title: Genetic history of Europe

text: Whereas Y-DNA and mtDNA haplogroups represent but a small component of a person's DNA pool, autosomal DNA has the advantage of containing hundreds of thousands of examinable genetic loci, thus giving a more complete picture of genetic composition. Descent relationships can only be determined on a statistical basis, because autosomal DNA undergoes recombination. A single chromosome can record a history for each gene. Autosomal studies are much more reliable for showing the relationships between existing populations, but do not offer the possibilities for unravelling their histories in the same way as mtDNA and NRY DNA studies promise, despite their many complications.


title: Genetic history of Europe

text: Genetic studies operate on numerous assumptions and suffer from methodological limitations, such as selection bias and confounding phenomena like genetic drift, foundation and bottleneck effects cause large errors, particularly in haplogroup studies. No matter how accurate the methodology, conclusions derived from such studies are compiled on the basis of how the author envisages their data fits with established archaeological or linguistic theories.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The 1999 Royal Rumble was the 12th annual Royal Rumble professional wrestling pay-per-view (PPV) event produced by the World Wrestling Federation (WWF; WWE as of 2002). It took place on January 24, 1999, at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim in Anaheim, California. The tagline and subtitle of the event was taken from a promise by WWF Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Mr. McMahon that the first entrant in the Royal Rumble, Stone Cold Steve Austin, had "no chance in hell" of winning the match. The theme song for the event, based on the phrase, would go on to become the entrance music for McMahon's stable The Corporation and later, just McMahon himself, which he uses to this day.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: As has been customary since 1993, the Royal Rumble match winner received a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. For the 1999 event, the winner received a match for the WWF Championship at WrestleMania XV. The main event of the card was the 1999 Royal Rumble match. The event centered on the continuing heated rivalry between Stone Cold Steve Austin and Mr. McMahon, with those men entering the Royal Rumble match at #1 and #2, respectively. Mr. McMahon won the match by last eliminating Austin. The penultimate match was for the WWF Championship and was an "I Quit" match between Mankind and The Rock, which is remembered both for its brutality and its place in the documentary film "Beyond the Mat"; The Rock defeated Mankind to win the title. Lower down on the card, the WWF Intercontinental Championship and WWF Women's Championship were both defended.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The Royal Rumble is an annual gimmick pay-per-view (PPV), produced every January by the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) since 1988. It is one of the promotion's original four pay-per-views, along with WrestleMania, SummerSlam, and Survivor Series, which were dubbed the "Big Four", and was considered one of the "Big Five" PPVs, along with King of the Ring. It is named after the Royal Rumble match, a modified battle royal in which the participants enter at timed intervals instead of all beginning in the ring at the same time. The match generally features 30 wrestlers and the winner traditionally earns a world championship match at that year's WrestleMania. For 1999, the winner earned a match for the WWF Championship at WrestleMania XV. The 1999 event was the 12th event in the Royal Rumble chronology and was scheduled to be held on January 24, 1999, at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim in Anaheim, California.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The card consisted of six matches. The matches resulted from scripted storylines, where wrestlers portrayed heroes, villains, or less distinguishable characters to build tension and culminated in a wrestling match or series of matches. Results were predetermined by WWF's writers, with storylines produced on their weekly television show, "Raw".


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The overriding theme of the pay-per-view was centered on The Corporation and Mr. McMahon's attempts to enforce his notions of how a company should be run on the promotion. Since its inception the night after Survivor Series, the group had mainly come to blows with D-Generation X, the Undertaker's Ministry of Darkness and McMahon's nemesis Stone Cold Steve Austin.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: When Commissioner Shawn Michaels allied himself with The Corporation, one of the first things he did was to book the Tag Team Champions, Road Dogg and Billy Gunn, in a title defense against Corporate members Ken Shamrock and The Big Boss Man. Despite his interference at they managed to retain their titles but they were not so lucky on "Raw is War" on December 14. As the feud between DX and The Corporation intensified, the New Age Outlaws turned to singles wrestling as Road Dogg found himself caught up in the hardcore division and became Hardcore Champion on December 21. Meanwhile, as well as tensions from the tag team feuding, Billy Gunn gained the ire of Ken Shamrock when his sister Ryan appeared at ringside, only to have her sibling affection distracted when Gunn lived up to his nickname by flirtatiously mooning Ryan after Val Venis had already danced for her. Filled with his typical rage Shamrock put his Intercontinental Championship on the line for a chance to honor his notions of sibling protection.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: After a minor absence, Women's Champion Sable returned to Raw with an open invitation on December 28, but before the match a fan came into the ring, later identified as Tori to give her a rose. A masked wrestler identified as "Spider Lady" came to the ring for the match (a nod to The Fabulous Moolah's screwjob over Wendi Richter in the mid '80s) but it ended in a no-contest when she started whipping Sable with her belt. The masked woman was revealed to be Luna Vachon, who would go on to face Sable in a "Strap Match" at the Rumble.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The Rock and Mankind had been feuding ever since Survivor Series in November 1998, when the two met in the finals of the "Deadly Game" tournament for the vacant WWF Championship. The Rock won the title that night with the help of the McMahons, who had previously been assisting Mankind, and became the chosen Corporate Champion while Mankind began a feud with the Corporation. Mankind faced The Rock again at Rock Bottom: IYH and won the match, but Mr. McMahon stepped in and announced that while Rock lost the match by falling unconscious to the mandible claw, he did not technically submit and thus the WWF Championship would not change hands. Angered at being screwed out of the championship twice, Mankind attacked Shane McMahon on Raw is War and demanded a match. On the first Raw is War of 1999, January 4, after interference from The Corporation, D-Generation X and Steve Austin, Mankind won his first WWF Championship. Initially he refused The Rock's demands for a rematch, despite Rock offering stipulation after stipulation to appease Mankind until eventually he quit begging, at which point Mankind revealed that he would face The Rock at the Rumble as long as it was an "I Quit" match.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The Royal Rumble match featured a number of notable build ups. On Raw is War on January 11, a Corporation vs. DX mini-Rumble was set up with the winner taking the coveted number 30 spot; after all the apparent competitors had entered it seemed as if Triple H had won until Mr. McMahon made his way to the ring, entering himself on behalf of the Corporation and throwing a distracted Triple H out of the ring. Again it seemed as if the winner was established until DX's Chyna made her way to the ring and won the match. The event would mark the first time a female wrestler took part in the match. Chyna also appeared at the Royal Rumble the following year as well. Chyna became the only woman to enter the match until Beth Phoenix entered the Royal Rumble in 2010, Kharma in 2012, and Nia Jax in 2019.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The most notable aspect of the Royal Rumble, though, was the feud between Mr. McMahon and Stone Cold Steve Austin. Austin had won the Royal Rumble the previous two years and McMahon attempted to prevent him from repeating by putting him in a "Buried Alive" match at Rock Bottom: IYH against The Undertaker with one Royal Rumble place on the line. Austin won, with a little help from Kane and was guaranteed a place in the match, but McMahon continued in his attempts to prevent Austin from winning the match by "randomly" drawing Austin's spot at #1 and entering himself in the match at #30. Commissioner Michaels over-rode his decision and put McMahon at #2, and set up the aforementioned Corporate/DX mini-Rumble for the now vacant #30 position. With Austin and McMahon being the first two to enter, McMahon wanted to guarantee there would be "no chance in hell" that Austin would win by not only training as a competitor, but also offering a $100,000 bounty for the man who eliminated him.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The opening match began slowly, with Boss Man taunting Road Dogg and being met with a crotch chop. The two circled each other, occasionally going in for a grapple but without achieving a move. Eventually Road Dogg became trapped in the corner and Boss Man punched him. Road Dogg found some short success when Boss Man tried to run and jump onto him, but was left with his crotch caught on the ropes. Boss Man tried to reply with his night stick but referee Mike Chioda stopped him and while he was being reprimanded, Road Dogg dragged him to his feet and pulled him into the ring post, legs open. After recovering, Boss Man threw Road Dogg outside of the ring. Inside the ring Boss Man took to hurling his opponent into the turnbuckles and then crushing him with a bear hug. Despite some punching back from Road Dogg, Boss Man dominated most of the match from this point and despite a Shake, Rattle & Roll from Road Dogg, Boss Man used his opponent's momentum to catch him in the Boss Man Slam, pinning him afterwards.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: With Billy Gunn in the ring, Ken Shamrock ran into a series of kicks but managed to get to his feet and punch Gunn into the corner. He quickly worked on slowing down Gunn's style, keeping him mostly grounded with a series of kicks and elbow drops, only picking Gunn up to kick him back down. Both men went down after Shamrock Irish-whipped him and tried to flapjack Gunn, only to have his face driven into the mat with a FameAsser. Although Gunn put Shamrock in the corner for a ten punch, he then went to run into him and was thrown over the top rope out of the ring. Shamrock took advantage of the time outside of the ring to drag Gunn around, throwing him face first into the ring post, steel steps and the unpadded floor before putting him back in the ring. When the two were on the apron, Gunn managed to stun Shamrock by elbowing him and jumping into a bulldog onto the Spanish announce table. Taking some time to recuperate, Shamrock was undeterred, fighting as soon as he returned to the ring as he began to work on Gunn's ankle. Gunn fought back but accidentally clotheslined referee Tim White and while he was down, Val Venis ran in and delivered a DDT on Shamrock. By the time White was conscious to make a pin count, Shamrock kicked out. Gunn gained momentum and eventually went for a move from the turnbuckle. When he came down, Shamrock caught his ankle and took him to the ground, using his ankle lock to make Gunn submit.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The European Championship match started with X-Pac running roughshod over Gangrel using a variety of spinning kicks. Gangrel's short advantage came from throwing X-Pac onto the ropes but X-Pac would not be kept down, trying a Bronco Buster. X-Pac tried to go to the top rope, fighting Gangrel from it, and then going for a flying crossbody. Some controversy arose when referee Teddy Long seemed to make the three count as Gangrel rolled the diving X-Pac into a roll-up pin, the champion kicking out too late. The match continued, though, despite chants from fans in attendance about the pin fall, but only for a short while as X-Pac jumped and drove a running Gangrel's head into the floor for the X-Factor and pinning him.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: Despite Shane McMahon announcing Sable as unfit for contest, she came to the ring and demanded to fight, with McMahon joining the commentary team and giving a very biased account. After whipping Vachon with the strap, Sable was knocked to the ground allowing Vachon to tap two turnbuckles but Sable stopped her, using the strap again to whip her. After being kicked in the corner by Sable, Vachon side slammed Sable and then wrapped the strap around Sable's neck, hoisting Sable on her back. She then toured the turnbuckles, tapping three of them unaware that Sable was doing the same from her back. Just before she could tap the fourth, Vachon was taken off her feet by Sable. Fearing a turn in the match, Shane McMahon jumped on the apron to distract the referee, but as Vachon went to tap the fourth turnbuckle, Tori attacked her and ran back into the crowd, letting Sable freely tap the fourth turnbuckle in sight of the referee to retain the Women's Championship.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The "I Quit" Match began with Mankind clotheslining and punching Rock into the turnbuckle before putting him on the ground and punching him, trying to make him quit early on with no success. When The Rock insulted Mankind over the microphone, Mankind struck him with the microphone and then Cactus clotheslined him out of the ring. After punching Rock against the barricade, he was thrown over the steel steps but managed to take control once again when The Rock joined the commentary team to further mock Mankind and was clotheslined over the table. After hitting him again with the microphone when he would not quit, Rock was thrown inside the ring again, where Mankind stuffed a smelly sock down the Rock's throat to the point where Rock could not talk to quit, as the Rock had passed out from the mandible claw. Mankind then took Rock out of the ring and through the crowd but when he tried to clothesline Rock, Rock slammed him back into the ringside barricade. Rock then took the bell to Mankind's head, ringing it next to his ear (and humorously singing "bells will be ringing" into the microphone) before trying to Rock Bottom him through the Spanish announce table, but the table gave way before the move could be performed.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: Mankind ran for recovery up the walkway but was chased by The Rock who lost control when his opponent began head-butting him. Rock thumbed Mankind's eye and took him through the technical area, smashing his head into the food there and then performing a DDT on him on the concrete, at which point Mankind refused to quit. Rock then brought a ladder into the match but was knocked down with the ladder on top of him, he escaped just as Mankind delivered a running elbow drop onto the ladder, though he would still not quit. Rock then set the ladder up and climbed to the first tier of crowd, fighting in front of them with Mankind just about to throw him off. Rock low blowed him though, and then climbed over the barrier up the stairs to make a running punch which launched Mankind onto the electrical hub of the arena, causing them to spark and the lights to go out briefly. Shane McMahon came to stop the match but Rock demanded his opponent quit, though he would not ask him the question as he kicked a crawling Mankind back towards the ring. With Mankind lying unconscious in the ring, Rock handcuffed his hands behind his back and hit his head into the turnbuckle. Mankind kicked the Rock low, then dropped a knee into his crotch and asked him if he quit. The Rock managed to stand up and clotheslined Mankind to the mat, putting a chair on his face and performing the Corporate Elbow. When he was asked if he would quit, Mankind told Rock to go to hell, Rock told him he'd go to hell first. Mankind stood up only to be met with three hard steel chair shots but still refused to quit, saying he'd have to be killed first. Rock then chased Mankind out of the ring and up the walkway, hitting him repeatedly with a chair until he fell unconscious on the concrete. Finally, Mankind was heard shouting "I quit!" three times in a row; the audio was actually a recording from a promo Mankind made on "Heat" in the match build up, so Mankind never actually quit, but the Rock was declared the winner nonetheless. Backstage footage of before and after this match can be seen on the pro wrestling documentary "Beyond the Mat".


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The Royal Rumble match began with Steve Austin and Vince McMahon circling each other. McMahon mistimed a clothesline and Austin punched him into the corner, stomping a mudhole. Austin then went to throw McMahon over the top rope but stopped, wanting to take his time as Golga came to the ring. With Austin distracted by Golga, McMahon fled under the bottom rope (and thus wasn't eliminated) but Austin soon followed when Golga was eliminated. Austin followed McMahon through the crowd and eventually fought their way to the halls of the arena and was led into the public toilets where The Corporation were waiting to beat Austin down and leave him unconscious on the floor. In the ring Droz had come out and waited the allotted time until Edge made his appearance, the two fighting only to quickly eliminate Gillberg as soon as he entered the ring. When Dan Severn entered the ring he immediately gunned for the also freshman Steve Blackman, the two fighting in the corner until Tiger Ali Singh came in and attacked Blackman. Meanwhile, clips were shown of Austin being lifted onto a gurney and eventually being taken to hospital. Shortly after, The Blue Meanie entered the match and went after Singh, before being cornered by Droz. When the eleventh man was scheduled to enter, nobody showed and backstage Mabel was shown throwing Headbanger Mosh into a wall before entering the Rumble himself in Mosh's place. Shortly after entering the match, Mabel took out Blackman, Severn, Singh, Meanie and Droz, and started a clash with Road Dogg, who was just fresh and took Edge out, having the upper hand. But after having some dominance, the lights went out, and when they came back up, under a blue hue, The Acolytes and Mideon had eliminated Mabel and took him to meet The Undertaker who put him in a (kayfabe) trance. None of them were competitors. Road Dogg was left on his own and quickly eliminated Gangrel but had more difficulty with Kurrgan. Al Snow tried to help Road Dogg but when he over zealously climbed the ropes to push Kurrgan out, Road Dogg jumped on the opportunity to push him over. The ring gradually began to fill up again with Goldust and Godfather until Kane entered, instantly putting all four wrestlers over the top rope and then eliminating himself when some asylum workers came to try and commit him.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: Mr. McMahon briefly returned into the ring but then exited to give the ring to Ken Shamrock, opting to join the commentary team instead. The next entrant was Billy Gunn, with only one shoe due to his ankle being injured from their earlier match up. As Test entered the ring, the Ministry were shown in the parking lot putting Mabel into a hearse and then an ambulance pulled up with Steve Austin driving. He quickly made his way to the ring, overshadowing the entrance of the Big Boss Man. McMahon ran around the ring away from Austin, running through it to allow Shamrock to secure him before fleeing again to the commentary team. Austin eliminated Shamrock with little trouble but put more effort into Boss Man, choking him with a turnbuckle tie. Again the ring began to fill up, with two members of DX in Triple H and X-Pac, Test and Boss Man representing The Corporation along with other singles wrestlers in Val Venis, Mark Henry, Jeff Jarrett, D'Lo Brown and Owen Hart. Austin took a break from being in the ring to go to the commentary team to throw a jug of water in McMahon's face before returning to the fight. At this point the first woman to enter a Royal Rumble, Chyna came to the ring. She instantly targeted Mark Henry, delivering forearms before throwing him over the top rope, but before she had time to celebrate Austin immediately clotheslined her over the top rope, for which Triple H attacked him, and in addition, this latter took both Val and Jarrett out. Triple H was soon eliminated by Austin as the numbers started to dwindle after Austin threw D'Lo and Owen over, and after giving a Stone Cold Stunner to Boss Man, Austin eliminated him leaving only him and McMahon. Austin went to the announce table and attacked McMahon, throwing him into the crowd and then back to ringside, hitting him with a chair. Austin then threw McMahon into the ring, standing over him as McMahon clambered to his feet and lowblowed Austin. The two both staggered to their feet when Austin stunnered McMahon. The Rock then came to ringside taunting Austin with the WWF Championship, climbing up to the apron. As Austin ran to punch Rock, McMahon climbed to his feet and came up behind Austin, throwing him over the top rope and winning the 1999 Royal Rumble match.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: In 2010, Jack Bramma of 411Mania gave the event a rating of 6.5 [Average], stating, "Hard to accurately judge. The undercard is mediocre. Rock-Foley [is] awesome, but as usual the show lives or dies with the Rumble match. The '99 Rumble match is definitely acquired taste, and if you weren’t a fan of the period, you will probably think it sucks. It’s dated as hell and is a microcosm of the Attitude Era, but I loved the Rumble match itself warts and all and that's mostly what the rating is for (the Rumble and Rock-Foley). Your mileage will totally vary."


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: On "Raw Is War" the following night, Mr. McMahon awarded The Rock the $100,000 bounty for helping him eliminate Austin in the Royal Rumble, and also announced that he was officially forfeiting his title shot at WrestleMania, the first time ever a Royal Rumble winner had done so, so as to not make The Rock defend his WWF Championship against McMahon. While McMahon planned to choose who The Rock would face at WrestleMania, he was interrupted by WWF Commissioner Shawn Michaels, who informed McMahon that since he forfeited his title shot at WrestleMania, according to WWF rules, the title shot was then immediately given to the Royal Rumble runner-up, Steve Austin, much to McMahon's fury. Austin took advantage by convincing McMahon to a match. Austin explained that even more than a WWF Championship match, he wanted another chance to fight McMahon without any legal ramifications so much that he would risk his WrestleMania title shot for the chance. To ensure that there would be no corporate interference, the match would take place inside a steel cage at . Austin went on to win the match after the debut of Paul Wight, who came through the ring's mat and threw Austin into the cage wall, breaking it open and causing Austin to exit the cage before McMahon. Austin proceeded to face The Rock at WrestleMania XV, winning the WWF Championship for the second year in a row.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: The mystery of Mankind's quitting was solved when it was revealed that Shane McMahon had played a voice clip from a prerecorded interview on "Sunday Night Heat" of Mankind vowing to make Rock be the one screaming, "I quit, I quit, I quit!" when he was actually unconscious. Having been screwed again, Mankind hijacked the $100,000 bounty money The Rock earned for helping eliminate Austin, and began to throw it in the crowd, holding it ransom for a rematch. The rematch would be a twenty-minute time limit hardcore match, held in an empty arena during halftime of Super Bowl XXXIII on "Halftime Heat", where Mankind would win the title back by trapping Rock underneath a heavy payload on a forklift truck. With the Rock claiming it was an unfair win, the two faced each other again, and in hopes of finding a definitive champion the match was booked as a "Last Man Standing" match at St. Valentine's Day Massacre. It ended in a draw when both men were counted out, meaning they had to settle it again the next night on "Raw is War" in a ladder match which Rock won with help from Paul Wight. With WrestleMania so close, Mankind sought to settle the score with Rock by countlessly trying to become a second special guest referee in the WrestleMania main event, alongside Wight. Early in the WrestleMania card, Wight and Mankind fought for the referee position in a match which saw Wight disqualified for chokeslamming Mankind through a pair of steel folding chairs. Mankind was sent to the hospital for his injuries, but returned to officiate in the closing minutes of the match.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: After making herself properly known, Sable's stalker Tori would be humiliated with her, pretending to align herself with Luna Vachon only to help Sable give her a beat down. Tori soon realized how selfish Sable was, though and the two had a match for the Women's Championship at WrestleMania XV where Sable retained her title thanks to interference from Nicole Bass.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: Mabel, meanwhile, was renamed Viscera and became the newest member of the Ministry of Darkness as it assembled its war against The Corporation and Mr. McMahon, making The Brood part of the stable too on February 1. The Undertaker would have a "Hell in a Cell" match against Big Boss Man at WrestleMania XV which ended with The Brood passing rope from the roof to hang Boss Man with. The feud between the two stables continued until they joined forces when it became apparent that the "higher power" The Undertaker was answering to was actually Mr. McMahon.


title: Royal Rumble (1999)

text: One day after her historic appearance in the Royal Rumble Match, Chyna turned heel by betraying Triple H and becoming the newest member of The Corporation. At St. Valentine's Day Massacre, the evil Chyna teamed with fellow Corporation member Kane in defeating Triple H and X-Pac. Chyna turned against Kane and reunited with Triple H at WrestleMania XV, but they would both help Shane McMahon defeat X-Pac later in the event, making Triple H a member of The Corporation.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The Konkan Railway (abbreviated KR) is one of the 19 railway zones in India with its headquarters at CBD Belapur in Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. The first passenger train ran on Konkan railway tracks on 20 March 1993, between Udupi and Mangalore. During its initial years of operation in the mountainous Konkan region, a number of accidents prompted Konkan Railway to implement new technology. Anti-collision devices, the Sky Bus and roll-on/roll-off are several of the railway's innovations. The long railway line connects the states of Maharashtra, Goa and Karnataka. The first train on the completed track was sent off on 26 January 1998.


title: Konkan Railway

text: For most of the modern era, the Konkan coast of India did not have a railway link connecting its coastal cities, towns and villages. Even the British who ruled India until 1947 did not build a railway along this route. The first proposal was surveyed in 1920. In 1957 an aerial survey was conducted of the area between Dasgaon, Raigad District in Maharashtra and Mangalore with the object of studying the possibilities of railway development in this region.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The long-pending demand of this region was fulfilled by Mr.George Fernandes who was the Railway minister in V.P.Singh's government, backed by then Finance minister Madhu Dandavate and Vice Chairman of Planning Commission Ramakrishna Hegde. They set up Konkan Railway Corporation Limited headed by E.Sreedharan for executing Konkan railway line to tide over funds crunch of Indian Railways.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The first phase of the Konkan Railway was the section from Apta to Roha. It was cleared by the Planning Commission, and the project was included in the 1978-79 budget at an estimated cost of 11.19 billion. The length of the railway from Apta to Mangalore was estimated at , and its cost was estimated at 2.39 billion in 1976. The engineering and traffic survey for the West Coast Railway Line from Apta to Mangalore was conducted from 1970 to 1972. The final survey for the Apta-Roha-Dasgaon section was made in 1974–75.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The project involved over 2,116 bridges (of which the Panvalnadi bridge was the highest viaduct in India till 2010, Now Jhajjhar Khad is the highest viaduct in India) and 92 tunnels and was the largest railway project of the century in Asia. A major challenge was land acquisition from about 43,000 landowners. When the Konkan Railway Corporation (KRCL) began asking people to surrender property which had belonged to them for generations, many (convinced of the project's importance) did so voluntarily. This enabled the process to be completed in one year. The longest bridge is on the River Sharavathi, spanning and the longest Tunnel is in Karbude near Ratnagiri, stretching .


title: Konkan Railway

text: Terrain and the elements were challenging; flash floods, loose soil, landslides and tunnel collapses affected work at many places on the project. Thickly-forested construction sites were often visited by wild animals.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The route crosses three states (Maharashtra, Goa and Karnataka), each of which agreed to provide financing. The authorised share capital was increased in 1996-1997 from 6 billion to 8 billion, with the government of India taking a 51-percent share; the rest went to Maharashtra (22 percent), Karnataka (15 percent), Kerala (6 percent) and Goa (6 percent).


title: Konkan Railway

text: Contracts for the project were given to construction firms which included Larsen & Toubro who were given a major part of the project, Gammon India and Afcons. To speed up construction, piers for major bridges were cast on riverbanks itself and launched with pontoon-mounted cranes. This was India's first use of incremental launch bridge-building. The greatest challenge was presented by the nine tunnels bored through soft soil, which required a slow, manual process. Excavation was difficult due to saturated clay and high water table. Tunnels collapsed immediately several times, requiring the work to be redone. Nineteen lives and four years were lost in the construction of the soft-soil tunnels alone, and a total of seventy-four people died during the railway's construction.


title: Konkan Railway

text: In Goa, which makes up of the route, concerns were raised about the environmental and economic impact of the railway. According to opponents of the project, the coastal railway would destroy habitat, damage historical sites, and disrupt lives in the densely-populated state. In 1991, the Konkan Railway Re-Alignment Committee (KRRAC) organised protests against the proposed railway line. The KRRAC's main points were that the proposal would flood coastal regions, destroy fertile land, harm the monuments of Old Goa, irreparably damage the marshes and mangrove swamps along the coast and the estuaries of the Mandovi and Zuari Rivers, and displace neighbourhoods along the coast. The committee proposed an alternative hinterland alignment passing through relatively-unpopulated regions, which would extend the line by about but reduce environmental damage.


title: Konkan Railway

text: But the hinterland alignment was rejected by the Konkan Railway Corporation because it would substantially lengthen & divert the line, deny rail access to Goa's population centers, and delay and increase the costs of construction. The KRRAC, which had become a political movement, filed public interest litigation in the Bombay High Court in March 1992 seeking an injunction on construction work and diversion of the line through the hinterland alignment. The high court dismissed the petition the following month, ruling that The Konkan Railway Re-Alignment Committee (KRRAC) now under new name Save Konkan Ecology Forum (SKEF) is strictly & violently opposing Doubling & Electrification Works of Konkan Railway Line, planned by Indian Railways in 2014/2015, citing concerns about the environmental and economic impact, destruction habitat, damage historical sites, and disrupt lives in the densely-populated state. Maharashtra, Karnataka & Kerala Governments had given Green signal for doubling & electrification of Konkan Railway Line in 2015/2016.


title: Konkan Railway

text: In March 1993, the southern between Thokur, from Mangalore, (now Mangaluru) and Udupi in Karnataka entered service, followed by the northern section between Roha and Veer in Maharashtra in June of that year. The first passenger train on the route ran between Mangalore and Udupi on 20 March 1993. The service was extended by from Veer to Khed in March 1995, and by a further from Khed to Sawantwadi Road in December 1996. The Southern service was extended by from Udupi to Kundapur in January 1995, and by a further to Pernem in Goa in August 1997.


title: Konkan Railway

text: Through services between Mumbai and Mangalore remained on hold due to a problematic tunnel at Pernem, which experienced repeated cave-ins and flooding. The tunnel was finally completed in January 1998, six years after its construction began. Through services on the line began after the inauguration of the full stretch from Roha to Mangalore on 26 January 1998. Passenger service on the full route, between Mumbai and Mangalore, began in May 1998.


title: Konkan Railway

text: According to a study by the railway, track doubling is possible on about which runs on the plains. Several stretches on the line can be converted to double track, such as the line from Roha to Veer, which is now doubled. The stretch between Udupi and Mangalore is another candidate. The track from Madure to Vaibhavwadi Road is entirely flat terrain and can easily be converted into Double Track. The track from Panvel Junction to Roha has been doubled.


title: Konkan Railway

text: On 3 November 2015, Konkan Railway senior official Bhanu P. Tayal announced to the press that track-doubling and electrification would begin on 8 November in Kolad. Life Insurance Corporation offered a favourable 2.5 billion loan, and other funding would be available. The project, expected to cost 100 billion, was scheduled for completion by 2020. In October 2018, the railway announced that the stretch between Roha and Veer would have two tracks by December 2019.


title: Konkan Railway

text: Matsyagandha Express ( Train number 02619 run as special) travelling from Lokmanya Tilak Terminus, Mumbai (LTT) to Mangaluru Central (MAQ) became first train to take Roha-Veer double line on Konkan railway route on 30 August 2021 at 7.30p.m.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The foundation stone laying for electrification of the Konkan railway line was done in November 2015. The entire 741 kilometer route stretching from Roha, Maharashtra to Thokur, Karnataka has been electrified in March 2022. Inspection of the entire stretch was completed in six phases starting in March 2020. The last stretch between Ratnagiri and Thivim was inspected on March 24 and authorisation was obtained on March 28.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The railway was scheduled to have new crossing stations at Indapur, Goregaon Road, Sape Wamne, Kalambani Budruk, Kadavai, Veravali, Kharepatan Road, Achirne, Mirjan and Innanje by December 2019. Most of these stations are operational now.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The railway has a total track length of . Its length through Maharashtra is , through Karnataka , and through Goa.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The route is popular with passengers due to its connectivity with regions hitherto inaccessible by rail and the substantial time savings for travellers between western and southern India. Several trains which had taken circuitous routes ran on the Konkan Railway, reducing running time. The first of these was the Mumbai-Mangalore Netravati Express (later extended to Trivandrum), which was diverted to the Konkan Railway on 1 March 1998; this was followed by the Thiruvananthapuram Rajdhani Express on 1 April of that year. The Matsyagandha Express, running from Lokmanya Tilak Terminus to Mangalore, began service on 1 May 1998. The Hazrat Nizamuddin-Mangalore Mangala Lakshadweep Express was diverted to the route and extended to Ernakulam Junction on 1 August 1998. The Pune-Ernakulam Junction Express was introduced on 25 February 1999. The Marusagar Express, which runs between Jaipur and Ernakulam Junction and was extended to Ajmer via the Konkan Railway, began service on 12 October 2001. The Jan Shatabdi Express was flagged off between Mumbai and Madgaon (the longest-running Jan Shatabdi) on 16 April 2002 to commemorate Indian Railways' 150th anniversary. On 1 February 2008, a Garib Rath Express between the Kochuveli railway station in Thiruvananthapuram and Lokmanya Tilak Terminus began service.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The Tejas Express is the first semi-high-speed, fully air-conditioned train fleet introduced by Indian Railways, with modern on-board facilities. Its inaugural run was on 24 May 2017 from Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus to Karmali railway station in Goa. It covered 552 km (342 mi) in eight hours and 30 minutes.


title: Konkan Railway

text: Freight response to the railway was lukewarm, prompting its corporation to consider reducing its rates. With an outstanding debt of 33.75 billion, the KRCL was counting on freight traffic for revenue. To attract freight traffic, the corporation began advertising to industries on the route.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The corporation introduced roll-on/roll-off (RORO) service, a road-rail system, on the section between Kolad (Maharashtra) and Verna, Goa in 1999; it was extended to the Surathkal railway station in Karnataka in 2004. The RORO service, the first of its kind in India, allowed trucks to be transported on flatcars. It has been popular, carrying about 1.6 million trucks and earning over 1.2 billion by 2009.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The terrain and weather of the Konkan region have caused problems for the railway. During the 1998 monsoon, torrential rains triggered landslides which washed away tracks and disrupted service. Despite the corporation's efforts to address the problems through engineering (such as protective netting along cuttings to prevent boulders from rolling onto the tracks), the problems recurred each year.


title: Konkan Railway

text: The line's first major accident occurred on the night of 22 June 2003, when a landslide derailed a Karwar–Mumbai express train at the entrance to a tunnel. Fifty-one people died as a result of the accident, and others were injured. As a result, the corporation was severely criticised for failing to take adequate safety measures in the landslide-prone region. An inquiry reported that the cause of the accident was the failure of a cutting due to the lack of monsoon patrolling. The findings were disputed by the corporation, which said that the lack of monsoon patrolling did not lead to the accident (which was due to forces of nature). Shortly after the accident, however, the corporation announced that it would enhance safety measures on the route.


title: Konkan Railway

text: Barely a year later, the measures were found inadequate when a second major accident occurred on 16 June 2004. A Mangalore–Mumbai Matsyaganda Express derailed and fell off a bridge after striking boulders on the tracks, killing 20 people. Again, the corporation insisted that the accident was due to forces of nature. Questions were then raised about the safety and reliability of the Konkan Railway. An inquiry by the Commissioner of Railway Safety ruled that the accident was caused by the "falling of boulders and earth" on the tracks. After the report was issued, the corporation implemented its recommendations. These included reducing train speeds during the monsoon to from and engineering measures such as boulder netting, shotcreting, rock bolting, micropiling and vetiver plantations along the line to improve safety.


title: Konkan Railway

text: A goods train carrying fertilizers derailed between Diwankhavti and Khed station(83/7Km)at 15.57 Hrs on 10 May 2020. This happened during Covid-19 virus lockdown when regular passenger and goods trains were stopped by Central or Union government of India. There was no injury or casualty. Traffic resumed on the railway on 13 May 2020 at 9.15 Hrs.


title: Proline

text: Proline (symbol Pro or P) is an organic acid classed as a proteinogenic amino acid (used in the biosynthesis of proteins), although it does not contain the amino group but is rather a secondary amine. The secondary amine nitrogen is in the protonated form (NH) under biological conditions, while the carboxyl group is in the deprotonated −COO form. The "side chain" from the α carbon connects to the nitrogen forming a pyrrolidine loop, classifying it as a aliphatic amino acid. It is non-essential in humans, meaning the body can synthesize it from the non-essential amino acid -glutamate. It is encoded by all the codons starting with CC (CCU, CCC, CCA, and CCG).


title: Proline

text: Proline is the only proteinogenic secondary amino acid which is a secondary amine, as the nitrogen atom is attached both to the α-carbon and to a chain of three carbons that together form a five-membered ring.


title: Proline

text: Proline was first isolated in 1900 by Richard Willstätter who obtained the amino acid while studying "N"-methylproline, and synthesized proline by the reaction of sodium salt of diethyl malonate with 1,3-dibromopropane. The next year, Emil Fischer isolated proline from casein and the decomposition products of γ-phthalimido-propylmalonic ester, and published the synthesis of proline from phthalimide propylmalonic ester.


title: Proline

text: Proline is biosynthetically derived from the amino acid -glutamate. Glutamate-5-semialdehyde is first formed by glutamate 5-kinase (ATP-dependent) and glutamate-5-semialdehyde dehydrogenase (which requires NADH or NADPH). This can then either spontaneously cyclize to form 1-pyrroline-5-carboxylic acid, which is reduced to proline by pyrroline-5-carboxylate reductase (using NADH or NADPH), or turned into ornithine by ornithine aminotransferase, followed by cyclisation by ornithine cyclodeaminase to form proline.


title: Proline

text: -Proline has been found to act as a weak agonist of the glycine receptor and of both NMDA and non-NMDA (AMPA/kainate) ionotropic glutamate receptors. It has been proposed to be a potential endogenous excitotoxin. In plants, proline accumulation is a common physiological response to various stresses but is also part of the developmental program in generative tissues (e.g. pollen).


title: Proline

text: A diet rich in proline was linked to an increased risk of depression in humans in a study from 2022 that was tested on a limited pre-clinical trial on humans and primarily in other organisms. Results were significant in the other organisms.


title: Proline

text: The distinctive cyclic structure of proline's side chain gives proline an exceptional conformational rigidity compared to other amino acids. It also affects the rate of peptide bond formation between proline and other amino acids. When proline is bound as an amide in a peptide bond, its nitrogen is not bound to any hydrogen, meaning it cannot act as a hydrogen bond donor, but can be a hydrogen bond acceptor.


title: Proline

text: Peptide bond formation with incoming Pro-tRNA is considerably slower than with any other tRNAs, which is a general feature of "N"-alkylamino acids. Peptide bond formation is also slow between an incoming tRNA and a chain ending in proline; with the creation of proline-proline bonds slowest of all.


title: Proline

text: The exceptional conformational rigidity of proline affects the secondary structure of proteins near a proline residue and may account for proline's higher prevalence in the proteins of thermophilic organisms. Protein secondary structure can be described in terms of the dihedral angles φ, ψ and ω of the protein backbone. The cyclic structure of proline's side chain locks the angle φ at approximately −65°.


title: Proline

text: Proline acts as a structural disruptor in the middle of regular secondary structure elements such as alpha helices and beta sheets; however, proline is commonly found as the first residue of an alpha helix and also in the edge strands of beta sheets. Proline is also commonly found in turns (another kind of secondary structure), and aids in the formation of beta turns. This may account for the curious fact that proline is usually solvent-exposed, despite having a completely aliphatic side chain.


title: Proline

text: Multiple prolines and/or hydroxyprolines in a row can create a polyproline helix, the predominant secondary structure in collagen. The hydroxylation of proline by prolyl hydroxylase (or other additions of electron-withdrawing substituents such as fluorine) increases the conformational stability of collagen significantly. Hence, the hydroxylation of proline is a critical biochemical process for maintaining the connective tissue of higher organisms. Severe diseases such as scurvy can result from defects in this hydroxylation, e.g., mutations in the enzyme prolyl hydroxylase or lack of the necessary ascorbate (vitamin C) cofactor.


title: Proline

text: Peptide bonds to proline, and to other "N"-substituted amino acids (such as sarcosine), are able to populate both the "cis" and "trans" isomers. Most peptide bonds overwhelmingly adopt the "trans" isomer (typically 99.9% under unstrained conditions), chiefly because the amide hydrogen ("trans" isomer) offers less steric repulsion to the preceding C atom than does the following C atom ("cis" isomer). By contrast, the "cis" and "trans" isomers of the X-Pro peptide bond (where X represents any amino acid) both experience steric clashes with the neighboring substitution and have a much lower energy difference. Hence, the fraction of X-Pro peptide bonds in the "cis" isomer under unstrained conditions is significantly elevated, with "cis" fractions typically in the range of 3-10%. However, these values depend on the preceding amino acid, with Gly and aromatic residues yielding increased fractions of the "cis" isomer. "Cis" fractions up to 40% have been identified for aromatic–proline peptide bonds.


title: Proline

text: From a kinetic standpoint, "cis"–"trans" proline isomerization is a very slow process that can impede the progress of protein folding by trapping one or more proline residues crucial for folding in the non-native isomer, especially when the native protein requires the "cis" isomer. This is because proline residues are exclusively synthesized in the ribosome as the "trans" isomer form. All organisms possess prolyl isomerase enzymes to catalyze this isomerization, and some bacteria have specialized prolyl isomerases associated with the ribosome. However, not all prolines are essential for folding, and protein folding may proceed at a normal rate despite having non-native conformers of many X–Pro peptide bonds.


title: Proline

text: Proline and its derivatives are often used as asymmetric catalysts in proline organocatalysis reactions. The CBS reduction and proline catalysed aldol condensation are prominent examples.


title: Proline

text: -Proline is an osmoprotectant and therefore is used in many pharmaceutical and biotechnological applications.


title: Proline

text: The growth medium used in plant tissue culture may be supplemented with proline. This can increase growth, perhaps because it helps the plant tolerate the stresses of tissue culture. For proline's role in the stress response of plants, see .


title: Proline

text: Proline is one of the two amino acids that do not follow along with the typical Ramachandran plot, along with glycine. Due to the ring formation connected to the beta carbon, the "ψ" and "φ" angles about the peptide bond have fewer allowable degrees of rotation. As a result, it is often found in "turns" of proteins as its free entropy (Δ"S") is not as comparatively large to other amino acids and thus in a folded form vs. unfolded form, the change in entropy is smaller. Furthermore, proline is rarely found in α and β structures as it would reduce the stability of such structures, because its side chain α-nitrogen can only form one nitrogen bond.


title: Proline

text: Additionally, proline is the only amino acid that does not form a red-purple colour when developed by spraying with ninhydrin for uses in chromatography. Proline, instead, produces an orange-yellow colour.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The 2010 Australian federal election was held on Saturday, 21 August 2010 to elect members of the 43rd Parliament of Australia. The incumbent centre-left Australian Labor Party led by Prime Minister Julia Gillard won a second term against the opposition centre-right Liberal Party of Australia led by Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and Coalition partner the National Party of Australia, led by Warren Truss, after Labor formed a minority government with the support of three independent MPs and one Australian Greens MP.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: Labor and the Coalition each won 72 seats in the 150-seat House of Representatives, four short of the requirement for majority government, resulting in the first hung parliament since the 1940 election. Six crossbenchers held the balance of power. Greens MP Adam Bandt and independent MPs Andrew Wilkie, Rob Oakeshott and Tony Windsor declared their support for Labor on confidence and supply. Independent MP Bob Katter and National Party of Western Australia MP Tony Crook declared their support for the Coalition on confidence and supply. The resulting 76–74 margin entitled Labor to form a minority government. The Prime Minister, government ministers and parliamentary secretaries were sworn in on 14 September 2010 by the Governor-General Quentin Bryce. In November 2011, Coalition MP and Deputy Speaker Peter Slipper replaced Labor MP Harry Jenkins as Speaker of the House of Representatives, increasing Labor's parliamentary majority from 76–74 to 77–73.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: In the 76-seat Senate, the Greens won one seat in each of the six states, gaining the sole balance of power with a total of nine seats, after previously holding a shared balance of power with the Family First Party and independent Nick Xenophon. The Coalition was reduced from 37 to 34 and Labor was reduced from 32 to 31. The two remaining seats were occupied by Xenophon and Victoria's new Democratic Labor Party Senator John Madigan. Family First Party Senator Steve Fielding was defeated. These changes took effect in the Senate on 1 July 2011.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: More than 13 million Australians were enrolled to vote at the time of the election. Australia has compulsory voting (since 1925) and uses preferential ballot (since 1919) in single-member seats for the House of Representatives and single transferable vote (since 1949) with optional group voting tickets (since 1984) in the proportionally represented Senate. The election was conducted by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC).


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: Prior to the Labor party's win in the 2022 Australian federal election, this was the most recent federal contest in which Labor formed government. It remains the most recent election in which the leader of the party forming government represented a division outside New South Wales.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The Labor Party, led by Julia Gillard, and the Liberal Party, led by Tony Abbott, were the predominant parties to contest the election. The smaller National Party led by Warren Truss is in a coalition with the Liberal Party. Following the 2007 federal election, the 150-member Australian House of Representatives consisted of 83 Labor-held seats, 65 Coalition seats (55 Liberal and 10 National), and two seats held by independents. The Australian Greens won 8 per cent of the 2007 vote, and the Family First Party won 2 per cent, with the Greens winning 1 seat in the lower house.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The coalition total was reduced to 64 seats when Rob Oakeshott, former state Nationals turned independent MP, won the seat of Lyne at the September 2008 Lyne by-election, resulting from the resignation of former Howard minister and Nationals leader Mark Vaile. The April 2008 Gippsland by-election, resulting from the resignation of the former Howard minister and Nationals MP Peter McGauran, saw the Nationals' Darren Chester retain the seat, receiving a swing of 6%. The Liberals suffered a swing in the September 2008 Mayo by-election resulting from the resignation of former Howard minister and Liberal leader Alexander Downer, and came close to losing the seat to the Greens candidate. The Liberals retained seats at the Bradfield and Higgins by-elections in December 2009. The member for Ryan, Michael Johnson, was expelled from the Liberal National Party on 20 May 2010, reducing the Coalition to 63 seats.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: Since the previous national election in 2007 there were a number of redistributions. These realignments of electorate boundaries are regularly undertaken by the Australian Electoral Commission and they maintain similar voter numbers in each electorate. They saw Labor's notional number of seats increase to 88 with the coalition's notional number decreased to 59, with independents in three. The swing required by the opposition to win majority government had decreased by approximately 0.1 percent.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The redistribution of electoral divisions for Western Australia made the Liberal held Swan notionally Labor, and vastly changed Kalgoorlie and O'Connor, with the former being safer for the Liberals, and the latter becoming more marginal. Kalgoorlie was also renamed Durack. The redistribution also damaged the WA Nationals' chances of a House of Representatives seat. Tasmania was also redistributed but, while there were some changes to boundaries, little changed in terms of seat margins.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: New South Wales lost a seat to Queensland due to population changes for the second election in a row. The Labor Party suggested the abolition of the marginal Liberal seat of Macarthur, while the Liberal Party suggested that Liberal-held Hume and National-held Riverina be merged to create a new seat called "Bradman" in honour of Sir Donald Bradman. The National Party suggested the abolition of the Labor-held city seat of Banks. The draft New South Wales redistribution, published in August 2009, proposed that Reid be abolished and that Lowe be renamed "McMahon" in honour of former Prime Minister Sir William McMahon. In response to widespread criticism of the abolition of the name "Reid", the finalised redistribution, published in October 2009, instead had Lowe renamed "Reid" and Prospect replaced with McMahon. Boundary changes also resulted in the Liberal seats of Macarthur, Greenway and Gilmore becoming notionally Labor-held, with major changes to other seats, including Calare, Parkes and Macquarie.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: In Queensland, the seat of Wright was created as a Liberal-held seat based on the Gold Coast hinterland. The redistribution saw the status of Blair change from marginal Labor to a safe Labor seat. The status of marginal Liberal seats Dickson and Herbert also changed to marginal Labor seats.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: A redistribution for Victoria commenced in 2010, but was not finalised before the election was called.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: In the 76-member Australian Senate, from July 2008 to June 2011, the Labor and Liberal parties hold 32 seats each, and the Liberals' coalition partner, the National Party (including one CLP), five seats. The balance of power rests with the crossbench, consisting of:


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: For a majority, the government requires an additional seven votes from non-Labor senators. If the Liberal Party chooses to vote with the Labor Party, support from the crossbench is not required.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The election-eve Newspoll of over 2000 voters reported Labor on a 50.2 percent two-party-preferred vote. A post-election Newspoll taken 27–29 August 2010 of 1134 voters revealed 47 percent wanted a Gillard Labor government, to 39 percent for an Abbott Coalition government, while 14 percent were uncommitted. There was no difference between male and female voters. Ages 18–34 and 34–49 were even stronger for Labor, while those above 50 bucked the trend preferring the Coalition 45 percent to 40 percent.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: A JWS Research "mega-poll" was conducted by robocall late in the campaign and published by Fairfax. It polled an Australian record of 22,000 voters in 54 marginal seats and a further 6,000 in safe seats. It revealed a national two-party-preferred vote for Labor of 51.6 percent. Losses in Queensland and New South Wales were offset by the gains of Dunkley, McEwen (both 57 percent for Labor), and Cowper and Boothby (both 54 percent for Labor), finishing with a total of 79 Labor, 68 coalition, 3 independent.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The graph shows a timeline of the estimates by three main polling companies – Roy Morgan (green), Nielsen (blue), and Newspoll (red) – of the two-party-preferred vote for Labor from January 2008 to 20 July 2010. The pink dot on the left side represents the actual 2PP vote for Labor in the November 2007 election.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The graph shows a timeline of Newspoll's estimates of the primary vote for Labor (red), the Coalition (blue), the Greens (green), and other parties or independent candidates (magenta) from 2007 to 2010. The four dots on the left side represent the actual vote for each party in the November 2007 election.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: Labor and the Coalition each won 72 seats in the 150-seat House of Representatives, a loss of eleven and a gain of seven respectively. Labor retained a majority of seats in a majority of states against the Coalition − New South Wales (26 to 20), Victoria (22 to 14), South Australia (6 to 5), and Tasmania (4 to 0), but fell sharply in Queensland (8 to 21) with a pre-existing minority in Western Australia (3 to 11). Labor won their largest two-party preferred vote in Victoria and Tasmania since official two-party records began in 1949, and in South Australia, their fourth-largest.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: On the crossbench, one member of the Australian Greens, one member of the National Party of Western Australia and four independent members held the balance of power. After gaining the support of four crossbenchers Labor was able to form a minority government.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: A year after the election, "The Age" summarised the collective positions of the crossbenchers as one of "no regrets". On 24 November 2011, the Coalition's Peter Slipper replaced Labor's Harry Jenkins as Speaker of the Australian House of Representatives, increasing Labor's parliamentary majority from 75–74 to 76–73. On 21 January 2012 Andrew Wilkie withdrew his support for Labor, changing the majority to 75–73.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: The Senate has 76 seats. Forty seats were up for election; six in each of the six states and two in each of the two territories. The terms of the four senators from the territories commenced on election day, all other terms took effect from 1 July 2011. The Coalition holds 34 seats and Labor holds 31 seats, with the balance of power shifting solely to the Australian Greens with nine seats, after previously holding a shared balance of power with the Family First Party and independent Nick Xenophon. The Labor government required the support of at least eight non-Labor Senators to pass legislation.


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: Labor and the Coalition incurred swings against them in votes and seats. The Greens received a four percent swing and won a seat in each of the six states at the election, a first for an Australian minor party. John Madigan (Victoria) of the Democratic Labor Party won a seat, while Steve Fielding (Victoria) of the Family First Party lost his seat. Xenophon was not required to stand at this election but will be up for re-election at the next. Minor parties not winning a seat but receiving a notable swing include the Australian Sex Party (+2.0), the Liberal Democratic Party (+1.7) and the Shooters and Fishers Party (+1.4).


title: 2010 Australian federal election

text: Members listed in italics did not re-contest their House of Representatives seats at this election. Six notional boundary redistributed seats were contested at this election. Based on booths contested at the previous election, the seats redistributed by the AEC from being marginal Coalition seats to marginal Labor seats – Dickson, Gilmore, Herbert, Macarthur and Swan – were all retained by the Coalition. Greenway was redistributed to become a marginal to fairly safe Labor seat, and was retained by Labor.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Sarabjit Singh Attwal (also spelled Sarabjeet Singh; 1963 or 1964 – 2 May 2013) (alleged to be Manjit Singh Rattu by Pakistan) was an Indian national convicted of terrorism and spying by a Pakistani court. He was tried and convicted by the Supreme Court of Pakistan for a series of bomb attacks in Lahore and Faisalabad that killed 14 bystanders in 1990. However, according to India, Sarabjit was a farmer who strayed into Pakistan from his village located on the border, three months after the bombings.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: After a brief trial in the Lahore High Court (later directed to the Supreme Court), he was condemned and sentenced to death in 1991, but the sentence was repeatedly postponed by the Government of Pakistan. While in prison at Kot Lakhpat Jail, Lahore in April 2013, he was attacked by fellow inmates and died six days later at the Jinnah Hospital, Lahore.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Singh was born in Bhikhiwind, located along the Indo-Pakistani border in the Tarn Taran district of Punjab, India. He was fond of wrestling and taking care of rare pigeons. He worked as a farmer on other's fields. He was married to Sukhpreet Kaur and had two daughters Swapandeep and Poonam Kaur. His sister, Dalbir Kaur, was working towards his release since 1991 till his death in 2013.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: However, another woman named Baljinder Kaur disputed Dalbir's relation to Singh and claimed to be Singh's real sister. According to Baljinder, Singh was the third eldest of ten siblings and Dalbir was not their sister, but had happened to know Singh since 1989; "Dalbir Kaur assured us she had right links and would struggle for the release of Sarabjit on some conditions. We trusted her and let her pursue the matter, only to be pushed out of the picture." Dalbir added that she had nothing to prove her relation with Singh except offering to undergo a DNA test. She also claimed that Singh's real brothers, Charanjit and Harbhajan, were not allowed to light his pyre at his funeral and were "pushed back" by people at the cremation ground. Commenting further on Dalbir, she added: "People have been coming to the fore (after Singh's death) for cheap publicity. They were nowhere when I alone struggled for his release."


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Sarabjeet was caught on an unmarked Indo-Pakistani border area in Pakistan and arrested by the Pakistan Rangers near Kasur. Singh and his supporters claimed that the arrest was a case of mistaken identity and that he was only a poor farmer who was drunk and had strayed over the border. His sister said that the family launched a search but could not find any clue to his whereabouts for nine months. After a year they received a letter from Singh, informing them that he had been arrested in Pakistan as "Ranjit Singh", as he had no identification papers and had been charged by the Lahore police in the bombings. He was convicted of spying and carrying out the bombings and was given the death penalty.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Some sources say that he was initially arrested on charges of illegally crossing the India-Pakistan border. But after eight days, the Pakistani police charged him with involvement in the 1990 terror blasts at Faisalabad and Lahore. The authorities claimed that he was 'Ranjit Singh' and had been responsible for the four blasts which killed 14 people, and had been arrested while returning to India after carrying out the bombings. He was accused of working for the Indian Research and Analysis Wing intelligence agency. He subsequently confessed on camera to the bombings.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: It was later reported that Ranjit Singh was later apprehended in Canada, and later in Chandigarh state INDIA.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: In 1991 Singh was given the death sentence under Pakistan's Army Act. His sentence was upheld by the High Court Division and later by the Appeallate Division. The Supreme Court dismissed a petition to review his death sentence in March 2006 as Singh's lawyers failed to appear for the hearing. Singh said that his appeal had been dismissed by the Pakistan Supreme Court only because of lack of interest by his former lawyer.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Singh had been arrested on the night of 30 August 1990 at the Kasur border for illegally crossing the Indo-Pakistani border. Eight days after, the police implicated him in the terrorist bombings. Burney also pointed out that the same magistrate had recorded the witness statements in all the four bombings, of which one had taken place at Faisalabad and the remaining three at Lahore, although the police investigations involved four different police stations and two different districts. He said four different magistrates should have recorded the statements. None of the statements recorded in front of the magistrate were taken under oath. Singh had been paraded before the witnesses in the absence of the magistrate, and the police had informed the witnesses that he was the bomber. This was confirmed by Salim's testimony.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: An Indian origin British lawyer, Jas Uppal, campaigning for his release, pointed to several problems with the prosecution in the trial. These problems included:


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: On 26 April 2008, the key witness Shaukat Salim retracted his statement during an interview with journalists. Salim's father and other relatives had been killed in the bombing. In court Salim testified that Singh had planted the bomb but later said that he made that statement under pressure from the police. Singh's lawyer, Abdul Rana Hamid, said that Salim's statements had no legal standing as they were never recorded in court.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Five of his mercy petitions were rejected by the courts and the President of Pakistan, but in 2008 the government nonetheless put off Singh's execution indefinitely.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: On 27 June 2012, both Pakistani and international media reported President Asif Ali Zardari signed a document sent by the interior ministry of Pakistan commuting Singh's death sentence to life in prison. A life sentence in Pakistan generally lasts 14 years. Singh, having spent 22 years in jail, was therefore to be released. The news of his pardon and imminent release initiated celebrations in his hometown. The Indian foreign minister also issued a statement of appreciation to Islamabad for the gesture.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: This drew a storm of condemnation from Islamic groups Jamaat-e-Islami and Jamaat-ud-Da'wah. Later that day, after media agencies in both Pakistan and India had reported on a commuted sentence and pending release for Singh, the Pakistani government announced that the name of the prisoner to be released would be "Surjeet" Singh, not "Sarabjit" Singh. Surjeet Singh was arrested on charges of spying by the Pakistani security officials. Indian government, however, denied that Surjeet Singh was a spy.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Regarding the confusion related to Sarabjit-Surjeet mix-up, Surjeet Singh said that similar Urdu spellings of both the names led to the confusion. Surjeet also said that Indian prisoners are treated well in Pakistani jails and they are provided with all the basic necessities. BBC News reported that in recent years, several Indians returning from Pakistani jails have admitted to spying. Some have criticised India's government for abandoning them.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Five hours later the Pakistani government issued a statement denying the reports and holding the media responsible for the confusion. They announced that the release order had been for another prisoner, Surjeet Singh, who was pardoned in 1989. Sarabjit's family condemned the incident as a" ""cruel joke".


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Singh filed a new mercy appeal to the President of Pakistan on the 65th independence day of that country.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: On 23 August 2005, Singh's case was taken up in both houses of the Indian Parliament, where the government was asked to take action for his release.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: In March 2008, Singh's family went to Pakistan for his scheduled execution. They met several prominent Pakistani politicians, including former Prime minister Nawaz Sharif to appeal for his release. Sharif said, "After seeing the plight of the members of Sarabjit's family who have come to Pakistan, any person can feel the pain they are going through." However, Sharif added that he should be released on the condition that India would send him back to Pakistan if further evidence was found against him.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: The Indian External Affairs Minister K. Natwar Singh took up Sarabjit Singh's case with the Pakistan High Commissioner Aziz Ahmed Khan and urged him to convey Delhi's hope that Islamabad would treat the matter as a humanitarian issue.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: After his conviction in 1991, several mercy petitions were filed by Singh's lawyers. The fifth petition was filed on 28 May 2012 along with 100,000 signatures collected from India. None of the mercy petitions were granted.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: In 2009 British lawyer Jas Uppal started an online campaign "freesarabjitsingh.com" to highlight the case and request human rights groups to intervene on his behalf. Awais Sheikh, Singh's Pakistani lawyer, supported the campaign and provided his services free of charge.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Bollywood actor and activist Raza Murad also campaigned for his release. As of June 2012, he had collected 138,226 signatures in support of Singh's release. After the Pakistani government's reversal regarding his release in June 2012, Murad intensified his 'Free Sarabjit' campaign.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: In June 2012, Bollywood actor Salman Khan came forward to seek support from people and media for the release of Sarabjit. He also started an online petition from his NGO Being Human in support of his release.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: In April 2008, a group of Pakistani students organised a march seeking withdrawal of all official moves to pardon Singh.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Singh was attacked on 26 April 2013 at about 4:30 pm in the Central Jail Lahore (Kot Lakhpat jail), by other prisoners, with bricks, sharp metal sheets, iron rods and blades. He was admitted to Jinnah Hospital, Lahore in critical condition with severe head injuries, in a coma, with a broken backbone. He was placed on a ventilator. The exact circumstances of the attack and the number of attackers have been differently reported. Some sources have indicated that there were six assailants whereas others have indicated two. Some indicated that he was assaulted in his cell; others indicated that the attack took place when he was brought out of his cell for an hour-long break. According to his sister, the attack on Singh was pre-planned and the jail authorities were involved. His wife, sister and two daughters were allowed to visit him in the hospital.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: Singh had been threatened after Afzal Guru was executed in India in February 2013 over his role in the 2001 Indian Parliament attack case. Some sources had indicated that the attack was planned after Guru's execution. The Indian prime minister, Manmohan Singh, termed the attack as "very sad". On 29 April 2013, India appealed to Pakistan to release Sarabjit Singh on humanitarian grounds or at least allow him to be provided medical treatment in India, but these were repeatedly rejected by Pakistan. Appeals by lawyers were also filed with the Supreme Court of Pakistan to send Singh for medical treatment to the UK or outside Pakistan to save his life.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: On 1 May 2013 he was declared brain dead by doctors at Jinnah Hospital, but Pakistani authorities refused to give a statement. His sister and family returned to India. His sister said that the doctors attending to her brother were not being honest with them and she suspected foul play. She also remarked to having seen ink on his left thumb and that the Pakistani doctors had been evading questions.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: On 2 May 2013, he was reported to have died at 12:45 am local time in Lahore, when he was removed from the ventilator support after his condition worsened towards the middle of the night. His body was brought to India by a special aircraft the same evening. Indian doctors claimed that the second postmortem revealed that vital organs were missing from his body. An autopsy also revealed that his skull was broken into two pieces. They were, however, waiting for the report of the first postmortem conducted in Pakistan.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: The Government of Punjab, India declared a three-day period of mourning over Singh's death and announced it would pay his descendants a compensation of Rs 10,000,000. A biopic titled 'Sarbjit' directed by Omung Kumar starring Randeep Hooda, Richa Chadda and Aishwarya Rai Bachchan released on 20 May 2016.


title: Sarabjit Singh

text: A biographical film called "Sarabjit" was produced by Vashu Bhagnani (among others) and directed by Omung Kumar. Actress Aishwarya Rai essayed the role of Singh's sister, Dalbir Kaur, while, Randeep Hooda and Richa Chada played the role of Sarbjit Singh and his wife, Sukhpreet, respectively. The film was narrated through the perspective of Sarbjit Singh's sister Dalbir Kaur and was released on 20 May 2016 in India; the Censor board of Pakistan banned the film for being "anti-Pakistani".


title: Fabian Schär

text: Fabian Lukas Schär (; born 20 December 1991) is a Swiss professional footballer who currently plays as a centre-back for Premier League club Newcastle United and the Switzerland national team.


title: Fabian Schär

text: Beginning his career at his hometown club of Wil, Schär transferred to Basel in 2012, winning the Swiss Super League in all three of his seasons before his move to Hoffenheim.


title: Fabian Schär

text: After playing at the 2012 Olympics, Schär made his senior debut for Switzerland in 2013. He represented the nation at the FIFA World Cup in 2014, 2018 and 2022, as well as the UEFA European Championship in 2016 and 2020.


title: Fabian Schär

text: Born in Wil, Canton of St. Gallen, Schär began his playing career at hometown club Wil and rose through the youth ranks, soon playing regularly for Wil's reserve team. He eventually made his league debut on 29 November 2009 against FC Stade Nyonnais, coming on as a late substitute. He scored his first Swiss Challenge League goal in an away win against Yverdon-Sport on 30 October 2010.


title: Fabian Schär

text: On 4 July 2012, Schär transferred to Basel on a three-year contract with the option of a fourth. He made his Swiss Super League debut on 29 September in a 1–1 away draw against Lausanne-Sport. He scored his first goal for his new club on 7 October in the St. Jakob-Park during the 3–2 home win against Servette, heading an equaliser following a corner from Fabian Frei.


title: Fabian Schär

text: At the end of the Swiss Super League season 2012–13 Schär won the Championship title and was Swiss Cup runner up with Basel. In the 2012–13 UEFA Europa League Basel advanced as far as the semi-finals, there being matched against the reigning UEFA Champions League holders Chelsea, but they were knocked out losing both matches and being beaten 2–5 on aggregate.


title: Fabian Schär

text: At the end of the 2013–14 Super League season Schär won his second league championship with Basel. They also reached the final of the 2013–14 Swiss Cup, but were beaten 2–0 by Zürich after extra time. During the 2013–14 Champions League season Basel reached the group stage and finished the group in third position. Thus they qualified for Europa League knockout phase and here they advanced as far as the quarter-finals.


title: Fabian Schär

text: The 2014–15 season was a very successful one for Basel and Schär. Basel won the championship for the sixth time in a row that season. In the 2014–15 Swiss Cup they reached the final, but for the third season in a row, they finished as runners-up, losing 0–3 to Sion in the final. Basel entered the Champions League in the group stage and reached the knockout stages, with a 1–1 away draw against Liverpool enough to take them through. Basel later lost to Porto in the Round of 16.


title: Fabian Schär

text: On 21 July 2017, Schär signed a four-year deal with Deportivo de La Coruña. He made his La Liga debut on 20 August, starting in a 3–0 home loss against Real Madrid. He scored two goals in the 2017–18 season, which ended in relegation for the Galician team.


title: Fabian Schär

text: On 26 July 2018, following Deportivo de La Coruña's relegation from the La Liga, Schär signed a three-year deal with Newcastle United after the club had activated his £3 million buy out clause in his contract.


title: Fabian Schär

text: He made his debut for the club on 26 August 2018 in a 2–1 defeat to Chelsea. Schär scored his first goals for Newcastle against Cardiff City on 19 January 2019, netting twice in a 3–0 victory at St James' Park. He scored his third Newcastle goal against Burnley in a 2–0 win, opening the scoring with a 30-yard strike that would win Premier League and Match of the Day's February Goal of the Month competition. His fourth goal came in the final game of the season, and eventual 4–0 win over Fulham.


title: Fabian Schär

text: Schär was a Switzerland youth international having played at under-20 and under-21 level. Schär made his international debut for the Swiss U-20 team in a game against Poland U-20 on 17 November 2011. He played his first game for the Swiss U-21 on 29 February 2012 in the 2–1 defeat against the Austrian U-21. He scored his first goal for the Swiss U-21 during his fourth appearance for them on 10 September 2012 in a match against Estonia U-21 This was the final game in the qualification to the 2013 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship. Switzerland finished in second position and entered the play-offs. In the first leg of the qualification play-offs on 12 October 2012 against the German U-21 team Schär was shown the red card after he fouled Sebastian Polter as last man. Despite the goal from the penalty spot the game ended in a 1–1 draw.


title: Fabian Schär

text: He was selected to represent Switzerland in the men's football tournament at the 2012 Summer Olympics as part of the Swiss under-23 team. He played over 90 minutes in the first two games of the tournament, but the team were knocked out, finishing in fourth position of their Group.


title: Fabian Schär

text: On 8 August 2013, Schär was called up to Swiss senior team for the first time and made his debut on the friendly match vs Brazil on 14 August 2013.


title: Fabian Schär

text: On 6 September 2013, scored his first goal for the Swiss senior team in a 4–4 home draw against Iceland. Four days later, on 10 September, Schär scored two more goals in a 2–0 away win over Norway.


title: Fabian Schär

text: On 13 May 2014, Schär was named in Switzerland's squad for the 2014 World Cup. He made his tournament debut as a starter in the team's third match, replacing the injured Steve von Bergen and helping Switzerland to a clean sheet in a 3–0 defeat of Honduras.


title: Fabian Schär

text: In Switzerland's first game of Euro 2016, Schär headed Xherdan Shaqiri's corner kick after five minutes for the only goal against Albania in Lens.


title: Fabian Schär

text: In May 2019, he was named to the national team for the 2018-19 UEFA Nations League final matches and played in all two matches but finished 4th.


title: Fabian Schär

text: In 2021, he was called up to the national team for the 2020 UEFA European Championship, where the team created one of the main sensations of the tournament reaching the quarter-finals.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: The Occupation of the Ruhr () was a period of military occupation of the Ruhr region of Germany by France and Belgium between 11 January 1923 and 25 August 1925.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: France and Belgium occupied the heavily industrialized Ruhr Valley in response to Germany defaulting on reparation payments dictated by the victorious powers after World War I in the Treaty of Versailles. Occupation of the Ruhr worsened the economic crisis in Germany, and German civilians engaged in acts of passive resistance and civil disobedience, during which 130 were killed. France and Belgium, facing economic and international pressure, accepted the Dawes Plan to restructure Germany's payment of war reparations in 1924 and withdrew their troops from the Ruhr by August 1925.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: The Occupation of the Ruhr contributed to German rearmament and the growth of radical right-wing and left-wing movements in Germany.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: The Ruhr region had been occupied by Allied troops in the aftermath of the First World War. Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles (1919), which formally ended the war with the Allies as the victors, Germany was forced to accept responsibility for the damages caused in the war and was obliged to pay war reparations to the various Allies. Since the war was fought predominately on French soil, these reparations were paid primarily to France. The total sum of reparations demanded from Germany—around 226 billion gold marks (US $ billion in 2022)—was decided by the Inter-Allied Reparations Commission. In 1921, the amount was reduced to 132 billion (at that time, $31.4 billion (US $442 billion in 2022), or £6.6 billion (£284 billion in 2022). Even with the reduction, the debt was huge. As some of the payments were in raw materials, which were exported, German factories were unable to function, and the German economy suffered, further damaging the country's ability to pay. France was also suffering from a high deficit accrued during World War I, which resulted in a depreciation of the French franc. France increasingly looked towards the prospect of German reparations payments as a way to stabilize its economy.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: By late 1922, the German defaults on payments had grown so regular that a crisis engulfed the Reparations Commission; the French and Belgian delegates urged occupying the Ruhr as a way of forcing Germany to pay more, while the British delegate urged a lowering of the payments. As a consequence of a German default on timber deliveries in December 1922, the Reparations Commission declared Germany in default, which led to the Franco-Belgian occupation of the Ruhr in January 1923. Particularly galling to the French was that the timber quota the Germans defaulted on was based on an assessment of their capacity the Germans made themselves and subsequently lowered. The Allies believed that the government of Chancellor Wilhelm Cuno had defaulted on the timber deliveries deliberately as a way of testing the will of the Allies to enforce the treaty. The entire conflict was further exacerbated by a German default on coal deliveries in early January 1923, which was the thirty-fourth coal default in the previous thirty-six months. Frustrated at Germany not paying reparations, Raymond Poincaré, the French Prime Minister, hoped for joint Anglo-French economic sanctions against Germany in 1922 and opposed military action. However, by December 1922 he saw coal for French steel production and payments in money as laid out in the Treaty of Versailles draining away.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: After much deliberation, Poincaré decided to occupy the Ruhr on 11 January 1923 to extract the reparations himself. The real issue during the "Ruhrkampf" (Ruhr campaign), as the Germans labelled the battle against the French occupation, was not the German defaults on coal and timber deliveries but the sanctity of the Versailles Treaty. Poincaré often argued to the British that letting the Germans defy Versailles in regards to the reparations would create a precedent that would lead to the Germans dismantling the rest of the Versailles treaty. Finally, Poincaré argued that once the chains that had bound Germany in Versailles were destroyed, it was inevitable that Germany would plunge the world into another world war.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: Initiated by Poincaré, the invasion took place on 11 January 1923. General Alphonse Caron's 32nd Infantry Division, under the supervision of General Jean-Marie Degoutte, carried out the operation. Some theories state that the French aimed to occupy the centre of German coal, iron, and steel production in the Ruhr area valley simply to get the money. Some others state that France did it to ensure that the reparations were paid in goods, because the mark was practically worthless due to hyperinflation that already existed at the end of 1922. Since the Territory of the Saar Basin was separated from Germany, the supply of iron ore fell on the French side and coal on the German side, but the two commodities had far more value together than separately: the supply chain had grown tightly integrated during the industrialization of Germany after 1870, but the problems of currency, transportation and import/export barriers threatened to destroy the steel industry in both countries. Eventually, this problem was resolved in the post-World War II European Coal and Steel community.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: Following France's decision to invade the Ruhr, the Inter-Allied Mission for Control of Factories and Mines (MICUM) was set up as a means of ensuring coal repayments from Germany.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: The Allied occupation was greeted by a campaign of both passive resistance and civil disobedience from the German inhabitants. Approximately 130 German civilians were killed by the French occupation army during the events, including during civil disobedience protests, e.g., against dismissal of German officials. Some theories assert that to pay for passive resistance in the Ruhr, the German government began the hyperinflation that destroyed the German economy in 1923. Others state that the road to hyperinflation was well established before with the reparation payments that started on November 1921, see 1920s German inflation. In the face of economic collapse, with high unemployment and hyperinflation, the strikes were eventually called off in September 1923 by the new Gustav Stresemann coalition government, which was followed by a state of emergency. Despite this, civil unrest grew into riots and coup attempts targeted at the government of the Weimar Republic, including the Beer Hall Putsch which brought Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party into mainstream German politics for the first time. The Rhenish Republic was proclaimed at Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle) in October 1923.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: Though the French succeeded in making their occupation of the Ruhr pay, the Germans, through their passive resistance in the Ruhr and the hyperinflation that wrecked their economy, won the world's sympathy, and under heavy Anglo-American financial pressure (the simultaneous decline in the value of the franc made the French very open to pressure from Wall Street and the City of London), the French were forced to agree to the Dawes Plan of April 1924, which substantially lowered German reparations payments. Under the Dawes Plan, Germany paid only 1 billion marks in 1924, and then increasing amounts for the next three years, until the total rose to 2.25 billion marks by 1927.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: Internationally, the French invasion of Germany did much to boost sympathy for the German Republic, although no action was taken in the League of Nations since it was technically legal under the Treaty of Versailles. France's allies Poland and Czechoslovakia opposed the occupation because of their commercial links with Germany and their concern that the action would push Germany into a closer alliance with the Soviet Union. The French, with their own economic problems, eventually accepted the Dawes Plan and withdrew from the occupied areas in July and August 1925. The last French troops evacuated Düsseldorf and Duisburg along with the city's important harbour in Duisburg-Ruhrort, ending French occupation of the Ruhr region on 25 August 1925. According to Sally Marks, the occupation of the Ruhr "was profitable and caused neither the German hyperinflation, which began in 1922 and ballooned because of German responses to the Ruhr occupation, nor the franc's 1924 collapse, which arose from French financial practices and the evaporation of reparations". Marks suggests the profits, after Ruhr-Rhineland occupation costs, were nearly 900 million gold marks.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: When on 12 July 1922, Germany demanded a moratorium on reparation payments, tension developed between the French government of Poincaré and the coalition government of David Lloyd George. The British Labour Party demanded peace and denounced Lloyd George as a troublemaker. It saw Germany as the martyr of the postwar period and France as vengeful and the principal threat to peace in Europe. The tension between France and Britain peaked during a conference in Paris in early 1923, by which time the coalition led by Lloyd George had been replaced by the Conservatives. The Labour Party opposed the occupation of the Ruhr throughout 1923, which it rejected as French imperialism. The British Labour Party believed it had won when Poincaré accepted the Dawes Plan in 1924.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: Despite his disagreements with Britain, Poincaré desired to preserve the Anglo-French entente and thus moderated his aims to a degree. His major goal was winning the extraction of reparations payments from Germany. His inflexible methods and authoritarian personality led to the failure of his diplomacy. After Poincare's right-wing coalition lost the 1924 French legislative election to Édouard Herriot's Radical-led coalition, France began making concessions to Germany.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: To deal with the implementation of the Dawes Plan, a conference took place in London in July–August 1924. The British Labour Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, who viewed reparations as impossible to pay, successfully pressured the French Premier Édouard Herriot into a whole series of concessions to Germany. The British diplomat Sir Eric Phipps commented that "The London Conference was for the French 'man in the street' one long Calvary as he saw M. Herriot abandoning one by one the cherished possessions of French preponderance on the Reparations Commission, the right of sanctions in the event of German default, the economic occupation of the Ruhr, the French-Belgian railroad Régie, and finally, the military occupation of the Ruhr within a year". The Dawes Plan was significant in European history as it marked the first time that Germany had succeeded in defying Versailles, and revised an aspect of the treaty in its favour.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: The Saar region remained under French control until the 1935 Saar status referendum, which handed the territory to Nazi Germany.


title: Occupation of the Ruhr

text: In German politics, the French occupation of the Rhineland accelerated the formation of right-wing parties. The ruling centre-left Weimar coalition was discredited by its inability to resolve the crisis, while the far-left Communist Party of Germany remained inactive for much of the crisis under the direction of the Soviet Politburo and the Comintern. Disoriented by the defeat in the war, conservatives in 1922 founded a consortium of nationalist associations, the "Vereinigten Vaterländischen Verbände Deutschlands" (VVVD, "United Patriotic Associations of Germany"). The goal was to forge a united front of the right. In the climate of national resistance against the French Ruhr invasion, the VVVD reached its peak strength. It advocated policies of uncompromising monarchism, corporatism and opposition to the Versailles settlement. However, it lacked internal unity and money and so never managed to unite the right. It had faded away by the late 1920s, as the NSDAP (Nazi party) emerged.


title: Attica (region)

text: Attica (, ) is an administrative region of Greece, that encompasses the entire metropolitan area of Athens, the country's capital and largest city. The region is coextensive with the former Attica Prefecture of Central Greece. It covers a greater area than the historical region of Attica.


title: Attica (region)

text: Located on the eastern edge of Central Greece, Attica covers about 3,808 square kilometers. In addition to Athens, it contains within its area the cities of Elefsina, Megara, Laurium, and Marathon, as well as a small part of the Peloponnese peninsula and the islands of Salamis, Aegina, Angistri, Poros, Hydra, Spetses, Kythira, and Antikythera. About 3,800,000 people live in the region, of whom more than 95% are inhabitants of the Athens metropolitan area. In 2019, Attica had the HDI of 0.912, the highest in Greece.


title: Attica (region)

text: The region was established in the 1987 administrative reform, and until 2010 it comprised the 4 prefectures of Athens, East Attica, Piraeus and West Attica.


title: Attica (region)

text: With the 2010 Kallikratis plan, the region's powers and authority were completely redefined and extended. Since 1 January 2011, the region represents the second-level local administration. While being supervised by the Decentralized Administration of Attica, it is now an independent self-governing body with powers and a budget comparable to the former prefectures.


title: Attica (region)

text: The Attica region consists of eight electoral districts: Athens A, Athens B1, Athens B2, Athens B3, Piraeus A, Piraeus B, East Attica and West Attica.


title: Attica (region)

text: The region has shrunk by 35,965 people between 2011 and 2021, experiencing a population loss of 0.9%.


title: Attica (region)

text: The Gross domestic product (GDP) of the region was 87.4 billion € in 2018, accounting for about 47% of the Greek economic output. GDP per capita adjusted for purchasing power was 28,000 € or 93% of the EU27 average in the same year. The GDP per employee was 99% of the EU average. Attica is the region in Greece with the highest GDP per capita. Despite that, the unemployment rate stood at 21.6% in 2017.


title: Attica (region)

text: Numerous ferry lines, both normal ferries and the "flying dolphins" (fast sea vessels), connect the port of Piraeus with the islands of the region.


title: Fire (1996 film)

text: Fire (Hindi: आग) is a 1996 Indo-Canadian erotic romantic drama film written and directed by Deepa Mehta, starring Shabana Azmi and Nandita Das. It is the first installment of Mehta's "Elements trilogy"; it is succeeded by "Earth" (1998) and "Water" (2005).


title: Fire (1996 film)

text: The film is loosely based on Ismat Chughtai's 1942 story, "Lihaaf" ("The Quilt"). "Fire" is one of the first mainstream Bollywood films to explicitly show homosexual relations, and the first to feature a lesbian relationship. After its 1998 release in India, activists staged several protests, setting off a flurry of public dialogue around issues such as homosexuality and freedom of speech.


title: Fire (1996 film)

text: The film opens with young Radha sitting in a mustard field with her parents. Her mother tells her a tale of a person who wanted to see the ocean, but Radha says that she does not understand the moral of the story.


title: Fire (1996 film)

text: The film flashes forward to Sita, a newly married woman on honeymoon with her husband Jatin, who is distant and shows little interest in Sita. Jatin is in a typical joint-family arrangement – he lives with his older brother Ashok, his sister-in-law Radha, his paralysed mother Biji and the family servant Mundu. Ashok and Jatin run a small store that sells food and rents videotapes.


title: Fire (1996 film)

text: Jatin shows no care for Sita, and she learns that he only agreed to the arranged marriage in order to put an end to Ashok's nagging. Jatin continues to date his modern Asian girlfriend, and Sita does not rebuke him. The rest of Jatin's home is not rosy either. Biji is immobile and speechless after a stroke, and Sita and Radha must constantly attend to her. Sita spends her days slaving in the hot kitchen, and finds herself lonely and frustrated at night because Jatin is out with his girlfriend. She yearns to break out of this stifling situation.