Eleventh IIFA awards kickstarts today

The 11th International Indian Film Academy (IIFA) awards will kick off here today, but without the presence of the Bachchans and other prominent Indian film personalities.

Conducting the IIFA in Sri Lanka has been seen as hurting the Tamil sentiments back in India.

The run-up to the event has seen an open threat being issued to Bollywood stars from the South Indian Film Chamber of Commerce. The chamber has decided not to screen films of actors who choose to attend the function.

The IIFA is seen as Bollywood''s most coveted ceremony, but big names like Shah Rukh Khan, Aishwarya Bachchan, Ranbir Kapoor, Rajnikant and Kamal Haasan have opted to skip it.

However, stars like Vivek Oberoi, Lara Dutta, Bipasha Basu and Boman Irani are among those who are attending the event.

Mandira Bedi, Chunky Pandey and Javed Jaffrey will host the event that will see big stars performing on stage.

Salman Khan and Sri Lankan beauty and Bollywood actress Jacqueline Fernandez, besides Hrithik Roshan, Suniel Shetty, Lara Dutta, Riteish Deshmukh, Dino Morea and many others will perform and attend the gala event.

A charity cricket match will also be played between the Indian celebrities led by Hrithik Roshan and Suniel Shetty and Sri Lankan cricketers led by Kumara Sangakkara in support of UNICEF’s Cricket for Children project.

The event will also showcase the works of various Indian and Sri Lankan designers.

Nokia Dual SIM Mobiles

As for the C2, it happens to be a "real" dual SIM phone where both the SIM cards would be active. The first SIM card on the Nokia C2 sits underneath the battery and the second is 'hot-swappable', a feature unique to Nokia. This means the second SIM card can be removed and inserted when the phone is on. Apart from being dual SIM, the C2 will also offer its users a wide range of information covering healthcare, agriculture, education and entertainment via Nokia's Ovi Life Tools, as well as the email account for the developing world, Ovi Mail. In addition to Ovi Mail, it also supports Nokia Messsaging - making the C2 a very capable entry level phone. It has an FM radio and music player and guess what? It can take microSD cards of up to 32GB!

Nokia also took the wraps off the Nokia Bicycle Charger Kit, an alternative charging solution built especially for people with limited access to electricity.

The estimated retail prices of the new Nokia mobile phones, before taxes and subsidies, are:

• Nokia C1 (C1-00) - EUR 30 (Rs. 1,700)
• Nokia C1 (C1-02) - EUR 35 (Rs. 2,000)
• Nokia C1 (C1-01) - EUR 39 (Rs. 2,200)
• Nokia C2 (C2-00) - EUR 45 (Rs. 2,500)

The Nokia C1 (C1-00) is expected to ship in the third quarter of 2010, with the Nokia C1 (C1-01) in the early fourth quarter, and the Nokia C1 (C1-02) and Nokia C2 towards the end of the fourth quarter 2010.

Nokia Dual SIM Phones

As for the other two members of the C1 family, they are single IM devices (C1-01 and C1-02) and are Nokia's most affordable devices offering microSD compatibility supporting up to 32GB of memory.

Nokia C1-01

Both new devices boast of color screens, web browsing over GPRS and access to Nokia web services such as Nokia Messaging. The C1-01 has a VGA camera and is capable of video recording as well.

Nokia C1-02

Nokia Announces Inexpensive Dual SIM Phones

Nokia C1 and C2 are expected to be priced between 30 to 45 Euros (Rs. 1,700 to 2,500)

World's largest phone maker Nokia has been famous for not making dual SIM phones. Well, not any longer! The company has announced a bunch of low-cost phones, including dual SIM handsets, starting at EUR 30. These new devices are slated to arrive on sale later this year in Africa and Asia.

The four new devices launched belong to Nokia's low cost C-Series of handsets. Out of these, two are dual SIM handsets while two are single SIM solutions. The C2 and the C1-00 are the dual SIM handsets.

Along with the C2, three new single SIM phones under the C1 name have been announced. As mentioned earlier, one of the C1 phones is a two-in-one dual SIM phone. The C2 is expected to go on sale by the fourth quarter of 2010.

The most affordable of the Nokia C1 trio (C1-00) is priced at EUR 30 and is the first Nokia mobile phone to feature a 2-in-1 double SIM solution. This phone can take in two SIM cards but only one would be active at any given point of time. Users can switch from one SIM to another with the flick of a switch. The C1 offers users a standby battery time of up to six weeks, the longest ever for a Nokia mobile phone, especially useful in those parts of the world where access to electricity is limited. The utilitarian nature of the phone is highlighted by the presence of a flashlight that can help people wade through darkness should he be in one of the remote corners of the planet where there is no electricity. The entire C1 range comes with color displays, FM Radio and a standard headphone jack.