Category: Life & Style

The 61st Annual Grammy Awards were held in Los Angeles with all its glam and glitz on 10th Feb 2019. The largest and star-studded music awards show celebrates and honors the best in the music industry. Proclaimed as the most distinguished musical night, international singers, enthusiasts, and fans gathered to witness what is considered to be the Nobel Prize of Music.

The award ceremony is hosted by R&B singer Alicia keys, which is the first female host in the last 14 years, held at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Due to the fierce competition, the Recording Academy had expanded its General Field to accommodate eight nominees each. The General Field includes Record of the Year, Album of the Year, Song of the Year and Best New Artist.

Main winners of the Grammy Awards 2019 are as follows:

Album of the Year: Kacey Musgraves, “Golden Hour”

Record of the Year: Childish Gambino – “This Is America”

Song of the Year: Childish Gambino, “This Is America”

Best New Artist: Dua Lipa

Best Pop Solo Performance: Lady Gaga, “Joanne” (Where Do You Think You’re Goin’?)

Best Country Album: Golden Hour – Kacey Musgraves

Best Rock Performance: Chris Cornell, “When Bad Does Good”

Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian award for 2019 was conferred upon Shri Pranab Mukherjee, the 13th President of India from 2012 until 2017, Shri Bhupen Hazarika, and Shri Nanaji Deshmukh, Social Activist, and a member of RSS.

Padma Awards 2019, one of the highest civilian awards were also distributed on 25th Jan 2019, on the eve of Republic day by the President of India at ceremonial functions which were held at Rashtrapati Bhawan.

These Padma awards are conferred in 3 categories: Padma Vibhushan, Padma Bhushan, and Padma Shri For the year 2019, the President of India Ram Nath Kovind approved 112 Padma Awards. It comprises 4 Padma Vibhushan, 14 Padma Bhushan and 94 Padma Shri Awards. Of the list, 21 awardees are women, 11 persons form the category of Foreigners/NRI/PIO/ OCI, 3 Posthumous awardees and 1 transgender person.

The recipients of Padma Vibhushan awards are Ms. Teejan Bai, Shri Anil kumar Manibhai Naik, Shri Balwant Moreshwar Purandare, and Shri Ismail Omar Guelleh. The recipients of Padma Bhushan are Shri Darshan Lal Jain, Shri Parvin Gordhan, Shri Mohanlal Viswanathan Nair, Shri Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa, Shri Ashok Laxmanrao Kukade, Shri Kariya Munda, etc.

The Padma Shri recipients are Rajeshwar Acharya, Illias Ali, Manoj Bajpayee, Uddhab Kumar Bharali, Jyoti Bhatt, Pritam Bhartwan, Dilip Chakravarty, Swapan Chaudhuri, Sunil Chhetri, Babulal Dahiya, etc.

Mrs. Aishwaryaa Rajinikanth Dhanush, daughter of legendary actor and noteworthy film-maker Rajinikanth was recently appointed United Nations Women’s Advocate for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in India. This proud announcement was made by Ms. Lakshmi Puri, U.N. Assistant Secretary General and U.N. Women Deputy Executive Director. Ms. Lakshmi Puri believes that since Mrs. Aishwaryaa Rajinikanth Dhanush is a remarkable dancer, she inspires confidence in young women and across South India and beyond.

During the ceremony, Mrs. Aishwaryaa Rajinikanth Dhanush said in her acceptance speech that it will be an honour for her to serve as United Nations Women’s Advocate for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in India. Dr. Rebecca Reichmann Tavares, Representative of United Nations Women India, warmly welcomed Mrs. Aishwaryaa Rajinikanth Dhanush to the United Nations Women family with the words, “We are delighted to have Aishwaryaa as UN Women’s Advocate for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in India. As a filmmaker, dancer – and now writer – she is perfectly placed to reach out to a range of audiences, particularly young people, and to encourage them to speak out and act to prevent violence against women, create a level playing field for women and girls, and most importantly, help change mindsets and attitudes that allow inequalities to persist.”

Apart from being a classical dancer, Mrs. Aishwaryaa Rajinikanth Dhanush is a leading film director and writer as well. On her honorable accomplishment, Mr. Rajinikanth shared his emotions by saying that he feels “proud and delighted” to see his daughter being associated with the United Nations. Also, it is expected that a startup entrepreneur, Mrs. Aishwaryaa Rajinikanth Dhanush will make the required contribution in raising awareness of United Nations Women’s core beliefs regarding gender equality and women’s empowerment across India, augmenting the organization’s efforts to close the gender gap and achieve a more equal world—Planet 50-50—by the year 2030.

It was an occasion of great celebration for many when on 4th September 2016, the catholic nun Mother Teresa was proclaimed as a saint in a mass gathering. The canonization ceremony commenced at St Peter’s Square in Vatican City. At the event, Cardinal Angelo Amato addressed Pope Francis and read out a short bio of Mother which was followed by the Formula of Canonization read by Pope Francis in Latin. Later, he performed other rites after which Mother Teresa was announced Saint Teresa of Calcutta.

One of the most renowned nuns who served thousands of poor people in Kolkata, Saint Teresa was born as Agnese Gonxha Bojaxhiu in 1910 to ethnic Albanian parents. She left her home when she was eighteen to join the Irish order of Loreto. In the year 1950, she founded the Missionaries of Charity which presently has more than 4,500 nuns across the globe. Mother Teresa was also awarded with the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 for her immense contribution. She died in 1997.

Speaking on the occasion, Pope Francis praised the generous saint and said, “She bowed down before those who were spent, left to die on the side of the road, seeing in them their god-given dignity.” He also added, “She made her voice heard before the powers of the world, so that they might recognize their guilt for the crimes of poverty they themselves created.”

Thousands of people from various cities came to attend the event. A 12-member delegation led by Minister of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj and delegation from West Bengal and New Delhi including Mamata Banerjee and Arvind Kejriwal also became a part of the event. Around 1,500 homeless people across Italy were also brought to Rome in buses to be given seats of honor at the celebration and were served a pizza lunch by nuns.

The gala evening of the 90th annual Academy Awards on 4 March, 2018 was marked with scintillating presence of celebrities from the Hollywood. “The Shape of Water” ruled the charts, winning best picture and best director (for Guillermo del Toro) and also nabbed prizes for production design and original score. Mr Gary Oldman won the lead actor award for his work as Winston Churchill in “Darkest Hour” and Ms Frances McDormand earned her second best actress Oscar for  her role as a grieving mother in “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri.” Mr Sam Rockwell (“Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri”) and Ms Allison Janney (“I, Tonya”) won supporting actor and actress honors.

Frances Mcdormand, who is the winner of the Best Actress 2018 was also previously nominated for four times for Academy Award nomination. She was previously nominated for Actress in Supporting Role for North Country (2005), Almost Famous (2000) and Mississippi Burning (1988). She also won the Best Actress in Supporting Role for her role in Fargo.

Cycling is an activity that most of us used to enjoy in our childhood. However, as we grew up recreational activities like this paused, for we became more inclined towards the changing lifestyle of the new technological era. This decrease in the outdoor activities has led to various health issues.

Various researches conducted by scientists have shown that many of these activities have the ability to cut down the risk of the new age diseases. Cycling is one of them.

Recently, a research suggested that Cycling has the potential to reduce the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes. The Research stated that non-cyclists have 20 percent higher risk for T2D than the people who involve themselves in regular cycling. In addition, this activity also helps in lowering the risk of various chronic diseases in the people of all age groups.

Martin Rasmussen from the University of Southern Denmark admitted this and stated that “We find it especially interesting that those who started cycling had a lower risk of Type 2 diabetes, given that the study population were men and women of middle and old age”.

Around 24,623 men and 27,890 women from Denmark, between the ages of 50 and 65 were observed in the study whose cycling habits were compared to get the stated results. Hence, it becomes important to motivate people to engage in the outdoor recreational activities that will help them in preventing the development of T2D.

It is high time that one should realize the need to involve in the recreational activity that not only helps in lowering the risk various diseases but also fills a person with energy and keeps him happy and healthy.

In a yet another outstanding achievement, Dubai is crowned as the second-largest in the list of worlds’ most important retail hubs. This is the fifth time that city has achieved this honor.

Dubai has 57 percent of international retailers, while the topper in the list London has 57.9 percent of international retailers. Dubai may soon acquire the top position if it continues with this global expansion.

Presently, The Emirate has around 62.6 percent of brands from Europe and 60.6 percent of brands from United States. In the year 2013, it witnessed 19 new retail entrants and in the present time due to the development and expansion of various malls, the Emirate has become a centre of attraction for many new retailers and international brands.

Hamad Buamim, Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry President and Chief Executive Officer affirmed that Dubai offers “advanced infrastructure” for retail businesses. He said “The UAE economy has been witnessing steady growth over the last few years. Dubai has clearly benefitted from the economic competitiveness and the emirate’s retail sector continues to be driven on the back of strong growth exhibited by tourism, aviation and capital inflow.”. He also added that “Retail constitutes nearly a third of Dubai’s gross domestic product and we expect the industry to continue showing strong growth in the coming years,”

On this occasion, George Kostas, CEO, Majid Al Futtaim Properties talked about the growing demand of the industry and also expressed that their recent announcement about the increase in investment will be make sure that they meet the future demands of the industry.

As the demand is rising, more and more retailers are trying to enhance their business activities across nations. This has resulted in the increase of new entrants on the city level which is said to have gone up by 26 percent every year.

Dubai’s love for fashion and luxury is merging with the growing demands and hence, it is quite possible that this emirate will certainly rise as a giant hub in the fashion industry.

SOS Children’s Villages is an independent, non-governmental, social development organization which is internationally recognized. They provide safe and secure homes to the homeless and orphaned children across the nations. The organization functions in 133 countries across the world.

It has been 50 years that this organization started working in India and since then it has pays a great attention towards the issues related to children who are in need of care and protection. Today it has around 32 SOS Children’s Villages and over 25, 000 beneficiaries across the country. Established in 1949, the organization provides not only a caring family but also takes care of the other facilities such as quality education, healthcare, and individual care.

The organization works on four pillars namely, The Mother, Brothers and Sisters, The House, The Village. According to these pillars, a child is given a caring parent, corporative siblings, homely accommodation and healthy environment which collectively lead to a better upbringing of the child and make him independent strong and morally active.

The organization runs two flagship programmes namely, Family Based Care (FBC) and Family Strengthening Programme (FSP). Under Family Based Care, SOS covers approximately 6500 girls and boys in 32 children’s villages where they look after every need of the child from his childhood to adolescence. The other program Family Strengthening Programme runs in the slum areas near SOS Villages and aims to help the poor families by educating their children and providing them healthcare facilities as well. Through these programs and initiatives, SOS strives hard to bring a change in the pathetic condition of homeless children and poverty stricken families of India.

For their outstanding contribution towards the society, the organization has been awarded with various illustrious awards numerous times. Some of them are, Save the World Award (2009), the Mother Teresa Gold Medal (2008) and The Conrad N. Hilton Humanitarian Prize (2002) etc.

SOS Children’s Villages vigorously contribute towards a better and educated India and also encourage and highlight the need of such organizations in the nation.

In 2011, African Innovation Foundation (AIF) started an initiative known as Innovation Prize for Africa (IPA) to honor and encourage people who work towards the development of new and innovative products that will become a breakthrough in various fields such as manufacturing & service industry, health & well-being, agriculture & agribusiness, environment, energy & water and ICTs.IPA awards an amount of USD 150,000 to the winners and helps them in getting a global platform to share their innovative ideas.

This year, the Innovation Prize for Africa marked its fifth anniversary at Gaborone, Botswana. It received a whooping number of entries out of which they selected only 10 nominees. However, only three were announced as the winners. The first position was attained by Dr. Valentin Agon who was awarded $100,000. Imogen Wright and Dr. Eddy Agbo achieved second and third position respectively.

Among the winners, Nigeria’s Dr. Eddy Agbo received special award for Social Impact for his innovative healthcare solution to address Africa’s prevailing malaria burden. He invented a rapid non-blood diagnostic medical device known as Urine Test for Malaria (UMT) that can diagnose malaria in less than 25 minutes.

This breakthrough will be quite affective in healthcare sector for there is a lack of quick diagnosis in the case of Malaria. In most of the cases, the doctors prescribe anti-malaria medication whenever they detect a fever although it is known that not all fevers are due to malaria. If the patient does not get a quick diagnosis and treatment, he may face various complications such as kidney failure, build-up of lung fluid, aplastic anaemia and even death. At this stage, Agbo’s device will come into play. His UMT device is designed to detect malaria parasite proteins in the patient’s urine in a short span of time.

According to a report by the World Health Organization (WHO), around 660, 000 people die due to Malaria in Africa which has drastic effects on the economy and households. Keeping these reports in mind, Agbo’s innovative device proves to be a major revolution for the healthcare solutions in Africa.

All living things eat to survive. Some people like to savour what they eat and in the process satisfy their appetite and senses both. Yet there is a different genre of people, who consider food as art and fashion. For them, eating something is not enough, until it was also presented in a fashionable way.

Food fashion is common in the hospitality industry. If you have paid about a thousand bucks for two pieces of potato, some cucumber, and two types of leaves soaked in some thick sauce presented on a white plate in a fashionable Italian restaurant, and have yet felt satisfied, you are a lover of food art.

A different meaning has emerged recently, where food fashion in images is used so sensually that it’s called foodporn. Obviously, it is being used in a totally positive sense, where the image of the food is arousing your senses in such a way that you can’t hold back and feel forced to find it and eat it.

However, the basic need of eating for the sake of eating is essential. Satisfying your senses takes a back seat when satisfying your hunger is more important. The ways of civilized world may be different, and food fashion is supplementary rather than the fundamental need of human beings.