Rafiq Kathwari, an Indian-American Poet Won Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award 2013

Rafiq Kathwari, an Indian-American poet on 29 September 2013 selected for 2013 Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award for the collection of his debut poems.

Rafiq Kathwari is the first non-Irish person to win the Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award. Rafiq Kathwari's collection of 20 unpublished poems In Another Country was selected for the coveted award amidst 112 contestants from across the world.

About Rafiq Kathwari

• Rafiq Kathwari, a Kashmiri by descent has become the first non-Irish to have won the award and will recieve 1000 euros as the prize money.
• He has translated selected Urdu poems of Alama Iqbal, creating his own version. His poems are mostly inspired by loss of innocence in Kashmir and from his mother's long time illness.
• Rafiq Kathwari graduated from the University of Kashmir in 1969 before studying at the New York University and Columbia University.
• Most of his working life has been spent with Ethan Allen, a large manufacturer and retailer of home furnishings based in the United States.
• Many of his works have been in print and online in the US, Ireland and Asia.

About Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award

• The award was founded by the Patrick Kavanagh Society in 1971 to commemorate the Irish poet Patrick Kavanagh.
• The Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award meant for a first unpublished collection of poems in English is open to poets, born in the island of Ireland, or of Irish nationality, or long term resident in Ireland.
• The award is now in its 41st year. Previous winners include Eileán Ni Chuilleanáin, Paul Durcan, Thomas McCarthy, Peter Sirr, Sinead Morrissey, Conor O’Callaghan, Celia de Freine and Joseph Woods.

Yingluck Shinawatra poised to become Thailand’s First Female Prime Minister

Thailand's Prime Minister-elect, Yingluck Shinawatra, on 4 July 2011 formed a coalition consisting of five parties under the wings of her own Pheu Thai Party following her landslide victory in parliamentary elections in Thailand. The grouping of five constituent parties would have 299 seats in the 500 member new house. Her Pheu Thai Party bagged 265 seats in the final tally and stood in no compulsion to form a coalition. With her landslide victory she is poised to become Thailand’s first female prime minister.

Angela Merkel Won Third Term in German Elections

Chancellor Angela Merkel won a third term by a landslide victory in German elections on 22 September 2013.

Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative Union bloc - the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) won 41.5 percent of vote, but finished just short of an absolute majority.

The centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) won 25.7 percent of votes and the ecologist Greens won 8.4 percent votes.

Final results gave the CDU/CSU 311 seats, the Social Democrats 192, the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) 64 seats and the ecologist Greens 63 seats.

Navneet Kaur Dhillon won the Multimedia Award at the Miss World 2013

Pond's Femina Miss India World 2013 Navneet Kaur Dhillon on 27 September 2013 won the Multimedia Award at the Miss World 2013 in Indonesia. India won this award for the second time in a row. The award was first introduced by the Miss World Organization in 2012 and India's Vanya Mishra was its first winner.

Megan Young was crowned as Miss World 2013 in Bali, Indonesia,

Megan Lynne Young (born 27 February 1990) is a Filipino American beauty queen, actress and model. She won the Miss World Philippines title and was later crowned as Miss World 2013 in Bali, Indonesia.She is the first woman from the Philippines to win the title of Miss World. Young is currently a member of ABS-CBN's Star Magic. She is the elder sister of actress Lauren Young.

India won bronze medal in the 8th Women’s Asia Cup 2013

India won bronze medal in the 8th Women’s Asia Cup 2013 as they defeated China 3-2 via penalty shootout in the 3rd/4th place play-off played at the National Stadium in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on 27 September 2013. 

The two teams had ended 2-2 in the regulation time. Ritu Rani captained Indian side in the tournment, whereas Weilin Mao captained the China team.

India had to win this tournament to qualify for the 2014 World Cup at The Hague, Holland. However, it came at the third place.

Meanwhile, Japan stunned defending champions Korea 2-1 in the final to win the Asia Cup and secure a place in next year's World Cup. 

The 8th Women’s Hockey Asia Cup 2013 Held at Kualalumpur (Malaysia) from 21 to 27 September 2013.

Sudha Singh of Railways won Gold in Women's 3000m Steeplechase

Sudha Singh of Railways won gold medal in women’s 3000m steeplechase on the third and penultimate day of the 53rd National Open Athletics Championship on 9 September 2013. She doubled her achievement by improving her own meet mark. Significantly, she is National record holder besides  being  a silver medallist at Asian Championship. Sudha, clocked 10 minutes 9.04 secs to better her own old meet record of 10:09.56 set in 2010.

Her Railways teammate Lalita Babar was second 10:33.40 whereas Kiran Tiwari of Haryana was third in 10:52.75. The championship was held at Birsa Munda Athletics Stadium, Ranchi.

Who: Sudha Singh of Railways

Where: Ranchi

What: won gold medal in women's 3000m steeplechase

When: 9 September 2013

Meet the Indians going to Mars

20-year-old Amulya Nidhi Rastogi

Indian Cities & Nicknames

Indian Cities & Nicknames

SNo	Nick name	Place
1	Golden City	Amritsar
2	Manchester of India	Ahmedabad
3	City of Seven islands	Mumbai
4	Queen of Arabian Sea	Cochin
5	Space City	Bangalore
6	Garden City of India	Bangalore
7	Silicon Valley of India	Bangalore
8	Electronic city of India	Bangalore
9	Pink city	Jaipur
10	Gateway of India	Mumbai
11	Twin city	Hyderabad - Sikandarabad
12	City of festivals	Madurai
13	Deccan Queen	Pune
14	City of Buildings	Kolkata
15	Dakshin Ganga	Godavari
16	Old Ganga	Godavari
17	Egg bowls of Asia	Andhra Pradesh
18	Soya region	Madhya Pradesh
19	Manchester of the South	Coimbatore
20	City of Nawabs	Lucknow
21	Venice of the east	Cochin
22	Sorrow of Bengal	Damodar river
23	Sorrow of Bihar	Kosi river
24	Blue Mountains	Nilgiri
25	Queen of the Mountains	Mussoorie (Uttaranchal)
26	Sacred river	Ganga
27	Hollywood of India	Mumbai
28	City of Castles	Kolkata
29	State of five rivers	Punjab
30	City of weavers	Panipat
31	City of lakes	Srinagar
32	Steel city of India	Jamshedpur (Called Tatanagar)
33	City of temples	Varanasi
34	Manchester of the north	Kanpur
35	City of Rallies	New Delhi
36	Heaven of India	Jammu & Kashmir
37	Boston of India	Ahmedabad
38	Garden of spices of India	Kerala
39	Switzerland of India	Kashmir
40	Abode of the God	Prayag (Allahabad)
41	Pittsburg of India	Jamshedpur

Tigmanshu Dhulia won the best director award for Paan Singh Tomar movie at the 11th Norway Bollywood Film Festival at Loreskog

Tigmanshu Dhulia won the best director award for Paan Singh Tomar movie at the 11th Norway Bollywood Film Festival at Loreskog cinema center in Oslo on 17 September 2013.

While filmmaker Rahul Mittra bagged the Best Producer award for his Saheb Biwi Aur Gangster Returns, Jimmy Sheirgill got the best actor award for the same film.

About the film

Paan Singh Tomar is Indian biographical film (2012) based on the true story of an athlete Paan Singh Tomar employed by the Indian Army and who won a gold medal at Indian National Games, but was forced to become a notorious bandit.

The film is directed by Tigmanshu Dhulia and produced by UTV Motion Pictures. Irrfan plays the title role, with Mahie Gill, Vipin Sharma and Nawazuddin Siddiqui portraying supporting roles.

About Norway Bollywood Film Festival

Norway Bollywood Film Festival aimed to create cultural understanding within people living in Norway, and help to increase the cultural exchange in Norway. The film festival inaugurated in 2003.

Each year the Bollywood Film festival is held at Oslo, Norway and features a rich mix of film programs designed to build and support the growing interest in the Indian entertainment industry. This includes programming that cultivates an audience for Hindi films while supporting the cause of promoting Indian films in the country.

The festival is one of the biggest film festivals in Scandinavia, attracting hundreds of Indians, Pakistanis and Norwegians each year, apart from top names from Bollywood.

97th BIRTHDAY OF M. S. Subbulakshmi

Madurai Shanmukhavadivu Subbulakshmi ( 16 September 1916 – 11 December 2004), also known as M.S., was a renowned Carnatic vocalist.
She was the first musician ever to be awarded the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian honor.
 She is the first Indian musician to receive the Ramon Magsaysay award, often considered Asia's Nobel Prize, in 1974 with the citation reading "Exacting purists acknowledge Srimati M. S. Subbulakshmi as the leading exponent of classical and semi-classical songs in the Karnataka tradition of South India.

Delhi gang-rape case: Death sentence for all four convicts

Four convicts in the December 16 Delhi gang-rape-cum-murder case were on Friday awarded death penalty by a Delhi court which said the gravity of the offence cannot be tolerated.

"Death to all," additional sessions judge Yogesh Khanna said while delivering the verdict in theDelhi gang-rape case that had evoked nationwide outrage and led the government to bring in a stringent anti-rape law.

"Besides discussing others offences, I straightaway come to section 302 (murder) of IPC. This falls under inhuman nature of the convicts and the gravity of offence they committed cannot be tolerated. Death sentence is given to all the four convicts," he said.

The offence committed by Mukesh (26), Akshay Thakur (28), Pawan Gupta (19) and Vinay Sharma (20) falls under the rarest of rare category warranting capital punishment, the judge said.

The four were convicted by the court on September 10 for the gang rape and murder of a 23-year-old paramedic student.




"Court cannot turn a blind eye to such a gruesome act," the judge said, while handing down the maximum punishment to the four convicts in the Delhi gang-rape case.

He said, "When crime against women is rising on day-to-day basis, so, at this point in time court cannot keep its eye shut."

"There should be exemplary punishment in view of the unparallelled brutality with which the victim was gang raped and murdered, as the case falls under the rarest of rare category. All be given death," the court said while reading out a portion of the order.

"This is a time when serious crime against a woman has come to the fore and now its judiciary's responsibility to instil confidence among the women," it said.

Besides murder, the four have been also convicted for offences including gangrape, unnatural offences, attempt to murder, dacoity, destruction of evidence, conspiracy, kidnapping or abducting in order to murder, while acquitting them of the charge of murder in dacoity.

Immediately after pronouncement of sentence, the victim's mother expressed satisfaction over the verdict.

"Halak mein saans atki thi, jo ab bahar nikli hai. Mein dhanywaad karti hu desh ke logon ka aur media ka' (We were waiting with bated breath, now we are relieved. I thank the people of my country and the media)," she said.

Besides her, the victim's father and two brothers were also present in the jam-packed court room when the sentence was pronounced.

Hearing that he will face the gallows, Vinay started crying in court while the other three convicts-Mukesh, Pawan, Akshay-started shouting for pardon, with one of the defence lawyers A P Singh also joining them in seeking mercy.

Advocate V K Anand, who appeared for Mukesh, said he has regard for the verdict and he will file an appeal in the Delhi high court.

Special public prosecutor Dayan Krishnan said, "I have done my job and we (prosecution) are happy with the verdict."

Soon after the Delhi gang-rape verdict was delivered, people waiting outside the courtroom started clapping.

The girl's mother said that no such victim should remain silent and must come forward to lodge a complaint.

Defence counsel A P Singh said he will move high court only "if no other rape takes place in next two months after this verdict".

"If the country wanted this case to be a deterrent, I will wait for two months to see the crime scene. If no rape takes place due to death being given in the instant case, I will give in writing that my clients be hanged," he said.

Vinay, who started crying and screaming after the order, sat down in the courtroom when the police personnel came to take him back to jail.

The post-lunch work at the Saket Court had come to a standstill with court staff members and litigants eagerly waiting for the pronouncement of the quantum of sentence.

The corridors of six-storeyed court building was crowded with people.