4 TIMES CITY * THE TIMES OF INDIA, CHENNAI

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 2016

100m link holds up Maduravoyal project THE S-FILES

Company Looks At Website Optimisation For Businesses
`56cr Sewage
A Prathap
that there are electricity was completed in 2014. Pipeli-

Project In
posts and water pipelines un-
derneath the road.
Jeevanandham said, The
piece of land changed many
nes have been laid on either
ends of the road at Dasari
Padma Nagar.
On the southern side of
Using data analytics to
Limbo For 2 Yrs
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
hands since 1896 before I fi-
nally bought it in 2011from Vi-
jay Shanthi Builders. They
said the road was never a pub-
the road, pipelines have been
laid across the stretch pas-
sing through Krishnamacha-
ri Nagar, Natesan Nagar, Sri-
track consumer behaviour
Chennai: A 100m road rema- lic road. The 100m stretch is devi Nagar and Rukmani Na- Pic:A Prathap

ins the missing link in the su- no longer used as an access gar. On the northern side, Aparna.Desikan@
spended `56-crore undergro- road by residents in the three work has been completed timesgroup.com

und sewerage project at Ma-
duravoyal, where the local co-
uncillor has stopped work,
claiming that he bought the
stretch of land five years ago.
Challenging the claim, resi-
dents of Maduravoyal went to
the Madras high court but li-
tigation has left the project in
a limbo for last two years. Mo-
re than 20,000 families will ha-
ve to deal with overflowing
septic tanks yet again this
Time to amend In cases of drunk driving,
ROADBLOCK: The road in Dasari Padma Nagar which has stalled work
monsoon.
Maduravoyal councillor E
Jeevanandham said he bo-
ught 2.3 acres in Dasari Pad-
ma Nagar, which encloses the
30-feet wide road. Maduravo-
yal resident S Narayanan,
who filed the case against Jee-
vanandham, stated in his affi-
davit, The 30-feet road is in
existence for the past 30 ye-
ars. It was maintained by Ma-
duravoyal Town Panchayat
and Maduravoyal Municipa-
lity and now by Chennai Cor-
poration. He further stated
adjoining streets. Maduravo-
yal Residents Federation
president said, The council-
lor who owns the adjacent
plot has now cordoned off the
public road by digging pits
and laying construction de-
bris all around.
Work on laying undergro-
und pipeline for sewage dis-
posal at Maduravoyal began
after sanction in 2009, follo-
wing which most of the work
from Seemathamman Nagar
to Karthikeyan Nagar. All
that remains is the missing
link which will connect the
pipeline from either end.
Jeevanandham said, Op-
position parties are targeting
me to bring disrepute to my
party. Some of the residents
are acting on their behalf. I
am ready to give up the piece
of land if the corporation of-
fers me a fair compensation.
W
ebsite optimi-
sation has
been around
fo r n e a rly
eight years, but startup
Zargets USP has been its
real-time analysis of con-
sumer behaviour.
The differentiation we
provide is that we eliminate
screenshots and track
each step of the web- The
site users through a startup was
chrome plug-in and founded by 3
the inputs come in former Zoho
ADOBE FOR MARKETING
employees
real time, as the web-
site runs, says Par-
Tracks heat maps which indicate user reaction to a website
thiban, CEO, Zarget. Other
ways to track user behav- Founders | Incorporated | Initial Capital |

Arbitration Act passengers can be charged too TIMES NEWS NETWORK

iour could be through
screenshots, which may not
be dynamic, he adds.
E x - Z o h o e m p l o ye e s
Naveen
Venkatesan,
Arvind
Parthiban and
2015

Manish.Raj@timesgroup.com
Chennai: Taking advantage of
some provisions of the Arbit-
ration and Conciliation Act,
some multinational compani-
es are incorporating an Indian
subsidiary company with a sti-
pulation in the contract that
the venue of arbitration, in ca-
se of a dispute, will be in a fore-
ign country and foreign laws
will apply. This provides them
with leverage vis-a-vis Indian
companies, said Justice Hulu-
vadi G Ramesh, recently, spea-
king at the two-day conference
on Challenges in Domestic
and International Arbitra-
tion.
Because of national and in-
ternational disputes, the Uni-
ted Nations Commission on In-
ternational Trade Law (UN-
CITRAL) adopted the UNIC-
TRAL model law on
international commercial ar-
bitration in 1985. Eleven years
later, the Indian parliament
enacted the Arbitration and
Conciliation Act, 1996. This
was amended on October 23,
2015 by Arbitration and Conci-
liation (Amendment) Ordi-
nance, which subsequently be-
came an Act. On many occa-
sions when one of the compa-
nies was from India and the
other from abroad, the foreign
company imposed a condition
in the contract that the arbitra-
tion would occur in a foreign
country under foreign laws.
This led to huge expenditure
by Indian companies. This was
because one of the sections
(Section 20) of the Act was un-
fortunately worded in such a
wide language to even permit
two Indian parties to agree that
arbitration can be outside, he
said, adding, Section 28 gave
an impression that Indian par-
ties executing an agreement in
India have a choice to agree
that the place of arbitration co-
uld be outside the country.
Taking advantage of the
two provisions, some MNCs
incorporated an Indian subsi-
diary and then stipulated in
the contract that the venue of
arbitration will be outside In-
dia, and foreign laws will app-
lyeven though the entire
contract is implemented in In-
dia without any foreign ele-
ment, said Justice Ramesh.
This necessitated correcting
the ambiguity in law, he added.
Underscoring the lacunae
in the amendment act, Justice
Ramesh further said the new
law had removed the presence
of time limit adding to the de-
lay in dispute resolution.
Chennai: If the driver of yo-
ur car is drunk and has cau-
sed a fatal accident, the law
says you can be booked with
the same charges as the dri-
ver as well as an extra char-
ge: Section 109 of the Indian
Penal Code which deals with
abetting a crime. The Chen-
nai Traffic Police say that
the passenger is abetting the
crime even if he is not di-
rectly committing it.
While advocates specia-
lising in road accidents say
that this is not fair as the
passenger was not the one
behind the wheel, in the la-
test incident involving na-
tional racing champion Vi-
kas Anand and his friend T
Charankumar, both have be-
en charged with culpable ho-
micide not amounting to
murder. The car was owned
by Charan. Even if he was
not driving the car, he had
the knowledge that his fri-
end was drunk and this co-
uld lead to accidents, said
advocate at the Madras high
court V Kannadasan.
T Charankumar, in his
bail petition to the traffic po-
lice, said he was innocent as
he was not driving. The pe-
titioner submits that he is
In a recent incident where the driver crashed a Porsche into a line of
autos, both the driver and the passenger have been charged
innocent of the alleged of-
fence and he did not drive
the car and the car was dri-
ven by his friend Anand Vi-
kas and he was only the co-
passenger, read the peti-
tion.
In a similar accident in
February, both the driver
and passenger Moham-
mad Safiq and Mohammad
Farook were arrested for
culpable homicide not amo-
unting to murder when the-
ir car rammed a two-whee-
ler while traveling at a high
speed. While TOI couldnt
reach the accidents investi-
gative officer for a comment,
an officer at the Anna Squa-
re police station where the
case was registered said:
The passenger was fully
aware of the fact that his fri-
end was drunk and still let
him drive the car. He should
be held equally responsib-
le.
Ideally, the passenger
should be let off with a war-
ning a warning at best file
a case of abetment, say lawy-
ers. What if the driver of a
call taxi was drunk and you
were a passenger?, asked
another advocate at the
Madras high court V S Su-
resh. The police should
thoroughly investigate the
circumstances and file the
chargesheet accordingly,
he added.
Naveen Venkatesan, Arvind
Parthiban and Santhosh
Kumar started the company
in early 2015 to provide in-
sights on consumer behav-
iour for e-commerce sites.
Bonding over weekend
cricket matches, they dis-
cussed solutions to prob-
lems they had faced during
their Zoho stint.
These discussions led to
forming Osmnez, which
was later renamed Zarget.
The fledgling startup
had the unusual distinction
of having two global ven-
ture capitalists Matrix
and Accel Partners ex-
press interest and sign term
sheets within two months
of its inception.
Having worked in Zoho
for 10 years, we had plans of
bootstrapping, but the in-
vestment was a surprise
and we ended up spending
close to `15 lakh to set up.
Although we had other play-
ers participating, Accel and
Matrix had done a thorough
background analysis that
gave us the confidence to
accept their fund-
ing,Parthiban said.
Including the investment
from Girish Mathr ub-
Santhosh
Kumar
h o o t h a m s F re s h d e s k ,
Zarget went onto raise `10
crore in seed funding.
The startup analyses
data like heat maps, which
indicate the way users react
to the website.
Zarget also uses AB test-
ing to track data on usage
of various versions of the
website and funnel analy-
sis, which gives insights
into what makes the cus-
tomers interested in buying
a product. Such techniques
help the startup increase
the conversion rate at e-
commerce, marketing and
SAAS agencies.
Parthiban recalls
launching the SAAS tool in
Product Hunt in December
2015, which proved to be a
hit with close to 2,000
signups.
The company, which had
six ex-Zoho employees at its
inception, has grown into a
team of 40.
Taking inspiration
from Zoho, which is among
the market leaders in soft-
ware products, we aspire to
PRESENCE
15 lakh
Clients | 100
paying customers
including
INDIA, US FreshDesk,
AND BRAZIL
91 mobiles
become leaders in the mar-
keting category, he said.
We now have close to 100
paying clients and 1,000
websites using Zargets
tool. Freshdesk and 91 mo-
biles are among our promi-
nent users, who are based
out of India, US and Bra-
zil, he added.
Using Zarget, weve
made tweaks that have
helped boost sign-up by 26%
in three days, says Shihab
Muhammed, business head,
Freshdesk.
Outlining immediate
plans, he adds that in an-
other year, the company
would later go on to person-
alise the website using arti-
ficial intelligence based on
user experience.
With optimisations and
tools to increase conver-
sions on websites, Par-
thiban envisions Zarget
would become the Adobe for
marketing.
(This series
captures the start-up
ecosystem in the state)

R Ramesh Shankar
CITY LIGHTS

C'est la vie
A bunch of youngsters enjoying the first
metro rail trip from Little Mount to the
airport were buzzing with excitement
during the journey as they had heard that
the line runs very close to the airports
runway. As the train drew closer, they got
their mobiles out and waited for the runway
to appear. There was a flurry of activity
when a coastguard plane was spotted
gliding down. The kids kept clicking
pictures and also switched on the video
mode. As they crowded near the window,
the train suddenly dipped into a tunnel. The
sightseers were left dumbfounded at the
unfairness of it all.
- V Ayyappan
Something's fishy
Roadside fish vendors near Jayalakshmi
theatre bus stop in Adambakkam were a
worried lot on Sunday morning, after an
Amma Canteen was opened there.
Apparently, an official had suggested that
they relocate since their presence would
inconvenience customers of the canteen.
Why should I shift? a woman vendor
asked. I have been selling fish here for over
20 years while the Amma Canteen has just
arrived, she said, as one of her customers
nodded in agreement. This amma has
been plying her trade here for ages. If
UPROOTED: A tree that has fallen into a pond in Eshwaran Kovil Street in Okkiyam
anyone should move, it is the other Amma,
he declared. - Salil Jose
Having the last laugh
Although Uber passengers can travel to
multiple locations during a trip by changing
the destination on their phone, one driver
clearly doesn't want to lose out on the
minimum fare that a new trip would fetch.
During a trip starting from R A Puram, my
friend and I asked him to stop in Nandanam
for a moment and then head to Adyar. He,
however, insisted that it was a 'point-to-
point' drop service only. I stayed calm and
decided to change the destination on my
Where old vehicles go to die
NOT IN OUR BACKYARD
Invisible
pavement
M any pavements are oc-
cupied by vendors and
used as parking lots by vehi-
cles, leaving little or no space
for pedestrians. One such
stretch is South Avenue Road,
Ambattur Industrial Estate,
which houses showrooms of
phone as soon as we reached Nandanam so major car companies and ser-
vice stations on either side.
that he would be forced to take us to Adyar.
But he outsmarted us by ending the trip just Vehicles are parked on either
before reaching Nandanam and asking us
to get off. When I threatened to complain, GATHERING RUST: These scrap vehicles have been dumped near the Perambur BSNL community
side of the road and the pave-
ment is not even visible most
he was unfazed. My friend tried booking centre and quarters for nearly four years. This is a residential area and they are encroaching on of the time. Will the authori-
another Uber cab but our tryst with him public space besides being an eyesore. We hope the authorities take action to clear the vehicles ties act to ensure that pedes-
was not yet over. He kept on accepting the soon- Murali Mohan trians are not inconve-
trip request since he was nearby, only to nienced?
turn us down subsequently. Fortunately,
another Uber driver accepted our next OVERT VIOLATION: The CAUGHT IN THE ACT K VASUDEVAN | Ambattur
request. We complained to Ubers customer storm water canals on
care and got a full refund. For a free Uber either side of the
Chennai
Public nuisance
trip, all you need is a rude driver and
endless patience!
- Rashmika Majumdar
Bypass Road between
Mogappair West and A lorry seized by the police
department (P5 police
station, MKB Nagar) two
Maduravoyal are being
misused by people who years back has been parked

5cr are eligible to vote in civic polls
From P 1
body polls in rural areas. For urban
areas, 75,933 electronic voting ma-
Power shutdown illegally let out raw opposite our flat at M13, Cen-
tral Avenue, Vyasarpadi. The
sewage water from
Power supply will be suspended in the following space between our compound
tankers. We request the
areas on Tuesday between 9am and 2pm.
concerned authorities to wall and lorry is being used
CIT Nagar: Model Hutment Rd, 1to 6th cross St, 2nd cover the open canal and as a public convenience for

A total of 13,362 chiefs of rural lo-

cal bodies and 1,328 chiefs of ur-
ban local bodies will be elected by
ward councillors and other directly
elected members through indirect
polls on this day.
Elections will be held in 91,098
polling booths across the state. Of
these, 62,337 booths are in rural ar-
eas and 28,671booths in urban areas.
The Greater Chennai Corporation
will have 5,531polling booths. A total
of 5.80 crore people are eligible to
vote in the direct polls held across
Tamil Nadu for various local bodies.
The state election commission
will use 2,17,500 ballot boxes for local
chines (EVMs) will be used.
"Around 12,000 EVMs have been
brought in from Orissa. Around
6,000 jumbo ballot boxes will be
brought from Andhra Pradesh by
our team shortly," Seetharaman
said.
He said that 664 election officers
and 1,836 assistant election officers
would be posted in urban areas. In
rural areas, there will be 907 EOs
and 16,979 AEOs. This is at a rate of
four officers per booth in urban and
seven or eight officers per booth in
rural areas. In total, as many as 6.50
lakh officers will be on poll duty, he
said.
to 5th Main Rd of East CIT Nagar, South West Boag
Rd, Sadullah St, Abdul Aziz
St, Moosa St, South Dhandapani St, Part of VN Rd,
strictly ensure that the
raw sewage water
pedestrians, a bar for drunk-
ards and a hiding place for
anti-social elements. This has
collected by tankers is
Moopparapan St, Canal Bank Rd, Srinivasan St, properly transferred to been brought to the notice of
Gopal St, Siviaji St, Damodaran St, Part of the nearest Metrowater the police department but no
Mannar St, Part of South Usman Rd, Motilal St, sewage treatment plant. action has been taken.
Sarojini St, Ramanathan St, Rameswaram Rd, - Balaji Srinivasan VIJAYAKUMAR SIVALINGAM |
Ranganathan St, Mangair St, Mooparappan St,
Vyasarpadi
Moosa St, Burkit Rd, Dandapani St, Crescent part St,
Jagathesan St, Mylai Ranganathan St, Part of
Thanikachalam Rd, Lotus colony, Nandanam Available on the
Extension 1 to 15 St, Old Tower Black, part of OBSTACLE COURSE NO TAKERS FOR THIS BOX
Chemminars Rd Temple tower Kiviraj Building, EVR App Store
Periyar Building, Anna Salai.
Kolathur: Anjugam Nagar 3,4,6,11th main Rd, Available on
Vetrivel Nagar, 1,2nd St Main Rd, Samdariya Colony Google Play
1,4,5th St, East Mada St, Chelliamman Koil,
Bajanai Koil St, CMWSSB, Ganga Devi Nagar, MN
Nagar, Agatheeswaran Nagar, KS Nagar, Lakshmi
Amman Koil St, Virundali 200 ft Rd One Part,
Thiruvalluvar Nagar, Vivekananda Nagar One Part,
Kadappa Rd One Part.
Nolambur: NNS, HIG, MIG, Chinna Nolambur,
Adayalampet, Kongu Nagar, Mugappair WeSt Block
1 to 8th Block, Rajankuppam, Panneer Nagar,
Mohanaram Nagar, Jaswanth Nagar, Reddy Be A Smart TOI
Palayam Area AIBEA Nagar, Vellar Street, Eri Citizen Reporter
Scheme, Gangai Amman Nagar, Ponniamman Keep mobile phones
Nagar, Keel Ayanambakkam.
GPS on while clicking
Mellur: Mellur, Vallur, Athipattu, Gounderpalayam,
& sending pictures
Subba Reddy Palayam, Nandhiyambakkam, Minjur, STUMBLING BLOCK: This TNEB junction box has been
Kesavapuram, Semapuram, Vanipakkam,
PERILOUS: This manhole cover has been Describe exactly
constructed 12 inches above street level on Lady lying on 4th Street, AE Block, Anna Nagar for more where and when
Siruvakkam, Naloor, Ariyanvoil. than six months. It is a big hurdle on the already
Madhavan Road, on the way to Iyappan temple, in picture was taken,
Perambur Rajaji Nagar: Janagiram Reddy narrow lane. To make matters worse, there is
Mahalingapuram, and is a potential hazard to giving street names
Colony, Nethaji Nagar, Ranga Doss Reddy Colony, sewage work going on in the block and debris is
commuters. Will the authorities concerned look and other locators
Rajaji Nagar (Part), Parthibhan St, Goul St, VV being dumped on the box. I request the authorities
into this? - G P Mohan
nagar (Part). to take note and do the needful - Vinod Nair