Khalsakids.org, a website dedicated to helping Sikh students fight bullying in schools has been launched as an interactive resource tool and features a discussion forum, videos and downloadable presentations.
The Sikh Coalition, a New York based community organisation, launched the site in response to an incident this year in which a Sikh schoolboy’s turban was forcibly removed

Amrit Singh, the US-based daughter of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, has co-authored a book which gives substantial evidence that torture and abuse of prisoners in US detention centres abroad was widespread and systemic and not confined to Abu Ghraib in Iraq.
The book, Administration of Torture: A Documentary Record from Washington to Abu Ghraib and Beyond, has been co-authored by Amrit Singh, an attorney who works for the American Civil Liberties Union and Jameel Jaffer, also an ACLU attorney.

BOBBY JINDAL, 36, won the gubernatorial elections in Louisiana, beating out 11 rivals, to be become the youngest governor of an American state. He’s also first politician of South Asian origin to be governor.
Jindal’s parents come from Malerkotla in Punjab.
Oxford educated Jindal won the election with 53 per cent of the votes, enough to avoid a November 17 runoff. No one has won a gubernatorial primary outright until now in Louisiana. He was elected to the House of Representatives in 2004 and is the second Indian American Congressman, the first being Dilip Singh Saund.
Jindal is known as one who fixed the state’s healthcare system and as a fighter against corruption.

Four punjabis—Harinder Takhar, Vic Dhillon, Kuldeep Kular and Amrit Mangat—have won the Canadian provincial polls for the second time in a row. Significantly, all of them are from the Liberal party and have achieved the feat of winning back-to-back elections after 70 years.
Kuldeep Harinder Takhar, a minister for small business and entrepreneurship in the current Dalton McGuinty government, has won from Mississauga Erindale centre by trouncing progressive Conservative party nominee David Brown..

R.S. Baxi, the London-based chief of J&H International has been elected president of the Brussels-based paper division of the Bureau of International Recycling, the first time an Asian has been elected to head the institution in its 59 year history. The Bureau has offices in 65 countries.
Baxi, who is also president of the World Punjabi Organisation (Europe), received the Queen’s Award for International Trade in 2001 and is a director of Soulier UK, part of a French conglomerate involved in water utilities, refuse collection and recycling. He is also a member of the Bank of England’s small firm’s panel for East London.

Tom Tar Singh, OBE, has donated a collection of letters and handwritten manuscripts of Mahatma Gandhi, to the Indian government.
The manuscripts, dating from the 1920s to the 1940s, were acquired by Singh at an auction at Sotheby’s London and includes drafts and revisions of a series of articles for Young India. Also in the collection is correspondence exchanged between Gandhi and Badrul Hasan and Dr Jafar Hasan.
The gift was made to coincide with the anniversary of the birthday of the Mahatma.

Rajee gandhi and Subuadeep Guia fled the deadly wildfires of Southern California this week, they took off together.
Gandhi and Guia and a dozen of their fellow India-born engineers from the Sony electronics plant in San Diego were among the nearly 1,000,000 people who moved out of the way of the series of wildfires.
“During the worst of it, all you can think of is to get away from the flames and the smoke,” said Guia, 31.” Gandhi said: “We engineers liked to play basketball after work and hang out together. The bonds we formed during good times stood us in good stead.”
Gandhi went to one of the 45 evacuation centres scattered throughout the county. The blaze that engulfed miles of California habitat spread fast as winds of nearly 100 miles per hour whipped the flames across the hills and canyons of the drought-parched suburbs.
Mahendra Hazariwala of the Gujarati Association of San Diego said an estimated 2000 Indian families were forced to flee the California fires but have now started trickling back home. In upscale Rancho Bernardo, home to many Gujarati doctors and businessmen, several houses were burned to cinders.

Tulsi Tanti, chairman of Suzlon Energy and D.P. Dobhal of the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology, have made it to the list of global environment champions in Time magazine. They are part of a list that includes Nobel Peace Prize winner and former US Vice-President Al Gore, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Prince Charles of Wales and former Russian President Mikhail Gorbachev.
Tanti is the fourth largest wind turbine maker in the world.
Time said threats that face our planet are varied from species extinction to dwindling natural resources and front line activists as well as boardroom tycoons are equally needed to be heroes of the environment.

UP/HARYANA/HP DIASPORA

Raj Sharma from Boston is among an elite group of financial advisors recognised in Barron magazine’s special report on “America’s 100 Top Brokers.” Sharma was selected for this honour for the second year in a row based upon following the industry’s best practices, having the biggest books of business, and on a range of qualifications including revenue, customer satisfaction and other factors. 
Merril Pyes, managing director of the Boston Financial Centre paid tribute to Sharma’s professionalism and success in serving clients as well as his dedication to Merrill Lynch and its clients.
Sharma has worked with Merrill Lynch for 17 years and in accepting the plaudits gave credit to his team and their dedication.

US-based Spectrum International, a company owned by an NRI, has announced plans to invest Rs 2,000 crore in Haryana in the food preservation and processing industries.
An official spokesperson of the Haryana Government said this was announced at a reception organised in honour of visiting Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda at Royal Albert Palace, New Jersey, in the United States. The reception was organised by the people of Haryana and prominent local associations and attended by over 200 NRIs. Hooda announced that the state government would appoint a nodal officer to deal and coordinate with the NRIs. While welcoming their investment in Haryana, Hooda assured them that they would not face any difficulties and find a congenial atmosphere in the state.

Paul Sharma, 46, a portfolio manager with a hedge fund in London, plans to apply for an overseas Indian citizenship that would let him buy real estate in India.
Sharma, who is of Indian origin, left India in 1968 and has since been living in the UK. And he is not eyeing India for sentimental reasons alone.
“I am from Himachal Pradesh and I would like to buy a property somewhere around my native place,” Sharma says. Though he has property in the UK, he isn’t buying more there. Reason: the UK market is soft unlike the Indian market, where the returns are huge.