M A I N   N E W S

No-trust move defeated in Haryana Assembly
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 31
A motion moved by the entire Opposition in the Haryana Assembly today expressing want of confidence in the state government was defeated by voice vote even as Opposition legislators walked out of the House even before voting.

However, seeing the government lose during the voting was not the objective of the Opposition. Mr Ajay Singh Yadav, Deputy Leader of the Congress, said earlier while participating in the debate that the no confidence motion had been moved so that the Opposition legislators could speak on various issues since the notices for adjournment given by the Opposition legislators to discuss these issues had been rejected by the Speaker.

While making speeches in favour of the motion, Opposition legislators focussed primarily on the Dulina incident and virtually all of them held the police personnel as the main culprits and demanded a probe by the CBI into the incident. Next on the priority list was the Bill passed in the House yesterday regarding setting up of casinos in the state which drew a lot of flak from them. The issue of drought relief also figured in speeches of the Opposition MLAs, some of whom also briefly touched upon the government step of retrenching surplus employees.

The Chief Minister, Mr Om Prakash Chautala, in his reply to the motion, gave a detailed account of the circumstances leading to the incident. The blow by blow account, however, was objected to by Mr Bhajan Lal, MLA and chief of the PCC, who said in view of the probe by the Commissioner ordered by the government, Mr Chautala should refrain from giving a detailed account. Mr Chautala retorted that he could not do otherwise as Mr Dharam Pal, Congress MLA from Gurgaon district ( four out of the five people killed in Dulina belonged to Gurgaon), also made a graphic presentation about how the five people were killed in Dulina.

While turning down the demands for an inquiry by the CBI, Mr Chautala said that family members of the victims from Gurgaon district had already joined the probe by presenting themselves yesterday before the Commissioner who had been entrusted to conduct the probe.

“During Mr Bhajan Lal’s last tenure as the Chief Minister, 25 Dalits were killed but he did not visit the families of any of them”, Mr Chautala alleged. As Mr Bhajan Lal feebly protested, the Speaker, Mr Satbir Singh Kadian, said that the travelling bills of Mr Bhajan Lal could be checked to ascertain this allegation. At this Mr Bhajan Lal was heard saying that he did not claim reimbursements for undertaking such tours.

On the issue of casino, Mr Chautala said that revenue generated from casinos would enable the government avoid imposing more taxes on people. He also challenged the Opposition to prove if he had kept money in any foreign bank and said if the charge was found to be true, 99 per cent of the money could be taken away by the person who would make the discovery.

The Chief Minister said while the state government could not give cash relief to the drought affected farmers since no fund for this purpose had been released by the Centre, the farmers were supplied with more power and more water in the irrigation canals to tide over the crisis.

Earlier, moving the motion, Mr Bhupinder Singh Hooda, CLP leader and the Leader of the Opposition, said that the law and situation in the state had deteriorated drastically and the killing of the five Dalit men was a pointer to this. Mr Hooda said that two days after the incident Mr Chautala had passed by Badshapur, village of four of the men killed at Dulina. But he did not visit their homes and later on when he was asked why he did not meet, his answer was that he did not know about the incident. “If the Chief Minister does not know about such an incident, he had no right to continue as the Chief Minister”, Mr Hooda said.

No benefits for Haryana judges
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 31
Judges working in Haryana will not get benefits recommended by the First National Judicial Pay Commission, popularly known as the Shetty Commission. This became clear after the State Vidhan Sabha unanimously (in the absence of the Opposition) passed an official resolution asking the State Government “not to give effect to the Supreme Court judgement (asking the State Governments to implement the commission’s report) and refer the matter to the Government of India for initiating an appropriate administrative and legal action.

The apex court had directed the states in the All India Judges Association versus Union of India and others case to revise the pay scales of the judges and to give them a residence-cum-library allowance, conveyance facility, rent-free accommodation, 50 per cent concession in electricity and water charges of their residences and to set up a training institute for judicial officers.

The court had also directed that the judicial system should be strengthened by increasing the strength of judges from the existing ratio of 13 judges per 10 lakh people to 50 judges for 10 lakh people. It also directed that the existing vacancies in the subordinate courts should be filled by March 31, 2003.

The resolution said that the additional financial liability on the State Government for implementing the apex court judgement would be Rs 625 crore. The state, it said, was not in a position to meet this expenditure.