“On behalf of the Government of the Republic of Li-thuania, I wish to extend our sincere congratulations on your overwhelming victory in general elections and your appointment as the Prime Minister of India. Bhaa-ratiya logon ke is mukhr janadesh se aap apne kaariyon aur udeshya se safal bhaarat ka nirman karenge,” reads the letter.

PM Butkevičius also noted the wide range of coope-ration that already existed between India and Lithua-nia and expressed his hope that this partnership would continue to grow and expand.

Lithuania’s newly re-elected President Dalia Gry-bauskaitė too wished the new Government of India great success in fulfilling the goals set and in enhancing the security and well-being of the people of India. She also invited the new Prime Minister of India to visit Li-thuania.

Lithuania’s Foreign Minister was one of the first to congratulate the new Government of India on Twitter.

India and Lithuania have established diplomatic re-lations in 1992. The Lithuanian Prime Minister visited India in 1995 Lithuania‘s President paid a State visit to India in 2001. Neither Prime Minister nor President of India has visited Lithuania yet.

INDIAN STUDENTS OBSERVE LITHUANIA CASTING HER VOTE IN PRESIDENTIAL

AND EP ELECTIONS

As Lithuania was going to the ballots on May 25 to elect the country’s President and 11 representatives to the European Parliament, the Embassy of Lithuania in

NEWSLETTER MAY – JUNE 2014

With good news from Lithuania!

EMBASSY OF LITHUANIA, NEW DELHI

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PRESIDENT OF LITHUANIA RE-ELECTED FOR THE SECOND TERM

On May 25 Lithuania’s President Dalia Grybauskaitė was re-elected for another five-year term at the Presi-dent’s Office with 57.87 percent of the vote, as per data published by the Central Electoral Commission.

Her competitor, Social Democrat candidate Zigmantas Balčytis got the support of 40.14 percent of the electorate.

The total voter turnout in the elections was 1.2 mil-lion people, which makes 47.3 percent of eligible voters.

“I accept this election result as a huge commitment to all of you. No other president has been re-elected for two consecutive terms. It’s a historic victory for all of you,” the president said live on the national television LRT.

Grybauskaitė won in 52 electoral constituencies, while Balčytis was the leader in eight. Grybauskaitė se-cured the highest support in the second biggest city of Lithuania Kaunas (74.12 percent) and the Kaunas dis-trict (72.14 pct), whereas Balčytis had the most voters in the districts of the Eastern Lithuanian - Šalčininkai and the capital city Vilnius, i.e., 87.78 pct and 85.1 pct, respectively.

LITHUANIAN LEADERS CONGRATULATE THE NEW GOVERNMENT OF INDIA

Leaders of Lithuania sent their greeting to the new government of India.

Prime Minister of Lithuania Algirdas Butkevičius has sent a congratulatory letter to Prime Minister Na-rendra Modi on May 26.

New Delhi has invited the students from the prestigio-us Amity International School (Saket) to observe the election process.

A group of 10th and 11th grade students visited the Embassy that Sunday morning, where they had the possibility to follow the voting process in the Embassy as local observers.

The Indian students could also learn in detail the electoral process in Lithuania and the EU. A conferen-ce call was arranged via Skype with the students of the Didždvaris High School in Šiauliai, Northern Lithua-nia, during which the experiences of Lithuanian and Indian elections were shared.

A total of 12 Lithuanian citizens residing in India have registered for participation in the 2014 Presiden-tial elections and the elections to the European Par-liament. The first round of Presidential elections took place on May 11, 2014, and the second round is taking place simultaneously with the European Parliament elections on May 25, 2014.

Lithuanian legislation allows the voting at the di-plomatic missions abroad.

LITHUANIAN DANCE PERFORMANCE FASCINATED THE AUDIENCE OF KOLKATAOn June 5 the 3rd International Kalindi Bratyajon

Theatre Festival was launched in Kolkata with the Lithuanian play “Salamandra’s Dream”. The festival

was solemnly inaugurated by the West Bengal Go-vernment minister-in-charge of Panchayat and Rural Development Subrata Mukherjee, the West Wengal Government Minister of Tourism and patron of the festival Bratya Basu, the Minister Counsellor of the Lithuanian Embassy in India Diana Mickevičienė and the famous painter Shivaprasanna.

In her inaugural speech Diana Mickevičienė noted that Lithuania and West Bengal were connected by many links, first being Rabindranath Tagore whose poetry is very popular in Lithuania. Another impor-tant link is Antanas Poška, a Lithuanian scholar and traveller who came to India on a motorbike in 1931 and worked in Calcutta for 3 years. “In return for the Bengali hospitality our countryman have experienced in Calcutta, in the 1930-ies and nowadays, we have sent one of the best modern Lithuanian theater trou-pes to the cultural capital of India” - said Diana Mic-kevičienė.

The audience was mesmerized by the performan-ce Loreta Juodkaitė and her incredible body language which the artist herself called the language of her soul. Loreta’s embodiment of the mythical amphibian Sa-lamandra – traditionally credited with extraordinary powers of fire-resistance and the ability to regenerate her body parts by the Western mythology - has really deleted the boundaries between body and soul. “Kol-kata has never seen this sort of a performance, it is a sensation” – were the reactions of the many in the audience shared with the organizers after the perfor-mance.

“Salamandra’s Dream” has been presented in Kolka-ta by the Embassy of Lithuania in India and the “Arts Printing House” supported by the Lithuania’s Minis-try of Foreign Affairs and the Lithuanian Council of Culture.

FORMER GOOGLE CEO PLANS TO INVEST $ MILLIONS IN LITHUANIA

by Arnoldas LukošiusPublished on lrytas.lt 2014-05-23 15:03“I hope to find a person or a company in Lithuania

which will be interested in my investment. That’s why I am here,” says Debu Purkayastha in a sit-down in-terview with Lithuania’s largest daily “Lietuvos rytas”.

Debu, who is in the capital city of Vilnius with a short visit, is a true legend in the business world. Born in Calcutta (India), he had become one of the most important people at Google.

For many years Debu had been working in the Si-licon Valley, where he was running corporate acquisi-tions worth billions of dollars. Now he represents the London-based Octopus Investments Fund and is rea-dy to reveal which factors are decisive in the selection of an investment project. Also, why Lithuania seems to him a much more promising country than some larger advanced economies.

- How did you discover Lithuania and what kind of winds have brought your sails here?

- First time I learned about Lithuania was when I le-arned about the existence of Skype. Tallinn, the capital of the neighboring Estonia, where Skype was original-ly created, all of the sudden popped up on the map, so I decided to visit that city. Somebody told me: why don’t you go further south and have a look at Lithua-nia too?

The Lithuanian investor Antanas Guoga invited me to come to his country. It was a very tempting invita-tion, because at that time our company was actively working with a London based start-up YPlan, foun-ded by two Lithuanians. I met them while still wor-king for Google; they told me they are from Lithuania, so I got curious what kind of a country is that.

In addition, I have got a very good friend who owns

Wahanda, one of Europe’s largest health, beauty and wellness sites. In 2012, he bought a Lithuanian com-pany Salonium and speaks about Lithuania only in superlative terms. He says that this was his best in-vestment ever, so he has already moved all his opera-tions to Lithuania.

- And what did you actually find when you came here?

- Lithuania is home to a flock of talented people. Here, young people are still interested in studying en-gineering and the general level of education is very good.

The country is small, so it can be flexible and adapt pretty easily. The proper allocation of resources can set the course of the entire country’s development. Large economies tend to grow slowly and depend on their do-mestic market. Yours can be quickly restructured and reach global scale and competitiveness on the instant.

See more at: https://in.mfa.lt/index.php?27147455

LEADERS OF LASER SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY GATHER IN LITHUANIA

Lithuania hosted the 15th International Sympo-sium on Laser Precision Microfabrication (LPM 2014) that took place on June 17-20, 2014 in Vilnius. LPM is the world’s number one meeting of the laser user community where the most advanced developments and recent trends in laser application for fine and precise fabrication of diverse materials are discussed between industry, research and academia. This is the place to exchange ideas and share the latest results and techniques of their scientific research and technologi-cal development pertinent to laser micro- and nano-fabrication.

This annual event, each time held in a different co-untry that excels in laser sciences, was hosted by Li-

Photo by www.technologijos.lt

thuania for the first time. “This is yet another proof that the achievements of Lithuania having chosen to specialize in lasers and in their applicability in micro-fabrication of subtle matters have been acknowledged in the whole world” – said Dr. Gediminas Račiukaitis, Co-Chair of LPM 2014 and Programme Committee Chair.

Like every year, LPM 2014 had a number of remar-kable speakers. One of them was professor Algis P. Piskarskas, one of the founders of the Lithuanian la-ser school and the laser industry of the country. In his plenary address he presented his best-known discove-ries in his address “Boosting Laser Light to Extreme Intensities”.

The world-famous Professor from USA Martin Ri-chardson gave an overview of new laser-based tech-nologies set to transform manufacturing. Professor Kazuyoshi Itoh from Japan presented a paper on Ul-trafast Laser Processing of Glass. Special sessions were held to discuss most relevant topics of today’s use of laser technologies – processing of glass for the tablets and LCDs, applicability of lasers in solar elements, water-assisted micro and nanofabrication.

Lithuania is home to the 10 percent of scientific lasers of the world and produces 90 percent of the world’s picosecond lasers.

Source: delfi.lt, www.lpm2014.org

FOREIGN POLICY MAGAZINE: LITHUANIA ONE OF THE MOST

PROFITABLE PLACES TO INVEST

‘Where to invest around the world in 2014?’ asks the influential economist Daniel Altman in the latest edition of Foreign Policy magazine.

For him, Lithuania is among the preferable na-

tural choices. In the Baseline Profitability Index 2014 composed by Altman Lithuania ranks as the most promising place to invest in the Baltic region and as #2 in the entire Europe.

The Baseline Profitability Index (BPI) brings toge-ther eight factors to predict the total pretax return in-vestors might expect in countries around the world: economic growth, financial stability, physical security, corruption, expropriation by government, exploitati-on by local partners, capital controls, and exchange ra-tes. In each case, the probability of how likely a given factor was to affect an investment, and then how costly the effect might be is estimated.

India ranks as #6 place to invest in the Baseline Profitability Index 2014.

Source: www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2014/05/29/where_to_invest_around_the_world_2014_edition_bpi?wp_login_redirect=0

LITHUANIAN SCHOLARS HAVE DEVELOPED CONCRETE THAT MAY PERSIST EVEN IN HELL

Scientists from Vilnius Gediminas Technical Uni-versity (VGTU) have developed a new-generation concrete. By adding nanoparticles they have change the material’s structure so that it maintains its original qualities even under extreme temperatures reaching 1,000-1,400 degrees Celsius (1,800-2,500 F).

While experimenting with the material VGTU’s re-searchers chose to add the nanoparticles of silica (si-licon dioxide) to the usual mixture of cement, water and construction aggregate. The outcome was aweso-me: the basic qualities of concrete have improved dra-matically after the nanoparticles of silica were added. For example, the concrete’s ultimate strength and its heat resistance characteristics were performing two times better than previously, while its durability had also increased.

The application of this new technology promises to significantly reduce the maintenance costs of concrete structures, argue the scientists of VGTU.

“Not only does the introduction of nanoparticles significantly improve the basic qualities of concrete; the preparation of our new-generation material is as simple as the preparation of the traditional one,” says Dr. Valentinas Antonovičius, leader of the research team. “Users can make it in a usual cement mixer and apply in the construction using the old time-honored methods.”

“More importantly, this upgraded concrete will cost you only 2-3% more than usual, while the other tech-nologies aimed at reaching the same qualities of con-crete will make your product, on average, ten times

Photo by VGTU

Embassy of the Republic of Lithuania in the Republic of IndiaC-93, Anand Niketan, New Delhi 110021

Tel. (+91 11) 43132200, Fax. (+91 11) 43132222, http://in.mfa.lt

more expensive,” notes Dr. Antonovičius.Although most of concrete mixtures are categorized

as A1 Class Combustible, which means 100% noncom-bustible and suitable to prevent fire from spreading, the regular concrete starts crumbling under the temperatu-re of 600 degrees Celsius (1,100 F) and higher. There-fore, the construction of heat-prone facilities, such as thermal power plants, is highly dependent on the use of special refractory materials.

The product developed by Lithuanian scientists has already been tested in practice, at the medical waste in-cinerator of Vilnius City in Lithuania. Enriched with nanoparticles, the new concrete allowed the furnace to work nonstop twice as longer than before.

Researchers say the demand for heat-resistant mate-rials will only grow in the future, especially as the use of biomass and biofuel in energy generation is increasing. With the growing popularity of renewables, more and more incinerators will be built, where all sorts of fuel, from peat and coal and straw to municipal waste, will be burnt. The concrete developed by VGTU must be of great avail in these circumstances.

Source: delfi.lt See the original article (in Lithuanian) at http://www.

delfi.lt/verslas/nekilnojamas-turtas/lietuviu-isradi-mas-kuris-butu-paklausus-ir-pragare.d?id=64887217.

ANNIVERSARY OF THE SELF IMMOLATION OF A FREEDOM FIGHTER MARKED

IN LITHUANIA

The anniversary of Romas Kalanta’s 1972 suicide pro-test, which sparked riots in Soviet Union in the 1970-ies, was marked in the second biggest city of Lithuania Kaunas, in the garden where he made his famous sacri-fice on May 14.

It has been 42 years since a 19 year-old man doused himself in gasoline and set himself on fire in the Kaunas

Music Theater garden to protest the Soviet occupation of Lithuania.

Following his death, Kaunas youth held a demonstra-tion. The scale of the anti-Soviet unrest in Kaunas was one of the largest in the Soviet Union. Local authorities involved not only militia but also paratroopers and se-curity forces to crack down on protesters.

The news of civil unrest in Lithuania spread in the West and among Soviet dissidents despite attempts by the Communist Party and KGB to prevent it.

Participants of the commemorative gathering shared memories of anti-Soviet demonstrations and of the So-viet response to prevent people commemorating Kalan-ta in the years following his death.

Jonas Klemanas, present at the commemorative events, told how Soviet security would begin preventi-ve vigilance early as April every year between Kalanta’s death and Lithuania’s independence, ”I remember how every time the Soviet authorities would start ‘celebra-ting’. As early as April, you would know that the Kalanta anniversary was approaching as militia officers would emerge to patrol and go everywhere in threes. These were internal army soldiers dressed in militia uniforms. And that would repeat a year after year,” Klemanas said.

Kalanta was posthumously awarded with a First De-gree Grand Cross of the Order of the Cross of Vytis.

Photo by Respublika