On Sunday morning Eastern US time, four astronauts will zoom into space on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. Commanding the spaceflight is Raja Chari, a United States Air Force colonel.
Caught in a vicious grip of inflation, the government on Wednesday announced that the south-west monsoon, crucial for the nation's agricultural well being, would be near normal this season. "India Meteorological Department's long range-forecast for the 2008 south-west monsoon season is that the rainfall for the country as a whole is likely to be near normal," Earth Sciences Minister Kapil Sibal told reporters in New Delhi.
It is important to approach the belief of people in ancient India's achievements with a sense of proportion, balance and empathy, argues B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
Hitting out at the Samajwadi Party government over the Mathura violence, he said it is the biggest failure of the state government which has also failed to control 'goonda raj' in the state.
A release issued by IIT said tremendous rise in aquacultural food production in the last decade in India and the world had compensated the decline in production from capture fisheries with production from aquaculture sector.
Amphan was the fiercest Cyclone to hit West Bengal in the last 100 years. A large part of the state was without power as electricity poles have been blown away. Mobile and internet services were also down as the cyclone has damaged hundreds of communication towers.
Amid a major political row, former Tamil Nadu Agriculture Minister Agri Krishnamurthy has been arrested in connection with the alleged suicide of a senior engineering department official S Muthukumarasamy but the opposition remained unimpressed and pressed for CBI probe.
'I would like to convey the message to your readers that the prime minister himself is directly seized of the situation on the ground. He periodically reviews the situation on the ground and how it is moving forward, taking inputs from economists, business leaders, chambers of commerce.'
El Nino is expected to occur in August-September, but it is unlikely to have any major impact on the monsoon, and the weatherman expects a positive Indian Ocean Dipole, which has a strong influence on rainfall in the country.
Beijing braces for a 30-year low of minus 16 degrees Celsius from Saturday through Sunday, the Beijing meteorological station said.
'If not, we can become frighteningly chaotic, more chaotic than what we are today.' 'In today's environment in the country, we still have a window of opportunity.'
The toll in the killer nor'wester in Bihar rose to 54 as reports of 12 more deaths came from the 12 ravaged districts on Thursday.
He attributed the episode to low sugar and low oxygen supply to his body as he was wearing convocation robes.
According to agriculture department officials, the state is heading for a bumper paddy harvest despite a slight reduction in acreage compared with the previous year.
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