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This study aims to analyse the inter-rail modal shift behaviour of suburban rail passengers to examine ridership for the proposed metro extension corridor in Chennai, India. This investigation was conducted in 2019 as part of a feasibility study for the extension of the metro line spanning between Chennai Airport and Kilambakkam, a southern suburb of Chennai. The same origin–destination pair is also served by the suburban rail system. It is an extension of the operating line from Washermenpet to the airport of the Phase I metro project. For this inter-rail competition study, a sample of 272 suburban rail passengers covering work, education and other trip purposes were interviewed using a stated preference questionnaire. Six stated scenarios were considered for analyses which included travel time saving by using the metro along with the fare difference between metro and bus. The study revealed that suburban rail passengers were less concerned about travel time saving and gave priority to fare difference irrespective of trip purpose. This shows the unique metro choice behaviour of suburban rail travellers in the Indian context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Accessing care for sexual health has always been a challenge in our Indian context. The primary reason is a lack of awareness of modes of transmission of sexually transmitted diseases (STD), appropriate testing, and treatment options. The second is taboo associated with the morality of the individual. The third is the accessibility and availability of Quality STD care by allopathic specialists in comparison to the demand. This has paved way for lots of myths and misconceptions among the general public regarding STDs and HIV disease. Compounding it is the mushrooming of nonqualified practitioners and healers who claim to cure all STDs and HIV has led to poor treatment outcomes. Several methods of partnership with qualified allopathic practitioners have been tried for the provision of quality STD care by various donor-funded, HIV and STD prevention programs in the country. The key reasons for the nonsustainability of these clinics were the lack of technical capability to handle the sexual health and STD clinical cases and the huge cost involved in the advertisement and maintenance of the clinics. Methodology: Seven clinicians from different geographical locations in Tamil Nadu, who were exclusively qualified in Venereology, conceived the idea of provision of comprehensive clinical care cum counseling and testing services through a networking model from December 01, 2020. The model comprised the following: (1) Dedicated YouTube channel (Nakshatra Health) to provide scientific information on STD and HIV, modes of transmission, clinical symptoms, lab testing, interpretation of results, clinical treatment options, and counseling on prevention, (2) Dedicated telephone helpline was established with WhatsApp to answer the queries of clients by the network venereologists, (3) Dedicated website (www.nakshatra.health) was developed to provide information on STD and HIV and options to clarify doubts and fix appointments online, (4) Clinical consultations were done in a hybrid mode with an option for direct clinic and online consultation. Prescriptions were provided using dedicated software instantly, (5) Networking was done with NABL-accredited labs and collection centers for performing STD and HIV tests with e-test request forms, (6) Networking was done with pharma companies to provide pre- and postexposure prophylaxis (PEP) services to clients through e-prescriptions. Cross referrals were made across the network members to facilitate easy access to clinical services by clients from different parts of Tamil Nadu. The entire concept was branded as "Nakshatra health" with a tagline - "Your sparkling solution for safe sexual health care." Quality STD care and ethical practice were the underlying motos of this concept. Results: During the 20 months (December 2020 to July 2022), 6442 phone calls and 9328 WhatsApp messages were received. 82.3% of the calls and messages were queries from clients related to their sexual exposures, and 16.4% were general information seekers. During this period, the Nakshatra Health YouTube channel had 1590 subscribers and nearly 2.4 lakh views of all its 24 videos. Among the viewers, 92.4% were male. 52.29% of viewers were between the ages of 25 and 34 years, 28.25% were between the ages of 18 and 24 years, and 17.25% viewers were between the ages of 35 and 44 years. 86% of the viewers were from India and 13% were Tamil-speaking viewers from Middle East, Southeast Asian countries and 1% were from European, African, and American countries. The most commonly watched videos were related to HIV symptoms and lab tests for STD and HIV. 16% of the viewers repeatedly watched the various videos in the series. The network laboratories provided testing services for 1082 clients with 2423 various STD/HIV tests. Totally 3328 clients availed of online consultation and 924 clients accessed clinic-based services across the network members. Among these cases, 18 cases of Syphilis (primary and secondary) and 12 cases of acute gonococcal urethritis, and 10 cases of genital warts were diagnosed and treated. 12 cases of phimosis and 4 cases of anal warts were surgically treated in collaboration with a surgeon. Through this initiative, PEP and PreP services were provided to 228 and 8 individuals. Conclusion: Designing a comprehensive sexual health service package is crucial to ensure the availability and ease of access to services to the general public. Provision of correct scientific information, networking and cross-referral of cases with like-minded dermatovenereologists/clinicians interested in venereology sexually transmitted infections, easily accessible clinical, laboratory, and treatment services including PreP and PEP medications, and ethical practice are the key factors for scaling this concept. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

India is one of the fastest developing countries in the world. The economic progress of a country depends on the proper functioning of the Banking Industry. The success of the banking industry depends on the employees of the banks. Here, the study aims to identify important factors influencing employees' work styles of private sector banks. Work style is the way of performing the work. The required data for the study is collected from all the 496 employees working in private sector banks in the study area. Factor Analysis, Cluster Analysis, and Chi- Square test have been applied. The analysis shows that Work Autonomous and Support from Colleagues are dominating factors of work style. Cluster Analysis depicts that most of the employees have monarch behaviour, and they can balance their work style. The behaviour of employees has an impact on the level of balance of work style. The study also suggests some possible implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the modern scenario of globalization, it has become a competitive one to keep the consumers in fold and even keep our natural environment safe. Green marketing is a phenomenon which has developed in the modern market and has emerged as an important concept in India as in other parts of the developing and developed countries which is seen as an important strategy of facilitating sustainable development. A majority of organizations around the world are making an attempt to reduce the harmful impact of production processes on the climate and other environmental conditions. They have comprehensively utilized the word green in marketing campaigns in the form of green marketing, green supply chains, green retailing, green consumers, green products, etc. hence the businesses and the marketers are taking the indication and are going green for the betterment of the entire society. This study is to analyze the thoughts of consumers on green marketing practices in Virudhunagar district. The researcher has used the factor analysis to identify the factors influencing the thoughts of consumers towards green marketing practices. The result reveals that advertisement and media, environmental protection, recycling of waste, green buying behaviour and preference of green products are the most influencing variables towards green marketing practices in Virudhunagar district. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) was passed by the government of India on August 5, 2005. The basic objective of the Act is to enhance livelihood security in rural areas by providing at least 100 days of guaranteed wage employment in a financial year to every household whose adult members' volunteer to do unskilled manual work. MGNREGA is a powerful instrument for ensuring inclusive growth in rural India through its impact on social protection, livelihood security, and democratic empowerment. It attempts to bridge the gap between the rich and poor in the country. The MGNREGA stipulates that works must be targeted towards a set of specific activities which provides an opportunity to build rural infrastructure through water conservation and harvesting, renovation of water bodies, land development, soil erosion, soil control, rural connectivity, and so on. In this proposed study, aim is to analyze the awareness of beneficiaries about the provisions of transparency in sanction and implementation of works under MGNREG Scheme in Virudhunagar District by using Sign test. Sign test is the non-parametric test with a simple procedure of plus and minus sign. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main purpose of the present study is to analyse the working condition of women agricultural workers in Virudhunagar District. Women workers play an inevitable role in agriculture field. In India more than 60 percent of the workers in agriculture sector are women. The problems of agricultural labourers have been sought to be tackled through multi-dimensional course of action viz., improvement of infrastructural facilities, diversification to nonfarm activities, skill improvement programmes, financial assistance to promote self-employment, optimising the use of land resources and so on through a variety of rural development, employment generation and poverty alleviation programmes. Therefore, the researcher has taken this topic for research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural banking in India plays a vital role in the growth of rural economy. The banks in rural areas are found to help the rural people in their all-round progress. Rural banking is rightly called an engine of rural development. The overall position of rural banking in India is not quite encouraging. The banker offers almost the whole thing--from a plain savings product, to loans for businesses and wealth management guidance--to the rural population and creates new strategies to support rural customers. Though the Indian banks are penetrating the rural areas to meet the rural customers' needs, still they have not achieved the set goal. Penetration indicates how many users are there for products/services. Getting consumers to use its products/services is one of the measures of success of a company. The government also seems to be instrumental in the dispersal of branches of regional and rural banks at the grassroots level to provide banking service to the needy people. Therefore, the present study aims to analyze the penetration of the banking products and services in the rural areas of Sivakasi. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investment of hard earned money is a crucial activity of every human being. Investment is the commitment of funds which have been saved from current consumption with the hope that some benefits will be received in future. Thus, it is a reward for waiting for money. Savings of the people are invested in assets depending on their risk and return demands, safety of money, liquidity, the available avenues for investment, various financial institutions, etc. On the other hand, the savings provide capital to industry, economic development to the country. In developing country like India, household savings is the major source of capital for economic activities. The study helps to understand the knowledge and behavior of households, the major provider of funds to economic activities of the country. Hence, a study of investment behavior of households has made with the objective of understanding the level of knowledge of households about investment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The commercial banks play a very important role in India. Interest income, non-interest income and spread are the important avenues of banks' profitability. Subsequent to economic reforms, Indian banking system has undergone a sea change. Against this backdrop, the income and expenditure pattern of scheduled commercial banks in India has been analyzed and trend analysis of earnings quality has been undertaken with appropriate statistical tools, and based on the findings, suggestions have been offered for improving the overall performance of Indian banking industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The successful functioning of any industry is determined by the factors like men, material, money and market. Among all these factors, manpower assumes greater significance. Manpower is the life blood of any industry. Therefore, every effort should be taken on a priority basis to keep this factor for achieving the main objectives of the industry. The textile industry occupies a unique place in our country. It is the second largest employment generator after agriculture. The textile industry being labor-intensive, is a major contribution to the country's economy with its vast potential for creation of employment opportunities in the agricultural and industrial sectors. Business organizations are made up of people and function through people. Textile industries are no exception to this. Hence, it is essential for every organization to adopt the human resource management practices in the administration. This paper also analyzes the human resource management in textile industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Accurate HIV diagnosis is essential for appropriate patient care. This present study evaluated the performance of two different new rapid HIV diagnostic tests; 1) TRUSTline HIV-1/2 Ab rapid test (Athenese-DxPvt. Ltd, Chennai, India)and 2) OnSite HIV 1/2 Ab Plus Combo Rapid Test (CTK Biotech Inc., San Diego, USA) and also validated ALTA Rapid Test Reader (RTR-1) (CTK Biotech Inc., San Diego, USA), the device is a user-friendly and image-analysis based qualitative/semi-quantitative tabletop reader., Methods: A total of n ​= ​500 characterized specimens were used for this evaluation and the results of the new test kits (TRUSTline and OnSite) were also compared with 4 th generation ELISA kit (Genescreen™Ultra HIV Ag-Ab ELISA) and 3 other commercially available rapid tests that were in the market; 1)SD Bioline™ HIV 1/2 3.0, 2) Aspen® HIV 1/2 Rapid Ab Test and 3) Diagnostic enterprises HIVTRI-DOT. The test band intensities of the TRUSTline and OnSite tests were measured in an ALTA rapid test reader and compared with the naked eye reading., Results: The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value and efficacy of TRUSTline and OnSite were 100%, 99.6%, 99.5%, 100% and 99.8% and 100%, 100%, 100%, 100% and 100% respectively., Conclusions: The 'TRUSTline HIV-1/2' and 'OnSite HIV 1/2' kits are suitable to use in the HIV testing algorithm. Use of the ALTA rapid test reader could be user's friendly in the field level testing in resource-limited settings"., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare no conflicts of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Indian Association of Medical Microbiologists. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)