The whole world watched Mumbai being attacked by terrorists last week. Today, there is hardly any part of the country that is not feeling vulnerable. Deendayal Vaidya and G V Skaria sought experts’ opinions on where Pune stands on the terror radar and what can be done to safeguard it

Keep a ‘Neighbourhood Watch’

The impetus to prevent an assault similar to the one which rocked the financial capital of the country, lies with the government; it is they who control the police, law enforcement agencies and intelligence set-up.

PUNE: Twenty-three-year-old Ashwini Angarkhe has completed her bachelor's degree in arts while her sisters Aruna (21) and Kshitija (19) are doing their final year of law and second year of bachelor's degree of arts, respectively. But all three have now entered a profession that is very rare: that of women drivers.

Let them drive', a cab service by and for women, was launched in the city on Wednesday. The service aims at providing safe and secure service to women commuters travelling not just within the city but also to other cities in the district of Pune.

PUNE: It started as an initiative in sleepy little Cochin to train underprivileged children there in the English language. And as the city's
children woke up to their potential, Make A Difference (MAD), a youth volunteer network, spread its wings to other cities, bringing joy and hope to the lives of over 1,200 children in Cochin, Chennai and Pune.

After having received the Ashoka Youth Social Entrepreneur award for the year, volunteers of MAD are overjoyed that they were chosen out of 520 entries which came from 61 countries across the world.

BANGALORE: Bangaloreans, who have been subjected to frequent power cuts during the last few days due to shortage of power, can heave a sigh of relief in the days to come as the Bangalore Electricity Supply Company (BESCOM) has finalised the “Pune model” of roping in captive private projects (CPPs) to generate electricity during peak hours.

But the relief comes at a cost! Consumers will have to pay an extra cost, over and above the existing tariff.

Pune railway station is not what it used to be, especially after the November 26 massacre of passengers at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus in Mumbai.

That’s the first impression one gets on noticing the men-in-khaki with “advanced weaponry” on platforms, pedestrian foot overbridges, at reservation counters and at entrance and exit points.

PUNE: The city witnessed a spell of heavy showers late on Monday evening. During the period of a little over an hour, a whopping 6.6 mm of
rainfall was received, Met department officials said.

"The presence of a trough off the western coast caused the rainfall. The conditions are likely to remain for the next 24 hours," A B Mujumdar, deputy director general, meteorology (DDGM), India Meteorological Department (IMD), told TOI.

PUNE: Following the recent terror attacks in Mumbai
, Pune Customs officials and staff, deployed at the coastal areas of Ratnagiri, Sindhudurg and
Goa, have been asked to be more alert and keep a tight vigil on coastal activities, R Sekar, commissioner of customs, Pune, said.
He also said that 24-hour sea patrolling is already underway along the coast while the division has received sanctions for six more advanced boats for the purpose.

Pune The slowdown in passenger movement between Pune and Mumbai following the terror siege in Mumbai is expected to normalise from today. Following the three-day terror shoot out there was a drastic drop in commuters heading towards Mumbai.

"Things ought to return to normal by Monday. Usually on Sundays, we have only about 15 per cent of the regular load in any case. But we hope the crowds will return on Monday," said Central railway spokesperson, Shrinivas Mudgerikar.

PUNE: A one-year-old infant was among the 10 people from the city killed in a road mishap near Solapur on the Pune-Solapur highway on Sunday around 5.30 am. The group travelling in a jeep was on a pilgrimage to the temple town of Tuljapur in Osmanabad district.

The victims belonged to three families the Shitoles from Nana Peth and the Dholes and Kadams from Maharshinagar near Gultekdi.

For Vaibhava Rele, a television producer, fate placed her inside the Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai on Wednesday night. She'd traveled there from her home in Pune, India, for a production meeting at one of the hotel's restaurants.

There were about 25 people in the room when gunfire broke out.

Islamic terrorists, part of a band of gunmen carrying out coordinated attacks at 10 different locations in Mumbai, were firing indiscriminantly inside the hotel, at times taking hostages.