Now the 26-year-old is going to an international conference in Brazil to speak about Indian domestic workers, labourers and hawkers.

Salma, whose full name is Anis Fatima Shaikh, started selling vegetables from the age of seven even as she continued to study till Class 12 as a private student, and one day she took up the cause of the street vendors after she was harassed by government officials.

“I then started to gather legal information about the rights of hawkers (street vendors) and labourers. I then helped other hawkers fight for their rights,” said Salma, a leader of the Azad Hawkers Union, a part of the National Association of Street Vendors of India (NASVI).

“I have been imprisoned on a few occasions and when I read the names of the freedom fighters on the walls of the jail, I got inspired to fight for my cause,” she said.

Salma will be attending the May 21-24 Global Network Conference in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro.

“Sixty participants from 20 countries will be at the conference. It will bring together people from trade unions, labour and human rights activists from Asia, Africa, Latin America, Arab countries and Europe,” Salma told IANS in fluent English.

The Global Network is an alliance of labour organisations, established in 2001 by Solidar, a European network of NGOs working for social justice, and the International Federation of Workers’ Education Associations from South Africa.

“NASVI is associated with Global Network and suggested my name for the conference,” she said.

She will be the lone Indian representative in the conference on ‘The Role of Labour Movement in Shaping the International Cooperation Agenda after 2015′.

She is however not new to international conferences, having flown to Nairobi in Kenya to speak on child street vendors at the World Social Forum six years ago.

The second of three sisters and two brothers, Salma had to drop out of school at the age of seven to help her parents sell vegetables.

“But I never gave up studies. I kept studying through notes and books of other children. Two years back, I appeared for my Class 10 exams privately and last month I passed my Class 12 exams,” she said.

“I’m glad my parents take pride in my achievements,” she said.

The 58-year-old is eager to ease into more dramatic parts, admitting he’s getting too old for rigorous action shoots.

“I want the audience to know I’m not just about fighting, also I can act. And so day by day, year by year, I said, ‘Right, I’m going to show you the real Jackie Chan,” femalefirst.co.uk quoted Chan as saying.

He thinks age will soon take a toll on his frequency of taking up action-based projects.

“I don’t just want to be an action star, I want to be a true actor so for the last 10 years I’ve done other films like ‘The Karate Kid’ where I’d rather play an old man. I will ask my body how long I can go. I’m not young anymore,” he said.

“We are working to add chemical detectors to his security,” Minister for Security Ngodup Dongchung told reporters here.

The spiritual leader had spoken of a threat to his life from Chinese agents, and that Tibetan women were being trained to harm him.

In an exclusive interview with Sunday Telegraph in Britain May 8, the 76-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner revealed he had received reports that Chinese agents had trained Tibetan women for a mission to poison him while posing as devotees seeking his blessings.

On the presence of Chinese spies in this town, in the Himalayan foothills, Dongchung said: “We can’t rule out the possibility of the presence of agents of Chinese and even rival Shugden sect.”

“We have our own mechanism to keep tab on suspicious activities of the exiles and the guests. But we can’t claim that it’s 100 percent fool proof. We are doing our best,” Dongchung added.

Minister for Religion and Culture Pema Chhinjor said: “Although the Dalai Lama takes security threat (at the interview) to his person lightly, there are a variety of threats to his well-being that the security agencies are obliged to take it seriously.”

Citing reports received from Tibet in June 2010, Chhinjor said in a statement: “Chinese intelligence agencies are making concrete plans to harm His Holiness by employing well-trained agents, particularly females.”

“It’s also learnt that they are exploring the possibility of harming him by using ultra-modern and highly sophisticated drugs and poisonous chemicals,” Chhinjor said.

Chhinjor, who is officiating as the prime minister-in-exile, said in another report received in October 2011, that Chinese intelligence agencies have stepped up their clandestine efforts to collect intelligence on the status of His Holiness’s health, as well as collecting physical samples of his blood, urine and hair.

“They are reportedly co-opting Tibetans inside Tibet to visit India with the intention of seeking an audience with him to this end,” he said.

According to Chhinjor, in recent years the Chinese government has launched an unprecedented offensive campaign against the Dalai Lama inside Tibet and has issued instructions to organise protests by overseas Chinese communities against him during his visits outside India.

Currently, India is home to around 100,000 Tibetans.

Zuckerberg wrote about the big event in his life on his Facebook timeline, with a status update that read, “Married Priscilla Chan” on May 19.

An accompanying picture shows a smiling Zuckerberg dressed in a simple dark blue suit, white shirt and wearing a tie. Chan is in an elegant sleeveless laced white wedding gown with a veil falling over her shoulders. A string of bulbs are hung in the background which is Zuckerberg’s backyard.

The couple met at Harvard and have been together for more than nine years. Chan’s Facebook page also had the updated relationship status with the message “married to Mark Zuckerberg.”

The marriage capped an extremely eventful week for the couple. Zuckerberg celebrated his 28th birthday on Monday, May 14. Days later Facebook, which was founded by Zuckerberg in 2004 in his Harvard dorm, became went public through an IPO that pegged the value of the world’s most popular social network site at 104 billion dollars.

The same week Chan graduated from the University of California, San Francisco. Chan studied medicine and is now a pediatrician. On her graduation day, Zuckerberg had written on his Facebook page, “I am so proud of you Dr Chan.”

Narayana Murthy

Infosys Founder and currently its Chief Mentor Narayana Murthy has been felicitated with  Global Leadership and Free Enterprise awards by the University of South Florida. The two awards were presented to Murthy by USF President Judy Genshaft at a ceremony in Tampa, Florida.

While talking to its students, Murthy talked about his current duties as Infosys chairman emeritus, which keeps him busy though not involved in the day-to-day operations, and then engaged in a question and answer session.

Murthy recounted details about the impact of changes in the tech world that “transformed the entire scenario” for corporations and “opened up unlimited and enormous opportunities,” most significantly the introduction of super computers and online transaction capabilities.

Maria Valentino, who mentioned how impressed she was with the business culture she found during her visit to Infosys as a student, asked how his company managed to maintain its values. Murthy responded that, because of his middle class background, it was not as difficult to do as it might be for the mass of people eking out a living.

“You need a spirit of sacrifice and you need to have trust,” he said. He explained how the company’s ethos has its roots in the very first meeting held at his house in Mumbai with his six fellow founders. Their discussion was focused on profitability. Murthy focused their attention on “seeking respect,” “living in harmony with society” and making sure “you don’t shortchange your customers”.

When you do those things, “Revenue will come. Profit will come,” he said.

In response to a question about the chances of Murthy entering politics, he mentioned his preference for “rational discussion” and the difficulty the political world offers for such a discussion, he expressed some hesitation

India with a Logistics Performance Indicators (LPI) score of 3.08 was ranked 46th in the World Bank’s latest survey on trade logistics with Singapore with a score of 4.12 listed as the top performer among the 155 economies included in the report.

Countries like India, Chile, China, Morocco, South Africa, Turkey and the US all improved their previous performance, according to the study, which is based on a comprehensive world survey of international freight forwarders and express carriers.

According to the LPI report, high income economies dominate the top logistics rankings, while the economies with the worst performance are least developed countries that are also often landlocked, small islands, or post-conflict states. In the upper-middle income country category, top performers include South Africa, China and Turkey.

In the lower middle income category, India, Morocco and the Philippines have above average performance improvements. And among low-income countries, outperformers included Benin, Malawi and Madagascar.

“Infrastructure stands out as the chief driver of progress in top performers, followed by improvements in logistics services, and customs and border management,” said Mona Haddad, Sector Manager of the World Bank’s international trade department.

“All top performers show strong cooperation between the public and private sectors, and a comprehensive approach in the development of services, infrastructure and efficient logistics.”

Only by fostering cooperation between the public and private sectors, and by considering the impact of all agencies on the supply chain can a country create sustainable improvements in its logistical capabilities, the study suggested.

President Barack Obama  withdrew Majumdar’s nomination, which was sent to the Senate on Nov 30 last year, a brief White House announcement said.

However, Science journal citing Energy Secretary Steven Chu reported that Majumdar, who has led the energy department’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) for nearly two-and-a-half years, will leave June 9.

“Under Arun’s leadership, we have seen ARPA-E grow from a fledgling programme to become a leading agency for innovation and energy research,” Chu wrote to agency staff members in an e-mail last week.

“Arun has recruited some of the most talented professionals across the country to join the ranks at ARPA-E and create programs that have the potential of changing the entire energy landscape.”

Majumdar came to Washington from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California.

“Arun’s departure is a kick in the stomach,” Barton Gordon, a former member of the US House of Representatives who spearheaded the creation of ARPA-E in 2007, was quoted as saying.

Gordon, now a lobbyist with K&L Gates in Washington, DC, said Majumdar is a “good scientist and a good organizer who created a good bipartisan following [in Congress] for ARPA-E. I don’t think people realised what a good politician he is. He’s a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of guy.”

Modelled after the Pentagon’s Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency, ARPA-E is designed to funnel money quickly to high-risk, “transformational” efforts to develop new energy technologies.

Steve Jobs with his iPad

Legendry Enterpreneur Steve Jobs has a never-dying impact on Social Media. Even after his death, he is trending on Top in Google Plus and Twitter.

This time due to a film based on his biography produced by Sony Pictures as reported by Macrumours. This Hollywood films is based on adaptation of Walter Isaacson’s authorized biography of Steve Jobs.

Casting for the film has yet to be determined, but rumors have suggested that George Clooney and Noah Wyle may be in the running for the role of Jobs. Wyle portrayed Jobs in the 1999 made-for-TV film The Pirates of Silicon Valley, which focused on the early days of Jobs and Bill Gates.

Commenting on the announcement,Sony Pictures Co-Chairman Amy Pascal said, Steve Jobs’ story is unique: he was one of the most revolutionary and influential men not just of our time but of all time.

The project is a completely separate effort from an independent film about Jobs that has actor Ashton Kutcher starring in the lead role. Last week, Kutcher was spotted wearing Jobs’ trademark wardrobe en route to the film’s set.

The label of the beer made by Burnside Brewing Company in Portland, Oregon, featured the four-armed goddess Kali standing among three severed heads.

“In response to pleas from the Hindu community we have decided to postpone the limited release of ‘Kali-ma’ our imperial wheat ale flavoured with Indian spices and Scotch-Bonnet peppers,” the company said in a statement on its Facebook page.

“It is NEVER our intention at Burnside to offend or alienate any race, creed, religion or sexual orientation, the company,” it said.

Burnside Brewing owners said they got the idea from the movie “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom”, where Jones is forced to drink a potion called “the black sleep of Kali Ma” that puts him into a trance.

“The inspiration for the beer label simply came from a favourite childhood movie in the ‘Indiana Jones’ series and we were unaware that it could be offensive to anyone.”

The brewer said it was “currently scrambling to re-name the beer and intend to release it soon afterwards”.

“To those who have been patiently waiting, we humbly ask that you wait just a little longer and to anyone we have offended we sincerely apologise,” it said.

The issue was raised in India’s upper house Tuesday with the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) demanding that the government immediately summon the US ambassador as the religious feelings of Hindus were being hurt.

BJP MP Ravi Shankar Prasad said: “The UPA (United Progressive Alliance) government claims good relations with the US… Is there no manufacturing code there.”

“Can they show the god of any other faith like this.”

The BJP member asked the government to “summon the American ambassador” immediately.
Responding to the demand, Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Rajiv Shukla said he would “inform the external affairs minister (S.M. Krishna) immediately”.

Bawa, distinguished professor of biology at the University of Massachusetts, Boston and the 2012 winner of the Prize gifted the prize money of one million Norwegian Kronor (about Rs. 1 Crore ) to the Bangalore-based Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE), a research institution in the areas of biodiversity conservation and sustainable development. Bawa is its founder and president.

The Gunnerus Sustainability Award is given for outstanding scientific work that promotes sustainable development globally, and the first award was given to Bawa for his work on biodiversity in Central America, the Western Ghats in India and the Himalayas.

At the acceptance ceremony in February, Bawa said it was unfortunate that almost all money in international assistance goes to projects rather than to strengthening institutions.

Standing by his belief that “it is institutions that transform societies”, Bawa donated the award money to ATREE.

“The gift is a fine example of philanthropy at its best. It also endorses Bawa’s commitment to a better world, and to ATREE,” said Pheroza Godrej, a member of the governing board of ATREE.

ATREE director Gladwin Joseph said: “The gift will help ATREE address important environmental challenges. ATREE was recently ranked No.9 globally, and No.1 in Asia among environmental think tanks.”

Bawa was recently elected to the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Sciences for his contribution to public discourse and public policy surrounding sustainability.