Karnataka, Records – Page 20

Mangalorean Sydneysiders to celebrate 15 years anniversary on Sep 4

The Mangalorean Catholic Association of Sydney, popularly known as MCAS is celebrating its 15th anniversary this year. The 15th anniversary celebrations will be held at Good Shepherd Parish and School, Plumpton on Sunday September 4.

The first Mangalorean Catholics arrived in Sydney in the 60s. There was a big influx in the 80-90 decades. MCAS founder Stanley D’Cruz along with adequate support from like-minded families organised an historic picnic with over 100 participants on 19 November 2006, at the Centennial Park in Homebush. They promoted the values and advantages of an official association, which led to the birth of MCAS in May 2007. It was hoped that the formation of MCAS would help in the spreading and enrichment of the culture, tradition, values and other aspects of the community.

MCAS vision is to provide a platform to bring Mangalurean Catholics together to promote and sustain Mangalurean culture, values and tradition. Its mission is to bring together through celebrations of faith and fellowship in traditional culture.

Numerous Mangalurean Catholic families in Sydney are multi ethnic, they have married spouses from Sri Lankan, Tamilian, Malayalee, Anglo Saxon, Goan, Punjabi, Gujarati, Ukraine, European, backgrounds etc. MCAS, as per government guidelines showcases the benefits of cultural diversity to promote social cohesion. Presently the community members work in the fields of education, banking, IT services, health, construction, government services etc and have participated to a great extent to the economic prosperity of NSW for the past 60 years or so.

Some of the popular events MCAS organises are the Monthi Fest, Lenten pilgrimage, popular Bollywood event, ManGo Cup cricket tournament, annual picnic etc. Charity has always been a hallmark of MCAS. Since inception, MCAS has donated to the Mangalore diocese, African Mission, Poor Sisters of St Claire, Infant Jesus Orphanage, Mukta Trust, White Doves etc. In 2021, MCAS through a Covid fundraiser helped 24 students in Mangaluru whose breadwinner parent died due to Covid, with assistance from the Catholic Association of South Kanara (CASK). In September 2021, MCAS organised a zoom homage meeting for the late Oscar Fernandes, eminent Mangalurean in the Indian government. This meeting was addressed by Cardinal Oswald Gracious and many other eminent Mangalureans. MCAS was also active during the past two Covid years.

Several eminent Mangalureans have been hosted by MCAS during the past many years. These include Bishop Aloysius D’Souza, late Oscar Fernandes, late Octavia Albuquerque, women’s leader, Francis Colaco, retired inspector general of police in Karnataka and Andhra states, Brig Gerry Gonsalves president KCA, Bengaluru, Fr Swebert D’Silva SJ and Fr Praveen Martis SJ, principals St Aloysius College, and Sr Olivia AC, retired principal St Agnes College.

Gadag: Cow dung Okuli – A unique tradition the day after Nagara Panchami

A unique celebration of Okuli (spraying of colours) is followed in this city since long. In the Kumbara Oni of Gangapur Pete of the city people throw cow dung on one another and celebrate this festival.

Nagara Panchami is a festival of girls. They wear new dresses and go to Nagara Katte and offer milk and celebrate the festival. On the next day is Shashti, Karikattambali day. On this day the boys get together and throw cow dung on one another.

Preparations for this festival begin a month before. Cow dung collection begins a month before the festival. The youth of the Kumbara lane go in groups and ask for cow dung from families who have cows and calves.

The cow dung war that takes place between the boys looks exactly like Holi. However, instead of colours liquid cow dung is sprayed. First the cow dung is made into a big heap on the main road of the Kumbara lane. Various colours are sprayed on the heap. Later, the boys group themselves into two teams and go to nearby farmland and get ready to play the cow dung game.

The youths get ready for this unique Okuli in unique style. They wear garlands of various vegetables like aubergine, cucumber, onion, ridge gourd, tomato etc. In addition, they wear peculiar costumes for drawing attention. They also wear dresses of females. Once ready, they all go to Durgadevi temple in a procession and offer pooja. After the pooja, the cow dung play is flagged off.

The cow dung game goes on for about two hours. Cow dung has special mention in Ayurveda medicine. It is impossible to imagine the life of a farmer without cow dung. The farmer community has given cow dung the position of a deity. This cow dung Okuli that is celebrated from centuries is mainly done to proclaim the sanctity of cow dung. In addition, people of this locality believe that all kinds of skin diseases are cured if one pours cow dung liquid on the body.

Ranganathittu bird sanctuary is Karnataka’s first Ramsar site

Ranganathittu sanctuary also finds a place in the Important Bird Areas (IBA) list of 42 sites in Karnataka that are identified by the Bombay Natural History Society.

After a wait of over ten years, Karnataka got its first Ramsar site on Wednesday.

The ministry of environment, forests and climate change (MoEFCC) declared Ranganathittu Bird Sanctuary in Mandya as a Ramsar site. With this, the forest department, local administration and tourism department will not just be able to ensure better conservation but also scale up its eco-tourism potential to international standards. Located in the mid-stream of the Cauvery river, Ranganathittu is an integral part of the wetland system and spreads across 517.70 hectares.

It also finds a place in the Important Bird Areas (IBA) list of 42 sites in Karnataka that are identified by the Bombay Natural History Society. Ranganthittu houses 188 species of plants, 225 species of birds, 69 species of fish, 13 species of frogs, 98 species of medicinal plants and 30 species of butterflies.

It is an important breeding site for around 20 species of water birds, 17 of which breed on trees growing on islands on the spot. It houses healthy populations of mugger crocodiles (Crocodylus palustris), smooth-coated otter (Lutrogale perspicillata) and the endangered hump-backed mahseer fish (Tor remadevii).

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Dhinidhi Desinghu: Bengaluru’s little swimming champ

12-year-old Dhinidhi Desinghu breaks 13-year-old swimming record

Bengaluru’s Dhinidhi Desinghu has been making waves in the swimming circuit. The 12-year-old rose to prominence last year when she set national records in the 100m freestyle, 200m freestyle and 200m individual medley at the Junior and Sub-Junior National Aquatic Championship.

This year, she has kept up her gold-winning performances, bagging three gold medals in the Karnataka Mini Olympics in May and following it up with three more golds at the Karnataka Junior and Sub-Junior Aquatic Championship, including a recording-breaking effort in 100m freestyle (59.64 seconds) that rewrote a 13-year-old record.

The youngster has the tough task of balancing her academics and swimming commitments. “Since school timings have changed after the easing of the pandemic restrictions, it is a bit more stressful and my academic workload has increased since the previous year. But I am able to cope,” says Dhinidhi, a Grade 7 student at Kendriya Vidyalaya DRDO in CV Raman Nagar.

Catch them young: HCL’s TechBee career programme to hire 2,000 Class 12 students in Karnataka

HCL Technologies is currently conducting walk-in training interviews across four cities — Bengaluru, Shivamogga, Hubballi and Mysuru — to hire Class 12 students

HCL Technologies, an IT services and digital transformation solutions provider, is planning to hire over 2,000 fresh talent from Karnataka, under its ‘catch them young’ drive.

As part of its early career programme, TechBee, the firm is currently conducting walk-in training interviews across four cities — Bengaluru, Shivamogga, Hubballi and Mysuru — to hire Class 12 students. Students who have completed Class 12 in 2021 or 2022 with a minimum of 60% with Mathematics or Business Mathematics in their curriculum would be eligible to be part of this programme, the company said.

Bespoke training and mentoring

To offer bespoke training and mentoring initiatives, HCL has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Karnataka Skill Development Corporation (KSDC) to train tech-savvy, enthusiastic individuals seeking to accelerate their careers in IT.

Subbaraman B, Vice President, HCL Technologies, said, “Under TechBee, we aim to hire the best talent, train them and enable them to achieve financial independence at the start of their career. So far, over 8,000 students have been selected for the TechBee programme across the country and are in various stages of their career journey with HCL.’‘

“We, at HCL, observed a lot of interest and potential in students in Karnataka as well. That is why we chose to do these walk-in drives in the state,’‘ he told The Hindu.

Tata Steel signs MoU with start-up for drone-based mining solutions

Tata Steel will also work jointly with AUS to provide exclusive drone-based solutions, including mine analytics and geo-technical mapping, to Tata Steel group companies.

Domestic giant Tata Steel on Wednesday said it has inked a pact with a Bengaluru-based startup for drone-based mining solutions for effective mine management.

The primary goal of this collaboration is to jointly develop and offer sustainable and end-to-end integrated solutions that will focus on efficiency, safety, and productivity of open cast mining operations.

“Tata Steel has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Aarav Unmanned Systems (AUS), a Bangaluru-based startup, providing end-to-end drone solutions… for effective mine management,” the company said in a statement.

Tata Steel will also work jointly with AUS to provide exclusive drone-based solutions, including mine analytics and geo-technical mapping, to Tata Steel group companies across mining locations in India, it said.

On the partnership, D B Sundara Ramam, vice president, Raw Materials, Tata Steel, said: Drone survey enabled digitalisation and other technology will assist in gathering impactful and actionable insights. We see enormous potential in redefining core mining processes such as exploration and mine planning using drone data and adequate analytics.

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Students from Karnataka on mission to create green sanitary pads

Once considered a taboo topic to discuss in public, the way Indians now think about menstruation has seen a paradigm shift in recent years. The National Family Health Survey reveals that close to 50 per cent of women in the 15-24 age group still use cloth for menstrual protection. It is a health risk if an uncleaned cloth is reused as it could lead to several infections.

But there is a group of warriors fighting this menace. There is a quiet revolution going on among biotechnology students of BIET, Davanagere, who are producing sanitary napkins using areca husks.

Dr NS Manjunath, head of biotechnology department and a graduate in MSc inmicrobiology from Kalaburagi University, is the man behind this innovation. He has been taking up research in this field which has prompted his students to take up the challenge of producing napkins and diapers from biodegradable raw material.

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CWG 2022: Kundapur weightlifter Gururaj Poojary wins India’s 2nd medal

Weightlifter Gururaj Poojary won the second medal for India at Commonwealth Games 2022 after he bagged a bronze medal in the men’s 61kg event, here on Saturday July 30.

Poojary successfully pulled off a combined lift of 269kg, (118kg in snatch and 151kg in clean and jerk) to claim a podium finish at Birmingham 2022. This was also his second straight CWG medal after he won the men’s 56kg silver medal at the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games in Australia.

Gururaj Poojary hails from Jeddu in Chittur gram panchayat of Kundapur. Gururaj, son of Mahabala Poojary and Paddu Poojary couple living at Jeddu village.

Snooker Prodigy To Play For India At Global Event

14-year-old Natasha Chethan, who started the precision game when she was just nine, has a Mysuru connection too

Natasha Chethan, who has her roots in Mysuru, has been selected to represent India at the World Snooker Championship to be held from Aug. 21 to 25 in Bucharest, Romania.

Aged 14, she is the youngest player of the contingent and will be representing India in the Women’s Under-21 Category.

Natasha has participated in the Karnataka State Ranking Tournament winning in both the Under-18 snooker and billiards categories and was the runner-up in the Under-21 snooker and billiards categories. At the National-level, she was runner-up in the Under-18 billiards category and finished No.4 in the Under-21 snooker category.

She had participated in the UK 9 Ball Pool Open held in May 2022 in London and in a Chinese Pool (hey ball) championship in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. At Bucharest, she will be representing India for the first time. “It is a proud moment,” she told Star of Mysore.

Natasha is the official junior ambassador of ‘Sight Right’, a premier UK-based academy which has been training snooker champions like Mark Williams and Shaun Murphy for many years now. She is sponsored by Finland-based Taom, a prestigious pool and snooker equipment manufacturing company.

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Royal Mysuru Sailing Club to host ranking event from Friday

The National Youth Championship that concludes on August 4 is supported by the Yachting Association of India

The Royal Mysore Sailing Club (RMSC) is hosting its 4th event on the KRS backwaters – the National Youth Championship – which was allotted to it by the National Federation- Yachting Association of India (YAI).

The event is a ranking event and will take place from July 29 to August 4.

The RMSC is also shortly launching a programme titled ‘Vision 2028 Olympics’ which is an endeavor directed towards producing Olympians from Karnataka, in line with the National Sports Policy launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, according to a release here.

Following the ranking event, RMSC is organising a National Fun Regatta event from August 4 to 7 which will help bring participants and visitors from across the country to come together and explore Mysuru as a tourist destination. By elevating Mysuru’s presence as a metropolis city and a noteworthy vacation spot, the event will also aid in boosting the city’s tourism, the release stated.

The Royal Mysore Sailing Club (RMSC) is also taking the initiative in launching a campaign directed towards the growth of Mysuru as a city. The campaign is titled ‘City of Sails’ which refers to the significance of sailing as a sport and the importance of the KRS backwaters associated with Mysuru.

The Royal Mysore Sailing Club (RMSC) is approved by the Karnataka State Sailing Association (KSSA) and the Mysore District Sailing Association (MDSA).