by the medical community. And file cases against doctors who do it," Mr George says. "Otherwise by 2021, we are frightened to think what it will be like."

भारत की 2011 की जनगणना से पता चलता है कि सात साल से कम उम्र की लड़कियों की संख्या में गंभीर गिरावट आई है-कार्यकर्ताओं को डर है कि पिछले एक दशक में अस्सी लाख कन्या भ्रूणों का गर्भपात किया गया होगा। दिल्ली में बीबीसी की गीता पांडे इस बात की पड़ताल करती है कि इस संकट का कारण क्या है।


Missing pianist believed to be buried by wrong family

Summary: A grieving Canadian family has accidentally buried the wrong body.

It was an error that only came to light when the missing relative thought to have died returned home months after the funeral. Police believe the body belonged to pianist Scott Cushnie, 80, who has been missing since August. Friends and family of the Toronto musician say if he were alive, he would have "had a laugh" and they hold no hard feelings towards the other family. The coroner's office says the body is being exhumed so a full identification can be carried out. How did the mix-up happen? Mr Cushnie's long-time friend Andrea Reid told the BBC that she got a call from police last week explaining that they believed they had found him - and that they thought he had been accidentally buried by the wrong family. Police told Ms Reid a man died in hospital last August, after an ambulance driver spotted him falling on the sidewalk. Meanwhile, another family was also searching for their loved one. Police called them to identify the body in the morgue, and the body was released to their care. Police have not identified the family for privacy reasons. "When he died he was released to his family and they made funeral arrangements," police spokeswoman Jenifferjit Sidhu confirmed. How the families were told Months later, the man the family thought they had buried returned alive, leading police to contact Ms Reid, who had been leading the search for Mr Cushnie. "In a lot of ways this was actually a big relief, because I wasn't under the impression that he was alive any more and my fears about what could have happened to him were running rampant," she said. "To know that an ambulance was right there when he had his accident, and he was given immediate care, and he's been cared for this whole time, was actually a really nice comfort." Who was Mr Cushnie? Mr Cushnie was well known in Toronto's music community. Born legally blind, he played piano professionally in blues and rock bands since the 1950s, and shared the stage with greats such as Aerosmith and Duane Allman. Ms Reid formed a close friendship with Mr Cushnie over music. He became her piano mentor and taught her the blues. She also became his de-facto manager, helping him book gigs and get to appointments. He was living in an independent senior's flat in Toronto when he went missing, and was in good health. Mr Cushnie leaves behind two sisters and several nieces and nephews. A need for closure "It is such a strange situation," said his niece Liz Hale. "We'd like to talk to that other family." Ms Hale said there is no ill will about the mistake, but that speaking to them would help give them closure. "My mom and his other sister especially are really saddened by it all, and we are just hoping that we can move on, and celebrate his life with his friends and fellow musicians." The coroner's office is still working on identifying the body that was buried, but Ms Reid says there is little doubt in her mind that it is him. She saw some of the effects that were collected, and recognised his house keys. Ultimately, she believes Mr Cushnie would find the mistaken burial funny. "He was a man with an incredible sense of humour... if he had read about this story he would have had a laugh," she said.

एक दुखी कनाडाई परिवार ने गलती से गलत शव को दफना दिया है।


Going off the rails: The Edinburgh trams saga

Summary: Trams will return to Edinburgh's streets for the first time in almost 50 years, when the service begins on Saturday. However, in the decade since the first money was allocated to the project, the price has doubled, the network has halved and it has taken twice as long to build as was first thought.

By Steven BrocklehurstBBC Scotland news website Edinburgh's tram "network" is now just part of one of the original lines, stretching from the airport to the city centre. It had been intended to reach the waterfront at Leith and Newhaven, and there were to be other lines too, but they fell away as the troubled project rumbled on. The idea of bringing back trams to Edinburgh's congested streets goes back many years but the current saga can be said to have begun in September 2003. Back then the Labour-led Scottish Executive earmarked £375m, indexed for inflation, for the proposed tram routes linking the city centre with both Leith and Edinburgh Airport. It was hoped trams would be operational by 2009. Now, more than five years behind schedule, Edinburgh has trams on its streets for the first time since 1956 but just one route, not the network that was envisaged. The 8.7mile (14km) route stretches from Edinburgh airport to York Place in the city centre, with 15 stops along the way. It has cost of £776m, plus more than £200m in interest on a 30-year loan taken out by the council to cover the funding shortfall. It is something of a miracle it ever got finished at all, given the disputes along the way. The entire project was going to be scrapped by the SNP when the Nationalists formed their first minority government at Holyrood in 2007, only for the decision to be overturned by the will of the other parties in the Scottish Parliament. And four years ago a bitter dispute between the arms-length company responsible for bringing trams to Edinburgh and its main contractor brought the whole project to a halt for months. When David Mackay quit as chairman of Transport Edinburgh Limited he branded the project "hell on wheels". Mr Mackay described the main contractor on the tram works, Bilfinger Berger, as a "delinquent company that smelled a victim". During the darkest days of the dispute, the German construction giant said nothing publicly due to contractual restrictions. But there is little doubt that Bilfinger Berger's executives were similarly left frustrated and angry by TIE's handling of the project. Add to all this the fact that vital roads in Edinburgh city centre and Leith were dug up for the best part of seven years, causing congestion, inconvenience and financial harm to businesses and it is little wonder that the dream of a tram system to rival any in Europe is now such a painful idea for the people of Scotland's capital. As Edinburgh's elegant streets were transformed into a giant building site, initial scepticism was replaced by downright opposition. It is often said by locals that Edinburgh has one of Britain's best bus services but the city council developed a new transport plan at the start of the millennium and trams were a priority. At first the tram project was dependent on the revenues from a road-charging scheme that the City of Edinburgh Council wanted to implement, similar to that introduced in London in 2003. But when the controversial road tolls were rejected after a public outcry, the tram scheme sailed on, backed by cash from the Scottish government of the time. By September 2005, as the parliamentary bills for the line made their way through Holyrood the cost was put at £539m. The new estimates of cost prove too much for the council which shelved the Granton-Newhaven and Edinburgh airport-Newbridge sections. In March 2006 the legislation was passed in parliament, with completion now put back to 2011 and the first work to divert utility pipes and cables in Leith began in March 2007. But work stopped as the Scottish Parliament elections arrived and in May 2007, the new SNP administration at Holyrood tried to press ahead with its pledge to scrap the trams project. However, opposition parties outvoted the minority government and it was forced to hand-over almost £500m for the project. The Scottish government's finance secretary John Swinney said he would give the project the cash already agreed and "not a penny more". Any further cash would have to be found by the City of Edinburgh Council. Construction could now begin and a whole new range of problems arrived. The city centre was left gridlocked when work began on Princes Street at The Mound due to a "catastrophic failure" of traffic management and similar stories bubbled up wherever the tram works went. Princes Street, the main route through the centre of Scotland's capital, remained closed to traffic for most of 2009, an annus horribilis for the project. A dispute between Tie, which was overseeing the project, and the construction consortium spiralled out of control and a legal dispute dragged on for many months, putting back the finish of the project and driving up costs. In October 2010 council officials admitted the tram line would only run to St Andrew Square in the city centre, the plan to continue to Leith and Newhaven bit the dust. Next the chairman of the Edinburgh tram company resigned and work ground to a complete standstill. 2011 saw some sort of resolution with the contractor but a fresh crisis emerged as the council realised it did not have the money to complete the project. Edinburgh's city council came up with a plan to stop the line at Haymarket, more than a mile west of the city centre, a decision which was labelled as "bonkers" by the city's Chambers of Commerce. The Scottish government had to wade in again and refused to provide the final £72m of its funding if the line did not go to the city centre, forcing the council into a u-turn. In contrast to the troubled history of the project its final two years have been relatively smooth, although by this stage it was hard to imagine what else could go wrong. Construction of the line was finished at the end of last year and testing of the trams has been going on for several months. Now Edinburgh is ready to get on-board its trams for the first time. But the people of Edinburgh may take some time to love them.

ट्राम लगभग 50 वर्षों में पहली बार एडिनबर्ग की सड़कों पर लौटेंगे, जब सेवा शनिवार को शुरू होगी। हालाँकि, परियोजना के लिए पहला पैसा आवंटित किए जाने के बाद के दशक में, कीमत दोगुनी हो गई है, नेटवर्क आधा हो गया है और इसे बनाने में दोगुना समय लगा है जैसा कि पहले सोचा गया था।


Sheep run over and killed by hare coursers in Dorset

Summary: Six sheep have been run over and killed by hare coursers who drove across their field.

It happened in Sixpenny Handley in Dorset some time between 18:00 BST on Friday and 08:00 on Saturday. Dorset Police said the dead ewes and lambs were discovered with tyre tracks across their bodies. No arrests have been made. Anyone who either saw anything suspicious or who has dashcam footage from that time is urged to contact the force.

छह भेड़ों को खरगोशों द्वारा कुचल दिया गया है और मार दिया गया है जो उनके खेत में चले गए थे।


NHS Grampian chief executive named as Caroline Hiscox

Summary: NHS Grampian has named its nursing director as its new chief executive.

Prof Caroline Hiscox will take over in November from Prof Amanda Croft, who announced in June she was retiring from the post. Chairwoman of NHS Grampian, Prof Lynda Lynch said the new chief executive had made a significant contribution since joining as a director in 2015. Prof Croft was appointed in April last year, having previously held the role in an interim capacity.

एन. एच. एस. ग्रैम्पियन ने अपने नर्सिंग निदेशक को अपना नया मुख्य कार्यकारी नामित किया है।


Two 'unaccounted for' following Eastbourne house fire

Summary: Two people are believed missing after a fire at a house in Eastbourne, which police are treating as arson.

One man has been taken to hospital suffering from burns, but police say two other residents of the house in Croxden Way are "as yet unaccounted for". Emergency services have described the blaze, which broke out at about 01:20 BST on Tuesday, as "ferocious". Fire damage has made it too dangerous for investigators to gain access. A spokesman for Sussex Police said officers are "working with colleagues at East Sussex Fire and Rescue Service to establish the cause of the fire, which is being treated as arson."

ईस्टबोर्न में एक घर में आग लगने के बाद दो लोगों के लापता होने की आशंका है, जिसे पुलिस आगजनी मान रही है।


Can we trust BMI to measure obesity?

Summary: You've been using our fat calculator in your droves, working out your BMI (body mass index) and comparing the result with people in your age group and your part of the UK.

By Philippa RoxbyHealth reporter, BBC News But a few people have been critical. They say using BMI to measure whether they are healthy, overweight or obese is misleading. So what's the truth? Can we trust what it tells us? Is BMI the best measure of obesity? Firstly, it is a quick and easy way of working out whether you are in the healthy category by using two simple measures - weight and height. Most doctors say it is the best method they have, it's pretty accurate, can be measured simply in clinic and is acceptable to patients. "It works in the vast majority of people, the vast majority of time," says Prof Naveed Sattar, from the University of Glasgow. "If two people are the same height and one has a BMI of 25 and the other a BMI of 40, then excess body fat is the reason." Measuring BMI is also much more accurate and potentially less embarrassing than measuring someone's waist circumference, which is also a good guide. BMI is calculated by dividing an adult's weight by the square of their height. Your BMI Your BMI is [bmi_result] which is in the [bmi_category] category. BMI is a standard way of measuring if people are a healthy weight for their height. For most adults 18.5 to 24.9 is the healthy range. Your age group Your BMI is [comparative] the average of [bmi_score] for a [gender_singular] in your age group ([user_age_group]) in [user_country]. About [percent]% of [gender_plural] in your age group in [user_country] are overweight, obese or very obese. 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% Percentages may not sum to 100 due to rounding Your part of the UK In all parts of the UK, the majority of the adult population is overweight, obese or very obese, according to the latest national surveys. In [region], the figure is about [percentage]% of [gender_plural]. Wales BMI data is gatherered through self measurement so may be an underestimate What does this mean for you? The information you've given us indicates you could be underweight. There can be health risks associated with a low BMI such as anaemia, osteoporosis, a weakened immune system and fertility problems. This is not a medical diagnostic tool so don't panic if this isn't the result you were expecting to see. If you're concerned about your weight, or your health in general, speak to a healthcare professional such as your GP. Follow the links for more information and advice on what to do if you're underweight: You're in the healthy range which is great. Research shows that having a healthy BMI can reduce your risk of serious health problems, such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke and some cancers. But not all people with a BMI in this range have a lower risk. Other factors such as smoking, high blood cholesterol or high blood pressure will increase your risk. If you're of Asian descent you have a higher risk of heart disease and diabetes at a lower BMI and waist circumference. A healthy BMI for you would be 18.5-23. We're more likely to gain weight as we get older so to stay a healthy weight you may need to make small changes to your diet or your activity levels as you age. Here are some tips to help you stay healthy: The information you've given us indicates you are overweight. Research shows that a BMI above the healthy range can increase your risk of serious health problems, such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and some cancers. A healthy BMI for a person of your height would be 18.5-24.9. If you're of Asian descent you have a higher risk of heart disease and diabetes at a lower BMI and waist circumference. A healthy BMI for you would be 18.5-23. Losing even a small amount of weight, if sustained, can have a big impact. For most people changing your diet is by far the best way to lose weight. Activity can help you maintain your target weight, and can have other health benefits, but increasing activity alone is not nearly as effective as diet at helping you shed the pounds. Even small changes like reducing portion sizes or choosing lower calorie snacks and drinks can help you lose weight or stop putting it on. Here are some other options you may want to try: The information you've given us indicates you're in the obese category. Research shows that having a BMI in this range will significantly increase your risk of serious health problems, such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and some cancers. A healthy BMI for a person of your height would be 18.5-24.9. If you're of Asian descent you have a higher risk of heart disease and diabetes at a lower BMI and waist circumference. A healthy BMI for you would be 18.5-23. Losing even a small amount of weight, if sustained, can have a big impact. For most people changing your diet is by far the best way to lose weight. Activity can help you maintain your target weight, and can have other health benefits, but increasing activity alone is not nearly as effective as diet at helping you shed the pounds. There's lots of support available to help you make changes, either to lose weight or to stop putting on weight. Here are some options you may want to try: The information you've given us indicates you're in the very obese category. Research shows that having a BMI in this range will significantly increase your risk of serious health problems, such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease, stroke, and some cancers. A healthy BMI for a person of your height would be 18.5-24.9. If you're of Asian descent you have a higher risk of heart disease and diabetes at a lower BMI and waist circumference. A healthy BMI for you would be 18.5-23. Losing even a small amount of weight, if sustained, can have a big impact. For most people changing your diet is by far the best way to lose weight. Activity can help you maintain your target weight, and can have other health benefits, but increasing activity alone is not nearly as effective as diet at helping you shed the pounds. If you are concerned, or would like to find out more, speak to your doctor or GP. If you are ready to make lifestyle changes, there is lots of support available. Here are some options you may want to try: Your waist size BMI is not the only way of measuring whether you are a healthy weight. Doctors say that carrying too much fat around your belly can increase your risk of health problems. Excess fat in this area can stress internal organs - even if your BMI is in the healthy range. Your waist size is [size] For [gender_plural], the NHS says a waist size of: 80cm (31.5 inches) or more means an increased risk of health problems 88cm (34 inches) or more means a very high risk of health problems 94cm (37 inches) or more means an increased risk of health problems 102cm (40 inches) or more means a very high risk of health problems People from non-white ethnic groups may be at risk at a lower waist size How to check your waist with just a piece of string If you can't see the calculator tap or click here. But does it work for everyone? No, not all. And this provoked a few comments along these lines: "Why, in this day and age, are you using BMI to tell people they are overweight? It is an outdated method that does not take into consideration muscle and actual health! I am extremely fit and healthy with a low body fat percentage, yet your BMI tells me (and many more self-conscious girls) that I am overweight!" There are some people who carry a lot of muscle and little fat, like bodybuilders, boxers and rugby players. Muscle is much denser than fat so they may end up with a BMI that classes them as obese, despite the fact they may be fit and healthy. But this is thought to apply to fewer than 1% of the population. Most people aren't extreme athletes. Tim Cole, professor of medical statistics, at University College London Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health, said BMI was "still extremely relevant". "You don't see many bodybuilders around but you do see lots of people with large waists. Many people get exercised about that wrongly." As people age, they lose muscle and may be classed in the "healthy weight" range even though they may be carrying excess fat. This is particularly true of smokers. BMI also doesn't apply to pregnant women, and some ethnic groups have a higher risk of health problems at lower BMI levels. Does BMI actually measure fat? It can't measure how much excess fat we have in our bodies - as opposed to muscle and bone - because that would require some pretty complicated and expensive medical procedures, which just aren't practical to carry out on the whole population. What it does do is give a healthy weight range for a particular height, taking into account variations in body shape - and it provides a good starting point for the majority of people. It also doesn't measure how fat is distributed throughout the body (some fat is ok; too much in the wrong place is a risk). Research shows that people who carry a lot of fat around their waists are at higher risk of health problems than those with more fat around their thighs and buttocks. They are more likely to have fat stored in their abdomen around key organs, which could increase the risk of heart disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes. So waist size may be a better way to monitor your health than BMI. That's why our calculator included an option for giving your waist size too. "If people think they have lots of muscle mass, their waists should be lower for a given BMI - so they can easily check," says Prof Sattar. How to measure your waist Regardless of your height or BMI, you should try to lose weight if your waist is: Can BMI tell us anything about disease risk? On its own, it can't. But doctors use BMI in conjunction with other measures - like blood pressure, cholesterol and family history - to work out an individual's risk of type 2 diabetes or heart disease, for example. Body mass index is not specific to any particular health risk - and that's its strength, experts say. However, a BMI above the healthy range or too much fat around the waist is known to increase the risk of serious health problems, including stroke and certain cancers. Are we shaming those who are overweight? One person said of the BBC calculator: "Your unscientific method of calculating 'fatness' is an unhelpful tool that dehumanises those who are obese or overweight, shaming them into losing weight and threatening their fragile relationship with their bodies." There was no intention of shaming people - merely offering a way of finding out about your own weight because excess fat is the cause of an increased risk of a range of diseases. If you think you would like to lose some weight, you should go and see your GP for advice first. The best way to lose weight is to make small, realistic changes to your diet and physical activity.

आप अपने समूह में हमारे वसा कैलकुलेटर का उपयोग कर रहे हैं, अपने बीएमआई (बॉडी मास इंडेक्स) पर काम कर रहे हैं और अपने आयु वर्ग और यूके के अपने हिस्से के लोगों के साथ परिणाम की तुलना कर रहे हैं।


Isle of Man storms bring 'mountains of rubbish'

Summary: Beach cleaners have collected "mountains of rubbish" deposited on the west coast of the Isle of Man during recent stormy weather.

About 30 Beach Buddy volunteers gathered 54 bags of rubbish at Ballaugh Cronk on Sunday. Coordinator Bill Dale said they also found "dozens" of oil drums. He added: "We tackled mountains of rubbish- the recent storms brought more than I have seen in seven years of running Beach Buddies."

समुद्र तट सफाई करने वालों ने हाल के तूफानी मौसम के दौरान आइल ऑफ मैन के पश्चिमी तट पर जमा "कचरे के पहाड़" एकत्र किए हैं।


Man hit by bowling ball thrown from window in Bilborough

Summary: A man was left with serious injuries when he was hit with a bowling ball thrown from a window.

The man was hit in Strelley Road, Bilborough, Nottinghamshire, at about 09:20 GMT. He was taken to hospital. The road was shut for several hours afterwards while officers "ensured the safety of another man", Nottinghamshire Police said. A 30-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder. Police urged witnesses to contact them. Det Sgt Simon Carter said officers believe it was "an isolated incident". Follow BBC East Midlands on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. Send your story ideas to eastmidsnews@bbc.co.uk.

खिड़की से फेंकी गई गेंद से एक व्यक्ति को गंभीर चोटें आईं।


Motorcyclist dies in road crash in Cumbria

Summary: A motorcyclist died when his machine was involved in a collision with a car near Egremont in Cumbria.

It happened at 19:40 BST on the A595 near the Blackbeck Inn near Egremont. The 52-year-old male motorcyclist died at the scene. A 56-year-old man, who was driving a Vauxhall Astra, was taken to the West Cumberland Hospital with serious injuries. The road was closed while police investigated the accident.

कंब्रिया में एग्रेमोंट के पास एक कार के साथ उनकी मशीन की टक्कर में एक मोटरसाइकिल सवार की मौत हो गई।


Murder charge over New Year's Day death in Stockbridge

Summary: A man has been charged with murder after a woman was found dead at a house in Merseyside.

The 46-year-old victim was found by police at Custley Hey in Stockbridge Village on New Year's Day following a report of concern for safety. A post-mortem examination found she died as a result of a blunt force trauma and "mechanical asphyxiation". Piotr Cichy, 48, of Custley Hey, has been remanded in custody to appear at Liverpool Magistrates' Court later. An investigation continues and anyone with information is asked to contact Merseyside Police.

मर्सीसाइड में एक घर में एक महिला के मृत पाए जाने के बाद एक व्यक्ति पर हत्या का आरोप लगाया गया है।


Hague opts for the lesser of two EVELs

Summary: William Hague has chosen the lesser of two EVELs.

James LandaleDeputy political editor@BBCJLandaleon Twitter His version of this ghastly acronym would give English MPs control over the detail - and a veto over - English laws. But MPs from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland would still have a role debating and voting on English legislation. For some Tory MPs this is not enough. They fear that Scottish MPs - including what could be a larger number of SNP MPs after the election - would still be able to frustrate English proposals. English MPs were never going to be given total control over English law. That would have created a de facto English Parliament that many MPs believe would have left the United Kingdom unworkable. David Cameron never had this in mind when he stood outside Downing Street last September and promised to listen to the voices of England. While some constitutional purists on the Tory benches are feeling sore, others are content. They now have something to say on the doorstep about the so-called English issue. Tory discipline This is not a front rank issue. Tories say that in some marginal constituencies, it is a matter of concern to a goodly number of voters. And crucially it is of concern to voters who tend to vote Tory but are disillusioned with the party, voters who feel uncomfortable over gay marriage and coalition with the Lib Dems, voters who are thinking of voting UKIP. So this issue is as political as it is constitutional. The Conservatives hope to pick up a few votes in England by leading from the front over EVEL. They quite like winding up Labour by promising to curb their power base in Scotland, although the SNP might appear more of a threat to that right now. And the Tories like the idea of giving themselves some defensive cover against UKIP if the party finally decides that English nationalism is a tune they want to play. The risk for the Tories is that they try to be too clever. They hope to hold a symbolic vote in the Commons on this before the election so they can accuse Labour of playing "see no EVEL, hear no EVEL". Some Tory MPs might be unable to resist putting their own amendments down. What was designed to embarrass Labour could end up highlighting Conservative divisions. The question now is whether Tory discipline will hold.

विलियम हेग ने दो ई. वी. ई. एल. में से छोटे को चुना है।


Edinburgh company generates electricity from gravity

Summary: An Edinburgh company is harnessing a simple idea to crack an important energy challenge, using the principle of the winding mechanism on an old clock It could be used around the world, where old mine shafts are available, some of the deepest in South Africa

Douglas FraserBusiness/economy editor, Scotland What goes up must come down, and a vague memory of school physics reminds me that an object that has yet to come down has potential energy in it. Drop it, and it becomes kinetic energy. That's the essence of pump storage in hydro projects. On a steep drop between two reservoirs, use excess power at night to pump water uphill, then release it downhill when you need it. When the nation's kettles are switched on at half time in a big football match, the sluices are opened, water hits the turbines, and power is delivered within very few seconds. It's much faster and greener than firing up a gas boiler. Winding gear Norway's geography has blessed it with a lot of pump storage. The UK's much less so. There are a few big projects, such as Cruachan, and a couple of sites, including one at the planning stage north of Dumfries, which could be developed. But with only a few possible sites, and daunting cost when you develop one, a much cheaper application of the same very simple physics is being developed by an Edinburgh company. Unlike so many incomprehensible techie start-ups, it has chosen a name that describes precisely what it does. Gravitricity - generating electricity from gravity - is getting noticed by investors, as an effective alternative to large batteries, so that renewable energy supply can be stored until there is demand. No need to go to the Congolese jungle to get hold of the raw materials for batteries. All you need is a lot of concrete, some very strong cables, and winding gear. I simplify a bit. The power also has to be harnessed by turbines and then connected to the grid. And you have to build high towers, or find deep holes in the ground. Gravitricity wants to start with such a tower in Edinburgh, to prove the concept. But it then wants to use mines which are closing, or recently closed, to make use of their deep shafts. The company is in discussions with mine owners in the UK, South Africa, Finland, Poland and the Czech Republic. The average European mine shaft is 800 metres. In South Africa, it is more than 2,000m. Blue whales The scale of the ambition is really quite large. The company reckons on using 24 weights, totalling 12,000 tonnes, stacked in a mine shaft. Depending on demand, they could be released one at a time or in combination, and at different speeds, depending on what is required. This apparatus, it is pointed out, has the same weight as 84 blue whales (while area is compared with football pitches or the size of Wales, and height with double-deck buses, the comparison with blue whale weight is lost on me, not least because they are rarely seen and unimaginably large. But I digress). At that scale, the company claims the output from one (average) mineshaft could power 63,000 homes for an hour. The weights could then be recharged when demand is lower, and you do it all over again, without any degradation of capacity. A UK government agency, Innovate UK, has just pumped a £640,000 grant into the idea. This week, analysts at Imperial College London, predicted that the idea offered a much cheaper form of storage than batteries or other alternatives. An industrial-scale lithium ion battery Is seen as costing £442 ($532) per Megawatt hour, in investment and charging costs. Air compression is cheaper at £239 ($310). But a lump of concrete in a mineshaft comes in at £132 ($171) for the same "shaving" or gradual release of energy. The plan is for a working prototype to be operational by 2022. One thought, though. If it's as simple a concept as it sounds, it will take a smart lawyer to ensure the intellectual property is protected.

एडिनबर्ग की एक कंपनी एक पुरानी घड़ी पर घुमावदार तंत्र के सिद्धांत का उपयोग करते हुए एक महत्वपूर्ण ऊर्जा चुनौती को पार करने के लिए एक सरल विचार का उपयोग कर रही है, इसका उपयोग दुनिया भर में किया जा सकता है, जहां पुराने खदान शाफ्ट उपलब्ध हैं, जिनमें से कुछ दक्षिण अफ्रीका में सबसे गहरे हैं।


Ipswich market to be run by borough council

Summary: Ipswich market is to have a change of management from September.

Geraud UK's five-year lease ends in August and Ipswich Borough Council has decided not to renew the contract. A spokesman for the council, which will run the market itself, said: "The market is not moving or closing - we think we could help it thrive." John Connolly, business and contracts manager for Geraud UK, said: "We're very disappointed - it's a great place and a great market." Ipswich Borough Council said stall holders would be spoken to at the "first available opportunity". The market currently runs four days a week - on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The council could not confirm whether this would remain the case.

इप्सविच बाजार में सितंबर से प्रबंधन में बदलाव होना है।