Category: News

Mumbai, April 8 — Commercial services on the first phases of Mumbai Metro corridors 9 and 2B began Wednesday morning, a day after they were inaugurated by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, officials confirmed.

The new lines mark significant milestones in Mumbai’s mass-transit network. Metro Line 9 provides the first direct metro connectivity between Mira-Bhayandar in Thane district and Mumbai, while Line 2B introduces metro services to the Harbour Line for the first time.

The Phase 1 stretch of Metro Line 9 spans 5.6 km with four stations: Dahisar East, Pandurangwadi, Miragaon, and Kashigaon. According to the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), Line 9 is expected to cut travel time between Mira-Bhayandar and Mumbai to about 30 minutes, compared with the current journey of one to two hours. Built at a cost of ₹6,607 crore, the line will eventually link to other corridors, offering seamless connectivity to South Mumbai.

Metro Line 2B (Phase 1) covers 5.53 km and includes five stations: Deshbhakt N G Acharya Udyan (Diamond Garden), Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Chowk, Deonar, Mankhurd, and Maharashtra Nagar–Mandale. Services commenced at 6 am, providing a vital new option for commuters on the eastern side of the city.

With these additions, Mumbai’s operational Metro network now spans six corridors, including:

• Line 1 (Ghatkopar-Andheri-Versova)
• Line 2A (Andheri West-Dahisar East)
• Line 7 (Dahisar East-Andheri East)
• Line 3 (Colaba-Bandra Kurla Complex–SEEPZ, underground)
• Newly opened Line 9 and Line 2B

The MMRDA also implemented revised timetables for Line 2A and Line 7 to improve frequency, predictability, and the overall commuter experience. Line 2A will now operate as a standalone corridor between Andheri West and Dahisar East, from 5:50 am to 11 pm, with a peak frequency of six minutes.

Additionally, the integrated Line 7–9 corridor, stretching 19.79 km from Gundavali to Kashigaon, will run from 5:50 am to 11 pm, with a peak frequency of under six minutes, providing 276 services on weekdays.

The inauguration of Lines 9 and 2B marks a new chapter in Mumbai’s urban mobility, promising faster, more efficient, and reliable transportation for commuters across the metropolitan region.

New Delhi, Apr 8: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Wednesday projected the country’s GDP growth for 2026-27 at 6.9%, slightly lower than the 7.6% estimated for 2025-26. The downward revision reflects concerns over elevated commodity prices and supply chain disruptions stemming from the ongoing West Asia crisis.

Announcing the first bi-monthly monetary policy for the new financial year, RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra highlighted that India’s merchandise exports could face challenges due to interruptions in key shipping routes, alongside rising freight and insurance costs.

Governor Malhotra noted that while India’s domestic economy remains resilient, global uncertainties, particularly in energy and logistics, are likely to influence growth and inflation trends. The RBI continues to monitor external pressures closely to maintain macroeconomic stability while supporting sustainable growth.

The central bank’s cautious outlook underscores the importance of strategic fiscal and trade measures to mitigate the impact of global disruptions and sustain India’s growth momentum in the coming year.

New Delhi, Apr 8: Union Steel Minister H. D. Kumaraswamy has emphasized the urgent need for India’s steel sector to embrace sustainability, green practices, and a circular economy.

Speaking at an industry workshop, he said that traditional growth models are no longer sufficient. The sector must reduce carbon emissions, optimize resource use, and adopt eco-friendly technologies to align with India’s vision of becoming a “Viksit Bharat” (developed nation).

Kumaraswamy also highlighted the role of innovation and research in building a globally competitive steel industry. Encouraging startups and indigenous solutions, he stressed that sustainable practices will not only support growth but also safeguard the environment.

Officials noted that with rising demand for steel in infrastructure and construction, India has a unique opportunity to lead in environmentally responsible manufacturing. By investing in cleaner technologies and efficient processes, the steel industry can achieve growth while minimizing its ecological footprint.

The minister’s message is clear: the future of India’s steel sector lies in smart, sustainable, and inclusive growth, paving the way for a stronger and greener nation.

Apr 8: Odisha has emerged as a leading performer in the implementation of the AMRUT 2.0 scheme, making steady progress in improving urban water infrastructure across the state.

As part of the initiative, seven new water treatment plants with a total capacity of 43 million litres per day have been made operational. These facilities are now supplying cleaner and safer drinking water to nearly 2.83 lakh residents, significantly improving their daily lives.

The progress reflects the state’s strong focus on ensuring reliable water supply in urban areas. With better infrastructure in place, many families are now experiencing improved access to clean water, which is essential for health and overall well-being.

Officials believe that these efforts mark an important step toward building more sustainable and livable cities, while also strengthening public trust in essential services.

Apr 08: Histria Books is pleased to announce the release of The Tale of Scrawny Billy J. by Andrew Biel and illustrated by Robin Dorn. This story is published by Histria Kids, an imprint of Histria Books dedicated to outstanding works for children that both educate and entertain.

At first glance, The Tale of Scrawny Billy J. looks like a classic children’s story about a skinny kid who wishes he was strong. But author Andrew Biel takes the standard confidence fable in a completely unexpected direction. When young Billy stumbles into a circus sideshow to meet the Marvelous Ms. Muscles, he does not receive a magical potion or a vague pep talk. Instead, he gets a surprisingly accurate, incredibly fun lesson in biomechanics.

The story uses playful rhymes to introduce kids to their masseters and gluteals, moving body positivity away from abstract concepts and grounding it in actual human physiology. Children learn that real strength is about understanding the functional machinery they already possess. It is a smart, practical approach to self-esteem that treats kids like intelligent readers.

Praise for The Tale of Scrawny Billy J:

“Biel’s rhymes scan well throughout, and his focus on how muscles are for daily activities reinforces the idea that anyone can achieve healthy living. Dorn’s painted illustrations are the standout, depicting both the weirdness of the circus and activated muscles in every day activity. The images don’t feel like diagrams―they move the story forward in addition to highlighting anatomy.” — Kirkus Reviews

Andrew Biel was once a skinny kid like his protagonist Billy J., convinced he had no muscles until he accidentally discovered one under his armpit. He went on to learn much more about anatomy, writing the best-selling textbook Trail Guide to the Body, and today uses his muscles to kayak, cross-country ski, and hike. The book is brought to life by Robin Dorn, a painter and scientific illustrator specializing in human anatomy, who enjoys keeping in touch with her whimsical side through vibrant characters like Ms. Muscles.

The Tale of Scrawny Billy J. by Andrew Biel, 36 pp., ISBN 978-1-59211-694-2 is available at HistriaBooks.com and from all major book retailers. This title is also available as an eBook. Titles published under the imprints of Histria Books are distributed in the United States and Canada by Simon & Schuster and in the rest of the world through Unified Book Distribution. 

The Odisha government has taken a new step to help people better understand the state budget. Speaking at the launch of the awareness program “Ame Janiba, Ama Budget” (Let Us Understand Our Budget), Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi said that a budget is not just about numbers—it is about the dreams and development of every citizen.

ବଜେଟ କେବଳ ଆୟ-ବ୍ୟୟର ତାଲିକା ନୁହେଁ, ବରଂ ଏହା ଓଡ଼ିଶାର ସମଗ୍ର ଉନ୍ନତି ସହ ପ୍ରତ୍ୟେକ ନାଗରିକଙ୍କ ସ୍ୱପ୍ନ ପୂରଣର ଏକ ସୁଦୃଢ଼ ରୋଡମ୍ୟାପ୍ ବୋଲି ରାଜ୍ୟସ୍ତରୀୟ ବଜେଟ ସଚେତନତା କର୍ମଶାଳା ‘ଆମେ ଜାଣିବା, ଆମ ବଜେଟ’ ଅବସରରେ ମାନ୍ୟବର ମୁଖ୍ୟମନ୍ତ୍ରୀ ଶ୍ରୀ ମୋହନ ଚରଣ ମାଝୀ କହିଛନ୍ତି ।

ରାଜ୍ୟସ୍ତରୀୟ ବଜେଟ ସଚେତନତା କର୍ମଶାଳା:-

✅… pic.twitter.com/2KwBDaGzod

— CMO Odisha (@CMO_Odisha) April 7, 2026

To make the budget more accessible, awareness workshops will be held from April 1 to April 14 across the state, reaching even the Panchayat level. The goal is to explain the budget in simple language so that common people can understand how government plans impact their daily lives.

The Chief Minister highlighted that this year’s budget is 7% higher than last year, showing a strong focus on growth and development. He also shared that the 2026–27 budget aims to make Odisha a key logistics and connectivity hub in eastern India.

The initiative reflects the government’s effort to build a more transparent and people-friendly system, where citizens are informed and involved in the development process.

Through this campaign, the government hopes to bring the budget closer to the people and ensure that its benefits reach every corner of the state.

 Apr 08: Histria Books is pleased to announce the release of Plumelet by Victoria Fomina. This story is published by Histria Kids, an imprint of Histria Books dedicated to outstanding works for children that both educate and entertain.

Princess Plumelet is a spoiled royal who thinks nothing of ruining a guest’s dinner with a fistful of hot pepper. But when the victim turns out to be a shape-shifting enforcer from the Ministry of Proper Behavior, Plumelet is cursed and swept away to a monochromatic tower made of antennas and mathematical spirals. 

Victoria Fomina’s picture book Plumelet takes the familiar framework of a bratty child learning her lesson and injects it with wild architectural surrealism. It is a visually arresting dreamscape where punishment means navigating mirrored corridors, negotiating personal space with a giant floating mouth, and confronting flocks of weeping eyes. Fomina’s collage art blends classical folklore with satellites, surveillance cameras, and sharp modern humor. It offers a wonderfully bizarre, edgy alternative for families tired of standard fables and ready for something weirder and infinitely more stylish.

Praise for Plumelet: 

“In this fascinating picture book Victoria creates a new universe, infinite and colorful, inhabited by surprising characters, sometimes a little frightening, sometimes funny – that’s what children usually like enormously.”– Anastasia Arkhipova, ex-vice President of The International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY)

Victoria Fominais an internationally acclaimed artist and illustrator of more than fifty books. Born on the Black Sea coast among ancient ruins, she brings a rich historical aesthetic to projects ranging from classic fairy tales to composer biographies. She collaborates with top global clients like Penguin Random House, Vogue, and What on Earth Publishing with His Majesty King Charles III. Her award-winning artwork has been featured in eighty exhibitions across seventeen countries.

Plumelet by Victoria Fomina, 44 pp., ISBN (Hardcover) 978-1-59211-664-5, ISBN (Paperback) 978-1-59211-664-5, is available at HistriaBooks.com and from all major book retailers. This title is also available in Hardcover and as an eBook. Titles published under the imprints of Histria Books are distributed in the United States and Canada by Simon & Schuster and in the rest of the world through Unified Book Distribution. 

Carlsbad, California, 8 April 2026: TAU Systems, a pioneer in compact particle accelerator technology, today announced a major scientific milestone: the first-ever demonstration of reliable, continuous operation of a laser-powered accelerator (LPA)-driven free-electron laser (FEL) sustained over more than eight hours without operator intervention. The achievement, published in a new research paper, marks a pivotal step toward making ultra-bright, tunable light sources practical for real-world scientific and industrial applications.

Traditional FEL facilities rely on large, costly radio-frequency accelerators that occupy entire campuses. LPAs shrink the acceleration distance from hundreds of meters to just millimeters by harnessing powerful laser pulses to accelerate electrons in a plasma. While the physics of LPA-driven FELs has been understood for almost 50 years, LPAs have historically had lower beam quality and stability, until now. Translating this technology into a stable light source has remained one of the field’s most stubborn engineering challenges.

The TAU Systems team, in collaboration with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), achieved this breakthrough by engineering a suite of interlinking stabilisation technologies onto the Hundred Terawatt Undulator (HTU) experiment at Berkeley Lab’s BELLA Center. The result was 100 MeV electron beams delivered at 1 Hz with high consistency over a continuous ten-hour period, driving a self-amplified spontaneous emission (SASE) FEL operating at 420 nm (in the visible blue-ultraviolet range) for more than eight hours without any manual adjustments.

Stephen Milton, VP of Accelerator Science at TAU Systems said: “This is the moment the community has been working toward. We have shown that an LPA-driven FEL is not just a proof-of-concept experiment. It is a platform capable of delivering the stability that real scientific and industrial users demand.”

Beyond simply operating the light source autonomously, the team used the extensive dataset collected during the run to map correlations between the properties of the drive laser, plasma source, and electron beam, and the resulting FEL output. These insights are already informing the next phase of performance improvements, with residual correlations in the data indicating that further gains in stability and brightness are within reach.

“This reported level of reliability and performance of the LPA-driven FEL not only represents a great improvement toward demonstrating the potential for future light source applications,” says Finn Kohrell, a postdoctoral scholar in the BELLA Center at Berkeley Lab and lead author of the published results. “It also allows us to gather an unprecedented amount of data about the highly complex interaction between the LPA and FEL process, and to identify which parameters are most impactful for further improving the FEL performance.”

The implications extend well beyond just one laboratory. Compact LPA-driven light sources have long been envisioned as a way to democratize access to high-brightness X-ray and UV beams, which are currently only available at a handful of national synchrotron and FEL facilities worldwide. Applications include structural biology, materials science, semiconductor lithography, medical imaging, and fundamental physics research. By demonstrating autonomous, multi-hour operation, TAU Systems and Berkeley Lab have cleared a critical barrier on the path to commercially deployable compact FELs.

TAU Systems characterizes the current system as a powerful research platform for the broader LPA-driven FEL community, enabling systematic studies of accelerator-to-light-source coupling that were previously impossible without long-duration stable operation. The company expects the findings to accelerate progress across the field and inform the design of future compact light source installations.

DUBLIN, Calif.–We are at the inflection point. After decades of building systems that assist humans, we are crossing into an era where intelligent systems act autonomously — executing decisions, orchestrating workflows, and adapting to complex environments in real time. Most companies are still laying the groundwork. Airrived has arrived.

Bhubaneswar railway station is undergoing a significant upgrade to enhance passenger comfort, safety, and operational efficiency. The redevelopment plan includes modernized waiting lounges, upgraded platforms, digital information systems, and improved amenities, aimed at providing a seamless travel experience for daily commuters and long-distance travelers alike.

Authorities stated that the project will also focus on better accessibility, enhanced safety measures, and aesthetic improvements, reflecting Bhubaneswar’s status as a major commercial and cultural hub. Once completed, the station is expected to handle increasing passenger traffic efficiently while offering a modern, world-class travel experience.