Stemade in Times of India
1
* THE TIMES OF INDIA, CHENNAI MONDAY, JULY 14, 2014 4 TIMES CITY VIEW FROM THE TOP: Clouds gather over the evening landscape in the city S L Shanth Kumar No license to screen The late timing of World Cup football matches came as a dampener for clubs which have screened sporting events like IPL cricket matches on giant screens so that patrons can enjoy the game over dinner. As patrons did not want to stay back so late and drive back home, clubs started to screen matches only after getting confirmations. One club had to cancel its plans to screen the match after only four of its members responded to an email asking whether they would be interested in watching the final match between Germany and Argentina. Star hotels and pubs which have licenses to serve liquor round the clock made the most of these matches by screening special sessions. Up in smoke Passengers and motorists who drove down to Central on Saturday evening were in for a surprise when they saw smoke coming out from behind Central. People at first thought the railway station was on fire but then got puzzled because everything looked normal and people were going about their work as usual. Many rushed in to check but then realised that it was the smoke from SBI building that was on fire at Parrys. Metro rail workers and autorickshaw drivers had a lot of explaining to do for motorists who stopped to ask about the situation. Not free for all A few employees at an office realised that they were getting signals of a WiFi package of a phone inside their workplace. They asked around to find out and alert the owner but could not trace him because there were numerous people on the floor and they did not suspect that signals would travel far. But on the contrary, a few colleagues started using the WiFi, assuming it was from an adjacent building. A month and many downloads and app updates later, a colleague who sat in a far corner of the floor told his peers that he had got a huge bill running up to more than `5,000 for usage. Checks revealed that the ID shown against the hotspot was his. It was then that they spilled the beans. Though all laughed it off, it taught the professional a lesson. Now, he is checking his bill to find out whether any of his neighbours have also been using his ‘free’ WiFi. Money or nothing A tragedy can bring out the best and the worst in humans, they say. During the building collapse in Porur, while there were many locals bringing in food for rescue workers or the police handing out buttermilk packets to everyone toiling in the sun, there was also a group of people who were trying to make the most of a tragedy. On the second day of the rescue operations, this reporter came across three people who claimed to be Shantha Kumari's husband. Shantha Kumari was one of the first people who was found dead. Even before there was any announcement about compensation from the government, a few of them had thought that money would be on its way and that it would be an handsome sum. One just hopes the real husband got the compensation. Sanjay or Sanjeev? What’s in a name? A lot. Union minister of women and child development Maneka Sanjay Gandhi seemed a bit disturbed when a speaker pronounced her husband’s name erroneously at a book launch held in the city recently. While giving an introductory speech, the speaker said ‘Maneka Sanjeev Gandhi’. Thinking that it might be a slip of the tongue, the minister remained silent when it happened first. But after the speaker repeatedly said ‘Sanjeev’ instead of Sanjay, Maneka pointed out the mistake. Fortunately, she neither created a scene nor discussed the matter with those who shared the dais with her. Instead, when the speaker ended her address , Maneka politely told her about the error. Apparently, the speaker was not aware of the mistake she made. (Contributed by V Ayyappan, Karthikeyan Hemalatha and M T Saju ) CITY LIGHTS C Suresh Kumar Priya.Menon@timesgroup.com W hen Seema Kumar had her baby, umbilical cord stem cell banking was unheard of. Eager to preserve the stem cells of her daughter Tejal as it may help her medically in the future, she scoured the net for more information. And that is when she read about dental stem cell banking. “I realised that we could get stem cells from teeth, so I contacted my den- tist and banked her milk tooth in March this year,” says the 36-year-old, who is an associate professor at NIFT. While um- bilical cord stem cell banking has been popular, many are slowly discovering the advantages of banking teeth. “There is less awareness about bank- ing dental stem cells but it is catch- ing on,” says Dr M S Muthu of Pedo Planet, a children’s dental centre that has four branches. “So far, about five people have come to me to bank their child’s tooth,” he adds. Vashali Surana recently banked her 10-year-old son Sa- haj’s milk tooth. “There was no awareness about stem cells when I had my sons, so when I heard about banking teeth I wanted to do it,” says the 36-year- old. Stemade Biotech, a private dental stem cell bank, which has its laboratory in Chennai, gets teeth from all over the country. “We launched in 2011 and now have a presence in 30 cities,” says manag- ing director Shailesh Gadre. “We have partnered with 700 dentists across the country, and trained them to collect teeth in specially designed containers, which is then transported to our lab near Tam- baram in Chennai.” Banking stem cells have many ben- efits as they can be used to treat many diseases in the future. There are two types of stem cells — embryonic cells that come from embryos three to five days old and adult cells. “There are ethical issues with taking embryonic cells; adult cells, however, can be col- lected without a problem,” says Gadre. Adult cells are also of two types — haematopoietic, which can be used to treat blood-related diseases and mesen- chymal cells that can be used to treat tissue and organ-related diseases. The latter can be obtained from many parts of the body, including the bone marrow. “However, it involves invasive proce- dures. But stem cells are present in the pulp inside teeth and you can get them from even milk teeth, provided you ex- tract it just before it falls,” says Gadre. Children usually have 20 milk teeth that begin falling from the age of seven to 13. “In the case of cord blood, you have only one opportunity, at the time of de- liver, but in the case of teeth, you have multiple opportunities,” says Dr Muthu. The finest dental pulp stem cells are found in baby teeth or milk teeth Though stem cells can be extracted from any healthy tooth, it is also often taken from wisdom teeth and during orthodontic treatment. “Often people don’t have enough space in the jaw to accommodate all their teeth so wisdom teeth are removed,” says paediatric dental surgeon Dr Vinodh Kumar, who runs Kids and Family Den- tal Care. “Sometimes even 28 teeth can- not be accommodated so teeth will be misaligned. We take two teeth out and align the remaining teeth with the help of wires and brackets. These teeth can be banked.” According to him, these stem cells can be used to treat a range of diseases, including eye disorders. Cost is, how- ever, a deterrent. “We get a lot of enquir- ies but it costs about `1 lakh,” says Dr Muthu. To attract customers stem cell banks are now offering EMI options. Some people also don’t mind cough- ing up the money. “We save up and invest for our child’s future. And this is a kind of medical insurance that I hope will never be used,” says Seema. Missed banking baby’s cord cells? SAVE MILK TEETH INSTEAD Parents Save Stem Cells From Teeth To Treat Future Illnesses FACE VALUE Dental stem cells are found in the dental pulp, the soft tissue inside a tooth Stem cells from milk teeth are ‘mesenchymal’ type of cells — cells that have the ability to generate a wide variety of cell types like chondrocytes, osteoblasts and adipocytes. Chondrocytes, osteoblasts and adipocytes are cells have the ability to generate cartilage, bones and adipose tissue that store energy as fat In essence, dental stem cells can generate solid structures of the body such as bone, cartilage and muscle New research suggests the potential to regen- erate nerves. This is being studied further for use in dentistry and medicine What are stem cells? Stem cells are the body’s raw materi- als — cells from which other cells with spe- cialised func- tions are generated Under the right conditions in the body or a laboratory, stem cells divide to form more cells called daughter cells These daughter cells either become new stem cells (self- renewal) or specialised cells like blood cells, brain cells, heart muscle or bone Dental pulp Stem cells Source: Mayo Clinic, Stemade Biotech The finest dental pulp stem cells are found in baby teeth or milk teeth Graphics by Varghese Kallada Dental stem cells DENTISTS COLLECT TEETH IN SPECIALLY DESIGNED CONTAINERS, WHICH ARE TRANSPORTED TO OUR LAB... ADULT CELLS, CAN BE COLLECTED WITHOUT ANY ETHICAL ISSUES Shailesh Gadre | MD, STEMADE BIOTECH T he Chennai building collapse, which has taken a huge toll, is a wake-up call for our lawmak- ers and municipal and plan- ning administrators. This was not an illegal building being constructed clandes- tinely in a congested part of an old city – this was a completely new construc- tion in an area planned by Chennai Metropolitan De- velopment Authority. That’s why it’s even more disturb- ing and highlights the loop- holes in law. We don’t have a law that regulates civil and structur- al engineers. This allows anyone who possesses a di- ploma or a degree in civil en- gineering to design the structure of a building. The distinction between those who are trained to design and those who should be only supervising construction gets blurred. You need to know how to evaluate soil structure, seismic condi- tions and a lot more. Only a post-graduate education can make a difference. Most mu- nicipal bodies, however, al- low unqualified persons to do the job. The job of a construction supervisor is also unregulat- ed – not even a municipal li- cence is required. So, what you get are glorified masons, without any formal skills) or diploma holders who have no working skills. Our municipal laws do not fix any professional re- sponsibility for the various skills required for such a complex building activity. So, while unregulated per- sons are allowed to design structures and even electri- cal and other building com- ponents, they cannot be held to account. The municipal bodies simply wink at this because municipal govern- ance in the country is found- ed on corruption. What compounds the problem is that neither re- cords of the design process- es, nor drawings are stored anywhere. Neither designers nor municipalities have any sys- tem of recording simple data like what load a building has been designed for or how much water or power it will consume. And at the bottom of this huge mess is the moribund state of our architectural and engineering education. Colleges have mushroomed in every district without ade- quately trained teachers. These degree shops turn out graduates who have no knowledge of their subjects, just a piece of paper to show at the end of four to five years in the classroom. It’s no won- der then that the responsibil- ity which comes with such a professional degree escapes them. The lack of a real estate regulator, of course, is the last nail in the coffin. There is no one to protect the con- sumer against unscrupu- lous builders and ensure that all laws related to con- struction of buildings are followed. In this particular case, the person who had pro- jected himself as the build- ing’s architect was not one. The architect who signed the drawings probably did not perform the statutory pro- fessional duties with any dil- igence. And nothing is known about the design or construction engineers. So, the result is an un- avoidable tragedy of grave proportions. How many times will we allow this to happen? (Sudhir Vohra is an architect and urban planner) Looking for the rot in the Chennai debris The Chennai case highlights loopholes in the law B A Raju Sudhir Vohra Chennai: There have been widespread reports of high levels of surveillance in the state, with officials, politicians and journalists being the target. During the previous DMK regime, the taped phone conversation between the then chief secretary L K Tripathy and a police offi- cial about the AIADMK chief J Jayala- lithaa’s assets case was leaked. Former social welfare minister Poongothai Ala- di Aruna resigned from the state cabi- net in 2008, two days after the tran- scripts of her conversation with a top vigilance official, pleading on behalf of her corrupt relative, were published in the media. There was much debate in the media at that time about the culture of surveillance in the state. Officials com- plained they felt that they were being watched all the time. In March 2011, AIADMK MPs demanded in Parlia- ment that the Prime Minister should or- der a probe against the alleged tapping of Jayalalithaa’s telephone by the DMK government. Meanwhile, sources said the SP who made the complaint was told by his ju- nior officials that his phone calls are be- ing scrutinized. “The SP was very upset with the developments. He had immedi- ately called a senior official in Chennai and reported the incident,” a highly place source told TOI. According to senior officials, the concerned SP also sent a written com- plaint to Ramanujam a few days back, in which he named the intelligence offi- cer who ordered the snooping. The mat- ter is under investigation now. A senior official in the police head- quarters in Chennai said an intelli- gence team has screened only the call list of the SP’s driver. “There was no phone tapping or surveillance of the SP. He has misunderstood what was hap- pening,” the official said. According to the com- plaint, a police vehicle has been misused for a long time in the dis- trict. The intelligence team considers the complaint as valid since it came from police circles. “The complaint made some strong allegations includ- ing the misuse of vehicle (for many days) against the driver of the SP. So we have instructed our team to monitor the driver’s movements,” officials in the in- telligence department said. They also added that the vehicle was captured by the closed circuit camera at the Toll pla- za in Salem many times in recent months. Senior cop says only driver’s call was screened Continued from Page 1 SNOOPING ROW Chennai: The city may soon see an in- crease in foreign tourist arrivals as the Union government has allowed citizens of 40 countries, including UK and coun- tries in Europe to apply for Indian visa online. Union budget has mentioned that e-visa will be accepted at nine air- ports in six months. Travel and tour organisers are up- beat that a major hurdle in attracting foreign tourists has been removed by the union government. The move is expect- ed to benefit foreign leisure travellers and MICE (meetings, incentives, confer- ence and exhibition) travellers who form a good percentage of travellers who come to Chennai. “Being the gateway for south India, a large number of foreign tourists arrive in Chennai and travel by road, rail or flights to other states for leisure and business. The government’s move will see a surge in foreign arrivals at the air- port,” said an Airports Authority of In- dia official. Travel and tour operators were fac- ing a lot of trouble because the hassle of applying for a visa was putting off many travellers. “We have lost a lot of delegates for important conferences because they could not get the visa on time. Many have written angry letters to us about the hassle in applying for visa at the In- dian embassy. There are long queues, lots of processes, forms and other trou- bles which many distinguished experts did not want to go through to come and attend a conference,” said M K Ajith Ku- mar of Asia Pacific Tours. He also said that applying for a tour- ist visa was easy while a visa to attend a conference or a meeting in India used to take time. “This is unjustified because there is no way immigration is going to find out if a foreigner who arrives on tourist visa attends a conference or meets experts from his field in India af- ter reaching here.” Tour operators now feel that the e-vi- sa facility and recognising Goa as a con- ference destination would do a lot of benefits for MICE tourism. Foreign tourist arrivals have increased. Tamil Nadu stands second with 3.99 million foreign tourist in the top 10 states that has attracted maximum number of travellers from abroad in 2013. “Majority of the travellers are those who visit Chennai as transit passengers and gets added as a visitor in the state,” said J Sethuraman, CEO, Travelxs Pri- vate, which specialises in inbound tour- ists. More tourists expected as e-visa to come into force TIMES NEWS NETWORK Chennai: The 51st annual book bank function of Rajasthan Youth Association was held at Kamaraj Memorial Hall on Sun- day. Rajendra Bokdia, president RYA said more than 2500 new ben- eficiaries had been added in 2014 and around 37,800 books were dis- tributed. The project has covered more than 87,500 students across the colleges in Chennai and Chengalpattu during the last 50 years. The text books include those of arts, commerce and engi- neering, he added. A free job fair for students in August was also announced dur- ing the event. Ajay Sancheti Member of Parliament, Rajya Sabha was the chief guest for the event. Assn’s book bank function held TIMES NEWS NETWORK Chennai: The corporation’s plans to decongest T Nagar seem to be stuck in a bottle- neck. Tenders will be floated for the `80 crore pedestrian plaza after World Bank re- leases funds for the project as part of giving the com- mercial hub a make-over. But corporation engineers are struggling to get traffic and parking facilities right. The plaza, meant to be a walkers’ paradise, will stretch from Panagal Park to Anna Salai, a distance of 1.4 kilometres. Engineers say it would be practical to first take up and complete the multi-level parking project that has also been proposed, in the same location, at Panagal Park. But senior officials of the corporation are reportedly keen to develop the plaza first as it would take only 6 months. The underground parking project is likely to take three years. “The primary problem is once work starts where will people park? Even on a nor- mal day it’s difficult to man- made fully underground. While officials and ground level engineers are pondering over how to han- dle heavy flow of road users, residents and commuters seem ready to put up with in- conveniences during con- struction. “Even when the Usman Road flyover was be- ing built we faced a lot of dif- ficulties,” says V S Jayara- man, resident of T Nagar. “But we benefit at the end of it. So the final result will give us a hassle free walking and shopping experience. Our only concern is that it has to be maintained and hawkers should not be encouraged.” The plaza starting from Bashyam Road near Panagal Park up to Dr Nair Road in the first phase will have will have an exclusive side of the road for cyclists and pedes- trians and the other side for MTC buses. The stretch from Dr Nair Road through the junction of North and South Boag Road up to Anna Salai where it ends it will be four track lane for all vehicles and pedestrians. age this area and traffic di- versions are yet to be worked out,” a corporation official said. “About seven interior roads have been identified for parking but that will again create traffic jams. We are also looking at school grounds. But if the multi- level parking is completed, then it will all be hassle free,” the official said. The proposed multi-level parking is a `25 crore facility on T Nagar's Bashyam Road, adjacent to Panagal Park, which got the government’s nod last year. The facility was initially designed to comprise six levels and be able to hold around 510 four- wheelers and 918 two-wheel- ers. But when the plaza came into picture, designers felt the façade and view of Pana- gal Park needed to remain and not be blocked out. Hence the parking facility is now being re-designed to be Plans for pedestrian plaza trump parking project Traffic To Be Issue As Plaza To Be Taken Up First Officials are keen on developing the pedestrian plaza before the underground project because that will take less time. But, the traffic problem will still remain unanswered C Suresh Kumar Divya.Chandrababu @timesgroup.com About seven interior roads have been identified for park- ing but that will again create traf- fic jams. We are al- so looking at school grounds SENIOR CORPORATION OFFICIAL
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Stemade & importance of Dental Stem Cell preservation was covered in an article by Times of India
Transcript of Stemade in Times of India
* THE TIMES OF INDIA, CHENNAIMONDAY, JULY 14, 20144 TIMES CITY
VIEW FROM THE TOP: Clouds gather over the evening landscape in the city
S L Shanth Kumar
No license to screenThe late timing of World Cup football matches came as a dampener for clubs which have screened sporting events like IPL cricket matches on giant screens so that patrons can enjoy the game over dinner. As patrons did not want to stay back so late and drive back home, clubs started to screen matches only after getting confirmations. One club had to cancel its plans to screen the match after only four of its members responded to an email asking whether they would be interested in watching the final match between Germany and Argentina. Star hotels and pubs which have licenses to serve liquor round the clock made the most of these matches by screening special sessions.
Up in smoke
Passengers and motorists who drove down to Central on Saturday evening were in for a surprise when they saw smoke coming out from behind Central. People at first thought the railway station was on fire but then got puzzled because everything looked normal and
people were going about their work as usual. Many rushed in to check but then realised that it was the smoke from SBI building that was on fire at Parrys. Metro rail workers and autorickshaw drivers had a lot of explaining to do for motorists who stopped to ask about the situation.
Not free for allA few employees at an office realised that they were getting signals of a WiFi package of a phone inside their workplace. They asked around to find out and alert the owner but could not trace him because there were numerous people on the floor and they did not suspect that signals would travel far. But on the contrary, a few colleagues started using the WiFi, assuming it was from an adjacent building. A month and many downloads and app updates later, a colleague who sat in a far corner of the floor told his peers that he had got a huge bill running up to more than `5,000 for usage. Checks revealed that the ID shown against the hotspot was his. It was then that they spilled the beans. Though all laughed it off, it taught the professional a lesson. Now, he is checking his bill to find out whether any of his neighbours have also been using his ‘free’ WiFi.
Money or nothingA tragedy can bring out the best and the worst in humans, they say. During the building collapse in Porur, while there were many locals bringing in food for rescue workers or the police handing out buttermilk packets to
everyone toiling in the sun, there was also a group of people who were trying to make the most of a tragedy. On the second day of the rescue operations, this reporter came across three people who claimed to be Shantha Kumari's husband. Shantha Kumari was one of the first people who was found dead. Even before there was any announcement about compensation from the government, a few of them had thought that money would be on its way and that it would be an handsome sum. One just hopes the real husband got the compensation.
Sanjay or Sanjeev? What’s in a name? A lot. Union minister of women and child development Maneka Sanjay Gandhi seemed a bit disturbed when a speaker pronounced her husband’s name erroneously at a book launch held in the city recently. While giving an introductory speech, the speaker said ‘Maneka Sanjeev Gandhi’. Thinking that it might be a slip of the tongue, the minister remained silent when it happened first. But after the speaker repeatedly said ‘Sanjeev’ instead of Sanjay, Maneka pointed out the mistake. Fortunately, she neither created a scene nor discussed the matter with those who shared the dais with her. Instead, when the speaker ended her address , Maneka politely told her about the error. Apparently, the speaker was not aware of the mistake she made.
(Contributed by V Ayyappan, Karthikeyan Hemalatha
and M T Saju )
CITY LIGHTS
C S
ure
sh K
um
ar
When Seema Kumar had her baby, umbilical cord stem cell banking was unheard of. Eager to preserve the
stem cells of her daughter Tejal as it may help her medically in the future, she scoured the net for more information. And that is when she read about dental stem cell banking.
“I realised that we could get stem cells from teeth, so I contacted my den-tist and banked her milk tooth in March this year,” says the 36-year-old, who is an associate professor at NIFT. While um-bilical cord stem cell banking has been popular, many are slowly discovering the advantages of banking teeth.
“There is less awareness about bank-ing dental stem cells but it is catch-ing on,” says Dr M S Muthu of Pedo Planet, a children’s dental centre that has four branches. “So far, about five people have come to me to bank their child’s tooth,” he adds.
Vashali Surana recently banked her 10-year-old son Sa-haj’s milk tooth. “There was no awareness about stem cells when I had my sons, so when I heard about banking teeth I wanted to do it,” says the 36-year-old.
Stemade Biotech, a private dental stem cell bank, which has its laboratory in Chennai, gets teeth from all over the country. “We launched in 2011 and now have a presence in 30 cities,” says manag-ing director Shailesh Gadre. “We have partnered with 700 dentists across the country, and trained them to collect teeth in specially designed containers, which is then transported to our lab near Tam-baram in Chennai.”
Banking stem cells have many ben-efits as they can be used to treat many diseases in the future. There are two types of stem cells — embryonic cells that come from embryos three to five days old and adult cells. “There are ethical issues with taking embryonic cells; adult cells, however, can be col-lected without a problem,” says Gadre.
Adult cells are also of two types —haematopoietic, which can be used to treat blood-related diseases and mesen-chymal cells that can be used to treat tissue and organ-related diseases. The latter can be obtained from many parts of the body, including the bone marrow.
“However, it involves invasive proce-dures. But stem cells are present in the pulp inside teeth and you can get them from even milk teeth, provided you ex-tract it just before it falls,” says Gadre.
Children usually have 20 milk teeth that begin falling from the age of seven to 13. “In the case of cord blood, you have only one opportunity, at the time of de-liver, but in the case of teeth, you have multiple opportunities,” says Dr Muthu. The finest dental pulp stem cells are found in baby teeth or milk teeth
Though stem cells can be extracted from any healthy tooth, it is also often
taken from wisdom teeth and during orthodontic treatment.
“Often people don’t have enough space in the jaw to accommodate all their teeth so wisdom teeth are removed,” says paediatric dental surgeon Dr Vinodh Kumar, who runs Kids and Family Den-tal Care. “Sometimes even 28 teeth can-not be accommodated so teeth will be misaligned. We take two teeth out and align the remaining teeth with the help of wires and brackets. These teeth can be banked.”
According to him, these stem cells can be used to treat a range of diseases, including eye disorders. Cost is, how-ever, a deterrent. “We get a lot of enquir-ies but it costs about `1 lakh,” says Dr Muthu. To attract customers stem cell banks are now offering EMI options.
Some people also don’t mind cough-ing up the money. “We save up and invest for our child’s future. And this is a kind of medical insurance that I hope will never be used,” says Seema.
Missed banking baby’s cord cells?SAVE MILK TEETH INSTEAD
Parents Save Stem Cells From Teeth To Treat Future Illnesses
FACE VALUEDental stem
cells are found in the dental pulp, the soft tissue inside a tooth
Stem cells from milk teeth are ‘mesenchymal’ type of cells — cellsthat have the ability to generate a wide variety of cell types like chondrocytes, osteoblasts and adipocytes.
Chondrocytes, osteoblasts and adipocytes are cells have the ability
to generate cartilage, bones and adipose tissue that store energy as fat
In essence, dental stem cells can generate solid structures of the body such as bone, cartilage and muscle
New research suggests the potential to regen-erate nerves. This is being studied further for use in dentistry and medicine
What are stem cells? Stem cells are the
body’s raw materi-als — cells from
which other cells with spe-cialised func-tions are generated
Under the right conditions in the
body or a laboratory, stem cells divide to form more cells called daughter cells
These daughter cells either become new stem cells (self-renewal) or specialised cells like blood cells, brain cells, heart muscle or bone
Dental pulpStem cells
Source: Mayo Clinic, Stemade Biotech
The finest dental pulp stem cells are found in
baby teeth or milk teeth
Graphics by Varghese Kallada
Dentalstem cells
DENTISTSCOLLECT TEETH INSPECIALLY
DESIGNED CONTAINERS,WHICH ARE TRANSPORTEDTO OUR LAB... ADULT CELLS,CAN BE COLLECTED WITHOUTANY ETHICAL ISSUESShailesh Gadre | MD, STEMADE BIOTECH
The Chennai buildingcollapse, which hastaken a huge toll, is a
wake-up call for our lawmak-ers and municipal and plan-ning administrators. Thiswas not an illegal buildingbeing constructed clandes-tinely in a congested partof an old city – this was acompletely new construc-tion in an area planned byChennai Metropolitan De-velopment Authority. That’swhy it’s even more disturb-ing and highlights the loop-holes in law.
We don’t have a law thatregulates civil and structur-al engineers. This allowsanyone who possesses a di-ploma or a degree in civil en-gineering to design thestructure of a building. Thedistinction between thosewho are trained to designand those who should be onlysupervising constructiongets blurred. You need toknow how to evaluate soilstructure, seismic condi-tions and a lot more. Only a post-graduate education canmake a difference. Most mu-nicipal bodies, however, al-low unqualified persons todo the job.
The job of a constructionsupervisor is also unregulat-ed – not even a municipal li-cence is required. So, whatyou get are glorified masons,without any formal skills) ordiploma holders who haveno working skills.
Our municipal laws donot fix any professional re-sponsibility for the variousskills required for such acomplex building activity.So, while unregulated per-
sons are allowed to designstructures and even electri-cal and other building com-ponents, they cannot be heldto account. The municipalbodies simply wink at thisbecause municipal govern-ance in the country is found-ed on corruption.
What compounds theproblem is that neither re-cords of the design process-es, nor drawings are storedanywhere.
Neither designers normunicipalities have any sys-tem of recording simple datalike what load a building hasbeen designed for or howmuch water or power it willconsume.
And at the bottom of thishuge mess is the moribundstate of our architecturaland engineering education.Colleges have mushroomedin every district without ade-quately trained teachers.These degree shops turn outgraduates who have noknowledge of their subjects,just a piece of paper to show
at the end of four to five yearsin the classroom. It’s no won-der then that the responsibil-ity which comes with such aprofessional degree escapesthem.
The lack of a real estateregulator, of course, is thelast nail in the coffin. Thereis no one to protect the con-sumer against unscrupu-lous builders and ensurethat all laws related to con-struction of buildings arefollowed. In this particularcase, the person who had pro-jected himself as the build-ing’s architect was not one.The architect who signed thedrawings probably did notperform the statutory pro-fessional duties with any dil-igence. And nothing isknown about the design orconstruction engineers.
So, the result is an un-avoidable tragedy of graveproportions. How manytimes will we allow this tohappen?
(Sudhir Vohra is an architect and urban planner)
Looking for the rot inthe Chennai debris
The Chennai case highlights loopholes in the law
B A Raju
Sudhir Vohra
Chennai: There have been widespreadreports of high levels of surveillance inthe state, with officials, politicians andjournalists being the target. During theprevious DMK regime, the taped phoneconversation between the then chiefsecretary L K Tripathy and a police offi-cial about the AIADMK chief J Jayala-lithaa’s assets case was leaked. Formersocial welfare minister Poongothai Ala-di Aruna resigned from the state cabi-net in 2008, two days after the tran-scripts of her conversation with a topvigilance official, pleading on behalf ofher corrupt relative,were published in themedia.
There was much debate in themedia at that time about the culture ofsurveillance in the state. Officials com-plained they felt that they were beingwatched all the time. In March 2011,AIADMK MPs demanded in Parlia-ment that the Prime Minister should or-der a probe against the alleged tappingof Jayalalithaa’s telephone by the DMKgovernment.
Meanwhile, sources said the SP whomade the complaint was told by his ju-nior officials that his phone calls are be-ing scrutinized. “The SP was very upset
with the developments. He had immedi-ately called a senior official in Chennaiand reported the incident,” a highlyplace source told TOI.
According to senior officials, theconcerned SP also sent a written com-plaint to Ramanujam a few days back,in which he named the intelligence offi-cer who ordered the snooping. The mat-ter is under investigation now.
A senior official in the police head-quarters in Chennai said an intelli-gence team has screened only the calllist of the SP’s driver. “There was nophone tapping or surveillance of the SP.He has misunderstood what was hap-
pening,” the official said. According to the com-
plaint, a police vehicle hasbeen misused for a long time in the dis-trict. The intelligence team considersthe complaint as valid since it camefrom police circles. “The complaintmade some strong allegations includ-ing the misuse of vehicle (for manydays) against the driver of the SP. So wehave instructed our team to monitor thedriver’s movements,” officials in the in-telligence department said. They alsoadded that the vehicle was captured bythe closed circuit camera at the Toll pla-za in Salem many times in recentmonths.
Senior cop says onlydriver’s call was screened�Continued from Page 1
SNOOPING ROW
Chennai: The city may soon see an in-crease in foreign tourist arrivals as theUnion government has allowed citizensof 40 countries, including UK and coun-tries in Europe to apply for Indian visaonline. Union budget has mentionedthat e-visa will be accepted at nine air-ports in six months.
Travel and tour organisers are up-beat that a major hurdle in attractingforeign tourists has been removed by theunion government. The move is expect-ed to benefit foreign leisure travellersand MICE (meetings, incentives, confer-ence and exhibition) travellers whoform a good percentage of travellerswho come to Chennai.
“Being the gateway for south India, alarge number of foreign tourists arrivein Chennai and travel by road, rail orflights to other states for leisure andbusiness. The government’s move willsee a surge in foreign arrivals at the air-port,” said an Airports Authority of In-dia official.
Travel and tour operators were fac-ing a lot of trouble because the hassle ofapplying for a visa was putting off manytravellers.
“We have lost a lot of delegates forimportant conferences because they
could not get the visa on time. Manyhave written angry letters to us aboutthe hassle in applying for visa at the In-dian embassy. There are long queues,lots of processes, forms and other trou-bles which many distinguished expertsdid not want to go through to come andattend a conference,” said M K Ajith Ku-mar of Asia Pacific Tours.
He also said that applying for a tour-ist visa was easy while a visa to attend aconference or a meeting in India used totake time. “This is unjustified becausethere is no way immigration is going tofind out if a foreigner who arrives ontourist visa attends a conference ormeets experts from his field in India af-ter reaching here.”
Tour operators now feel that the e-vi-sa facility and recognising Goa as a con-ference destination would do a lot ofbenefits for MICE tourism. Foreigntourist arrivals have increased. TamilNadu stands second with 3.99 millionforeign tourist in the top 10 states thathas attracted maximum number oftravellers from abroad in 2013.
“Majority of the travellers are thosewho visit Chennai as transit passengersand gets added as a visitor in the state,”said J Sethuraman, CEO, Travelxs Pri-vate, which specialises in inbound tour-ists.
More tourists expected ase-visa to come into force
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Chennai: The 51st annual bookbank function of RajasthanYouth Association was held atKamaraj Memorial Hall on Sun-day.
Rajendra Bokdia, presidentRYA said more than 2500 new ben-eficiaries had been added in 2014and around 37,800 books were dis-tributed. The project has covered
more than 87,500 students acrossthe colleges in Chennai andChengalpattu during the last 50years. The text books includethose of arts, commerce and engi-neering, he added.
A free job fair for students inAugust was also announced dur-ing the event. Ajay SanchetiMember of Parliament, RajyaSabha was the chief guest for theevent.
Assn’s book bank function held TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Chennai: The corporation’splans to decongest T Nagarseem to be stuck in a bottle-neck. Tenders will be floatedfor the `̀80 crore pedestrianplaza after World Bank re-leases funds for the projectas part of giving the com-mercial hub a make-over.But corporation engineersare struggling to get trafficand parking facilities right.The plaza, meant to be awalkers’ paradise, willstretch from Panagal Park toAnna Salai, a distance of 1.4kilometres.
Engineers say it would bepractical to first take up andcomplete the multi-levelparking project that has alsobeen proposed, in the same
location, at Panagal Park.But senior officials of thecorporation are reportedlykeen to develop the plazafirst as it would take only 6months. The undergroundparking project is likely totake three years.
“The primary problem isonce work starts where willpeople park? Even on a nor-mal day it’s difficult to man-
made fully underground.While officials and
ground level engineers arepondering over how to han-dle heavy flow of road users,residents and commutersseem ready to put up with in-conveniences during con-struction. “Even when theUsman Road flyover was be-ing built we faced a lot of dif-ficulties,” says V S Jayara-man, resident of T Nagar.“But we benefit at the end ofit. So the final result will giveus a hassle free walking andshopping experience. Ouronly concern is that it has tobe maintained and hawkersshould not be encouraged.”
The plaza starting fromBashyam Road near PanagalPark up to Dr Nair Road inthe first phase will have willhave an exclusive side of theroad for cyclists and pedes-trians and the other side forMTC buses. The stretch fromDr Nair Road through thejunction of North and SouthBoag Road up to Anna Salaiwhere it ends it will be fourtrack lane for all vehiclesand pedestrians.
age this area and traffic di-versions are yet to be workedout,” a corporation officialsaid. “About seven interiorroads have been identifiedfor parking but that willagain create traffic jams. Weare also looking at schoolgrounds. But if the multi-level parking is completed,then it will all be hasslefree,” the official said.
The proposed multi-levelparking is a ̀̀ 25 crore facilityon T Nagar's Bashyam Road,adjacent to Panagal Park,which got the government’snod last year. The facilitywas initially designed tocomprise six levels and beable to hold around 510 four-wheelers and 918 two-wheel-ers.
But when the plaza cameinto picture, designers feltthe façade and view of Pana-gal Park needed to remainand not be blocked out.Hence the parking facility isnow being re-designed to be
Plans for pedestrian plaza trump parking project Traffic To Be
Issue AsPlaza To Be
Taken Up First
Officials are keen on developing the pedestrian plaza before theunderground project because that will take less time. But, thetraffic problem will still remain unanswered
C Suresh Kumar
About seveninterior roadshave been
identified for park-ing but that willagain create traf-fic jams. We are al-so looking atschool groundsSENIOR CORPORATION OFFICIAL
