Sindhi language

Sindhi /ˈsɪndi/ (سنڌي, सिन्धी, ) is an Indo-Aryan language of the historical Sindh region, spoken by the Sindhi people. It is the official language of the Pakistani province of Sindh. In India, Sindhi is one of the scheduled languages officially recognized by the federal government. It has influences from Balochi spoken in the adjacent province of Balochistan.

Most Sindhi speakers are concentrated in Pakistan in the Sindh province, and in India in the Kutch region of the state of Gujarat and in Ulhasnagar region of the state of Maharashtra. The remaining speakers in India are composed of the Hindu Sindhis who migrated from Sindh, which became a part of Pakistan and settled in India after the independence of Pakistan in 1947 and the Sindhi diaspora worldwide. Sindhi language is spoken in Sindh, Pakistan and Kutch, India as well as immigrant communities in India, Hong Kong, Oman, Philippines, Indonesia, Singapore, UAE, UK, USA, Afghanistan, and Sri Lanka.

There are 46 million Sindhis living in Pakistan, with 44 million in Sindh, and over 2 million living in other provinces, Mostly in Balochistan. About 16% of the population of Sindhis in Pakistan are Hindus. Most of them live in urban areas like Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur, Mirpur Khas, Dadu, Larkana and Jacobabad. Hyderabad is the largest centre of Sindhi Hindus in Pakistan with 100,000-150,000 people.

Space station

A space station, also known as an orbital station or an orbital space station, is a spacecraft capable of supporting a crew, which is designed to remain in space (most commonly as an artificial satellite in low Earth orbit) for an extended period of time and for other spacecraft to dock. A space station is distinguished from other spacecraft used for human spaceflight by lack of major propulsion or landing systems. Instead, other vehicles transport people and cargo to and from the station. As of September 2014 two space stations are in orbit: the International Space Station, which is permanently manned, and China's Tiangong-1 (which successfully launched on September 29, 2011), which is unmanned most of the time. Previous stations include the Almaz and Salyut series, Skylab and most recently Mir.

Today's space stations are research platforms, used to study the effects of long-term space flight on the human body as well as to provide platforms for greater number and length of scientific studies than available on other space vehicles. Each crew member staying aboard the station for weeks or months, but rarely more than a year. Most of the time crew remain at station but its not necessary that crew should have to be stay at station. Since the ill-fated flight of Soyuz 11 to Salyut 1, all manned spaceflight duration records have been set aboard space stations. The duration record for a single spaceflight is 437.7 days, set by Valeriy Polyakov aboard Mir from 1994 to 1995. As of 2013, three astronauts have completed single missions of over a year, all aboard Mir.

Jai Hind

Jai Hind (Hindi: जय हिन्द) is a salutation, slogan and battle cry most commonly used in India in speeches and communications pertaining to or referring to patriotism towards India (also known as Hind). It translates roughly to "Hail India", "Victory to India" or "Long live India". It is said that Father of the slogan Jai Hind is Chembakaraman Pillai. The term was coined by Major Abid Hasan Safrani of the Indian National Army as a shortened version of Jai Hindustan Ki (translation: Victory to India).

The Jai Hind postmark was the first commemorative postmark of Independent India, and was issued on the day of independence, 15 August 1947.

In popular culture

A follower of Indian nationalist Subhas Chandra Bose, Ramchandra Moreshwar Karkare, of Gwalher (Gwalior) Madhya Bharat, wrote a patriotic drama Jai Hind in MARCH 1947 and published a book in Hindi, with the same title as "Jai Hind". Later, Ramchandra Karkare became Congress president of Central India Province. (Freedom Fighter Ramchandra Moreshwar Karkare was also a strong follower of Chandrashekhar Azad and was an active member of his team in 1925)

Media of Pakistan

Media in Pakistan provides information on television, radio, cinema, newspapers, and magazines in Pakistan. Pakistan has a vibrant media landscape; among the most dynamic in South Asia. To a large extent the media enjoys freedom of expression in spite of political pressure and direct bans sometimes administered by political stake holders. Political pressure on media is mostly done indirectly. One tool widely used by the government is to cut off ‘unfriendly’ media from governmental advertising. Using draconian laws the government has also banned or officially silenced popular television channels. The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority (PEMRA) has been used to silence the broadcast media by either suspending licenses or by simply threatening to do so. In addition, media is also exposed to propaganda from state agencies, pressured by powerful political elements and non-state actors involved in the current conflict.

Media freedom in Pakistan is complicated, journalists are free to report on most things. however any articles critical of the Government or the Military and related security agencies are automatically censored. Anything perceived as blasphemous by the countries Blasphemy laws are also automatically subject to censorship. The blasphemy laws are also used to block website based free media such as YouTube and others.

Pisces (astrology)

Pisces (♓) (/ˈpaɪsiːz/,pis'eez;Ancient Greek: Ἰχθύες Ikhthyes) is the twelfth astrological sign in the Zodiac, originating from the Pisces constellation. It spans the 330° to 360° of the zodiac, between 332.75° and 360° of celestial longitude. Under the tropical zodiac the sun transits this area on average between February 19 and March 20, and under the sidereal zodiac, the sun transits this area between approximately March 13 and April 13. The symbol of the fish is derived from the ichthyocentaurs, who aided Aphrodite when she was born from the sea.

According to some tropical astrologers, the current astrological age is the Age of Pisces, while others maintain that it is the Age of Aquarius.

Background

While the astrological sign Pisces per definition runs from elliptical longitude 330° to 0°, this position is now mostly covered by the constellation of Aquarius, due to the precession from when the constellation and the sign coincided. Today, the First Point of Aries, or the vernal equinox is in the Pisces constellation. There are no prominent stars in the constellation, with the brightest stars being of only fourth magnitude. One star in the constellation, Alpha Piscium, is also known as Alrescha which comes from the Arabic الرشآء al-rišā’, meaning "the well rope," or "the cord."Ptolemy described Alpha Piscium as the point where the cords joining the two fish are knotted together. The astrological symbol shows the two fishes captured by a string, typically by the mouth or the tails. The fish are usually portrayed swimming in opposite directions; this represents the duality within the Piscean nature. Although they appear as a pair, the name of the sign in all languages originally referred to only one fish with the exception of Greek, Bulgarian, Dutch,Latvian.