Primer Minister to address nation
New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will address the nation for the first time today.

According to government sources, the Prime Minister will emphasise on the strengthening of rural infrastructure and farm credit. He is also expected to announce reforms that will make the government more people-friendly.
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The old order changeth…
Vajpayee hints at quitting
Mumbai: Upset over the attacks on him from within the Sangh Parivar after the poll debacle, former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee on Wednesday night said he has "had enough".
Responding to the rallying cry of 'Abki bari Atal Bihari', from his supporters Vajpayee retorted in Marathi 'Aata Nako Bari.

Pushakal Jhale', meaning: 'Now no more...I have had enough'.
The former Prime Minister, who was flanked by L K Advani and M Venkaiah Naidu, said: "For the first time I am under attack."
Ever since BJP lost power after the Lok Sabha debacle, he has been under attack from the Sangh Parivar and particularly more so after his critical comments recently against the Gujarat Chief Minsiter Narendra Modi.
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…Yielding place to new
Advani repaints his rath: Neglect of Hindutva
Mumbai: The Leader of the Opposition, L.K. Advani, zeroed in on the neglect of Hindutva and the lack of political focus as one of the main reasons for the "totally unexpected" election results.
Advani also made a strong case for restoring the party's emotional bond with the Sangh Parivar led by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. He said the party must be always mindful of the Sangh, the karyakartas (party workers) and the "core constituency" that had over the years supported the BJP because of its ideological moorings in Hindutva.
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TRAI moots cut in ADC
New Delhi: Telecom tariffs are likely to fall by 16-25 per cent with the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) proposing to bring down the Access Deficit Charge (ADC) to between 2.2 per cent and 5.3 per cent of the revenue, instead of the present system of loading the charge on each call made by consumers. The proposed ADC regime would lower the burden on operators from Rs 5,000 crore per annum to about Rs 1,500-3,500 crore. The benefit is expected to be passed on to the consumer. The proposal, which is expected to be implemented by October, was issued by TRAI on Wednesday in a consultation paper and is in line with the regulator's plan to gradually phase out ADC.

Access Deficit Charge is essentially a form of a cess imposed by TRAI on all telecom users for providing subsidised telephone services in rural areas by Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL). At present, each time a consumer makes a domestic call, he pays an ADC varying from 30 paise to 80 paise per minute and a high of Rs 4.25 per minute for international long distance (ILD) calls.
The ADC component accounting for about 16-25 per cent of the tariff is being passed on to BSNL. If the TRAI proposal comes through, domestic tariffs may come down by 30 paise to 80 paise.
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Dakshankan: Online practice exams for students
New Delhi: Thomson Prometric, a provider of technology-enabled testing and assessment services and part of The Thomson Corporation, has announced a three-year agreement with the Institute of Advanced Computing and Management (IACM) to launch Dakshankan online practice examinations for school students in India. By using Dakshankan, CBSE students of Standard X, XI and XII would be able to assess their learning at various levels as their studies progress. The service is priced at Rs 3,000 per student per year.

IACM has developed the examination questions in line with the syllabi of the schools, and exams can be taken chapter wise, module wise and for complete book course from a repository of over 75,000 questions. Thomson Prometric has provided the technology for the solution. Students opting for the examination can purchase key identity from bookshops and cybercafes, and can then go to the Dakshankan Web site (www.dakshankan.com), fill up a form to get a student identity and password, following the receipt of which they can appear for the tests.
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IIM Lucknow to retain old fee structure
New Delhi: The Indian Institute of Management-Lucknow (IIML) has decided to continue charging an annual fee of Rs 1.3 lakh this year while announcing a tuition fee waiver for all students whose family income is below Rs 2 lakh a year. The tuition fee has been fixed at Rs 55,000 per annum. Students whose family income is below Rs 1.5 lakh per annum will get a complete fee waiver from the institute. Family income includes the students' income, income of spouse and parents. For students whose family income is between Rs 1.5 and Rs 2 lakh, the extent of fee waived (apart from the tuition fee) will be decided on a case-by-case basis. This was announced by the IIML Chairman, Mr Hari Shankar Singhania, after the board meeting in Delhi.
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DoS to finalise SatNav contract; foreign bidders in fray
Bangalore: The Department of Space (DoS) is to finalise a contract for ground-based equipment for the demonstration phase of the country's ambitious satellite navigation (SatNav) project. In the race for the nearly Rs 150-crore contract are the US majors Raytheon and the French giant Alcatel, with whom the ISRO/DoS has been in talks for over a year. The chosen bidder will supply ground-based equipment for the eight reference stations and the master control centre planned at Bangalore, besides global processing systems (GPS).

Called GAGAN, the national SatNav project is a collaboration formalised in November 2002 between ISRO/ DoS and the Airports Authority of India. It is expected to be demonstrated in phase 1 by 2006 and be fully in place in 2008. GAGAN (GPS aided Geo Augmented Navigation) will also catapult India into a select club of countries with their own regional satnav systems. The technology demonstration phase could become operational around 2005-06 when the space agency plans to fly its Gsat-4 communications satellite carrying a SatNav enabling transponder. An initial experimental phase will cover the Indian airspace and in the final phase, the satellite will become compatible with the international systems to enable seamless navigation.
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