By Dheeraj Sharma IANS | May 14 Recently, it was flashed in the media that people are struggling outside the hospitals to get a bed. Several celebrities have also conveyed that they had to wait for hours to get a bed during this Covid crisis. Immediate parallels are drawn with the UK and the USA. In other words, how our systems in India are obtuse and uncaring. They have no measure of individual pain and hence people have to wait for hours to get a bed in the hospitals. In a

New Delhi, May 14 (IANSlife) For decades, diet conversations globally have ranged from the simple and straightforward to elaborate and convoluted, the latter sometimes even bordering on crazy. In today's digital age, before you can say cheese, a new diet would have garnered a global following, with everyone from a lay person to experts swearing by its efficacy. However, just a few weeks or months later, the same experts have moved on to another 'miraculous' weight-loss o

United Nations, May 13 (IANS) India will have to invest heavily in infrastructure in order to recover from the economic havoc brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, even if that means going in for deficit financing, according to a UN expert. "A crisis often presents an opportunity" and making the right investments can have a multiplier effect in steering the economies to a recovery, while also making a monumental difference in people's life," Hamid Rashid, the he

New Delhi, May 11 (PTI): India might be heading towards a "serious livelihood crisis" as the situation seems to be worse this time for the working class amid the COVID crisis and local restrictions by states already add up to something close to a nationwide lockdown, according to noted economist Jean Dreze.  In an interview to PTI, he also said the government's target to make India a USD 5 trillion economy by 2024-25 was never a "feasible target" and was

By Atul Aneja New Delhi, May 11 (IANS): Recent findings in a report in an Australian daily has yet again reinforced the call that international investigators must dig deeper to rule out whether Covid-19 is a made-in-China bioweapon. The controversy about Covid-19 origins has resurfaced after the Weekend Australian newspaper revealed that Chinese scientists were thinking about bioweapons, visualising a Word War-3 scenario. The daily cited a Chinese government document which dis

By Major General S.B. Asthana IANS | May 10 India is in a state of biological war against an invisible enemy (coronavirus), which has imposed unprecedented health emergency of this century. While the magnitude of cases and sudden spike, in second wave, has pushed many countries into unsurmountable shortages, but it does put a question mark on handling of the pandemic this time, in comparison to much better handling of pandemic last year during first wave by India. While specialists

New Delhi, May 10 (IANS) Author and gastronomist Veena Sharma has always believed that ones kitchen is ones best pharmacy, providing us with the particular admixtures and combinations that help uplift both our physical and mental constitutions. "If we knew what and when to ingest certain foods into our systems, we would be infused with sacred healing that would make our bodies light and mind sharp...The moment the body is supplied with the right balance of nutrients, vitamins,

By N. Lothungbeni Humtsoe New Delhi, May 9 (IANSlife) Today you get to express your love to your mum and make her feel special. Celebrate your mother and other important women in your life with a gift. While flowers and cards are common presents, this time around you might be searching for a more personalised and unique gift. If you're stumped for Mother's Day gift ideas, you needn't worry; these gifts help you get the best for the best. 1. SarathyFab This colla

Rio De Janeiro, May 9 (AP) Some have claimed she''s indulging a forbidden romance. More likely, loneliness compels her to seek company at Rio de Janeiro''s zoo. Either way, a blue-and-yellow macaw that zookeepers named Juliet is believed to be the only wild bird of its kind left in the Brazilian city where the birds once flew far and wide. Almost every morning for the last two decades, Juliet has appeared. She swoops onto the zoo enclosure where macaws are kept an

New Delhi, May 8 (IANS) With half the children under five in India being malnourished, the present Covid-19 crisis could further impact child nutrition and service delivery across the country that is in the grip of a ferocious second wave, said the UN Children's Fund UNICEF. "With 27 million births and 30 million pregnancies every year, life-saving services to help women give birth are critical in India," said Yasmin Ali Haque, UNICEF Representative in India, on Friday

New Delhi, May 8 (IANS) In 1998, Ray McLennan, who till then had been importing into the UK "all sorts of things" from India like musical instruments, saris, tilak, Tulsi malas and agarbatti, purchased Motilal Books, a small Oxford-based distributor focusing on academic bookshops and university libraries. In 2014, he set up his own company, Rays Books of India Pvt Ltd, to broaden his accessibility. Between them, the two companies recorded a turnover of 1.7 million pounds i

New Delhi, May 7 (IANS) "There is no point writing my name. I am just doing what I can," says the 68-year-old, who makes it a point to bring food packets and soup for the 50 patients and volunteers at the Mini Covid Care Centre in Bal Bhavan in Chandigarh. Everyday. She says this is the least she can do. So is the case with Shantanu Bhardwaj, who owns a shop in Sector-22. He makes a quick round to the Centre to ask if they need anything. "It is going to be a routine t

BY OJJUS CHAWLA IANS | May 6 As we all know, a pandemic is an epidemic of an infectious disease that has spread across the world and created havoc. For instance, you might have heard this term when COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic by the WHO. Although the history of pandemics is quite long and extensive, from the 1918 Spanish Flu to COVID-19 now, pandemics have always impacted life as we know it. It all started with the earliest recorded pandemic which happened during the Pe

Dharamsala, May 6 (IANS) In a first scientific evidence, Russian scientists have demonstrated that the body of a person in the rare spiritual meditative state of 'thukdam' is in a quite different state from the body of someone undergoing the ordinary process of death. The scientists have established research laboratories in the Tibetan settlements in Bylakuppe and Mundgod in Karnataka where they have examined 104 monks in meditation. They are carrying out a project of res

New Delhi, May 6 (IANS) When she sent a picture of brooding girl, sitting atop a shikara, to Times square, one of her editors commented that it looked too grim to be sent where it would be flashed a few thousand times its original size. Working for an international news agency in Singapore, that was the moment she knew that it was important to do something that would represent her people. A year later, in 2008, she quit her job and began to write. Author Farah Bashir, whose debut no

New Delhi, May 4 (IANS) The leopard is the reigning rock star of the wildlife world. It's a species that is obscure and largely overshadowed by the tiger, especially in India, scientist, conservationist and author Sanjay Gubbi writes in "Leopard Diaries". However, it is also a species that is loved by some and hated by many others. Nearly buried in this cacophony of conflict lies the "remarkable story" of this "lonely, mysterious creature" that he e

Kolkata, May 3 (IANS) May 2, 2021 is perhaps one of the three dates that Mamata Banerjee will remember all her life, not just because she became the Chief Minister of West Bengal for the third time in a row by defeating the all-powerful BJP single-handedly, but because her tryst with dates such as this is part of her historical evolution to weave a political narrative that she is in true sense a 'Giant Killer'. It was in 1984 when Rajiv Gandhi and Arun Nehru threw a challeng

New Delhi, May 2 (IANS) Professional studies and surveys for gathering social data is an essential service towards sustaining democracy, and making fair, enlightened governance and genuine development possible. Autonomous and transparent research is the best safeguard against inadvertent or deliberate bad governance. Scientific, non-partisan research is truly the third eye of governance, writes N. Bhaskara Rao, a pioneer of social research in India, in a new book which he argues tha

New Delhi, April 30 (IANS) Here's a unique and beautiful gift book for every day of the year, celebrating the astonishing art of Jim Kay paired with magical quotations from the original Harry Potter novels by J.K. Rowling. "Harry Potter e A Magical Year: The Illustrations of Jim May" (Bloomsbury) combines Kay's stunning colour illustrations with his previously unseen pencil sketches and preparatory pieces, offering a unique and fascinating insight into his sketchbo

New Delhi, April 29 (IANS) Wasps deserve to be just as highly valued as other insects, like bees, due to their roles as predators, pollinators, and more, according to a new review paper led by UCL and University of East Anglia researchers. The study, published in Biological Reviews, compiles evidence from over 500 academic papers to review how roughly 33,000 species of stinging (aculeate) wasps contribute to their ecosystems, and how this can benefit the economy, human health, and s