The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Thursday, July 12, 2001,
Chandigarh, India

M A I N N E W S

Dhawan expelled from Congress
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, July 11
The Chandigarh Territorial Congress Committee (CTCC) virtually split today with the expulsion of AICC member, Harmohan Dhawan from the party by the Congress high command.

According to sources, Mr Dhawan was expelled from the party for anti-party activities. Mr Dhawan had been attacking the local party leadership for a long time but his recent utterances against the Congress chief, Ms Sonia Gandhi, seemed to have hastened his expulsion from the party.

It may be recalled that Mr Dhawan was served a show-cause notice by the AICC late last month. Though Mr Dhawan replied to the notice, he chose to attack Ms Gandhi and her coterie at a press conference a couple of days ago.

The party had taken a serious view of the formation of the “non-political” Chandigarh Vikas Manch by Mr Dhawan a few months ago. Similarly, the “gherao” of the Mayor and the Senior Deputy Mayor, both Congressmen, the boycott of a rally addressed by AICC general secretary, Mohsina Kidwai, besides the returning of party flags to AICC treasurer, Moti Lal Vora, were viewed as anti-party activities by the party high command for which he was issued the show-cause notice.

Mr Dhawan had joined the Congress over two years ago just before the Lok Sabha polls and had played a major role in the victory of the local MP, Mr Pawan Bansal. He had maintained his support base in the elections held before the 1999 Lok Sabha poll.

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Punjab, Haryana for strengthening panchayats
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 11
Punjab today said it was not in favour of divesting the duly elected Gram Panchayats of its powers by any other direct or indirect way and that a parallel setup would be against the spirit of the Constitution.

The Haryana Chief Minister, Mr Om PrakashChautala and Union Rural Development Minster Mr M.Venkaiah Naidu at the Conference of State Ministers of Panchayati Raj in New Delhi on Wednesday.

Haryana Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala and Union Rural Development Minster M. Venkaiah Naidu at the conference of State Ministers of Panchayati Raj in New Delhi on Wednesday.

Haryana too came out in support of strengthening the Panchayati institutions with Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala announcing grant-in-aid of Rs 8 lakh to those Panchayati Raj institutions (PRIs) and Zila Parishads whose performance was outstanding. He said a grant-in-aid of Rs 5 lakh would be given to the Panchayat Samitis and Rs 50,000 to Gram Panchayats to enable them to undertake developmental work.

The view of Punjab and Haryana came at a national conference of Panchayati State Ministers here which was inaugurated by Rural Development Minister M.Venkaiah Naidu. Mr Naidu said the states should consider giving a five-year term to Panchayati Raj Institutions to ensure a definite time frame for devolution of powers and funds to local bodies.

“The states should consider giving a fixed term of five years to all Panchayati Raj Institutions and like the Lok Sabha, Panchayat bodies should go to polls before completion of five years,” he added.

Mr Nirmal Singh Kahlon, Minister for Rural Development and Panchayats, greeting Mr M. Venkaiah Naidu, Union Minister for Rural Development, at the conference. Mr Sujjan Singh, Minister of State for Panchayati Raj, is also seen in the picture.

Punjab’s Minister for Rural Development and Panchayats, Mr S.Nirmal Singh Kahlon, said the state government was fully committed to installing all the three tiers of the Panchayati Raj system in the state.

He said Gram Panchayats should be given due representation in the constitution of Panchayat Samities and Zila Parishads by way of direct and indirect election to these bodies.

Saying that unless all the three Fs — Functions, Functionaries and Funds — were transferred in one go to the Panchayati Raj Institutions, the result was difficult to be achieved. He said in Punjab many functions had been transferred but a lot was yet to be done.

He informed the meeting that the Punjab Government would constitute district planning committees under the control of the Department of Rural Development and Panchayats within a month or so.

Mr Kahlon said there should be unanimity on reducing government control over Panchayati Raj Institutions. The possibility of setting up an independent quasi-judicial hierarchy to take care of complaints against elected representatives should also be considered, he added.

He felt the Centre could work out a uniform frame-work in this regard which could be considered by the state governments.

Mr Chautala pointed out that Haryana had ranked second in the country as 95.49 per cent of the funds were utilised during the year 2000-2001 under Centrally-sponsored rural development schemes.

He said the Haryana Government was in favour of decentralisation of power and the powers being given to the Panchayati Raj Institutions should be monitored from time to time. In this regard he spelt out the steps taken by his government.

Apart from giving financial assistance to Panchayati Raj Institutions, Mr Chautala said it had also been decided to transfer administrative control of those departments to PRIs which were directly related to the rural area. The administrative and financial control of primary schools had already been transferred to PRIs since April 1, 2001.

Mr Naidu said functional and financial decentralisation by the states reflected only a minimum devolution of powers and it was imperative that the devolution of powers was not delayed any further.