Education

Highest Observation Deck in the World @ 1821 Feet !!!

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At the Top, Burj Khalifa SKY Level 148 HRCourtesy of ‘At the Top, Burj Khalifa SKY’ The 148th floor of the Burj Khalifa.

Dubai’s Burj Khalifa is the tallest tower in the world at 2,722 feet tall with 160 floors.

And now it also has the highest observation deck on level 148 — a stunning 1,821 feet above the ground. It beat out the previous world record holder Canton Tower with its 1,601 foot high observation deck in Guangzhou, China.

This makes the fourth Guinness World Records title for the Burj Khalifa, including the tallest building, tallest man-made structure, and highest restaurant.

1. Burj Khalifa © Michael MerolaMichael Merola/Emporis The Burj Khalifa now has four Guinness World Records titles.

And because it’s not enough just to see the view, the Burj Khalifa put together an entire experience called At the Top, Burj Khalifa SKY.

First, it takes visitors from the ground level of The Dubai Mall to level 125. Not even the elevator ride is boring — the elevators travel at 33 feet per second with special projections that make it appear as though you’re soaring above other global landmarks.

Once you reach Level 125, you have 360-degree views of the city plus more interactive features. You can then get back on another high-speed elevator and shoot up to the 148th floor — the SKY level — for the highest outdoor terrace in the world. The entire experience lasts over an hour.

At the Top, Burj Khalifa SKY Level 125 HRCourtesy of ‘At the Top, Burj Khalifa SKY’ The 125th floor of the Burj Khalifa.

SOURCE:::: Business insider india.com

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A Perfect Example of ” Chasing Passion ” by a Roadside ‘Chaiwala’ in Delhi…

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Laxman Rao is a Chaiwala by profession but his heart lies in literature. Although he sells tea along roadside of ITO area in Delhi, he has penned down more than 20  novels and plays. Rejected by publishers, he started self publishing & distributing books.

A truly inspiring story of how passion transcends everything.
Go chase yours.

SOURCE:::: Storypick and Youtube

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Teachers and Friends Recall CEA’s Fun-Filled Student Days @ IIM Ahmedabad !!!

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Teachers and friends of India’s new Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian remember how his friends and he once bought a second-hand car from the money they earned during summer assignments while studying at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM)-Ahmedabad.

Arvind Subramanian

 

“I remember some of the students, including Arvind Subramanian, Ivan Menezes (now, chief executive of Diageo) and Lalit Bhojwani (of Origin Consultants), had bought a second-hand car out of the money they earned for their summer assignments,” said Nayan Parikh, president, IIM-A Alumni Association, and Subramanian’s batchmate. “Often, the car would not start and other students would be called to push it.”

Subramanian was a student at the premier management institute from 1979 to 1981, pursuing a post-graduate programme. He was taught by such luminaries as former Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor C Rangarajan and former IIM-A director Bakul Dholakia. They all remember Subramanian as a bright student, interested in research, with a deep liking for economics and finance. They are also confident that the country’s economy is now in safe hands.

“This is a positive development for the IIM-A fraternity. Raghuram Rajan as RBI governor and now Arvind Subramanian as chief economic advisor are going to make significant contribution to the Indian economy,” said Dholakia, now the director-general of International Management Institute.

“A highly established and talented faculty member like Rangarajan became the RBI Governor, as did Rajan. Now, Subramanian is the CEA. IIM-Ahmedabad is making a significant contribution in the building of the Indian economy.”

Remembering Subramanian as a “bright student”, Dholakia said, “He was deeply interested in economics and finance. We had a compulsory course on macroeconomics called Economic Environment and Policy, which Rangarajan and I used to teach.” Dholakia also remembers Subramanian had an inclination for research and was not interested in pursuing a corporate career.

Another faculty who remembers the new CEA from when he was a student is Abhinandan Jain. “He was down-to-earth and understated.”

Source::::www.business-standard.com

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India”s NIRBHAY Subsonic Cruise Missile… Few Facts on its Launch …

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Nirbhay, India’s first home-grown subsonic cruise missile, was on Friday successfully test-launched from the Interim Test Range in Chandipur, near Balasore in Orissa.

This is Nirbhay’s second launch, the first being terminated mid-way on 12 March 2013 owing to a technical snag. Nirbhay, with an expected strike range of 800-1000 km, is the first missile being made completely in Bangalore.

Here are some facts of the missile:

1) Nirbhay is a subsonic cruise missile – it starts off as a rocket and then turns into an aircraft.

2) Nirbhay is expected to have an expected strike range of 800-1000 km.

3) The missile was nurtured at the Defence Research and Development Organisation’s premier laboratory Aeronautical Development Establishment in Bangalore’s C V Raman Nagar.

4) The cost of one missile is Rs 10 crore.

5) It has good loitering capability, good control and guidance, high degree of accuracy in terms of impact and very good stealth features.

6) The Nirbhay missile is similar to the US Tomahawks, which can fly like an aircraft and capable of travelling up to 1,000 km.

7) It can fly at tree-top level making it difficult to detect on radar and as it approaches the target, the missile can determine the point of impact while hovering over the target.

8) It gives India the capacity to launch different kinds of payloads at different ranges from various platforms at a very low cost. It can be launched from a mobile launcher.

SOURCE::: REDIFF.COM  
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” Three Things I Have Learned From Warren Buffett “…. Bill Gates

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I’m looking forward to sharing posts from time to time about things I’ve learned in my career atMicrosoft and the Gates Foundation. (I also post frequently on my blog.)

Last month, I went to Omaha for the annual Berkshire Hathaway shareholders meeting. It’s always a lot of fun, and not just because of the ping-pong matches and the newspaper-throwing contest I have with Warren Buffett. It’s also fun because I get to learn from Warren and gain insight into how he thinks.

Here are three things I’ve learned from Warren over the years:

1. It’s not just about investing.

The first thing people learn from Warren, of course, is how to think about investing. That’s natural, given his amazing track record. Unfortunately, that’s where a lot of people stop, and they miss out on the fact that he has a whole framework for business thinking that is very powerful. For example, he talks about looking for a company’s moat—its competitive advantage—and whether the moat is shrinking or growing. He says a shareholder has to act as if he owns the entire business, looking at the future profit stream and deciding what it’s worth. And you have to be willing to ignore the market rather than follow it, because you want to take advantage of the market’s mistakes—the companies that have been underpriced.

I have to admit, when I first met Warren, the fact that he had this framework was a real surprise to me. I met him at a dinner my mother had put together. On my way there, I thought, “Why would I want to meet this guy who picks stocks?” I thought he just used various market-related things—like volume, or how the price had changed over time—to make his decisions. But when we started talking that day, he didn’t ask me about any of those things. Instead he started asking big questions about the fundamentals of our business. “Why can’t IBM do what Microsoft does? Why has Microsoft been so profitable?” That’s when I realized he thought about business in a much more profound way than I’d given him credit for.

2. Use your platform.

A lot of business leaders write letters to their shareholders, but Warren is justly famous for his. Partly that’s because his natural good humor shines through. Partly it’s because people think it will help them invest better (and they’re right). But it’s also because he’s been willing to speak frankly and criticize things like stock options and financial derivatives. He’s not afraid to take positions, like his stand on raising taxes on the rich, that run counter to his self-interest. Warren inspired me to start writing my own annual letter about the foundation’s work. I still have a ways to go before mine is as good as Warren’s, but it’s been helpful to sit down once a year and explain the results we’re seeing, both good and bad.

3. Know how valuable your time is.

No matter how much money you have, you can’t buy more time. There are only 24 hours in everyone’s day. Warren has a keen sense of this. He doesn’t let his calendar get filled up with useless meetings. On the other hand, he’s very generous with his time for the people he trusts. He gives his close advisers at Berkshire his phone number, and they can just call him up and he’ll answer the phone.

Although Warren makes a point of meeting with dozens of university classes every year, not many people get to ask him for advice on a regular basis. I feel very lucky in that regard: The dialogue has been invaluable to me, and not only at Microsoft. When Melinda and I started our foundation, I turned to him for advice. We talked a lot about the idea that philanthropy could be just as impactful in its own way as software had been. It turns out that Warren’s brilliant way of looking at the world is just as useful in attacking poverty and disease as it is in building a business. He’s one of a kind.

SOURCE:::: Bill Gates in http://www.linkedin.com

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Message For the Day…” One Must Pay Due Care to Understand the Teachings of Great Avatars…”

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There may be a few statements in Bhagavad Gita or other scriptures that might appear to contradict each other. For instance, in the Gita at one place, Lord Krishna stresses the need for action, at another the adherence to Dharma, and in another place commends renunciation of all Dharma and urges complete surrender to the Lord. These apparent contradictions are not contradictions. The teaching varies according to the state of spiritual development of the person concerned and the situation in which one is placed. The lesson here is one must pay due care and attention to understanding completely the inner significance of the great teachings of the Avatars and sages before any criticism is attempted.

Sathya Sai Baba

 

 

” This Teenager From West Bengal is the True Hero …” Malala Yousafzai

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As the world celebrates Pakistani teenager Malala Yousafzai winning the Nobel Peace Prize, Malala herself is celebrating the courage of a little known young girl from West Bengal’s Sandeshkhali area who has been quietly working against the trafficking of young girls from the region.

Anoyara Khatun, 18, from North 24 Parganas, has, with the support of other children and non-governmental organisations, built a strong network to resist trafficking of young girls and prevent child marriages in the region.

“Malala and the Malala Fund celebrate Anoyara’s exemplary courage and leadership. She has helped reunite more than 180 trafficked children with their families, prevented 35 child marriages, rescued 85 children from the clutches of child labour and registered 200 out-of-schools (drop-outs) into schools,” says a Facebook post by the Malalafund, an initiative by Malala.

The post made on October 13, International Day of the Girl, only a few days after Ms. Malala was awarded the Nobel Prize, has described Anoyara as “a true girl hero.”

When The Hindu met Anoyara at Sandeshkhali on Wednesday, she was aware of the Facebook post and could not stop talking about Malala. The first year student of a local college has also collected a number of vernacular newspapers that published news of Ms. Malala’s award and shared it with her friends.

“Though I have not met Malala, I did meet her father Ziauddin Yousafzai at Brussels in June 2012,” she said. She made the trip to Belgium when she was nominated for The International Children’s Peace Prize.

“Trafficking of young girls and child marriages were rampant in the villages here. Poverty and lack of awareness and education provided the ideal conditions for traffickers to operate here,” Ms. Anoyara said.

In 2008, Save the Children, an international non-governmental organisation working for child rights, helped establish a number of multi activity centres in the Sandeshkhali area. These centres help create awareness among the children of the region about the dangers of trafficking and similar crimes. Anoyara recalls stories of how she and others chased away traffickers who came offering jobs and marriage to young girls in the region.

Jatin Mondar, the State Programme Manager of Save the Children, West Bengal said that through these centres, the organisation had managed to put in place a “committee-based child protection model” in Sandeshkhali since 2004.

“Now, if someone approaches the villagers with the proposal to take a girl to Delhi or anywhere else for work, that person is sure to be handed over to the police by us,” Anoyara said.

Keywords: Malala Yousafzai, Nobel Peace Prize, Anoyara Khatun, Malala mentor

SOURCE:::: The Hindu.com

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Meet Mr. Arvind Subramanian … Chief Economic Adviser to Govt. Of India…

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After his candidacy first emerged in August, US based economist Arvind Subramanian has finally been selected as chief economic adviser by the Indian government.

 

This announcement came at a newsconference in New Delhi where Subramanian was present. He is a development economist who worked closely with Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Raghuram Rajan when both were at the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

According to analysts, one of the prime factors that tipped scales in favour of Arvind Subramanian was his proximity to RBI governor Raghuram Rajan. Narendra Modi personally handpicked Arvind to be his chief economic adviser.

Confirming his appointment in an impromptu news conference outside the Finance Ministry, Mr Subramanian said: “It is a great honour… to serve in a government that has a mandate for reform and change.” He said macro-economic stability and creating favourable conditions for investment will be priorities.

Traditionally, the chief economic adviser is responsible for producing the annual Economic Survey – a document on the state of economy that underpins the drafting of the Budget – and a mid-year economic update that is presented to Parliament.

Recently, Mr Subramanian criticised the Indian government’s decision to derail a WTO deal struck last year to streamline trade procedures by tying it to a separate controversy over food subsidies.

He also criticised Mr Jaitley’s maiden budget in July for being too optimistic in its revenue forecasts.

Mr Subramanian was educated in India and Britain and went on to serve at the IMF and at the forerunner to the World Trade Organization, before taking senior academic posts at Harvard and Johns Hopkins universities in the United States.

In 2011, Foreign Policy magazine has named him as one of the world’s top 100 global thinkers. He obtained his undergraduate degree from St. Stephens College, Delhi; his MBA from the Indian Institute of Management at Ahmedabad, India; and his M.Phil and D.Phil from the University of Oxford, UK.

Below is a small bio of Arvind Subramanian (Courtesy- Peterson Institute of International economics) 

Arvind Subramanian is the Dennis Weatherstone Senior Fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics and senior fellow at the Center for Global Development. His book Eclipse: Living in the Shadow of China’s Economic Dominance was published in September 2011, and he is coauthor of Who Needs to Open the Capital Account? (2012). Foreign Policy magazine has named him as one of the world’s top 100 global thinkers in 2011.

He was assistant director in the Research Department of the International Monetary Fund. He served at the GATT (1988–92) during the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations and taught at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government (1999–2000) and at Johns Hopkins’ School for Advanced International Studies (2008–10).

He has written on growth, trade, development, institutions, aid, oil, India, Africa, and the World Trade Organization. He has published widely in academic and other journals, including the American Economic Review (Papers and Proceedings), Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of International Economics, Journal of Monetary Economics, Journal of Public Economics, Journal of Economic Growth, Journal of Development Economics, Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, International Monetary Fund Staff Papers, Foreign Affairs, World Economy, and Economic and Political Weekly.

He has also published or been cited in leading magazines and newspapers, including the Economist, Financial Times, Washington Post, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and New York Review of Books. He contributes frequently to the Financial Times and is a columnist in India’s leading financial daily, Business Standard.

He advises the Indian government in different capacities, including as a member of the Finance Minister’s Expert Group on the G-20. His book India’s Turn: Understanding the Economic Transformation was published in 2008 by Oxford University Press.

With agency inputs  

Source::::www.dnaindia.com

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Happy Birthday ‘ People’s President ‘… DR. Abdul Kalam Turns 83 Today !!!

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APJ Abdul Kalam turns 82 today

Indians, let’s wish ‘happy birthday’ to one of the most popular Rashtrapati the country every had – Dr APJ Abdul Kalam ! Kalam, also known as ‘missile man of India’, is celebrating his 83rd birthday today. He assumed the office as India’s 11th president in 2002. During his tenure, he made the highest office in India accessible to the common man in the country and was affectionately called ‘people’s president’. Kalam was a gentle, amiable, approachable president, known for his simplicity. Before his term as the country’s Rashtapati, Kalam worked as an aerospace engineer with Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). Kalam was born into a family of Tamil Muslims in Rameswaram, a small temple town located in the southern most edge of India in 1931. A brilliant student, Kalam graduated from Madras Institute of Technology and joined DRDO and later, ISRO. “After observing my teacher teaching me how birds fly…I aimed something to fly…Then I pursued my studies in Physics and aerospace,” he said recently at an event attended by students. There are many missions to the credit of this ‘missile man’. Kalam is well-known for his work on the development of ballistic missile and launch vehicle technology and he played a pivotal role in India’s Pokhran-II nuclear tests in 1998, the first since the original nuclear test by India in 1974. Kalam was the project director of India’s first indigenous Satellite Launch Vehicle (SLV-III) which successfully deployed the Rohini satellite in earth’s orbit in July 1980. In a poll conducted by news channel CNN-IBN, he was selected as India’s Best President. The country has conferred on him the prestigious Bharat Ratna, Padma Vibhushan and Padma Bhushan. During his term as Rashtrapati, Kalam visited universities and schools across the country, interacted with children. No wonder, his 79th birthday was recognised as World Student’s Day by United Nations. Kalam has also received honorary doctoral degrees from 36 unversities and institutions worldwide. Kalam has penned a number of books including ‘The Wings of Fire’, his autobiography, which has been translated and published in 13 languages so far. His books are largely popular among the student community in the country. “For the last one decade when I became President and after it, I had one dream and that was when can I in my lifetime see smile on a billion faces,” he recently told a boy who asked him what kept him motivated all the time. More power to this great visionary !

SOURCE::::news.oneindia.in

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Read more at: http://news.oneindia.in/india/happy-birthday-people-s-president-apj-abdul-kalam-tur-1540924.html

” Suggest a Suitable Name to Space Robot and Win a Prize from NASA …” !!!

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Name a Flying Space Robot, and Win a Prize From NASA

NASA needs your help to name a new space robot, and you could win some cash doing it.

NASA officials are asking space fans around the world to help name, and design a mission patch for, a new free-flying robot expected to launch to theInternational Space Station in 2017. The first-place winner of the challenge will receive $1,000. Officials with the space agency put out the call to any interested space fans at New York Comic Con on Saturday.

“We have this new free-flying robot that we’re building,” Jason Crusan, director of NASA’s Advanced Exploration Systems division, told a full house at Comic Con. “We don’t know what to call it. ‘Free-flying robot’ sounds kind of boring and not all that exciting, so we’re asking you to actually name the robot for us.”

Image: Free-flying robotNASA / TOPCODER
A sketch shows how a free-flying robot on the International Space Station could be moved by remote control to get a better video angle.

Second, third and fourth place also come with cash prizes. Second place will win $500, with third and fourth prize taking home $250 each. NASA has teamed up with Topcoder to organize the contest.

If an artist’s depiction of the new space automaton is any indication, the new robot may look like something out of “Star Wars.” In the artist’s concept, the robot could appear as a small, ball-shaped droid that will use fans to move itself around the interior of the International Space Station. It is expected to be able to fly itself, or be operated by remote control.

The new free-flying bot would join a group of other free-fliers already on the station. NASA’s SPHERES robots (the name is short for Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites) are already used on the orbiting outpost.

To participate in the NASA challenge to name the new robot, space fans need to register with Topcoder. Participants will reach a checkpoint where they will receive feedback on their initial designs on Oct. 22, and the challenge ends on Oct. 27. Officials will announce the winners of the competition on Nov. 2.

To participate in the challenge and learn more about it, go tohttp://www.topcoder.com/challenge-details/30046039/?type=design&noncache=true.

— Miriam Kramer, Space.com

This is a condensed version of a report from Space.com. Read the full report.Follow Miriam Kramer on Twitter and Google+. Follow Space.com on Twitter,Facebook and Google+.

First published October 15th 2014, 5:55 am  in http://www.nbcnews.com

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