Hybrid vehicles set to hit Indian roads next year.

Both Honda Siel Cars India and homegrown Mahindra & Mahindra have indicated that they will make their hybrid vehicles commercial by next year. Other auto makers, such as Toyota and Ford, are also exploring the market for hybrid vehicles in the country. Hybrid vehicles run on electricity and another fuel, which could be petrol, diesel or bio-fuel. The car owner has the option to drive the car using either electricity or petrol and can easily switch from one to another. These vehicles help reduce emissions by generating power from an electric motor, burning less fuel for each mile travelled. M&M’s senior vice-president (product development), automotive sector, Arun Jaura told ET: “As I talk to you, we are test-piloting Scorpio’s mild-hybrid variant and full-hybrid variant. We plan to launch them early next year.” Mr Jaura added that both variants would be priced higher than the current Scorpio petrol and diesel models. The full-hybrid Scorpio will run on electricity and petrol. In the mild-hybrid version, a conventional Scorpio’s engine will have the option of being turned off whenever the car is braking or stopped yet restart quickly and cleanly. When the engine is off, accessories can run on electrical power. Honda Siel Cars India will also launch its premium offering Civic in its hybrid avatar next year. ”We have plans to launch the Civic hybrid in India by next year. The cars would initially be imported as completely built units (CBU),” said Jnaneshwar Sen, senior Gm (marketing), Honda Siel Cars India.

Honda Civic hybrid would run on electricity-petrol combine. Toyota, which is known for making one of the most successful hybrid cars Prius, is keen on bringing it in India. However, Toyota India officials believe it can happen only if the government is ready to provide subsidies to hybrid vehicle makers. American auto maker Ford India, too, is monitoring the market and globally has the technology ready for such products. Arvind Mathew, managing director, Ford India says: “We will continue to monitor market demand in India before we launch any hybrid product.” The Society of Automobile Manufacturers Association India (SIAM), on its part, has told the government that to gradually increase the use of such vehicles, the price has to come down significantly. For that, support from the government by way of reduced taxes/duties on CNG/LPG/Hybrid vehicles and other alternative fuel vehicles and components is needed. Auto makers believe the government should provide manufacturing support to players for hybrid vehicles and also extend some tax sops if hybrids are imported as CBUs.

The government is also expected to extend infrastructure support, such as providing consumers with enough CNG, LPG, clean fuels and electric charging stations. “In several countries, hybrid car owners are offered exemptions when they file income-tax. Such tax breaks to consumers will provide them with incentives to buy hybrid cars,”adds Mr Jaura.

Link Economic Times

The world is becoming a happier place -- study

The world is becoming a happier place, a study published in this month's Perspectives of Psychological Science shows.
Data from national surveys conducted between 1981 and 2006, which were collated by researchers at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research, showed that happiness was on the rise in 40 out of 52 countries.
And in a separate happiness ranking, which looked at 97 countries representing 90 percent of the world's population, only 20 countries were listed as unhappy.
University of Michigan political scientist Ronald Inglehart, the lead author of the study, said the upswell in happiness came as a surprise to researchers, who have long felt it was "almost impossible to raise an entire country's happiness level."
"There has been a lot of research over the last 25 years indicating that happiness is very stable," Inglehart told AFP.
"There may be short-term changes but it returns to a set point," he said.
But the study, which was part of the ongoing World Values Surveys, appeared to disprove that theory.
For the past 26 years, World Values Surveys have asked more than 350,000 people how happy they are.
Among the 52 countries and territories for which long-term comparative data were available, India, Ireland, Mexico, Puerto Rico and South Korea showed steep upticks in happiness last year, while the happiness quotient in 14 other countries, including nine in Europe, also rose, but less sharply.
Those 14 countries are Argentina, Canada, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, South Africa, Spain and Sweden.
"Economic growth, democratization and tolerance are strongly linked with happiness," said Inglehart.
"We have had an unusual set of circumstances in the last 25 years where all of these things that are quite important and have strong linkages to happiness have been going in a favorable direction. So most countries have rising levels of happiness," he told AFP.
"Democracies are significantly happier than non-democratic countries; prosperous countries tend to be happier than poor countries; and tolerant people -- even intolerant people living in a tolerant society -- tend to be happier."
In the United States, Switzerland and Norway, happiness was stagnant, but all three countries were still in the top 20 of the 97 nations that were ranked in order of happiness levels.
Denmark, where 52 percent of the population said they were very happy, was at the top of that list and Zimbabwe at the bottom, with only around four percent of Zimbabweans saying they were happy.
"Zimbabwe has everything going wrong. It's desperately poor, AIDS is high, people are being killed, the political system is repressive. It's not a great place to live these days and it's deeply unhappy," said Inglehart.
"The results clearly show that the happiest societies are those that allow people the freedom to choose how to live their lives," Inglehart said, citing the tolerant societies and democratic political systems in Denmark, Iceland, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Canada -- all of which rank among the 10 happiest countries in the world.

Link AFP

Windows Server 2008 Uses 10% Less Energy, Microsoft Says

Microsoft has published a whitepaper showing that the new Windows Server 2008 uses 10% less energy than its predecessor, released in 2003."Microsoft Windows Server 2008 has been designed with energy efficiency in mind, to provide customers with ready and convenient access to a number of new power-saving features," according to the report.
Energy-efficiency upgrades include updated support for administrating processor power-management functions across multiple servers and new virtualization technology to consolidate servers onto fewer machines.
"If multiple virtual servers can run on a single physical machine without consuming significantly more power than a standalone server, that means you can add virtual servers at essentially no power cost," the report notes.
Microsoft's tests show that Windows Server 2008 uses 2.3% less power when idle and 6.8% less when active compared to the 2003 version. The energy cost savings are minimal - about $30 a year for a 20-server configuration - but the benefits can add up over time, especially in larger server environments, Microsoft says.
Microsoft has been talking up the energy benefits of Windows Server 2008 since it was released in March, even publishing a best practices guide for IT managers to coincide with the launch
Link Sustainable life media

World Cup Memories of 1983

There was, though, a lot of friendly punching and backslapping as the World Cup squad of 1983 reassembled, 25 years on, for a silver jubilee felicitation ceremony by the BCCI. Kapil Dev and his Devils, as they were called, all got together again, spouses and kids in tow, for what was to be a formal ceremony, but also turned out to be a nostalgia trip for the buddies.

Sunil Gavaskar, who was carrying the cricket ball that was used during the World Cup, said, “The ball still has its shine. Sadly, some of the autographs on the ball have become faded, and but now, I’m going to try and take the autographs of the winning squad on it again.” BCCI president Sharad Pawar and MS Gill did the honours, while the men smiled and joked even on stage. Kapil paaji even got a little emotional while making his speech. Apart from the men in white, the other centre of attention all evening were the men who turned up, coincidentally, all in pink – former captains Rahul Dravid, Mohd Azharuddin and Anil Kumble.

When we caught up with Azharuddin, he said, “Actually, I wasn’t planning to come for the function today. It was just that I had some work in Delhi and decided to attend the ceremony at the last minute. It was a memorable experience to be part of such a grand occasion.” Dravid was also glad to be there. “It is a great moment for me to be here as part of the event,” he said. “This is a landmark in the history of Indian cricket. It’s been a long time since we have seen such a victory, and we hope to repeat it in the future soon.” Srikkanth’s wife Vidya said that her two sòns were in Chennai and so could not make it to the event. Poonam and Kirti Azad, however, had no such issues and got their sons along, looking every bit the proud parents. Both boys – Somya and Surya – are cricket players too. Soon after the do, the squad left for London, where Gavaskar will throw a bash tomorrow, at Lord’s – on the anniversary of the day India won the World cup in 1983.

Spotted: Sharad Pawar, Kapil Dev, Sunil Gavaskar, Krishnamachari Srikkanth, Sandeep Patil, Kirti Azad, Mohinder Amarnath, Ravi Shastri, Balwinder Sandhu, Yashpal Sharma, Madan Lal, Syed Kirmani, Roger Binny, Dilip Vengsarkar, Sunil Walson, PR Mansingh, MS Gill, Raj Singh Dungarpur, Vishwanath Gundappa, Ajit Wadekar, IS Bindra, Chandu Borde, NKP Salve, Rajeev Shukla, Marshneil Gavaskar, Deepa Patil, Vidya Srikkanth, Manali Vengsarkar, Poonam Azad, Jhulan Goswami, Anjum Chopra, Diana Aduljee, Rahul Dravid, Azharuddin, Anil Kumble
Link times of India

Top 10 annoying office habits!

Overbearing, obsessively rude, noisy, and opinionated – there are so many things that can be found annoying in that one person in office. So, what actually are some of the ‘universally’ bad behaviours for office work? Here's a look at the top 10 annoying office habits... 1. Office drummers - There are lesser annoying office habits than the person who has to tap out a rhythm while waiting for their brain to submerge into the work they’re assigned. 2. Foghorn phone voice - The breed of office worker who raises their tone several decibels as soon as they pick up the phone. 3. Pod pong - Well, these are those people who marinate themselves in perfumes overnight. 4. Key smashers - All offices have at least one person who appears to think that to make the little symbols on their keyboard appear on the screen, they need to exert the force of an atomic bomb through the ends of their digits. 5. Paid for nothing - In this case, an employee gets paid for standing out in the sunshine chatting to wheezy and addicted mates while the fresh-lunged members of the workforce are indoors putting their mind to work. 6. Snot funny - What is it with people, who riddled with pleurisy, the bubonic plague or cancer of the entire body, still think it's a good idea to come in to work? The world really won't stop if that report doesn't get finished and the boss more likely regards you as a mug than a martyr. Your work mates, of course, will shower you with love for ruining their plans for the weekend and keeping their kids out of school. 7. Lucifer's lunch - Egg and mayonnaise sandwiches, tuna fishcakes, blue cheese with crackers, breakfast burritos with extra onion and chips with salt and vinegar – all food items which should be banned from the workplace, thanks to their smell. 8. Ringtone hell - This section includes all those people who play bits of their favourite heavy metal music collection from a speaker on their desk, via their mobile phone. 9. Space invaders - You distinctly remember hearing the boss bring your new work mate over to his or her work area and say, "This is your desk". The boss did not follow that up with the words, "but feel free to use your colleague's desk for overspill if there's not enough room for your inane gossip magazines and pictures of your 17 children". 10. Eau de underarm - There are fewer things more noxious than a damp-shirted male who, after working up a sweat running for the bus, is left to "mature" over a keyboard for eight hours.
Link Times of India

Let's Live Every Moment So We Die Well, Too

Spiritual longing comes to you not because you think of God. If people think of God, they will not become spiritual, they will only think of how to acquire more. If God comes and blesses them, they will want more money, property, health, everything. Only when you think about death, these questions come up: What is this about, where will i go, what will happen to me? This wanting to know will come naturally. Yoga is not just about life; when we talk about living well, we are also talking about dying well. Dying gracefully, joyfully, is important. It is the final thing you get to do; but most people are doing it horribly. When we say a spiritual possibility, a space, there is also room to die. Spirituality is a means to live; it is also a means to die because living and dying are not different. Right now i can say you are living, or i can say you are dying. The process of dying is on; one day it will be complete. It is just that so much negativity is attached to the word "death". But death is a part of life. One who does not know how to die, or is unwilling to die, cannot live. If you are afraid of death, you will only avoid life, you cannot avoid death. Every day of your life you need to be aware that you are mortal. In Shoonya meditation everything that you consider as "myself" will become nothing; it is as if you die. Again, when you open your eyes, it is all there. If you practise this consciously, twice a day, when the time to die comes, it will no more be a big issue. The process you refer to as life is something that can be constantly improved upon. Not everybody is living with the same quality, level of understanding and grace. Even if you live a thousand years and do everything that you wish to do, still something better could be done. This is the way of life. But death is perfect and absolute when it happens; death does not need anybody's assistance. You don't have to think about it; you don't have to reflect upon it. But the limited nature of life needs to be reflected upon. So always the first training for a spiritual aspirant is to go and sit in the cremation ground. You are just like a miracle happening and one day you are gone. Busy in between, but you are like a bubble: when the bubble is on, it is so real; one prick — gone! Look at this life right now: inhalation, exhalation. If the next inhalation does not happen, that's it... That is how fragile this life is. People always think death is something that happens to somebody else; it's not so, it will happen to you and me. If you remind yourself every day that you will also die, you will move towards knowing higher perception. If you are aware of the mortal nature of your life, is there time to get angry with somebody, to quarrel or do anything stupid? Once you are conscious that you will die, you will want to make every moment of your life as beautiful as possible. Those who are constantly aware of the fragile nature of existence, they don't want to miss a single moment; they will naturally be aware. They can't take anything for granted; they will live purposefully, becoming aware

Link spirituality

Football ace Linekar wants Gandhi statue in Leicester

Former England football ace Gary Linekar has lent his support for the installation of a statue of Mahatma Gandhi in his home city of Leicester which has a large Asian population. A section of people in the city, located about 100 km from here, have opposed the move to install a statue of Gandhi and has instead favoured Linekar or any other local hero. In a letter written to Keith Vaz, MP, Linekar, who is now a popular football and TV presenter, said he agreed that the ethnic diversity of Leicester should be "celebrated" and that Gandhi's philosophy of brotherhood amongst different religions and ethnicity should be honoured. Such diversity should be supported with public acknowledgment. The statue will come at no extra cost to the tax payer as private funding has already been secured, Vaz, who is leading the campaign to celebrate the religious and ethnic diversity of the City of Leicester, said on Friday. Leicester is predicted to be Britain's' first white minority city in 12 years. Vaz said a statue of Mahatma Gandhi would be an excellent symbol of the leader's and the city's commitment to diversity. In his letter, Linekar said: "As far as a statue of me is concerned, frankly I think that is best left to other people to decide. "Clearly the cost of such a statue will be a factor and perhaps the extra materials required for my ears would make the statue too expensive!”. Linekar is frequently teased on television for his "bigger than normal" ears.

Pentagon bans Google map-makers

The US defence department has banned the giant internet search engine Google from filming inside and making detailed studies of US military bases.
Close-up, ground-level imagery of US military sites posed a "potential threat" to security, it said.
The move follows the discovery of images of the Fort Sam Houston army base in Texas on Google Maps.
A Google spokesman said that where the US military had expressed concerns, images had been removed.
Google has now been barred from filming and conducting detailed studies of bases, following the discovery of detailed, three-dimensional panoramas online - and in particular, views of the Texan base.
"Images include 360-degree views of the covered area to include access control points, barriers, headquarters, facilities and community areas," said the defence department in a statement quoted by AFP news agency.
It said such detailed mapping could pose a threat.
Google spokesman Larry Yu said the decision by a Google team to enter the Texas base, which is in San Antonio, and undertake a detailed survey, had been "a mistake".
He told the BBC that it was "not our policy to request access to military installations, but in this instance the operator of the vehicle with the camera on top - which is how we go about capturing imagery for Street-View - requested permission to access a military installation, was given access, and after learning of the incident we quickly removed the imagery".
Individuals and governments
Military officials are currently looking into exactly what imagery is available - though it may not be able to order its removal if images are taken from public streets.
Among the popular mapping services offered by Google are Street View, which allows web users to "drive" along virtual US landscapes with ground-level views, and Google Earth, which offers detailed satellite and 3D images of locations around the world.
In this case, it was imagery offered on Street View that caused the concern.
But both have provoked complaints - from individuals depicted in the images and from governments concerned that satellite images could compromise security.
Gary Ross, a spokesman for the US Northern Command, told AFP that although such services could be useful, "there has to be a balance".
But Mr Yu said Google would listen to concerns about privacy and security.
"We try to have a compliant image removal policy - not only relative to the military but to consumers also," said Mr Yu. "If people have concerns, they should contact us."

Link BBC News

The Buddha