AQIS recognises the importance of this festival which is one of the most powerful affirmations experienced by Hindu brothers and sisters through the exchange of traditional gifts in celebration of love and togetherness. That’s why it’s committed to processing international mail in a timely manner to ensure that your special gifts are received in time.

 “The lead up to Rakhi has shown that it is common for well meaning overseas family and friends to send not only their prayers, but also quarantine risk items that can be detrimental to the Australian environment. All international mail is assessed, x-rayed or checked by detector dogs, and packages containing risk items are opened and inspected” said Ms Caroline Martin, Program Manager, AQIS International Mail Program.

 Quarantine risk items include Rakhi threads made with seeds or flowers; traditional Indian sweets made with mithai or milk products such as barfi, mysore pak, gulab jamun, rasgulla, pedas or soan-papdi; grains; and dried fruits.

 “To ensure the auspicious occasion of Rakhi is celebrated on time AQIS endeavours to keep processing delays to a minimum but this is difficult when mail contains risk items as they require further processing which leads to lengthy delays. But you can avoid these delays if you tell friends and family overseas not to send gifts containing quarantine risk items—as gifts with no risk items are processed much faster. So talk to your friends and family overseas and have your gift in time for Rakhi, which will certainly make the day much more enjoyable,” said Ms Martin.

 AQIS wishes all siblings a joyous Rakhi; a celebration of the continued tradition signifying love and good wishes, and much enjoyment of their Rakhi gifts.

 For more information :

• Visit the AQIS website www.aqis.gov.au/rakhi
  • download the brochure ‘What Can’t be Mailed to Australia?’
  • call AQIS on 1800 020 504 (free call in Australia and is in English).

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“Today I seek a mandate from the Australian people,” she says.

Ms Gillard made the announcement in the courtyard of Parliament House in Canberra, shortly after midday, local time.

Ms Gillard said moving forward meant plans to build a  sustainable Australia, “not a big Australia”.
  
“Moving forward means making record investments in solar power and other renewable energies to help us combat climate change and protect our quality of life,” she said.

Enrol to vote

The Prime Minister said Australians will have until 8pm (AEST) on Monday to register to vote with Ms Gillard confirming writs for the election will be issued at 6pm on the same day.

Pledge to get Budget back to surplus

Ms Gillard said budget surpluses and a stronger economy would offer Australians the chance “to get a job, keep a job, learn new skills, get a better job and start your own business”.

Ms Gillard said she had been driven by a clear set of values.

“I believe in hard work … in the importance of respect and valuing other people,” she said.

“Most importantly (I belive in) the transformative power of a high-quality education.”
  
“The uncertainty is not behind us yet, and economic challenges are still very much with us and hard working Australian families who are doing it tough can attest to that,” she said.

Ms Gillard committed Labor to offsetting every dollar of new promises with spending cuts.
 
“We will make a modest set of commitments to the Australian people and we will honour those commitments,” she said.
 

Family values

Ms Gillard said she learnt those values from her parents.

“And like millions of other Australians (they) worked unbelievably hard so that their children could have opportunities that they could never have dreamed for themselves.”
 
“I believe in hard work … in the importance of respect and valuing other people,” she said.

“Most importantly (I belive in) the transformative power of a high-quality education.”
  

Border protection

The prime minister said that “moving forward” also meant stronger protection for the nation’s borders.
  
“And a strong plan, a real plan that takes away from people smugglers the product that they sell.”

Health and hospital funding

Ms Gillard noted that Labor had increased expenditure on hospitals by 50 per cent in its first term.
  
“Moving forward on health meant training 3,000 nurses and 1,300 GPs during the next three years “all the while as we expand our GP super clinics and implement our health reforms”.

Gillard attacks Coalition

Ms Gillard said the opposition’s economic approach was backward looking, citing the coalition’s stance against the stimulus package.
  
Failing to provide the stimulus would have sent the economy downwards into a spiral of lower incomes, lost jobs and reduced services.

“That is the spiral they would have recommended for this country but the wrong thing for Australians. It would have taken us backwards,” she said.

Ms Gillard accused Opposition Leader Tony Abbott of remaining committed to Work Choices, no matter what words he sought to use as camouflage.

“In terms of the words he seeks to disguise his intent with, we have heard all of that before,” he said.

“Their gaze is fixed in the rear-view mirror, rather than on the road ahead,” she said.

Ms Gillard said Mr.. Abbott thought improving education and health meant cutting their funding.

“He’s now calling for that same backwards-looking approach to other services that hard-working Australians need,” she said.

“Instead of creating GP super clinics, he would eliminate them, instead of expanding trades training centres, he would end them, instead of providing computers to children in schools – he would see none of that.”
 

Meeting with the GG

She arrived in the nation’s capital earlier this morning, after spending the night in her Victorian electorate of Lalor.

It was an early start for Ms Gillard, who left her home in Melbourne about 7am (AEST) on Saturday morning before a 10.40am meeting with Governor-General Quentin Bryce at Yarralumla.

She emerged from Government House after half an hour then returned to Parliament House to prepare for a midday press conference.

Abbott fires first shots

Despite the focus being on Ms Gillard’s movements on Saturday, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott fired the first shots of the campaign in Brisbane.

Mr.. Abbott formally axed coalition support for its old Work Choices policy during an address to the Liberal National Party conference.

“If there was one policy on which the coalition lost the last election, it was workplace relations,” Mr.. Abbott told the conference.

“On workplace relations policy, the coalition trashed its own brand and has to re-establish trust.

“Trust will only be restored by demonstrating, over time, that the coalition again has the steady hands in which people’s job security and pay and conditions can once more safely rest.”

The surprise move will be a blow for Labor, which has been using industrial relations as a key weapon against the coalition.

Mr.. Abbott confidently jogged into the Hilton Hotel ballroom to a standing ovation and delivered a pre-election attack on the government.

“We are ready to govern,” he said.

He said the past three weeks had been “chao

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The symbol will be printed or embossed on currency notes or coins, Information and Broadcasting Minister told reporters after the Cabinet meeting.

Kumar’s entry was chosen from among 3,000 designs competing for the currency symbol. He will get an award of Rs 2.5 lakhs.

She said the government will try that the symbol is adopted within six months in the country and globally within 18 to 24 months.

The symbol will feature on computer key boards and softwares so that it can be printed and displayed in electronic and print, she said.

Soni said it would also help in distinguishing the Indian currency from rupee or rupiah of countries like Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Indonesia

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Radha Mitchell at the premiere of The Waiting City in Sydney

By Ashok Kumar

The DENDY cinema auditorium in Circular Quay dazzled under the shine of Aussie stars Radha Mitchell and Joel Edgerton where the Sydney premiere of their new film The Waiting City on last Monday night. The Claire McCarthy-directed film was shot entirely in Calcutta for six weeks, thereby reversing the trend of Bollywood films being shot in Australia. The film is set for release in cinema halls on 15 July

Claire, who wrote and directed the film, said after visiting Mother Teresa’s home in Calcutta (now Kolkata) three times, she thought of making a film there and, hence, The Waiting City.

“My personal experiences working in orphanages and within some of the poorest parts of India and also my experiences of making other films within this context, have offered me access into this rarely seen and unique world. Increasingly globalisation, the accessibility of travel, the high proportion of infertility of women in Australia in their late thirties and our fascination as a culture with exoticism has all been motivating factors to inspire this story.”

The Waiting City, Produced by Jamie Ashok Hilton, is a tale of Ben and Fiona, a childless couple, who travel from Australia to India to adopt a little girl, Lakshmi. On a mythological level, Fiona and Ben’s “soul awakening”; their dreams, fantasies and hero’s journey, take the audience into a parallel narrative universe. Ben and Fiona are forced to delve both into the shadow lands of self and into a realm of mystery, dreams and spirits in order to achieve their hearts desire.

Claire, Joel, Radha and Jamie at the Premiere of TheWaiting City

What they discover on their rollercoaster ride to parenthood scares them, shocks them, liberates them and forces them into a state of true catharsis – independently and as a couple. This is hopefully what distinguishes this film from a nice, polite, realist drama about a middle-class couple from Australia who try to adopt a third world baby and come up against insurmountable odds. In a brief pinpoint in time, we see a portrait of a marriage and a love story that has epic, mystic and psychological dimensions.

The Waiting City is an emotional, visually compelling and timely story that also has broad audience appeal.  Radha Mitchell and Joel Edgerton, both wonderful actors, have brought an incredible authenticity, fearlessness and humanity to their roles. I am very proud of the many and varied contributions to the film from all of the wonderful cast.

On a personal and professional level, The Waiting City augments my fascination with the alchemy of poetic, humanist, psychological drama. My on-going collaboration with producer Jamie Hilton, the strength of our top class assembled creative and technical team and the generous commitments from our investors hopefully has ensured that The Waiting City is a startling and original project that will launch careers and offer a dynamic new direction for Australian cinema.

Radha Rani Mitchell told a waiting battery of newsmen and lens men that filming the film was anything but glamorous, with the entire six-week shoot in Calcutta.

“As much as I love India it is one of the more challenging places in terms of pollution and other aspects … but it can be inspiring,” she said.

“I had diarrhoea so that was an environmental element that had an impact and helped to break us down a bit.”

Joel Edgerton escaped the unpleasant side-effect. “I must have a stomach of steel,” he said. But in the movie, it was he who gets diarrhoea and Radha takes care of him.

Nasib Singh playing Dhol at the after party near Dendy Cinema

All the stars posed liberally for the lens people both at The Red Carpet and later at the after party where the famous Punjab drum player Nasib Singh made quite a few feet to tap to his beats. Among the others who walked the Red Carpet include Producer of the film James Ashok Hilton, former Premier Bob Carr and his wife, Arts MinisterVirginia Judge and Claire’s husband and cameraman Denson Baker.

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Dhoni, 29, has signed up with an Indian sports management company Rhiti, which will handle his endorsements, merchandise, corporate profile, patents and digital rights, as well as visibility on social networking sites.

“We have entered into a two-year contract with Dhoni for 2000 million rupees ($48 million),” Rhiti general manager Sanjay Pandey told newsmen.

“We signed the contract a week back. From now onwards we will be handling Dhoni’s endorsements.”

The deal, the richest in Indian cricket history, surpasses batting superstar Sachin Tendulkar’s $US40 million ($45.62 million) three-year contract with sports management firm Iconix in 2006.

Dhoni, often described as India’s most eligible bachelor, married childhood sweetheart and hotel management student Sakshi Singh Rawat at a private ceremony outside the northern town of Dehra Dun last week.

Dhoni is reported to currently endorse 22 leading brands, including Pepsi, Reebok, Aircel, Godrej and Hersheys.

A Forbes study last year on the world’s richest cricketers put him at the top with an annual earning of $US10 million ($11.4 million), followed by Tendulkar at $US8 million ($9.12 million).

Two other Indian cricketers, Yuvraj Singh ($6.27 million) and Rahul Dravid ($5.7 million), were ranked third and fourth, while England all-rounder Andrew Flintoff was in fifth place with ($4.56 million), Forbes said.

Australian Test captain Ricky Ponting was in sixth place with ($3.99 million) a year, the magazine said, adding the figures included club and national team salaries and commercial endorsements.With

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UNSW Indian Cultural Association is introducing awards in 3 following categories to be awarded

on a very special occasion on September 1, 2010.

1. Best UNSW International Indian Student academic achievement award

2. Best visionary article award- Article about India

3. Best visionary article award – Indian students contributions to India and Australia

1. Best UNSW International Indian Student academic achievement award

Kindly submit your nomination to info@ica.unsw.edu.au

2. Best visionary article award – Article about India

This award is open to following UNSW members: Indian students-International /

Indian origin and Indian staff / Indian origin staff

The article should be your own creation that shall cover some of the following aspects

in 1500 to 2000 words with a maximum of 2 pictures in word document file:

Indian freedom movement and freedom fighters,

Indian culture – brief bhagavat gita, bible, quron, festivals of India,

Rising Indian cinema, cricket(games), people’s interest, politics,

21st century India and its scientific and technology developments,

Your vision for future India

It can be your personal or group submission, kindly quote all the references at the end of the article

3. Best visionary article award – Indian students contributions to India and Australia

This award is open only to UNSW Indian international students / Indian origin students

The article should be your own creation that shall cover some of the following aspects

in 1500 to 2000 words with a maximum of 2 pictures in a word document file:

Young India, Indian students, nurturing the young talent,

Indian students experience in Australia and India,

Your vision to contributing to India and Australia

It can be your personal or group submission, kindly quote all the references at the end of the article

Last date for submission: August 09, 2010

Submission address: info@ica.unsw.edu.au,

Copy to s.bandyopadhyay@unsw.edu.au, obu.iitm@gmail.com

For further details: www.ica.unsw.edu.au

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Police are investigating possible links to the bomb threat and last night’s explosion and fire..

Two people were seen running from the restaurant just after 11.30 pm as fire engulfed the building, witnesses told police.

Police claim that fire preceded the explosion that showered Cleveland Street with glass and debris. One witness said the shop front was missing.

Four occupants of a unit above the restaurant escaped. One person was taken to St Vincent’s Hospital with smoke inhalation, while another was treated by paramedics.

Shop fronts next to the damaged building have had their signage partially melted and paint blackened.

A nearby restaurant owner, who did not want to be named, said he heard a “loud explosion, like a bomb” just after 11.30pm.

The man said the explosion caused glass and signs to cover the road. He said the building was quick to catch fire.

“Then I see people climbing out of a window, about four. [It was] very lucky,” he said.

The witness said police had been at the same site “about two weeks ago” and cleared out several restaurants along the Cleveland Street strip, possibly because of a bomb threat.

A NSW Fire Brigades spokesman said more than 20 firefighters fought the blaze and had it under control after about 30 minutes.

He said the blaze was suspicious but could not speculate yet on what caused the explosion.

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 Pawar is the second Indian to hold the ICC’s top job, after Jagmohan Dalmiya’s stint in the late nineties. He praised the leadership of outgoing president Morgan, terming it an ‘impressive innings’. “David Morgan has set the principles by which the ICC operates and now it is our responsibility to build on his legacy,” Pawar said.

One of India’s most influential regional politicians, Pawar’s rise to the most powerful post in cricket administration started with a fractious victory over former India captain Ajit Wadekar in the elections to the Mumbai cricket board in 2001. The next big step was the defeat of Dalmiya’s candidate in the tussle for control of the BCCI in 2005 after losing by one vote in the previous year

MUMBAI: Sharad Pawar on Friday arrived from Singapore after formally taking over as the ICC president and rubbished suggestions that rejection of John Howard’s candidacy for the vice-president’s post would divide world cricket.

Pawar, who succeeded Englishman David Morgan, returned here this morning after taking charge as president during the ICC Executive Committee meeting in Singapore.

Upon arrival, the union agriculture minister was bombarded with questions about Asian bloc’s refusal to back Howard but he rejected talk of any divide by insisting that the former Australian Prime Minister just didn’t get enough support in a democratically-held election.

“The majority did not support him. Ultimately in any democratic organisation, there has to be support from the majority but that was not there in his case,” he said.

Asked whether the rejection would divide world cricket, Pawar said, “I don’t think so. We have discussed the matter individually and collectively with everybody including Australia, England and New Zealand. We took a collective decision.”

The 69-year-old Pawar will now have to shoulder twin responsibilities of being a minister and ICC president but the veteran politician said would be able to handle with a little help from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

“Fortunately the ICC headquarter is in Dubai and Dubai works on Saturday and Sunday. So, it’s a matter of two hours flight. So, I think there won’t be any difficulty. Secondly I will discuss with Prime Minister about my responsibilities and will take appropriate decision so that my government work is not affected,” he said.

“I may suggest for more hands. I had asked for three ministers but they have given only one. If I request to reduce some of my work, we may find some solution. I won’t allow my work in government to suffer,” he said.

Asked what he considers the biggest challenge of his new job, Pawar said, “We have to preserve all the formats of the game. Today we have 105 countries who are ICC members. But in true sense unless we expand the game to China, USA, some parts of Eastern Europe and some parts of Africa, the game would not reach every corner of the world.”

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Story telling is an age old art of communication.  Then there were play, theatre and finally films. In the present day world, we face new challenges every day.  There were three-hour plays and some had duration of two hours depending on the actors’ and writers’ abilities. Now the new challenge is to tell you story in just 10 minutes. Hence, it is called Short + Sweet.

Alex Broun is a specialist in this form of playwriting and has acted, produced and directed several Short + Sweet plays. Recently, the Abhinay School of performing Arts’ organised a work shop and Alex conducted the training for several budding playwrights at the Hurstville Civic Centre. They all had the talent and Alex helped them discover it.

Alex opened the workshop with his commanding words “My aim is to inspire you to write and inform you about some of the tools how to start”. He progressed maintaining his authority and said “why should you write a ten minute play – this is the fastest growing performance around the world’. He also stated that all of you have the opportunity to have your play performed in theatre. He continued “I write because I want to tell my stories and I want my stories get told” and urged “try to write a 10 minute play-just give it a go. Tell your story”.

 He freely shared the techniques and traits of writing, challenging his mesmerised students “turn off your inner critique, stop this negative voice- create something interesting to watch”

Alex created a stimulating environment for the audience which was in awe and frantically taking notes, taking it all in. It was so exciting to be taught the skills by this passionate world renowned celebrity that the participants could not hold their ideas anymore and shared freely what they would like to see on stage and are unsure how it will work. Alex advised “piece of theatre is a sheer act of imagination-you are telling your story, imagine something and take the audience on a journey. There was so much more in his words of wisdom that for three hours he kept his listeners spell bound.

It was an amazing experience to see that the budding writers hungry for knowledge floated some very exciting ideas and opened up a new world for Alex himself. He was touched to see that this diverse culture has so much to offer, a different perspective and so many life stories to tell. These ideas opened a new field, a new dimension for him and he was pleasantly surprised with the quality of the ideas the novice and potential writers brought to the workshop.

 Alex immediately spotted the potential; so many stories and life experiences bubbling inside these enthused participants, ready to be told on stage, will make a very interesting theatre experience. Sharing these ideas will not only enhance the appreciation of the diverse cultures but also opens a new dimension for the  theatrical world by injecting new viewpoints from the Indian, Asian and other ethnic backgrounds..

 He encouraged the inspired the group to get on with writing and offered that Abhinay school will organise their scripts to be played out on stage with experienced actors. He further emphasised that these script writers can in fact direct these actors and see how their script plays out on stage. They then take it a step further and go back and rewrite and fine tune their script. He then took it to extra mile and said they have a chance that their script may be picked up for the Short & Sweet, the biggest ten minute play festival in the world. What an offer; an offer too good to refuse, dream come true for any script writer.

 Abhinay School of Performing Arts President Aishveryaa Nidhi, a well known theatre personality and the only Indian actor to have won the nomination for Best Actress in 2009 Short + Sweet drama festival, has done a great job in connecting Indian and other ethnic playwrights and drama lovers to main stream theatre.

Ms. Nidhi has revealed that the workshop participant’s work would be staged live in August at a venue to be decided later. To those who missed the workshop, August shows would be a great opportunity and inspiration to explore their hidden talent.

For more information log on to www.abhinay.com.au or contact Aishverya Nidhi on 0488 200 222 for future workshops and to watch the plays.

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 In a democracy, it is hard to believe that a government could think of any draconian law that turns a blind eye towards the future of hundreds and thousands of students who want to benefit the country with their skills they acquired by studying and working in this country.

The Immigration and Citizenship Minister, Mr. Chris Evans has sent the Migration Amendment Bill 2010, popularly known as Visa Capping Bill to the Senate for approval and that is more or less certain to win the approval if the elections are not held early. The approved amendment will have a retrospective effect. With the new powers the Minister attains, he will ask thousands of potential migrants to leave after accepting their applications and granting them the bridging visa, or in other words assuring them of a settlement in Australia.

Now how can a government first accept, process and approve and then say sorry we can’t proceed. Agreed that it is the prerogative of the government to act as per its changing needs but Mr. Evans should consider the fact that these student have ‘bought a dream’ and whosoever may have been the seller, they have invested in the future of Australia. It is a democracy and not anarchy as yet in Australia.

The Indian sub-continent community has rallied behind these prospective migrants who have adapted to the work culture of this country and set up an organisation “Friends of International students” to further their cause.  We sincerely hope that similar teams have been set up by members of other migrant communities as well.

Prominent among the “Friends of International students” team include:

1.     Mr. Raj Datta – Chairperson, Deepavali Festival Committee of NSW

2.      Ms. Aruna Chandrala – President, United Indian Associations

3.      Ms. Lucky Singh – President GOPIO Sydney

4.      M . Apoorv Chaturvedi- Exec Member, Friends of International Students

5.      Mr. Syed Nazmus Sakib- Exec Member, Friends of International Students

6.      Mr. Vish Viswanathan, President – Federation of  Australian Indian Associations

7.      Dr. Yadu Singh – Representative – Hindi Samaj, Member, UIA, General Committee

8.      Mr. Rahul Jethi – Exec Member, Friends of International Students

9.      Dr J S Virk – Chairman, GOPIO Australia Business Council

10.    M Ranjit Khera – Punjabi Heritage Association of Australia    

With a view to helping the cause of International students a petition has been lodged to the Federal Government seeking changes to the proposed amendment to the Migration Regulation Act 1994.

The petition is accessible on http://fairgo4internationalstudents.org

The team has called upon the international community members to click on the ‘sign the petition’ and contribute their signature for a just cause.

Cutting across different sections of the community, several members have given their opinion on the proposed amendment.

Dr Yadu Singh, a member of the “Friends of International students” and who has written blogs www.yadusingh.wordpress.com and used his twitter account www.twitter.com/dryadusingh in support of the student community.

He comments,”I have met several distressed former students over recent weeks. They are suffering due to their uncertain future in Australia. I have met and discussed these issues with many people of our community. I feel that the Visa capping Bill 2010, if passed, should be applied prospectively, not retrospectively. It will not be fair if it is applied on those who have completed their studies, have applied for PR and are on bridging Visa currently. People should get “Fair go”.

I make an appeal to people from our community to not play any divisive politics in this matter. All groups from our community should work as a part of a bigger team and avoid doing things in isolation. Consultative approach is the need of the hour. Undermining one another should be avoided. We need to learn from the history and definitely not become pawns in the “divide and weaken” games of political parties and their “henchmen” in our community. These “machinery men” of the political parties have a different agenda as their primary loyalty is to the political party of which they are members, not our community. Many of such “Machinery men” of political parties are actually paid members of Unions and their primary loyalty is not difficult to guess. Knowing that Political parties have tried and succeeded to a large extent in controlling at least a segment of our community leadership, I am hoping that our community leaders will have a re-thinking on this and not allow themselves to be used by poltical parties with useless photo opportunities. Substantive stands, demands and actions are needed. Now is the time when our “leaders” should show leadership.

Affected students need our help, support and counsel which our community leaders must provide. This is their duty.”

Mr. Vish Viswanathan, President, Federation Of Australian Indian Associations Inc says, “The Federal Government has a moral responsibility in dealing with the issue of International Students affected due to the Visa Capping Bill. While it is necessary to clean up the immigration system and plug loopholes in the system currently being exploited by unscrupulous agents, it is also important to ensure innocent students are not drastically affected due to retrospective implementation of the new rules. Nobody wants to see more colleges closed. It is very important for the Federal Government to consult with the community organisations and the affected students to reach a truly beneficial migration program which will benefit the Australian economy in the long term. Hope the Government will listen to us, the community for reaching  a WIN WIN situation.”

Ms. Lucky Singh, President GOPIO Sydney says “A retrospective application of the proposed amendments to several thousands of legally lodged GSM applications is unjust and unfair.We urge the Federal Government to continue the processing of GSM visa applications that are already in the pipeline. The international students have devoted their long times towards this wait for GSM visa and even contributed massively in Australian infrastructure. They have paid taxes on times and the tax paid ratio from overseas migrated people is more from anyone else in Australia. Our international migrated people have grown a lot in Australia with the growth of Australian economy.

This axe on international students will not only ruin the image of Australia in International market but also bring a huge downfall to the Australian infrastructure and multiculturism.

So it’s a humble request that Australia should not adopt an absolute hard line system because a diversity of skills and backgrounds is needed to create an effective and productive society.”

Meanwhile, there are reports that some office-bearers of the United Indian Associations have met some ministers and MPs in Canberra purportedly in this connection. But some of the members of the team have expressed their shock at the developments as they were not consulted on the agenda or the timing for the meeting.

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