The 63rd Santosh Trophy for the national football championships has come to its last leg with four semi-\ufb01nalists left in the fray. The battle gets tougher from here on as

Suspense builds ahead of the soft- ware developer\u2019s conference in San Francisco, where the PC-mak- er might also talk about its long- absent chief executive Steve Jobs.

tention held for quite a while and you stood looking at a piece of art made of junk? You don\u2019t remember? That is exactly what happened on World Environ- ment Day at Ajuba Solutions. Ajuba, apart from being a great place to work, is also a great place for fun. They have a team called ICONS that organises events and games to keep the zeal of the employees alive.

This time, team ICONS orga- nised \u2018Junk Art\u2019 to kindle the cre- ative urge of employees. What is junk art? For those who haven\u2019t heard, you could call it \u2018Wonders out of Waste\u2019. The idea of the game was to create new things out of things of no practical val- ue.

rules and regulations. The Aju- bans did all the work of junk art right on the operations \ufb02oor amidst their normal work routine.

The categories of award were \u2018Most useful out of the most use- less award\u2019, \u2018Most creative junk art award\u2019 and \u2018Best looking junk art award\u2019. Forty teams partici- pated across the three of\ufb01ces in Chennai, using the most useless items ranging from egg shells, used batteries, bottles, fused bulbs, coffee dregs, cassette tapes, rubber caps of used syr- inge bottles, sawdust and water- melon seeds to name a few.

The judges for the event were Anuradha Pasupathy, founder of AP Textile Design Company and a guest faculty at NIFT, and Nish- anth Purohit, an established cin- ematographer and cameraman

who has shot several Wild life documentaries for Discovery Channel and The National Geo- graphic.

It was a real feast for the eyes with train and eagle made of torn coke cans and eggs shells. The Zoo Zoo\u2019s made of egg shell were the in-thing. We had them in the form of cricketers playing IPL (Rephrased as APL \u2013 Ajuba Pre- miere League), in the form of cheergirls and as couples resting on the beach. The highlight of the event was the raincoat made of used milk covers, which could any day beat the real ones \u2013 be it in terms of the make or colour. The event was a reminder of how waste could be reused or recy- cled and how the world could be a much better place to live in.

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t was raining events last week at most campuses as companies celebrated World Environment Day (WED).

Campuses were abuzz, with em- ployees committing their time to do their bit to show that they care for a green Earth. UST Global\u2019s Chennai centre took the occasion to do a fol- low-up of their CSR initiative, Mitra, where they provide health care and spread environmental awareness in Azhinjivakkam village in Thiruvallur district. Around 200 educational kits where distributed to children of Ja- napanachathiram

Infosys, on the other hand, kicked off a \u2018Polythene bag-free commit- ment\u2019 across all Infosys campuses globally. The initiative sought to ban the use of polythene bags by Infosys employees in an effort to reduce the consumption of non-biodegradable plastics.

Cognizant celebrated the occasion with an array of events focused on the theme climate change and healthy environment. Tree planta- tion, green walk, carpooling registra- tion drives, painting competition, etc were conducted.\u25a0

ocaine activity is on the rise in Chennai of late and some city nightclubs and

colleges here have turned key joints for peddlers. Reliable police sources reveal that an upcoming cine actress is oper- ating cocaine cells here and stays elusive due to her high- level connections.

Cocaine, a semi-synthetic drug that is banned in many countries, including India, is primarily smuggled to Chennai from South American countries like Columbia, Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia. Enroute to Chen- nai, the contraband travels through central Africa, Dubai and Mumbai.

S. Davidson Devasirvatham, Zonal Director of Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), said that cocaine activity has increased in Chennai like never before over the last one year. \u201cA few months ago our team arrested two Kenyan nationals in Chen- nai who were possessing close to 20 gms of cocaine. Upon in- terrogation the two drug ped- dlers revealed that a total of 10 cocaine cells are operating in our city,\u201d Davidson informed.

He also said that drug ped- dlers, mostly African nationals in the city, run a heavily pro\ufb01t- able illegal cocaine business mainly at parties, shopping malls, a few nightclubs, some college campuses and a few railway stations in north Chennai.

With regard to the arrest of the Kenyan nationals, Zonal Di- rector also talks about the in- volvement of an upcoming Tamil movie actress. According

to reliable sources in the city police, the actress, who had done a few \ufb01lms in Telugu as well, is suspected to be oper- ating cocaine cells in the city. \u201cThe actress, who is a cocaine addict, had come in contact with the Nigerians to buy the substance. Later she went into a partnership with them and started to buy and sell cocaine,\u201d said an investigating of\ufb01cer on conditions of anonymity.

The actress, who is believed to be a key supplier of cocaine to many Kollywood drug users, still remains \u2018unreachable\u2019 for the police and drug control agencies due to her bigwig links here.

NCB sources also attribute the rise of cocaine in Chennai to the bartering of the drug for heroin, which is highly in de- mand in European countries. Heroin is easily available here at Rs. 5 to Rs. 7 lakh per kilo- gram, while its international market value is 10 times more. Therefore, of late cocaine and heroin are being bartered by dealers who use ingenious ways to smuggle them in and out of Chennai. Sources also reveal that the points of barter are mainly in Mannady and Thiru- votriyur.

Apart from conventional methods of drug smuggling via airports and sea ports by swal- lowing cocaine pills and bring- ing it in concealed packages, smugglers have also resorted to using courier services. Drug control agencies are keenly watching this avenue as co- caine is believed to be increas- ingly smuggled to Chennai using this modus operandi.

Cocaine smugglers are even using
courier services to bring the drug to
the city, according to NCB sources

thanaraj\u2019 to pay tribute to the artist considered by many as one of the most in\ufb02uential one that came out of the Madras School of Arts and Crafts.

Opened on June 8, the exhibition is on till June 28 at Artworld, 1/12, Ganeshpuram, 3rd Street (off Cenotaph Road), Chennai - 600 018. The gallery timings are from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. (closed on Sundays). You can call the gallery at 24338691/ 24315371 or email artworld@airtelmail.in\u25a0