Mangaluru: Budding cartoonist, food blogger Nikhil Pai commits suicide

On Friday, February 7, 2020 Tulu Koota Kuwait under the leadership of Dynamic President Ramesh S Bhandary and coordination of Sports Secretary Roshan Quadras  held its annual picnic at Mishref Garden, Kuwait.  Although slight drizzling on the   previous night had caused great concern amongst committee members , yet the  windy and dusty weather did not lessen the enthusiasm and excitement of Tulu Koota Kuwait members.  Over 1000 members enjoyed the fun filled day.

MC of the occasion Mr. Manoj Shetty & Ms. Priya Devadiga welcomed the audience and Chief guests for the event Dr Jeshna Rajan- Badr Al Samaa Clinic, Dr. S.M.Hyther Ali- Chairman of TVS Hyder Group, Mr. John Simon- Group Manager for Corporate Sales and Event Marketing ,  Al Mulla Exchange, Mr Pradeep, owner of Geetherb medicine and Mr. Lokesh & Team from NH Assets.  The program kicked off with Kuwait & Indian National anthem. The guests in their address to audience, praised Tulu Koota Kuwait unwavering efforts to unite people through language, and also the solid philanthropy and charity work being carried by the association was applauded. The presidents  of different South Canara  association in Kuwait were also amongst invited dignitaries for the event, and were welcomed with flower bouquet. This was followed by the release of “ Tulu Nada Jathre flyer”.

Tulu Koota Kuwait President, Ramesh S Bhandary in his speech welcomed the dignitaries and emphasized the significance of the annual picnic gathering. He further elaborated on the innovative concept of “Tulunada Jathre ” being initiated this year, and requested fervent support and participation from all members in  this wonderful program scheduled to be held on Friday,  March 27, 2020 at Indian Central School Indoor Ground Abbasiya. 

As part of days celebration TKK’s Flag hosting  was done  by President , Ramesh Bhandary. “Go Green Global concept” by Tulu Koota members   was the highlight of the inaugural ceremony.  This act was directed by talented committee member Mr. Suresh Salian.

The act beautifully conveyed the message of sustainability, and climate change and raised awareness on how to fight it, how to live green.  The traditional inaugural of the sports event was done by breaking of coconut by Sports Secretary Mr. Roshan Quadras.  TKK First Lady Mrs Anitha Ramesh Bhandary led the sports march holding the traditional torch followed by the  Go Green Global team holding different country flags with plant pots, followed by President, committee members and Sponsors of TKK. The president officially inaugurated the Sports Event by officially lighting the Sports Lamp.

After the inauguration ceremony, the members and kids actively participated in day long sports games and activities meticulously planned out by the Sports committee  for different age groups.  Passing the parcel, Veggies collection, ball bucket, veg shopping , macroni race, hockey, kutti donne, sack race, lagori,  breaking the pot , tyre race, slow cycling, water ballon race, musical chair , kabbadi, volley ball, throw  ball , tug of war, housie housie, kept the members and their families  engaged and entertained. The winners for the competitions were awarded with trophies towards the end of the exciting day.

Delicious and authentic Mangalorean lunch for the event was served by Oriental Restaurant Kuwait.  Sounds and lights support for the event was provided by Anand, while the beautiful moments were captured in camera by Mr.Blen Dsouza and Mr.Rajesh Devadiga

Tulu Koota Kuwait takes this opportunity to thank its committee members, members and volunteers for their dedicated efforts and team spirit and active participation that eventually lead to the huge success of Family Picnic 2020. The Event Sponsors were Al Ahleia Insurance Company SAKP, Al Mulla Exchange, Khain Properties Udupi, Badr Al-Samaa Clinic, TVS Hyder Group and Geetherb.

While it makes perfect sense for IT employees to work from remote locations via video conferencing and collaboration tools seamlessly - especially in the case of tech giants like Google or Microsoft -- workers from the non-IT companies and small and medium enterprises (SMBs) are the worst-hit in India as most of them have little or no clue about how these messaging and collaboration tools work amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Small companies -- from corporate to education verticals -- are scrambling to get their act together as new coronavirus threat has reached their premises, prompting them to send employees home who have age-old laptops, poor network and connectivity with no UPS backups and little knowledge about how to handle group chat and collaboration software like Zoom, Google Hangouts Meet, Microsoft Teams and Flock etc.

Instead of halting operations, however, businesses can choose to shift towards remote working methods with teaching non-IT staff on how to use the latest digital software to connect and work, say industry experts.

The training will take some time and may hamper productivity in the short run but is a win-win situation for the non-tech companies in the long run, in case any such global emergency arises in the future.

According to a latest report by Gartner, 54 per cent of HR leaders have cited that poor technology and/or infrastructure for remote working is the biggest barrier to effective remote working.

Sandy Shen, Senior Director Analyst, Gartner, says that with COVID-19 disrupting the business landscape, CIOs should relook at the digital fulfillment of market demand.

"The value of digital channels, products and operations is immediately obvious to companies everywhere right now. This is a wake-up call for organisations that have placed too much focus on daily operational needs at the expense of investing in digital business and long-term resilience," warned Shen.

Businesses that can shift technology capacity and investments to digital platforms will mitigate the impact of the outbreak and keep their companies running smoothly now, and over the long term.

"Videoconferencing, messaging, collaboration tools and document sharing are just a few examples of technologies that facilitate remote work. Additional bandwidth and network capacity may also be needed, given the increasing number of users and volume of communications," informed Shen.

The IT industry's apex body Nasscom has asked the government to relax norms for a month to allow work-from-home for technology and back-office employees as a measure to deal with the spread of Covid-19 in India.

Networking giant Cisco said that it has seen "significant growth" in the usage of its web conferencing and video-conferencing service Webex in India.

According to Muneer Ahmad, Business Head, ViewSonic India, due to COVID-19 pandemic, the corporate and educational sector is severely getting affected in the country.

"ViewSonic IFP has a cloud-based software which help teachers and corporates to connect through video conferencing to multiple people at the same time and can split the screen into six screens. It can also connect with various tools like Skype, Cisco WebEx, Zoom, Google Hangouts and GoToMeeting," Ahmad told IANS.

Co-working sector has also taken a hit and the industry is looking at several measures to tackle it -- from ensuring supply of juices rich in Vitamin C to supply of disinfectants and giving work from home facilities.

"The scheduled visits of the clients at our co-working offices have been postponed. Few of our clients have cancelled their outstation meetings and have now started audio/video conferencing for virtual meetings," said Nakul Mathur, MD, Avanta India.

According to reports, India has approximately 1,000 co-working locations (as of September 2019) and is the second-largest market for the co-working industry after China.

As India's first licensed B2B Virtual Network Operator, CloudConnect Communications offers a collaborative platform that allows companies to overcome the COVID-19 threat while maintaining seamless business continuity and optimum employee productivity.

"We offer a secure, robust, reliable, scalable and trackable mobile-first unified communication infrastructure that aids remote teleworking so that businesses can continue operating even under any unforeseen circumstances," said Gokul Tandon, Executive Chairman, CloudConnect Communications.