The New Indian Express 17.12.2009
City Corp to host eclipse festival
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The CPM-led Thiruvananthapuram Corporation seems determined to make the public more science-friendly and less tangled up in superstitions. The Corporation will host a `grahanotsavam’ or eclipse festival on December 31, 2009, and January 15, 2010, on the occasion of lunar eclipse and solar eclipse respectively.
The Corporation Council on Wednesday decided to make elaborate arrangements for public to view the celestial happenings from Central stadium on these particular days. The programme was announced at the Council by Education Standing Committee Chairman G.R. Anil who said that the objective of the fest was to inculcate in the public an awareness on scientific reasoning behind the eclipses and remove superstitions associated with it.
Telescopes, solar filters and other facilities for watching the eclipses on both days would be provided by the Corporation with the support of Science and Technology Museum, Kerala University Physics Department, Astronomy Association, Kudumbasree and other voluntary organisations, Anil said.
As December 31 is also the last day of the Year of Astronomy (which is being observed this year), the programme assumes significance, he said. Not just elders, students would also be made part of the eclipse festival. In nearly 50 schools in the Corporation limits, the local body would make available telescopes and solar filters for the children to view the eclipses.
EMS HOUSING SCHEME: The Council has set December 24 as the last day for ward committees to approve the beneficiary list of EMS Housing scheme in 86 wards. There are 9884 beneficiaries in the list. The BPL list has also been finalised. This has to be presented in ward committees and doubts and complaints rectified before the end of this month, Mayor C.Jayan Babu said.
The Council witnessed a heated debate on the way court cases are being handled by Corporation’s advocates. CPM leader Rajendradas raised the issue in the Council and said that senior advocates fail to appear in many crucial cases fought by the local body.
Congress leader Maheswaran Nair said that Corporation senior advocate Nandakumar Menon must be removed from the post. Deputy Mayor V. Jayaprakash who was in the Chair, said that though there had been some procedural flaws on the part of Corporation in court cases, the advocates were not to be blamed. A review of the status of court cases was done by Mayor recently and such allegations have been found baseless, he said.
