The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh News : Junk it

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Tuesday, Mar 18, 2008
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Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh

Junk it

Junk food contains merely sugar, salt and fat and hardly any protein. It leads to obesity resulting in diabetes, and even premature death due to overload of blood circulation, points out medical expert and secretary of Visakha Consumer Council P. Rama Rao. Positive healthy measures should be encouraged, he says. Almost 40 per cent of the educated employed youth were dependent on street food or junk food. For every one dollar spent by the World Health Organisation (WHO) on nutrient food, multinational companies are spending 500 dollars to promote their products like soft drinks and junk food, a dangerous trend, he points out, and calls for bringing pressure on Government by sending e-mails, SMS and other means to take measures to improve public health, he states.

Silver screen tribute

The Vizag Film Society last week screened a documentary on Ghantasala, made by his son Ratna Kumar. The film focused on the all-time great singer and music director who had attained immortality though he died at the relatively young age of 52, shortly after composing Bhagavadgita. Unfortunately, he did not see it being released and becoming an inseparable part of the devotional music collection of people.

Several film personalities spoke about the stature of the singer and described his songs and music as a treasure that will last forever. Of great value is his rendering of the songs in the classic Lavakusa and composing music for it. Both singer P. Suseela and film director Dasari Narayana Rao have spoken for crores of Telugus when they recalled Ghantasala’s everlasting contribution to the film - an epic in every sense of the word.

Feeling the heat

“Thank God, we haven’t been injured in the melee,” a woman constable was heard saying, after the police successfully foiled a bid by tribals to gatecrash into the Collectorate.

A posse of police is deployed at the Collectorate gate, the permanent venue of dharnas and protests, almost everyday to keep protestors at bay. “We come here by 10 a.m. and have to stay put till around 2.30 p.m. to prevent the crowds from turning hostile,” remarked a woman inspector.

She asked: How can we attend to our duties at the station, when half-the-day is wasted here?

Many a time, protestors are also injured.

But, it’s like a double-edged sword for the police to bear the sizzling summer heat and the heat of the moment every day.

Prabhakkar Sharma, G.V. Prasada Sarma and B. Madhu Gopal

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