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Substandard coal
Customs Duty
Fard centres go hi-tech |
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Domestic violence
St. Joseph’s School
Critic reflects on present literary scenario
Farmers of Moga, Barnala on agitation path
Debt-ridden families stage dharna
Traffic goes haywire
as cops ‘busy’ issuing challans
Ousted Congman set to join SAD
Body Building Contest
Free cardiac check-up camp held
Gold chain snatched
Two held for snatching
Workers’ rally
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Substandard coal
Bathinda, March 10 According to sources, the Coal India, which has been supplying coal to these plants for years together at Lehra Mohabbat and Ropar, was found to be substandard. It was reported that the quality of coal is far inferior from what was agreed upon in the purchase order signed by the PSEB authorities with the Coal India. This was confirmed by Y.S. Ratra, chairman, PSEB, here today. As per the purchase order, the size of the 70 per cent coal should have been between 20 per cent and 50 mm. However, only 20 to 40 per cent coal is found to be of 20 to 50 mm in size. And 20 per cent of the coal should have been of 2 to 20 mm, however, its ratio is found 40 to 50 per cent. Talking to The Tribune, Ratra said that the PSEB authorities have finally decided to impose penalty on the Coal India for supplying substandard coal to its thermal plants in the state, resulting in the rise of generation loss of power. Obviously, the supply of substandard coal was causing huge loss to the PSEB, he added. It may be mentioned here that the Guru Nanak Dev Thermal Plant at Bathinda and Guru Gobind Singh Thermal Plant, Ropar, are getting 15,000 metric tonne of coal daily while the Pichhwara Mines of Chhatisgarh are supplying coal to the Guru Hargobind Thermal Plant at Lehra Mohabbat. The PSEB chairman said the Coal India had been informed many a times through the central linkage committee of the board to improve the quality of coal to these plants. But the supplies of coal delivered at Bathinda and Ropar plants were found to be substandard. He said there was no complaint against the Pichhwara Mines of Chhatisgarh and these mines didn’t have sufficient coal to meet the requirement of the board. So, the board had to depend on supplies from the Coal India, he added. He said that even the imported coal was also used at these plants on trial basis. Despite good quality of imported coal, transportation of coal to these plants from ports at Gujarat had proved costly. |
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Customs Duty
Earlier, only national level shooters were exempt from this duty. The move has been welcomed in this Olympic year as five out of nine shooters who have qualified namely, Abhinav Bindra, Gagan Narang, Anjali Bhagwat, Avneet Kaur Sidhu and Samresh Jung, would be participating in the air gun events at the Beijing Olympics. “These events are commonly staged for school and college students in India. As the domestic manufactures are not able meet the required precision standards, most shooters prefer to import air rifles and air pistols. Beginners, especially young children, used to find it very difficult to import these weapons because they did not have sufficient funds to pay the heavy customs duties,” said Avneet Kaur Sidhu, an ace shooter and Olympic qualifier, while speaking to TNS over the phone from Sydney where she is attending a preparatory camp along with other Indian shoters, for the Beijing Olympics. “This will facilitate broadbasing of the shooting sports in the country and will make it more affordable for aspiring shooters. As the import duty was very high earlier, the players had to either take loans for buying their own rifles or borrowed the guns from others,” Avneet added. Raja K.S. Sidhu, Secretary General, Punjab Olympic Association, said, “The decision has been hailed countrywide. After the customs exemption, shooters won’t have to compromise with low-quality infrastructure from Ahmedabad, its hub. With this initiative, players at the grassroot level will also come to the fore as more and more people will have access to the game.” Amrit Pal Singh Sidhu, member, Dasmesh Rifle Club, Badal (Muktsar), said, “The exemption of duty is praiseworthy as it would definitely boost the morale of the players. India has been winning several medals in the game at the international level, and this initiative would help the country in winning more medals in the future”. |
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Fard centres go hi-tech
Ferozepur, March 10 In a high level meeting held here recently to discuss the computerisation of the land records, the commissioner, B.S. Sudan held a detailed discussion with officials from Bathinda, Mansa, Muktsar, Moga, Faridkot and Ferozepur districts. The meeting was attended by Megh Raj, DC Ferozepur, Rahul Tiwari, DC Bhatinda, Surjit Singh Dhillon, DC Mansa, Satwant Singh Johal, DC Moga , A.S. Bains, Director Land Records Punjab, Satish Chugh, Project Director, besides ADCs, SDMs and other district officials from all the six districts under Ferozepur and Faridkot divisions. In the meeting, Director (Land Records) A.S. Bains gave a detailed overview of the Integrated Land Management System (ILMS) being developed by the state government for the computerisation of the land records. Sudan told that in all the six districts, one tehsil or sub-tehsil had been selected for the computerisation under the pilot project. He further told that the computerization, when completed would ease lot of problems being faced by the rural folks, as the entire land records would be available on computer. Sudan said that fard centres were being opened in Ferozepur, Talwandi Bhai, Mamdot, Zira, Makhu, Fazilka, Arnewala, Khuian Sarvar, Sito Gunno, Jalalabad and Guruharsahai, from where farmers could get copies of the mutation and jamabandhis without any difficulty. On the occasion, the revenue officials gave their suggestions regarding problems being faced during the process of computerisation. Sudan assured revenue officials that their suggestions would be considered. According to the information, the computerisation was initially done in sub-tehsils- Bariwala, Lambi, Nathana, Badni Kalan, Mamdot besides, Faridkot and Mansa tehsils as pilot project but later all tehsils and sub-tehsils would be covered. |
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Domestic violence
Bathinda, March 10 Her sobbing father, Teja Singh, added, “My daughter did not tell me earlier about the pathetic life, she was living at her in-laws home. When I came to know about the facts, I could not stop myself and went to meet them, where my son-in-law Sukhwinder thrashed me and my brother”. On the other hand, when Sukhwinder Singh, the accused, was contacted on phone, he refuted these allegations and blamed his father-in-law Teja Singh for the dispute. “I accept that I have beaten my father-in-law and his brother but it was just in self defense as they first assaulted me, just a couple of days back,” he said. When the in-charge CAWC, Gurdev Singh, was asked, he said the proceedings have been initiated to ascertain the actual facts. |
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St. Joseph’s School
Bathinda, March 10 The principal of the School, who was directed the by the court to appear in person, complied with the orders and attended the Court. The court allowed another petitioner to be impleaded as party in the case. The counsel for St Joseph’s School pleaded for quashing the show cause notice while the petitioners insisted that the proceedings should not be dropped. Local Judicial Magistrate Mewa Singh had rejected the plea of St Joseph’s School to set aside the earlier orders of the Court, asking the principal of the school on March 5 last to appear in person in the court and passed fresh orders directing her to appear in the court on March 10 and also turned down the request of the school to vacate the stay on starting the LKG classes. Earlier, Judicial Magistrate Nirmal Singh had passed the orders after the school refused to handover the records on the pretext that the same had been sent to high command. Taking suo moto notice of the defiance court orders of February 22 by the school authorities the Judicial magistrate directed the principal to appear in person in the Court. Some parents had filed a petition in the court alleging irregularities in admissions to LKG and also accused the school authorities of violating the Supreme Court guidelines. |
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Critic reflects on present literary scenario
Bathinda, March 10 “I am most touched by the writings of Nanak Singh and Gurdial Singh. Of present novelists, I like reading Mittar Sen Meet, Kewal Kaloti and even Baldev Singh.” When asked about the situation of the present Punjabi novel scene, he smiles, and says, “If we compare it with the national scene, besides a few novelists, all that’s written is trash. We cannot even compete globally in the literary circuit because they are hundreds of years ahead of us. First novel written in Punjabi was ‘Sundri’ by Bhai Vir Singh and the first English novel is claimed to be written in 1470. So one can imagine the difference.” |
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Farmers of Moga, Barnala on agitation path
Moga, March 10 The protest, which lasted for hours, saw unprecedented participation of women. Raising slogans, they demanded realisation of promises made in the poll manifesto prior to the last year’s election by the Akali party. Tarlok Singh Himmatpura, district president, BKU (Ekta), criticised Badal for backtracking from his promises. He recalled that when out of power, Badal used to demand Rs 2.50 lakh for the family of farmer who commits suicide. However, he brought down the relief to Rs 2 lakh in the poll manifesto, he said, and added that even realisation of this had been a distant dream so far. He claimed that according to the survey carried out by his
organisation, 348 tillers from 30 villages of this predominantly agriculture-district committed suicides from 1990 to 2007. He added that it was only a sample survey concentrated on limited villages while the problem was much more and almost all the villages were replete with such cases. Criticising the Akali leaders’ stance of running a pro-farmers party he opined that it was a mere eyewash and pretext to garner votes while the reality lied somewhere else. Buttressing his claim, he said that his union had submitted the aforementioned report to the government but it neither yielded nor succour for the aggrieved families. The BKU (Ekta) sought Rs 5 lakh, writing off all advances and job to the next of kins of the farmers, who committed suicides under duress while unable to pay the loan. Besides, he claimed that there were 780 farmers in the district who had to sell off their agricultural land in process of returning their advances. He demanded that they must be provided with five acres of land each. With inception at about 12 in the noon the protest terminated at nearly 4:30 p.m when an SDM rank officer accepted their memorandum of demands to be forwarded to the state
government. |
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Debt-ridden families stage dharna
Barnala, March 10 Joginder Singh Ugrahan, state president BKU said that the waiving of loans of the framers would not serve the purpose. He questioned that what would happen to those farmers who had lost their land in paying debts. Sukhdev Singh Kokri ,general secretary, said that about 3244 suicide affected farmers of 370 villages and 5760 landless families of 381 villages were protesting across the state today at various district headquarters. He said that the union demanded that the state government must provide financial assistance to the tune of 5 lakh to each suicide affected family and five-acre of land to each landless farmers. Later, the farmers presented a memorandum in this regard to deputy commissioner Barnala, R.L. Mehta. |
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Traffic goes haywire
as cops ‘busy’ issuing challans
Bathinda, March 10 Bathinda-Goniana road is being reconstructed, due to which one side of it has been closed. As all the vehicles have been plying on single road, which is creating traffic snarls. The district police is apparently busy enough to ‘achieve the target of maximum number of challans,’ so as no officer has taken the responsibility to depute cops at the ‘accident-prone’ roundabout to prevent any untoward incident. It has been observed that no diversion board has been placed over there to make the commuters alert about the diverted road. The bus drivers are least bothered about two-wheelers and light motor vehicles, while taking wrong turns. The police department seems to have gone into deep slumber, and the officials have been apparently waiting for some mishap to awake in this direction. Irked over the careless attitude of the traffic police at the roundabout in-question, Deepak Kumar, a car driver, said, “The traffic police is just bothered about the challan and not about this serious hazard to every passerby ” “There should be at least three policemen deputed here to manage the free flow of the traffic,” said Sat Pal Singh, a scooteriest. Veer Bhan, a car diver, who narrowly escaped from an accident, rued, “Neither the police department nor the municipal corporation has cared for putting up some precautionary signboard to make the commuters alert before taking turn.” On being apprised with the high risk of accidents at the roundabout in-question, ASP (city) Harsh Kumar Bansal expressed ignorance and said, “We will see to it in the morning, as the duty of the traffic policemen is going to be over.” |
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Ousted Congman set to join SAD
Moga, March 10 He was expelled from the Congress for his alleged anti-party activities for the next six years. Talking to this correspondent, he claimed that thousands of Congress workers from Nihal Singhwala would follow him and would join SAD. It may be recalled that he unsuccessfully contested assembly elections of 1997 and 2002 from Baghapurana. However, he led an open revolt against the Congress when he was denied party ticket in the last year’s assembly elections. Congress candidate Darshan Singh Brar won the
election. |
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Body Building Contest
Mansa, March 10 Altogether 175 body builders from 18 districts of Punjab took part in the state-level contest, which was held in Mansa for the first time. Other competitors, who won first prizes included, Sonu Singh of Fatehgarh Sahib in 55 kg, Gurdeep Bawa of Barnala in 60 kg, Daljeet Singh of Punjab Police in 65 kg, Heera Lal of Punjab Police in 70 kg, Parvesh Kumar of Punjab Police in 75 kg, Sudesh Kumar of Jalandhar in 80 kg, Jagdeep Singh of Fatehgarh Sahib in 85 kg, Jagdesh Kumar of Punjab Police in 90 kg and Narinder Singh of Punjab Police in 100 kg. Contenders of Punjab Police stole the show by bagging most of the medals while Jalandhar district came 2nd and Fatehgarh Sahib got 3rd position in the contest. District and session judge, Mansa, Bhupinder Singh inaugurated the tourney. |
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Free cardiac check-up camp held
Bathinda, March 10 Dr Sukhdev Singh advised the people to refrain from smoking, avoid fried food and do physical exercise to remain fit. Cardiac diseases were taking the shape of an epidemic even in the young people these days, he added. Dr G.S. Nagpal, Nova Heart and Kidney Hospital, Bathinda, would hold free kidney camp from March 12 to March 19 for the poor kidney patients. Free tests like scanning and blood tests would be conducted at this camp. |
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Gold chain snatched
Bathinda, March 10 According to the civil lines police, Sonia Goyal of LIG flats lodged a complaint alleging that she was going by foot in the colony, when two unidentified youngsters riding a black motorcycle snatched her gold chain. A case was registered in this regard under section 356 of the IPC. |
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Two held for snatching
Bathinda, March 10 Giving the details, the head constable of traffic, Lakbir Singh said that he had received a quest to nab a car bearing number PB-60-9494, this afternoon. Finding the car moving near bus stand he reported to the control room and took them to the civil lines police post. When the civil lines police post officials were contacted they confirmed the report and said the investigation was going on to ascertain the facts. |
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Mansa, March 10 Addressing to the rally, state secretary of the morcha, Bhagwant Singh Sammaon alleged that Gram Panchyat utilised machines in pond construction. While Sarpanch of Taamkot, Jagga Singh said that charges levelled against him were baseless and they had distributed wheat among the workers. —OC
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Bathinda, March 10
Popular literary critic of Punjabi, Tarsem Raj ‘Vinod’, famously known as T.R. Vinod, is simple, like life is. And like life is, he is there, living it out, his way. This 72-year-old ‘Baba Bohar’ of the Punjabi literary critic scene is fully aware of the Indian literary tradition and has evolved a method that takes into account the social content, structural tension and narrative technique in the interpretation of literary texts.
Tarsem Raj Vinod
Bathinda, March 10
Bathinda, March 10