The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

	Congress won’t spare guilty: Virbhadra Tribune Reporters Kulu, February 19 “The Dhumal government is breathing its last and that is why Mr Dhumal and other BJP leaders have been using tactics of character assassination,” Mr Virbhadra Singh, former Chief Minister, said here today while addressing a hurriedly called press conference. Mr Virbhadra Singh denied protecting the Congress rebel in the Kulu assembly constituency. He said the misunderstanding was being created by the Independent candidate, who had been expelled from the Congress, adding that it was false and concocted. The former Chief Minister said the accumulation of property by Mr Dhumal and his sons and relatives reflected a clear indication of the corrupt practices adopted during the past five years by the BJP government. He said the Congress would make inquiries to all corrupt practices, without prejudice, during the past five years and the guilty would be penalised. Mr Virbhadra Singh later addressed a workers’ meeting at Katrain. He called upon party workers to work for the victory of Mr Raj Krishan Gaur, the nominee of the Congress. HAMIRPUR: All-India Youth Congress chief Randeep Singh Surjewala on Wednesday dubbed the BJP as the mainstream of corruption in Himachal Pradesh. Talking to reporters here, he said the ending of corruption from society would be the main plank of the Congress. Mr Surjewala said there was an increase in the activities of militants in Jammu and Kashmir and other parts of the country since the NDA government led by Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee took charge. He blasted the Central Government for its inept handling of the situation created by Pakistan on the border. It was the result of the failure of Indian intelligence agencies, he added. SHIMLA: Mr Anand Sharma, spokesperson of the All-India Congress Committee, on Wednesday said Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi had no moral right to talk of constitutional propriety as he had miserably failed to perform dharma during riots in his state. Addressing a press conference here, he said it was shocking that a Chief Minister, during whose regime all constitutional provisions were thrown to the winds, was preaching others to respect constitutional authority. He expressed surprise over Mr Modi's claim that Gujarat had attracted foreign investment running into thousands of crores and said the fact was that there had been an exodus of industries from the state. The Congress spokesperson claimed that an anti-BJP wave was sweeping the state and the statement of Mr Dhumal that there could be a post-poll alliance with the HVC only confirmed this.
	Modi blames Cong for nation’s ills Tribune Reporters Hamirpur, February 19 Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi today criticised the Congress for its failure to deal with terrorism in Jammu and Kashmir and to extend a helping hand to the government on this issue. Addressing an election rally at Matten Sidh in the district, he said the election plank of the Congress regarding terrorism was hallow as it was mainly responsible for the spurt in terrorist activities in India. He claimed that the NDA government at the Centre, led by Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, had done a lot to deal with the situation. Braving inclement weather, the crowd listened to BJP leaders. Mr Modi came four hours late. Till then, other leaders addressed the gathering and listed the achievements of the BJP governments at the Centre and in the state. Mr Modi tried to raise the sentiments of the people by giving them a call to reject the Congress as it was responsible for all ills the nation was facing. He came down heavily on Congress leaders for their ‘nefarious acts’ during the Gujarat elections. SOLAN: Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modion Wednesday questioned the Punjab Chief Minister and his two ministerial colleagues allegedly involved in a sex scandal in Gujarat to make public the person who had borne the expenses of their boarding, lodging and travel for their Ahmedabad trip undertaken in December last in the wake of Assembly elections. Mr Modi was talking to mediapersons during a brief halt here today. Launching a scathing attack on the morality of the Punjab ministers, he asked them whether the trips were funded by an individual or borne by the state Congress committee, the All-India Congress Committee or the Punjab Congress. He also questioned the ministers as to why they had not booked rooms in the hotels under their own names. SHIMLA: Mr Pramod Mahajan, General Secretary of the BJP, said on Wednesday that infighting and presence of rebels would not harm the party's electoral prospects as its main rival, the Congress, had been more severely affected by the malaise. Talking to newsmen here, he said he could not claim that infighting had been contained altogether but the ground reality was that the Congress had more potential rebels in field than the BJP. Moreover, there were some other players in the field like the HVC, the BSP and the NCP to dent the Congress vote. In the nutshell, the BJP would be the net gainer. Infighting and the rebels apart, there were some positive factors working in favour of the party. There was no discontent among the influential sections like the employees and apple growers who usually turned against it as and when it came to power in the past. It was, however, the performance of the Dhumal Government and the liberal financial support given to it by the Vajpayee Government which would count the most with the electorate.
	Keep watch on Capt, aides: Badal Tribune News Service and UNI Nalagarh, February 19 SAD President Parkash Singh Badal today asked the people of Himachal Pradesh to keep a close watch on the activities of the Punjab Chief Minister, his colleagues and aides during their campaign sorties in this state. Quoting frontpage headlines from an English daily, which spoke of the Punjab ministers “indulging in soft Hindutava and hard sex’’ during their Gujarat trip, Mr Badal said the presence of Capt Amarinder Singh’s ministers in Himachal posed a serious danger to the honour, morality and social fabric of the hill state, which had been famous for its high moral standards. Mr Badal was addressing an election rally at Banua village in the Nalagarh constituency of Solan district in support of Sikh BJP candidate, Hari Narain Singh. Referring to the sleaze scandal involving two Punjab ministers during the Gujarat election campaign, the former Punjab Chief Minister stated that such reports were a matter of serious concern in this hill state where people were highly religious. The Akali leader also decried the manner in which the Congress here, with “a liberal dose of hateful propaganda’’, had tried to create tension between the brotherly states of Punjab and Himachal. “No Punjab leader should have said anything that could reflect adversely on the honour and dignity of the people of Himachal like Capt Amarinder Singh has been doing by making derogatory remarks against Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal,’’ Mr Badal said. Referring to the Congress manifesto for the Himachal elections, Mr Badal said the Congress treated its manifestoes as mere traps to lure the innocent people. “Once they come to power, they treat these manifestoes as worse than toilet papers. He referred to the Congress manifesto for the 2002 elections in Punjab, saying that the party had gone back on all its commitments to the people there. The Congress had promised to continue with free electricity to farmers, to double the amount of “Shagun scheme” for Dalits, triple the old-age pension, a bonus of Rs 30 per quintal on paddy, an increase in free domestic electricity to Dalit families from 50 to 150 units and a special stipend for the unemployed, but all these promises faded away after the Congress came to power in Punjab, Mr Badal said. Shimla: The Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), on Wednesday extended support to the BJP in the February 26 Himachal Pradesh Assembly elections, but refused to accept the result as a mandate against the economic reform policies of the NDA government and the BJP's fresh push to Hindutva. This was announced here today by the party Secretary-General and Union Chemicals and Fertilisers Minister Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa at a press conference. Mr Dhindsa said Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh had spoilt relations between the people of Himachal Pradesh and Punjab through unnecessary intervention in the politics of the hill state. Mr Dhindsa said the governments of the two states had taken many initiatives for joint ventures in the power sector, but the relations were allowed to be worsened by the Punjab Chief Minister. He said the Punjab Chief Minister and his ministerial colleagues Partap Singh Bajwa and Amarjit Singh Samra had brought disrepute to the entire Sikh community through their "escapades" in Gujarat.
	FACTORS AT PLAY Mudslinging unlimited A.S. Prashar Tribune News Service MANDI: Mass issues and problems like poverty, unemployment, health and education concerning the common man of Himachal Pradesh have been overshadowed by the campaign of sleaze, slander and mudslinging unleashed against each other by the two main contenders for power, the BJP and the Congress, in the run-up to the assembly elections. While the no-holds-barred drive for soliciting votes appears destined to go down as the dirtiest in the electoral history of the state, BJP leaders here say the first shot was fired by the Punjab Chief Minister, Amarinder Singh. It was he who tried to convert the elections into tug-of-war between the Punjab Congress and the Himachal Pradesh Chief Minisrter, Prem Kumar Dhumal. Raids on Mr Dhumal’s properties at Jalandhar, newspaper advertisements and remarks that Mr Dhumal had migrated from Punjab to rule Himachal Pradesh have evoked a strong reaction from the BJP. ‘‘Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones at others,’’ was the warning given by Mr Dhumal during an interaction with the media at Chandigarh’s Press Club about two weeks ago. He was asked to respond to the advertisement blizkrieg targeting the administrative corruption in Himachal Pradesh in general and Mr Dhumal in particular unleashed by the media managers of the Punjab Chief Minister. They had launched a similar campaign against the SAD-BJP alliance during the Punjab elections last year, throwing it totally on the defensive. The SAD-BJP alliance eventually lost in the elections. Capt Amarinder Singh’s media managers are obviously keen on repeating the feat in Himachal Pradesh too. Only the time will tell if they are successful or not. But the events that have unfolded since Mr Dhumal’s warning have shown that it is not an empty threat. The BJP is no mood take it lying down. The BJP has hit back with a vengeance by targeting the Punjab Chief Minister, his Cabinet colleagues and bureaucrats. BJP leader Madan Lal Khurana attacked Capt Amarinder Singh for his allegedly questionable relations with a woman pilot and released in Chandigarh photographs of the two standing together. Another episode at Panchkula involving a senior bureaucrat known to be close to Capt Amarinder Singh and the wife of a top bureaucrat has also come in handy for the propaganda mills of the BJP. They have been alleging that Capt Amarinder Singh had been promoting a culture of ‘‘leisure and pleasure’’ in Punjab, which had to be stopped in Himachal Pradesh. The registration of a case involving two Punjab ministers and an MLA in Ahmedabad in a call girl sex scandal, which has sent shock waves in both Punjab and Himachal Pradesh, has to be seen in this context. Capt Amarinder Singh has lept to the defence to his ministers, who have lost no time in filing a suit for damages against the Gujarat government. The campaign of mutual mudslinging may or may not yield the desired results for the two parties. But it has certainly left the common disgusted, besides a host of law suits which will be fought between the political leaders of the two states in Chandigarh, Shimla and Ahmedabad.
	FACTORS AT PLAY Rebels may hit BJP, Cong fortunes Prabhjot Singh and Chander Shekhar Sharma HAMIRPUR: Feeling “slighted” over various issues, including distribution of party tickets, rebels, especially those owing allegiance to ‘Mitra Milan’, may upset the applecart of not only the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), but also of the Congress in various assembly segments of the Hamirpur parliamentary constituency. Of the five assembly constituencies in the district, the BJP faces, besides the Congress, its own strong rebels in three. The Congress faces the BJP as well as its dissenters in two constituencies, making the contests interesting and absorbing. Since no political party will “tolerate indiscipline during the trial of its political strength”, almost all rebels have been thrown out by the parties concerned on the charges of “indiscipline” for varying periods. Interestingly, the rebels have taken the fight not only to the streets, but also to the families of the candidates. For example, in Hamirpur, Ms Urmil Thakur faces her own brother-in-law, Mr Narinder Thakur (‘Mitra Milan’), besides facing a tough challenge from her neighbour and traditional rival, Ms Anita Verma of the Congress. Interestingly, both the ‘Mitra Milan’ chief, Mr Kamal Nanda, and Chief Minister, Mr Dhumal, come from this district. In 1998, it had returned all five BJP candidates. “The party now faces an uphill task in repeating the 1998 performance,” claims one of the party activists now working for ‘Mitra Milan’ candidate, Thakur Raghubir Singh from the adjoining Nadaun constituency. Mr Babu Ram Mundayal, a trusted lieutenant of Mr Dhumal, has been locked in a tough quadrangular contest. “We are fighting to get Mr Mundayal, Ms Urmil Thakur, Mr Baldev Sharma and Mr Dhumal defeated in this district,” says Mr Kamal Nanda claiming that “60 to 80 per cent of the party cadre is with them. Mr Nanda admits that he has had talks both with Congress and HVC leaders after all efforts for a patch-up with the BJP leadership failed. What makes the contest at Nadaun interesting is that it is not only the BJP which has a strong rebel to fight within its cadre and vote bank, but the Congress, too, has a strong rebel in Mr Prabhat Chaudhary, a Bangalore-based silver merchant. He is opposing Mr Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu, a former Youth leader and councillor from Shimla. Mr Prabhat Chaudhary is expected to garner a substantial “Chaudhary vote” in the constituency. In Nadhaunta, while Mr Rattan Singh Rana is the ‘Mitra Milan’ candidate while Mr Manjit Singh Dogra is the rebel Congress candidate. Besides the rebels, a number of local factors have been at play. These include allegations of nepotism, favouritism and bribery, both in recruitments and transfers. For example, in the Nadaun area, the major complaint of the people has been that only those who close to the BJP MLA have been given jobs in the Kangra Cooperative Bank. Nearly 200 posts in the bank were filled during the past couple of years. The BJP MLA from Nadaun has been the chairman of the bank.
	FACTORS AT PLAY Rebels may tilt the scales Rakesh Lohumi Tribune News Service SHIMLA: While corruption and development have emerged as the major issues, it is the rebel factor which may tilt the scales for the two main contenders, the BJP and the Congress, in the 17 Assembly segments falling under the Shimla parliamentary constituency. Rebles of the two parties have entered the fray in as many as 13 seats and some of them may even reach the winning post. For instance, Mr Rakesh Verma (Independent) is well ahead of his BJP and Congress rivals in the Theog seat. Similarly, in the Chopal Assembly segment, Mr Subash Manglait, (Independent), a PhD from Panjab University and son of influential spiritual guru — Koti Maharaji — along with Mr Arun Bhandari, a Congress rebel, has made the contest quadrangular. Dr Subash Manglait is growing strong in the Neoal-Tikri area of the constituency and is giving sleepless nights to the Congress and the BJP. In Kasumpti, it is again Congress rebel Sohan Lal, who is giving the Congress and BJP candidates a run for their money. Another Congress rebel, Dr Pramod Sharma, is trying to queer the pitch for Mrs Vidya Stokes, the pradesh Congress committee chief in Kumarsain. In Solan district, BJP rebels are calling the shots while for the Solan seat, the main contest is between Mr Mohinder Sofat and Dr Rajiv Bindal, the rebel and official candidates of the BJP, respectively, Mr Lakhwinder Rana, another BJP rebel, is posing a serious challenge to the BJP nominee, Mr Hari Narain Singh, and Rana Sukriti of the Congress. In Arki, both parties are facing rebels. Mr Ram Pal is in the field as a BJP rebel and Mr Gurdev as a Congress rebel, Mrs Vinod Chandel, a Congress rebel, has entered the fray as the Him Loktantrik Morcha candidate. In adjoining Sirmaur district again, it is the BJP which is liely to suffer more because of rebels. Mr Jagat Singh is challenging the official BJP candidate in Shillai and Mr Surinder Banolta in Pacchad. In Renuka, Mr Mohan Lal Azad, originally of the BJP, has entered the fray as the Lok Janshakti candidate. In Paonta Sahib, Mr Karnesh Jang, another Congress rebel, is also contesting as the Lok Janshakti nominee. Besides the rebel factor, which is, in fact, a reflection of the ongoing intense factional fight in the BJP and the Congress, factors like unemployment are also weighing in in minds of the electorate, particularly the youth in Solan and Sirmaur districts. The fact that both chief ministerial candidates of the Congress, Mr Virbhadra Singh and Mrs Vidya Stokes, are from Shimla goes in favour of the Congress. While there is no discontent among apple growers against the BJP like previous elections, the ginger growers of Sirmaur are unhappy with the BJP. They allege that the party had done nothing to help those affected with the virtual wipeout of the areas of the only cash crop. While development is a positive factor in favour of the BJP, particularly in the interior areas of Shimla and Sirmaur districts, its unequal distribution had also caused reaction among those denied the benefit.
	HVC not to support Cong, BJP Our Correspondent Bilaspur, February 19 HVC chief and Rajya Sabha MP Anil Sharma has declared that the HVC was all set to win at least 35 seats and HVC supremo Sukh Ram was bound to become the next Chief Minister of Himachal. Addressing a largely attended HVC election rally at Malokhar, about 45 km from here, last evening, Mr Anil Sharma criticised Chief Minister P.K. Dhumal for his “betrayal” of the HVC though the party supported his government for full five years. Even if the HVC did not get a majority of its own, it would not now give support either to the BJP or the Congress to form a government but seek support from other like-minded parties in an attempt to keep Mr Virbhadra Singh and Prof P.K. Dhumal out of the race for the post of Chief Minister. Mr Anil Sharma declared that if people of Kotkehloor elected Krishan Kumar Kaushal, who is fighting on the HVC ticket, he would certainly be made a minister in next Himachal Government.



	Leopards keep campaigners at bay Tribune News Service HAMIRPUR: It is not only inclement weather but also the fear of leopards that has been putting the brakes on campaigning for the February 26 Assembly poll in some parts of the hill state. Hamirpur is a known leopard-infested area where, according to the 1997 Census conducted by the Department of Wildlife, as many as 100 of these dreaded carnivores had been spotted. Since the town has a large floating population, it gets virtually deserted in the evenings. “Other day I was returning to Hamirpur from a nearby village before I was confronted by a leopard. I was on my scooter. Though I switched on the lights, it did not move. I was just 25 minutes away from my home. But since the leopard refused to get up from the road, I had to go back to the village I was returning from and spend the night there,” recalls Mr Bhupinder Thakur, husband of BJP candidate from Hamirpur Urmil Thakur. If the applications received for compensation are any indication, these leopards have been striking both human and animal populations at regular intervals. For example, in the first eight weeks of the current calendar year, 13 cases of attacks on humans and 33 on domestic animals, including cattle, by these carnivores have been reported in the district. Mr R.C. Bargal, Divisional Wildlife Commissioner, however, maintains that though the fresh Census could not be undertaken last year, the population of leopards in the Hamirpur area is more or less the same as it was five years ago. “Fortunately, there are no maneaters in the area. These carnivores attack human beings and their domestic animals only after dusk and in areas close to the forests,” he said. According to information gathered by The Tribune, in the year 2000-2001, nine humanbeings were injured in attacks by leopards and they were paid Rs 16,875 as compensation. The officials explain that both Union and state governments have fixed norms for grant of compensation to the victims of leopard attacks. For example in the case of killing of a man or a woman by a leopard, a compensation of Rs 1 lakh is given to next of kin of the deceased. In the case of grievous injury, compensation is Rs 33,000. For minor injuries, it is Rs 1875. Similarly, in case of domestic animals, compensation is more in case they are attacked or killed while being tethered in their sheds and less if these are attacked in the wild. For example, a cow at home would get its owner Rs 2500 as compensation while if it gets killed in the wild, the owner is entitled to a maximum compensation of Rs 1,500. The Department of Forests and Wildlife disbursed Rs 1,48, 125 in 2000-2001 and Rs 60,217 in 2001-2002. Both election managers and voters are not taking any chances with leopards and prefer to end electioneering before it gets dark. They do not start until daylight breaks out. The problem is more in rural and remote areas than in bigger towns like Hamirpur. In some of the smaller towns, people prefer to lock themselves in even before dusk. In case they have to move out, they keep torches or lamps with them to keep leopards away.