TRIVANDRUM, 8 January 2006 — The Indian Navy has inducted its first unmanned aerial vehicle squadron at the Southern Naval Command here. “With its commissioning, we have become one among the few navies in the world to have inducted unmanned platforms into the maritime scenario,” Chief of Naval Staff Arun Prakash said. The ability to operate these flying machines from remote locations and without a pilot is expected to enhance the surveillance capability of the Indian Navy. “The UAVs will undertake reconnaissance hundreds of miles out at sea. With their optical, radar and electronic warfare payloads nothing will remain hidden from them….Piracy, gun and drug-running, maritime terrorism and possibility of accidental pollution point toward the paramount importance of maritime reconnaissance,” he added. The unit uses Heron and Searcher MK-II UAVs acquired from Israel, Prakash said.

Health Care for 2.5 Million Families

The state government has announced a comprehensive health care insurance for the benefit of 2.5 million families below poverty line. At an annual premium of a nominal Rs. 99, two-thirds of which would be borne by the state and local self-governments, the ICICI Lombard will provide Rs. 100,000 in case of death or permanent disability due to accident, Rs. 50,000 for partial disability, up to Rs. 30,000 for hospitalization for a five-member family or one of its members, Rs. 6,000 for domicile treatment and Rs. 15,000 as labor expenses per annum. During the treatment of the sole income earner in a family, Rs. 50 will be given as subsistence allowance every day and Rs. 50 as allowance for bystanders a week. The scheme offers cashless hospitalization benefit for the insured at the network hospitals on showing the photo ID cards issued by the insurance company.

Power Tariff Cut

With the general elections just four months away, the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) government has reduced the power tariff for domestic consumers and small businesses by 20 paise a unit with effect from Jan. 1. The State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC) endorsed the decision last week after the state government agreed to bear the State Electricity Board’s burden on account of the tariff reduction. Both the UDF and the Congress party leadership had recently asked the government to come out with populist measures to regain the “lost grounds” after a series of drubbing in by-elections. Reduction of power tariff was one of them.

Chandy for Davos

Chief Minister Oommen Chandy, along with his Delhi and Rajasthan counterparts, will be attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, during Jan. 25-29. He will make a presentation on the development experience of the southern state that boasts of quality of life indicators comparable to developed countries despite poor economic growth. Creating future jobs is one of the main themes of the five-day summit, an official statement here said. The three were the only chief ministers invited for the India Economic Summit held in New Delhi in November.

High-Tech Mahabharata

Toonz, Asia’s leading animation studio based here, will soon be busy recreating epic characters of Mahabharata with a combination of animation, lyrics and music in Hindi. The company has signed an agreement with Bombay-based production house Impact Vision to create standard half-hour episodes for television, Toonz CEO P. Jayakumar said. The Impact Vision CEO Satish Mutatkar has penned the lyrics sung by Sonu Nigam, Shankar Mahadevan, Shaan, Kailash Kher, Vijay Prakash, Madhushree and others. “This is a very interesting project for the studio,” Jayakumar said. “Creating an animated show that completely hinges around music is a challenge”. Funded in 1999, Toonz studio creates content for film, television, DVD, Internet and other interactive platforms. It is currently working on its home productions, The Adventures of Hanuman, Paddy’s Pages, and Frogskool, in addition to projects for overseas clients.

Beggars’ Own Country

People of Kerala’s three prominent cities, Trivandrum, Cochin and Calicut, give alms of over Rs. 420 million a year and a strong battalion of 3,000 beggars, majority of them children from other Indian states like Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Rajasthan, collect over Rs. 1.1 million every day, according to a recent survey. Half of these beggars are “deployed” in the port city of Cochin, where begging is “strictly prohibited” and they collect Rs. 220 million annually. The study, conducted by the NGO “Child Line”, also found that beggars in Malabar are most prosperous with each earning as high as up to Rs. 600 a day. According to Fr. Jose Koyickal, who is doing research on child beggars, large-scale migration of workers from the neighboring states and the affluence of the state have triggered the spurt of beggars in the state in the last couple of years. While young men and women engage in hard work on construction sites, the old and children beg.