- Tarn Taran to be 19th district
- Free power to SCs
- Relief to teaching and non-teaching staff of government-aided private schools
- Cases of terrorism-affected families in the state to be referred to the Centre for grant
- Transfer of 188 government primary schools top panchayati raj institutions,
leading to creation of 650 posts of ETT teacher
- Zero VAT on pre-owned cars
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Chandigarh, May 31
The Punjab Council of Ministers today gave approval to refer cases of 9,000 terrorism-affected persons in the state to the Union Government so as to seek ex-gratia and rehabilitation grant for them on a par with 1984-riot victims. It involves a financial liability of Rs 405 crore.
A Cabinet sub-committee, headed by the Deputy Chief Minister, Ms Rajinder Kaur Bhattal, had made a recommendation to the council to refer the issue to the Union Government.
The Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee President, Mr Shamsher Singh Dullo, has also been pleading the cause of terrorism-affected families for the past one year or so.
In fact, he has planned to take representatives of the terrorism-affected families to Delhi on June 3 for a meeting with the Congress president, Ms Sonia Gandhi.
Mr Dullo will request Ms Gandhi to urge the Union Government to give relief to the affected families.
The Punjab Government has disbursed a financial grant of Rs 168.32 crore to 8,416 riot victims as per the recommendations of the Nanawati Commission.
Almost all decisions taken by the council, which met under the chairmanship of the Chief Minister, Capt Amarinder Singh, have loud political overtones. Clearly, these
have been taken with an eye on the coming Assembly elections. The Council of Ministers also approved to pay compensation of Rs 3.65 crore to 365 Jodhpur detainees.Each detainee will be given Rs 1 lakh.
Removing the condition of power load, the council gave approval to provide 200 units per month of free electricity to the Scheduled Castes across the board.
Required approval from the Punjab State Electricity Regulatory Commission will be availed in this regard.
Earlier, Scheduled Caste families having connected load up to 500 watts were entitled for 200 free units of power.
The setting up of a multi-member Punjab State Vigilance Commission on the pattern of the Central Vigilance Commission was also approved.
The council okayed the proposal to make Tarn Taran the 19th district of the state in Jalandhar Division to commemorate 400th year of Guru Arjan Dev’s martyrdom on June 16.
The long-pending demand of teaching and non-teaching employees of government-aided private schools regarding merger of 50 per cent of the dearness allowance with the basic pay from April 1, 2004 was also accepted by the council.
However, the arrears payable to the employees of these schools, up to March 31, 2006, will have to be deposited in the national saving certificates to be purchased from post offices in
Punjab. Employees would be paid in cash with effect from April 1, 2006.
The council also gave its nod to the transfer of 188 government primary schools in Bathinda, Faridkot, Mansa, Moga, and Muktsar from the Education Department to the panchayati raj institutions (PRIs) and thereby creating 650 additional posts. Eligible ETT diploma holders will be employed against these posts.
The council also approved to levy zero VAT on pre-owned cars and to make necessary amendment in schedule 'A' appended to the Punjab Value Added Tax Act, 2005, from the date of its publication.
An ex post facto approval was given to increase the strength of members of the Punjab Subordinate Services Selection Board from 10 to 12, thus regularising the appointment of Col Zorawar Singh (retd), Mr Harminder Singh Gill and Mr Sarbjit Singh Sandhu as members of the board.
Creation of five posts of Assistant Programmers on contract basis for the district treasuries of Muktsar, Fatehgarh Sahib, Nawanshahr, Mansa and Moga was also cleared.
Meanwhile, Mr K.K.Tandon and Mr M.L.Chopra, both leaders of aided-schools employees’ union, hailed the decision regarding merger of 50 per DA.
They urged Capt Amarinder Singh that, on the same pattern, DA should be merged with the pension of the employees who retired from aided schools.
