Sunday, March 28, 2010

Hema Malinis bunglow burgled - Security Guards suspected

Hindi cinema's original dream girl Hema Malinis bunglow in Mumbai suburb of Dindoshi was burgled last weekend. Money and jewellery worth Rs.80 lakh is reported missing. Police claim that they have enough leads to believe that the two on-duty security guards at the bungalow were behind the crime. One of them is detained by the police for questioning while a team of police is dispatched to find the other who allegedly escaped to his village in Uttar Pradesh together with the stollen goods.

The crime was discovered on Saturday morning by Hema's cousin, who is the caretaker for the posh 2,500 sqft bungalow situated at Yashodhara Hilltop Society in Dindoshi, Goregaon (E) when the actress is away. He noticed a broken window and things kept in the safe in the bedroom missing. Hema Malini who apparently was in Nagpur during the incident, returned immediately upon being informed. They then went to the Dindoshi Police Sation together and reported the incident. "I was away for a dance show when this robbery occurred. No papers were lost, only jewellery and money are gone," said Hema Malini in speaking about the incident. She also claimed to have no suspects in this matter, hoped the police would nab the culprits soon.

According to the Dindoshi Police team who visited the spot, the crime took place on Friday night. The robbers entered the house through a window in the back of the bungalow and forced open the bedroom door to get to the safe where the cash and valuables were kept. Two to three people must have been involved, who were and familiar with the plan of the house in order to carry out the break in without anybody noticing, all the more points towards an inside job, the police said.

Sunday, March 14, 2010

Grinding Teeth at Night Can Be Related to Stress

If you know somebody who is given to grinding teeth during sleep, it can be a telltale sign that the person is suffering from some kind of stress. Well that’s what results of a recent study conducted on persons who grind their teeth at night by Heinrich-Heine-University, Dusseldorf, Germany show. This habit of teeth grinding, called as ‘sleep bruxism’ is quite a common phenomenon but so far no reason could be established as to what caused it.

In this study 69 adults were examined of whom 48 were already known to have bruxism. For this purpose thin plates were attached to the teeth of the subjects overnight to assess the extent of grinding. The same individuals were also made to answer questionnaires to take stock of what’s going on in their life and how much stress they are under in their personal or professional front.

Dr.Maria Giraki who headed the team which conducted the tests says in her report that while factors like age, sex or education didn’t seem to affect bruxing, there was a striking connection with those who claimed to be under stress in day to day life or work. The ones who suffered the most were those who didn’t know how to deal with the stress effectively, she said.

The journal, Head & Face Medicine will carry the details of the study.

Bruxism in the long run can lead to excessive wear and tear to teeth, looseness and sensitivity. It can also cause growth and pain in the muscles responsible for chewing. Now with this study establishing stress as a reason for this habit, maybe a solution is also on the way.

For nore info, visit : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruxism.

Written by Priya Shankar

Sunday, March 07, 2010

PayPal Resumes India Bank Withdrawals - Good News For Freelancers

PayPal is widely known to be an easy way to collect money from affiliate and advertising programs and payment for freelance services. The money collected in PayPal account then can be transferred online, to the users' bank account.

Sometime during early February, PayPal had officially announced that the RBI (Reserve Bank Of India) had intimated them that they required specific approvals to allow personal inward remittances to India, which PayPal did not have. So till the time PayPal obtained these approvals; all personal payments into India remained suspended. However, if the PayPal user from India was an exporter, they would be still be able to use PayPal for payments of goods and services, but PayPal will not provide users with the IEC (Importer Exporter Code) to withdraw payments to their banks accounts. Instead, the users will have to apply for it themselves and the process in itself might take several weeks as getting the IEC is not an easy task.

Now, it appears that PayPal is resuming their services, but with some new features.

According to the new rules specified by RBI (Reserve Bank of India), the PayPal management has included a new field called the “Purpose Code”. Basically, this code allows the banks to identify the nature of the cross border bank transaction. It is also to be noted that this is clearly different from IEC (Importer Exporter Code). The new withdrawals will require users to use a Purpose Code while withdrawing money to their bank accounts. So, if you received payments for your website or blog, you need to use Freelance Journalism as your purpose code.


Besides, you don't have to make any real efforts to get a Purpose Code. PayPal has provided a table in their post to confirm your Purpose Code. You can either choose your code according to your business category or confirm your code from PayPal’s customer support team.

After logging into your PayPal Account and selecting the ‘Withdraw Funds’ option, you would be then asked to fill out a new field titled the Purpose Code. Select the code most appropriate for your nature of business and proceed. More details on purpose codes can be found by clicking here.

Further info on same can also e found here.

Users are advised to choose their purpose code accordingly, so that you do not get into any trouble later. There will also be a limit on the amount that the user can withdraw before which they will be required to produce receipts or invoices and their PAN card. PayPal has also not explicitly stated how much the upper limit would be before the Indian user would require additional documents. However, it is believed that this would more likely be not more than Indian Rupees 50,000, as bank deposits above this limit require users to produce their PAN cards.

Wednesday, March 03, 2010

Another Godman lands in a Sex Scam

The whole cult of ‘Godmen’ suffered yet another jolt today with one more from them losing credibility and prestige in the public eye.

Sri Paramahamsa Nithyananda Swamiji of Nithyananda Dhyana Peetha near Bidadi, close to Bangalore, was hit by a sting operation carried out by a Tamil Channel and Magazine. The Swamiji was ‘caught in a compromising position’ in a video aired by the popular Tamil Channel Sun TV on Monday. The video shows him with a female allegedly an actress from Tamil movies. The hidden camera shots taken over two days make it amply clear that the person filmed is indeed the Swamiji.

The channel hasn’t revealed the whereabouts of where the video was shot or the identity of the actresses involved. Rumor says there are two of them, identified as Ragasudha and Rajitha, two popular actresses from Kolliwood. Ragasudha who starred in films like Dhinamum Ennai Gavani, Iyer IPS, Mullil Roja, has been involved in a sex scandal before this as well.

The news created ripples all over Tamil Nadu and there were sporadic protests and violence. At Coimbatore, angry followers vandalized property, while at Thiruvannamalai the Ashram run by the Swami faced a march in protest by a few locals. Subsequently the Ashram was provided police protection and the situation remains calm.

A spokesperson of the Nithyananda, Sachidanandaswamy claimed that it was nothing but a combination of rumors, conspiracy and graphics and wished to reassure the thousands of devotees whose minds were hurt by the rumors. They were contemplating taking legal action, he said.

Written by Priya Shankar