title: St. Louis Rams

text: Despite having a talent-laden roster, the Rams’ front-office dysfunction had traveled from California to Missouri. With team president John Shaw remaining in Los Angeles after the relocation, president of football operations Jay Zygmunt clashed with head coach Martz, including an incident in which Zygmunt prevented the ill Martz from phoning in a play to his offensive coordinator. Poor draft choices and mediocre records began to pile up for the once-budding dynasty as the post-Martz era found the Rams in chaos. Hoping to regain control within the franchise, the Rams hired former Dolphins offensive coordinator Scott Linehan as head coach on January 19, 2006. On January 24, Jim Haslett, the former head coach of the Saints, signed a three-year deal as defensive coordinator.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: Following the 2007 season, Georgia Frontiere died on January 18, 2008, after having owned the team for 28 years. Ownership of the team passed to her son Dale “Chip” Rosenbloom and daughter Lucia Rodriguez. Rosenbloom was named the new Rams majority owner. Linehan was fired on September 29, 2008, after the team started the 0–4, and Haslett took over as interim head coach for the rest of the season. In late December, Shaw and Zygmunt both resigned and Billy Devaney was promoted to general manager.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: Steve Spagnuolo was named head coach in January 2009. Spagnuolo had masterminded the Giants’ defensive scheme that shut down the previously undefeated New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLII. As the 2009 season began, conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh put in an offer to buy the Rams, but his controversial televised comments about Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb in 2003 led the league to force Limbaugh to drop his plans. In spite of his success with the Giants, Spagnuolo's first season as Rams head coach was terribly disappointing as the team went 1–15, beginning with a shutout at the hands of the Seahawks. The team's lone victory came in Week 8 over the 2–14 Detroit Lions. However, Spagnuolo was not fired after his poor first season. From 2007 to 2009, the Rams lost 42 of 48 games.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On May 31, 2009, the "St. Louis Post-Dispatch" reported that majority owners Rosenbloom and Rodriguez officially offered their majority share of Rams for sale. They retained the services of Goldman Sachs, a prominent investment banking firm, to help facilitate the sale of the Rams by evaluating bids and soliciting potential buyers. The sale price was unknown, but at the time "Forbes" estimated the team's value at $929 million. On the final day to do so, then-minority owner Stan Kroenke invoked his right of first refusal to buy the 60% of the team that he did not already own. The original intended buyer, Shahid Khan, would later acquire the Jaguars after the 2011 season. Pursuant to NFL rules, owners are prohibited from owning other sports teams in the same market. At the time of purchase, Kroenke, a real estate and sports mogul married to a Walmart heir (d/b/a Kroenke Sports Enterprises), owned the Denver Nuggets, the Colorado Avalanche, the Colorado Rapids, the Pepsi Center (home to the Nuggets and Avalanche) and Altitude Sports and Entertainment. These interests violated the NFL's cross-ownership rule. Nevertheless, on August 25, 2010, NFL owners unanimously approved Kroenke as the owner of the franchise contingent upon his eventual divestment of his Colorado sports interests. Kroenke complied with the rule when he transferred ownership of the Nuggets, the Avalanche, the Pepsi Center and the Altitude to his son Josh.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: For having the NFL's worst record at 1–15 in 2009, the Rams earned the #1 overall pick in the 2010 NFL Draft and used it to acquire University of Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: Bradford was the main focus of the 2010 offseason. In order to make room for the new quarterback, Keith Null and several other unproductive players were cut from the roster. The Rams lost their season opener against the Cardinals with Bradford throwing three interceptions, including one on the last play of the game. They recorded their first win by beating Washington and ending a 14-game home-losing streak in Week 3. In Week 4, the Rams ended a 10-game losing streak against Seattle, 20–3. After being trounced 44–6 by Detroit, they returned home in Week 6 to beat San Diego 20–17. Bradford continued to show promise through the season despite struggling from his inexperience. Despite a 7–8 record, the Rams had a chance to win the NFC West when they traveled to 6–9 Seattle for a prime-time matchup. However, the Seahawks won the game and the division, 16–6. Bradford went on to win the 2010 Offensive Rookie of the Year award.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: The 2011 season started disastrously, with the Rams opening 0–6, finally winning in an improbable victory over the Saints in Week 8. The team finished 2–14, with their only other win being a Week 10 victory over Cleveland. Bradford missed half the season with an ankle injury, and the Rams’ offense was rated the worst in the league.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: At the conclusion of a poor 2011, Spagnuolo and nearly all of the coaching staff were fired except offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels, who was asked by the New England Patriots to return during the playoffs (he had been an assistant coach there prior to his disastrous stint as Denver Broncos head coach in 2009). The Rams then hired head coach Jeff Fisher, who had led the Tennessee Titans in their Super Bowl XXXIV loss to the Rams 12 years earlier. Fisher would then influence the hiring of new general manager Les Snead and an all-new coaching staff including offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer and defensive coordinator Gregg Williams. Williams was eventually suspended for the entire 2012 season for his part in the Saints bounty scandal.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: Despite the 2011 fiasco, the Rams continued with their plans to rebuild the team around Bradford and convinced the Redskins to give up two first-round draft picks and one second-round draft pick in exchange for the Rams’ #2 overall pick. This moved the Rams down to the #6 pick in the 2012 NFL Draft, which they in turn traded to Dallas, but were left with an abundance of others for future use. Following the draft, they signed undrafted Oregon State punter Johnny Hekker, who would become a Pro Bowl-caliber player.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: The Rams started 2012 with low hopes, but the draft trade with Washington confirmed Bradford would be their quarterback of the future. The team then surprised some by starting off 3–2, their first winning record since 2006. They then lost three straight, but rebounded with a solid 4–4–1 finish, including a 24–24 road tie with eventual NFC champion San Francisco, to finish 7–8–1, a five-game improvement over 2011 and an impressive 4–1–1 record in the very competitive NFC West.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: In 2013, the Rams finished with a 7–9 record. In the 2014 season, their 20th in St. Louis, the team would again miss the playoffs with a 6–10 record. Bradford missed the entire 2014 season with an injury, allowing Shaun Hill and Austin Davis opportunities at quarterback.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On March 10, 2015, the Rams were involved in a rare trade of starting quarterbacks as they traded Bradford along with a fifth-round pick in 2015 to the Philadelphia Eagles in exchange for the Eagles' Nick Foles along with a fourth-round pick in 2015 and a second round pick in 2016. Foles had a 14–4 record as starter and an impressive TD–INT ratio of 46–17, while Bradford had an 18–30–1 record. On the day of the 2015 draft the Rams traded Zac Stacy, the Rams’ 2013 rushing leader, for a 7th round pick to the Jets.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: The Rams opened their 2015 season at home against Seattle. In Foles’ Rams debut, he threw for 297 yards and a touchdown. Following the dramatic win, Foles struggled against his former divisional rival, the Redskins as the Rams lost 24–10. Foles' accuracy improved the following week but he threw no touchdowns and his first interception as a Ram against the Steelers, dropping the team to 1–2. Following the two losses Foles bounced back, handing the unbeaten Cardinals their first loss of the season. After that game, Foles’ problems with turnovers from 2014 started to show, as he completed 11 passes out of 30 for 141 yards, 1 touchdown, and a career-high 4 interceptions against the Green Bay Packers. On November 16, Foles was benched in favor of Case Keenum, who would start the remainder of the season.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: Leading the team through their turbulence was rookie running back Todd Gurley. Gurley was drafted 10th overall in the 2015 NFL Draft. Gurley, who tore his ACL in November 2014, saw his rehabilitation go ahead of schedule and during the team's preseason, while he did not play, he practiced without pads on. Soon after, Gurley was medically cleared for full contact by St. Louis team physicians. On September 27, 2015, he made his NFL debut against the Pittsburgh Steelers. He was eased into action and finished the game with 6 rushes for 9 yards. The following week, the Rams visited undefeated Arizona for an NFC west divisional matchup. Again Gurley started slow with just 2 yards at halftime, but rushed for 144 yards in the second half as the Rams edged the Cardinals 24–22. The next three games against the Packers, Browns, and 49ers would see Gurley rush for at least 128 rushing yards per game. He scored his first NFL touchdown on October 25, 2015, against the Cleveland Browns. With 566 yards in his first four NFL starts, Gurley became the most prolific rusher in his first four NFL games since the AFL–NFL merger. In Week 15, Gurley became the third rookie in Rams history to rush for 1,000 yards in a season after Jerome Bettis and Eric Dickerson in the Rams 31–23 victory over the Buccaneers. and in their 23–17 victory over the Seattle Seahawks and becoming the second Rams rookie to rush for 1,000 yards and 10 touchdowns since Eric Dickerson in 1983.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: The Rams played their final home game against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, on December 17, 2015. While the Edward Jones Dome was not at sell out capacity, a sizeable group of Rams fans attended the game, holding signs that read “Keep the Rams in St. Louis.” Enthusiastic chants of “Keep the Rams” and “Kroenke Sucks” were heard during and after the game. Despite offensive production from Tampa Bay, the Rams still managed a 31–23 victory with Case Keenum throwing for 234 yards and 2 touchdowns, Todd Gurley rushing 48 yards, Tavon Austin rushing 32 yards and a touchdown, Kenny Britt receiving for 71 yards and 1 touchdown, and Jared Cook receiving for 64 yards. The Rams offense dominated this game as well the defense also put pressure on the Buccaneers quarterback Jameis Winston.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On December 22, 2015, Todd Gurley, along with fellow Rams players Aaron Donald and Johnny Hekker were selected to be part of the 2016 Pro Bowl. Gurley was one of three rookies to be selected to the Pro Bowl, along with Chiefs cornerback Marcus Peters and Seahawks wide receiver and kick returner Tyler Lockett.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: The Rams concluded their season with two road games in the West, winning 23–17 against the Seahawks and losing 19–16 in overtime against the 49ers. Overall, the team finished their final season in St. Louis with a 7–9 record.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: The Rams and the St. Louis CVC began negotiating a deal to get the Rams’ home stadium, the Edward Jones Dome, into the top 25 percent of stadiums in the league (i.e., top eight of 32 NFL teams, in reference to luxury boxes, amenities and overall fan experience). Under the terms of the lease agreement, the St. Louis CVC was required to make modifications to the Edward Jones Dome in 2005. However, then-owner Georgia Frontiere waived this provision, in exchange for cash that served as a penalty for the city's noncompliance. The City of St. Louis, in subsequent years, did make changes to the scoreboard and increased the natural lighting by replacing panels with windows, although the overall feel remained dark. The minor renovations which totaled about $70 million did not bring the stadium within the specifications required under the lease agreement, thus keeping the Dome in a state of uncertainty.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On February 1, 2013, a three-panel arbitrator selected to preside over the arbitration process found that the Edward Jones Dome was not in the top 25 percent of all NFL venues, as required under the terms of the lease agreement between the Rams and the CVC. The arbitrator further found that the estimated $700 million in proposed renovations by the Rams was not unreasonable, given the terms of the lease agreement. Finally, the City of St. Louis was ordered to pay the Rams’ attorney fees which totaled a reported $2 million.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: Publicly, no interest was expressed by city, county and state officials in providing further funding to the Edward Jones Dome, in light of those entities (and taxpayers) continuing to owe approximately $300 million on the facility. A resolution was not reached by the end of the 2014 NFL season; therefore, with the City of St. Louis remaining in non-compliance with its obligations under the lease agreement, the Rams were free to nullify the lease and change to a year-to-year lease. Months later, the Rams scheduled a game to be played in London, violating the Edward Jones Dome's terms of lease.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: In an effort to try to keep the team in St. Louis, a multipurpose stadium, National Car Rental Field, was proposed in 2015, estimated to cost $1.1 billion. The initial proposal called for the stadium to be paid for by a combination of $250 million from Rams, a $200 million loan from the NFL, $130 million from personal seat license sales, $55 million in tax credits and other public incentives, $350 million from extending the state bonds originally issued for the construction of the Edward Jones Dome.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On January 9, 2016, the NFL distributed a report to team owners calling the St. Louis stadium plan "unsatisfactory and inadequate" to keep the Rams in St. Louis.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On January 31, 2014, both the "Los Angeles Times" and the "St. Louis Post-Dispatch" reported that Rams owner Stan Kroenke purchased approximately of land adjacent to the Forum in Inglewood, California for a purchase price rumored to be between $90 million and $100 million. Commissioner Roger Goodell represented that Mr. Kroenke informed the league of the purchase. As an NFL owner, any purchase of land in which a potential stadium could be built must be disclosed to the league. Kroenke subsequently announced plans to build an NFL stadium on the site, in connection with the owners of the adjacent Hollywood Park site, Stockbridge Capital Group. This development further fueled rumors that the Rams intended to return its management and football operations to Southern California. The land had been originally intended for a Walmart Supercenter, but Walmart could not get the necessary permits to build it. Kroenke is married to Ann Walton Kroenke, who is a member of the Walton family, and many of Kroenke's real estate deals have involved Walmart properties.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On January 5, 2015, the "Los Angeles Times" reported that Stan Kroenke and Stockbridge Capital Group were partnering up to develop a new NFL stadium on the Inglewood property owned by Kroenke. The project includes a stadium of 80,000 seats, and a performance venue of 6,000 seats, while reconfiguring the previously approved Hollywood Park plan for up to of retail, of office space, 2,500 new residential units, a 300-room hotel and of public parks, playgrounds, open space and pedestrian and bicycle access. The stadium was projected to be ready by 2018. In lieu of this, St. Louis countered with a stadium plan for the north riverfront area of downtown, with the hope of keeping the Rams in the city.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On February 24, 2015, the Inglewood City Council approved the stadium plan and the initiative, and construction began on the new stadium on December 21, 2015, on the former Hollywood Park site.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: On January 4, 2016, the St. Louis Rams filed for relocation to move to the Los Angeles area for the 2016 NFL season. They were among three teams (the others being the Oakland Raiders and San Diego Chargers) that had filed for relocation to Los Angeles. All three franchises had previously played in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. Weeks later, the NFL owners gathered in Houston for a meeting on January 12 to decide which teams, if any, would win relocation rights to Los Angeles.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: A few days before the scheduled owners meeting, Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones suggested that the Rams and Chargers share Stan Kroenke's Los Angeles Entertainment Center. This suggestion was taken as a possible option discussed in the Houston meetings. During the Los Angeles meeting, the Committee on Los Angeles Opportunities, which consists of six NFL owners, favored the Carson project over the Rams’ Inglewood project. However, in the first round of voting, the Inglewood proposal got the greater number of votes (21) while the Carson project received far fewer (11). This, however, did not meet the required threshold of 24 votes. In the second round of voting, the Inglewood proposal got 20 votes while the Carson proposal got 12. After hours of trying to reach a compromise, the Rams succeeded and announced their relocation to Los Angeles, effectively ending the team's 21-year tenure in St. Louis.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: The Chargers organization was given the first option to join the Rams after a year (if they failed to reach a new stadium deal with the city of San Diego); the Chargers exercised this option on January 12, 2017, making Los Angeles home to two NFL franchises again. (Had the Chargers declined to exercise this option, then the Raiders would have had this option.) The Raiders eventually relocated to Las Vegas, Nevada, after 25 years back in Oakland. The Rams were the second team to relocate to a previous home city (after the Raiders, who left Oakland after the 1981 season and moved back in time for the 1995 season).


title: St. Louis Rams

text: In 2017, the city of St. Louis filed a lawsuit regarding the loss of the Rams, stating issues like the continued payments on the Edward Jones Dome, the breach on contract, and the failure to release financial files. The lawsuit was settled in 2021 for $790 million.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: Stan Kroenke became extremely unpopular in St. Louis after the Rams left, with fans often chanting "Kroenke Sucks" or "Fuck Stan Kroenke" at unrelated St. Louis sporting events.


title: St. Louis Rams

text: In 2020, St. Louis was one of the cities to receive a football team from the rebranded XFL, dubbed the St. Louis BattleHawks. They played several games in The Dome at America's Center, and notably led the league in fan attendance.


title: Coal India

text: Coal India Limited (CIL) is an Indian central public sector undertaking under the ownership of the Ministry of Coal, Government of India. It is headquartered at Kolkata. It is the "largest government-owned-coal-producer" in the world. It is also the seventh largest employer in India with nearly 272,000 employees.


title: Coal India

text: The psu contributes around 82% to the total coal production in India. It produced 554.14 million tonnes of raw coal in 2016–17, an increase from its earlier production of 494.24 million tonnes of coal during FY 2014–15 and earned revenues of from sale of coal in the same financial year. In April 2011, CIL was conferred the Maharatna status by the Government of India, making it one of the seven with that status. As of 14 October 2015, CIL is a PSU owned by the Central Government of India which controls its operations through the Ministry of Coal. As of 14 October 2015, CIL's market capitalisation stood at making it India's 8th most valuable company.


title: Coal India

text: Coal mining in India had primarily been a private sector enterprise. This changed in September 1956 when the Government of India established its own coal company National Coal Development Corporation (NCDC). Collieries run by the Railways formed the nucleus of NCDC. This was to fulfill the fast growing energy requirements in the country to support rapid industrialization taking place through Five-Year Plans of the Government. In the same year, Singareni Colliery Company, which was operating in Andhra Pradesh since 1920, was also brought under the Government control when the Central Government and state Government of Andhra Pradesh acquired 45% and 55% shares respectively.


title: Coal India

text: In 1971, the Government of India nationalized all the 214 coking-coal mines and 12 coke-ovens running in the private sector, excluding those held by TISCO and IISCO for their captive use. On 1 January 1972, a new Government company Bharat Coking Coal Limited (BCCL) was formed to take control of these nationalized mines and coke-ovens. On 30 January 1973, all the remaining 711 non-coking coalmines of the country in private sector were also nationalized. 184 of these mines were handed over to BCCL, and remaining 527 were handed over to a newly opened department Coal Mines Authority. 4 months later, on 14 June 1973, this department was converted into a separate Government company CMAL. NCDC, earlier formed in 1957, was merged with CMAL, and 45% share-holding of Central Government in Singareni Collieries Company Ltd was also handed over to CMAL. CMAL started functioning with its 4 divisions, viz, Eastern Coalfields, Central Coalfields, Western Coalfields, and Central Mine Planning and Design Institute.


title: Coal India

text: By 1973, all coking coalmines were under BCCL, which was functioning as a subsidiary of Steel Authority of India (SAIL) under Department of Steel of the Ministry of Steel and Mines; and all non-coking coalmines were under CMAL, which was under Department of Mines of the Ministry of Steel and Mines. For better control, both BCCL and CMAL were brought on 11 October 1974 under the Department of Coal (now an independent Ministry) of the newly formed Ministry of Energy.


title: Coal India

text: On 1 November 1975, a new public-sector company Coal India Limited (CIL) was formed to enable better organizational and operational efficiency in coal sector. All the 4 Divisions of CMAL were given the company status, and were brought under CIL along with BCCL. 45% share-holding of the CMAL in Singareni Collieries Company was also transferred to CIL, and CMAL was closed.


title: Coal India

text: Thus, CIL started functioning in 1975 with 5 subsidiary companies under it. These were Bharat Coking Coal Limited (BCCL), Eastern Coalfields Limited (ECL), Central Coalfields Limited (CCL), Western Coalfields Limited (WCL), and Central Mine Planning & Design Institute Limited (CMPDIL). In due course of time, 3 more companies were formed under CIL by carving out certain areas of CCL and WCL. These were Northern Coalfields Limited (NCL), South-Eastern Coalfields Limited (SECL), and Mahanadi Coalfields Limited (MCL).


title: Coal India

text: Pursuant to the Fuel Policy of 1974, CIL also started the construction of India's First Low Temperature Carbonisation Plant at Dankuni in the late 1970s. It was renamed as Dankuni Coal Complex, and is one of the only operational Coal gas plant of this kind in the world. Dankuni Coal Complex has been incurring heavy loss due to the Greater Calcutta Gas Supply Company (formerly known as Oriental Gas Co.) giving non-remunerative price and fixing them unilaterally. Coal India is planning to venture into Coal-to-Methanol technology at the existing Plant.


title: Coal India

text: In October 2010, the Government of India made an initial public offering (IPO) of 10% of the equity shares of CIL (631.6 million equity shares) to public at an offer price of per share (at face value of 10 per share). The IPO was oversubscribed by 14.17 times. Against an IPO issue size of it received bids for making it the second highest collections in any IPO in India. On the first day of its listing on the stock market, its shares soared 40% higher than IPO price. With the listing, CIL became the fourth most valued company on the Indian stock exchanges with a market value of . CIL was included in the 30-member BSE SENSEX on 8 August 2011.


title: Coal India

text: On 30 January 2015, in an offer for sale (OFS), Government of India sold a further 10% stake in CIL. Priced at per share, the sale fetched the government , making it the largest ever equity offering in the Indian share market.


title: Coal India

text: CIL is the largest coal producing company in the world. It produced 536.51 MT (million tonne) coal during FY 2015–16. Coal India operates through 83 mining areas in 8 states of India. As on 1 April 2015, it has 430 coal mines out of which 175 are open cast, 227 are underground and 28 are mixed mines. Production from open cast mines during FY 2014–15 was 92.91% of total production of 494.24 MT. Underground mines contributed to 7.09% of production. CIL further operates 15 coal washeries, out of which 12 are for coking coal and 3 are for non-coking coal with 23.30 MTY and 13.50 MTY capacities respectively. CIL's only Low Temperature Carbonisation Plant of Dankuni Coal Complex is currently run on lease basis by its subsidiary SECL. In addition to above, it also manages 200 other establishments like workshops, hospitals, training institutes, mine-rescue setups, etc.


title: Coal India

text: CIL produces coal through seven of its wholly owned subsidiaries. These are Eastern Coalfields Limited (ECL), Bharat Coking Coal Limited (BCCL), Central Coalfields Limited (CCL), Western Coalfields Limited (WCL), South Eastern Coalfields Limited (SECL), Northern Coalfield Limited (NCL), and Mahanadi Coalfields Limited (MCL). Its 8th wholly owned subsidiary Central Mine Planning & Design Institute Limited (CMPDIL) provides exploration, planning and technical support to all the 7 production subsidiaries. CMPDIL also provides consulting services to third-party market clients in the field of exploration, mining, allied engineering & testing, management-systems, training, etc. The North Eastern Coalfields (NEC) and Dankuni Coal Complex (DCC) are owned directly by the parent holding company of CIL. However, DCC has been leased to SECL since 1995.


title: Coal India

text: CIL also has a wholly owned subsidiary in Mozambique, Coal India Africana Limitada (CIAL) for pursuing coal mining opportunities in that country.


title: Coal India

text: The details of number of employees, revenue for FY 2012–13 and production of coal is given in the table below:


title: Coal India

text: Listing: CIL's equity shares are listed on [Bombay Stock Exchange] where it is a constituent of the BSE SENSEX index and the National Stock Exchange of India where it is a constituent of the S&P CNX Nifty.


title: Coal India

text: Shareholding: On 30 January 2015, 79.65% of the equity shares of the company were owned by the Government of India and the remaining 20.35% were owned by others. On 30 January 2015, in an Offer For Sale (OFS), Government of India sold a further 10% stake in CIL. Priced at per share, the sale fetched the government , making it the largest ever equity offering in the Indian share market. On 18 November 2015, Government of India approved another 10% stake sale in CIL.


title: Coal India

text: Coal India had 333,097 employees as on 31 March 2015, out of which 314,259 were Non-Executives and 18,838 were Executives.


title: Coal India

text: Coal India reported a rise of almost 46% in its net profit for the quarter ended March 31, 2022 in consolidated terms. India’s biggest coal miner had posted a consolidated net profit of ₹4,586.78 crore in the year-ago period.


title: Coal India

text: The company registered sales worth ₹30,046.25 crore during the quarter under review compared with ₹24,510.80 crore. Total revenue from operations stood at ₹32,706.77 crore during Q4 FY22, against ₹26,700.14 crore in Q4 FY21.


title: Coal India

text: Green initiatives: CIL planted 1.57 million saplings during 2014–15. In its Annual Report for 2014–15, it informed that it has planted around 82 million trees over an area of around 33700 Ha.


title: Coal India

text: Operating 239 mines without environment clearance: In September 2011, CAG criticised CIL for operating 239 mines in seven coal producing subsidiaries, which existed prior to 1994, without environmental clearance. These mines included 48 open-cast, 170 underground and 21 combined mines. In its report, the CAG also pointed out that of the 18 sample open-cast and eight underground mines, ten mines had undertaken capacity expansion without environmental clearances. The company, in its reply, said that applications for clearances to the projects have already been submitted to the Ministry of Environment and Forests.


title: Coal India

text: Coal mines near Tiger Reserves: In India, some coal mines are located near/below the tiger reserves. Mining or construction of administrative offices in/near these reserves disturbs the wildlife. Hence environmental organisations like Greenpeace have been opposing mining in these areas. Around 50% of the energy requirements of India are met by coal. Hence the protection of wildlife is sometimes overlooked due to this fact. In its argument, the CIL said that in many cases it only does underground mining which does not hurt the forests above.


title: Coal India

text: Accidents during mining: CIL in its Annual Report for FY 2012-13 reported lowest ever figures of average 66 deaths and 251 serious accidents per year for the period 2010-2012 indicating that safety at workplace is improving over the years. Critics claim that the safety practices in most mines are inadequate, which is causing too many casualties. It is also claimed that many accidents and deaths are not recorded and hence are not part of 'official figures'.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The Romanian alphabet is a variant of the Latin alphabet used for writing the Romanian language. It is a modification of the classical Latin alphabet and consists of 31 letters, five of which (Ă, Â, Î, Ș, and Ț) have been modified from their Latin originals for the phonetic requirements of the language:


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The letters Q ("chiu"), W ("dublu v"), and Y ("igrec" or "i grec," meaning "Greek i") were formally introduced in the Romanian alphabet in 1982, although they had been used earlier. They occur only in foreign words and their Romanian derivatives, such as "quasar", "watt", and "yacht". The letter "K", although relatively older, is also rarely used and appears only in proper names and international neologisms such as "kilogram", "broker", "karate". These four letters are still perceived as foreign, which explains their usage for stylistic purposes in words such as "nomenklatură" (normally "nomenclatură", meaning "nomenclature", but sometimes spelled with "k" instead of "c" if referring to members of the Communist leadership in the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc countries, as "nomenklatura" is used in English).


title: Romanian alphabet

text: In cases where the word is a direct borrowing having diacritical marks not present in the above alphabet, official spelling tends to favor their use ("München", "Angoulême" etc., as opposed to the use of "Istanbul" over "İstanbul").


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Romanian spelling is mostly phonemic without "silent letters" (but see "i"). The table below gives the correspondence between letters and sounds. Some of the letters have several possible readings, even if allophones are not taken into account. When vowels , , , and are changed into their corresponding semivowels, this is not marked in writing. Letters K, Q, W, and Y appear only in foreign borrowings; the pronunciation of W and Y and of the combination QU depends on the origin of the word they appear in.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Romanian orthography does not use accents or diacritics – these are secondary symbols added to letters (i.e. basic glyphs) to alter their pronunciation or to distinguish between words. There are, however, five special letters in the Romanian alphabet (associated with four different sounds) which are formed by modifying other Latin letters; strictly speaking these letters function as basic glyphs in their own right rather than letters with diacritical marks, but they are often referred to as the latter.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The letter "â" is used exclusively in the middle of words; its majuscule version appears only in all-capitals inscriptions.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Writing letters ș and ț with a cedilla instead of a comma is considered incorrect by the Romanian Academy. Romanian writings, including books created to teach children to write, treat the comma and cedilla as a variation in font. See Unicode and HTML below.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The letters "î" and "â" are phonetically and functionally identical. The reason for using both of them is historical, denoting the language's Latin origin.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: For a few decades until a spelling reform in 1904, as many as four or five letters had been used for the same phoneme ("â", "ê", "î", "û", and occasionally "ô"), according to an etymological rule. All were used to represent the vowel , toward which the original Latin vowels written with circumflexes had converged. The 1904 reform saw only two letters remaining, "â" and "î", the choice of which followed rules that changed several times during the 20th century.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: During the first half of the century the rule was to use "î" in word-initial and word-final positions, and "â" everywhere else. There were exceptions, imposing the use of "î" in internal positions when words were combined or derived with prefixes or suffixes. For example, the adjective "ugly" was written with "î" because it derives from the verb "to hate".


title: Romanian alphabet

text: In 1953, during the Communist era, the Romanian Academy eliminated the letter "â", replacing it with "î" everywhere, including the name of the country, which was to be spelled . The first stipulation coincided with the official designation of the country as a People's Republic, which meant that its full title was . A minor spelling reform in 1964 brought back the letter "â", but only in the spelling of "Romanian" and all its derivatives, including the name of the country. As such, the Socialist Republic proclaimed in 1965 is associated with the spelling .


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Soon after the fall of the Ceaușescu government, the Romanian Academy decided to reintroduce "â" from 1993 onward, by canceling the effects of the 1953 spelling reform and essentially reverting to the 1904 rules (with some differences). The move was publicly justified as the rectification either of a Communist assault on tradition, or of a Soviet influence on the Romanian culture, and as a return to a traditional spelling that bears the mark of the language's Latin origin. The political context at the time, however, was that the Romanian Academy was largely regarded as a Communist and corrupt institution — Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife Elena had been its honored members, and membership had been controlled by the Communist Party. As such, the 1993 spelling reform was seen as an attempt of the Academy to break with its Communist past. The Academy invited the national community of linguists as well as foreign linguists specialized in Romanian to discuss the problem; when these overwhelmingly opposed the spelling reform in vehement terms, their position was explicitly dismissed as being too scientific.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: According to the 1993 reform, the choice between "î" and "â" is thus again based on a rule that is neither strictly etymological nor phonological, but positional and morphological. The sound is always spelled as "â", except at the beginning and the end of words, where "î" is to be used instead. Exceptions include proper nouns where the usage of the letters is frozen, whichever it may be, and compound words, whose components are each separately subjected to the rule (e.g. + → "clumsy", not *). However, the exception no longer applies to words derived with suffixes, in contrast with the 1904 norm; for instance what was spelled after 1904 became after 1993.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Although the reform was promoted as a means to show the Latin origin of Romanian, statistically only few of the words written with "â" according to the 1993 reform actually derive from Latin words having an "a" in the corresponding position. In fact, this includes a large number of words that contained an "i" in the original Latin and are similarly written with "i" in their Italian or Spanish counterparts. Examples include "river", from the Latin (compare Spanish ), now written ; along with < , < , < , < , etc.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: While the 1993 spelling norm is compulsory in Romanian education and official publications, and gradually most other publications came to use it, there are still individuals, publications and publishing houses preferring the previous spelling norm or a mixed hybrid system of their own. Among them are the weekly cultural magazine and the daily , whereas some publications allow authors to choose either spelling norm; these include , magazine of the Writers' Union of Romania, and publishing houses such as . Dictionaries, grammars and other linguistic works have also been published using the and long after the 1993 reform.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Ultimately, the conflict results from two different linguistically-based reasonings as to how to spell . The choice of "â" derives from "a" being the most average or central of the five vowels (the official Bulgarian romanization uses the same logic, choosing "a" for ъ, resulting in the country's name being spelled "Balgariya"; and also the European Portuguese vowel for "a" mentioned above), whereas "î" is an attempt to choose the Latin letter that most intuitively writes the sound (similarly to how Polish uses the letter "y").


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Although the Romanian Academy standard mandates the comma-below variants for the sounds and , the cedilla variants are still widely used. Many printed and online texts still incorrectly use "s with cedilla" and "t with cedilla". This state of affairs is due to an initial lack of glyph standardization, compounded by the lack of computer font support for the comma-below variants (see the Unicode section for details).


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The lack of support for the comma diacritics has been corrected in current versions of major operating systems: Windows Vista or newer, Linux distributions after 2005, and currently supported macOS versions. As mandated by the European Union, Microsoft released a font update to correct this deficiency in Windows XP in early 2007, soon after Romania joined the European Union.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: In addition, the acute accent (á, í) was used in verb infinitives and 3rd-person imperfect forms stressed on the last syllable: "lăudá" ("to praise"), "aud̦í" ("to hear"), 3rd-person imperfect "lăudá", "aud̦iá". The grave accent (à, ì, ù) was used in 3rd-person perfect forms stressed on the last syllable: "lăudà", "aud̦ì".


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Use of these letters was not fully adopted even before 1904, as some publications (e.g. "Timpul" and "Universul") chose to use a simplified approach that resembled today's Romanian language writing.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: As with other languages, the acute accent is sometimes used in Romanian texts to indicate the stressed vowel in some words. This use is regular in dictionary headwords, but also occasionally found in carefully edited texts to disambiguate between homographs that are not also homophones, such as to differentiate between "cópii" ("copies") and "copíi" ("children"), "éra" ("the era") and "erá" ("was"), "ácele" ("the needles") and "acéle" ("those"), etc. The accent also distinguishes between homographic verb forms, such as "încúie" and "încuié" ("he locks" and "he has locked").


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Diacritics in some borrowings are kept: "bourrée", "pietà". Foreign names are also usually spelled with their original diacritics: "Bâle", "Molière", even when an acute accent might be wrongly interpreted as a stress, as in "István" or "Gérard". However, frequently used foreign names, such as names of cities or countries, are often spelled without diacritics: "Bogota", "Panama", "Peru".


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The character encoding standard ISO 8859 initially defined a single code page for the entire Central and Eastern Europe — ISO 8859-2. This code page includes only "s" and "t" with cedillas. The South-Eastern European ISO 8859-16 includes "s" and "t" with comma below on the same places "s" and "t" with cedilla were in ISO 8859-2. The ISO 8859-16 code page became a standard after Unicode became widespread, however, so it was largely ignored by software vendors.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The circumflex and breve accented Romanian letters were part of the Unicode standard since its inception, as well as the cedilla variants of s and t. Ș and ț (comma-below variants) were added to Unicode version 3.0. From Unicode version 3.0 to version 5.1, the cedilla-using characters were specified by the Unicode Standard to be "used in both Turkish and Romanian data" and that "a glyph variant with comma below is preferred for Romanian"; On the newly encoded comma-using characters, it said that they should be used "when distinct comma below form is required". Unicode 5.2 explicitly states that "the form with the cedilla is preferred in Turkish, and the form with the comma below is preferred in Romanian", while mentioning (possibly for historical reasons) that "in Turkish and Romanian, a cedilla and a comma below sometimes replace one another".


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Widespread adoption was hampered for some years by the lack of fonts providing the new glyphs. In May 2007, five months after Romania (and Bulgaria) joined the EU, Microsoft released updated fonts that include all official glyphs of the Romanian (and Bulgarian) alphabet. This font update targeted Windows XP SP2, Windows Server 2003, and Windows Vista. The subset of Unicode most widely supported on Microsoft Windows systems, Windows Glyph List 4, still does not include the comma-below variants of S and T.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Adobe Systems decided that the Unicode glyphs "t with cedilla" U+0162/3 are not used in any language. (It is in fact used, but in very few languages. T with Cedilla exists as part of the General Alphabet of Cameroon Languages, in some Gagauz orthographies, in the Kabyle dialect of the Berber language, and possibly elsewhere.) Adobe has therefore substituted the glyphs with "t with comma below" (U+021A/B) in all the fonts they ship. The unfortunate consequence of this decision is that Romanian documents using the (unofficial) Unicode points U+015E/F and U+0162/3 (for ș and ț) are rendered in Adobe fonts in a visually inconsistent way using "s with cedilla", but "t with comma" (see figure). Linotype fonts that support Romanian glyphs mostly follow this convention.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The fonts introduced by Microsoft in Windows Vista also implement this de facto Adobe standard. Few Microsoft fonts provide a consistent look when cedilla variants are used; notable ones are Tahoma, Verdana, Trebuchet MS, Microsoft Sans Serif and Segoe UI.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The free DejaVu and Linux Libertine fonts provide proper and consistent glyphs in both variants. Red Hat's Liberation fonts only support the comma below variants starting with version 1.04, scheduled for inclusion in Fedora 10.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Some OpenType fonts from Adobe and all C-series implement the optional OpenType feature codice_2. This feature forces "s with cedilla" to be rendered using the same glyph as "s with comma below". When this second (but optional) remapping takes place, Romanian Unicode text is rendered with comma-below glyphs regardless of code point variants.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Unfortunately, most Microsoft pre-Vista OpenType fonts (Arial etc.) do not implement the codice_1 feature, even after the European Union Expansion Font Update, so old documents will look inconsistent as in the left side of the above figure. Select few fonts, e.g. Verdana and Trebuchet MS, not only have a consistent look for cedilla variants (after the EU update), but also do a simultaneous remapping of cedilla s and t to comma-below variants when codice_1 is activated. The free DejaVu and Linux Libertine fonts do not yet offer this feature in their current releases, but development versions do.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Pango supports the codice_5 tag since version 1.17. XeTeX supports codice_5 since version 0.995. As of July 2008, very few Windows applications support the codice_5 feature tag. From the Adobe CS3 suite, only InDesign has support for it.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The status of Romanian support in the free fonts that ship with Fedora is maintained at Fedoraproject.org.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Unicode also allows diacritical marks to be represented as separate combining diacritical marks. The relevant combining accents are U+0326 COMBINING COMMA BELOW and U+0327 COMBINING CEDILLA. Support for applying a combining Comma Below to letters S and T may have been poorly supported in commercial fonts in the past, but nearly all modern fonts can successfully handle both the Cedilla and Comma Below marks for S and T. As with all fonts, typographical quality can vary, and so it is preferable to use the single code points instead. Whenever a combining diacritical mark is used in a document, the font in use should be tested to confirm that it is rendered acceptably.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: LaTeX allows typesetting in Romanian using the cedilla Ş and Ţ using the Cork encoding. The comma-below variants are not completely supported in the standard 8-bit TeX font encodings. The lack of a standard LICR (LaTeX Internal Character Representations) for comma-below Ș and Ț is part of the problem. The codice_8 input method attempts to remedy the problem by defining the \textcommabelow LICR accent. This is unfortunately not supported by the codice_9 input method.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The problem may partially worked around in a LaTeX document using these settings, which would allow use of ș, ț or their cedilla variants directly in the LaTeX source:


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The codice_8 package composes the comma-below glyphs by superimposing a comma and the letters S and T. This method is suitable only for printing. In PDF documents produced this way searching or copying text does not work properly. The Polish QX encoding has some support for comma-below glyphs, which are improperly mapped to cedilla LICRs, but also lacks A breve (Ă), which must always be composite, thus unsearchable.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: In the Latin Modern Type 1 fonts the T with comma below is found under the AGL name /Tcommaaccent. This is in contradiction with Adobe's decision discussed above, which puts a T with comma-below at /Tcedilla. In consequence, no fixed mapping can work across all Type 1 fonts; each font must come with its own mapping. Unfortunately, TeX output drivers, like dvips, dvipdfm or pdfTeX's internal PDF driver, access the glyphs by AGL name. Since all of the output drivers mentioned are unaware of this peculiarity, the problem is essentially intractable across all fonts. In consequence, one needs to use fonts that include a mapping which is not bypassed by TeX. This is the case with newer TeX engine XeTeX, which can use Unicode OpenType fonts, and does not bypass the font's Unicode map.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: Modern computer operating systems can be configured to implement a standard Romanian keyboard layout, to permit typing on any keyboard as if it were a Romanian keyboard.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: In systems such as Linux which employ the XCompose system, Romanian letters may be typed from a non-Romanian keyboard layout using a compose-key.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: The system's keyboard layout must be set up to use a compose-key. (Exactly how this is accomplished depends on the distribution.) For instance, the 'left Alt' key is often used as a compose-key.


title: Romanian alphabet

text: To type a letter with a diacritical mark, the compose-key is held down while another key is typed indicate the mark to be applied, then the base letter is typed. For instance, when using an English (US) keyboard layout, to produce ț, hold the compose-key down while typing semicolon ';', then release the compose-key and type 't'. Other marks may be similarly applied as follows:


title: Romanian alphabet

text: There is a Romanian equivalent to the English-language NATO phonetic alphabet. Most code words are people's first names, with the exception of K, J, Q, W and Y. Letters with diacritics (Ă, Â, Î, Ș, Ț) are generally transmitted without diacritics (A, A, I, S, T).


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Montgomery County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It is the third-most populous county in Pennsylvania and the 73rd-most populous county in the United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of the county was 856,553, representing a 7.1% increase from the 799,884 residents enumerated in the 2010 census. Montgomery County is located adjacent to and northwest of Philadelphia. The county seat and largest city is Norristown. Montgomery County is geographically diverse, ranging from farms and open land in the extreme north of the county to densely populated suburban neighborhoods in the southern and central portions of the county.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Montgomery County is included in the Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington PA-NJ-DE-MD metropolitan statistical area, sometimes expansively known as the Delaware Valley. The county marks part of the Delaware Valley's northern border with the Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. In 2010, Montgomery County was the 66th-wealthiest county in the country by median household income.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: The county was created on September 10, 1784, out of land originally part of Philadelphia County. The first courthouse was housed in the Barley Sheaf Inn. It is believed to have been named either for Richard Montgomery, an American Revolutionary War general killed in 1775 while attempting to capture Quebec City, or for the Welsh county of Montgomeryshire (which was named after one of William the Conqueror's main counselors, Roger de Montgomerie), as it was part of the Welsh Tract, an area of Pennsylvania settled by Quakers from Wales. Early histories of the county indicate the origin of the county's name as uncertain.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: According to the United States Census Bureau, the county has a total area of , of which are land and (0.9%) are covered by water.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: As of the census of 2020, the county was 73.27% White (72.18% White, non-Hispanic), 9.55% Black or African American, 0.22% Native American or Alaskan Native, 7.94% Asian, 0.02% Pacific Islander, and 2.87% some other race; 6.13% were two or more races. 6.36% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: As of the census of 2010, the county was 79.0% White non-Hispanic, 8.7% Black or African American, 0.1% Native American or Alaskan Native, and 6.4% Asian (2.1% Indian, 1.7% Korean, 1.2% Chinese, 0.5% Vietnamese, 0.3% Filipino, 0.1% Japanese, 0.6% other Asian); 1.9% were two or more races, and 1.6% were some other race. About 4.3% of the population were Hispanic or Latino.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: As of the census of 2000, 750,097 people, 286,098 households, and 197,693 families resided in the county. The population density was . The 297,434 housing units averaged 238 units/km (616 units/sq mi). The racial makeup of the county was 86.46% White, 7.46% Black or African American, 0.11% Native American, 4.02% Asian, 0.03% Pacific Islander, 0.75% from other races, and 1.16% from two or more races. About 2.04% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race, 17.5% were of German, 16.7% Irish, 14.3% Italian, 6.5% English, and 5.0% Polish ancestry. Around 90.5% spoke English, 2.0% Spanish, 1.1% Korean, and 1.0% Italian as their first language. Historically, much of western Montgomery County is part of the Pennsylvania Dutch Country, with a great many descendants of German-speaking settlers from the 18th century.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Montgomery County is home to large and growing African American, Korean American, Puerto-Rican American, Mexican American, and Indian American populations. The county has the second-largest foreign-born population in the region, after Philadelphia County.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Of the 286,098 households, 32.00% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 57.20% were married couples living together, 8.80% had a female householder with no husband present, and 30.90% were not families. About 25.60% of all households were made up of individuals, and 9.90% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.54 and the average family size was 3.09.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: In the county, the age distribution was 24.10% under the age of 18, 7.10% from 18 to 24, 30.50% from 25 to 44, 23.40% from 45 to 64, and 14.90% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females, there were 93.60 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 90.00 males.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: The median income for a household in the county was $60,829, and for a family was $72,183 (these figures had risen to $73,701 and $89,219, respectively, as of a 2007 estimate). Males had a median income of $48,698 versus $35,089 for females. The per capita income for the county was $30,898. About 2.80% of families and 4.40% of the population were below the poverty line, including 4.60% of those under age 18 and 5.10% of those age 65 or over.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Historically, Montgomery County was a stronghold for the Republican Party. The county was the only one carried by Barbara Hafer in the 1990 gubernatorial election over the incumbent governor, Bob Casey. However, the Democratic Party has made substantial gains in the county over the last quarter-century and gained the registration edge early in 2008.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: As in most of Philadelphia's suburbs, the brand of Republicanism practiced in Montgomery County for much of the 20th century was a moderate one. As the national parties have polarized, the county's voters have increasingly supported Democrats at the national level. After voting for the Republican presidential nominee in all but one election from 1952 to 1988, Lyndon Johnson's landslide in 1964, Montgomery County residents have voted for the Democratic presidential nominee for the past seven consecutive elections, with the margins progressively increasing between 1992 and 2008 to 21.8%. The Democratic victory margin decreased in 2012 back to 14.3%, but rebounded in 2016 to 21.3%. In 2020's election, the Democratic victory margin grew to 26.2%.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Most county-level offices were held by Republicans until after the 2007 election, when Democrats picked up control of five row offices. Democrats have also won several elections in the Pennsylvania General Assembly in recent years, including two GOP-leaning State House districts in 2004, the 148th with Mike Gerber and the 153rd with Josh Shapiro. Today, although the county is very Democratic at the national level, at the state and local level, it is not specifically partisan.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: In the 2004 United States Senate election, Republican Arlen Specter won the county over Montco resident Joe Hoeffel, but Democrat Bob Casey, Jr. out-polled Rick Santorum in the 2006 Senate election. In 2006, Democrat Rick Taylor unseated incumbent Republican Eugene McGill in the 151st (although Taylor lost in 2010 to Republican Todd Stephens) and, in 2008, Democrat Matthew Bradford unseated incumbent Republican Jay Moyer in the 70th. Six of the county's 12 state house seats and four of the county's eight senate seats are now held by Democrats. All four statewide Democratic candidates carried Montgomery in 2008, with Barack Obama receiving 60% of the county's vote. Barack Obama won Montgomery County in 2008 and 2012.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Despite Donald Trump's victory in the state of Pennsylvania in the 2016 election, Montgomery County was one of the few counties in Pennsylvania which swung in the Democratic presidential candidates' direction with Hillary Clinton winning Montgomery County with 58.87% of the vote, an improvement from Barack Obama's 56.6% vote share in 2012. In the 2016 U.S. Senate elections as well as the Pennsylvania Attorney General elections, Montgomery County voted for Katie McGinty and Josh Shapiro, both Democrats. In 2020, Joe Biden received over 60% of the vote in Montgomery County, the first Democrat to do so in the county's history.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Montgomery County is governed by a three-person county commission. The current composition is two Democrats and one Republican. By law, the county commission must have one member of a minority party represented.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: On July 24, 2013, Montgomery County Register of Wills D. Bruce Hanes, a Democrat, announced he would begin issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, flouting Pennsylvania law banning such unions. Hanes called the commonwealth's ban "arbitrary and suspect", saying he believes it violates the Pennsylvania Constitution and the United States Constitution. The Republican administration of Governor Tom Corbett filed suit in the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania in an attempt to block Hanes from licensing same-sex marriage. Commonwealth Court Judge Dan Pellegrini ordered Hanes in September 2013 to stop issuing same-sex marriage licenses. After Federal Judge John Jones threw out Pennsylvania's ban on same-sex marriage in May 2014, calling it unconstitutional, offices in other counties were able to issue these licenses, while Hanes had to wait for the ruling against him to be removed.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Montgomery County is a suburb of Philadelphia, the nation's sixth most populous city, and many of its residents work in the city. However, Montco is also a major employment center with large business parks in Blue Bell, Lansdale, Fort Washington, Horsham, and King of Prussia which attract thousands of workers from all over the region. The strong job base and taxes generated by those jobs have resulted in Montgomery County receiving the highest credit rating of 'AAA' from Standard & Poor's, one of fewer than 30 counties in the United States with such a rating. In 2012, Moody's downgraded the general obligation rating to Aa1, and in 2018 the rating was revised back to Aaa.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Under Pennsylvania law, five types of incorporated municipalities are listed: cities, boroughs, townships, home rule municipalities (which can include communities that bear the name "Borough" or "Township") and, in at most two cases, towns. These boroughs, townships, and home rule municipalities are located in Montgomery County:


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Census-designated places are geographical areas designated by the United States Census Bureau for the purposes of compiling demographic data. They are not actual jurisdictions under Pennsylvania law. Other unincorporated communities, such as villages, may be listed here, as well.


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: Even though the historic village of Valley Forge, as well as the park, are partially located within Montgomery County, the modern village is in Chester County, PA


title: Montgomery County, Pennsylvania

text: The county has a hot-summer humid continental climate ("Dfa") except in some lowland areas very close to Philadelphia where it is humid subtropical ("Cfa"). The hardiness zones are 6b and 7a.


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: Kim began doing theater when he was 18 years old. He has portrayed a wide variety of roles on the stage, focusing upon Western classical works, including Shakespeare, Chekhov, Ibsen and Molière. He has spent most of his career in theater.


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: Kim starred in the first play written by an Asian American to be produced professionally in New York, "The Chickencoop Chinaman" by Frank Chin, which was mounted by The American Place Theatre in 1972.


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: Kim co-founded the American Players Theatre in Spring Green, Wisconsin with Anne Occhiogrosso and Charles Bright in 1977. He was the theater's artistic director.


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: In 1974, Kim starred in Chin's second play, "The Year of the Dragon". Also that year, he became one of the first Asian-American actors to play a leading role in an American production of a Shakespeare play when he played the title role in The New York Public Theater's 1974 production of "Pericles, Prince of Tyre".


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: He played Kralahome in the 1996 revival of "The King and I" on Broadway, later succeeding to the leading role. Other Broadway credits include Golden Child and the revised version of "Flower Drum Song", both written by David Henry Hwang.


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: Kim portrayed the Keymaker in the film "The Matrix Reloaded" (2003). He was originally asked by casting director Mali Finn for the role.


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: In 2008, he played mathematician Dashiell Kim in the episode "The Equation" of the television series "Fringe."


title: Randall Duk Kim

text: Kim voiced Po's teacher, Grand Master Oogway, in "Kung Fu Panda" (2008) and "Kung Fu Panda 3" (2016).


title: Kirby Super Star

text: Kirby Super Star, released as Kirby's Fun Pak in PAL regions, is an anthology platform video game developed by HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in 1996. It is part of the "Kirby" series of video games by HAL Laboratory. The game was advertised as a compilation featuring eight games: seven short subsections with the same basic gameplay, and two minigames.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: The game was later released for the Wii and Wii U Virtual Consoles. Nintendo re-released "Kirby Super Star" in Japan, the United States and Europe in September 2017 as part of the company's Super NES Classic Edition. The game was released on the Nintendo Switch Online service on December 12, 2019.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: An enhanced remake titled "Kirby Super Star Ultra" was released for the Nintendo DS in 2008 and 2009 to commercial and critical success, selling just under 3 million copies.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" is a side-scrolling platform game. Similar to previous entries in the "Kirby" series, the player controls Kirby to complete various levels while avoiding obstacles and enemies. Kirby can walk or run, jump, swim, crouch, slide, and inhale enemies or objects to spit them out as bullets. He can fly for a limited time by inflating himself; while flying, Kirby cannot attack or use his other abilities, though he can release a weak puff of air. By eating certain enemies, Kirby can gain copy abilities, power-ups allowing him to take on the properties the enemy possessed. In "Kirby Super Star", Kirby gains the ability to guard so he can defend himself from weak attacks.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: If Kirby uses a copy ability, he can produce a Helper, a character that can be controlled automatically or by another player. Like Kirby, Helpers can float continuously, but can only use the copy ability they were based on. The player can also grant the Helper a different form or revert them into a power-up in an emergency. The player characters lose health if they are hit by enemies or hazards. If the Helper loses all their health, there is a short time for Kirby to grant it a new power before it disappears. If Kirby loses all of his health, the player will lose a life. Health can be replenished by eating food scattered across levels. Losing all lives results in a game over.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" is split into seven smaller games, six primary and one supplemental, in addition to two minigames. While most retain the same game mechanics, they have different stories and objectives. Some games must be unlocked by playing others, and all must be finished to complete the game.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" was developed in Japan by HAL Laboratory and directed by Kirby creator Masahiro Sakurai. It was the third "Kirby" game he directed, following "Kirby's Dream Land" and "Kirby's Adventure". Although a Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) title, the "Kirby Super Star" prototype was developed for the original Nintendo Entertainment System. According to Sakurai, although the prototype was for internal use only, it was almost complete and some of Kirby's animations were nearly identical in the final game. The prototype was used to test out ideas before implementing them in the final product; Sakurai said having the game operating on an internal build made it easier to develop ideas. HAL president Satoru Iwata had little involvement with the game, and left development under Sakurai's supervision.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: For "Kirby Super Star", Sakurai "had three pillars in mind. One was two-player cooperative gameplay and another was including actions similar to those in fighting games. The third was an omnibus format." The addition of cooperative gameplay was something Shigeru Miyamoto requested. While Sakurai knew a SNES "Kirby" game would mean bigger, more detailed characters and graphics, he wanted to hear from Miyamoto before thinking about the foundation and other important aspects. Sakurai and Iwata traveled to Kyoto; there, Miyamoto told them he wanted cooperative gameplay, something uncommon in side-scrolling platform games. Miyamoto had dreamed of creating a cooperative game in his "Super Mario" franchise for many years, but was unable to until "New Super Mario Bros. Wii" in 2009 because of how fast the series' gameplay is. "Kirby", on the other hand, is slower-paced, so Miyamoto figured it would be possible. Sakurai thought about it and came up with the idea to have a main player and an assisting one; this led to the conception of Helpers, which he thought opened the door for inexperienced players.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: Development lasted three years, longer than usual for the era. This was partially due to the influence of Rare's "Donkey Kong Country" (1994), a game that incorporated computer-generated (CG) graphics. Sakurai was certain using CG would be beneficial, so the team redid the artwork about halfway through development. HAL's development schedule also lengthened development. Sakurai planned to include an additional game mode, "Kagero Mansion", which was discarded due to time constraints. "Kagero Mansion" was a horror game with an emphasis on action and puzzle elements; it saw Kirby stuck in a mansion and unable to inhale. HAL also planned to add a move that allowed Kirby to create an explosion from guarding, but cut the idea. The game's working title was "Kirby of the Stars: Active", which "suggest[ed] that the game was more proactive and had more active gameplay." "Mother" series creator Shigesato Itoi came up with the final title, which Sakurai said "convey[s] how rich it is in content".


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" was one of the last SNES games, released just three months before the launch of the system's successor, the Nintendo 64. Publisher Nintendo released the game in Japan on March 21, 1996, in North America on September 20, 1996, and in Europe on January 23, 1997. In Japan, the title is "Kirby of the Stars: Super Deluxe", while in Europe, it is "Kirby's Fun Pak". The Japanese packaging was designed to resemble a Paulownia box, an idea that originated from Itoi. In Japan, expensive sake and silverware is often sold in Paulownia boxes; the team thought the packaging would convey that the game was special.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" was rereleased on the Wii and Wii U via Nintendo's Virtual Console digital distribution service. The Wii version was released in Japan in October 2009 and in the West in May 2010, and the Wii U version was released worldwide in May 2013. The game was also included in "Kirby's Dream Collection" (2012), a 20th anniversary compilation of "Kirby" titles for the Wii.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" was both a critical and commercial success, selling over one million copies in Japan. It received "favorable" reviews according to the review aggregation website GameRankings, and is widely regarded as one of the best games of the franchise. The four reviewers of "Electronic Gaming Monthly" applauded the large amount of content, simultaneous two-player mode, graphics, and Kirby's power-absorbing ability. Captain Cameron of "GamePro" gave it a perfect 5 out of 5 in sound, control, and FunFactor, and a 4.5 out of 5 in graphics. He commented that "The perfect execution of the varied controls leads to simple-but-charming fun." Reviewing the Virtual Console release, Nintendo Life praised the "impressive" musical score and "colorful" visuals.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Electronic Gaming Monthly" named "Kirby Super Star" a runner-up for Side-Scrolling Game of the Year (behind "Guardian Heroes"). Gamesradar ranked the game at #19 in their "The Best SNES Game of All Time." In 2018, Complex listed Kirby Super Star #51 in its "The Best Super Nintendo Games of All Time." IGN rated Kirby Super Star 47th on their "Top 100 SNES Games." They praised the game calling it an incredible game and having incredible value.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" was given an enhanced remake in the form of "Kirby Super Star Ultra" to celebrate the series' 15th anniversary. The remake features four new modes, three new minigames, and multiple additions to the base game including new sub-bosses and enemies. The remake was released in North America on September 22, 2008 and released to critical and commercial success, selling just under three million copies worldwide.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: Many of the music tracks in "Kirby Super Star" have been remixed in various games, such as the "Super Smash Bros." series; the Nintendo 64 game, for instance, had a new version of the Gourmet Race theme as Kirby's theme song.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: "Kirby Super Star" was made available on the Wii Virtual Console in Japan on October 13, 2009, in North America on May 17, 2010 and in the PAL region on May 28, 2010. The Wii U Virtual Console version was released in Japan on May 1, 2013 and in North America and Europe on May 23, 2013. When released in Europe for the Wii U Virtual Console, the North American version was included instead of the European version. It was also one of the games included in "Kirby's Dream Collection", which was released for the Wii in celebration of the series' 20th anniversary.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: Meta Knight's battleship, the Halberd, would reappear in "", "Super Smash Bros. Brawl", "Kirby's Epic Yarn", "Super Smash Bros. for Wii U", "", and Super Smash Bros Ultimate.


title: Kirby Super Star

text: A stage based on "The Great Cave Offensive" appears in "Super Smash Bros. for Wii U". In reference to the scope of the mode of the same name, the arena is amongst the largest stages in the game's catalog, and thus supports up to eight players. It features a unique mechanic dubbed the "Danger Zones", stage hazards that instantly KO any fighter whose damage percentages exceed 100%. The stage was also included in "Super Smash Bros. Ultimate".


title: Kirby Super Star

text: In 2021, Charlie Rosen and Jake Silverman arranged the composition, "Meta Knight's Revenge", for The 8-Bit Big Band. Their cover was subsequently nominated for and won the Grammy Award for Best Arrangement, Instrumental or A Cappella.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Just My Luck is a 2006 American romantic comedy film directed by Donald Petrie, from a screenplay by I. Marlene King and Amy B. Harris, starring Lindsay Lohan, Chris Pine, Faizon Love, Missi Pyle, and McFly. It tells the story of Ashley Albright who works in public relations and is the luckiest person in Manhattan, while Jake Hardin is a janitor and would-be music producer who seems to have terrible luck until their good and bad luck is switched upon kissing each other at a masquerade party which changes both their lives and leads them to meet each other once again.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Ashley Albright works at Braden & Co. Public Relations and has an extremely fortunate life, experiencing recurring strokes of good fortune since childhood. In contrast, Jake Hardin experiences bad luck on a daily basis.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Jake is the unpaid US manager of the British band McFly. For weeks, he tries to get their demo CD to record label owner Damon Philips, hoping to get them discovered and become a music producer.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Jake sneaks into a masquerade ball put on by Ashley where he hopes to meet Phillips. During the ball, a fortune teller tells Ashley her luck will change. Failing to get Phillips' attention, Jake asks Ashley to dance. They kiss, switching their luck in the process.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Outside, Jake saves Phillips from being hit by a car. To repay him for saving his life, he takes the McFly demo and invites the band to his studio. Meanwhile, Ashley and Peggy are arrested because the neighbor she invited to be Peggy's date is a prostitute. Ashley is fired by Peggy and spends a night in jail.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: The next day, Ashley learns her apartment is condemned due to a flood and mold. Staying with her friends Dana and Maggie she experiences more bad luck. She tracks down the fortune teller, who suggests someone needed her luck more. Ashley realizes the stranger she kissed has her luck.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Phillips is impressed with McFly and signs them. Ashley tracks down every male dancer hired to work the ball, kissing each of them. After this fails to restore her luck, hungry and overwhelmed, Ashley has a public breakdown at a diner where Jake is. Not recognizing her, he sympathizes with her frustration at constant bad luck, offering to find her a job. She takes his former job at the bowling alley, developing a friendship with him. When Jake is worried McFly doesn't have enough material for an upcoming gig at the Hard Rock Cafe, she introduces him to singer/songwriter Maggie. Impressed, he decides to use her song.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: During a recording session, Ashley overhears Jake say he's been lucky ever since the masquerade ball. Realizing he was the masked dancer, she kisses him and leaves, finding her luck is back. She runs into Peggy, who is now engaged to Antonio and offers to rehire Ashley as the Vice President of Braden & Co. if she helps with a meeting that very night. Ashley then learns Maggie's song will no longer be performed at the concert.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Looking at a mirror she broke earlier, Ashley reflects on the cost of her good luck. Deciding to forego Peggy's rehiring offer, she goes to the concert where Jake and the band are having bad luck and may have to cancel the concert. Ashley kisses Jake and circumstances change, leading to a successful concert where Maggie's song is performed. Ashley realizes she's in love with Jake but doesn't wish to give him bad luck again. She decides to leave and live with her parents for a while.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Jake finds Ashley at Grand Central, realizing she is the woman from the ball. Since he used good luck to help others, Ashley argues she doesn't want to take it away. He points out she experienced good things even with bad luck and says he is willing to experience bad luck again if they are together. They kiss, switching their good and bad luck back and forth. Katy arrives and they simultaneously kiss her on each cheek, causing another luck transfer. She then wins a $25 lottery ticket. Jake and Ashley walk hand-in-hand, wondering if they will get used to living without luck and debating karma. Outside a construction crew accidentally break a pipe and water rains down on the two just as the movie ends.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: Principal photography of interior scenes (such as Ashley's apartment and Jake's apartment) took place in New Orleans, Louisiana before Hurricane Katrina hit the area. In March 2005, exterior scenes were shot in New York City. NYC locations included: the apartment building 43 Fifth Avenue (originally constructed in 1905 by architect Henry Andersen), which has been the home to many celebrities including actresses Julia Roberts and Holly Hunter, novelist Dawn Powell, and screenwriter Noah Baumbach; Christopher Park in Greenwich Village (where Jake offers Ashley a job); the New York Palace Hotel (455 Madison Avenue, where the masquerade ball takes place); Central Park; Rivera Cafe (225 West 4th Street, where Ashley experiences a public outburst); and the Hard Rock Cafe in Times Square, where McFly's concert is supposed to take place. Filming also involved exterior and interior shooting at Grand Central Terminal for the movie's final scene.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: During filming, Lohan sprained her ankle, making it difficult to walk for a time and preventing her from wearing heels.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: The film received mostly negative reviews from critics, with Rotten Tomatoes giving it a 14% rating based on 111 reviews with the critics' consensus: ""Just My Luck" asks little of its leads and less of its audience, adding up to a middling teen rom-com that sorely lacks sparks." Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade "B" on an A+ to F scale.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: "Just My Luck" opened at #4 at the North American box office with $5,692,285 in its opening weekend, May 12, 2006. In the US, it grossed $17,326,650. The film grossed $38 million worldwide.


title: Just My Luck (2006 film)

text: The album is made up partly of songs from McFly's first two albums, "Room on the 3rd Floor" and "Wonderland", with the exception of the brand new track "Just My Luck", which was recorded especially for the film. Though released as the film's soundtrack, a selection of the songs featured on the album were not in the film. Reworked versions of "5 Colours in Her Hair", "I've Got You" and "Unsaid Things", as well as the censored Single version of "I Wanna Hold You" appear on the album instead of the original versions. The European version of the album slightly muddles up the track listing, and adds the hidden track "Get Over You" in the pre-gap.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Russian political jokes are a part of Russian humour and can be grouped into the major time periods: Imperial Russia, Soviet Union and finally post-Soviet Russia. In the Soviet period political jokes were a form of social protest, mocking and criticising leaders, the system and its ideology, myths and rites.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Quite a few political themes can be found among other standard categories of Russian joke, most notably Rabinovich jokes and Radio Yerevan.


title: Russian political jokes

text: In Imperial Russia, most political jokes were of the polite variety that circulated in educated society. Few of the political jokes of the time are recorded, but some were printed in a 1904 German anthology.


title: Russian political jokes

text: There were also numerous politically themed Chastushki (Russian traditional songs) in Imperial Russia.


title: Russian political jokes

text: In "Pale Fire" by Vladimir Nabokov, the fictional author of the "Foreword", Charles Kinbote, cites the following Russian joke:


title: Russian political jokes

text: He comments on the uncanny linguistic parallelism between the English-language "crown-crow-cow" and the Russian "korona–vorona–korova".


title: Russian political jokes

text: In the Soviet Union, telling political jokes could be regarded as a type of extreme sport: according to Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code), "anti-Soviet propaganda" was a potentially capital offense.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Ben Lewis claims that the political conditions in the Soviet Union were responsible for the unique humour produced there; according to him, "Communism was a humour-producing machine. Its economic theories and system of repression created inherently amusing situations. There were jokes under fascism and the Nazis too, but those systems did not create an absurd, laugh-a-minute reality like communism."


title: Russian political jokes

text: Jokes from these times have a certain historical value, depicting the character of the epoch almost as well as long novels might.


title: Russian political jokes

text: According to Marxist–Leninist theory, communism in the strict sense is the final stage of evolution of a society after it has passed through the socialism stage. The Soviet Union thus cast itself as a socialist country trying to build communism, which was supposed to be a classless society.


title: Russian political jokes

text: This joke is an allusion to the consequences of the collectivization policy pursued by Joseph Stalin between 1928 and 1933.


title: Russian political jokes

text: This is another joke about how disastrous the consequences of collectivisation were on Russia's food supply, how Trotsky wanted to treat peasants harshly to uplift workers, Bukharin vice versa, and how capitalist countries were still faring well in spite of this.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Alexander Solzhenitsyn's book "Gulag Archipelago" has a chapter entitled "Zeks as a Nation", which is a mock ethnographic essay intended to "prove" that the inhabitants of the Gulag Archipelago constitute a separate nation according to "the only scientific definition of nation given by comrade Stalin". As part of this research, Solzhenitsyn analyzes the humor of zeks (gulag inmates). Some examples:


title: Russian political jokes

text: The Armenian Radio or "Radio Yerevan" jokes have the format, "ask us whatever you want, we will answer you whatever we want". They supply snappy or ambiguous answers to questions on politics, commodities, the economy or other subjects that were taboo during the Communist era. Questions and answers from this fictitious radio station are known even outside Russia.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Jokes about Vladimir Lenin, the leader of the Russian Revolution of 1917, typically made fun of characteristics popularized by propaganda: his supposed kindness, his love of children (Lenin never had children of his own), his sharing nature, his kind eyes, etc. Accordingly, in jokes Lenin is often depicted as sneaky and hypocritical. A popular joke set-up is Lenin interacting with the head of the secret police, Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky, in the Smolny Institute, the seat of the revolutionary communist government in Petrograd, or with "khodoki", peasants who came to see Lenin.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Jokes about Stalin usually refer to his paranoia and contempt for human life. Stalin's words are typically pronounced with a heavy Georgian accent.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Jokes about Nikita Khrushchev often relate to his attempts to reform the economy, especially to introduce maize. He was even called "kukuruznik" ('maizeman'). Other jokes target the crop failures resulting from his mismanagement of agriculture, his innovations in urban architecture, his confrontation with the US while importing US consumer goods, his promises to build communism in 20 years, or simply his baldness and crude manners. Unlike other Soviet leaders, in jokes Khrushchev is always harmless.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Leonid Brezhnev was depicted as dim-witted, senile, always reading his speeches from paper, and prone to delusions of grandeur.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Quite a few jokes capitalized on the cliché used in Soviet speeches of the time: "Dear Leonid Ilyich."


title: Russian political jokes

text: During Brezhnev's time, the leadership of Communist Party became increasingly geriatric. By the time of his death in 1982, the median age of the Politburo was 70. Brezhnev's successor, Yuri Andropov, died in 1984. His successor, Konstantin Chernenko, died in 1985. Rabinovich said he did not have to buy tickets to the funerals, as he had a subscription to these events. As Andropov's bad health became common knowledge (he was eventually attached to a dialysis machine), several jokes made the rounds:


title: Russian political jokes

text: Mikhail Gorbachev was occasionally mocked for his poor grammar, but perestroika-era jokes usually made fun of his slogans and ineffective actions, his birth mark ("Satan's mark"), Raisa Gorbachev's poking her nose everywhere, and Soviet-American relations.


title: Russian political jokes

text: In its declaration of national glories, the Soviet government claimed at various times, such as through "Pravda" publications, to have invented the airplane, steam engine, radio, and lightbulb, and promoted the pseudoscientific agricultural claims of Lysenko as part of Stalinist pseudohistory. This was joked about in the phrase "" from the early 1940s, sardonically claiming that the Soviet Union was also the birthplace of elephants. An anecdote from Andrei Sakharov includes "(1) classics of Marxism-Leninism-Stalinism on elephants; (2) Russia, the elephants' homeland, (3) the Soviet elephant, the world's best elephant (4) the Belorussian elephant, the Russian elephant's little brother."


title: Russian political jokes

text: Quite a few jokes and other humour capitalized on the fact that Soviet citizens were under KGB surveillance even when abroad:


title: Russian political jokes

text: A subgenre of the above-mentioned type of joke targets long sign-up queues for certain commodities, with wait times that could be counted in years rather than weeks or months.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Boris Yeltsin presided over the gutting and selling of many government companies and a substantial increase in corruption, which became target for jokes.


title: Russian political jokes

text: – I am from the "Washington Post". What do you say about the mass graves and the disrespect of human rights in Chechnya?


title: Russian political jokes

text: – I am from the "Daily Mirror". Is it true that there are concentration camps in Chechnya and that every day peaceful citizens are murdered in them?


title: Russian political jokes

text: – I am from "Süddeutsche Zeitung". Please clarify what is currently happening on the Strait of Kerch, if Tuzla is an isthmus or an island, and why Russians are building an embankment there.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Many draw parallels between Vladimir Putin and Joseph Stalin: his opponents do it accusingly, while neo-Stalinists proudly. Many jokes about past Soviet leaders are retold about Putin:


title: Russian political jokes

text: From at least 2015, it is common in Russia to joke about the "battle between the television and the refrigerator (битва холодильника с телевизором)." This refers to the balance between state media and actual living conditions in Russia: whether state propaganda on TV is able to overcome the presence of empty fridges.


title: Russian political jokes

text: Following the start of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine many jokes started to be circulated online about the war and the rather disappointing results of the Russian Army compared with the expectations set by state propaganda:


title: Gastronomy

text: Gastronomy is the study of the relationship between food and culture, the art of preparing and serving rich or delicate and appetizing food, the cooking styles of particular regions, and the science of good eating. One who is well versed in gastronomy is called a gastronome, while a gastronomist is one who unites theory and practice in the study of gastronomy. Practical gastronomy is associated with the practice and study of the preparation, production, and service of the various foods and beverages, from countries around the world. Theoretical gastronomy supports practical gastronomy. It is related with a system and process approach, focused on recipes, techniques and cookery books. Food gastronomy is connected with food and beverages and their genesis. Technical gastronomy underpins practical gastronomy, introducing a rigorous approach to evaluation of gastronomic topics.


title: Gastronomy

text: Archestratus wrote a guide to the foods of the Mediterranean in the form of a poem called "Gastronomy", according to Chrysippus of Tyana; only fragmentary quotations remain. The word is a compound of Greek 'stomach' and lit. 'custom', modeled on 'astronomy'. It was revived in 1801 as the title of a poem by . It was Brillat-Savarin, in his "Physiologie du goût" (1825) who systematized the study of food and cooking under this name.


title: Gastronomy

text: Gastronomy involves discovering, tasting, experiencing, researching, understanding and writing about food preparation and the sensory qualities of human nutrition as a whole. It also studies how nutrition interfaces with the broader culture. The biological and chemical basis of cooking has become known as molecular gastronomy, while gastronomy covers a much broader, interdisciplinary ground.


title: Gastronomy

text: Pascal Ory, a French historian, defines gastronomy as the establishment of rules of eating and drinking, an "art of the table", and distinguishes it from good cooking () or fine cooking (). Ory traces the origins of gastronomy back to the French reign of Louis XIV when people took interest in developing rules to discriminate between good and bad style and extended their thinking to define good culinary taste. The lavish and sophisticated cuisine and practices of the French court became the culinary model for the French. Alexandre Grimod de La Reynière wrote the gastronomic work (1803), elevating the status of food discourse to a disciplined level based on his views of French tradition and morals. Grimod aimed to reestablish order lost after the revolution and institute gastronomy as a serious subject in France. Grimod expanded gastronomic literature to the three forms of the genre: the guidebook, the gastronomic treatise, and the gourmet periodical. The invention of gastronomic literature coincided with important cultural transformations in France that increased the relevance of the subject. The end of nobility in France changed how people consumed food; fewer wealthy households employed cooks and the new bourgeoisie class wanted to assert their status by consuming elitist food. The emergence of the restaurant satisfied these social needs and provided good food available for popular consumption. The center of culinary excellence in France shifted from Versailles to Paris, a city with a competitive and innovative culinary culture. The culinary commentary of Grimod and other gastronomes influenced the tastes and expectations of consumers in an unprecedented manner as a third party to the consumer-chef interaction.


title: Gastronomy

text: The French origins of gastronomy explain the widespread use of French terminology in gastronomic literature. Pascal Ory criticizes this literature as conceptually vague; relying heavily on anecdotal evidence; and using confusing, poorly defined terminology. Nevertheless, gastronomy has grown from a marginalized subject in France to a serious and popular interest worldwide.


title: Gastronomy

text: The derivative "gourmet" has come into use since the publication of "Physiology of Taste" () an 1825 cooking treatise by Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, a lawyer and politician who aimed to define classic French cuisine. While the work contains some flamboyant recipes, it goes into the theory of preparation of French dishes and hospitality. According to Brillat-Savarin: "Gastronomy is the knowledge and understanding of all that relates to man as he eats. Its purpose is to ensure the conservation of men, using the best food possible."


title: Gastronomy

text: Many writings on gastronomy throughout the world capture the thoughts and aesthetics of a culture's cuisine during a period in their history. Some works continue to define or influence the contemporary gastronomic thought and cuisine of their respective cultures.


title: Famine in India

text: Famine had been a recurrent feature of life in the South Asian subcontinent countries of India and Bangladesh, most accurately recorded during British rule. Famines in India resulted in more than 30 million deaths over the course of the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries. Famines in British India were severe enough to have a substantial impact on the long-term population growth of the country in the 19th and early 20th centuries.


title: Famine in India

text: Indian agriculture is heavily dependent on climate: a favorable southwest summer monsoon is critical in securing water for irrigating crops. Droughts, combined with policy failures, have periodically led to major Indian famines, including the Bengal famine of 1770, the Chalisa famine, the Doji bara famine, the Great Famine of 1876–1878, and the Bengal famine of 1943. Some commentators have identified tried to blame British government inaction as a contributing factor to the severity of famines during the time India was under British rule. Famine largely ended by the start of the 20th century with the 1943 Bengal famine being an exception related to complications during World War II. In India, traditionally, agricultural laborers and rural artisans have been the primary victims of famines. In the worst famines, cultivators have also been susceptible.


title: Famine in India

text: Railroads built for the commercial goal of exporting food grains and other agricultural commodities only served to exacerbate economic conditions in times of famine. However, by the 20th century, the extension of the railroad by the British helped put an end to the massive famines in times of peace. They allowed the british to expedite faster sharing of food out to the most vulnerable.


title: Famine in India

text: The last major famine to affect areas within the modern Republic of India was the Bengal famine of 1943. A famine occurred in the state of Bihar in December 1966 on a much smaller scale and in which "Happily, aid was at hand and there were relatively fewer deaths". The drought of Maharashtra in 1970–1973 is often cited as an example in which successful famine prevention processes were employed. In areas formerly part of British India, the Bangladesh famine of 1974 was the last major famine. In 2016–2018, 194 million of 810 million undernourished people globally lived in India, making the country a key focus for tackling hunger on a global scale. In the last two decades, per capita income more than tripled, yet the minimum dietary intake fell.


title: Famine in India

text: One of the earliest treatises on famine relief goes back more than 2000 years. This treatise is commonly attributed to Kautilya who was also known as Vishnugupta (Chanakya), who recommended that a good king should build new forts and water-works and share his provisions with the people, or entrust the country to another king. Historically, Indian rulers have employed several methods of famine relief. Some of these were direct, such as initiating free distribution of food grains and throwing open grain stores and kitchens to the people. Other measures were monetary policies such as remission of revenue, remission of taxes, an increase of pay to soldiers, and payment of advances. Yet other measures included the construction of public works, canals, and embankments, and sinking wells. Migration was encouraged. Kautilya advocated raiding the provisions of the rich in times of famine to "thin them by exacting excess revenue." Information on famines from ancient India up to colonial times is found in five primary sources:


title: Famine in India

text: The ancient Ashokan edicts of the Mauryan age around 269 BCE record emperor Asoka's conquest of Kalinga, roughly the modern state of Odisha. The major rock and pillar edicts mention the massive human toll of about 100,000 due to the war. The edicts record that an even larger number later perished, presumably from wounds and famine. From Hindu literature, there is the 7th-century famine due to failure of rains in Thanjavur district mentioned in the Periya Puranam. According to the Purana, Lord Shiva helped the Tamil saints Sambandar and Appar to provide relief from the famine. Another famine in the same district is recorded on an inscription with details such as "times becoming bad", a village being ruined, and cultivation of food being disrupted in Landing in 1054. Famines preserved only in oral tradition are the "Dvadasavarsha Panjam" (Twelve-year Famine) of south India and the Durga Devi Famine of the Deccan from 1396 to 1407. The primary sources for famines in this period are incomplete and locationally based.


title: Famine in India

text: The Tughlaq Dynasty under Muhammad bin Tughluq held power during the famine centered on Delhi in 1335–1342 (which is reported to have killed thousands). Busy and faced with a difficult situation, the Tughluq couldn't properly address the famine. Pre-colonial famines in the Deccan included the Damajipant famine of 1460 and the famines starting in 1520 and 1629. The Damajipant famine is said to have caused ruin both in the northern and southern parts of the Deccan. Abd al-Qadir Badayuni claims to have witnessed cannibalism in Hindustan in a famine in 1555.