12-Hour Traffic Bandh in Aizawl

Aizawl, Nov 23 : The 12-hour traffic bandh in the Mizoram capital town began at 5 am today hitting movement of vehicles.

Aizawl district SP Lalbiakthanga Khiangte said traffic was thin in the town as most of the vehicles kept off the road fearing damage by protesters.

A few buses and taxis were sighted as the owners have not supported the bandh.

There were, however, no bandh supporters in the streets after 15 volunteers of bandh-sponsor Mizoram Motor Vehicle Taxation Refinement Demand Coordination Committee (MMVTRDCC) were arrested, he said.

Many students had to walk to attend classes as did government employees, who were instructed by the state government to attend office.

Mizoram Home Minister R Lalzirliana had yesterday warned that firm action would be taken against those who obstructed normal life.

The traffic bandh is being held to protest against the 'unprecedented' hike in road tax and compulsory payment of life time road tax, MMVTRDCC sources said.

Incredible Performance of India's Got Talent Strongmen Who Hit Each Other And Eat Glass

Don't try this at home

Bricks are lined up on a man's head and then smashed into smithereens with a sledgehammer.

Another man pulls a car across the stage using just his teeth - while a third eats glass as if it were biscuits.

Welcome to the weird and wonderful world of the Warriors of Goja - this year's most extreme contestants on India's Got Talent.

Smashing time: The Warriors of Goja made the judges wince with their performance, which saw a man smash a sledgehammer over bricks over his colleague's head

Shocked: The judges were left wincing with the extreme act

The group, who failed to make the final of the competition, left judges wincing as they ran over one of their members with a car and motorbike and jumped through a glass ladder.

One member of the panel covered her mouth in shock as the group set about one of their number - breaking paving slabs on his chest.

Dangerous drive: One of the group was run over by both a car and a motorbike

Not for children: Members jumped through a ladder of glass (left) and smashed paving slabs against one of their group (right)

In their breathless six minute audition, they also piled on each other, with beds of nails in between.

They ended their jaw-dropping performance, set against a backdrop asking the audience 'Are You Ready?', covered in blood.

'Degrading' Lynx Ads Featuring Lucy Pinder Banned

• Deodorant manufacturer Unilever in the dock for sanctioning images and demeaning women
• ASA concludes the adverts were 'likely to cause serious and widespread offence'

Advertisements for Lynx deodorant featuring glamour model Lucy Pinder have been banned for degrading women and treating them as sex objects.

The lads mag model was seen wearing very little and flashing her cleavage in a series of provocative video ads that hark back to the 1970s.

The deodorant is made by multi-national manufacturer, Unilever, which is in the dock for sanctioning the images and demeaning women.

'Demeaning': Lucy Pinder in one of the Lynx adverts which the Advertising Standards Authority says goes too far

'Highly unsuitable for children': The ASA found the adverts crossed the line and are offensive to many

Lynx is marketed using tongue in cheek humour that suggests the men who use it instantly become more attractive, with  beautiful women falling at their feet.

However, in a ruling published today, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has accused the company of going too far.

One internet video ad showed the model getting dressed, washing a car and eating an ice lolly. In each scene she was wearing different outfits all of which revealed her cleavage.

A second showed the model stripping wallpaper, jogging, applying lip gloss, eating whipped cream off her finger and playing with a light sabre.

On display near schools: Another poster featuring a different model showering on a beach in just her bikini bottoms drew more than 100 complaints

This Lynx advert for anti-perspirant has got a watchdog hot under the collar

A third featured various close ups of her cleavage, while on-screen text invited viewers to ‘Play with Lucy’ and gave the Lynx website address.

A fourth featured an image of the model in her underwear and bending over an oven door. The text stated ‘Can she make you lose control?’.

A poster for the product, which featured another model taking a shower on a beach and wearing only bikini bottoms, drew more than 100 complaints with many upset that it was put up close to schools.

It carried two controversial straplines, reading: ‘The Cleaner You Are The Dirtier You Get’ and ‘Get Dirty This Summer’.

In a ruling published today, the watchdog said: ‘We considered that the various activities that Ms Pinder carried out were presented in a sexually provocative way, and that alongside the focus on Ms Pinder's cleavage … were likely to be seen as gratuitous and to objectify women.

‘We considered that was emphasised by the text ‘Can she make you lose control?’ … and the invitation to ‘Play with Lucy’, which we considered would also be seen as degrading to women.

‘We therefore concluded that the ads were likely to cause serious and widespread offence.’

Criticising the poster, the ASA said the language was ‘clearly intended to imply that using the advertised product would lead to more uninhibited sexual behaviour’.

It added: ‘We therefore considered that the poster would be seen to make a link between purchasing the product and sex with women and in so doing would be seen to objectify women.’

The Parliamentary All Party Group on Body Image has announced an inquiry into the issue of body image and depictions in advertising.

Lib-Dem MP Jo Swinson, who has campaigned on the issue, said: ‘Lynx ad campaigns have a well-known, if rather far-fetched, theme of the product somehow helping young men to have more confidence with the opposite sex. 

‘Sometimes this has resulted in light-hearted and humorous adverts.

'However in this case the ASA has understandably found that using such sexually provocative images, coupled with the invitation to ‘play’ with Lucy, crosses the line, and is offensive to many.

‘These images are highly sexualised, and unsuitable for children.’

In its defence, Unilever said they had no intention to cause harm or offence.

They said the products are designed for men aged 17-27 and ‘had been had been popular over the years for its playful, sexy, tongue-in-cheek take on the 'mating game' narrative’.

Unilever said consumers had ‘come to expect, and were comfortable with, the narrative, tone and content seen in their ads’.

It said the video ads ‘were designed to be playful, sexy and humorous but not to cause offence’.

Imogen Thomas Appears To Mock Her Gagging Order

Isn't the tape supposed to be over your mouth?

She's been placed under a high court order banning her from divulging the lurid details about her relationship with Ryan Giggs.

But that hasn't stopped Imogen Thomas from making light of the whole situation in a new photoshoot.

Imogen, 28, appears in men's magazine Nuts this week where she poses almost nude apart from some strategically placed black tape.

Where's the rest of your dress? Imogen Thomas covers her body with a very small amount of black duct tape

The Welsh glamour model, who won Miss Wales in 2003, is barely contained by the tape as she pulls a series of seductive poses in front of a yellow background.

Baring a slight resemblance to the bizarre 'belt top' worn by Jodie Marsh some years ago, Imogen's duct tape dress does little to 'gag' her silicone-enhanced assets.

The raunchy set of photos were taken by a former glamour model named Zoe McConnell and are accompanied by a predictably suggestive interview.

Under wraps: The Welsh glamour model has been silenced by former lover Ryan Giggs

In the chat with Nuts, Imogen says her rudest night out in the UK would occur in London.

Out now: Nuts magazine is available to buy from today

She told the men's magazine: 'You can pretty much do anything you like in London and no one bats an eyelid. You can go out without a stitch on and people don’t even notice. Manchester’s a close second.'

Imogen also named Rihanna as her 'sexiest celebrity of 2011', saying: '[It] has to be Rihanna. Everything she does is sexy – her videos, the way she moves, the way she dresses. That girl drips sex!'

Earlier this month the former Big Brother star returned to the High Court, where she tried to lift an order preventing her from revealing details of her relationship with married footballer Ryan Giggs.

She put in a bid to lift a gagging order obtained by the footballer seven months ago.

The former Miss Wales arrived at court with her legal team to ask Mr Justice Eady for the right to make a public statement about the case.

But after almost two hours of legal wranglings in private the judge reserved judgment with no firm date given for his final ruling.

Before ordering the press and public to leave court he said the application was about 'what if anything can be said in public by way of a statement.'

At an earlier hearing Mr Justice Eady said even though Giggs had been named - the injunction was still in place to stop his family being 'engulfed in a cruel and destructive media frenzy.'

Alcohol Content Reduced, Vendors Fear Zawlaidi Wont sell

Aizawl, Nov 23 : With its alcohol content having been reduced to 11 per cent, the Mizoram-produced grape wine Zawlaidi would no more attract any buyers in the dry land, vendors feared.

Sources said the vendors are now reluctant to take the risk of getting a 750 ml bottle for Rs 133 from the wineries on cash payment and trying to retail it at a whopping Rs 194 in Aizawl, compared to a retail price of Rs 174 per bottle last year.

That too with its alcohol content heavily reduced.

There was no denying that the grape wine with 14 per cent alcohol volume had sold like hot cakes in the dry state of Mizoram where any brand of Indian made foreign liquor costs not less than Rs 500.

However, a few weeks after the first consignment of the red pot wine hit the local market in October last year, the conservative churches raised their concern over the high percentage of alcohol in the grape wine.

Branding Zawlaidi as liquor, the influential churches pressed the state to reduce the alcohol content, which was done.

Now, the issue has pushed the grape growers, who run the wineries, into yet another troubled sea.

Even though the wholesale rate has been increased to Rs 133 from last year s Rs 130, the retail price fixed at Rs 194 has made the vendors unhappy. Sources said the wineries/grape growers, however, were unable to accept the vendors scheme of pay-later.

We cannot accept the pay later system proposed by the vendors as it does not provide any security for us in case the wine bottles break or get lost while in transaction, secretary of Champhai Grape Growers Society.

Even though, the excise and narcotic authority has given a green signal, not a single bottle of Zawlaidi has left the wineries, sources said.

Dhaka Asks Delhi To Share All Details on Tipaimukh

Tipaimukh Project

New Delhi, Nov 23 : With concerns growing about the harm the Tipaimukh dam will wreak on the ecology, agriculture and fisheries downstream, Bangladesh yesterday urged India to hold consultations with it and share all relevant information before it implemented the hydroelectric project.

The 1,500-MW project is located on the Barak river near India's Manipur-Mizoram border just off Bangladesh's Zakiganj border in Sylhet. The Barak enters Bangladesh as the rivers Surma and Kushiyara.

Concern heightened in Bangladesh after news broke that India's state-owned enterprise NHPC had signed a Promoter's Agreement on October 22 with the government of Manipur and Sutlej Jal Vidyut Nigam Ltd to set up a joint venture company for the implementation of the controversial project.

“The government of India should share all relevant details of the proposed project in full transparency and also about any further step that it may take in connection with the project,” said a statement by Bangladesh's foreign ministry yesterday.

“This will be critical in avoiding any gap in understanding or allaying concerns in Bangladesh,” said the statement, which was issued five days after the news broke.

“Bangladesh, as a co-riparian country, would like to underscore the need for prior consultations before there is any intervention on common rivers like the Barak,” it said.

In its response to the development, the opposition BNP yesterday announced a daylong hartal on December 1 in Sylhet, which it said would be hardest hit by the Indian move.

India defends the project by suggesting that it is a hydroelectric project with provision to control floods and there is no plan to divert water for irrigation.

Experts in Bangladesh say the massive embankment dam will disrupt the flow of the Barak river and adversely affect agriculture and fisheries downstream. They also note that the project sits on an earthquake region and will cause havoc in the event of a quake.

Rights groups in Manipur have also been vocal in their protest. Their concern is that the project will displace thousands of local people.

The Bangladesh foreign ministry statement said its attention had been drawn to recent press reports about the signing of a Promoters' Agreement concerning the proposed Tipaimukh Dam project, in the Indian State of Manipur, on the river Barak.

Dhaka has also noted that the Indian external affairs ministry in a statement yesterday said the proposed project was designed to be “a hydroelectric project with provision to control floods”. As such, this project would not involve any diversion of water for purposes of irrigation.

The Dhaka statement said Bangladesh further took note of the reiteration in the press briefing that “…during the visit of H. E. Sheikh Hasina, Prime Minister of Bangladesh to India in January 2010, our Prime Minister had reiterated the assurance that India would not take steps on the Tipaimukh project that would adversely impact on Bangladesh. The assurance was again reiterated during the visit of our Prime Minister to Bangladesh in September 2011”.

No adverse impact of Tipaimukh on Bangladesh

Taken aback by loud protest in Bangladesh over the proposed Tipaimukh Dam Projects in Manipur, the Government of India is toying with the idea of inviting another delegation from the neighbouring country to visit the Project site.

Highly placed sources said that India wanted the Bangladeshis to see for themselves that there was no dam, no construction and no project work going on in the area. The Project would require environment clearance, said highly placed sources.

Meanwhile, India has on Tuesday formally declared that Tipaimukh project would have no adverse impact on Bangladesh.

An official spokesperson said, the only recent development pertaining to the project has been the signing of a ‘Promoter’s Agreement’ with the purpose of setting up a Joint Venture Company (JVC) between the Government of Manipur, NHPC Ltd. and Sutlej Jal Vidyut Nigam Ltd (SJVN) on October 22.

A 10-member Bangladesh Parliamentary delegation led by Abdur Razzak, former Water Resources Minister and current Chairman of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Water Resources, had visited India in July 2009 at the invitation of Government of India.

It had been clarified to the delegation that the proposed project was a hydro-electric project with provision to control floods and that this would not involve diversion of water on account of irrigation.

“Subsequently, during the visit of Prime Minister, Sheikh Hasina to India in January 2010, our Prime Minister had reiterated the assurance that India would not take steps on the Tipaimukh project that would adversely impact on Bangladesh. The assurance was again reiterated during the visit of our Prime Minister to Bangladesh in September 2011”.

In Bangladesh, reports of floating of a JVC has led to huge furor, and Bangladesh Foreign Ministry issued a statement, disclosing that India had promised to give details of the deal signed recently by National Hydro Power Company, Sutlej Jal Vidyut Nigam Limited and the Manipur Government to build the 1,500-MW project.

Media in Bangladesh have reported that the Tipaimukh Dam would decrease water flow in the Barak River during the monsoon, reduce the navigability of the Surma and the Kushiyara, dry up some water bodies and increase riverbank erosion 100-150km downstream.

Northeast Football Premier League To Debut in 2012

Guwahati, Nov 23 : Celebrity Management Group (CMG), a leading event management organization of the country, has proposed to set up the North East Premier League (NEPL) from next year onwards.

Disclosing this here today, All India Football Federation (AIFF) vice-president and convener of NEPL Ankur Dutta said AIFF has already given the go ahead signal to the organisers. Dutta said he had submitted the proposal and AIFF agreed to the concept.

After getting the green signal, he approached the Kolkata based CMG, which was instrumental in bringing Maradona and Argentina-Venezuela international soccer friendly to Kolkata, which readily agreed to support the NEPL.

Presenting the whole project, CMG managing director, Bhaskar Goswami said it will be an eight team event.

Apart from top teams of the seven States, the second best team of the region will be picked for the championship which will last for nine weeks during which 61 matches will be played, informed Goswami.

All the teams will play in home and away basis. After the league phase among two groups, top two teams will qualify for the semifinals. No official teams like ASEB, Assam Police, etc., will be allowed as the participating teams have to be private clubs.

The vision behind the competition is to give exposure to the talented players of this region as all the matches will be telecast live. Players and teams will also be benefited with lucrative offers.

Goswami further mentioned that teams may include three overseas players and it will be mandatory to put six players of U-21 years.

The NEPL is likely to start after the ongoing I-League which is scheduled to be completed by March next. Goswami clarified that the tournament will be run by a governing council and no State associations or clubs will be allowed to conduct the matches.

Dima Hasao Concern Over Naga Supra State

Silchar, Nov 23 : Dimasa organizations in Assam's Dima Hasao district have expressed concern over the demand for a supra state body by the NSCN (IM).

Jadike Naiso Hosom (JNH), the apex body of Dimasas, said on Tuesday,"We have come to understand that Nagas have been offered a supra state body in Naga inhabited areas of Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. If the demand is fulfilled, parts of Dima Hasao district of Assam will also be included in the supra state body. It will only create new problems in the area and will cause a threat to people belonging to Dimasa and other non-Naga communities living here. It will have serious implications on mutual co-existence of different communities in the region," said a statement signed by JNH publicity secretary Dhoneswar Batari.

JNH urged the government not to succumb to the demand of the NSCN (IM). The Dimasa apex body also called upon the people of Assam to keep vigil along all the areas bordering Nagaland so that neither the Centre nor Nagas can indulge in any misadventure.

"Assam should not give away an inch of its land to the proposed supra state body. People of the state as well as the government must take care of it," the JNH said.

Sources said Nagas are the second largest community in Dima Hasao district after Dimasas. NSCN (IM) has been spreading a propaganda that the Centre has given them the assurance of forming a supra state body, an arrangement for cultural integrity of the Nagas living in this region, to come as a Christmas gift to Nagas.

All Dimasa Students Union (ADSU), a powerful body in Dima Hasao, has strongly reacted to the supra state body issue as well. ADSU said Dimasas should oppose the idea for the sake of the existence of the community in the region.

The students' body said Dima Hasao is already going through ethnic conflicts and there is a complicated law and order situation in the region. Therefore any decision on supra state body for Nagas will lead to a sharp and widespread public agitation.

"No one is consulted about the arrangement except the NSCN (IM). The government should bring out a white paper on the issue before going for any arrangement," the ADSU said.