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India Meerut young offenders escape using bedsheets

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 03 Feb 2015 04:24:00 +0000

India's police are often criticised for providing lax security

More than 90 young offenders have escaped from a detention centre in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, police say.

The offenders, all below the age of 18, removed an iron grille from a window and tied bedsheets together to lower themselves to the ground.

They climbed out of the back of the building in the city of Meerut while police guarded the front.

Thirty-five of the prisoners have since been recaptured, police said.

Senior police official Om Prakash told the AFP news agency that the escape was "done so professionally that no one got a whiff".

The escape was only discovered when some of the prisoners were seen on the road, trying to flag down vehicles early on Monday.

Mr Prakash said that those still on the run included inmates convicted of crimes such as murder, rape, theft and banditry.

More than 31,000 young offenders are being held at detention centres in India, according to one official estimate.

Super Bowl XLIX quarter-by-quarter analysis

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 02 Feb 2015 04:40:00 +0000

FOURTH QUARTER: Patriots 28, Seahawks 24
Brady finally found a groove while the New England defense put Seattle in a rut. Blount was stonewalled on third-and-1 to start the period, killing another drive. But the New England defense came up with a key stop as Rob Ninkovich bagged Wilson on a coverage sack. Brady marched the Patriots down the field, hooking up for two 21-yard completions to Edelman, who was clearly laboring, while receiving 15 gift yards from Seattle's Earl Thomas on a roughing penalty.

Brady missed Edelman for a TD but came right to Amendola for a 4-yard score. The New England defense stiffened again, sending Seattle to another three-and-out. Brady stuck with what had worked: Vereen here, Edelman there, a dose of Gronk and back to Vereen. Then Simon was back in the crosshairs, unable to contain Edelman who easily evaded the beleaguered rookie for the go-ahead 3-yard TD.

Despite all that, Wilson had Seattle in position to repeat, driving the Seahawks 79 yards with the help of an amazing 33-yard catch by Kearse, who gathered a caroming pass at the New England 5 on his back. But Wilson inexplicably passed from the 1-yard line rather than feed Lynch and was picked off by rookie Malcolm Butler, who beat Lockette to the ball. Game. Set. Match. Lombardi. Dynasty day.

THIRD QUARTER: Seahawks 24, Patriots 14

Seattle's offense stayed hot on the heels of a sizzling halftime show by Katy Perry. Sticking with their first-half studs on the opening drive, Lynch ground out 25 yards on four carries while Matthews struck again, hauling in a 45-yard pass from Wilson. However Lynch was stuffed on third-and-1 at the Patriots 8-yard line, forcing the Seahawks to settle for a 27-yard Steven Hauschka field goal but their first lead.

Brady tried to go back to his own big gun but was victimized again by the Seattle defense as all-pro linebacker Bobby Wagner undercut Gronkowski for another interception, the first time Brady had thrown multiple picks in a Super Bowl. The mistake proved costly. Set up by a 15-yard Wilson run, Seattle reached the end zone again as Doug Baldwin finally shook free of star corner Darrelle Revis, who was obstructed by an official on the crossing route, for a 3-yard TD and 10-point Seattle lead.

At that point, advantageous patterns began to emerge for Seattle. A Bennett-powered pass rush relentlessly pursued Brady, now forced to largely revert to an empty backfield and one-dimensional passing offense, which undermined itself with a killer holding penalty.

LIVE: Coverage and analysis of Super Bowl XLIX

SECOND QUARTER: Seahawks 14, Patriots 14

The teams continued parrying as both offenses hit their stride.

Lane's injury exposed a vulnerability Brady instantly targeted. Rather than challenge top corners Richard Sherman or Byron Maxwell, the two-time MVP went after Lane's replacement, Tharold Simon. Julian Edelman beat the second-year corner for 23 yards to the Seattle 12-yard line. Two plays later, Brandon LaFell gained position on Simon and Brady drilled him with an 11-yard TD pass.

Seattle wasted no time with a response. Quarterback Russell Wilson, who escaped a pick by Logan Ryan on a poor throw, didn't complete his first pass until the fourth drive with his "pedestrian" receivers consistently failing to get open. But his second hook-up covered 44 yards to Chris Matthews, the rookie's first career catch. Three Lynch carries and 11 yards later and Seattle was in the end zone. A slow starter most of the season, Lynch managed 45 rushing yards before halftime.
But the Pats countered, their gameplan bearing fruit. Vereen, Edelman and Danny Amendola effectively worked between the numbers, an area of the field the top-ranked Seattle defense typically shuts down. But the short stuff set up a shot outside to Gronkowski, quiet to that point before he easily beat linebacker K.J. Wright down the sideline for a 22-yard TD.

Wilson was undeterred, driving the Seahawks 80 yards in five plays -- a New England facemaks penalty helped -- with reserve receivers Ricardo Lockette and Matthews doing the heavy lifting, the latter snaring an 11-yard TD over Ryan with 2 seconds to go as coach Pete Carroll eschewed a field goal on a gutsy call.

FIRST QUARTER: Seahawks 0, Patriots 0

The feeling-out process for the NFL's top heavyweights began with some light sparring followed by big jabs in a speedy first quarter.

The Patriots seemed primed to draw first blood, driving 58 yards in 12 plays to the Seahawks 10-yard line with a nice mix of runs and passes. But then Seattle landed a counterpunch with nickelback Jeremy Lane's end-zone interception of Tom Brady, the quarterback's third career Super Bowl interception in his sixth Super Sunday start. Heavy pressure from Seahawks DE Michael Bennett contributed to Brady's wayward pass.

However Lane injured his left arm during the runback, further weakening a Legion of Boom secondary that entered the game banged up, including SS Kam Chancellor's knee injury, suffered Friday.

The game began with a pair of inconsequential drives ending in punts as the Patriots spread the ball around while the Seahawks tried to establish Marshawn Lynch with three consecutive carries. The Patriots appeared ready to lean heavily on their backfield as Brady threw three passes to scatback Shane Vereen while LeGarrette Blount carried eight times.***

Follow Nate Davis on Twitter @ByNateDavis

PHOTOS: Super Bowl XLIX

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PHOTOS

@ 65 India's population is still young

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 29 Jan 2015 03:22:00 +0000

It has added between 250 million and 350 million people every decade

On January 26, 1950, when the Constitution of India came into force and a new Republic was born, the country was smaller, younger, but with a far bleaker outlook.

Sixty-five years later, some expected and some unexpected changes have transformed the country.

Census data shows that in 1951 India had 361 million people. To put this in perspective, today just Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh alone have more numbers. Since 1950, India has added one-quarter to one-fifth of its own population every ten years — until this last decade, when population growth fell to its lowest ever level. Except the first decade after the founding of the Republic, India has added between 250 and 350 million people every decade.

In 60 years, India’s population tripled. Even today, the decadal growth rates in the northern States are over 20 per cent, where Kerala and Tamil Nadu were 40 years ago.

If India is seen as a young country today, it was even younger at the time of the founding of the Republic. The median age was just 21 years, as opposed to over 25 today. Nearly half the population was under the age of 20 as opposed to 38 per cent today.

But a child born in 1951 was only expected to live until the age of 37 — now up to 64. India’s Infant Mortality rate (IMR) was a staggering 146 infant deaths for every 1,000 live births, now down to 40. The average woman had 5.6 children, over double today’s rate. Approaching replacement levels of 2.1 children per woman — a milestone India is just a few years away from — must have appeared nearly impossible. Adult mortality too has more than halved over the last 60 years.

But here’s a little-noticed demographic quirk of India’s declining fertility. While the popular narrative is one of women having fewer children, later in life, 60 years of fertility data show that the mean age at which women have their children has actually fallen. What this implies is that women still have their children in their early 20s, but then stop after two or three children, meaning fewer women in their thirties and forties in fact are now having children.

In 1951, India’s literacy rate was 18.33 per cent — fewer than one in every five adults was literate. This is now up to 73 per cent, and both the rural-urban and male-female gaps in literacy are down to their lowest ever rates. But the numbers also show just how big a head-start the southern states have had over their northern neighbours.

Kerala’s literacy rate in 1951 was the same as Bihar’s in 2001. The sex ratio was skewed against girls at birth even 60 years ago, and is even more so now. Fifty years ago, this was an extremely rural country; four out of every five Indians lived in villages. India has indeed urbanised in the last half century, but this has happened far slower than expected. As of the 2011 Census, nearly 70 per cent of India was still rural.

In 1950, India was more urban than China. Yet by 2005, China was 41 per cent urban to India’s 29 per cent, and by 2025 it will be 64 per cent urban to India’s 38 per cent, according to projections by McKinsey.

“Despite significant fluctuations over the past few decades, urban growth has, at best, been modest in India. Moreover, contemporary growth scenarios in India cast serious doubts on the prospect for rapid urbanisation in the future,” Amitabh Kundu, an expert on urbanisation, and retired professor from Jawaharlal Nehru University, said.

Migration — migrants as a percentage of the total population — Mr. Kundu says, has reduced steadily over the last few decades, despite the popular perception that it is growing; the bulk of urbanisation is explained by the expansion of cities, and their merging with nearby villages.

What has exploded are India’s megacities; between 1950 and 2005, Delhi — and this is the city alone, not its satellites – grew to 11 times its size.

In 1950, the world had just two megacities (with a population of over 10 million) — New York City and Tokyo. By 2015, the world had 22, three of the ten biggest — Mumbai, Delhi and Kolkata - being in India. By 2030, Mumbai and Delhi will be the world’s second and third biggest cities, as Tokyo and New York flatten, and Sao Paulo and Mexico City grow, but slowly. By then, Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad will also be megacities, by U.N. projections.

As it stands, there are many Indians today, for whom the last 65 years have been transformative in varying degrees. After the first three decades in which there was virtually no decline in poverty, the official count of those in poverty has fallen from 45 per cent of the population in 1993-4 to 22 per cent as of 2011-12. Deep-seated inequalities along caste, gender and religious lines remain, but gaps have substantially narrowed in the last 65 years.

Original Post Found HERE - http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/65-indias-population-is-still-young/article6823322.ece?utm_source=RSS_Feed&utm_medium=RSS&utm_campaign=RSS_Syndication

Sushma's Beijing visit will deepen trust: China

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 28 Jan 2015 13:59:00 +0000

Sushma Swaraj will start her first trip to China as External Affairs Minister on January 31.China said on Wednesday that the four-day visit of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to Beijing starting January 31 - close on the heels of the US President's India visit - would help both countries deepen mutual trust.

Officials said India is likely to use Swaraj's visit to reiterate to China that it would not follow any American attempt to "contain" China's rise. Even the timing of Swaraj's visit, taking place days after US President Barack Obama wrapped up his trip to India, will reinforce that message.

"This is her first visit since taking office last year. Both sides attach importance to her visit," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying told reporters, adding that Swaraj will have in-depth talks with her counterpart Wang Yi and also meet senior Chinese leaders.

During her January 31-February 3 stay in Beijing, Swaraj will also launch a major "Visit India" year-long tourism campaign and a China-India media forum.

On February 2 she will take part in the Russia-India-China (RIC) foreign ministers' trilateral meeting. That meeting too will underline India's message that it will pursue closer ties with China and Russia, despite the latter's problems with the West, even as Modi's government has moved ahead to substantially deepen strategic relations with Washington.

China's media has in the past week hinted at Beijing's unease at Modi's outreach to the US. While Chinese officials maintained this week they saw no reason to believe India was moving away from its independent foreign policy, State-run media outlets hit out at Washington for trying to rope India into its "re-balance" in Asia to "contain" China.

Hua said China and India were "in sound coordination and cooperation in regional and international issues", adding that President Xi Jinping's September visit to Gujarat and Delhi last year had "written a new chapter for strategic cooperation for the next five to ten years".

"China will work with India to sustain this momentum to build a closely knit partnership," Hua said.

Original Post Found Here - http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/sushma-swaraj-china-india-beijing/1/415785.html

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India Meerut young offenders escape using bedsheets

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South China Morning Post*91 young offenders in Indian prison escape2 hrs ago

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Independent On SaturdayDozens flee in bed-sheet breakout11 hrs ago

Mail Online UKIndian prisoners escape by scaling walls with bedsheets12 hrs ago

Super Bowl XLIX quarter-by-quarter analysis

@ 65 India's population is still young

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It has added between 250 million and 350 million people every decade

Sushma's Beijing visit will deepen trust: China