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The DNC hosted a press call with Texas Democratic Party Chair Gilberto Hinojosa, U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar (TX-16), Co-Chair of the Biden-Harris Campaign, and Lauren Miller – a mother who was forced to leave the state of Texas to receive life-saving abortion care .

“Let’s be clear: Texas Republicans did this and it shows their true cruelty. And they could only do it because of one man: Donald Trump,” said U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar (TX-16), Co-Chair of the Biden-Harris Campaign. “Donald Trump has repeatedly bragged that he is ‘proudly’ responsible for overturning Roe and ripping away women’s reproductive freedoms. Trump now says that state bans are ‘working the way they are supposed to.’ When women are suffering, when women can’t make their own decisions, when women’s lives are on the line he claims that this is the way it’s supposed to work. I ask every Texan, every American, but especially women like Lauren, Kate Cox, Amanda Zurawski and countless others who have fought for life-saving care – How dare he say that this is working?”

“I’ll never forget when one specialist tore off his gloves in frustration and threw them in the trash. ‘I can’t help you anymore,’ he said. ‘You need to leave the state…’ I was at risk of organ damage to my kidneys and brain, but I wasn’t dead enough for an abortion in Texas,” said Lauren Miller, Dallas mother who was forced to leave Texas to receive critical care because of the state’s abortion ban and joined a lawsuit filed by Texas women denied health care despite serious pregnancy complications. “This is untenable for the millions of women who call Texas home, and if we allow Trump to reach the White House this November, he will make this nightmare a reality nationwide.”

“Texas Republicans have repeatedly shown who they are. They are a group of MAGA extremists hellbent on stripping away women’s rights and all of their talk of being the party of freedom is hogwash,” said Gilberto Hinojosa, Chair of Texas Democratic State Party. “Our message to voters is this: Texas Democrats are the party of freedom. Joe Biden is the candidate who will protect fundamental freedoms in the states. We want people in our state to have the freedom to choose what health care is best for them without the threat of capital punishment. The fact that we are even discussing this is further proof of the depravity of Texas Republicans. This weekend in El Paso, Democrats from across the state of Texas will gather and vote on a platform that protects women from these violent threats and we will specifically protect families’ access to IVF treatment as one of our pillars.”

Sudeep Kanwal is a NY-based filmmaker who was born and, for most part, raised in India. He graduated from City College of New York with an MFA in film, specializing in writing & directing fiction. His short film, Silent Wave played at 23 film festivals across the United States. It won numerous awards and nominations. His next short, ‘Dhund’ premiered at the 2018 Mumbai Film festival as a winner of the Perfect 10 category. His first feature, ‘Privacy’, is co-produced by Mumbai-based art house studio, Fundamental Pictures.

PRIVACY is a neo-noir social thriller that asks the question, how much access to someone’s private life is okay? Roopali is an ambitious police officer confined to monitoring CCTV footage of the bustling streets of Mumbai. After a burglary takes place on her watch, Roopali becomes troubled and ignores protocol to investigate the incident. As she delves deeper into the investigation, her obsession with the CCTV surveillance grows, leading Roopali down a dark path from which she may not be able to return.

For more details and for tickets, please visit https://www.nyiff.us/

On the show, we talk to Sudeep about PRIVACY, about his journey, about his hometown, back home in India aand much more- Tune – in for sure, today, 23rd May on our Show, Saat Samundar Paar, on MeraSangeet Gold – at 9:00 AM,1:00 PM,5:00 PM, and 9:00 PM – EST. You can also catch the interview on MeraSangeet East at 11:00 AM EST.

A Software Engineer turned Filmmaker, Sumanth has written & directed 4 short films before this. Having worked in the IT industry for 5 years, Sumanth quit his job and moved back to his quiet, coastal hometown to set up his own design firm, while also pursuing his passion – filmmaking. He made a few short films, acquainting himself with the nitty-gritty of the art of filmmaking, before finally deciding to wind down his design firm & take a plunge into full-time filmmaking. Mithya is his debut feature film.

Mithya is a journey alongside Mithun, an 11-year-old, who is coming to terms with the loss of his parents.  The passing away of a young couple in the family, orphaning two kids, triggered a chain of thoughts. How would the little kids come to terms? How long before the wounds heal, or do they even? How do children grieve? Mithya is an attempt to find answers to these. Can a new house be home, can friendships be forged again or is it all just a search for something long gone? — Watch the film for all these answers and much more. For more details and for tickets, please visit https://www.nyiff.us/

On the show, we talk to Sumanth about Mithya, about his journey, about his hometown – Tune – in for sure, today, 21st May on our Show, Saat Samundar Paar, on MeraSangeet Gold – at 9:00 AM,1:00 PM,5:00 PM, and 9:00 PM – EST. You can also catch the interview on MeraSangeet East at 11:00 AM EST.

Cyndi Munson became the first Asian-American woman elected to the Oklahoma legislature in 2015 and has focused on bolstering protections for survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault, providing equal pay for equal work, and striving to improve the quality of life for people who suffer from dementia and Alzheimer’s. She has fought targeted bigotry against Asian Americans and is a staunch advocate for Oklahoma’s women and girls. Oklahoma has been on the frontlines of attacks against fundamental freedoms and Leader Munson is a rising star.

DLCC President Heather Williams says – “Leader Cyndi Munson is a force to be reckoned with. Her unwavering commitment to combating bigotry against AAPI communities is part of her important work in creating a brighter future – particularly in a state with entrenched Republican power and extremism. The DLCC is committed to electing a diverse slate of electors across the country who reflect the communities they represent. State legislatures shape the policy that impacts people’s lives the most, which is why having leaders with the lived experiences of their constituents is so essential. The DLCC is proud to stand with AAPI lawmakers like Leader Munson who are changing the face of power and the future of this country.”

Oklahoma House Democratic Leader and DLCC board member Cyndi Munson talks to us about her journey so far, about all that is at stake in the November Presidential elections, the polarization in politics in the US, and much more. Do join-in today, 15th May, for the 1st half of our Show, Saat Samundar Paar, on MeraSangeet Gold – at 9:00 AM,1:00 PM,5:00 PM, and 9:00 PM – EST. You can also catch the same 1st half on MeraSangeet East at 11:00 AM and 6:00 PM – EST.

According to latest National Family Health Survey (NFHS-5) data in India, 36% of children are stunted, 32% are underweight, and 21% are wasted. All that in spite of the fact that 64% of women exclusively breastfeed their babies. Behind this alarming data is the barely known fact – pervasive poor breastfeeding techniques that result in babies constantly crying for milk and mother’s giving up in frustration to switch prematurely to external baby feeds if they can afford& easily find. A problem that is completely fixable, and rather give those 86% of malnourished babies a chance of a healthy life – physically and mentally.

WHEELS Global Foundation (a social impact platform of global IIT alumni community)’s Newborn Nutritional Health Initiative is scaling pioneering work of IIT Bombay’s Health Spoken Tutorials (HST) team to address pervasive newborn malnutrition at scale. Washington D.C. based RIST (Rural India Supporting Trust) with a large grant is supporting scaling of deployment of this initiative across one of the largest State in India, Madhya Pradesh, so as to impact lives of >10m mothers and babies. After amazing results in several districts across three States (Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Chhattisgarh) where the babies gained as much as five-fold more weight in first six months and exceeded all WHO standards, HST team has taken its Cuedwell technology-enabled train-the-trainer model to enable thousands of health & ICDS workers so mothers can be taught proper breast-feeding and nutritional intake practices.

On 9th April, Consulate General of India (CGI), New York, hosted WHEELS leadership team along with several well-known IIT alumni, and its partners who are complimenting its newborn nutritional health program with daily healthy meals to underserved school kids across rural India — Annapoorna Trust serving >9m meals a day and Akshaya Patra Foundation serving >2m meals a day. Given the massive benefits mothers and babies would drive from these simple-to-learn (via IIT-Bombay’s HST team’s >10010-min long video tutorials) towards a healthy life and healthy society, CGI and WHEELS hope those who missed attending the public event would visit WHEELS’ initiative page to learn and benefit from this pioneering research and dedicated effort from a passionate team, and help scale the effort to entire India and all over the world.