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India's baby Nargis one of world's seven billionth inhabitant

"Nargis is the first child of 23-year-old Vinita and 25-year-old farmer Ajay and has been welcomed as the symbolic seven billionth baby," Bhagyashree Dengle, executive director of child rights group Plan India said. Nargis shares the honours of being the world's symbolic seven billionth baby with Philippines' Danica May Camacho who was born just after midnight in a government hospital in Manila.

The birth of Nargis has given a new resolve to her father Ajay, who now wants to work for creating awareness among the people about nurturing the girl child and wants his daughter to become a doctor.

Nargis was selected to be the symbolic seven billionth baby to focus on the plight of the girl child in the country facing the problem of female foeticide, Dengle said. The birth of Nargis and six other girls born in the area today was celebrated at a function organised by Plan India.

All the seven girls born in the area were given birth certificates and have also got seven celebratory sponsors like Mallika Sarabhai, Sunita Narain and Anushka Shankar who would be taking care of issues relating to their basic rights, education, health and participation for the next seven years as per the Plan India initiative.

Dengle said the UN had carried out a survey which found that the probability of the seven billionth child being born in Uttar Pradesh was high. Every minute, 51 babies are born in India, 11 of them in Uttar Pradesh.

Sensex down 68 pts in opening trade

Mumbai: The BSE benchmark, Sensex, fell by over 68 points in opening trade on Monday as realty, banking and oil and gas stocks succumbed to profit-booking in the wake of Friday's rally.

The 30-share Sensex, which has gained over 1,016 points in the past four sessions, fell by 68.65 points, or 0.39 per cent, to 17,736.15 in opening trade on Monday.
In a similar fashion, the wide-based National Stock Exchange Nifty Index shed 23.10 points, or 0.43 per cent, to 5,337.60.
Brokers said apart from profit-booking by market participants, a nearly 60 per cent dip in the Q2 net profit of the country's largest car-maker, Maruti Suzuki India, dampened the trading sentiment.

Stocks of Maruti Suzuki India fell by 4.59 per cent to Rs 1,098.80 in early trade.
Meanwhile, in the Asia region, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index was down 1.14 per cent, while Japan's Nikkei edged lower by 0.03 per cent in morning trade on Monday.

New Delhi: The country fondly remembered former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on her 27th death anniversary on Monday with President Pratibha Patil leading the nation in paying rich tributes to the departed leader. Patil paid floral tributes at Shakti Sthal, the memorial of Gandhi, here this morning. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar, Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi were also present on the occasion.

Delhi Lt-Governor Tejinder Khanna, Union Ministers Vilasrao Deshmukh, Kamal Nath, K V Thomas, N Narayana Swamy and Krishna Tirath, Motilal Vohra and Manishankar Aiyar were also present.

Devotional songs were played at the venue as the dignitaries sat at Shakti Sthal after paying tributes to the late leader. A speech by Indira Gandhi was also played on the occasion.

The former Prime Minister was assassinated by her bodyguards on October 31, 1984.

Perth: Vice-President Hamid Ansari on Monday left for India after attending the three-day Commonwealth Heads of Government (CHOGM) meeting here.
Ansari, who represented India at the summit of the leaders of the 54-nation bloc, had also held informal meetings with Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa, among other world leaders here.
However, no bilateral talks were held with Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard.

Taking a step-by-step approach to reforms, the Commonwealth has agreed to adopt some of the recommendations of an eminent persons group to make it more relevant in current times, but has virtually rejected the proposal for a human rights commissioner.

The final CHOGM communiqué on Sunday, the last day of the summit, noted the "impasse" in the Doha round and urged the trade ministers' World Trade Organisation meeting in December to commit to make "substantive progress" as well as make a formal "anti-protectionist pledge". The communiqué also called for "accelerated efforts" to conclude negotiations on a Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT).

It endorsed India's position that seeks a quick conclusion to the negotiations on the CCIT at the UN.

Washington: Microsoft founder Bill Gates coolly parried some harsh criticism from late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, in an interview with ABC television, saying their professional rivalry was positive.

Gates, who maintained a long rivalry with the Apple innovator, was asked about an authorized biography of Jobs by Walter Isaacson which portrayed Gates as comparatively uninspired as a creative spirit.

The Microsoft founder was told by ABC on Sunday that Jobs "basically said that you were 'unimaginative, had never invented anything and shamelessly ripped off other people's ideas.' That's pretty tough stuff. What's your reaction to that?" "Well, Steve and I worked together, you know, creating the Mac. We had more people on it, did the key software for it," Gates explained.

"So over the course of, you know, the 30 years we worked together, you know, he said a lot of very nice things about me and he said a lot of tough things.
Gates went on: "I mean, he faced, several times at Apple, the fact that their products were so premium-priced that they literally might not stay in the marketplace. So the fact that we were succeeding with high volume products, you know, including a range of prices, because of the way we worked with multiple companies, it's tough.

"So the fact that, you know, at various times, he felt beleaguered, he felt like he was -- he was the good guy and we were the bad guys, you know, very understandable.

"I, you know, respect Steve. We got to work together. We spurred each other on, even as competitors. None of that bothers me at all," Gates told ABC. Jobs lost his years-long battle with pancreatic cancer at the age of 56 earlier this month.

Singapore: India should go ahead with its civil nuclear power projects to balance against the impact of high oil and gas prices, a former senior official of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Monday. "Already India is moving towards more cooperation with Japan, US for introducing civil technologies.

"Also, India has a huge urban setting. So using nuclear power for providing urban situation as well as industry... is very efficient and effective way," Nabuo Tanaka, former executive director of the IEA, told reporters here.

"India already has lots of technology. But, just like China, these big emerging economies inevitably will depend on nuclear power," he stressed while speaking on the sidelines of the Singapore Energy Summit.

Tanaka ruled out cheaper oil days, saying he expected crude oil prices to range between $ 70 and $ 80 per barrel in the longer term, while the renewable energies development has slowed down due to the unpredictable global economic growths.
A higher $100 per barrel oil price would derail the global economy with pressure on energy costs.

Large oil and gas consuming countries should note this and give importance to alternative options, he said.

India plans to set up 40,000-megawatt of nuclear power plants by 2030, but these have been slowed down following the Fukushima incident.
Similarly, China, as an emerging economy, would also have to go the nuclear way, said Tanaka.

He also highlighted that the Japanese have learned lessons from the Fukushima nuclear plant incidents and were now working on much safer approach, especially new reactors.

Tanaka said he expected Japan to restart its idle nuclear plants next year as its option of non-nuclear energy would be too costly.
"Logically speaking, if Japan is not restarting nuclear power, it means Yen 3 trillion more expenditure on fuels," he said.