Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu ensures that every other head of state or government visiting India comes to his capital city. So the mandarins promoting tourism in his Government have decided to lay out the welcome by switching on city lights. After the success of lighting up the city's iconic Charminar in different colours, a similar dynamic system now brightens up the legislative assembly building and the Saidanama tomb facing the picturesque Hussainsagar Lake.

FIRST SPARK: The Charminar	EVENING STAR: The Legislative Assembly

More buildings, including the Mecca Masjid, Moazzam Jahi Market, Archaeological Museum and the Andhra Pradesh High Court are to be illuminated in less than a year. The computerised lighting system throws up a staggering 16 million colour variations but only 150 are visible to the human eye.

As part of the ambitious Hyderabad by Night Tour to be introduced in July, tourists will visit illuminated landmarks and will be entertained to a sit-down dinner of Hyderabadi cuisine while listening to a ghazal concert. "They are essentials and not add-ons to enable the tourist soak in the authentic ambience by night," says Tourism Director M. Kishan Rao. With all this bright light around, perhaps Naidu's babus will also sight the state's raging issues of drought and farmers' problems.

-Amarnath K. Menon

In Everest's Footsteps

Two hundred years ago, two British officers, William Lambton and George Everest set out on the great trignometric survey of India. Now schoolchildren across the country are being encouraged to follow in their footsteps, albeit in a modest scale-by mapping their neighbourhood. On June 16, the Department of Science and Technology's (DOST) "Mapping the Neighbourhood" scheme was launched in Almora, Uttaranchal.

Equipped with palmtop computers with built in GPS receivers and traditional instruments like compasses, the children will record the physical terrain of their neighbourhood. "The idea is to make geography interesting for the children and also provide valuable information for the community," says Amitabha Pande, joint secretary, dost.

-Supriya Bezbaruah