Sharjah: 'Indo-Arab Women Excellence' Award for Shabana Faizal at 'Come on Kerala' Conference
Sharjah, Feb. 17: Shafana Fazal, vice-chairperson of KEF Holdings and founder of Shabana and Faizal Foundation, has received 'Indo-Arab Women Excellence award' at India's largest commercial and cultural exhibition 'Come on Kerala,' organized by Gulf Madhyamam here.
Assistant Director General of Dubai Land Department Majida Ali Rashid, UAE's first female director Nayla Al Khaja, Dubai Tourism Director Sheikh Almatwa also received the award along with Shabana Faizal.
Sharjah Investment and Development Authority (Shurooq) Executive Chairman Marwan bin Jassim Al Sarkal, Eastern Group MD. Firoz Meeran, Jaleel Trading MD Shamir K Mohammed, Madhyamam Editor O Abdur Rahman, Gulf Madhyamam Chief Editor VK Hamza Abbas were also present at the ceremony.
Prominent singer KS Chithra also performed at the event. This is the second edition of 'Come on Kerala' and the organizers estimate that there were about three lakh people who attended the conference and exhibition in three day.
About Shabana:
Hailing from the coastal city of Karnataka, Shabana Faizal is the daughter of prominent entrepreneur and well known social figure B Ahmed Haji Mohiudeen, Thumbay, she completed her Psychology degree from local St. Agnes College of Mangaluru, before marrying Faizal E. Kottikolan in 1995.
She began her career as the entrepreneur when she set up and managed Sophiya’s World, a luxury and special items Studio in 1995.
Shabana has been instrumental in the formation of The Faizal & Shabana Foundation, in line with her belief in social responsibility and the upliftment of the under-privileged in society.
Shabana looks after corporate operations at KEF Holdings, including HR, including administration, corporate communications, IT and legal operations.
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NDA sweeps bypolls to four assembly segments in Bihar
Patna (PTI): The ruling NDA in Bihar on Saturday swept the bypolls to four assembly segments, retaining Imamganj and wresting from the INDIA bloc Tarari, Ramgarh and Belaganj, receiving a boost ahead of the assembly elections due next year.
Candidates of the Jan Suraaj, floated recently by former political strategist Prashant Kishor with much fanfare, lost deposits in all but one seat, in a clear indication that the fledgling party, despite claims of taking the political landscape in the state by storm, needs to cover much ground.
The biggest setback for the INDIA bloc, helmed by the RJD, came in Belaganj, a seat the party had been winning since its inception in the 1990s, but this time lost to the JD(U) headed by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, the arch-rival of its founding president Lalu Prasad.
The JD(U) candidate Manorama Devi, a former MLC, defeated by a margin of more than 21,000 votes RJD’s Vishwanath Kumar Singh who made his debut from a seat that fell vacant upon election to Lok Sabha of his father Surendra Prasad Yadav, a multiple term MLA.
The margin of victory was greater than the 17,285 votes polled by Mohd Amjad of Jan Suraaj, whom the RJD may have liked to blame for its defeat by causing a split in Muslim votes.
JD(U) national spokesman Rajiv Ranjan Prasad said, "The people of Bihar deserve kudos for rejecting the negativity of the opposition and reposing their trust in Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Under his leadership, the NDA will win more than 200 seats of the 243-strong assembly in 2025."
The RJD also suffered an embarrassing defeat in Ramgarh, where Prashant Kishor’s prediction of the party “finishing third or fourth” came true. The forecast had caused Sudhakar Singh, son of state RJD president Jagadanand Singh, the MP from Buxar who had won the assembly seat in 2020, to threaten that Jan Suraaj cadres in the constituency will be “beaten up with sticks”.
Singh’s younger brother Ajit finished a distant third after BJP winner Ashok Kumar Singh, a former MLA, and Satish Kumar Singh Yadav who fought on a ticket of the BSP, which has little foothold in Bihar.
Jan Suraaj, though, was hardly a factor in Ramgarh, where its candidate Sushil Kumar Singh polled less than four per cent votes.
The BJP also pulled off a stunning victory in Tarari, which falls under the Arrah Lok Sabha seat, currently represented by CPI(ML)’s Sudama Prasad, who had won the assembly segment for two consecutive terms.
CPI(ML) candidate Raju Yadav lost, by a margin of a little over 10,000 votes, to BJP debutant Vishal Prashant, better known as the son of local strongman Sunil Pandey, who was formerly with the JD(U) and had joined the saffron party a few months ago.
Jan Suraaj had initially announced that it was fielding a former Vice Chief of the Army in Tarari but later disclosed that he could not contest because of technical reasons. Its candidate Kiran Singh got less than four per cent votes.
The most respectable performance from Jan Suraaj came in the reserved Imamganj seat where its candidate Jitendra Paswan stood third, polling well over 20 per cent votes.
The seat, however, went to Deepa Kumari, daughter-in-law of Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi, who defeated RJD’s Raushan Kumar by a slender margin of less than 6,000 votes.
Manjhi, who heads the Hindustani Awam Morcha, vacated Imamganj earlier this year upon getting elected to Lok Sabha from Gaya.
With the exception of Ashok Singh in Ramgarh, the winners in all the seats shall be making their debut in the state assembly.
