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Friday, March 6, 2020

Yesterday, an all-women crew ran the Mysuru–Bengaluru Tippu Express in the Indian state of Karnataka. The state-run Indian Railways launched this event ahead of International Women’s Day, for promoting gender equality at work places.

B Shiva Parvathi was running the train as loco pilot (locomotive pilot), and 22-year-old Rangoli Patil was her loco co-pilot. The train left Mysore Junction railway station at 11:30 am IST (0600 UTC), covering a distance of 139km to reach KSR Bangalore station. The train had banners on it which mentioned “International Women’s Day Celebration”.

Speaking to newspaper Star of Mysore, B Shiva Parvathi said, “It is a proud moment for me to be steering this train today along with my Loco Pilot Rangoli and the all-women staff”. Mysore Divisional Railway Manager Aparna Garg told Wikinews only 10% of the employees in the Mysore Division were women, which constitutes about 650 female employees.

Mysore district comes under the South West Railway (SWR) branch of the Indian Railway. Mysore Division of the SWR celebration of the Women’s day started on March 1, and is planned till March 10. Various activities are being conducted in this period, including health check-ups, yoga, sports competition and trekking, newspaper The Hindu reported.

“The theme ‘Equal for All’ is an effort of the Railways to promote more women workforce and empower them. Women of today are no less to any men, be it in any field. I hope through such initiatives, more number of women are motivated to take up jobs in their respective fields of interest”, Garg told Star of Mysore.

Friday, October 27, 2006

Approximately seven videos showing school children beating their peers have been put on the Google-owned video service, YouTube.

The videos are recorded using cellphone cameras from students at Auckland Grammar School, Tauranga Boys’ College and Saint Kentigern College and other unidentified schools, according to New Zealand newspaper, The Press.

Auckland Grammar has three videos of bullying and Tauranga Boys College and St Kentigern College both have one video each.

According to The Press one video filmed in Auckland Grammar shows two students, surrounded by a large circle of boys, knock another boy unconscious. The boy appears to have convulsions. The clip was put on YouTube by I0pex a month ago and was titled “Some guy getting KNocked the fuck out.” It had a rating of four and a half stars out of a possible five.

The video was not accessible on YouTube by 27 October, 2006 at 7.36 a.m. UTC, a notice displayed said, “This video has been removed due to terms of use violation.” The Press said an unidentified clip shows two girls fighting, which was also removed for the same reason.

YouTube guidelines state: “Real violence is not allowed. If your video shows someone getting hurt, attacked or humiliated, don’t post it.”

According to NewsRoom the video showing the bullying from Tauranga Boys’ College shows three students, one student holding another while being punched on the ground in the face. When a teacher breaks up the fight, the comments for the video criticise the teacher for doing so.

One other video shows one Asian student bullying another Asian, according to The Press.

Annabel Taylor, Family Help Trust chairwoman, said: “The clips represented the worst aspects of bullying. It is premeditated, organised, intentional, choreographed even, and that’s what distinguishes it from common schoolyard bullying.”

Tauranga Boys’ College deputy principal, Robert Naumann, said: “While appropriate disciplinary action was taken against the boys involved in the incident, and none of those filmed had given their permission for the footage to be posted on the web, the film has remained within the public domain despite attempts by college staff to have it removed,” he said, “Youtube has continued to support its placement”. The video was not accessible on 27 October, 2006 at 7.36 a.m. UTC. Graham Young, principal of Tauranga Boys’ College, said: “A video posted on the Internet showing two of his students fighting is inappropriate and bizarre, but not unusual. Unfortunately technology allows teenagers to put all sorts of material about each other on websites.”

Martin Crocker, Netsafe director, said that while posting the videos did not break any law, the actions filmed in the videos did. “The terrible thing is that the aim of online notoriety is driving people to do quite extreme things,” Crocker said.

Dave Turnbull, principal of Cashmere High School, said that he is unaware of anything like that has happened in Christchurch. “The reality is it could have been any school.”

According to Paul Shamy from Stopping Violence Services Christchurch, “[I am] not surprised that the violence was in well-to-do schools such as Auckland Grammar as violence is spread throughout society.”

Thursday, November 15, 2007

A video showing a man being tasered by police and subsequently dying at the Vancouver International Airport has been released to the media. The cause of his death has not yet been determined.

Robert Dziekanski, 40, was immigrating from Pieszyce, Poland to live with his mother, Zofia Cisowski, in Kamloops, British Columbia. He did not clear customs at the airport for over eight hours and his mother was unable to locate him when she went to meet him at the airport. Since Dziekanski did not speak English airport security guards were unable to properly communicate with him. He started yelling at the airport staff because of this. He used chairs to prop open a door between a customs clearing area and a public lounge, he then threw a computer and threw a small table at a luggage section window.

He had calmed down and was standing with his hands at his side in the customs room until four Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) officers arrived and tasered the man, at least twice. Dziekanski began to convulse and was tasered a second time after falling to the ground, where the four officers pinned him down and handcuffed him. He screamed before he stopped moving. Paramedics arrived at the scene, but were unable to revive him and pronounced him dead.

Dziekanski’s mother had told him to wait in the luggage area where she would meet him, not realizing that this was inside the airport’s security zone, which was inaccessible to her. Arriving international passengers need to pass through customs first, before being able to meet people waiting to pick them up. His mother had tried in vain to get a message to him and eventually left the airport when told by airport staff that he wasn’t there.

Paul Pritchard, who had just arrived from China back to Victoria, shot a video of the incident and gave it to police. The police promised they would return the video within 48 hours. They gave him back his camera without the video.

Pritchard immediately hired a lawyer, held his own news conference, and threatened that he would take them to court to get it back.

CBC, CTV and Global television paid Pritchard several thousand dollars for the video, and he says he will use the money to take care of his father.

“It was against his [Pritchard’s father] wishes completely and my lawyer’s wishes as well. Profit is such an ugly word, and I hope people realize that it’s not a personal profit,” said Pritchard.

“I extend my heartfelt condolences to Mr. Dziekanski’s family, knowing that I could not hope to speak to the loss that they have suffered. I would also like to express my concerns for those people who were in any way touched by this extraordinary and tragic occurrence – our employees working that night, the various agencies involved, the emergency responders and the passengers who may have come across the scene,” Larry Berg, President and CEO of the Vancouver Airport Authority said on November 1.

According to a RCMP spokesman in Vancouver, the four officers involved in the case will testify in court under the coroners request, but it is expected to happen sometime next year.

Polish ambassador to Canada, Piotr Ogrodzinski, said “Mr. Dziekanski (was) a person who was agitated, frustrated, I think terrified, but not aggressive. He was not making a gesture that he intended to fight anybody” and “he didn’t know what to do. In fact, he was in search (of) help. That is why it is a really very sad and deeply moving film to watch.”

The incident is being investigated by the RCMP, the British Columbia Coroner’s Service, the Vancouver International Airport Authority, and the Commission for Public Complaints Against the RCMP.

A compilation of brief news reports for Monday, July 8, 2013.

Friday, September 7, 2012

London, England — On Wednesday, Wikinews interviewed Duncan Campbell, one of the creators of wheelchair rugby.

((Laura Hale)) You’re Duncan Campbell, and you’re the founder of…

Duncan Campbell: One of the founders of wheelchair rugby.

((Laura Hale)) And you’re from Canada, eh?

Duncan Campbell: Yes, I’m from Canada, eh! (laughter)

((Laura Hale)) Winnipeg?

Duncan Campbell: Winnipeg, Manitoba.

((Laura Hale)) You cheer for — what’s that NHL team?

Duncan Campbell: I cheer for the Jets!

((Laura Hale)) What sort of Canadian are you?

Duncan Campbell: A Winnipeg Jets fan! (laughter)

((Laura Hale)) I don’t know anything about ice hockey. I’m a Chicago Blackhawks fan.

((Hawkeye7)) Twenty five years ago…

Duncan Campbell: Thirty five years ago!

((Laura Hale)) They said twenty five in the stadium…

Duncan Campbell: I know better.

((Hawkeye7)) So it was 1977.

((Laura Hale)) You look very young.

Duncan Campbell: Thank you. We won’t get into how old I am.

((Hawkeye7)) So how did you invent the sport?

Duncan Campbell: I’ve told this story so many times. It was a bit of a fluke in a way, but there were five of us. We were all quadriplegic, that were involved in sport, and at that time we had the Canadian games for the physically disabled. So we were all involved in sports like table tennis or racing or swimming. All individual sports. And the only team sport that was available at that time was basketball, wheelchair basketball. But as quadriplegics, with hand dysfunction, a bit of arm dysfunction, if we played, we rode the bench. We’d never get into the big games or anything like that. So we were actually going to lift weights one night, and the volunteer who helped us couldn’t make it. So we went down to the gym and we started throwing things around, and we tried a few things, and we had a volleyball. We kind of thought: “Oh! This is not bad. This is a lot of fun.” And we came up with the idea in a night. Within one night.

((Hawkeye7)) So all wheelchair rugby players are quadriplegics?

Duncan Campbell: Yes. All wheelchair rugby players have to have a disability of some kind in all four limbs.

((Laura Hale)) When did the classification system for wheelchair rugby kick in?

Duncan Campbell: It kicked in right away because there was already a classification system in place for wheelchair basketball. We knew basketball had a classification system, and we very consciously wanted to make that all people with disabilities who were quadriplegics got to play. So if you make a classification system where the people with the most disability are worth more on the floor, and you create a system where there are only so many points on the floor, then the people with more disability have to play. And what that does is create strategy. It creates a role.

((Hawkeye7)) Was that copied off wheelchair basketball?

Duncan Campbell: To some degree, yes.

((Laura Hale)) I assume you’re barracking for Canada. Have they had any classification issues? That made you

Duncan Campbell: You know, I’m not going to… I can’t get into that in a major way in that there’s always classification issues. And if you ask someone from basketball, there’s classification issues. If you ask someone from swimming… There’s always classification issues. The classifiers have the worst job in the world, because nobody’s ever satisfied with what they do. But they do the best they can. They’re smart. They know what they’re doing. If the system needs to change, the athletes will, in some way, encourage it to change.

((Laura Hale)) Do you think the countries that have better classifiers… as someone with an Australian perspective they’re really good at classification, and don’t get theirs overturned, whereas the Americans by comparison have had a number of classification challenges coming in to these games that they’ve lost. Do you think that having better classifiers makes a team better able to compete at an international level?

Duncan Campbell: What it does is ensures that you practice the right way. Because you know the exact classifications of your players then you’re going to lineups out there that are appropriate and fit the classification. If your classifications are wrong then you may train for six months with a lineup that becomes invalid when that classification. So you want to have good classifiers, and you want to have good classes.

((Laura Hale)) When you started in 1977, I’ve seen pictures of the early wheelchairs. I assume that you were playing in your day chair?

Duncan Campbell: Yes, all the time. And we had no modifications. And day chairs at that time were folding chairs. They were Earjays or Stainless. That’s all the brands there were. The biggest change in the game has been wheelchairs.

((Laura Hale)) When did you retire?

Duncan Campbell: I never retired. Still play. I play locally. I play in the club level all the time.

((Laura Hale)) When did you get your first rugby wheelchair?

Duncan Campbell: Jesus, that’s hard for me to even think about. A long time ago. I would say maybe twenty years ago.

((Laura Hale)) Were you involved in creating a special chair, as Canadians were pushing the boundaries and creating the sport?

Duncan Campbell: To a degree. I think everybody was. Because you wanted the chair that fit you. Because they are all super designed to an individual. Because it allows you to push better, allows you to turn better. Allows you to use your chair in better ways on the court. Like you’ve noticed that the defensive chairs are lower and longer. That’s because the people that are usually in a defensive chair have a higher disability, which means they have less balance. So they sit lower, which means they can use their arms better, and longer so they can put screens out and set ticks for those high point players who are carrying the ball. It’s very much strategic.

((Hawkeye7)) I’d noticed that in wheelchair basketball the low point player actually gets more court time…

Duncan Campbell: …because that allows the high point player to play. And its the same in this game. Although in this game there’s two ways to go. You can go a high-low lineup, which is potentially two high point players and two very low point players, which is what Australia does right now with Ryley Batt and the new kid Chris Bond. They have two high point players, and two 0.5 point players. It makes a very interesting scenario for, say, the US, who use four mid-point players. In that situation, all four players can carry the ball; in the Australian situation, usually only two of them can carry the ball.

((Laura Hale)) Because we know you are going soon, the all-important question: can Canada beat the Australians tonight?

Duncan Campbell: Of course they are. (laughter)

((Laura Hale)) Because Australians love to gamble, what’s your line on Canada?

Duncan Campbell: It’s not a big line! I’m not putting a big line on it! (laughter) I’d say it’s probably 6–5.

((Hawkeye7)) Is your colour commentary for the Canadian broadcast?

Duncan Campbell: That was for the IPC. I did the GB–US game this morning. I do the Sweden–Australia game tomorrow at two. And then I’m doing the US–France game on the last day.

((Laura Hale)) Are you happy with the level of coverage the Canadians are providing your sport?

Duncan Campbell: No.

((Laura Hale)) Thank you for an honest answer.

Duncan Campbell: Paralympic Sports TV is their own entity. They webcast, but they’re not a Canadian entity. Our Canadian television is doing… can I swear?

((Laura Hale)) Yeah! Go ahead!

Duncan Campbell: No! (laughter) They’re only putting on an hour a day. A highlight package, which to me is…

((Hawkeye7)) It’s better than the US.

Duncan Campbell: Yes, I’ve heard it’s better than the US. At the same time, it’s crap. You have here [in Great Britain], they’ve got it on 18 hours a day, and it’s got good viewership. When are we going to learn in North America that viewership is out there for it? How many times do we have to demonstrate it? We had the Paralympics in Vancouver two years ago, the Winter Paralympics, and we had crappy coverage there. There was an actual outburst demand to put the opening ceremonies on TV because they weren’t going to do it. And they had to do it, because everybody complained. So they did it, but they only did it in BC, in our home province, where they were holding it. The closing ceremonies they broadcast nationally because the demand was so high. But they still haven’t changed their attitudes.

((Laura Hale)) I have one last question: what did it mean for you when they had a Canadian flag bearer who was a wheelchair rugby player?

Duncan Campbell: I recruited that guy. It was fantastic. I recruited him. Found him playing hockey. And that guy has put in so much time and effort into the game. He absolutely deserves it. No better player.

((Laura Hale)) Thank you!

((Hawkeye7)) Thank you! Much appreciated.

Friday, November 3, 2006

On November 13, Torontonians will be heading to the polls to vote for their ward’s councillor and for mayor. Among Toronto’s ridings is Beaches—East York (Ward 32). Four candidates responded to Wikinews’ requests for an interview. This ward’s candidates include Donna Braniff, Alan Burke, Sandra Bussin (incumbent), William Gallos, John Greer, John Lewis, Erica Maier, Luca Mele, and Matt Williams.

For more information on the election, read Toronto municipal election, 2006.