Sex worker elected twice as ward councillor in Muzaffarpur

A sex worker turned politician and was twice elected as the ward councillor of Bihar's Muzaffarpur district. Rani Begum has now put her past behind and is working towards a better future for people like her. "Initially, I faced difficulties working in the society. But gradually, when people saw my work they starting accepting me," Rani Begum said.

With determination and an unrelenting spirit, Rani Begum has exorcised her past ghosts, mostly following her marriage to a local resident. Begum, who also has two children from him, is now trying to improve the lives of others like her.

Rani Begum is grateful to her friends who funded her political plunge. Now she ensures that their voices and issues are heard. Rani today is the voice of more than 20,000 residents of the area, mostly sex workers or pimps. It's because of her initiative that slowly the lives of residents are also changing for good.

Rani Begum has started vocational programs for kids, especially the girl child so that they are not sucked into this profession. Though she lost the race of becoming the lady mayor of the city, she has certainly made a place for herself in the hearts of its people.

US-based linguist discovers a new dialect in Bihar

Mohammad Warsi, who teaches linguistics and Indian languages at the Washington University in St. Louis, said the main language for communication in Darbhanga, Madhubani, Samastipur, Begusarai and Muzaffarpur, is Maithili. But when Muslims speak among themselves, they speak a dialect that is different from Maithili, Hindi, and Urdu.

This dialect does not have its own script or literature, he said.

This might be the reason that this dialect went unnoticed to linguists so far, said Warsi, who is a recipient of James E. McLeod Faculty Recognition Award for 2012.

While doing a comparative study, Warsi said he found that this new dialect is completely different from Hindi, Urdu, and Maithli and their verb conjugation and sentence structure, is quite different from each other.

For example "We are going" would be rendered  "hum jaa rahain hain" in Hindi, "hum jaay  rahal chhii" in Maithli and "hum jaa rahain hain" in Urdu sentence. But in the new dialect it would be: "ham jaa rahaliya hae". Also, there is no agentive marker "-ne" in Mithilanchal Urdu.

Only one second person pronoun "tu" is used in the new dialect instead of "tu, tum and aap".

From these examples, it is clear that the verb conjugation in the new dialect is completely different from that of Hindi, Urdu, and Maithli, Warsi said.

Warsi, a native of Darbhanga district in Bihar has given the nomenclature of 'Mithilanchal Urdu' to this dialect.

"Language does not have any boundaries, nor is it dependent on any boundary," he said.

"Dialects are the contact languages of particular regions, and they have a deep impact on their cultural heritage," he said. "Slowly with time these dialects begin to take shape of languages."

The convergence of a dialect into a language is a symbol and pride of the people who speak it, Warsi said suggesting the inclusion of the new dialect in a recently initiated nationwide linguistic survey.

65-yr-old principal of Mahendra Das College in Gopalganj marries student

A 60-year-old college principal of Mahendra Das College in Gopalganj eloped and got married to his student, which has enraged the students of the college. The irked student unions staged protests outside the college and burned the effigy of the principal. They said that they want the dismissal of the principal.

The principal – Ramdular Das became close to intermediate student – Nibha, who was a studying in his college. He also promoted her as a professor before marrying her.

The principal eloped with the girl and married her in a temple in Gorakhpur on January 16, just to disappear again. The students and other faculty of the college came to know when they returned to the college on January 21.

Surprisingly, Ramdular Das says that, “Getting married at the age of 65 is not right”, adding that “I will continue with my saintly life as I was leading before.”

Nibha said, “I think our marriage was destined. I respected him a lot before we tied the knot and will continue respecting him.”

The incident has left the students and faculty of Mahendra Das College enraged and they say that it is simply unacceptable. The leader of the student union said, “We demand his ouster from our college. If needed, we will not refrain from going on strike.”

Bihar clings to a tenuous win

 There was a scare last October of a suspected polio-virus case in Bihar. To everyone’s relief, the World Health Organisation (WHO) confirmed it to be negative. After a prolonged struggle, Bihar has managed to keep itself polio-free for two consecutive years.

After a sharp spike in the number of cases in 2007 to 503, from 61 in 2006, there was a marked decline. In 2008, 2009 and 2010, the number of cases was 233, 117 and 9 respectively. For 2011 and 2012, not a single case was found, as per official data.

“It was a very difficult fight,” said N.K. Sinha, State Immunisation Officer. “We used Arjuna’s strategy and focussed fully on polio.”

Two important factors that worked well for the polio campaigns were the involvement of women around 2006 and of Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) and Anganwadi workers.

“The idea behind getting women in the two-member immunisation teams was access to the house. Some Muslim pockets don’t allow male members. We began with two male-member teams, which later became one male-one female and finally only-women teams, barring in remote and sensitive areas,” he said.

Naxals abduct eight labourers in Bihar

Naxalites abducted eight persons engaged in a road bridge construction in a village in Bihar's Jamui district, police said today.

Superintendent of police of Jamui Upendra Sharma said that a group of Naxalites swooped on Badaldiah village and abducted eight labourers engaged in road bridge construction work late last night.

The labourers were working in a road bridge construction work on Nawada-Jamui road from, the SP said. District police team has rushed to the village to rescue the abducted persons.

Bihar government firm on 75 per cent school attendance

In state run schools in Bihar, students will now have to show up with at least 75 per cent attendance for claiming money meant for procuring cycle, dress and that of scholarship.

The Nitish Kumar led NDA government has been providing cycles , dress and even books to school children, a move which encouraged the parents to send their wards to school. Such an incentive policy for doling out direct cash subsidy to the beneficiaries was widely appreciated and even emulated by other states.

But in a new move, the incentives ranging from cycle to dress and books will be admissible to only those students whose attendance will not be less than 75 per cent.

"It will be a mandatory prescription. We found from a survey that 85 per cent teachers are present in schools. But we will also have to make sure that enrolled students also went to schools. The presence of enrolled children was less" the chief minister Nitish Kumar said in Patna.

The state government has also launched an campaign for doling out cash subsidy for cycle , dress and even scholarship amount. The government hopes to disburse nearly Rs 2800 crore by this month end by way of incentives to students . But this time the government has enforced a rider of 75 per cent school attendance for availing the incentives, a decision which has not gone done well with a section of guardians.

Marine training institute proposed in Bihar

A marine training institution has sought 15 acres land from the state government to open a centre in Patna.

"We have sought 15 acres from Bihar Industrial Area Development Authority for opening a centre here in a bid to make Bihar a supplier of seafarers in the country as well as abroad," founder director of Pentagon Maritime Training and Research Institute Nalin B Pandey told reporters.

The group owns two marine companies – Pentagon Shipping and Logistics in Singapore and Pentagon Marine Service in Mumbai. Pandey said the company would invest Rs 10 crore for starting the institute, which would begin functioning within an year of getting the land from the state government.

The aim, he said, was to open employment opportunity for youths of the state in the field of marine. There were roughly 30,000 people in the country joining the marine sector at present out of which about 7,000 are from Bihar.

By opening the training centre here, the institute would cater to the students of neighbouring  Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Uttrakhand and Odisha, besides Bihar itself, he said. Pandey said the institute would offer three courses - Marine Engineering, Nautical Science and general purpose rating at low cost. While the first course would be of four years, the second of 3 years and the last for a year.

The courses would cost between Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 6 lakh. Experts in marine engineering from Italy, Canada and Singapore in addition to those from within the country would be invited to conduct classes for the students. Campus recruitment would also be organised by inviting leading marine companies of the country, he added.