Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan takes computer education to the seniors. And they are loving it. Deepa Venkatraman reports

ctor Kamal Hassan has suc- cessfully directed three fea- ture \ufb01lms (Chachi 420,Hey

that does not deter him from di- recting a short \ufb01lm. The \ufb01lm is on namma Chennai and is his way to encourage youngsters into the in- dustry.

The project is the outcome of the International Screenwriter\u2019s workshop conducted by Hassan recently in the city.

Revealing this at a press meet on Friday at Prasad Labs, Kamal Hassan said that the project will be funded by Prasad Labs.

The scripts for the 30 short \ufb01lms will be selected from the over 250 participants of the work- shop. They would be handpicked by actor Hassan and director of L.V. Prasad Film and TV Academy V. Hariharan.

are also expected to direct the \ufb01lms. The project would be launched next year.

The project was \ufb02agged off by legendary French script writer Jean-Claude

who penned the script for Kamal Has- san\u2019sMarudhanayagam, an in- complete project.

\u201cThe 30 short \ufb01lms will be a treasure about Chennai for the future generations,\u201d actor Kamal Hassan said, adding that he got the inspiration from Carrie`re.\u25a0

Of the 30 short \ufb01lms on Chennai, one would be directed by the actor himself, while the rest would be directed by some of the established directors.

The police control room recently received a
call mentioning that a number of pigs are
roaming at a locality in Adyar. The cop on
the receiving end told the caller \u2018it\u2019s not the
job of police to catch pigs\u2019 and disconnected
the call. In a few hours the cop got a
\u2018big dose\u2019 from his seniors as the
caller was the relative of a big
moustache IPS of\ufb01cer.

Some corrupt policemen in T.
Nagar limit are a happy lot after
their deputy commissioner, known
for his honest ways, was transferred last
week. Thekhakis are back to \u2018collection
mode\u2019 in the pocket, which is well-known as
a pro\ufb01table area for cops.

A senior police of\ufb01cer often addressed as the
king of south Chennai police zone went out
of control when his juniors under perform or
don\u2019t obey orders. The of\ufb01cer\u2019s style of
punishment is to thrash the indisciplined
khaki. There have been incidents where the
of\ufb01cers chased his subordinates to punish

A leading Kollywood hero, whose birthday is
coming soon, is said to be ready to \ufb02oat a
new political party and is only waiting for
the word from the ruling party. Reliable
sources say there is plan to induct the actor
into the party. Reason: his presence would
weaken a politically upcoming senior actor.

Planet M is celebrating World Music Day (June 21) with a sale at
all its stores. Shop three Sony CDs at Rs. 199, get 50 per cent
discount on select big DVDs and buy \u20182 and get 1 free\u2019 on Virgin
music, movie CDs and VCDs. The sale is on till July 31. Planet M
stores are at Anna Nagar, Mylapore and Nungambakkam.

ndirani Sreenivasan (67) can listen to online music and read newspapers. T. Natarajan (75) can type out letters in MS word

and send emails to his grandchil- dren. Lalita Venugopal (61) can pay bills online.

They come with their little note pads and computer manuals, start their class with a prayer and then move on to typing on the key- board. This sounds like a comput- er class but it is different in its own kind. They are 60-year-old-plus individuals who have a burning desire to be technically sound and computer literate.

The Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan Gandhi Institute of Computer Education and Information Tech- nology located at T. Nagar and Mylapore started a three-month computer course for the senior ci- tizens for free in May.

K.N. Ramaswamy, additional di- rector of BVB, Chennai comment- ing on the response says, \u201cThis project is to commemorate our golden jubilee. We initially wanted to enrol only 50 senior citizens for the \ufb01rst session but we got hun- dreds of applications. Hence we restricted the number to 156. And the rest of them are in the waiting list for the next batch.\u201d

As of now, there are three tim- ings\u201410 a.m., 12 p.m. and 2 p.m. \u2013 and the duration of the class is for two hours. One staff member su- pervises \ufb01ve students at a time for 20 minutes and then they contin- ue to practice their lessons on their respective computers.

\u201cThe three-month module high- lights basic computer fundamen- tals such as various parts of the computer, MS word, Excel func- tions, internet usage \u2013 general

sur\ufb01ng, emailing and stock brok- ing, Microsoft photo editor, use of calculator in the computer, win- dows media player,\u201d says Praveen Kumar, course coordinator.

One could see some curious minds \ufb01guring out the keyboard slowly while a few others who were adept at typewriting seemed to be more at ease. But the one common string was that they were all learning to use the computer for the \ufb01rst time in their lives.

Mandavali resident, K. S. Jayara- man (71), a retired marketing pro- fessional, missed the opportunity to learn computer in his of\ufb01ce days. Jayaraman, who has invested in several shares in the stock mar- ket, says: \u201cI am able to arrange all my shares in excel and save it in the hard disk at home. The com- puter manual is very useful and easy to comprehend with each function explained step by step in simple language.\u201d

Most of them said they had joined the course just to learn the new-age internet applications. Seventy-one-year-old T. Gajaraj, a diploma holder in electrical engi- neering, is currently trying to cre- ate a design for electrical equipment revolving around kine- matics. He says, \u201cI can surf a lot on kinematics online and get knowl- edge of various designs. This will help me a lot in my project.\u201d

There is a test conducted at the end of one month to gauge their understanding of what was taught. All of them are all praise of the staff members who teach them with lot of patience. Uma Mahesh- wari one of the teachers says, \u201cIt is a different experience \u2013 just like teaching children. The senior citi- zens are very punctual and sincere compared to college students. In the online objective test, they have fared very well.\u201d\u25a0

Nature B, a beauty salon and spa, is offering around 65 per cent
discount on all its treatments and packages. The offer is on for the
next four days. The salon is at Velachery and Chinna Neelangarai. For
details call 2449 5553/ 22551668.