The name AR Rahman is a synonym to good music. But any idea what makes the music composer to consistently come out with quality outputs for more than two decades? Well, Rahman himself has spilled the beans.

“Nature inspires me to compose good music. The good things in life, personalities inspire me. Then you realize how many people want something different and want pure things, my music is for them,” said Rahman.

The Oscar-Grammy winner said this in New Delhi recently, where he launched National Award winning sound engineer KJ Singh’s independent album Asli Music.

“Many things drive good music. We are composing music for young people to come into theaters to watch the film, that music is serving a different purpose,” Rahman said.

He added: “Music is a nice hiding place for me from reality; it helps me escape and be myself.”

Article source: http://www.indiaglitz.com/channels/malayalam/article/80910.html

Jaswin is one among thousands of children in the state born with chronic heart failure. Puliyinam Vithyathil Jose, his father who is a painter by profession, was finding it hard to amass money for the treatment of his child. It was then that some friends advised him to approach Care and share. And the child who was under treatment of Dr. Stigy Joseph for an year at the Angamali Little flower hospital, underwent surgery last week with the aid of the foundation . After the successful operation,  Cardio Thoracic surgeon Dr K A Rafeeq and his team of eminent doctors has made it sure that the child will not suffer any kind of related diseases in future.

Speaking on the occasion, the C M opined that ‘Hridayasparsham’ is a wise initiative, a perfect plan for all who like to do similar humanitarian activities in the society. He also expressed his satisfaction that the project has been able to support so much of people from different strata of the society and help them to get back to normal life.

Though Jaswin’s case was the 150th successful operation sponsored by Care and Share, 3000 applications are still pending at their office to be resolved. Care and share officials Shri K Muraleedharan, and M D father Thomas Kurian Marottipuzha explains that they are  trying to provide help to the maximum at the earliest.  The foundation is also running a few more projects, ‘Vidhyamritham-for helping the economically backward students for higher education with  scholarships ,and  Vazhikkatty-  a project that is aimed to prevent children from using drugs and related consumables. Those who are in need of immediate treatment for heart related ailments can contact the foundation in P B No.1755, Cochin 18.

Article source: http://www.indiaglitz.com/channels/malayalam/article/80922.html

After a decade,popular  character actor and president of AMMA,  Innocent is once again turning a hero for the movie titled as ‘Dr.Innocent aanu”.  Scheduled to reach the theatres by the 20th of this month, the humorous flick will have Sona Nair playing the heroine. Also featuring the majority of comedy stars of Mollywood including  Jagathy, Suraj, Biju Kuttan ,Lalu Alex, Koattayam Nazeer, Mamukoya, Sasi Kalinga and  Jaffer Idukki in other important roles, the movie is cinematographed by Anandakuttan. The movie  will also  be the debut venture of Santhosh Varma as a music director. Produced by Saseendra varma in the banner of  Varma film Corporation, ‘Dr.Innocent aanu” directed by Ajmal will be brought to theatres by Red rose release.

Article source: http://www.indiaglitz.com/channels/malayalam/article/80929.html

Mollywood makers are in the lookout for every type of innovative methods to satisfy the ever demanding viewers. The latest attempt is the first underwater song shot for a Malayalam movie. The makers of movie ‘has hired top technicians to shoot the song ‘Kaatharamam Mizhi” sung by Kaarthik and K S Chithra for the movie, that is captured with the Govind Padmasuriya and Jimy lipsynking under water.Vinod Vijayan called the shots for this underwater song captured by Top Notch cameras by technicians of Annanberg centre of Los Angeles. This is the first time in the history of cinema that such a lengthy song is shot for a Mollywood movie. The movie makers have also approached the Limca Book of Records for claiming the world record for this rare feat.

Directed by Kanakaraghavan ‘ the first schedule shoot of  ttekaal second (8 second) ‘is almost complete. The movie featuring Janaardhanan, Urmila Unni, Vijayaraghavan, Suraj Venjaaramoodu and Kollam Thulasi  is produced by Fifth element films.

Article source: http://www.indiaglitz.com/channels/malayalam/article/80933.html

Article source: http://www.indiaglitz.com/channels/malayalam/article/80931.html

“Put in place a strong tobacco control programme, initiate sexual health education to prevent sexually transmitted cancers like cervical and oral, encourage vaccination, conduct mammography and screening of vulnerable women for breast cancer and those above the age of 50, start screening for and vaccination against Hepatitis B that causes liver cancer and create centralized systems modelled on comprehensive cancer centres in the US that allow researchers to share data and engage in high quality clinical work,” says Mukherjee.

It’s simple and achievable advice. But as he says, “The will of the highest authorities is crucial.” Currently an assistant professor of medicine at Columbia University, Mukherjee studied in St Columba’s School before becoming a Rhodes scholar. With degrees from Stanford University, Oxford and Harvard Medical School, he feels sad when somebody refers to effective and affordable cancer prevention and care as synonymous with the first world.

“There are perfectly achievable goals in cancer treatment for all countries including India. Cervical cancer is initiated by a virus and is a completely preventable disease by vaccination and changes in sexual practice, which is highly achievable in India. Minimizing tobacco use will cut down lung cancer cases while routine mammography can diagnose and treat breast cancer early. None of these prevention mechanisms are complicated. The will of larger authorities is crucial,” Mukherjee says.

But why is India suddenly reporting such a massive spurt in cancer cases — 10 lakh new patients every year and four lakh deaths?

“Ageing of course. Also, early and accurate diagnosis is helping attribute the exact cause of death that didn’t happen before. Environmental carcinogens too are playing a major role. Increase in tobacco smoking is another major determinant,” says Mukherjee.

Calling cancer the next big frontier of medicine, Mukherjee explains cancer is not one disease but many diseases that share a common biological principle — a cell that has lost control and is dividing abnormally. “Ultimately it’s a gene that lives inside us unlike a virus. The challenge, therefore, is how to kill the cancer cells while sparing the normal cells before the former invades the organs and destroys their function.”

Admitting a kind of nihilism that has risen around cancer in India upsets him, Mukherjee adds, “The oncologists here are exceptional. Visiting AIIMS is a moving experience. The kind of work being done in a place that does not have much resources to start with is unbelievable. The volume of patients is enormous despite which doctors show so such compassion. Surgeons operating in less than ideal circumstances and yet being able to deliver is very impressive. So there is no lack of committed medical staff. What is required are some alterations in policy.”

Mukherjee’s book, which took six years to write, documents eloquently a disease humans have lived with — and perished from — for more than 5,000 years. From the Persian Queen Atossa, whose Greek slave cut off her malignant breast, to the 19th century recipient of primitive radiation and chemotherapy and Mukherjee’s own leukemia patient, Carla, “The Emperor of All Maladies” is about the people who have soldiered through toxic, bruising and draining regimes to survive and to increase the store of human knowledge.

So, what is his next work going to be on? “Culture and history through the eye of medicine maybe,” Mukherjee concludes.

Source:Times of India

ടൂര്‍ണമെന്റില്‍ ഇന്ത്യന്‍ പോരാട്ടം പത്താംസ്ഥാനത്തിലൊതുങ്ങിയെങ്കിലും മൂന്ന് ടീമുകളെ തോല്‍പിക്കാന്‍ സാധിച്ചു. ഓസ്ത്രേലിയ, ന്യൂസിലാന്‍ഡ്, ഫിജി എന്നീ ടീമുകളെയാണ് തോല്‍പിച്ചത്. മല്‍സരത്തിനുശേഷം പൂര്‍ണിമ കഴിഞ്ഞ ദിവസം നാട്ടിലെത്തി. മാതൃഭൂമി ജീവനക്കാരനായ തിരുവള്ളൂരിലെ മുരളീധരന്റെയും ഈസ്റ്റ് യു.പി സ്കൂള്‍ അധ്യാപിക ശ്യാമളയുടെയും മകളാണ്. തലശേãരി സായി സെന്ററിലെ ബാലചന്ദ്രന്റെ ശിക്ഷണത്തിലാണ് പരിശീലനം തുടങ്ങിയത്. കഴിഞ്ഞ മെയ് മാസം ക്വാലാലമ്പൂരില്‍ നടന്ന ഏഷ്യന്‍ യൂത്ത് വോളിയിലും പൂര്‍ണിമ ഇന്ത്യക്കുവേണ്ടി കളിച്ചിരുന്നു. സെന്റര്‍ ബ്ലോക്കറാണ് പൊസിഷന്‍. 2009^10 രാജസ്ഥാനില്‍ നടന്ന ദേശീയ വോളി ചാമ്പ്യന്‍ഷിപ്പിലെ ഏറ്റവും മികച്ച കളിക്കാരിയായി തെരഞ്ഞെടുക്കപ്പെട്ടിരുന്നു. ഇപ്പോള്‍ തലശേãരി ബ്രണ്ണന്‍ കോളജിലെ പ്ലസ് ടു വിദ്യാര്‍ഥിനിയാണ്.

To have proper appreciation of the magnitude of Sree Narayana’s achievements, it is necessary to understand the background of the social conditions in which he was born and brought up. Kerala, reputed for its natural beauty and richness of life, was alas, the accursed land of caste tyranny at that time; to such an extent that it was really a “lunatic asylum” as Swami Vivekananda branded it. The non-caste Hindus, the “Avarnas” were groaning under the terrible weight of social, economic, religious and political oppression imposed upon them by caste Hindus or “Savarnas”. Not only temples of God but temples of learning were also shut against them by twin weapons of untouchability and unapproachability. They had to toil hard for their caste-Hindu masters with hardly any reward. They had to suffer a multitude of disabilities that broke the very backbone of their life.

Numerically Ezhavas or Thiyyas are the largest non-caste Hindu community in Kerala. Sree Narayana was born into a middle class family of this community. His parents, ‘Madan Asan’ and ‘Kutty Amma’ endearingly called him ‘Nanu’. At the age of five, he began his education in the neighboring school in the old “Gurukula” model. After his elementary education in this school, he became the disciple of a great Sanskrit scholar ‘Raman Pillai Asan’ of Puthuppally in Central Travancore. Under his master’s tutelage, he became well versed in Sanskrit classics. For some time he too functioned as an ‘Asan’, a teacher of infant pupils. Thus he came to be known as ‘Nanu Asan’.
Nanu, even from his boyhood had an ascetic bent of mind. When he was on the threshold of his youth, he had to undergo the ceremonial of a marriage due to parental pressure. But he never led a married life. Sree Narayana’s mind was always agitated by a spiritual urge that induced him along with a fellow-spiritualist renowned as ‘Chattampi Swami’, to become the disciple of a man named Ayyavu, the then Superintendent of the British Residency in Trivandrum from whom he learned Yoga. At the age of twenty-three he left his family, renounced the pleasures of his world and wandered about as an “avadhutha” or mendicant, keeping his body and soul together by the alms he received from all sorts of people. Soon human eyes detected the “Sanyasin” and devotees began to gather around him at Aruvippurm, the seat of his meditation.

They participated in his prayers and spiritual learning. In due course the sage emerged from his retreat and like Buddha, came out to shed light onto a world of darkness. Thus began his crusade against social inequality and other iniquities.

In those days, the foundation and consecration of a Hindu temple was the exclusive monopoly of the Brahmins. Sree Narayana’s first revolutionary act was the challenge thrown against this monopoly, by him consecrating temples. The first in this line was the temple dedicated to Shiva in Aruvippuram in 1888 A.D. In the temple is inscribed in Malayalam the following ideal, which epitomizes the Sree Narayana creed. “This is the ideal place Where all live in full harmony Without distinction of Caste or prejudice of Creed”.

The people of the Ezhava community were the first to be awakened by the teachings of Sree Narayana and to be inspired into a spirit of mass militancy to eradicate their social disabilities. This was partly because the great Guru was born in that community and partly because the Ezhavas constituted the largest single community among the downtrodden masses in Kerala. Thanks to Sree Narayana, the Ezhavas came to have their own temples on the model of caste-Hindu temples that denied them admission, and in their temples they could worship the deities until then monopolized by caste Hindus. Within a few years Sree Narayana established a multitude of temples all over Kerala. The temples at Vakkom, Kulathur and Kovalam in south Travancore area, at Cherai, Koorkancherry and Peringottukara in Cochin area, and Tellicherry, Cannanore and Calicut in the Malabar area of Kerala State and Mangalore in Karnataka state are some of the most celebrated among these temples. It is significant that the history of founding of Temples by Sree Narayana was a process of evolution through which he slowly prepared the minds of the masses in the progressive realization of more and more revolutionary ideas. First he founded the temples dedicated to Shiva in the caste-Hindu pattern. Then in 1912 he made a departure from this when the temple dedicated to ‘Sharada’, the goddess of learning was founded at Varkala, thereby including the ideal of the worship of knowledge. Revolutionary changes were also introduced in the traditional rituals and ceremonials to be observed in temples. The next milestone in the path of his reform was the foundation of a temple in Murikkumpuzha near Trivandrum in 1922, where, in the place of a deity a bright light revealing the words “Truth, Duty, Kindness, Love” was installed. The climax of his temple reform was the installation of a mirror for worship in the temple founded at Kalavancode in Sherthallai. The mirror is symbolic of Sree Narayana’s teachings that man should find his salvation not in lifeless deities but in himself by the development and utilization of his inner self.

Long before the Temple Entry Proclamation of the Travancore government in 1936 whereby government temples were thro wn open to all Hindus, the temples established by Sree Narayana had become the asylum for worship, of the ‘lowlier of the lowliest’. Sree Narayana’s temples made no discrimination on the ground of caste, or creed. Unlike caste Hindu temples, they were open to both Hindus and non-Hindus.

Sree Narayana was a true “rishi” who lived with the people and for the people. He knew that without providing material comforts, it is futile to hold out the illusion of spiritual happiness to the starving and suffering millions. So he conducted a veritable campaign to eradicate the material disabilities of the downtrodden sections of Hindus. In 1903, Dr. P. Palpu, a devotee of Sree Narayana, founded a social organization called S.N.D.P Yogam (Sree Narayana Dharma Paripalana Yogam), the organization to promote the Dharma of Sree Narayana. This organization has done invaluable service in the epic struggle against caste system in Kerala. The organizers of S.N.D.P made Sree Narayana as its first President. The first General Secretary of S.N.D.P Yogam was Kumaran Asan, the peerless pioneer among modern Malayalam poets. He was one of the dedicated disciples of Sree Narayana. In fact the spiritual philosophy and the crusade against caste that illumine Kumaran Asan’s poetry were inspired mainly by association with and inspiration from the great Guru. Sree Narayana never went about preaching. He was essentially a ‘Karma Yogi’. But his ‘silence eloquent’, the inner light that emanated from his resplendent personality, inspired and enlightened all around him, wherever he went. He traveled throughout and outside. Wherever he went, he earned disciples and devotees in large numbers. In 1928 he founded the “Dharma Sangha”, an order of Sanyasins who were expected to be his true disciples. The members of this order were to propagate and perpetuate the teachings of Guru. Early in 1921 an All Kerala Fraternity Conference was held at Alwaye, and in this conference was delivered his eternal message “One Caste, One Religion, One God for Mankind”. In the wake of this conference Guru’s illustrious disciple K. Ayyappan started the “Sahodhara” (Brotherhood) movement in Cherai, his native place, to eradicate the caste system by promoting inter-caste marriage and inter-dining. Sahodharan Ayyappan braved formidable opposition from the reactionary elements, mostly from his own community-the Ezhavas. But inspired by the teachings and blessings of Sree Narayana, Sahodharan Ayyappan conducted a mammoth campaign to create a casteless society in Kerala. His tireless work went a long way to mitigate the rigors of the caste system in his country.
Sree Narayana founded two Ashrams, at Varkala and Alwaye, with educational institutions attached to them. These Ashrams remain the centers of purity and universal fraternity, the ideals, which the Guru greatly cherished and nourished. Sree Narayana did not attempt to found a new religion, but he propounded a great creed, the creed of “Universal Goodness”.

Like Sree Shankara, Sree Narayana was a profound thinker, a great seer and a born poet. He was also a great scholar in Sanskrit and Tamil. He has been the author of many works in Malayalam and Sanskrit, which are “Atmopadesa Sathakam” and “Darsanamala” which epitomize his great moral and spiritual precepts. He has also beautifully translated Tamil works like “Thirukkural” and “Ozhuvilotukkam” into Malayalam. In his works he has superbly expounded the ‘Advaita’ philosophy. ‘Daiva Dasakam’ a simple prayer written by Guru.

Sree Narayana is one of those rare men whose greatness was recognized even while they were alive. No better testimony is needed for this than the fact that Rabindranath Tagore and Mahatma Gandhi had visited and paid respects to him. Tagore, when he visited Kerala in 1922, interviewed the Guru and was deeply impressed that he remarked-

“Among the ‘Paramahamsas’ alive in India now, there is none Who has lived such a life of purity as Swami Sree Narayana”.

When Mahatma Gandhi visited Sree Narayana in 1923, there was a heart-to-heart exchange of ideas between them and in their dialogue Sree Narayana made no secret of his strong feelings, about the need to eradicate the caste system root and branch.

The last great conference, which was convened at the behest of Sree Narayana, was the “All Religious Conference”, the Parliament of religions held at Alwaye in 1924. In this conference where eminent representatives of all great religions assembled, Sree Narayana proclaimed that the conference was convened “Not to argue and win but to know and to make known”. In a message which he delivered at the conference, he said ‘This great Parliament of religions makes it abundantly clear that the ultimate goal of all religions is same and so there is no need for followers of different religions to indulge in mutual conflict.”

The great Guru Sree Narayana attained Samadhi on September 20, 1928. Thus physically Guru disappeared, but spiritually he lives forever in the minds of mankind.