Infosys announces 8% average raise for India staff

BANGALORE: Infosys has announced an 8% increase in salaries for employees based in India, effective July 1. The company's offshore employees, who were not given hikes in February, can look forward to a 3% increase in their salaries. The global sales team has been given 8% hike effective May 1. The Times of India was the first to report on May 25 that the company would give an increment to its employees.

Last month, the second-largest IT company handed out increment letters to its sales teams and to those employees who had received promotions. Last year, salary increases were given in October, when the company came under pressure from peers in the industry. Infosys then gave a 6% hike to offshore employees and 3% to onsite employees.

In a recent stock exchange filing, the company said wage hikes were inevitable due to competitive pressures. The company said it has to increase its employee compensation more rapidly than in the past to remain competitive with other employers, or seek to recruit in other low labour cost regions to keep wage costs low.

"These wage pressures have led to a situation where wages in India are increasing at a faster rate than in the United States, which could result in increased costs for companies seeking to employ technology professionals in India, particularly project managers and other mid-level professionals," the filing said.

Mumbai gets new Eastern Freeway: 17 kms, no signals

Mumbai commuters get some relief tomorrow.

A crucial and ambitious freeway will be inaugurated at 3 pm by the Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan today.

The Eastern Freeway, 17 kms long, and signal-free, will drastically reduce travel time between South Mumbai - India's most important financial district - and the Eastern Suburbs.

What was earlier a one hour drive from Chembur to the city's main train station, the Chhattrapati Shivaji Terminus or CST will now take about only 20 minutes.

Currently commuters use the Eastern Express Highway.

Starting Friday, commuters will be able to use the first phase (14 kms) of the freeway.

Construction of the freeway began in 2008.   The project has cost the government 1250 crores afte escalation. Original cost are stated above in diagram.

There has been much controversy over the delay in opening the freeway for commuters. The state government reportedly waited for over 10 days for a central Congress leader to inaugurate it. But with no one available from New Delhi, Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan will do the honours.

Also, the officials feel that the Eastern Freeway will be a unique tourist attraction as it is the first road in the city to have twin tunnels. Starting at the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre hill, it ends at Gautam Nagar near Panjarpol. Both passageways in the tunnel are 500 m in length. Only one tunnel will be thrown open now. The other will be operational next year.

3-week-old baby's bleeding in brain stopped by using superglue

New York: Surgeons at the University of Kansas Hospital sealed a 3-week-old baby's life-threatening brain aneurysm with a dollop of superglue.

Ashlyn Julian was born on May 16. Her parents, Gina and Jared Julian, said she was a healthy newborn.

However, in a matter of days, Ashlyn went from being a quiet but tired baby to one who was screaming and vomiting.

Doctors discovered an aneurysm the size of an almond on little baby's brain.

Doctors at the University of Kansas Hospital discovered the she had an almond-sized aneurysm in the middle of her brain.

Surgeons used the smallest adult catheter they could find and a strand of microwire to put super glue on baby Ashlyn's aneurysm, the New York Daily News reported.

The unconventional method of using super glue to repair Ashlyn's aneurysm worked, and the 3-week-old is on the road to recovery.

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Gujarat government's School enrolment drive from Thursday

AHMEDABAD: Government of Gujarat is all set to organize Shala Praveshotsav campaign for the 11th consecutive year from 13th June. The programme will be held in rural areas during June 13 to 15 and in urban areas during June 20 to 22.


The chief minister, along with the cabinet ministers and senior government officials will join the programme in order to encourage children and parents and to create social awareness about the importance of education.

As per the state government's claim the school drop out rate between class 1 and 5 has decreased from 17.83% in 2003-04 to 2.04% in 2012-13, while decreasing from 33.73% to 7.08% between class 1 to 7.

The state government claim that it has built over 1, 04,000 classrooms and constructed over 71,000 sanitation blocks. The state has also recruited over 1, 33,000 vidhya sahayaks to ensure adequate number of teacher to each school. As a result, female literacy rate has seen a rise of 12.93%, increasing from 57.80% to 70.73% in last decade.

The state government also provides insurance assistance to the parents of the children studying in primary and secondary schools under Vidhya Deep scheme. The government pays 100% premium under the scheme.

NASSCOM gets 4,000 applications for start-ups programme

New Delhi: Software services industry body NASSCOM Wednesday said it has received 4,000 applications for its recently launched 10,000 start-ups programme.

There is receipt of 4,000 applications for Angel Funding and acceleration under the 10,000 start-ups programme for which applications were invited between April 5-May 30, NASSCOM said in a release.

"We have close to 14,000 entrepreneurs from over 80 cities registering with the programme who submitted about 4,000 applications. We will now select about 20-25 start-ups for Angel Funding and incubation," NASSCOM President Som Mittal said.

It will also select about 150 startups, which would undergo rigorous mentoring by its members, programme partners and other industry partners, the IT industry body added.

The applications revealed some interesting insights about the emerging tech entrepreneurship landscape in India, it said.

Out of 4,000 applications received, about 25 percent start-ups aimed at providing solutions pertaining to education and skill development, 15 percent for media and 11 percent for health care.

From a technology point of view, 66 percent of the applications came for web/internet start-ups, followed by mobile start-ups, occupying a share of 24 percent.

Applications for cloud and big data were at 16 percent and 11 percent respectively.

Out of the total applications, close to 23 percent of the applicants were from Bangalore, followed by 20 percent applicants from Delhi NCR. One in every five applications was filed from smaller towns, it added.

Over 70 percent applications were from under the age group of 30 and about 15 percent of applicants were women.

PTI 

'Know Your Army' Mela generates interest in Tawang

Tezpur: To fortify the confidence of people in the good intent of the Army and motivate the North East youth to join the defence force, a two-day 'Know Your Army' Mela was organised at Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh.

The first of its kind Mela in Tawang from Monday was also to generate goodwill among the local populace and to familiarise them with the army's capabilities and equipment profile so as to provide requisite stimuli and motivation to the youth for joining the Army.

In the 20 stalls assorted equipment and weapons were on display and information provided on various entry schemes of army with the help of books, charts and v

ideo clippings, defence sources today said.

A cultural programme was presented by the troops and locals of Tawang exhibiting the rich cultural heritage in the form of traditional dances of India, the sources said.

About 2000 people from interior villages and Tawang witnessed the event with school children being enthralled by the display.

PTI 

Music bands of inmates on anvil in Bihar prisons

Patna: The prisoners have been known to participate in menial activities during stay in jails, but the authorities in Bihar prisons have set out on a novel programme to draw inmates' interest in music with a long-term plan to set up music bands of the prisoners.

Various music instruments have been purchased in some jails a

nd orders placed for other jails to provide training to the inmates in musical instruments so that they could set up music bands of their own and take part in inter-jail competitions, Inspector General (IG) Prison, Anand Kishore said.

It has been proposed to organise music classes for the interested inmates in all 21 jails in Bihar, he said, adding that such programmes have already started in a few jails, including the Beur central jail on the outskirts of the state capital.

Reputed musicians like Acharya Gajendra Mishra, Sanjay Kumar and Virendra Kumar have been hired to provide music training in various instruments to about 45 inmates at the Beur central Jail, IG said.

The chosen inmates at the Beur jail have been learning musical instruments like Spanish Guitar, Harmonium, Tabla, Drum Congo, Electronic Tanpura, Scale Changer, Synthesiser Keyboard, Naal and Jhaal, he said.

The trained inmates will not only take part in musical programmes in their own jails for entertainment of fellow prisoners, but may also take part in the inter-jail competitions in future, IG added.

PTI