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Cong nominee Mehta files papers for Indri
Photo voter lists to debut in bypoll
Adampur Seat
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NCP not to contest
Action plan to control forest fires
Day after fire, farmers look to govt
Destruction of Wheat Crop
High Court
Withholding of Diplomas
Loot-&-Murder Case
Man duped of over Rs 5 lakh
3 held for selling liquor
Armed youths strike at petrol station
Man kills father
1 gets bail in kidney case
Weekly Off Issue
BJP’s bandh call gets mixed response
Education dept told to submit plan on cylinders
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Cong nominee Mehta files papers for Indri
Karnal, May 2 Several bigwigs of the ruling party, including Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, president and working president of the HPCC Phool Chand Mullana and Kuldeep Sharma were present on the occasion. Flanked by several MLAs and the Karnal MP, the Congress candidate reached the mini-secretariat in a cavalcade of cars from Indri. Hooda addressed a rally at Indri and appealed to the voters to cast their ballot in favour of the Congress nominee. Mehta owns wealth and cash of more than Rs 5.30 crore whereas his wife owns property and cash worth Rs 73 lakh. Mehta has 25 acres of agriculture land worth Rs 2.50 crore. He owns around Rs 2.50 crore in non-agricultural land and buildings. Besides Rs 1 lakh in cash, he owns a combine, a car and a tractor. The Congress candidate also has an outstanding amount of Rs 35 lakh towards the PLDB and the Haryana Vidhan Sabha. In his affidavit, Mehta had furnished that his wife owns 2.25 acres worth Rs 50 lakh, an LIC policy of Rs 15,05000 and a luxury car. Besides Rs 50,000 in cash, she also possesses jewellery worth Rs 4.20 lakh, has Rs 3.25 lakh in banks and other financial institutions. |
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Photo voter lists to debut in bypoll
Karnal, May 2 Photo voter lists have been prepared for the Indri, Gohana and Adampur assembly constituencies. It is learnt that about 96 per cent voters of the Indri assembly constituency have been included in the photo voter list. However, sources clarified that it would not be the sole criteria to cast ballot as the lists were yet to be completed. Secondly, for the first in Haryana, all politicians have been barred from using beacon of any colour atop their vehicles during canvassing. However, The Tribune has learnt that elected representatives across the state, including scores of MLAs, MPs and parliamentary secretaries, are flouting the rules with impunity by using the beacon atop their vehicles during campaigning. However, some politicians claimed ignorance on the issue. “We are not aware of any such ban. During the last state assembly and parliamentary elections also, no such directions were issued,” claimed an elected representative. The model code of conduct strictly prohibits the use of beacon affixed with sirens on official and private vehicles of any political functionary. The rules clearly state that “even if the state administration has granted any individual a security cover, one cannot use beacon atop any vehicle, including on pilot cars”. The state electoral authorities have instructed the police to remain extra cautious in implementing the provisions strictly and to take appropriate action against violators. |
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Adampur Seat
Hisar, May 2 The independent candidates were Balwan Singh, Jasbir Singh, Kulwant Singh, Hoshiar Singh, Ajmer Khanda and Ram Phal. The candidate of the Republican Party of India (RPI), Hans Raj, also filed his nomination papers. Most of the independent candidates are dummy candidates who have filed nominations so that serious candidates can use their vehicles for campaigning thus circumventing the limit on expenses fixed by the election commission. The candidates who put them up also use the dummy candidates’ polling agents and other functionaries to ensure that they have enough men inside the polling booths to meet any exigency. |
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NCP not to contest
Chandigarh, May 2 This was announced by a senior leader of the Haryana NCP, Ved Pal. He said the party had decided that instead of wasting its energy in the byelections, it should concentrate on consolidating the party’s base in the state for the Lok Sabha and the next assembly elections. |
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Action plan to control forest fires
Chandigarh, May 2 Minister of state for forests and tourism Kiran Choudhry today held a meeting with senior officers of the district administration, the police and the forest departments of Yamunanagar and Panchkula districts to prepare the action plan. The meeting was called in wake of the recent forest fire, which broke out in the Morni forest area. She said a committee had been constituted to probe the Morni fire and the guilty would be punished for the negligence. She applauded the Panchkula administration and the forest department for taking timely actions in dousing the Morni fire. Choudhry said 3 months of the summer season were crucial and during these months forests were highly prone to catch fire. While expressing concern over the forest fires, she said these fires decreased the bio-diversity of the region and it took long time for that area to recover from loss caused by the fire. The action plan envisaged the sensitisation of village forests committees, gram panchayats and revenue officials, who would be involved in fire fighting operations. In view of the fact that the forest department did not inform the Panchkula district administration about the Morni fire though it had been raging for several days, it was decided that all departments concerned should have regular meetings every fortnight to keep a check on forest fires. The status report of every day would be submitted to the district administration by district forests officer. Strict action should be taken against office-bearers of the village forest committees for non-cooperating in reporting and extinguishing forests fires. Forests officials should patrol the forests areas regularly, create sufficient water bodies within the forests and put hoardings carrying messages at all tourist places in order to avoid fire incidents. Villagers should be trained to fight the fire and whistles and torches should be given to them so that in the time of emergency they could raise an alarm from far off places without wasting time. Choudhry also asked the officials to keep a check on illegal mining in the forest areas and directed the forest officials to keep a strict vigil on illegal miners.
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Day after fire, farmers look to govt
Dabwali (Sirsa), May 2 He claimed that the entire wheat placed in a corner of his land was gutted in a fire yesterday. He said hopes of farmers like him now rested on the government. Otherwise, he said, they would not be able to bear the loss for no fault of theirs. Similar was the feeling of another farmer of Sukhera Khera, Ram Kumar Godara. He, along with his family members and some labourers, had harvested wheat on nearly eight acres a few days ago. According to him, he had gone to arrange vehicles for transporting the crop to the grain market. However, he was shocked to learn that it had been burnt in an accidental fire in just few hours. Meanwhile, Geeto Devi succumbed to her burn injuries while her husband Veer Singh, who had 50 per cent burns, is recuperating in a hospital. V. Umashankar, deputy commissioner, said the officials concerned had been directed to carry out a survey to assess the loss of crop due to the fire. He added that a majority of the farmers had harvested their crop. He said the crop of only those farmers, who were preparing to transport it to the grain market, had been burnt. Amarjit Singh, tehsildar, Dabwali, said the department had started work to assess the loss from today. He said they had received applications in this regard and were visiting sites to assess the loss. O.P. Verma, district revenue officer, said his office would verify the eligibility of applicants after receiving a report from the SDM and the tehsildar of Dabwali. Subsequently, as per the policy of the government, funds would be released to eligible claimants. |
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Destruction of Wheat Crop
Sirsa, May 2 The Bhupinder Singh Hooda-led government is yet to announce compensation to the farmers whose standing crop is being destroyed across the state. District revenue officer O.P. Verma said the compensation would be given to the farmers whose produce was destroyed due to short circuits. He said the tehsildar’s office was still receiving applications for the loss of crop to fire and would soon forward these applications to the financial commissioner (revenue), Chandigarh. The compensation would be released accordingly. According to an estimate, over 1,500 quintals of wheat has been reduced to ashes causing financial loss to hundreds of cultivators.Cases are still being reported as harvesting is on. Ved Prakash, an employee of the fire brigade wing of the Market Committee, does not remember any day having gone without receiving calls for help in dousing fire in fields since the beginning of harvesting. Department officials accept that incidents of fire are high in comparison to the figures last year. According to agricultural experts, the reasons behind the increasing number of fire incidents could be human error, more use of combine harvesters or soaring heat. Generally, harvesting begins by April 7 and concludes in the last week of the same month in this region. However, mild whether in March delayed the start of harvesting. Agreeing with this premise, district agriculture officer Pradeep Kumar said it delayed the harvesting pattern this season. Besides, he felt the scarcity of farm labour forced more use of harvester combines, sparks from which sometimes cause fire. Meanwhile, 5,44,971 metric tonnes of wheat had been procured by the five government agencies from 55 grain markets of the district till April. The figure was 4,13,570 metric tonnes till this day last year. Durga Prasad Mehta, a farmer, of Alika village rued that his standing wheat crop on several acres turned to ashes on April 26. He expressed ignorance about the cause of
the fire. |
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High Court
Chandigarh, May 2 A candidate has alleged that out of nine candidates selected and appointed in the general category, six are the kith and kin of VIPs and politicians of the ruling party in Haryana. Issuing notices to the Haryana Agricultural Marketing Board and the commission for July 18, a Division Bench of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, comprising Justice Hemant Gupta and Justice Pritam Pal, today directed their counsel to submit the entire record of selections. Giving details, petitioner Virender Singh alleged that Sultan Singh was son of Sher Singh, a Congress leader and near relation of Randeep Surjewala. Dharam Raj Dangi is the nephew of MLA from Meham Anand Singh Dangi. Jagjit Singh is a nephew of Haryana Legislative Assembly Speaker Raghuvir Singh Kadian. Jyoti Dhankar is the daughter of Jhajjar Zila Parishad chairperson Bimla Dhankar. Bhagwan is son of former secretary of the Haryana Agriculture Marketing Board Ram Kanwar, who is a close relative of the Chief Minister. Ravinder Singh Nehra is very close to Chief Minister’s daughter. The petitioner through his counsel H.C. Arora alleged despite a direction issued by the Haryana State Information Commission, the selection commission had declined to intimate to the petitioner about the number of erasing, over-writings/ cuttings and questions attempted by him. He alleged the selection commission secretary was making all attempts to withhold relevant information from the petitioner as the secretary’s own daughter Shaifali Verma was among the selected candidates. The petitioner prayed the high court should restrain the selection commission from destroying the records. |
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Withholding of Diplomas
Rewari, May 2 Iterating their resolve to fight against the alleged highhandedness of the management, the agitating trainees again alleged that their diplomas were being withheld by the management arbitrarily and unjustifiably. Further alleging that they were being mentally tortured by certain villagers at the behest of the management for subservience, they categorically stated that they had never executed a bond to serve the institute for a period of one year after passing their general nursing and midwifery examination. Therefore withholding of their certificates by the management was unwarranted and illogical. They also announced that their struggle would continue till the management released their original certificates. Contrary to this Dr S.S. Yadav, director of the school of nursing, said the trainees were just like his daughters and their “unreasonable stand” had shocked and hurt him. He also made it known that their certificates would be released on May 31 after the completion of one or two essential modalities. |
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Loot-&-Murder Case
Gurgaon, May 2 The police is, however, tightlipped about any such development. SP (Mewat) K.K. Rao said they had rounded up some suspected persons from Haryana and Rajasthan. Sources said the accused had been identified and around Rs 10 lakh recovered from them. Asked, Rao said revealing anything at this stage would hamper the investigation. Everything would be revealed at an appropriate time, he said, adding that it was still to be confirmed whether the accused were professional killers or not. He, however, clarified that instead of the reported Rs 45 lakh looted in the case, the investigation showed that it was actually Rs 27 lakh. In addition, the victims were carrying Rs 66 lakh instead of Rs 80 lakh as reported earlier. The incident had taken place when the victims were carrying the cash for making the payment at the time of registration of land purchased by them near Pahari, a border town in Rajasthan, after selling their land in Haryana. The victims, belonging to Gadrana village in Palwal subdivision in Faridabad district, along with at least 12 persons of their village, were going there for the purpose in two cars when they were waylaid by the assailants near Khera village in Mewat district. It is the first loot-and-murder case in the area involving such a huge amount. |
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Man duped of over Rs 5 lakh
Rewari, May 2 The police has registered a case of cheating, criminal breach of trust, criminal intimidation and criminal conspiracy under Sections 420, 406, 506 and 120-B of the IPC against the accused. SI of the CIA police Om Prakash here is now investigating the matter following which the accused would be soon apprehended. It all began in December 2006 when Vishnu Dutt Sharma held a recitation of the Ramayana at Sarjeet’s residence here. Subsequently, he brought his associate, Shyam Sunder Sharma, who persuaded Sarjeet to get his “haunted” house purified through a special religious puja for which he charged Rs 30,000 from Sarjeet. Gradually, such purifying puja became a routine affair for which Sarjeet every time paid a huge amount to the duo. In the process, Sharma also craftily obtained a sum of Rs 3 lakh, which Sarjeet paid him through cheque in April 2007. Eventually, when good sense prevailed upon Sarjeet, he repeatedly demanded repayment of his money. But when the duo allegedly gave him a nasty treatment, he petitioned the district police chief, Ram Singh Bishnoi, who ordered registration of a criminal case against the duo. |
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3 held for selling liquor
Kurukshetra, May 2 District police chief Amitabh Dhillon said Kurukshetra had already been declared as holy town, where sale, purchase and use of liquor as well as meat had been prohibited. The arrested persons had been identified as Gian Chand, a resident of Narwana in Jind district, Shivi, alias Rishav, a resident of New Colony, and Ramesh Kumar from railway road, Kurukshetra. During interrogation, the arrested persons told the police that they used to sell liquor in the town from the office of a local resident, Pawan Kumar Pahalwan, and with the connivance of Pahalwan’s brother, Ashok Kumar. Twentynine bottles, including 10 half bottles and 7 quarter bottles of English wine and 12 bottles of country-made liquor, had been recovered from their possession. However, two others managed to escape, he added. Meanwhile, Dhillon had appealed the public to report the police in case any anti-social element was found dealing in drugs, including liquor, so that this town’s holiness could be maintained. |
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Armed youths strike at petrol station
Jind, May 2 According to a complaint lodged with the police, the three youths reached the petrol station situated near Ludhana village on a motorcycle around 1.15 pm when there was no customer. Two employees - Dinesh and Bablu - were preparing to have lunch. While one of the youths stayed back with the mobike at some distance, two of them reached the gate of the office of the petrol station and brandished a country-made revolver at the employees. They took the employees to the office and asked for the cash kept there and threatened to kill them if they tried to resist the move. They managed to lay their hands on Rs 8,500 and locked the staff in a room before fleeing. The incident came to light after about 20 minutes when a farmer came to get diesel filled in his tractor. A case has been registered. Meanwhile, several women residents of Kila Zafargarh village in the district staged a demonstration against the poor supply of potable water in the village this morning. The protest was held outside the “water supply house” maintained by the public health department. |
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Man kills father
Jhajjar, May 2 There was some long-standing property distribution dispute between them. Sources said Mukesh attacked his father,
Ramkishan, with a brick on the way to their house from fields. Mukesh had an argument with labourers working in the fields and his father reportedly favoured the
labourers. Irked over this, a spat ensued between them following which Mukesh attacked his father. He was immediately taken to the hospital but he died on the way. The accused has been arrested. |
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1 gets bail in kidney case
Ambala, May 2 Counsel Amit Gupta, who appeared on behalf of Harpal, pleaded that the CBI had failed to file a chargesheet against his client even after the expiry period of 90 days. He requested the court to grant bail to his client. The court accepted the request. Ajay Jain, counsel of Dr K.K. Aggarwal, withdrew his bail application, which was filed yesterday. The bail application of Linda was also withdrawn by her lawyer. |
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Weekly Off Issue
Gurgaon, May 2 Meanwhile, the DC has directed the labour office to conduct a survey to find out how many traders and shopkeepers were in favour of keeping the market closed on Sunday and how many on Tuesday. The sales tax numbers of the traders will also be checked in the survey to find whether the person runs his shop in Gurgaon market or not. Representatives of various traders’ organisations also met the DC today to apprise him about their stand in this regard, but they had divergent views on the issue. |
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BJP’s bandh call gets mixed response
Bhiwani, May 2 BJP leaders visited all markets to press for observing the bandh. President of the BJP Nagar Mandal Ghanshyam Saraf said the Congress government had failed to curb the rising inflation and people were finding it difficult to even buy vegetables. District unit general secretary Tara Chand Agarwal said the inflation had risen manifold in the rule of the UPA government. |
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Education dept told to submit plan on cylinders
Yamunanagar, May 2 The office of the additional deputy commissioner has also conceived a plan to hand over the cooking and serving of mid-day meal in over 600 government schools of the district to women self-help groups. The move will free schoolteachers from their responsibility of ensuring that the meal is cooked and served. Meanwhile, a sum of Rs 6.28 crore has been allocated under the district plan for this year. |
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