New Delhi, Dec. 24 — Bollywood divas are heading abroad to ring in Christmas and New Year’s in style.
While Deepika Padukone has gone to Maldives, Sonam Kapoor will be in Dubai with her family for Christmas, where they will also celebrate her father, actor Anil Kapoor’s birthday, today.
Katrina Kaif, who recently threw a party at her new home with her beau, actor Ranbir Kapoor, has also left for London to ring in the festive fervour with her family. Ranbir will reportedly join her soon, too.
New Delhi, Dec. 22 — Celina Jaitley, who became popular with her roles in films like No Entry (2005) and Golmaal Returns (2008) is now enjoying her role as mother to twin boys.
Having experienced the various phases of womanhood, she has seen how one’s wardrobe evolves over time. From her modelling days and the acting phase to her pregnancy, Celina has seen it all. She says, “My wardrobe is an integral part of my identity. I have a planned wardrobe – a melange of various shades of my moods and roles as a woman.”
However, wardrobe makeovers are often difficult for Celina as she gets attached to her clothes. She explains, “Earlier, I used to be a victim of the exploding wardrobe syndrome. But I now realise that hanging on to clothes and other items is psychologically equivalent to not letting go.”
And now, she has found that charity is actually an opportunity to revamp her style with changing season. She says, “Hence I make a very strong effort to evolve every season, and I do give away everything twice a year.”
However, in a city plagued with the issue of space crunch, Celina is lucky enough to have a walk-in wardrobe. She says, “It is huge and has customised space for everything from gowns and saris to swim wear. It’s has a special walk-in area for my 800 plus shoes too.”
e several Bodo houses have been set ablaze.
The toll rose to 78 on Thursday in attacks by NDFB(S) and retaliatory violence in lower Assam with miscreants among Adivasis setting afire houses of Bodos as the backlash to the Tuesday massacre continued for the second day.
In worst-affected Sonitpur district, six more bodies were recovered on Thursday morning from Maitalu Basti under Zinzia police station bordering Arunachal Pradesh taking the toll in attacks by NDFB(S) to 43 in the district and overall toll to 71, a police spokesman told PTI.
Three Adivasis were killed in police firing during protests against the carnage on Wednesday.
In Kokrajhar, the other severely-affected district, retaliatory violence by miscreants among Adivasis claimed the lives of four Bodos at Manikpur and Dimapur areas.
Twenty five people were killed by militants in Kokrajhar and three in Chirang district.
Fresh incidents of violence have been reported on Thursday morning from Gossaigaon area in Kokrajhar where several houses of Bodos have been set ablaze despite the indefinite curfew clamped in the entire district, he said.
Curfew has been also imposed in the affected areas of Sonitpur and Chirang districts along with parts of Dhubri and Baksa districts as precautionary measure, he added.
Union Minister of Home Rajnath Singh accompanied by his deputy Kiren Rijiju on Thursday visited Bishwanath Chariali in Sonitpur district to review the prevailing situation and also held talks with different political and social organisations.
They had reached Guwahati on Wednesday night and held meeting with Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi.
Alibaba ramped up its efforts to remove counterfeit goods before its initial public offering in September, the company said during a press conference today. Chief risk officer Polo Shao states that Alibaba took down 90 million suspicious listings from its marketplaces.
The Chinese e-commerce giant also works with law enforcement as well as brand owners to identify and remove counterfeit goods on its sites. The open nature of its marketplaces, especially Taobao, China’s largest C2C platform, however, often make it difficult to enforce intellectual property laws.
But as Alibaba prepared for its record-setting $25 billion IPO, it invested heavily in removing knock-offs from its sites.
In a company report (PDF link) that was also published today, Alibaba says that from the beginning of 2013 to the end of November 2014, it spent over one billion RMB ($160.7 million) to identify and remove counterfeit goods from its platforms. It also cooperated with law enforcement agencies in over 1,000 counterfeiting cases this year, which resulted in the arrests of 400 suspects from 18 counterfeiting rings, and the closure of 200 brick-and-mortar stores, factories, and warehouses.
According to the company’s research, 90 percent of all counterfeit goods in China were distributed from 10 regions, with the top three being the Pearl River Delta region, Yangtze River Delta region, and Southeast China.
“By using transaction data and mapping technology Alibaba Group found that more than 60 percent of counterfeit watches and jewelry originate from Southern China, while 60 percent of counterfeit outdoor sporting goods are from Southeast China region and 50 percent of counterfeit apparel originates from Eastern China,” it said.
“This year we increased our information sharing initiatives with various Chinese government agencies and continued to work with brands to bring about effective enforcement against counterfeiters who operate offline. Additionally, we continue to refine and harness technological tools at our disposal to track and trace counterfeiters who sell on our platforms, in order to assist enforcement authorities in tackling the problem at its source,” said Alibaba in its report.
These tools include data mining technology that lets Alibaba analyze and track transactions involving counterfeit goods and find where they originate; an online complaint platform for brand owners to report knock-offs; and random third-party checks to look for fake goods on its platforms.
These efforts have gradually paid off. In 2012, for example, Taobao was removed from the U.S. government’s “notorious markets” list.
At the same time, the company acknowledged that the problem will be difficult to completely eradicate.
“A report issued by China’s State Administration for Industry and Commerce showed that counterfeiting is still rampant offline, constituting the majority of trademark-infringing and counterfeit cases investigated. According to the report, of the 83,000 counterfeit and trademark-infringing cases investigated by the SAIC last year, online counterfeit cases constituted about 300 cases.”
New Delhi, Dec. 25 — At 21, Alia Bhatt already has three hits to her credit, and now she wants to work with the Khans (Aamir, Shah Rukh or Salman), who are much older than her. However, the actor feels that age doesn’t pose as a problem nowadays, as Bollywood is increasingly churning out experimental scripts that result in unusual pairings.
You have not been keeping well of late.
I am feeling much better now. Actually, after I fell sick for the first time, I had recovered completely but was unwell again. The entire year has been really hectic for me. Sometimes, I feel that since I have had so many major illnesses this year, it only means I must have worked very hard. So, I will be happy if people say that 2014 belongs to me.
You recently said that you want to work with the Khans…
What I meant to say was that nowadays filmmakers are making different kinds of movies, so it is possible for me to work with different actors. It (working with the Khans) might have sounded impossible 10-15 years back (keeping the age difference in mind), but since new-age directors are not scared of experimenting with innovative stories and scripts, there is much more scope to work with the Khans now.
A few days back, reports suggested that you had arrived at a party alone, but left with Sidharth Malhotra?
I have video proof that I entered alone and stepped out with a director friend. I didn’t come out with Sid. And even if I did, people just put two and two together to make something completely unimaginable. I seriously feel that there are more important things happening in the world than who’s coming out with whom.
So, you are not seeing anyone right now?
No, not at all. I have absolutely no time right now for anything else except for work. For the past six to seven months, my focus has been completely on films.
Your name is attached to so many films…
What can I say? I can’t do so many movies (at the same time), right? Officially, I can confirm two films – the first one is with Shahid (Kapoor), which I have shot, and then Ayan’s (Mukerji) next with Ranbir (Kapoor). I haven’t signed or confirmed anything else yet.
Demolition of houses and slums are a regular feature in Mumbai. In this context a slum area located at Kalina was recently demolished. Among them tenants lived a lady with her two children aged six months and four years. With no support from any concerned bodies she was compelled to live a life in the streets with her two children. The cold winter played hell with her and her children.
Some member of AAP from Kalina could not see the plight of the women and her children. They arranged a room her, paid her deposit for the room and now she has a decent living. She now with a shelter for her children is confident enough to earn a living and pay her monthly rent.
In another incident an AAP member Kumud had witnessed a lady on the streets whose son had recently died. Kumud thought of doing something for the lady. He started tweeting around seeking for help. Among those tweets he happened to get his attention a reporter of NDTV Saurabh Gupta. He covered the news and help started pouring in from all corners. Apart from the help what touched everyone’s heart is when Sourabh paid towards the meal for the street children and the lady. It showed a soft corner of a media man which is of course rare amongst this profession.
Fresh violence has been reported from Gossaigaon area of Kokrajhar district where several Bodo houses have been set ablaze.
The toll rose to 78 on Thursday in attacks by NDFB(S) and retaliatory violence in lower Assam with miscreants among Adivasis setting afire houses of Bodos as the backlash to the Tuesday massacre continued for the second day.
In worst-affected Sonitpur district, six more bodies were recovered on Thursday morning from Maitalu Basti under Zinzia police station bordering Arunachal Pradesh taking the toll in attacks by NDFB(S) to 43 in the district and overall toll to 71, a police spokesman told PTI.
Three Adivasis were killed in police firing during protests against the carnage on Wednesday.
In Kokrajhar, the other severely-affected district, retaliatory violence by miscreants among Adivasis claimed the lives of four Bodos at Manikpur and Dimapur areas.
Twenty five people were killed by militants in Kokrajhar and three in Chirang district.
Fresh incidents of violence have been reported on Thursday morning from Gossaigaon area in Kokrajhar where several houses of Bodos have been set ablaze despite the indefinite curfew clamped in the entire district, he said.
Curfew has been also imposed in the affected areas of Sonitpur and Chirang districts along with parts of Dhubri and Baksa districts as precautionary measure, he added.
Union Minister of Home Rajnath Singh accompanied by his deputy Kiren Rijiju on Thursday visited Bishwanath Chariali in Sonitpur district to review the prevailing situation and also held talks with different political and social organisations.
They had reached Guwahati on Wednesday night and held meeting with Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi.
Keywords: Assam violence, NDFB(S), Bodo militants
SHAMUKJULI, India (AP) — Hundreds of survivors of a brutal rebel attack that killed at least 63 people in northeastern India sought shelter Wednesday in a church and school while security forces imposed a curfew in a bid to contain the latest bout of ethnic violence.
Long-simmering land and ethnic disputes in Assam state erupted in bloodshed Tuesday when authorities said rebels belonging to a faction of an indigenous separatist group called the National Democratic Front of Bodoland attacked tribal settlers known as Adivasi, whose ancestors migrated to Assam more than 100 years ago. Most of them worked on tea plantations.
At least 100 people, mostly women and children, sought refuge in a church in Shamukjuli village in Sonitpur district, where 26 of the victims died. Another 200 people ran to a nearby school. The Adivasis are a mix of Hindus and Christians and many had been preparing for Christmas when the attack took place, survivors said.
Bodo rebels have been fighting for a separate homeland for their indigenous tribe, which makes up 10 percent of Assam’s 33 million people. They have staged attacks against both Adivasi and Muslim settlers in violence that has left at 10,000 people dead, most of them civilians, in the last three decades.
Many of the dead in Tuesday’s attacks included women and children, police said. The rebels may have been provoked by heavy losses they suffered recently as police intensified operations against the group, Singh said.
“We are trying to ensure that ethnic violence does not flare up,” he said, adding that a curfew was imposed in two districts and scores of police and paramilitary forces patrolled the area.
There were concerns the violence could spill over.
Following the attacks, angry Adivasis surrounded a police station in Sonitpur and attempted to attack the officers inside, said S.N. Singh, a top police official. Police opened fire, killing three Adivasis, he said.
He also said there were incidents of Bodo homes being attacked, but troops managed to control the situation.
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi condemned the latest attacks, and the Home Ministry rushed several thousand federal paramilitary troops to the region, junior Home Minister Kiren Rijiju said.
Dozens of rebel groups have been fighting the government and sometimes each other for years in seven states in northeast India. They demand greater regional autonomy or independent homelands for the indigenous groups they represent.
The rebels accuse the federal government of exploiting the region’s rich mineral resources but neglecting the local people.
In May, rebels from the same group shot and killed more than 30 Muslim settlers in the region.
___
Inside the ‘Christmas village’ of Yiwu, there’s no snow and no elves, just 600 factories that produce 60% of all the decorations in the world
There’s red on the ceiling and red on the floor, red dripping from the window sills and red globules splattered across the walls. It looks like the artist Anish Kapoor has been let loose with his wax cannon again. But this, in fact, is what the making of Christmas looks like; this is the very heart of the real Santa’s workshop – thousands of miles from the North Pole, in the Chinese city of Yiwu.
Our yuletide myth-making might like to imagine that Christmas is made by rosy-cheeked elves hammering away in a snow-bound log cabin somewhere in the Arctic Circle. But it’s not. The likelihood is that most of those baubles, tinsel and flashing LED lights you’ve draped liberally around your house came from Yiwu, 300km south of Shanghai – where there’s not a (real) pine tree nor (natural) snowflake in sight.
Christened “China’s Christmas village”, Yiwu is home to 600 factories that collectively churn out over 60% of all the world’s Christmas decorations and accessories, from glowing fibre-optic trees to felt Santa hats. The “elves” that staff these factories are mainly migrant labourers, working 12 hours a day for a maximum of £200 to £300 a month – and it turns out they’re not entirely sure what Christmas is.
“Maybe it’s like [Chinese] New Year for foreigners,” says 19-year-old Wei, a worker who came to Yiwu from rural Guizhou province this year, speaking to Chinese news agency Sina. Together with his father, he works long days in the red-splattered lair, taking polystyrene snowflakes, dipping them in a bath of glue, then putting them in a powder-coating machine until they turn red – and making 5,000 of the things every day.
Advertisement
In the process, the two of them end up dusted from head to toe in fine crimson powder. His dad wears a Santa hat (not for the festive spirit, he says, but to stop his hair from turning red) and they both get through at least 10 face masks a day, trying not to breathe in the dust. It’s a tiring job and they probably won’t do it again next year: once they’ve earned enough money for Wei to get married, they plan on returning home to Guizhou and hopefully never seeing a vat of red powder again.
Packaged up in plastic bags, their gleaming red snowflakes hang alongside a wealth of other festive paraphernalia across town in the Yiwu International Trade Market, aka China Commodity City, a 4m sq m wonder-world of plastic tat. It is a pound shop paradise, a sprawling trade show of everything in the world that you don’t need and yet may, at some irrational moment, feel compelled to buy. There are whole streets in the labyrinthine complex devoted to artificial flowers and inflatable toys, then come umbrellas and anoraks, plastic buckets and clocks. It is a heaving multistorey monument to global consumption, as if the contents of all the world’s landfill sites had been dug-up, re-formed and meticulously catalogued back into 62,000 booths.
The two men produce 5,000 red snowflakes a day, and get paid around £300 a month. Photograph: China Daily/Reuters
The complex was declared by the UN to be the “largest small commodity wholesale market in the world” and the scale of the operation necessitates a kind of urban plan, with this festival of commerce organised into five different districts. District Two is where Christmas can be found.
There are corridors lined with nothing but tinsel, streets throbbing with competing LED light shows, stockings of every size, plastic Christmas trees in blue and yellow and fluorescent pink, plastic pine cones in gold and silver. Some of it seems lost in translation: there are sheep in Santa hats and tartan-embroidered reindeer, and of course lots of that inexplicable Chinese staple, Father Christmas playing the saxophone.
It might look like a wondrous bounty, but the market’s glory days seem to have passed: it’s now losing out to internet giants like Alibaba and Made In China. On Alibaba alone, you can order 1.4m different Christmas decorations to be delivered to your door at the touch of a button. Yiwu market, by comparison, stocks a mere 400,000 products.
Aiming at the lower end of the market, Yiwu’s sales thrived during the recession, as the world shopped for cut-price festive fun, but international sales are down this year. Still, according to Cai Qingliang, vice chairman of the Yiwu Christmas Products Industry Association, domestic appetite is on the rise, as China embraces the annual festival of Mammon. Santa Claus, says the Economist, is now better known to most Chinese people than Jesus.
The beaming sales reps of Yiwu market couldn’t sound happier with their life sentence of eternal Christmastime. According to Cheng Yaping, co-founder of the Boyang Craft Factory, who runs a stall decked out like a miniature winter wonderland: “Sitting here every day, being able to look at all these beautiful decorations, is really great for your mood.”
It’s somehow unlikely that those on the other end of the production line, consigned to dipping snowflakes in red-swamped workshops for us to pick up at the checkout for 99p, feel quite the same way.
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Amit Shah on Tuesday did not rule out joining hands with either PDP or National Conference saying “all options are open”.
As results showed that BJP will be second largest party in the state after PDP, Shah said “All options are open, the option of forming a BJP government is open. The option of supporting somebody is also open. The option of joining some government is also open. All three options are open,”.
BJP’s decision will also depend on initiatives taken by other parties, he said.
BJP Parliamentary Board will weigh its options in the state and also deliberate on its chief ministerial candidate in Jharkhand on Wednesday, said Shah.
While the J&K Assembly election result has returned a hung verdict, BJP with its ally AJSU is close to cross the magic number of 41 in the 81-member Jharkhand House.
In the 87-member J&K Assembly, the latest wins and lead tally of PDP, BJP and NC was 28, 25 and 15 respectively.
Amit Shah termed the results an endorsement of Prime Minister Narendra Modi‘s leadership and his government’s development work since he assumed office in May.
“The poll verdict is a lesson for those who oppose our government’s agenda of development and change,” he said, in a dig at Opposition parties who have tried to corner the government in Parliament over conversion issue.
“BJP has increased its seats from 18 in 2009 to 41 this time in Jharkhand. In J-K, our seats have increased from 11 in 2008 to 25, we have received the maximum percentage of votes in the state,” he said.
Recent Comments