Internet services in India disrupted

Internet services have been disrupted throughout the country on Thursday following a major international cable breakdown in the Mediterranean sea.

Nearly, 50-60 per cent capacity remained down in the country following the damage of SEA-ME-We 3 and SEA-ME-WE 4 cables that connects Mumbai to East Coast of the USA and the UK.

"The repair will take another 15-20 days," Internet Service Providers Association of India (ISPAI) President Rajesh Chharia said.

Some service providers affected by the breakdown include FLAGTEL of ADAG Reliance and Delhi's internet ISP Spectranet and Bangalore's ISP Karturi Network, he said.

Several cables were damaged when some ships had to anchor in Egypt's Alexandria region due to bad weather conditions. It has impacted internet connectivity in India.

The connections were severed on Wednesday afternoon, Chharia added.

"Majority of the firms are trying to restore their connections through the Pacific Region, which is increasing the latency period (time taken to connect two servers)," he added.

Chharia said the Bombay Stock Exchange was unlikely to be impacted as it is connected through the VPN.

Losing faith in Yahoo

Yahoo chief Jerry Yang faced the Wall Street rowdies on the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call Tuesday, and it wasn’t pretty.

The Internet powerhouse reported a 23 percent drop in profit for the fourth quarter from a year ago and offered a weak forecast for 2008. One thousand jobs will be eliminated by mid-February. And the stock tanked 11% during after-hour trading.

Although the company delivered strong revenues of $1.8 billion in the fourth quarter — an 8% rise, none of the analysts offered congratulations to Yang. Instead, eight impatient men grilled the CEO during the hour-long call about Yahoo’s ongoing turnaround strategy.

Yang told the Street that 2008 is the year the Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company would make a key transformation. But shareholders have heard this story before. The same was said about Panama, its long-delayed ad system for search, which launched last year. Now, Yang says, Yahoo (YHOO) will make “profound, fundamental changes” to its graphical display ad network, its core business. Company execs hinted that its market share for online advertising will grow with better display-ad features by the second half of the year.

“You’re talking about increased investment, which means we should not really expect incremental operating margins to improve any time soon,” said Morgan Stanley analyst David Joseph during the call. “So you’re expecting investors to have some patience. What gives you the high conviction that we should be expecting display advertising to show improving growth towards the latter half of the year when there’s a lot of uncertainties?”

Yang shot back that the No. 2 search engine was “not in the business of prognosticating the economy.” Analysts fear that display advertising — big brands’ preferred way to spend online ad dollars — is the most vulnerable during a recession. While Yahoo relies on display advertising for much of its ad revenue, the majority of rival Google’s sales — an expected $16.7 billion for 2007 — is made in paid search. Google (GOOG) will report its fourth quarter earnings Thursday after the closing bell.

“We saw pretty good display growth in the second half of 2007, about 20 percent year over year,” Yang said. “Obviously we think that’s going to continue….We do believe the investments we’re making now in the display network and platform will enable some key things that differentiate ourselves in the market.”

Yahoo execs did their best to put a positive spin on turning the site into the starting point for web users, offering a premium ad network for advertisers, and plans for a “workforce realignment.” Nevertheless, the numbers were discouraging. Yahoo estimates it will make between $5.35 billion to $5.95 billion in sales this year. The Street estimated $5.9 billion.

The company projects it will have less cash on hand this year as AT&T (T) is expected to share less revenue for providing joint Internet service. Yahoo’s operating income last year was $1.93 billion compared to $1.73 billion to $1.98 billion expected this year.

“Their expectations were embarrassingly low,” says Jeffrey Lindsay of Bernstein. “They need to restructure and monetize. For the minute, we don’t have strong confidence that they’re going to achieve that goal…This management team isn’t doing enough to monetize its really valuable assets.”

Yahoo was vague about its plans to lay off 1,000 workers from its 14,300-employee workforce. Yang said the staff reductions were not across the board and that people could apply for open positions. Chief Financial Officer Blake Jorgensen said the company would take a charge of up to $25 million for the first quarter in connection with the job cuts.

Pumping up desert agriculture

The parched landscape of Sudan, on the southern edge of the Sahara desert, is among the world's driest regions, with a nine-month dry season and a highly unreliable rainy season. Large-scale farmers there manage to grow about half of the impoverished nation's food production with the help of motorized irrigation pumps, but for individual subsistence farmers and their families--about two-thirds of the nation's 40 million people--growing crops mostly means hauling water by hand in buckets.

That's a method that's inefficient and unreliable, often leading to crop failures that add to Sudan's burden of malnutrition and poverty. But thanks to a new venture set up by two MIT students, with a little bit of help from small grants from the MIT Public Service Center and Legatum Center, some of those farmers will soon get a chance to improve their crops, their livelihoods and the health of their families.

Mustafa Dafalla, a third-year student in civil and environmental engineering whose parents come from Sudan and who has visited there often, and Zahir Dossa, a fourth-year student at MIT Sloan School of Management, have created a new nonprofit organization called Selsabila to bring a simple technological solution to the region: Inexpensive treadle-powered water pumps, developed and produced by a company in India.

"There are plenty of programs in place to help large farmers," Dafalla says, "but nothing for low-income farmers."

The students began the project during last year's IAP, when they traveled to Sudan to find local supervisors and managers for the project, and to India to test the pumps and make arrangements with the manufacturer. After working over the course of the year to set up their company and finalize their plans, this month they will be visiting villages to promote the pumps and take orders. They aim to get the first 100 or more of the $100 pumps into the hands of Sudanese farmers by this May, with the help of local microfinance institutions in that country.

The pumps are expected to pay for themselves within the first year, through increased output--they should triple the average farmer's food production. At the same time, the venture will create new local businesses in the nation, as they set up stores to sell and service the pumps in local marketplaces.

Ultimately, Dossa and Dafalla hope to turn over the whole company to local people, where it would provide a source of revenue to help the struggling country's economy.

The organization's name, Selsabila, comes from the Koran, Dafalla explains. It means "a river that springs forth in heaven" he says. "It's an upbeat name--when people hear it, they would think of flowing water. A lot of these farmers are in despair, and we want to make people feel hope."

Virender Sehwag acknowledges after his century knock on the last day of the fourth test in Adelaide on Monday

The biggest battle Down Under comes to an end as the final Test match results in a draw. Australia hve retained the trophy as the home team wins by 2-1 margin. Poor umpiring, selection dilemmas, close contests, racism charges, exceptional batting by the tail-enders and a few surprising wickets by the part-timers - the Border-Gavaskar Trophy has witnessed it all, However this also marks the last game for India's big five together in Australia. Curtains also come down on a terrific career of Adam Gilchrist.

Sensex tumbles 640 pts on weak global cues

Tracking extremely weak global cues, the Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex fell by 640 points at 10.30 am on Monday after a record rise on Friday. Asian indices were down by about 2.5 per cent to 5.5 per cent during morning

Americans prefer Indian products over Chinese, says Fortune magazine

A majority of Americans are not averse to purchasing made-in-India products, but opposite is the case for those made in China, according to a new survey conducted by renowned U.S.-based business magazine Fortune.

In the wake of some of the American companies, including toymaker Mattel, recalling products they sourced from China due to high lead content, nearly three in five (57 per cent) of the U.S. citizens surveyed by Fortune said they were “less likely to buy a product if it is made in China.”

However, as much as 52 per cent of the survey respondents said such an incident would not affect their purchasing decision if the product is made in India.

In the survey, only 35 per cent of Americans said they were “less likely” to purchase a product manufactured in India, while 11 per cent said they were “more likely” to buy such goods.

For China-made products, 11 per cent people said they were “more likely” to buy these products, while 30 per cent said it did not matter to them whether goods were exported from China.

MIT and ABB announce energy research partnership

MIT and Switzerland-based ABB, a global leader in power and automation technology, have formed a partnership on energy research to help meet the world's need for clean electricity and energy efficiency.

ABB will join MIT's Energy Initiative (MITEI) and will support research in a variety of areas including nanofluids, power electronics, intelligent robotics and equipment heat management. As a Sustaining Member of MITEI, ABB will have a seat on the MITEI governing board, which provides key input on the direction and success of the Initiative's research portfolio.

"A MITEI partnership with ABB creates enormous opportunities to provide technology solutions to global energy challenges," said MITEI Director Ernest J. Moniz. "The ABB corporate portfolio offers a range of potential research focus areas in which MIT has substantial research capability and could make a major contribution. ABB's commitment to sustainability, energy efficiency and reducing greenhouse gas emissions is especially exciting from a research perspective."

"This partnership is another significant step in ABB's strategy of combining our leading industrial technology competence with cutting-edge international research," said Peter Terwiesch, ABB's chief technology officer. "New technology is the key to tapping the potential of energy efficiency in the face of the soaring demand and increasing environmental concerns."

ABB spends some $1.1 billion per year on research and development. Technology plays a crucial role in meeting energy and environmental challenges. Soaring energy demand has also placed a premium on energy efficiency, a key area of ABB's research and development activity, comprising about half of its research investment.

In addition to supporting the research program, ABB's five-year, $5-million collaboration will support graduate fellowships and MITEI's energy research "seed fund." The fund was set up to promote the development of a broad range of innovative energy technologies and concepts from researchers across the Institute.

MITEI Deputy Director Robert Armstrong noted that "over the length of this partnership, ABB will support 10 graduate energy fellowships at the Institute, the ABB-MIT Energy Fellows. ABB's commitment to developing the next generation of energy technologists will help nurture and develop young energy researchers to meet the global energy challenges of the next several decades."

MITEI is an Institute-wide initiative designed to help transform the global energy system to meet the challenges of the future. The MIT Energy Initiative includes research, education, campus energy management and outreach activities, and an interdisciplinary approach that covers all areas of energy supply and demand, security and environmental impact.

ABB is a leader in power and automation technologies that enable utility and industry customers to improve performance while lowering environmental impact. The ABB Group of companies operates in around 100 countries and employs more than 110,000 people. For more information on ABB's energy-efficiency activities, please visit www.abb.com/energyefficiency or www.abb.com/news.

Team Identifies weakness in anthrax bacteri

MIT and New York University researchers have identified a weakness in the defenses of the anthrax bacterium that could be exploited to produce new antibiotics.

The researchers found that nitric oxide (NO) is a critical part of Bacillus anthracis's defense against the immune response launched by cells infected with the bacterium. Anthrax bacteria that cannot produce NO succumb to the immune system's attack.

Stephen Lippard, the Arthur Amos Noyes Professor of Chemistry at MIT and an author of a paper on the work, said antibiotics developed to capitalize on this vulnerability could be effective against other bacteria that employ the same defense system. Those bacteria include Staphylococcus aureus, which commonly causes infections in hospitals and can be extremely drug-resistant.

The paper appeared in the Jan. 21 online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Anthrax occurs naturally around the world and can infect all warm-blooded animals including humans. Treatment usually includes large doses of intravenous and oral antibiotics, but the disease can often be fatal--especially if treatment is not started right away.

In the human immune system, specialized cells called macrophages are the first line of defense against anthrax infection. Macrophages engulf the bacteria and bombard them with reactive oxygen and nitrogen species, which create chemical reactions toxic to the bacteria.

The research team found that NO produced by the bacteria pre-emptively defends against attack by reactive oxygen species produced by the macrophages soon after infection. Twelve hours later, when the macrophages release NO to join in the attack, it is too late--by then the bacteria have taken over and eventually destroy the macrophages.

When the gene for the enzyme that synthesizes NO is knocked out in the bacteria, they cannot defend against early attack by the macrophages, which can then survive the infection.

"With the aid of an intracellular probe developed in our laboratory, which fluoresces in the presence of NO, our collaborators Evgeny Nudler and his group discovered a completely new target for the next generation of antibiotics," said Lippard.

With this knowledge in hand, the researchers are now using the fluorescent probe to screen libraries of chemicals for compounds that could potentially interfere with the bacterium's ability to synthesize NO, said Lippard. Such compounds could eventually be developed into new antibiotics.

Lead author of the paper is Konstantin Shatalin of the New York University School of Medicine. The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation

Short bacterial protein is surprisingly versatile

MIT researchers have discovered why an unusually short bacterial protein can have many more interactions than would normally be expected of something its size.

The team, led by biology professor Graham Walker, found that the protein, UmuD, belongs to a recently discovered class of proteins called intrinsically disordered proteins.

Proteins, which consist of chains of amino acids, locally fold themselves into one of two structures--a helix or a pleated sheet. In contrast, intrinsically disordered proteins lack such well-defined local structures.

The lack of formal structure probably allows such proteins to bind to a wider variety of proteins, Walker said.

"They have some structure, but not the way we're used to thinking about it," said Walker, senior author of a paper on the work, which appeared in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences the week of Jan. 14.

Normally, proteins form a specific structure with binding sites where other proteins can attach. The larger the protein, the more binding sites it can have. A protein like UmuD, which is made of fewer amino acids, would not be expected to have enough binding sites to interact with very many other proteins.

"If you think of it as two jigsaw puzzle pieces, it's hard to see how you could fit much more than one or two pieces together," said Walker, American Cancer Society Professor of Biology.

Previous structural studies carried out at high concentrations had shown that UmuD predominantly folds into sheets. However, the MIT researchers used a technique called circular dichroism spectroscopy to reveal that at concentrations similar to those in living bacteria, UmuD appears as a random coil.

As the intrinsically disordered proteins bind with other proteins, they may change their shape, allowing them to then interact with different proteins, potentially creating a chronological sequence of interactions as proteins bind and then are cast off.

UmuD usually is found in groups of two, which implies that it must have some kind of stable protein structure, said Sharotka Maria Simon, lead author of the paper and an MIT Ph.D. recipient now at Brandeis University.

"Even though we call it disordered, UmuD must have enough structure to consistently form a pair," she said.

The new finding sheds light on UmuD's role in the bacterial SOS system, which is called into action when DNA is damaged. In a paper published in Molecular Cell in December, Walker and others reported that UmuD had an unexpected role involving yet another protein in the SOS system.

The SOS system helps activate and control translesion polymerases, enzymes that copy damaged DNA. The system, which is called upon as a last resort, when DNA has lesions that regular repair mechanisms can't fix, keeps the cell alive by maintaining its DNA, at the cost of preserving potentially harmful mutations.

UmuD's ability to interact with multiple partner proteins allows it to control the function of two translesion polymerases, coordinating their action with DNA replication.

Other authors of the PNAS paper are F.J.F. Sousa and R. Mohana-Borges of the Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. The research was funded by the National Cancer Institute and a Cleo and Paul Schimmel Fellowship.

ELCOT approves construction work

Board of Electronics Corporation of Tamil Nadu (ELCOT) has approved the construction of 50,000 square feet built-up space (pre-fabricated structure that can be constructed within four to five months) in Tirunelveli IT Special Economic Zone (SEZ) at a cost of Rs.15 crore.

The Government has also approved a joint-venture development project on 400 acres in the Tirunelveli IT park.

ELCOT is to identify a private partner shortly. The Government expected that the IT park would generate direct employment to over 40,000 people in the next five years and the number might go up to one lakh in 10 years, said C. Umashankar, Managing Director, ELCOT, at the ‘empower I.T,’ an IT promotion event being conducted by the Government of Tamil Nadu through ELCOT and the National Association for Software and Services Companies here. Over 10,000 college students from Tirunelveli, Tuticorin, Kanyakumari and Virudhunagar districts are here to attend the seminar.

Software success attributed to “compete, but cooperate” mantra

One of Kiran Karnik’s favourite memories of his just-completed tenure as the president of India’s apex software body, Nasscom, comes from a meeting with a Chinese competitor.

“I sat down with this senior Chinese official and he had a 10-point list, which they had worked on very carefully,” relates Mr. Karnik. The list evaluated China’s potential for IT success, with the Chinese official insisting that his country could match India on almost every factor, be it talented engineers, an involved diaspora, infrastructure and funding mechanisms, and was even catching up on English skills.

“And then he told me: ‘What we don’t have is a Nasscom.’ That really made me feel good, that we are making an impact…Then he wanted us to help them set up something similar. So they sent two people to come and observe our working,” says a satisfied Mr. Karnik.

If imitation is the best form of flattery, Mr. Karnik and his team have a wide range of admirers. From South Africa to Brazil to Eastern Europe, IT industries have been modelling their industry associations on the Nasscom example.

As he hands over the baton to Hewlett Packard’s Som Mittal this month, Mr. Karnik feels that several other Indian industries would do well to learn from the IT association as well. Speaking to The Hindu at a farewell event organised by Nasscom’s Chennai members, Mr. Karnik attributed much of India’s software success to his association’s mantra of “compete, but cooperate.” The lesson goes beyond IT, he says, pointing to acrimonious competition in other industry sectors, especially in telecom. “The focus should be on growing the pie, not fighting over it,” he says.

The government can play an important role in propelling the growth of that pie to the next level by ensuring a positive policy environment. “It was fine till last year. Then the budget targeted IT industry growth,” he rued, warning that measures such as the fringe benefit tax on employee stock options and the service tax on leased accommodation would have long-term negative impacts on the industry.

However, Mr. Karnik feels he is leaving the industry in good shape, despite worries over a possible U.S. recession, rising rupee and talent shortages. “I am confident we have learned to cope with anything,” he says, pointing to the recession of 2001-02 as a valuable learning experience.

“We weathered that storm and that is the sign of true maturity,” he says.

Speaking to a group of entrepreneurs earlier in the evening, Mr. Karnik said innovation is the key to the future.

“First, we did things cheaper, then better, then quicker, then all three. But that is not enough. Our competitive advantage is decreasing…We have got to move ahead by taking the high ground to innovate,” he said, pointing out that with the twin factors of diversity and adversity, India is a fertile ground for innovation.

Since Mr. Karnik took over the leadership of Nasscom in 2001, the industry has placed itself firmly on the global map, growing almost six-fold over the last six years.

The man who helped coordinate the growth story plans to take a break for at least a month. In the next phase of life, he expects to spend time reading, writing and doing development-related work with NGOs. Any link with IT? He laughs it off: “Only as a dotted line with lots of gaps,” he promises.

Bus burning case: apex court stays death sentence for three

The Supreme Court on Friday stayed the death sentence imposed on three accused in the Dharmapuri bus burning case. They are said to be belonging to the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam.

A Bench of Justice P.P. Naolekar and Justice Lokeshwar Singh Panta suspended the death sentence while admitting appeals filed by C. Muniappan, Nedunchezhian and Ravindran, challenging the Madras High Court judgment confirming the trial court’s order awarding death sentence to the three accused.

The Bench after hearing senior counsel Sushil Kumar, Ranjit Kumar and U.R. Lalit, for the petitioners and senior counsel Altaf Ahmed for the State directed the Tamil Nadu government to file all the records in the court expeditiously.

The case relates to the death of three girl students – Kokilavani, Gayathri and Hemalatha – of the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore. The bus in which they were travelling along with 44 other students and two teachers was torched on February 2, 2000 following the conviction of AIADMK leader Jayalalithaa in a criminal case.

Pleas against Singur project dismissed

The Calcutta High Court on Friday dismissed all 11 petitions that challenged the land acquisition at Singur in West Bengal for the Tata Motors’ small car plant.

Other matters pertaining to the project were also dismissed.

Ruling that the land acquisition was valid, a Division Bench, comprising Chief Justice S.S. Nijjar and Justice P.C. Ghose, said it was made for employment generation and the area’s socio-economic development.

In a statement, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee described the verdict as one that would serve the greater interests of people and strengthen the State’s industrialisation drive.

Culture influences brain function, MIT imaging shows

People from different cultures use their brains differently to solve the same visual perceptual tasks, MIT researchers and colleagues report in the first brain imaging study of its kind.

Psychological research has established that American culture, which values the individual, emphasizes the independence of objects from their contexts, while East Asian societies emphasize the collective and the contextual interdependence of objects. Behavioral studies have shown that these cultural differences can influence memory and even perception. But are they reflected in brain activity patterns?

To find out, a team led by John Gabrieli, a professor at the McGovern Institute for Brain Research at MIT, asked 10 East Asians recently arrived in the United States and 10 Americans to make quick perceptual judgments while in a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner--a technology that maps blood flow changes in the brain that correspond to mental operations.

The results are reported in the January issue of Psychological Science. Gabrieli's colleagues on the work were Trey Hedden, lead author of the paper and a research scientist at McGovern; Sarah Ketay and Arthur Aron of State University of New York at Stony Brook; and Hazel Rose Markus of Stanford University.

Subjects were shown a sequence of stimuli consisting of lines within squares and were asked to compare each stimulus with the previous one. In some trials, they judged whether the lines were the same length regardless of the surrounding squares (an absolute judgment of individual objects independent of context). In other trials, they decided whether the lines were in the same proportion to the squares, regardless of absolute size (a relative judgment of interdependent objects).

In previous behavioral studies of similar tasks, Americans were more accurate on absolute judgments, and East Asians on relative judgments. In the current study, the tasks were easy enough that there were no differences in performance between the two groups.

However, the two groups showed different patterns of brain activation when performing these tasks. Americans, when making relative judgments that are typically harder for them, activated brain regions involved in attention-demanding mental tasks. They showed much less activation of these regions when making the more culturally familiar absolute judgments. East Asians showed the opposite tendency, engaging the brain's attention system more for absolute judgments than for relative judgments.

"We were surprised at the magnitude of the difference between the two cultural groups, and also at how widespread the engagement of the brain's attention system became when making judgments outside the cultural comfort zone," says Hedden.

The researchers went on to show that the effect was greater in those individuals who identified more closely with their culture. They used questionnaires of preferences and values in social relations, such as whether an individual is responsible for the failure of a family member, to gauge cultural identification. Within both groups, stronger identification with their respective cultures was associated with a stronger culture-specific pattern of brain-activation.

How do these differences come about? "Everyone uses the same attention machinery for more difficult cognitive tasks, but they are trained to use it in different ways, and it's the culture that does the training," Gabrieli says. "It's fascinating that the way in which the brain responds to these simple drawings reflects, in a predictable way, how the individual thinks about independent or interdependent social relationships."

Tata: it was my happiest day

“Yesterday [January 10] was the happiest day of my life. I was happy not just to make my dream come true but was happy for a group of young engineers, who could do something in India that everyone said could not be done,” Tata Sons chairman Ratan Tata said.

A day after the launch of the Rs. 1 lakh car at the Auto Expo 2008, he dedicated the world’s cheapest car to the people of rural India who did not have the means to buy a car. In an interaction with regional language media in New Delhi, he said: “India was not made only of metros ... it has a hinterland where 85 per cent of the population live. We hope to improve their lives, giving them a better and a safer form of personal transport — only then can we think that our company has done something for the prosperity of the country.”

It should help in improving the quality of life of the people, Mr. Tata said.

“The small car project is based on safety,” he said. He was pained by doubts being raised about the safety of the car. “ Safety on four wheels will be by far more than on a two-wheeler.” He said that ‘Nano’ had met crash test requirements and could also meet any future crash test requirements to meet international standards.

On his plans to set up new production facilities for the small car, Mr. Tata said the company was looking at setting up a plant in Punjab. It wanted to set up facilities in other parts of the country, where employment opportunities, training facilities and ancillary industries could be created. “If you are an investor in Tata Motors, I can assure you that your investment will not be jeopardised,” Mr. Tata said.

Cancer research centre


He also mentioned the other investments being made by the company in West Bengal, which included a world-class cancer research centre and hospital. Mr. Tata was hopeful that a cure for cancer would be found in that research.

Singur unrest may delay Nano's rollout

Keeping its promise Tata Motors unveiled Nano, the world's cheapest car, but all is not well at the under construction Singur plant from where the Rs 1-lakh car is supposed to rollout.

The facility in West Bengal's Singur, which would deliver the dream car, could still be a cause of worry for the daring industrialist.

Repeated interruptions in construction work could leave Tata Motors in the lurch in June 2008. That's the company deadline for giving final shape to the plant so that it could roll out its first car by the year-end.

Given the kind of hurdles the project has had to face since inception, meeting the June 2008 deadline is a stiff proposition. Achieving that would be no less a feat for Tata Motors than rolling out the people's car itself.

Ironically, work at the 935-acre site has slowed down considerably, since Thursday - the day Nano was launched.

This time due to protest by a section of security guards owing allegiance to the CPM and are resisting the company's decision to downsize its workforce.

Tata Motors Singur Site temporary worker Sushanta Pramanik says, "I could work for about an hour today. But then the CPM men came with their flags and stopped us."

Severe water logging at the site during last monsoon held up work for about a month.

Work is also yet to reach top gear at the adjacent 290-acre vendor park where 55 ancillary units are supposed to set up shops to feed the mother plant.

And political opposition apart, this could well be the prime source of botheration for Tata Motors.

Nano, cynosure of all eyes

The unveiling of the Tata Motors’ “People’s Car” — ‘Nano’ (now being referred to as “Lakhtakia car” because of its Rs.1-lakh price tag) — was being eagerly awaited not just by the Indians but by the entire world.

It was not just correspondents from national as well as regional media who congregated at the Tata Motors pavilion at the Auto Expo, a large number of scribes, of both print and electronic media, from across the globe — the U.S., the U.K., Germany, Italy, France, Japan, Australia, Singapore, Korea, Canada — besides representatives of all international wire agencies were awestruck after seeing the car.

They could hardly believe seeing a car with a fuel-efficient engine, meeting all safety and emission norms, and that too, at just one-fourth the price of small cars available in the U.S. and European markets.

“It is a milestone for not just Indian automobile industry but for the entire global auto sector. It will give some jitters to all global car-makers who are now focusing on small cars too,” said a Delhi-based senior auto journalist of a U.S. wire agency.

“In the U.S., the cheapest car comes in a price range of $10,000-$15,000, but now we have a serious competition with ‘Nano’ priced at $2,500. Though it will take some time for the Tatas to prove this car in the Indian market before introducing overseas, this has definitely highlighted Tatas’ growing prowess in the global auto arena. And if Tatas win the Jaguar and Land Rover bid, it will be icing in the cake for the company,” he added.

At the press conference held after the unveiling ceremony, journalists questioned Tata Group Chairman Ratan Tata on India’s poor road infrastructure and on traffic congestion issue.

“All these issues are to be addressed by the government and not me. My dream was to provide connectivity to billions of Indians and I think I have delivered on my promise to each Indian family. It will change the way people travel, particularly in semi-urban and rural India,” said Mr. Tata. Totally agreeing with Mr. Tata’s views, Rajesh Kumar, who runs a small book stall in the capital and was present at the Auto Expo to have a glimpse of the “Lakhtakia” car, said: “Today is the happiest day for my family, particularly my children, as I too can now think of buying a car. Mr. Tata will always be remembered as a person who realised the dreams of middle-class Indians.”

Tata unveils world’s cheapest car

Keeping his promise, made four years ago, to deliver a “people’s car,” Tata Group Chairman Ratan Tata unveiled on Thursday the Rs.1-lakh car christened ‘Nano.’

The world’s cheapest car from the Tata Motors stable comes with a rear mounted all-aluminium two-cylinder 623 cc petrol engine, promises a mileage of 20 km per litre, and meets all emission and safety standards.

“The vision was to give the people of India a car which is not produced anywhere else in the world. Through Nano, which denotes high technology and small size, I have tried to provide a reliable mode of transport to every Indian family,” Mr. Tata told an overflowing press conference attended by Indian as well as international media at the inaugural day of the Auto Expo 2008 here.

Nano rules Autoexpo, India, amid Singur protests

New Delhi The disputed Tata Motors factory site in West Bengal's Singur witnessed protests on the same day the company unveiled the world's cheapest car in the capital.

The Trinamul Congress-backed Krishi Jameen Raksha Committee or the Committee to Save Farmland burnt a dummy version of the people's car to express their anger.

"Our land was forcibly taken by us. We will not allow Ratan Tata to come in Singur," said Trinamul leader Becharam Manna.

A section of temporary workers at the project site also protested, hampering work at the 997-acre small-car plant site. They were protesting the company's decision to downsize workforce.

Tata Motors is expected to roll out the first Nano from the Singur plant in June, this year.

TATA Nano Pictures

Tata group's newly launched 'Nano' car seen at the 9th Auto Expo in New Delhi. The car, a hatchback with a 624cc engine, is priced at about Rs 100,000 ($2,500), half that of the current cheapest car in the market