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QChennai: State to Urge SC to Name Cauvery Board; Balakumaran Dead

Here is your roundup of the top stories from Chennai.

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1. TN to Urge SC to Name Cauvery Board and Notify

Here is your roundup of the top stories from Chennai.
Tamil Nadu will also seek to set up the headquarters of the board in New Delhi. While the tribunal did not mention the location, the draft scheme had said that it would be located in Bengaluru.
(Photo: IANS)

The Opposition is stepping up pressure for a Cauvery Management Board (CMB), and the Tamil Nadu government is set to urge the Supreme Court to direct the Union government to name the authority — as envisaged in the draft scheme — CMB and get it notified at the earliest. An oral submission will be made before the court on Wednesday, 16 May, when the case comes up for hearing.

A decision to this effect was taken at a meeting convened by Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami with ministers and bureaucrats at the Secretariat on Tuesday, 15 May. The thinking is that the notification of the authority will help convene the first meeting ahead of 1 June, the beginning of water year, and get the mechanism going. “A board was what was recommended by the tribunal and we stand by that. The tribunal order was gazetted in 2013,” said a senior official, seeking anonymity.

(Source: The Times of India)

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2. Prominent Tamil Novelist and Film Writer Balakumaran Passes Away

Here is your roundup of the top stories from Chennai.
Balakumaran, an accomplished novelist, had also written dialogues for films like Nayakan and Baasha.
(Photo Courtesy: The News Minute)

On 15 May, prominent writer, novelist and scriptwriter V Balakumaran breathed his last in Chennai. According to reports, the writer was admitted in Kauvery Hospital for severe breathing trouble earlier on Tuesday. He was 71 years old.

The writer had penned scripts for over 20 Tamil films including blockbusters like Nayakan, Gentleman, Guna, and Baasha. His dialogue writing skills have been a great asset to the industry, catapulting actors who mouthed them to greater fame. This includes Kollywood giants Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan. While his brilliance has been appreciated by many, in an interview to The Hindu, the writer said that he only did it for the money. His work in Kollywood also includes Dhanush’s Pudupettai.

Read the full story here.

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3. Child Theft Threat: Baby, Mom Tags at Chennai Hospital

Here is your roundup of the top stories from Chennai.
Officials said, to make the tracking system fool proof, the hospital staff have been instructed to take a picture of each baby with it’s mother and attendant, which is then fed into a software.
(Photo: The Quint)

As part of the attempt to check infant thefts, babies in the Government Hospital for Women and Children, Egmore, will soon sport devices around their ankles that will set off a siren if they are moved out – a contraption similar to the ones used in supermarkets and malls to catch shop-lifters. Two years after the state health department introduced electronic tagging of babies in Government Rajaji Hospital in Madurai following a directive by a Madras high court bench, officials have now expanded the project to Chennai.

Babies will have reusable radio frequency identification tags (RFID) tags on their ankles, while their mothers and attenders will wear them around the neck. “We have installed a RFID reader a little away from the entrance of main block,” said Dr TK Shanti Gunasingh, who heads the hospital. The reader will set off a siren if the baby is carried 50m away from the spot. “This will be the only route open to mothers and attenders who carry babies in and out of the building. The others will be blocked,” said Dr Gunasingh.

(Source: The Times Of India)

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4. RTO Staff Check Buses Ahead of Reopening of Schools

A fortnight ahead of school reopening, Collector V Anbu Selvan, along with Regional Transport Officers, on 15 May began checking safety features of school buses. On the first day, a school bus inspection committee headed by the Collector inspected about 225 buses in the city’s north and north west regions.

An RTO official said the inspection process involved checking the emergency exit doors, speed governors that are compulsory to prevent rash driving and window grills. Also, the team checked the painting of common yellow colour, display of school bus symbol, provision of racks for keeping school bags under the seats and installation of first aid boxes and fire extinguishers. The buses would have to meet the Tamil Nadu Motor Vehicles (Regulation and Control of School Buses), Special Rules 2012, they added.

(Source: The Hindu)

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5. Flouting Government Fiat, Telecom Operators Seek Aadhaar ID

Here is your roundup of the top stories from Chennai.
Vodafone, which enjoys 18.20 per cent market share (December-end TRAI data), blatantly refused to provide new SIMs without Aadhaar proof.
(Photo: Liju Joseph/The Quint)

Despite a central government directive to telecom operators not to demand Aadhaar for availing new SIM cards, operators are forcing customers to submit Aadhaar details to procure SIM cards in the city. Aruna Sundararajan, telecom secretary, told reporters on 2 May that telecom operators had been instructed to give SIM cards if voter IDs and driving licences were provided. However, two of the three largest telecom operators are still refusing to issue SIM cards without Aadhaar proof.

Three Reliance Jio dealers that The New Indian Express visited said that the SIM cards would not be activated if Aadhaar details were not provided. Syed, a dealer in Selaiyur, claimed that customers who had submitted driving licences or voter IDs as proof faced activation problems.

(Source: The New Indian Express)

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6. Plea to Shift Mortal Remains of Jayalalithaa from Marina Beach

Here is your roundup of the top stories from Chennai.
The petitioner contended that convicts should not be celebrated and honoured by the State.
(Photo: ANI)

An advocate has filed a public interest litigation petition in the Madras High Court seeking a direction to the Commissioner of Greater Chennai Corporation to remove the mortal remains of former Chief Minister Jayalalithaa from Marina beach and bury them in a non-coastal area. He also sought a direction restraining the Centre as well as State government from raising a memorial for her in the present site of burial.

S Jayaseelan, 48, had filed the case on the ground that Jayalalithaa had been convicted in a corruption case and therefore burying the remains of a convict on the beach was against public morality. “No convict should be given a State honour. Memorials are raised in praise and in memory of the leaders who spent their life for public cause.... Jayalalithaa went to jail not for any public cause but for looting Tamil Nadu of Rs 53 crore,” he said.

(Source: The Hindu)

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7. Director Bharathiraja Moves Hc Seeking Advance Bail

Here is your roundup of the top stories from Chennai.
The petitioner claimed and denied having said anything with the intention of insulting the religious feelings of any community during the speech delivered by him in support of lyricist Vairamuthu.
(Photo Courtesy: Wikipedia/Silverscreen)

Film director K Bharathiraja, 76, has moved the Madras High Court seeking advance bail in a case booked against him by the Vadapalani police, on the basis of a complaint lodged by a Hindu Makkal Munnani office bearer for having allegedly termed Lord Ganesha as an “imported God” while addressing a public gathering in January.

The director pointed out that the police had registered a First Information Report after more than four months since the complaint was lodged by VG Narayanan on January 19. This, he claimed, had been done deliberately because he had been recently criticising the Centre as well as the State government for failing to constitute the Cauvery Management Board.

(Source: The Hindu)

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