Month: October 2021

** A unique story of creating a ‘plantain bank’ at Vengeri

Babu Parambath cultivates 50 varieties from India and abroad.


At first glance, they all look the same until you read the name boards kept on the foot of every plantain shoot and Babu Parambath describes the speciality of each of them. Then you start noticing the minor details that make this plantain grove one of its kind.

Mr. Parambath, known for his several ventures in the waste management front as the project coordinator of Niravu waste management company, has collected 50 different varieties of plantains from not just India, but from other parts of the world too, over a period of one-and-a-half years since the first COVID-induced lockdown.

He has one or two shoots of each of them planted in the 10 cents next to his home at Vengeri.

** Indian-origin Anita Anand is Canada’s new Defence Minister as PM Trudeau reshuffles Cabinet

Ms. Anand will replace long-time Defence Minister Indian-origin Harjit Sajjan, whose handling of the military sexual misconduct crisis has been under criticism

Indian-origin Canadian politician Anita Anand was on October 26 appointed as the country’s new Defence Minister in a Cabinet reshuffle by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, over a month after his Liberal Party returned power in the snap polls and amid calls for major military reforms.

** Nivetha Thomas scales Mount Kilimanjaro, is game for more expeditions

“My eyes welled up when I reached the summit. It took me three hours to hike the last 50 metres,” says actor Nivetha Thomas, who scaled Mount Kilimanjaro a few days ago. At 5895 metres above sea level, Mt Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, East Africa, is the highest single free-standing mountain in the world.

Nivetha was accompanied by Telangana mountaineer Poorna Malavath, her coach Shekhar Babu Bachinepally and 15 crew members.

** No Hems or Haws

Meet Bengaluru make-up artist Durga Venkatesh, who can drape a saree in 155 styles in two hours .

In a time where inspiration and endurance is wearing thin, Durga Venkatesh, a make-up artist and bespoke fashion designer, has chosen to take life by the hems. Venkatesh, who has lived in Bengaluru since her childhood, currently holds the world record for the fastest number of saree styles draped, having been attested by the Limca Book of Records, India Book of Records, Asia Book of Records, Asian World Records, British World Records, and, most recently, the Kalam’s World Records in August.

In addition to this, she also won the Divalicious Mrs South India Universe title for 2019, and manages her own make-up salon and academy, Durga Makeup Studio & Academy in JP Nagar.

** Professor Sharada Srinivasan gets Woman Engineer of the Year award

Padma Shri awardee Professor Sharada Srinivasan has added yet another accolade to her expansive list of accomplishments by being one of three women to be chosen for the Indian National Academy of Engineering’s Woman Engineer of the Year award in 2021.

The title is awarded by the academy to women who have made breakthrough contributions to the fields of technology and engineering in India. She is a professor at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bengaluru.

** Lifetime achievement award for author Anita Desai

Anita Desai, one of India’s best-known authors, has been conferred with the Tata Literature Live! Lifetime Achievement Award for 2021.

Desai’s authorship has spanned more than 50 years, with memorable works such as ‘Fire On The Mountain’, ‘Cry The Peacock’, ‘A Village By The Sea’, ‘The Clear Light Of Day’, ‘Baumgartner’s Bombay’, and ‘In Custody’, which was made into a Merchant Ivory film starring Shashi Kapoor, Shabana Azmi, and Amrish Puri.

Desai’s blend of lyrical style, ease with different cultures, and a clear-eyed examination and confrontation of realistic truths about society and relationships, made for a unique reading experience that fast led her to occupy a leading place among her peers.

** Navy’s Offshore Sailing Regatta to set the stage for global solo circumnavigation

38 personnel will be engaged in readying six Indian Naval Sailing Vessels (INSVs) for the 700-km “Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav”

Saturday saw brisk activity at the Southern Naval Command here, with 38 personnel – including eight women, engaged in readying six Indian Naval Sailing Vessels (INSVs) for the 700-km “Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav” Offshore Sailing Regatta to Goa from Sunday.

They include women personnel who circumnavigated the globe in one such vessel in an all-women group in 2017 and have fixed their eyes on doing it solo in a year’s time. Powered by wind, they intend to cover the distance in less than five days. The regatta under the aegis of Indian Naval Sailing Association (INSA), is aimed at fostering the spirit of adventure and ocean sailing.

** Koo user base at about 15 million, eyes expansion to new market in Southeast Asia

The Indian microblogging platform, which has enjoyed a meteoric rise in usage, is currently also available in Nigeria, a market that ‘continues to grow’

Homegrown microblogging platform Koo’s user base has touched about 15 million now, with five million users added in the last quarter, its co-founder Aprameya Radhakrishna has said.

India, the world’s second-largest telecom market and the biggest consumer of data, is a key market for Internet companies like Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter given the large population base, burgeoning internet and smartphone adoption, as well as explosive growth.