After SMS and WAP, comes UMS
Mumbai—After short messaging services, SMS, and wireless access protocol, WAP, its time for unified messaging services or UMS.

UMS makes it possible for a user to access e-mail, voice mail, fax, text and voice over any device that he chooses. Irrespective of the nature of the message, it is converted into a format, which is acceptable to the device, which may be a phone, a fax or a personal digital assistant.
For instance, if the consumer wants to receive a fax of his emails, the service provider will send a text document of the e-mail through the Internet to a fax number.
UMS envisages the user choosing the form and the delivery device.
A more primitive form of this service is in cases where the cell or fixed line user will be able to access his e-mail boxes.
The form of delivery is pretty simple, the server on which the e-mail inbox resides will use a simple text to speech model and convert the basic details in an e-mail box into a voice message.
There are many players entering the field for instance, Ubiquus Technologies has tied up with UK-based VirtualPlus for providing these services in India while in Mumbai, BPL Mobile is planning to launch UMS services soon.
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JPC to take finance ministry, RBI to task
New Delhi—The current joint parliamentary committee is piqued over the non-implementation of the 1992 joint parliamentary committee’s action taken report (ATR) recommendations and plans to take the ministry of finance and the Reserve Bank of India to task in its next sitting on June 12.
The committee has asked the RBI and finance ministry officials to explain why a scam similar to the 1992 one broke out a decade later despite the earlier JPC explicitly revealing the systemic gaps and failure of the RBI’s supervisory mechanism in ensuring effective compliance by banks. The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) which was just getting into place then, in 1992, however, would not be grilled by the JPC as far as the implementation of the last ATR’s recommendations were concerned. However, Sebi’s laxity in monitoring the secondary markets during the current stock scam would be probed in detail.
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Blair gets landslide mandate
London—The Labour party won a second landslide victory with Tony Blair as prime minister and aide John Prescott, the deputy prime minister.

Blair’s agenda is to concentrate more on a stronger economy and social services, and said that the second Labour landslide can be attributed to their government’s sound economic policies.
On top on the freshly-returned Labour leader’s agenda would be overhaul of the public services and consolidation of economic gains made during his last stint.
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