Planet earth and the history behind its evolution to the modern day form carries with in lots of amazing and astonishing facts. Earth did not turn up the way it is in just a single day. Millions of years of evolution stand behind earth in its present form. All possible research has been made to discover the earth’s past and more is being done. Buried civilization and remains of primitive signs of life help earth scientist to join the knots and formulate the overall picture. Each and every aspect of planet earth has been developing since its creation and even before its creation. Theories of evolution of human and planet earth bring out amazing facts which remain unbelievable for a normal human being. Lots of species and places have been swallowed by the planet earth. Deep in the remains of earth and waters remain the signs of human evolution and some of the signs have been eaten away and human can just think of their probability. Dinosaurs are one such specie that most of us have heard of and at the same time we also believe in. Making of our wonderland did not happen in just a single day.If we could just gather the facts and take our imagination to the path of history, we will come across the earth that we may not even believe in. Evolved through the big bang and coming into its primitive existence with such violent and sudden manner was not something that earth could itself have controlled. Earth has gone through ice age, volcanic eruptions and emissions and much more that we as humans find hard to imagine and it would have been even worse for us to be present at that time. Just imagine living in the Stone Age with no technological advancement and so much of hardship around. The history of our planet is an epic journey-from its birth out of cosmic rubble to the unique complex of land, sea, atmosphere and life we know now.This National Geographic film takes a photographic journey thorough time from the violent birth of our planet earth, four and a half billion years ago, through ice-ages, massive volcanic eruptions and the dinosaur's reign to the first humans.Go back to five billion years ago and discover the birth of the Earth that is the only home to life as far as we know, see how life flourished and evolution worked, from the first single-celled organism to age of the dinosaurs and the first humans who walked on the planet, through the dazzling images and CGI animations.
Dance in India has a rich and vital tradition dating back to ancient times.The Indian dances are broadly divided into Classical dances and folk dances.The Classical dances of India are usually spiritual and religious in content.Indian Classical dance is also known as the traditional Indian dance which has abundant forms and takes human figure as its basic medium of expressions. Like the Indian culture, Indian classical dances are equally diverse in nature.The folk dances of India are also spiritual and religious in content but the main force behind the folk dances of India is the celebratory mood.There are numerous classical dance forms in India and innumerable folk dances.Each dance form can be traced to different parts of the country. Each form represents the culture and ethos of a particular region or a group of people.
Classical Dances
India has a very rich tradition of classical dance. Each form has its own specialty & grace, along with a set pattern of costumes & make-up.Indian classical dance is a relatively new umbrella term for various codified art forms rooted in Natya, the sacred Hindu musical theatre styles, whose theory can be traced back to the Natya Shastra of Bharata Muni (2nd century BC).Even though the art of Natya includes nritta, or dance proper, Natya has never been limited to dancing and includes singing, abhinaya (mime acting). These features are common to all the Indian classical styles.The foundation of the conventions and methodical movements and types of dance lies in an ancient book of dance, music and drama called Natyashastra.
According to a popular belief, Brahma, the Creator of the World, combined literature from the Rig Veda, songs from the Sama Veda, abhinaya (expression) from the Yajur Veda and rasa (aesthetic experience) from the Atharva Veda, to form natyashastra .It has has over 36,000 verses. Natyashastra is also known as fifth veda.It explains the nuances of dance, giving stress on mudras (hand formations) and their meanings, the kind of emotions and their categorization.Apart from the abhinaya and the performance of rasa, the audience is amused by the attire and ornaments of the artist. The majority of Indian classical dance forms are focused on the depiction of the nine rasas (Navarasas or the emotions), which includes Hasya (happiness), Krodha (anger), Bhibasta (disgust), Bhaya (fear), Shoka (sorrow), Viram (courage), Karuna (compassion), Adbhuta (wonder) and Shanta (serenity).
As per the ancient treatises, dance is considered as having three aspects: natya, nritya and nritta. Natya highlights the dramatic element and most dance forms do not give emphasis to this aspect today with the exception of dance-drama forms like Kathakali. Nritya is essentially expressional, performed specifically to convey the meaning of a theme or idea. Nritta on the other hand, is pure dance where body movements do not express any mood (bhava), nor do they convey any meaning. To present nritya and natya effectively, a dancer should be trained to communicate the navarasas.
Sangeet Natak Akademi, the national academy for performing arts, recognizes eight distinctive traditional dances as Indian classical dances, which might have origin in religious activities of distant past.They are:
From the Natya Shastra, 3 religious dance/drama forms developed:
Agama Nartanam: Dances performed inside the sanctum of the temple according to the ritual. This was a spiritual dance form. Carnatakam: Dances performed in royal courts to the accompaniment of classical music. This was an intellectual art form. Darbari Aattam: Dances performed more for common Indians which educated them about their religion, culture and social life. These dances were performed outside the temple precincts in the courtyards.
A dance style is classical to the extent it incorporates the Natya Shastra techniques. Some of the styles such as Kathak use very few elements found in Natya Shastra. Other art dances yet to be conferred as classical dances, whose theories and techniques can also be traced back to the Natya Shastra are:
Andhra Natyam - Telugu art dance
Vilasini Nrityam/Natyam - Telugu art dance
Kerala Natanam - Kerala classical dance
Out of the eight recognized dance forms, the only two temple dance styles that have their origin in Natya Shastra and are prescribed by the Agamas are Bharata Natyam and Odissi. These two most faithfully adhere to the Natya Shastra but currently do not include Vaachikaabhinaya (dialog acts), although some styles of Bharata Natyam, such as Melattur style, prescribe the lip and eye movements indicating Vaachikaabhinaya.
Kuchipudi, which also prescribes the lip movements indicating Vaachikaabhinaya, and Mohiniyattam are relatively recent Darbari Aatam forms, just as Kathakali, and two eastern Indian styles, Manipuri and Sattriya, that are quite similar.
Kathak originated as a court dance. Some believe it evolved from Lord Krishna's raas lilas, forms of which have also evolved into the popular Garba-style dances popular in North India and Gujarat. The style gradually changed during the Mughal period under the influence of Persian dance, a major change being straight knees instead of the bent knees used in most other Indian classical forms. Intricate footwork and spins, as well as abhinaya, are the highlights of Kathak.
Currently, Sangeet Natak Akademi does not consider the recently reconstructed dance styles of Andhra Pradesh such as Andhra Natyam and Vilasini Natyam as "classical." Bharatanrithyam, despite being the one most closely following Natya Shastra's precepts, is considered as a variety of Bharata Natyam.
Folk Dances
Folk dance in India is a term broadly used to describe all forms of folk and tribal dances in regions across India(These types of dances can be categorised into two major categories: Folk and Tribal dances).Folk dances are numerous in number and style, and vary according to the local tradition of the respective state, ethnic or geographic regions. There are cultural differences between the two forms- folk and tribal dances- the folk dances are the rural extensions of the larger Indian population for example Bhangra of Punjab and Garba of Gujarat. However, the tribal dances are dances by adivasis, which have a very different culture from the larger Indian population. It may be noted here that Indian tribal dances are vastly dissimilar from Indian folk dances, which can never be related. A common example of a tribal dance is the Santhali Dance, indigenous from Chottanagpur region. Other tribal dances of India include the Dhimsa dance by Oriya tribes, the Dhimsa dance, yet another tribal dance from Andhra Pradesh, the Nagaland tribal dances,etc. Each of these aboriginal tribes possesses its own distinguishable dance traditions and invariably all of them are interwoven with the life of the people who dance it.
Indian Folk dances have originated with a view to be a creation of different socio-economic set up and traditions. While Indian classical dance is considered a higher form of art and was practiced in courts, temples and on special occasions, folk dance forms are practiced in groups in rural areas as an expression of their daily work and rituals. Indian folk as well as tribal dances are simple and performed to express joy and performed to celebrate a season, festivals and so on. Its simplicity is shown by its less movement and uncomplicated steps.Some of the popular folk dances that are performed across villages and cities are Bhangra, Garba, Kalbelia and Bihu.Many folk dances are devoted to the presiding God of the specific community. The most appealing element of a folk dance is the requisite outfit for its performance. In Indian Folk Dances the accessories play a vital role, these costumes provide a separate identity to the folk dance. Many a time, folk dances are termed as per the name of the accessory used.
Almost all the regions of the country have their specific folk music and dance, which proves to be a wonderful way of expression of their community and its traditions. Though these folk dances are not as complex as the classical dance forms, they are very beautiful, because of the essence of rawness in them. Folk dances are performed for every possible occasion, to celebrate the arrival of seasons, birth of a child, a wedding and festivals. The folk dances are extremely simple with minimum of steps or movement. Indian folk dances are full of energy and vitality. Some dances are performed separately by men and women while in some performances men and women dance together. On most occasions, the dancers sing themselves, accompanied by artists with instruments. Each form of folk dance has a specific costume and rhythm. Most of the costumes, worn for folk dances, are colorful with extensive jewels and designs.
The capture of the most wanted sub-atomic particle in physics was today named as Science journal's Biggest Breakthrough of the Year.Scientists had been chasing the Higgs boson, nicknamed the 'God
particle' for more than four decades. In July the team from the European
nuclear research facility at Cern in Geneva announced the detection of a
particle that fitted the description of the elusive Higgs.The boson
is believed to give matter mass via an associated 'Higgs field' that
permeates space. Without the property of mass, the universe we live in
could not exist. Scientists used the world's biggest atom smashing
machine, the £2.6billion Large Hadron Collider on the Swiss-French
border, to track down the missing particle.Finding the Higgs topped
the list of most important discoveries of 2012 released today by
Science, one of the world's most prestigious scientific journals.
The
Denisovan Genome
Scientists sequenced the DNA blueprint of the
Denisovans, an extinct species of human that lived alongside
Neanderthals and the ancestors of people living today.
Making Eggs
From Stem Cells
Japanese researchers showed that embryonic stem cells
from mice could be coaxed into becoming viable egg cells.
Curiosity's
Landing System
Mission engineers at the American space agency NASA
safely and precisely placed the Curiosity rover on the surface of Mars.
They used a 'sky crane' that dropped the 3.3 ton rover to the surface
from a hovering platform on three cables.
X-ray Laser Provides
Protein Structure
Researchers used an X-ray laser, which shines a
billion times brighter than traditional synchrotron sources, to
determine the structure of an enzyme required by the parasite that
causes African sleeping sickness.
Precision Engineering of Genomes
The revision and deletion of DNA in higher organisms has generally been
hit-or-miss. In 2012, a tool known as TALENs, which stands for
'transcription activator-like effector nucleases,' allowed scientists to
alter or inactivate specific genes in animals such as zebra fish and
toads, and cells from patients with disease.
Majorana Fermions
The
existence of Majorana fermions, particles that act as their own
antimatter and annihilate themselves, has been debated for more than
seven decades. This year, a team of physicists and chemists in the
Netherlands provided the first solid evidence that such exotic matter
exists, in the form of quasi-particles. These are groups of interacting
electrons that behave like single particles.
A
decade-long study reported this year in more than 30 papers revealed
that the human genetic code is more functional than researchers had
believed. Although just 2% of the genome codes for actual proteins, the
Encyclopaedia of DNA Elements, or ENCODE, project indicated that about
80% of it is active in ways such as helping to switch genes on or off.
Brain-Machine Interfaces
Scientists showed that paralysed human
patients could move a mechanical arm with their minds and perform
complex movements in three dimensions.
Neutrino Mixing Angle
Hundreds
of researchers working on the Daya Bay Reactor Neutrino Experiment in
China found the last part of the jigsaw describing how particles known
as neutrinos morph from one strain or 'flavour' to another as they
travel at near-light speed. daily times monitor
The race between two defiant superpowers for supremacy over the outer space is also a secret battle between two extraordinary men.
The story of the race into space is marked by the greatest superpower rivalries, political paranoia, and technological feats of the twentieth century. But until now, we have only known half the story. With the end of the Cold War, a generation of secrets and cover-ups has been revealed.This is the true story about the American and Soviet space race led by Wernher von Braun and Sergei Korolev. The two men, thousands of miles apart, battled for the same goals.The documentary shows how Americans chief rocket designer, ex-Nazi Wernher von Braun was hurriedly white-washed by the US to lead the way, against the obscure Russian engineer Sergei Korolev - a genius known only as the 'Chief Designer' - whose story has long remained a mystery. Both were men of their times, but with visions that were timeless. And both were prepared to go to extraordinary lengths to see the fulfilment of their dreams.The world watched as the American and Soviet teams, impervious to disaster, took the fight for the coveted prize right up to the wire....
Financial inclusion or inclusive financing is the delivery of financial services, at affordable costs, to sections of disadvantaged and low income segments of society.Financial inclusion refers to the strategy adopted to make banking activities and its benefits reach the unbanked areas. It is a drive to bring the unprivileged people at par with the mainstream. It is argued that as banking services are in the nature of public good; the availability of banking and payment services to the entire population without discrimination is the prime objective of this public policy. The term "financial inclusion" has gained importance since the early 2000s, and is a result of findings about financial exclusion and its direct correlation to poverty. Financial inclusion is now a common objective for many central banks among the developing nations.
Need for Financial Inclusion
The Indian economy is the second fastest growing economy in the world. Majority of the population in India resides in rural areas. Thus development of rural India is a key step towards economic development for a country like ours.Credit is one of the very important inputs of economic development. The timely availability of credit at an affordable cost has a big role to play in contributing to the well being of the weaker sections of the society. Proper access to finance by the rural people is a key requisite to employment, economic growth and poverty reduction which are primary tools of economic development.
India has a huge network of institutional credit. Institutional credit refers to credit offered by financial institutions like banks. The Indian financial system is considered to be one of the finest systems in the world. It is only because of the strong grip of the financial system that even the global financial crisis could not affect India that severely.In spite of having such a strong financial system it has been evident that financial awareness has not been able to penetrate into the rural sections of the society. Non institutional credit givers in the form of money lenders still continue to grasp the poor in their clutches. This is a matter of concern and proper action needs to be taken for the same.
Credit can be penetrated into rural India through appropriate banking channels. The Indian banking industry has shown tremendous growth in the last few decades. But despite such growth, the banks have been unable to reach a vast segment of the Indian population causing financial exclusion. This void ultimately led to the emergence of policy for financial inclusion.
People residing in rural areas where banking facilities have not
yet touched foot are unaware of the benefits of financial services.
Finance is an integral part of every life. Managing the hard earned
money so that it grows to yield more money is very important. But people
who are financially unaware often fall prey in the hands of greedy
money lenders. These money lenders take undue advantage of the ignorant
people and they fall in debt trap that lasts for not only their life but
for generations to come.
It is now widely acknowledged that financial exclusion leads to non accessibility, non-affordability and non-availability of financial products. Limited access to funds in an underdeveloped financial system restricts the availability of their own funds to individuals and also leads to high cost credit from informal sources such as moneylenders.
Due to lack of access to a bank account and remittance facilities, the individual pays higher charges for basic financial transactions.
Absence of bank account also leads to security threat and loss of interest by holding cash. All these impose real costs on individuals.
Prolonged and persistent deprivation of banking services to a large segment of the population leads to a decline in investment and has the potential to fuel social tensions causing social exclusion.
Thus, financial inclusion is an explicit strategy for accelerated economic growth and is considered to be critical for achieving inclusive growth in the country.
Extent of Financial Exclusion in India
In India, almost half the country is unbanked.Only 55 per cent of the population has deposit accounts and 9 per cent have credit accounts with banks. India has the highest number of households (145 million) excluded from Banking. There was only one bank branch per 14,000 people.In 6 lakh villages in India, rural branches of Schedule Commercial Banks including Regional Rural Banks number 33,495 only.Only a little less than 20% of the population has any kind of life insurance and 9.6% of the population has non‐life insurance coverage.Just 18 per cent had debit cards and less than 2 per cent has credit cards.
Reasons for Financial Exclusion
(i) Geographical Location
remoteness of residence,hilly & sparsely populated areas with poor infrastructure & difficult physical access.
distance from bank branch
branch timings
(ii) Economic Factors
low income
low assets
(iii) Social Factors
ease of availability of informal credit
culture
Gender
(iv) Financial illiteracy
illiteracy
lack of awareness
(v) Documentation Process
Cumbersome
KYC – documentary proof of identity/ address
(vi) Inefficiency of the financial Institutions
high cost of operations
less volume & more number of clients
unsuitable products
language
staff attitude
poor functioning and financial health of some financial institutions (such as financial cooperatives) which limit the effectiveness of their outreach figures.
Primary Agricultural Cooperative Societies (PACS), which restrict their membership to persons with land ownership are also not effective in offering savings services.
Consequences of Financial Exclusion
Affects individuals and economy alike
The households, micro and small enterprises dealing entirely in cash are susceptible to irregular cash flows would be affected
Limits options for providing for old age security
Recourse to informal lenders
Exposed to higher interest rates charged by informal lender
Highest risk as loans are often secured against the borrower’s property
Banking with informal sources does not provide interest benefit and tax advantages and are far less secure
Benefits of Financial Inclusion
Financial inclusion does not restrict itself to credit. It includes financial awareness, knowledge about banks and banking channels, facilities provided by banks and the advantages of using the banking route. It involves educating people financially; making them financially literate.
Inclusive financial system allows poor households to save and manage their money in a secure manner, decreases their exposure to economic shocks in the form of drought, floods or any calamity of the kind which affects people dependant on agricultural activities.
An important measure of financial inclusion is to check the number of people who own a bank account. A person holding a bank account is considered to have elementary banking knowledge. Thus a count of the number of bank accounts gives an idea of the percentage of people who are aware of banking and what percentage still needs to be included. However financial inclusion does not end with opening of bank accounts. It has to be a continuous effort.
Steps taken so far to eliminate financial exclusion
Focus on Inclusive Growth
Improving Banking Technology
The Indian Way- Multi Agency Approach
Financial Stability and Development Council (FSDC) mandated to focus on Financial Inclusion and Financial Literacy
Financial Sector Regulators including the Reserve Bank committed to FI Mission
Financial services through mainstream financial institutions to 6 lakh villages
Banking Correspondent Model
The drive for financial inclusion has been started in India by the monetary regulator, Reserve Bank of India.The Reserve Bank of India has initiated several policy measures to ensure financial inclusion and increase the outreach of the banking sector. A major initiative taken by the Bank in this direction is the introduction of the business correspondent model.Under this model RBI has permitted banks to use the services of intermediaries such as business facilitators and correspondents to provide banking services for ensuring greater financial inclusion and increasing the outreach of the banking sector.
By using the Information Technology the banking services in the rural areas are being improved
What has been done so far?
ICT based Business Correspondent (BC) Model for low cost door step banking services in remote villages .
RBI Board approved Financial Inclusion Plans (FIPs) of banks for 3 years, starting April 2010.Roadmap to cover villages of above 2000 population by march 2012
Availability of minimum four banking products through ICT model has been ensured
Mandatory opening of 25 % of new branches in unbanked rural centers.
KYC documentation requirements significantly simplified for small account
Guidelines for convergence between Electronic Benefit Transfer and FIP have been issued.
Pricing for banks totally freed . Interest rates on advances totally deregulated.
Approach adopted by RBI:
Achieving planned, sustained and structured Financial inclusion.
Technology-To be fixed first
All Bank branches must be on Core Banking Solution (CBS). All Regional Rural Banks (RRBs) to be on CBS by September 2011.
The Internet is quite different to all previous communication media since it is much less easy for governments to control and shape its development. On the print media, TV, phone and radio the governments can exercise a fair degree of control .With the Internet, governments can have a say, but their control is diminished. Governance is traditionally undertaken by government, but the global nature of the Internet makes it less practical for a government to control cyberspace.
How Internet works ?
The Internet works because open standards allow every network to connect to every other network.This is what makes it possible for anyone to create content, offer services, and sell products without requiring permission from a central authority.It levels the playing field for everyone and it’s the reason why we have a rich diversity of applications and services that many of us enjoy today. No one is in charge of the Internet.Unlike the telephone network, which for years in most countries, was run by a single company, the global Internet consists of tens of thousands of interconnected networks run by service providers, individual companies, universities, governments, and others.
Operators, engineers, and vendors that provide network infrastructure services such as Domain Name Service (DNS) providers, network operators, and Internet Exchange Points (IXPs).
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is the non-profit body formed for domain name and IP address allocation and management. It is perhaps, the most public of the Internet control organisations since domain names or web addresses are one of the most tangible aspects of the Internet for users. IANA - Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, is based at ICANN. IANA is in charge of all "unique parameters" on the Internet, including IP (Internet Protocol) addresses. Each domain name is associated with a unique IP address, a numerical name consisting of four blocks of up to three digits each, e.g. 204.146.46.8, which systems use to direct information through the network.
The Internet Society is a professional membership society formed in 1992. In 2002 it had more than 150 organization and 11,000 individual members in over 182 countries. It summarizes its aims as ‘To provide leadership in addressing issues that confront the future of the Internet, and is the organization home for the groups responsible for Internet infrastructure standards, including the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and the Internet Architecture Board (IAB).A key aspect of their mission statement is: ‘To assure the open development, evolution and use of the Internet for the benefit of people throughout the world’
The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is one of the main technical bodies. It is an international community of network designers, operators, vendors and researchers concerned with the development of the Internets architecture and its transport protocols such as IP. Significant sub-groups are the Internet Architecture Board, a technical advisory group of ISOC with a wide range of responsibilities and the Internet Engineering Steering Group, which is responsible for overseeing the activities of the IETF and the Internet standards process.The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is a large open international community of network designers, operators, vendors, and researchers concerned with the evolution of the Internet architecture and the smooth operation of the Internet. It is open to any interested individual.
The World Wide Web consortium is the organisation responsible for web standards.It focuses on improving publishing standards such as HTML and XML. XML is an important development in forming what the WWW organisation refers to as the ‘Semantic web’. The consortium also aims to promote accessibility to the web for those with disabilities – for instance, it is working on a voice-based browser.
TINA-C (Telecommunications Information Networking Architecture Consortium) is somewhat different to the others, in that it takes a higher-level view of how applications communicate over communications networks. It does not define detailed standards. Its principles are based on an object-oriented approach to enable easier integration of systems.
What is Internet Governance ?
Internet governance is the development and application by Governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles, of shared principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures, and programmes that shape the evolution and use of the Internet.Internet governance is not restricted to the activities of governments. Many different types of stakeholders have a role in defining and carrying out Internet governance activities .Internet regulation is part of Internet Governance.Internet regulation is basically restricting or controlling access to certain aspects or information. Internet regulation consists of: Censorship of data, and controlling aspects of the Internet such as domain registration, IP address control and more.
Steps towards (multi-stakeholder)Internet Governance
At the inaugural World Summit on the Information Society in 2003, global
attention turned to the notion of Internet Governance.The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) was a unique two-phase United Nations (UN) summit that began with the goal of achieving a common vision, desire and commitment to build a people-centric, inclusive and development-oriented Information Society where everyone can create, access, utilize and share information. One of its chief aims was to bridge the so-called global digital divide separating rich countries from poor countries by spreading access to the Internet in the developing world. The ITU was the lead organizing agency of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS).
At the first World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva 2003 the topic of Internet governance was discussed. ICANN's status as a private corporation under contract to the U.S. government created controversy among other governments, especially Brazil, China, South Africa and some Arab states. Since no general agreement existed even on the definition of what comprised Internet governance, United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan initiated a Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) to clarify the issues and report before the second part of the World Summit on the Information Society in Tunis 2005. After much controversial debate, during which the US delegation refused to consider surrendering the US control of the Root Zone file, participants agreed on a compromise to allow for wider international debate on the policy principles. They agreed to establish an Internet Governance Forum, to be convened by United Nations Secretary General before the end of the second quarter of the year 2006.
In November 2005, the World Summit on the Information Society, held in Tunis, established the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) to open an ongoing, non-binding conversation among multiple stakeholders about the future of Internet governance.The United Nations created the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) to continue the work of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). The IGF has brought together stakeholders from government, industry, and civil society to discuss Internet governance issues at a series of annual meetings since 2006.
The position of the US Department of Commerce as the controller of
the Internet gradually attracted criticism from those who felt that
control should be more international. A hands-off philosophy by the US
Dept. of Commerce helped limit this criticism, but this was undermined
in 2005 when the Bush administration intervened to help kill the .xxx
top level domain proposal.When the IANA functions were given to a new US non-profit Corporation called ICANN, controversy increased. ICANN's decision-making process was criticised by some observers as being secretive and unaccountable.
In December 2012 , ITU facilitated the The World Conference on International Telecommunications 2012 (WCIT-12) in Dubai. WCIT-12 was a treaty-level conference to address international rules for telecommunications, including international tariffs. The previous conference to update the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs) was held in Melbourne in 1988.
In August 2012, ITU called for a public consultation on a draft document ahead of the conference.It is claimed the proposal would allow government restriction or blocking of information disseminated via the internet and create a global regime of monitoring internet communications – including the demand that those who send and receive information identify themselves. It would also allow governments to shut down the internet if there is the belief that it may interfere in the internal affairs of other states or that information of a sensitive nature might be shared.
Why WCIT matters ?
Decisions made by governments at WCIT could redefine both how we use the Internet and how it's goverened. Modifications to the ITRs could result in changes to the Internet’s architecture, operations, content and security.
Battle of the Hydaspes (River Jhelum) (326 bce), fourth and last pitched battle fought by Alexander the Great during his campaign of conquest in Asia. It took place after Alexander’s conquest of the Achaemenid Persian Empire and immediately before his army began the journey homeward to Macedonia. Porus, the Indian ruler of the territory between the Jhelum and the Chenab rivers (in modern Pakistan), was his opponent. After facing the Indians for days across an unfordable river, Alexander, by using diversionary tactics, managed to cross the stream above their camp. More troublesome to Alexander than the numerical superiority of Porus’s 34,000-man army were the 200 elephants that threatened the effectiveness of the Macedonian cavalry. During the battle, Alexander overwhelmed Porus’s left wing, forcing it back upon the elephants, which panicked and plunged riderless into the Indian ranks. The Macedonian phalanx then routed the Porus's army. Alexander made an alliance with Porus and allowed him to remain ruler in his kingdom.This documentary focuses on the Indian campaigns of Alexander the Great. It goes into great detail of Battle of the Hydaspes (Jhelum).
Society is composition of people.People interact,interrelate with the society. Their needs are fulfilled by the society.Order,unity,coordination,control are some elements that are required for a society to sustain.These functions of the society are performed through certain social institutions.These institutions while fulfilling the needs of the individual and society as well,they maintain order and stability of the societies.Social institutions consist of ideas,interests and structure with a set of common values and procedures in order to meet needs of the society.
Types of Social Institutions :
Social institutions are enduring relationships that result from human interaction. Over a period of time, these relationships have established predictable patterns that allow the members of society to pursue life, their dreams and happiness. Social institutions are natural products or creations of societies, the primary function of which is to help societies meet basic needs. They exist in every known society. They overlap, interact, and support one another. It would be impossible to think of a social order without any existing social institution for they serve as the bedrock of human society.
There are six major social institutions, namely: family, marriage, education, economics, politics, and religion. These institutions have shown continuity and stability for they are products of relationships that have long endured the test of time Other social institutions may have developed out of these major social institutions as we see them existing in society at present.
Family as an Institution
Family is the primary social unit.Of all human groups family is the most important primary groups.The exact definition of family can vary greatly from time to time and from culture to culture. How a society defines family as a primary group, and the functions it asks families to perform, are by no means constant.Generally it is defined as basic social unit consisting of persons united by ties of marriage(affinity), “blood”(consanguinity), or adoption and usually representing a single household. The essence of the family group is the parent-child relationship, whose outlines vary widely among cultures.The family as an institution provides for the rearing and socialization of children, the care of the aged, sick, or disabled, the legitimation of procreation, and the regulation of sexual conduct in addition to supplying basic physical, economic, and emotional security for its members.
It means family institution fulfills basic and primary needs like food,clothing,shelter,protection and economic needs of the people sharing common living space.Family ensures continuity of society through function of reproduction.Since the family consists of man and woman who are married and have legal sanction for mating and progeny,the function of reproduction is being done by the family.It also fulfills psychological needs like love and affection,it is an effective agency of social control and it also performs religious functions which has immense influence and control on the behaviour of the individual.
Some common features of Family :
Family is a primary social unit.It is considered as an universal unit because it is seen in one form or the other in all the communities.
It is a close knit group and is limited in size because all the people in a society cannot become members unless they have biological or marital relations.
The new members or children learn the traditions,beliefs,norms,values,etc. from the family.
There is common and mutual responsibility among the members.
It is both temporary and permanent .It is permanent because it is as old as the society itself.It is temporary because the members of family would change each time with the events like birth,death,marriage and migrations.
All the family members have a common house and live together.
Families are identified by nomenclature.The members of family bear a common nomenclature.
Functions of Family :
1. Fulfilling the biological needs
2. Satisfying the Psychological and emotional needs
3. Economic co-operation
4. Maintaining the morality
5. Giving legitimacy to the children
6. Gives social, religious and cultural recognitions for sexual mating after marriage
7. It plays a prominent role in the socialization process of an individual
8. It acts as an agency of social control - it controls the behaviour of the individuals
9. It acts as a basic unit for performing religious functions
10.Still many families esp. in the developing countries are acting as basic economic units.
11.It takes care of the
aged, sick, or disabled
and young members.Family plays an integral role in children's development.
Types of Families :
1.On the basis of marriage: Family has been classified into three major types:
Polygynous family (having more than one wife)
Polyandrous family (having more than one husband)
Monogamous family (one spouse/one couple)
2.Based on size and structure family are three types:
Nuclear Family
Joint Family
Extended Family
Nuclear family, also called elementary family, in sociology and anthropology, is a group of people who are united by ties of partnership and parenthood and consisting of a pair of adults and their socially recognized children. Typically, but not always, the adults in a nuclear family are married. Although such couples are most often a man and a woman, the definition of the nuclear family has expanded with the advent of same-sex marriage in some countries. Children in a nuclear family may be the couple’s biological or adopted offspring.
Extended familyincludes a group of relatives.It includes a nuclear family and their blood relatives consisting of grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins all living nearby or in the same household.The extended family system often, but not exclusively, occurs in regions in which economic conditions make it difficult for the nuclear family to achieve self-sufficiency.
Joint Family is a type of extended family composed of parents, their children, and the children's spouses and offspring in one household.In general, a family is called a joint family where the members in a house, taking food in a common cookery enjoy undivided landed property, participate in a common worship and united in blood relationship.
3.On the basis of the nature of residence family can be classified into five main forms :
Family of matrilocal residence
Family of patrilocal residence
Bilocal family
Avunculocal family
Neolocal family
Matrilocal residence or matrilocality (also uxorilocal residence or uxorilocality) is a term referring to the societal system in which a married couple resides with or near the wife's parents, thus the female offspring of a mother remain living in (or near) the mother's house, thereby forming large clan-families, typically consisting of three or four generations living in the same place.
Patrilocal familyis a family system in which the wife is expected to live near the husband's parents.
Bilocal family is a family system in which the couple lives in the house of the father of groom for some time and in the house of the mother of the bride for some time.
Avunculocal Family is a family where the couple lives in the house of maternal uncle of the bride after marriage.
Neolocal family is a family where the couple choose a new residence after marriage.
4.On the basis of ancestry or descent family can be classified into three main types:
Matrilineal family-descent that follows a female line is known as matrilineal.Both males and females belong to their mother's kin group
Patrilineal family-both males and females belong to their father's kin group but not their mother's.
Ambilineal family-descent from either male or female is recognized, but individuals may select only one line to trace descent.
5.Classification on the basis of authority :
Patriarchal Family - form of family in which the male is the family head and lineage is traced through the male line
Matriarchal Family - A family group, in which the wife has the highest status, controls the other family members and makes important decisions affecting the family group.
Historians and others examine temples built in India more than 1,000 years ago. They remain quite intriguing, though today’s tourists rarely visit them. Records reveal that trained elephants had to drag millions of stone blocks to help erect these structures. The program notes that due to the temples’ size, the U.S. Senate, Versailles, the Houses of Parliament, and St. Paul’s Basilica in Rome could all fit within a single one of them. Michael Bell narrates as footage and animated maps are used to help viewers learn more about what these ancient structures look like and why they were built. In this intriguing program, we are transported to this exotic land and examine the mysteries behind some of the most fascinating structures found there. Southern India has the largest temple complexes ever built. In “Lost Temples of India”, we examine these 1,000-year-old temples adorned with intricate and beautiful sculptures. We learn how the kings used large herds of trained elephants to drag the millions of stone blocks into place and how these temples are virtually unknown and unvisited by Western tourists.
The moon is Earth's only natural satellite. The moon is a cold, dry orb (spherical body) whose surface is studded with craters and strewn with rocks and dust (called regolith). The moon has no atmosphere.It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System. It is the largest natural satellite of a planet in the Solar System relative to the size of its primary, having 27% the diameter and 60% the density of Earth, resulting in 1⁄81 its mass. The Moon is the second densest satellite after Io, a satellite of Jupiter.
It is the brightest object in the sky after the Sun, although its surface is actually very dark, with a reflectance similar to that of coal.
The Moon is in synchronous rotation with Earth, always showing the same face with its near side marked by dark volcanic maria that fill between the bright ancient crustal highlands and the prominent impact craters.The moon revolves around the Earth in about one month (27 days 8 hours). It rotates around its own axis in the same amount of time. So the same side of the moon always faces the Earth; it is in a synchronous rotation with the Earth.The far side of the moon was first observed by humans in 1959 when the unmanned Soviet Luna 3 mission orbited the moon and photographed it. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin (on NASA's Apollo 11 mission, which also included Michael Collins) were the first people to walk on the moon, on July 20, 1969.On the moon, the sky would always appear dark, even during the daytime. Also, from any spot on the moon (except on the far side of the moon where you cannot see the Earth), the Earth would always be in the same place in the sky; the phase of the Earth changes and the Earth rotates, displaying various continents.
The average distance from Earth to the Moon is 384,400 km (238,900 mi). The actual distance varies over the course of the orbit of the moon, from 356,700 km (221,600 mi) at the perigee and 406,300 km (252,500 mi) at apogee.The Moon is spiraling away from Earth at an average rate of 3.8 cm (1.5 in) per year, as detected by the Lunar Laser Ranging Experiment.The Moon's orbit is expanding over time as it slows down (the Earth is also slowing down as it loses energy). For example, a billion years ago, the Moon was much closer to the Earth (roughly 200,000 kilometers) and took only 20 days to orbit the Earth. Also, one Earth 'day' was about 18 hours long (instead of our 24 hour day). The tides on Earth were also much stronger since the moon was closer to the Earth.
Lunar Features
Saros
The saros is the roughly 18-year periodic cycle of the Earth-Moon-Sun system. Every 6,585 days, the Earth, Moon and Sun are in exactly the same position. When there is a lunar eclipse, there will also be one exactly 6,585 days later.
Size
The moon's diameter is 2,159 miles (3,474 km), 27% of the diameter of the Earth (a bit over a quarter of the Earth's diameter).
The gravitational tidal influence of the Moon on the Earth is about twice as strong as the Sun's gravitational tidal influence. The Earth:moon size ratio is quite small in comparison to ratios of most other planet:moon systems (for most planets in our Solar System, the moons are much smaller in comparison to the planet and have less of an effect on the planet).
Mass & Gravity
The moon's mass is (7.35 x 10 22 kg), about 1/81 of the Earth's mass. The moon's gravitational force is only 17% of the Earth's gravity. For example, a 100 pound (45 kg) person would weigh only 17 pounds (7.6 kg) on the Moon. The moon's density is 3340 kg/m 3. This is about 3/5 the density of the Earth.
Temperature
The temperature on the Moon ranges from daytime highs of about 130°C = 265°F to nighttime lows of about -110°C = -170°F
Atmosphere
The moon has no atmosphere. On the moon, the sky is always appears dark, even on the bright side (because there is no atmosphere). Also, since sound waves travel through air, the moon is silent; there can be no sound transmission on the moon.
Mare
Mare (plural maria) means "sea," but maria on the moon are plains on the moon. They are called maria because very early astronomers thought that these areas on the moon were great seas. The first moon landing was in the Mare Tranquillitatis (the Sea of Tranquility). Maria are concentrated on the side of the moon that faces the Earth; the far side has very few of these plains. Scientists don't know why this is so.
Craters and Rills
The surface of the moon is scarred by millions of (mostly circular) impact craters, caused by asteroids, comets, and meteorites. There is no atmosphere on the moon to help protect it from bombardment from potential impactors (most objects from space burn up in our atmosphere). Also, there is no erosion (wind or precipitation) and little geologic activity to wear away these craters, so they remain unchanged until another new impact changes it.
These craters range in size up to many hundreds of kilometers, but the most enormous craters have been flooded by lava, and only parts of the outline are visible. The low elevation maria (seas) have fewer craters than other areas. This is because these areas formed more recently, and have had less time to be hit. The biggest intact lunar crater is Clavius which is 100 miles (160 km) in diameter.
A rille is a long, narrow valley on the surface of the moon. Hadley Rille is a long valley on the surface of the moon. This rille is 75 miles (125 km) long, 1300 feet (400 m) deep, and almost 1 mile (1500 m) wide at its widest point. It was formed by molten basaltic lava that carved out a steep channel along the base of the Apennine Front (which was explored by the Apollo 15 astronauts in 1971).
Formation
The prevailing hypothesis today is that the Earth–Moon system formed as a result of a giant impact: a Mars-sized body (Thea) hitting the newly formed proto-Earth, blasting material into orbit around it, which accreted to form the Moon. Giant impacts are thought to have been common in the early Solar System. Computer simulations modelling a giant impact are consistent with measurements of the angular momentum of the Earth–Moon system and the small size of the lunar core. These simulations also show that most of the Moon came from the impactor, not from the proto-Earth. However more recent tests suggest more of the Moon coalesced from the Earth and not the impactor.Meteorites show that other inner Solar System bodies such as Mars and Vesta have very different oxygen and tungsten isotopic compositions to the Earth, while the Earth and Moon have near-identical isotopic compositions. Post-impact mixing of the vaporized material between the forming Earth and Moon could have equalized their isotopic compositions,although this is debated.
Another Theory
Evidences in favour of Thea Hypothesis :
The Earth has a large iron core, but the moon does not have a large core. This is because Earth's iron had already drained into the core by the time the giant impact happened. Therefore, the debris blown out of both Earth and the impactor came from their iron-depleted, rocky mantles. The iron core of the impactor melted on impact and merged with the iron core of Earth, according to computer models.
Earth has a mean density of 5.5 grams/cubic centimeter, but the moon has a density of only 3.3 g/cc. The reason is the same, that the moon lacks iron.
The moon has exactly the same oxygen isotope composition as the Earth, whereas Mars rocks and meteorites from other parts of the solar system have different oxygen isotope compositions. This shows that the moon formed form material formed in Earth's neighborhood.
If a theory about lunar origin calls for an evolutionary process, it has a hard time explaining why other planets do not have similar moons. (Only Pluto has a moon that is an appreciable fraction of its own size.) Our giant impact hypothesis had the advantage of invoking a stochastic catastrophic event that might happen only to one or two planets out of nine.
Internal structure of the Moon
Like the terrestrial or rocky planets Venus, Mercury, Earth and Mars, the Moon is made up of concentric layers formed by the melting and separation of magma.There is a solid outer crust about 65km deep, below which is a silicate mantle about 1,000km thick. At the centre there is a metallic core with a radius of about 500km.The core is not magnetic, suggesting that unlike the Earth's core, the centre of the Moon is solid and has no convection.
Behaviour of the Moon
Phases
As the Moon travels around the Earth, its appearance in the night sky changes. As the Moon does not emit any light of its own, we can only see it when it is reflecting the Sun's light.
Depending on the relative positions of the Moon and Sun, different amounts of the Moon will be visible from Earth. These changes in the appearance of the Moon are known as phases.
Occasionally the Moon passes between the Sun and Earth blocking out the Sun's light from Earth. When the Earth passes through the Moon's shadow like this it produces a solar eclipse. More frequently, however, the situation is reversed and it is the Moon that passes through the Earth's shadow producing a lunar eclipse.
Gravity
The mass of the Moon is about a hundred times smaller than the Earth. Although this may appear small, it is in fact relatively large for a natural satellite. Because of this relatively large mass, the Moon's gravity exerts enough force to move the oceans and create tides.
These tidal forces also make the Moon rotate on its axis once a day. This means that the same side of the Moon always faces the Earth and we never see the far side of the Moon.
Inconclusive evidence of free water ice at the lunar poles was accumulated from a variety of observations suggesting the presence of bound hydrogen. In September 2009, Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) on India's Chandrayaan-1 detected water on the Moon.In November 2009, NASA reported that its LCROSS space probe had detected a significant amount of hydroxyl group in the material thrown up from a south polar crater by an impactor; this may be attributed to water-bearing materials – what appears to be "near pure crystalline water-ice". In March 2010, it was reported that the Mini-RF on board the India's Chandrayaan-1 had discovered more than 40 permanently darkened craters near the Moon's north pole which are hypothesized to contain an estimated 600 million metric tonnes(1.3 trillion pounds) of water-ice.
Water may have been delivered to the Moon over geological timescales by the regular bombardment of water-bearing comets, asteroids and meteoroids or continuously produced in situ by the hydrogen ions (protons) of the solar wind impacting oxygen-bearing minerals. The search for the presence of lunar water has attracted considerable attention and motivated several recent lunar missions, largely because of water's usefulness in rendering long-term lunar habitation feasible.
The presence of large quantities of water on the Moon would be an important factor in rendering lunar habitation cost-effective, since transporting water (or hydrogen and oxygen) from Earth would be prohibitively expensive. If future investigations find the quantities to be particularly large, water ice could be mined to provide liquid water for drinking and plant propagation, and the water could also be split into hydrogen and oxygen by solar panel-equipped electric power stations or a nuclear generator, providing breathable oxygen as well as the components of rocket fuel. The hydrogen component of the water ice could also be used to draw out the oxides in the lunar soil and harvest even more oxygen.Analysis of lunar ice would also provide scientific information about the impact history of the Moon and the abundance of comets and asteroids in the early inner solar system.
Importance of Moon and its Study
The Earth was hit by asteroids and comets more often than the Moon, however, because Earth is larger and has more gravity. This increased gravity also caused the impactors to be accelerated to higher velocities towards the Earth. That must have been a catastrophic time to be here. When some of these impactors hit the Earth, the explosion caused rocks and dirt from Earth to shoot up and away from our planet. Some of that projected material flew all over the solar system, and some of it landed on the Moon. There could be a few hundred kilograms of Earth material per square kilometer of the Moon’s surface, buried under a few meters of lunar soil. It would be interesting to retrieve those rocks and bring back samples of the early Earth. Almost nothing from this time period has survived on the Earth because of tectonic recycling of the crust plates or because of atmospheric weathering. We would try to detect some organics within those rocks, and that could tell us about the history of organic chemistry on Earth. Some of these rocks could even have preserved fossils of life. Such rocks could help us look further back into the fossil record, which now stops at 3.5 billion years ago. This way, we could possibly learn about the emergence of life on Earth.
By exploring the Moon, we also can get clues on how the Earth has evolved. We can study processes on the Moon that have also shaped the Earth, like volcanism and tectonics. Because the Moon is smaller than the Earth, the Moon’s radiogenic heating dissipated much faster. After about one billion years, the interior of the Moon didn’t evolve much, and surface changes mostly were due to impacts. There was a brief period of magmatic activity from the subsurface -- a few plumes of magma made their way up to the surface and filled newly formed impact basins with basalt, creating what we call the Maria. This happened up to about 2 billion years ago. Because the Moon offers different conditions than the Earth, we can better understand how physical processes work generally by studying a larger range of parameters than just the Earth’s.
The Moon affects the liquid envelope of the Earth, and the oceanic tides in particular. The Moon affects the ocean tides more in some areas than others. For instance, in the channel between the British Isles and the European continent, the tidal range can be 10 meters, compared to what you see in the Pacific, where it is below a meter. The crust of the Earth is also affected. The Moon’s tidal forcing causes significant heating and dissipation of energy to take place. Part of this energy is heating the Earth, and part of it is dissipated by forcing the Moon to recede from the Earth over time. There are people who propose that the tidal effect of the Moon may have helped trigger the convection on the Earth that led to the multi-plate tectonics. The other planets don’t have the same tectonic cycle. For most of them, the crust is like a lid that doesn’t move much horizontally, and the magma and heat are blocked by this lid on the surface. The Earth instead has rolling convective motion that drags the crust, and then the crust plunges back down into the mantle and gets recycled.
There are some very subtle effects of the Moon in the climate and the oceans. One pattern that has been found recently is related to the Pacific Ocean’s El Niño phenomenon. You have a cold undersea current coming from the Antarctic sea, and that creates the Humboldt stream which keeps the sea around the South American coast near Peru and Chile quite cold. Because of this, there are fewer clouds and less precipitation there. Sometimes this current drifts away from the coast, and then you have much more cloud formation and a period of very bad weather over South America. Satellites have monitored this stream over the Pacific Ocean and they have found some streams which were not known before. They can connect some of these streams with how the Moon’s tidal effect influences the mixing of the deep ocean. There was a French-American mission called TOPEX/Poseidon that accurately measured the altitude of the sea and detected a little stream a few centimeters high. That doesn’t seem like a lot, but over the whole area of the Pacific Ocean it represents a huge amount of water transferred from one place to another.
If you would take away the Moon suddenly, it would change the global altitude of the ocean. Right now there is a distortion which is elongated around the equator, so if we didn’t have this effect, suddenly a lot of water would be redistributed toward the polar regions.
The Moon has been a stabilizing factor for the axis of rotation of the Earth. If you look at Mars, for instance, that planet has wobbled quite dramatically on its axis over time due to the gravitational influence of all the other planets in the solar system. Because of this obliquity change, the ice that is now at the poles on Mars would sometimes drift to the equator. But the Earth’s moon has helped stabilize our planet so that its axis of rotation stays in the same direction. For this reason, we had much less climatic change than if the Earth had been alone. And this has changed the way life evolved on Earth, allowing for the emergence of more complex multi-cellular organisms compared to a planet where drastic climatic change would allow only small, robust organisms to survive.
The Moon has influenced biology in other ways as well. For species living near the coast, the tide is an important factor. When you look at the shorelines, you can recognize different layers of organisms that have adapted to the salt water conditions based on the ebb and flow of the tide.
The eyesight of many mammals is sensitive to moonlight. The level of adaptation of night vision would be very different without the Moon. Many of these species have evolved in such a way that their night vision could work in even partial lunar illumination, because that’s when they are most active. But they can be more subjected to predators, too, so there is a balance between your ability to see and your ability not to be seen. The Moon has completely changed evolution in that aspect.
Human vision is so sensitive that we are almost able to work by the light of the Milky Way. The full Moon has more light than we need to see at night. For most of our history, we were hunting and fishing or doing agriculture, and we organized our lives by using the Moon. It determined the time for hunting, or the time where we could harvest. That’s why most of our calendars are based on the Moon.
In a recent workshop called “Earth-Moon Relationships,” psychologists discussed the relation between the lunar phases and several aspects of life. There was a very interesting correlation, not with the birth of children, but with the time of conception. Perhaps that is due to some social or sentimental value of the Moon. We tend to forget the impact the Moon has on our lives because we use electric lights, but for most of our history we had to adapt our behavior to the lunar phases.
Finally, the Moon had a key role in the emergence of science, and in our understanding of our place in the universe. We saw the repetition of the phenomena of lunar phases, and we observed solar and lunar eclipses. These were big challenges to our understanding of nature, and a few astronomers were put to death because they weren’t able to predict the eclipses. This challenged us to develop accurate predictions for the motion of the sun and the motion of the Moon.
Studying the Moon helped us determine distances in the solar system and the size of celestial objects. By studying lunar phases, for example, people were able to determine how far the Moon is from the Earth, the size of the Earth, and our distance from the sun. More recently, the Moon was the terrain where the space race took place between two political systems, allowing for great technical and scientific achievements. The Moon has inspired humankind to learn how to travel to space, and to bring life beyond Earth’s cradle.
