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The Times Of India - Chennai, 1/12/2020 Cropped page Page: 5
SUNDAY TIMES OF INDIA, CHENNAI JANUARY 12, 2020 5TIMES CITY
Waste on busy T Nagar street cleared in double quick time
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Conservancy workers have done a shoddy job of clearing waste from the side of Velachery Main Road at Medavakkam. The space can be used by pedestrians if cleared properly – Anand P
This manhole cover on Rajendraprasad Road, Chromepet, is damaged and poses a risk of commuters tripping over or someone falling in. Will the Pallavaram municipality replace the cover? – Venkataraghavan Santhanam
GETTING BETTER
JOB HALF-DONE
PLUG THE LEAK
FIX THIS PLEASE
OINK!
A day after news of an overflowing, damaged garbage bin on Kannadasan Street, T Nagar, appeared in these columns, the space was cleared and a better bin provided by the corporation – T N Venkatesh
Sewage overflow is a regular menace on Lloyd’s Road, Royepettah. Can the authorities concerned ensure the problem is fixed? – Suresh Kumar
Stray pigs often roam on Appa Durai Main Street, Ayanavaram, and run the risk of being run over by vehicles or causing accidents – Ashok Shekar
RATING SCALE
TRASH ★ | POOR ★ | BELOW AVERAGE ★★ | AVERAGE ★★ | ABOVE AVERAGE ★★★ | GOOD ★★★ | VERY GOOD ★★★★ | VERY GOOD+ ★★★★ | OUTSTANDING ★★★★★
■ Ajay Krishna (Mahesh Babu) is an orphan and a soldier serving at Kashmir. Professor Bharathi (Vijayashanthi) is a righteous professor and single mother of three, with one son already lost during service. How Ajay steps up when she’s in trouble forms the crux of the story.
With Sarileru Neekevvaru, Anil Ravipudi brings back the old Mahesh Babu, someone who
played cocky characters that fought, danced, saved the day and delivered speeches seeped in morality. There’s enough drama, emotion and most importantly, looming danger in the film (until Mahesh Babu saves the day) to fuel the wafer-thin story, but Anil is so caught up in weaving two mismatched story-lines together that he forgets to keep the repetitiveness in check. He banks on you to suspend disbelief for the most part and given as how the film doesn’t take itself too seriously in the first place, it might work for some.
Ajay Krishna (Mahesh Babu) is the true-blue soldier posted at Kashmir who will disable bombs without safety suit on and walk into operations without a helmet on his head – that’s how you know he likes to live life on the edge and is the hero because he has nothing to lose. Professor Bharati (Vijayashanthi) is a patriotic woman and a single mother who has lost her eldest child when he was serving in the army and is yet ready to send her second son (Satya Dev) to serve too. She also has a biological daughter apart from an adopted one and is someone who does not shy away from taking tough decisions to ensure the good emerge victorious. Then there’s Kurnool MLA Nagendra (Prakash Raj) who’s the epitome of evil because that’s what Prakash Raj does best.
In a tale completely unrelated to this, there’s Samksruti (Rashmika Mandanna), her supportive mother (Sangeeta) and tired father (Rao Ramesh). Her favourite pastime happens to be to propose marriage to anyone she sees just so she doesn’t marry the man her father chose for her. So it’s only natural that when she sees Ajay, she
latches on to him like a leech and refuses to let go, consent and choice be damned. But it’s all fun and games and definitely shown in lighter vein till a fake rape scene is staged and of course, she’s also wrestled into the other half of the story by force.
The good part about Sarileru Neekevvaru is that it never takes itself too seriously. What’s also good is that despite the paper-thin story Anil builds on, he does not veer in a direction you would expect the story to take. The way Ajay’s character is built, he seems to like to throw a few punches, deliver a speech and crack a joke or two to lighten the mood (in that sequence). The character is completely reminiscent of his roles from the early 2000s and is a trope that will work with fans. So just when you realise something completely implausible has happened on-screen, you are reminded that this is a commercial entertainer.
The much-hyped scenes in the train drag on thanks to some of the jokes not landing. Also, what doesn’t work is that Anil seems to want to hammer the message home instead of letting his audience think. The jokes get repetitive, so do scenes, the catch lines and all that talk of soldiers serving at the border and patriotism, greatness of Alluri Seetharama Raju are repeated so much, you just wish there was a way to tell the director you get it! The jokes too about Rao Ramesh’s family being crazy, you don’t have to tell us so many times, we know! Not to mention that climax that veers between idealism and comedy, unsure of which side to take. Phew! The less said about it the better. Also, actor Krishna sure is there in the film, just not in the way you’d think.
Mahesh Babu does a good job of playing a man who will serve the country, crack jokes and protect. It’s
been long since he got a chance to act in a film like this and he grabs the opportunity with both hands, giving it his all. Rashmika Mandanna is there. She woos, gets hyper, dances, has a catch-line, all for the male lead, but why she exists in this tale, other than to fawn over him is a mystery. Vijayashanthi gets a solid role, and the way she’s set up you expect so much more from her character. But when even her role is reduced to mouthing one-liners praising the hero, there’s only so much one can do. She too gives it her all though, especially in an emotional scene, so do Prakash Raj and Ajay in roles they can play in their sleep.
DSP’s music for the film is okay, with Daang Daang opening the film on an unexpected note but He Is So Cute and Mind Block (which is super-fun to watch) being horribly misplaced and breaking the flow of things. Suryudivo Chandrudivo and Sarileru Neekevvaru are the numbers that fit the narrative and comes at apt time. His background score however works and gets the job done without overpowering the narrative. Rathnavelu’s cinematography too works but is unfortunately overshadowed by subpar VFX shots. The action by Ram-Lakshman is engaging.
Sarileru Neekevvaru definitely has its moments but Anil Ravipudi’s bloated narrative that tries too hard, not to mention do everything at once without a proper structure in place proves to be a major drawback. This one’s worth watching for Mahesh Babu and Vijayashanthi, especially if you miss watching them in top form. Meeku ardham avtonda?
— Neeshita Nyayapati
Sarileru Neekevvaru (Action, Drama, Romance) ★★Cast: Mahesh Babu, Rashmika Mandanna, Rajendra Prasad, Vijayashanti, Prakash Raj, Dil Raju, Sunkara RamabrahmamDirection: Anil RavipudiRunning Time: 2 hours 2 minutesLanguage: Telugu (U/A)
CINEMA OF THE WEEK
Mahesh Babu and Vijayashanti make Sarileru Neekevvaru worth watching
To review any movie and check show timings visit etimes.in
Chennai: To reverse the dro-opy admission trend of engi-neering courses, colleges inTamil Nadu have turned the-ir eyes towards emerging are-as such as artificial intelli-gence, data science and ma-chine learning. More than 35engineering colleges haveapplied to Anna Universityexpressing interest to startBTech courses in artificial in-telligence and data science,and computer science and bu-siness systems for the nextacademic year.
All India Council for Tech-nical Education (AICTE) hasannounced that engineering
colleges would be allowed tostart new courses in artificialintelligence, data science, cy-ber security, machine lear-ning and block chain. AnnaUniversity had invited appli-cation for starting a course inartificial intelligence and da-ta science. It has also began toframe syllabus for the course.
“Colleges must get AIC-TE’s approval to offer the newprogramme. The council mayallow fresh intake for BTechcourses in National Board ofAccreditation (NBA)-accre-dited departments,” officialsfrom Anna University said.
“Artificial intelligence
and data analytics hold greatfuture. Information techno-logy will be used in every stre-am. Students who study thesecourses will have a bright fu-ture,” said K Maran, directorof Sairam Institutions.
B Chidambararajan, prin-cipal of Valliammai Enginee-ring College, urged the uni-versity to work with AICTE toenable colleges to offer thesecourses from the next acade-mic year.
The university will checkwhether the colleges have ne-cessary infrastructure to of-fer the courses and accordpermission. “We have to train
our engineering graduates inall emerging streams such asartificial intelligence, in-ternt of things (IoT) andblock chain to make thememployable. Even cyber secu-rity has a good demand forengineers. After proper in-spection, the university willallow colleges to start suchcourses,” said M K Surappa,vice-chancellor of Anna Uni-versity.
But university professorsalso cautioned against offe-ring the specialised course atundergraduate level sayingcourses such as agricultureengineering, geo informaticsand mining, which had initi-al attraction, have lost steam.They said specialised cour-ses should be offered only atthe postgraduate level.
Meanwhile, many engine-ering colleges have sought todiscontinue traditional cour-ses such as civil engineeringand electrical and electronicsengineering due to poor en-rolment.
BTech In AI,Data Science
Is A CrowdFavourite
Colleges rush to Anna Univ fornod to offer new engg courses
Chennai: Metrowater hasscaled up its capacity to recy-cle grey water from 45MLD(million litres a day) to60MLD in its two tertiary tre-atment reverse osmosis(TTRO) plants in Koyambeduand Kodungaiyur. An orderto this effect was recently is-sued by the state governmentin the last week of December,Metrowater managing direc-tor T N Hariharan told TOI.
A total of 530MLD of greywater is generated in the city.Of this, nearly 20% —120MLD — is being treated.Treated water from Koyam-bedu is supplied to industrialunits in Oragadam, Irungat-tukottai, Sriperumbudurand Pillaippakkam areas,while that from Kodungaiy-ur is supplied to industries inManali, Ennore and Minjur,Hariharan said. Some of the
companies are Chennai Pet-roleum Corporation Limi-ted, Madras Fertilizers Limi-ted, Manali PetrochemicalsLimited, Tamil Nadu PetroProducts Limited, C TECHand Indian Additives Limi-ted.
There are more than 500industrial units in Sriperum-budur, Oragadam, Irungattu-kottai and Pillaippakkamareas in Kancheepuram dis-
trict and another 200 plusunits in Ennore, Manali andMinjur industrial cluster. Be-fore the TTRO plant in Koy-ambedu became operational,about 25MLD of water wasdrawn from Chembarambak-kam lake for industrial use,he added.
A SIPCOT official saidthey buy treated water at `̀60per kilolitre from Metrowa-
ter, which is then sold at `̀80per kilolitre to the industrialunits.
Explaining about the qua-lity of TTRO water, Hariha-ran said it has a TDS level ofless than 70/litre. Generally,water that has TDS value lessthan 500/litre is fit for humanconsumption. “However, sofar the TTRO water has notbeen distributed for humanconsumption. During the in-auguration of TTRO plant atKodungaiyur, we demonstra-ted how the water was of po-table quality,” Hariharan sa-id.
Metrowater is in the pro-cess of setting up tertiary tre-atment plants with ultra fil-tration system in Nesappak-kam and Perungudi. Metro-water has plans to release thewater treated in the new sy-stems into water bodies tohelp recharge the groundwa-ter table, Hariharan said.
Metrowater scales up grey watertreatment capacity to 120MLD
Chennai: “The AICTEshould endeavour and makeefforts to take a decision be-fore the cutoff date of admis-sions as prescribed by theapex court,” the HC benchhad said.
An Anna University offi-cial said, “The universitytook action against the engi-neering colleges with morethan 25% deficiency in labs,
library, faculty members andclassrooms. Now, the univer-sity may suspend the affilia-tion for colleges which havedeficiencies.”
With more than 100 engi-neering colleges in the statefunctioning without properinfrastructure, Anna univer-sity plans to rope in more ex-perts from IIT Madras, IIScBangalore and NIT Trichythis year. “One or two facultymembers from these institu-tions will be part of inspec-tion committees.”
Last year, 170 facultymembers from these three in-stitutions inspected morethan 537 engineering colleges
in the state.But, the consortium of
private colleges said the com-mittees viewed even minorerrors like absent of facultymembers seriously. “… Wehave submitted representa-tion to the university. As far ascourt order is concerned, theuniversity still recommend-ed to the AICTE for actionagainst colleges with poor in-frastructure,” said P Selva-raj, secretary of Consortiumof Self-Financing Profession-al, Arts and Science Colleges.
Anna University formervice-chancellor E Balaguru-samy suggested disaffiliatingparticular programmes incolleges with poor infrastruc-ture, saying it would be moreharsh than reducing seats.
He further urged the uni-versity to disaffiliate collegesfound functioning in viola-tion of affiliation norms. “Itis time for Anna University totake severe action against col-leges which do not follownorms. AICTE is only reasonfor the poor quality of techni-cal education in the state. It isresponsible for opening somany colleges and allowingthem to continue withoutproper infrastructure…,” headded.
Even minor issuestaken seriously, say
private colleges
SOME RAGA BY THE PLAZAC Suresh Kumar
A SPECIAL STAGE SET: Samanvi, vocalist and finalist of the Times Thyagaraja Awards 2020, performswith violinist V Nandhika and percussionist Nikshith T at the Pondy Bazaar pedestrian plaza in an eventorganised by the Times of India as a part of Namma Chennai Chanceyilla celebrations, supported byGreater Chennai Corporation and Chennai Smart City Limited
Chennai: City police on Sa-turday arrested a history-she-eter from Ice House area inconnection with a burglarycase and recovered at least 18sovereigns of stolen gold je-wellery from him.
Police said Prakash, ofMaduranthakam, has a mur-der and a few burglary casespending against him and waslived on the pavements nearMarina.
On November 15, Sridha-ran of SMV Koil Street in Tri-plicane, had lodged a compla-int at the Ice House Police Sta-tion stating that unidentifiedpeople had stolen 18 sovere-igns of jewellery from his hou-se. Police registered a caseand combed the CCTV camerafootage recorded in the vicini-ty to zero in on suspects.
They identified the manwho entered the premises tobe Prakash and launched a forhim. Police seized the stolenjewellery from him and re-manded him in judicial custo-dy after producing him beforea magistrate court.
Man held forbreaking in,
stealing gold
Chennai: The state transportdepartment has issued a go-vernment order to elevate theeligible reserve employees –drivers and conductors atMTC, TNSTC, excludingSETC – to daily paid cadre asper the norms of the schedu-led services.
The GO dated January 6 re-gularises the services of 1,112drivers and 162 conductors,making them eligible forconversion to daily paid cad-re. The GO said the additionalfinancial commitment ari-sing out of the implementa-tion will be met by revenuegenerated by the respectivestate transport undertakings.The state transport corpora-tion appointed 6,416 driversand 6,486 conductors from2014 to 2016.
Of them, 1,828 drivers and537 conductors were on reser-ve crew roll in the seven trans-port corporations. TNN
1,274 transportreserve staffregularised
Chennai: Police on Saturdayarrested three suspects and de-tained two juveniles in connec-tion with the attack and robberyof a cabbie.
The arrested were identifiedas Aravind, 23, of Aatanthangal;Govindaraj, 19, of Puzhal; Sa-tish, 32, of Kathirvedu.
On December 25, the ganghad hired a call taxi from Tiru-vallur to make a trip to Ambat-tur and return. While two of thesuspects boarded a cab driven byRaji, 27, in Tiruvallur, threeother boarded the cab at Ambat-tur and all five were returning inRaji’s car, making a detour thro-ugh Red Hills.
At Red Hills the gang attack-ed Raji, left him in a pool of bloodon the road and escaped in hiscar. In a complaint lodged withthe Red Hills police, Raji, a Roya-puram resident, reported thatthe gang also snatched a silverchain, and a ring, a gold bracelet,two mobiles and `̀4,000 in cashfrom him.
Police traced the suspectswith the help of CCTV camerafootage collected from the crimescene. The stolen valuables andcar were recovered from them.The arrested trio was remandedin Puzhal prison while the juve-niles were sent to the juvenilehome in Kellys.
Five suspectswho mugged
cabbie and fledin his car held
Chennai: An unidentified ve-hicle fatally knocked down aconservancy worker in Man-daveli on Saturday morning.
Police said Meenakshi, 57,a Lloyds Road resident work-ing for the city corporation,was sweeping the road near apetrol bunk in Mandaveliwhen a speeding vehiclemowed her down and fled thespot.
Fellow workers who werenearby rushed her to the Gov-ernment Royapettah Hospitalwhere she was declaredbrought dead. Her body wassent for postmortem.
The Adyar traffic policehave registered a case andlaunched a search for the sus-pect with the help of CCTVcamera footage retrievedfrom the locality.
Corpn workermowed downby speeding
vehicle
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‘TIME TO ACT’
We have to train ourengineering graduates inall emerging streams suchas artificial intelligence,IoT and block chain tomake them employable M K SURAPPAvice-chancellor of Anna University
CCI NG 3.7 Product: TOIChennaiBS PubDate: 12-01-2020 Zone: Chennai Edition: 1 Page: TOICHP5 User: akshya.jayram Time: 01-11-2020 23:58 Color: CMYK
