The 13-year-long human genome project whose aim was to identify all the 20,000-25,000 genes in human DNA and determine the sequences of some three billion chemical base pairs that constitute it, ended successfully in 2003. In the five years since then it has enabled medical researchers to make some pretty spectacular new health breakthroughs, including finding links between genetics and a number of conditions like heart attack, cancer, multiple sclerosis and gallstones.

The Gujarat forest department has handed an arrest warrant against actor Aamir Khan

For Indian doctors, western shores could be greener. But for an increasing number of foreign patients, Indian hospitals are fast becoming their first choice. Over 1.5 lakh medical tourists travelled to India in 2002 alone, bringing in earnings of $300 million. Since then, the number of such travellers has been increasing by at least 25% every year. A CIIMcKinsey report projects that earnings through medical tourism would go up to $2 billion by 2012.

Steel Authority of India Limited (SAIL), which entered its golden jubilee year of production in February, ended the year 2007-08 with new landmarks in performance by producing 13.04 million tonnes of saleable steel for the first time. This was a consequence of several initiatives like utilising full potential of available assets and human resources, R&D interventions, implementation of de-bottlenecking schemes, etc.

Being beaten up at home could be making Indian women and children frail and undernourished. In an interesting research, a team of social scientists from Harvard School of Public Health has for the first time found a strong association between domestic violence and chronic malnutrition among Indian women and children.

With chances of conventional war becoming rare, the Centre has mooted a proposal to change the character of civil defence by giving its volunteers the responsibility of tackling disasters in addition to protecting people and property from external aggression or internal disturbances. Currently, the activities of civil defence is to provide necessary support to citizens in 124 selected cities at the time of external aggression. Under the proposed change, the Centre is plans to extend its activities to all 604 districts in the country.

An overhead water tank has suddenly sprung up near the Taj complex and the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), which looks after the monument, says it is clueless as to who built the

Two days after former Karnataka chief minister S M Krishna accused Tamil Nadu chief minister M Karunanidhi of using

Exploited in their youth and physically abused when they are not able to work anymore, old elephants in Kerala can now look forward to a life away from the dreaded sharp hook of the mahout. The state's forest department is to launch an old-age home for elephants, the first in the country.

Get set to pay more for parking in busy markets and posh commercial centres. The Environment Pollution Control Authority (EPCA) has proposed levying higher rates in areas where real estate is costlier and demand for parking space high. It also wants time-linked rates extended to the entire city