R E G I O N A L   B R I E F S

PUNJAB

NEW DIRECTOR: Mr Kulra Singh Brar took over as Director, Regional Research Station, of Punjab Agriculture University, here on Friday.

LUDHIANA
TREKKING: Nine students of SDP College for Women — Anju Chawla, Manju, Jaspreet Kaur and Neha, Ms Reetu, Rachna, Manpreet Kaur, Baljinder, Sonia Dutt, attended the national Hiking and Trekking Camp held recently at Manali during vacations. The camp was organised under the auspices of the Directorate of Youth Services, Punjab. More than 128 students from various colleges attended the camp. The campers hiked and trekked through Manalsu Nala, Sailang Valley, Arjun Gufa, Nehru Kund, Vashisht Temple, Hadamba Temple and Rohtang pass. 

TEEJ FUNCTION: SDP College for Women will hold a function to mark Teej on August 5 on the College campus. Ms Gurkanwal Kaur, MLA and President, Punjab Pradesh Mahila Congress, will be the chief guest and Ms Sushila Gupta, Deputy Mayor, Municipal Corporation, will be the guest of honour.

SEMINAR: UPSC Jain Public School, Jamalpur, Chandigarh Road conducted a seminar on Personality Development for students of plus one, plus two on July 30 and 31. Resource person, Mr Sanjay Bhandari laid stress upon SWOT analysis (Strength, weakness, opportunities & threats). 

WORKSHOP: Infopark has announced free workshops in ‘glass painting, oil painting, water colour painting, pot painting and hand embroideries. These workshops will start from August 4 and will continue for a week. 

FAREWELL: A warm farewell was given to two employees of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), Aarti Chowk here, on Saturday on their retirement. Sub-Inspector Vidya Dhar and telephone mechanic Shiv Shankar Mishra were honoured. Division Engineer Rajinder Gupta praised the services of the retiring employees. 

SALES TAX ON CSD: The Indian Ex-Services League Panjab and Chandigarh has expressed the resentment against imposition of sale tax on CSD items. In a press note it said instead of lending a helping hand to the state government ex-serviceman had been burdened. No efforts have been made to rehabilitate ex-servicemen. 

LAWYER’S WIDOW COMPENSATED: A widow of a city lawyer heaved a sigh of relief when she got Rs 5 lakh as compensation on Saturday. Her husband advocate S.K. Mishra had died in a road accident. Mrs Vineeta Mishra and her son received the cheque from senior lawyers of the city in New Judicial Complex here, who were running the Lawyer’s Group Insurance Policy. She thanked them for helping her at this juncture. Her husband had availed himself of the policy by paying just Rs 380 for a year. 

CAMP CONCLUDES: More than 60 students of BBA and BCA attended a three week pre-session training camp organised at the Guru Nanak Institute of Management and Technology (GNIMT), Gujarkhan Campus, Model Town, that concluded here on Saturday. The camp was organised under the aegis of the Indian Society of Technical Education (ISTE), New Delhi. Dr A.S. Bansal, Director, GNIMT, said the institute had been organising such educational camps and a month long project development computer programme for computer students had also concluded recently. 

FORUM’S PLEA: The Lal Bahadur Shastri Social Forum at its meeting held at Janta Nagar here on Saturday appreciated the anti-corruption movement launched by Capt Mr Amarinder Singh. The Anti-Corruption Council of India’s director general, Dr Shiv Gupta said the movement to root out corruption still need to be carried out at the lower level of as there was rampant corruption in the municipal corporation, Improvement Trust, PUDA, PWD, the Electricity Board, the Revenue Department, the DTO office and the Police department offices. The Punjab Government should fix a time schedule for disposal of all files by officials concerned so that the public wasn’t be harassed. 

DE-ADDICTION CAMP: A drug de-addiction and acupuncture camp has been organised by Dr D.N. Kotnis Acupuncture Hospital. Mr Som Parkash, Director, Social Security, Women and Child Development, Punjab. He visited the patients suffering from various diseases and also drug addicts under treatment in the camp. 

QUIZ CONTEST: An inter house quiz contest was organised by the Senior Humanities Forum in the Kundan Vidya Mandir School on Saturday. Six teams consisting of three participants represented each of the houses - Raman, Tagore, Patel, Gandhi, Nehru and Subhash. There were twelve rounds in all and the topics covered included — literature, history, current affairs and sports. 

MANSA
DISMISSED: Mr G.K. Rai, Special Judge, Mansa, on Friday dismissed the bail applications of three officials of the Food and Supplies Department namely Jangir Singh, Mukhtiar Singh and Sri Niwas Sharma in a case FIR No 92 registered under Sections 406, 467, 468 and 471 of the IPC against two partners of M/s Gupta Rice Mill, Budhlada, in the district. 

NAWANSHAHR
RALLY HELD: The district unit of the PCMS Association struck work for two hours and organised a rally here at Civil Hospital on Friday in protest against the abolition of NPA.

PHAGWARA
HONOURED: The Hargobind Nagar branch of the State Bank of India on Friday honoured 15 meritorious students, SDM Pritam Singh was the chief guest at the function while Nagar Council chief Malkiat Singh Ragbotra presided. Mr B.S. Sabharwal, AGM of the bank, said the bank had given up to Rs 15 lakh as loan to students for studies abroad and Rs 7.5 lakh for getting higher education in the country.

SAMRALA
BKU REJECTS MSP: A meeting of the Bharti Kisan Union, Punjab was organised on Saturday under the presidentship of Mr Baldev Singh Mianpur its state president. Releasing the minutes of the meeting, Mr Balbir Singh Rajewal, National General Secretary of the BKU said the union, in an unanimous resolution outrightly rejected the maximum support price (MSP) of paddy fixed by the Union Government at Rs 550 and Rs 580 per quintal. The union demanded that the Central Government should shun its anti-farmer attitude and fix the MSP of grade a paddy at Rs 760 per quintal. To oppose this anti-farmer attitude of the BJP-Akali government, the union decided to march towards the Parliament in New Delhi on September 17 with at least one lakh farmers. 

CHANDIGARH

SAS NAGAR
CULTURAL NIGHT: The Malayalee Samajam here will organise a children's cultural night at Sanatan Dharma Mandir hall, Phase IV, on Sunday. Quiz, games, songs and dances will be presented the children as part of the cultural show. The children will also be staging skits. A group of eight tiny tots will present a cinematic dance on a Malayalam song in traditional attire kaily mundu for the boys and saree for the girls. The cultural night will follow the annual general body meeting of the samajam which will be conducted under the chairmanship of Mr Benny Thomas during which the annual report and accounts of the Samajam will be presented. 

HARYANA

AMBALA
AWARDED: A NCC cadet of Dev Samaj Girls College, Ambala city, Ms Sheetal Verma, was awarded a merit scholarship of Rs 15,000 by Sahara Group of Companies. The Principal of the college, Ms Shashi Sharma, said Sheetal had participated in the Republic Day function at Delhi last year. 

ELECTED: Mr Vinod Kumar was elected president of Neelkanth Mahadev Mandir located in Urban Estate, Sector 7, in Ambala city. Praduman Kumar and Tarun Aggarwal were elected vice-presidents while Mahender Pal Gupta was elected as general secretary, Ashwani Kumar as cashier and Joginder Bajaj as press secretary. 

CONCLUDES: District Congress two-day training camp concludes at Congress Bhavan, Ambala Cantonment, on Saturday. Kalka MLA Chander Mohan said Congress activists are going to tell the people about the anti-people policies of the Chautala government. He said when their party comes to power, false cases against BKU chief Ghasi Ram Nain will be withdrawn. Mr Nain is fighting for the cause of farmers and it is wrong on the behalf of police to term him a traitor. Ambala Cantonment district Congress president Ashok Jain said awareness has been generated among the Congress persons following the training camp. He said Congress activists have been explained about the party policies in detail. 

DEMAND: The Haryana BJP chief and Member of Parliament from Ambala, Mr Rattan Lal Kataria, demanded that the Ambala air force station should be shifted somewhere else as it was a big threat to the lives of civilians residing in the surrounding colonies. A day before on Friday the Defence Minister, Mr George Fernandes, had undertaken a sortie in MiG-21 from this airbase. Talking to mediapersons here on Saturday he said he had also raised this issue in Parliament as six of the MiG-21 and Jaguars of this airbase had crashed during in the last two years. Three of those crashed over the residential colonies in which 13 persons were killed and more than 16 were injured. President of local unit of the party Sheesh Pal Bhola and the senior leaders of the local unit Giyan Chand Aggarwal, Ravi Sehgal, Shankar Dass and Raj Singh were present. 

FATEHABAD
RIDICULED: Mr Vinod Mehta, additional press secretary to the Haryana Chief Minister, on Friday termed as ridiculous the reported statement of Mr Naval Kishore Sharma, AICC General Secretary and in charge of party affairs in Haryana, that Congress popularity graph in Haryana had increased after the Fatehabad Assembly byelection.

REMANDED: The Chief Judicial Magistrate, Mr R.N. Bharti, on Friday remanded an official of the District Industries Centre (DIC), Fatehabad to judicial custody till August 14. The accused was arrested red handed on Thursday by the state Vigilance Bureau while taking a bribe of Rs 500 from a villager.

HISAR
AWARENESS CAMP: The Department of Food and Nutrition of Haryana Agricultural University launched a breastfeeding week in collaboration with the Integrated Child Development Scheme Cell at Agroha, near here, on Saturday. Dr Raj Bala Grewal, Dr Sudesh Joon and Ms Santosh Kataria of HAU explained the importance of breastfeeding to a large number of young mothers present on the occasion. The head of the department, Dr Neelam Khetarpal, said similar awareness camps would also be organised at Kaimri, Arya Nagar and Sisor. Besides, a seminar on "Breastfeeding in a globalised world for peace and justice" would be held on August 7 on the varisity campus here.

HIMACHAL PRADESH

BILASPUR
NAVRATRA FAIR: About two lakh pilgrims are reported to have visited Nainadevi within the first two days of “Navratra fair” and offered cash totalling Rs 13.5 lakh. Mela Officer-cum-District Magistrate, Mr J.S. Pathania said here on Friday that some NRI pilgrims had offered $173 to the deity.

DHARAMSALA
RIDICULED: The Kangra District Congress Committee general secretary and party spokesman, Mr Rajan Dewan, on Friday ridiculed the statement of the BJP spokesman, Mr Ganesh Dutt that the Virbhadra government was vindictive towards IPS officer Diwakar Prasad. Talking to mediapersons here, Mr Dewan defended the action of the Chief Minister and said that the senior IPS officer should explain his conduct.

DALHOUSIE
CM’S GESTURE: The Punjab Chief Minister, Capt Amarinder Singh, has agreed in principle to provide jobs to the remaining one member each of the ousted families of the Ranjit Sagar Dam (Thein Dam project) whose land and houses had submerged in the dam water. These families belong to Dalhousie tehsil bordering Dhar subdivision of Gurdaspur district. This was stated by Mrs Asha Kumari, Himachal Education Minister while laying the foundation stone of a Rs 50 lakh building of high school at Chuhan in the Banikhet constituency on Friday.

NURPUR
RESENTED: The former Chairman, HPTDC and local ex-MLA, Mr Rakesh Pathania in a statement here on Thursday look exception to the Virbhadra Singh government’s decision to close the office of the Additional Deputy Commissioner (ADC), Nurpur and shifting the ADC from here.

KILLED: Kushal Kumar, a Home Guard jawan and a resident of Bassa Waziran near here, died on the spot when his scooter was hit by a private bus at Raja-ka-Talab on Thursday. Mangat Singh, driver, who fled after the accident was on Friday arrested by the police. A case under Sections 279, 304-A of the IPC has been registered against him.

BOOKED: Following a complaint of Satya Devi of Kandwal near here the police has registered a case under Sections 147, 149, 323, 451 and 506 of the IPC against Kuldeep, Joginder, Shamboo, Kala, Prem, Nikka Ram and Ashok for allegedly attacking Jeet Ram, a travelling ticket examiner of the Railways on Thursday.

UNA
ALLEGED: The former Chief Minister, Mr Prem Kumar Dhumal, on Friday alleged that the Congress government had failed on all fronts to check the increase in crime rate. It was only interested in taking revenge against its opposition by filing false cases he added.