A Paradigim Shift in Indian Venture Capital Industry

Venture Capital Industry is a very young industry, which has been changing rapidly. Since the 1990’s venture capital in India is growing steadily. The future is likely to offer even greater opportunities as entrepreneurs are encouraged, creating new legal structures, commercial arrangements. The vision and mission of venture capital in India is changed in 2012. It is an exciting year since 2013 for India’s Venture Capital investing, as new innovations, business models in areas such as e-commerce, mobile applications, health care delivery, medical devices and its technology, financial inclusion, clean technology and IT are likely to drive most of the activity. The paper is conceptual in nature, focus and discusses the performance of venture capital industry in past 15 years and the present scenario. The researcher has used secondary data for analysis. This study is limited to Indian situations. The growth of India’s investor community and the resulting increase in the amount of capital being invested in purely domestic opportunities provides India’s Venture Capital Industry for the coming year is relatively positive

Exploring Men's Coping With Psychological Distress Within the Context of Conforming to Masculine Role Norms

The purpose of this study was to explore the relationships among masculine and coping variables with psychological distress. It also identified the extent to which masculine variables and coping styles contributed to psychological distress, in a sample of New Zealand men. The study sample comprised of 80 adult men, recruited from tertiary and community organisations in Hamilton. Participants were required to read and complete a questionnaire comprising of a series of questions relating to adherence to masculine gender role norms, gender role conflict, coping styles and recent levels of anxiety, stress and depressive symptoms. The Conformity to Masculine Role Norms Inventory and the Gender Role Conflict Scale were used to assess the men’s degree of conformity to socialised masculine ideals, and the degree to which they experienced conflict, as a result of their gendered role. The Depression Anxiety Stress Scale was used to measure psychological distress, the outcome variable. Coping style was assessed using the Brief COPE Scale. The main findings were that some aspects of conformity to masculinity, such as the strict adherence to norms of Emotional Control and Self-Reliance were associated with higher levels of psychological distress, Emotional Control (r=.279, p=.008) and Self-Reliance (r=.395, p <.01). Some of the men appear also to struggle to meet socialised masculine ideals associated with restrictive emotional expressiveness, as indicated by a significant association between Restrictive Emotionality and psychological distress, r=.338, P= <.01. The findings also indicated that Avoidant Coping was positively associated with psychological distress (r=.235, p=.02) in contrast to an inverse association between Problem Solving Coping and psychological distress (Problem Solving Coping r=-.471, p<.01), highlighting the benefits of using active, direct coping strategies to mitigate the effects of psychological distress. Results of the multiple regression indicated that coping styles in comparison to the gender variables accounted for more than half of the variance of the outcome variable (psychological distress), and was a better predictor of psychological distress in the sample of men. Furthermore, the gender variables helped to explain psychological distress over and above what was explained by coping strategies alone. These findings have highlighted that masculine gender role may be inextricable linked to the way men cope with psychological distress. It should therefore be considered together with coping styles in future studies examining psychological distress. Implications of these findings for the development of effective clinical interventions, and directions for future research were also discussed

Predictive Value of Tumor Ki-67 Expression in Two Randomized Trials of Adjuvant Chemoendocrine Therapy for Node-Negative Breast Cancer

Several small studies have reported that having a high percentage of breast tumor cells that express the proliferation antigen Ki-67 (ie, a high Ki-67 labeling index) predicts better response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy. However, the predictive value of a high Ki-67 labeling index for response to adjuvant chemotherapy is unclear. To investigate whether Ki-67 labeling index predicts response to adjuvant chemoendocrine therapy, we assessed Ki-67 expression in tumor tissue from 1924 (70%) of 2732 patients who were enrolled in two randomized International Breast Cancer Study Group trials of adjuvant chemoendocrine therapy vs endocrine therapy alone for node-negative breast cancer. A high Ki-67 labeling index was associated with other factors that predict poor prognosis. Among the 1521 patients with endocrine-responsive tumors, a high Ki-67 labeling index was associated with worse disease-free survival but the Ki-67 labeling index did not predict the relative efficacy of chemoendocrine therapy compared with endocrine therapy alone. Thus, Ki-67 labeling index was an independent prognostic factor but was not predictive of better response to adjuvant chemotherapy in these studie

Assessment of indoor Air PollutantsgGenerated from energy sources in Rural Households of Chamarajanagar Taluk

Most of the rural households in India use biomass for cooking and heating purposes. The biomass combustion emit huge amount of pollutants which causes harmful effects on environment and on human health. The present study was conducted to assess the level of indoor air pollutants during cooking in rural households. The investigation was carried out in 50 randomly selected rural households of Chamarajanagar taluk that use biomass, kerosene and LPG as cooking fuels. The concentration of CO and CO2 were measured by using battery operated CO and CO2 meter which works on NDIR method. The sampling of suspended particulate matter was done by gravimetric method using handy sampler 821. The particulate matters were collected on micro fiber filter paper which is subjected to morphological analysis by SEM. The recorded mean concentration of CO (46.67 ppm) for traditional cook stove was higher than the WHO standard (35ppm). The results have shown that the emission of CO, CO2 and SPM concentrations were more for biomass fuels as compared to kerosene and LPG fuels. The suspended particulate matters were found to be spherical, angular, cluster and irregular in shapes. The study has shown that utilization of biomass fuels under poorly designed cook stove is the main factor responsible for increase of indoor air pollutants

Biomass: A key source of energy in rural households of Chamarajanagar District

Biomass is the most prominent renewable energy resources. It plays a vital role in meeting the domestic energy needs among the rural households of developing countries. The present study has been made to assess the utilization pattern of fuel sources among the households of five selected villages of Chamarajanagar district. The calorific values of commonly used firewood species have been determined. The results have shown that there is a greater dependency on biomass energy for domestic needs as compared to commercial ones. Firewood is the primary energy source (98.62%) for cooking and heating purposes among the rural households. The investigation has revealed that about half of the households are using different fuel wood species without the awareness of thermal efficiency in their traditional biomass cook stoves. An attempt has been made to investigate the calorific values of the fuel wood species used by them. Based on the findings it has been suggested usage of species with greater heating efficiency with lesser quantity would be sufficient to meet their daily energy requirement

Utilization pattern of biomass energy and socioeconomic dimensions associated with Yelandur, Karnataka, India

Energy is considered as a key factor which determines the economic development in the entire sector of any region. Biomass is one of the primary energy sources in rural areas. The study was carried out to examine the utilization pattern of biomass energy and socioeconomic dimensions associated with rural areas of Yelandur, Karnataka, India. Field studies in these villages covering 645 households were made to collect the data and assess the socioeconomic conditions that govern the biomass utilization pattern for meeting energy requirements. Firewood is the primary energy source (94.78 %) for cooking and heating among these rural folk. Most of them are illiterates (60 %) with 28.96 % of them having a meagre income. Traditional biomass stoves are used predominantly. The study shows that there is a positive correlation (R 2 = 0.98) between the households size and volume of firewood consumption. The study has revealed that the firewood fuels are the dominant source of energy for cooking and heating purposes

Assessment of water quality of Arkavathi river polluted by silk industries effluents

The study has been made to evaluate the water quality of Arkavathi River at Ramanagar district. Water samples were collected from the non-polluted and polluted sites to analyze the physico-chemical parameters including temperature, pH, turbidity, electrical conductivity, total dissolved solids, chloride, hardness, ammonia, phosphate, bicarbonate, biological oxygen demand, dissolved oxygen and carbon dioxide. The results have shown that there is a significant increase in chloride, TDS and hardness level in polluted site as compared to the non-polluted site. The investigation has revealed that, the river water is polluted due to direct mixing of industrial effluents. Therefore, it has been suggested that the river water should be treated with appropriate means before being utilized for drinking or domestic purposes