Chandigarh, September 25
A maid working at the house of a senior woman Haryana IAS officer has levelled allegations of physical torture against her employer here today.

The victim Janaki, who reached the Sector 16 Government Multi-speciality Hospital to get treatment, has alleged that she was severely thrashed by her employer Shashi Gulati, a resident of House No 717, Sector 7, due to which she was injured.

Gulati, when contacted, however, denied the allegations.

“I have no idea about such a complaint. I left home for office in the morning and there was no such incident at my home. Last week, the maid had wanted to leave the job but I requested her to stay for a few more days as I was going to shift my house. That could be the reason for getting offended and maligning me,” said Gualti.

Janaki, who made it to the hospital with her husband Mewa Lal in the morning, first approached the doctors and then reached the police post at the hospital to lodge the complaint against Gulati. The doctors, however, treated her as an outdoor patient and did not admit her as the “condition of the victim was not serious”.

Strangely, the complaint has mentioned that Janaki did not want any action against the employer. It also does not mention the reason for her thrashing.

The police, however, does not have her address so that she could be contacted later. “The complainant did not want any action in the case so we did not find it fit to ask her about the place where she was staying after the incident,” said the investigating officer, assistant sub inspector Gurcharan Singh.

Again, the police has no answer to the query that why had Janaki lodged a complaint with the police alleging physical torture.

Chandigarh, September 25
Income tax officials today began recovery proceedings against a local businessman, Arun Ummat, son-in-law of a prominent Punjab Congress leader, in connection with alleged tax arrears to the tune of Rs 6 crore.

The officials seized Arun’s Ford Fiesta, and his properties, including a glass factory in Panchkula, are likely to be attached tomorrow. The recovery proceedings were initiated following court orders received by the IT department two days ago.

The IT officials swooped on Arun’s Sector 21-A house around 3 pm. When the inmates of the house did not open the door even after repeated knocks, the officials took the car parked in the driveway in their possession and made a gardener and a ‘dhobi’ sign as independent witnesses to the proceedings.

IT officials pasted notices on the walls of the house stating that the recovery proceedings had been initiated as “you” had failed to respond to the show-cause notices and summons issued by the ward concerned and tax recovery officer. The IT officials towed the car away even as the inmates of the house watched the proceedings from behind closed windows.

According to the officials, a raid was conducted on various business and residential premises of Arun way back in 1999. Subsequently, evasions to the tune of lakhs were detected on his company’s accounts. Over the years, the penalty leads to Rs 6 crore and proceedings were launched to recover the huge amount. According to the officials, the company was also a defaulter in certain bank loans running into Rs 11 crore.

The officials said while Arun was the MD of Abzoney Glass Pvt Ltd, his wife Sangeeta, too, had interests in it.

Arun is reportedly married to the daughter of Punjab MLA Brahm Mohindra. Efforts to contact Arun or any of his immediate family members for comments proved futile. They didn’t open the door for this reporter.

Chandigarh, September 25
Tension prevailed in Industrial Area-I, after four Ram Darbar youths received serious multiple injuries in a clash between two groups late this evening.

Some policemen of the PCR also received injuries when they tried to intervene and control the situation. Additional forces, including CRPF personnel, were rushed to the scene to control the situation. The injured youths - Bittu, Sanjeev, Suraj and Sachin - have been admitted to the GMCH, Sector 32.

According to the police, two of the victims - Sanjeev and Bittu - were returning home when they were waylaid by Deepa, Nari, Sandeep, Badshah.

They were reportedly attacked with sharp-edged weapons. All victim and assailants are in their twenties.

According to sources, the assailants also damaged the PCR vehicle of the police. The police was informed by the family members of the victim. Tension prevailed in the area after the incident, as local residents accused the police of doing little to maintain law and order.

Chandigarh, September 25
Residents had a tough time today as the two-day strike call given by the United Forum of Bank Unions hit banking operations in the region. With all nationalised banks remaining closed, banking transactions worth Rs 500 crore could not be affected during these two days.

On an average, banking transactions worth Rs 250 crore take place in the tricity each day. The two-day of strike meant that transactions worth Rs 500 crore could not be carried out. Unconfirmed reports of ATMs running dry in Sector 22 and in some parts of Mohali were also received.

The strike, which was absolute, was called to oppose the decision of the government to bring about complete privatisation of the banking sector, in a phased manner. The employees are also protesting against the complete ban on new recruitment, merger of public sector banks and are seeking the option of pension for bank employees, said Vijay Magon, general secretary of the State Bank of India Officers Association.

As a result of the two-day strike, cheques that were deposited in banks on Tuesday, will be cleared only on Monday next week. These cheques would be sent to the MICR house for clearance on Saturday and would be affected in the consumers’ accounts only on Monday i.e. September 29. Even the cheques deposited in the private banks will be affected next week, as the MICR house is run by Punjab National Bank.

Though banks had made provisions by loading their ATMs to their maximum capacity on Tuesday evening, there is a cap on the money that can be withdrawn from the ATM on a given day. As a result, a huge rush was witnessed at the ATMs of most banks, especially in the commercial areas of Sector 17, 22 and 35 here yesterday. Scared that the ATMs could run dry, people had started queuing up outside the ATMs since morning.

Meanwhile, a number of bank officials had gathered at the local head office of State Bank of India in Sector 17 today and took out a procession to Bank Square. They raised slogans against the government and deplored the anti-employee policies.

Chandigarh, September 25
Striking a right balance between the UT administrator, Gen S.F. Rodrigues (retd), and minister of state for finance Pawan Bansal will be the biggest challenge for the new home secretary, Ram Niwas, who assumed charge here yesterday.

With Rodrigues and Bansal not seeing eye to eye on several issues, the 1985 batch IAS officer would need all his administrative acumen to keep the two centres of power in good humour. And it would not be an easy task with the local unit of the Congress making the "anti-people" stance of the bureaucracy an issue even before AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi recently.

Ram Niwas was apparently not the first choice of the UT administrator, who went out of the way to "lobby" for the extension of former home secretary Krishna Mohan in New Delhi. But Krishna Mohan was repatriated on March 31 and the administration backed a woman officer, drawing flak for favouring a particular officer.

Ultimately, fed up with the "lobbying" by different officers in the previous panel, the centre sought another panel, in which Ram Niwas was one of the officers.

Left with no choice, the administration and the ministry of home affairs recommended the name of Ram Niwas, who was placed 11th in the all-India civil services merit list and had reportedly been empanelled as the joint secretary to the Government of India. Sources term him as a no-nonsense and dynamic officer who believes in getting things done quickly.

Being a seat of power for three governments — UT, Punjab and Haryana — Chandigarh would provide the right atmosphere for Ram Niwas to put his long administrative experience to use.

Chandigarh, September 25
Medical aspirants in the region are at their wits’ end as far as the availability of application forms for CBSE and AIIMS are concerned.

According to sources, hapless parents and candidates are running from pillar to post to get the forms, the reason being, the forms are available only at Panjab University’s branch of State bank of India and that too they are out of stock.

Interestingly, the forms were only made available a week back but they went out of stock within a day or two. Since then the parents and their wards, coming from as far as Ferozepur, Pathankot, Jammu and other far flung areas, have been making rounds of the bank, only to be welcomed by the notice pasted on the bank counter that the forms were not available. Also, the forms duly filled have to reach New Delhi by the first week of October.

But given the non-availability of forms, this seems a distant dream.If the bank staff members are to be believed, their situation is no better. According to official sources of the bank, a total of 1,400 forms, including those of AIIMS and CBSE entrance examination, arrived from New Delhi’s branch, which is responsible for sending the forms.

PU’s branch is merely a counter to sell them but the forms are made available from the local head office branch of SBI in New Delhi. Given this situation where demand is exceeding supply, the helpless bank officials are now giving the telephone numbers of New Delhi branch so that the parents can directly speak to the authorities.

“We understand that it concerns the career of so many children but the problem is not at our end, if it had been so, it would have been long rectified”, SBI-14 branch chief manager Sumit roy said.

To top it all, the two-day bank strike added to the students’ woes, who were not able to get forms during the two days and were now fearing if their forms would reach Delhi on time or not.

The sale of forms is not a profitable proposition for the bank. According to sources, for each form, which the bank officials sell, only 1 per cent goes to them, which in this case is Rs 10 per form. As for the other forms of the university, which the bank sells through its extension counter, the bank only gets Rs 3 per form. That’s another matter that the university has on an average increased the cost of reach form by Rs 200-300 but the remuneration for the bank remains as low as Rs 3.

Chandigarh, September 25
When it comes to dealing with corruption cases, the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation, it seems, has two sets of rules - one for its employees and the other for the contractors.

While the employees are rightly hauled up for their wrong acts, the same cannot be said for the contractors as they usually go scot free, cocking a snook at the MC’s zero tolerance policy against corruption.

A look at various corruption cases registered against the firms enlisted with the MC by the police, CBI or the vigilance is enough to expose the “double standards” of the corporation. While in most of the corruption cases related to projects, the officials concerned are suspended, no action is initiated against the firms.

The MC authorities reinstate the employees only after getting a clean chit from the concerted authority, but they continue to allot work to the “corrupt” contractors on the plea that charges have not been proved against them so there is no need to debar or blacklist them.

In January this year, the CBI had registered a case of cheating, forgery and conspiracy against a firm, which was given the work of installing streetlight on Dakshin Marg. A case was also registered against three employees of the corporation.

As a punishment, the MC repatriated an executive engineer and a junior engineer of the project to their parent departments, whereas the sub-divisional officer was suspended. However, no action was initiated against the firm. Despite pending inquiry by the CBI, the same firm had recently applied for the work of Rs 90 lakh for installation of streetlights in Sector 17, said sources.

A case was been registered by CBI in which the contractor alleged that officials were asking for bribe for clearing the payment. The MC suspended two officials even though the CBI has not proved anything against the officials. The contractor received payment and despite the case still pending with the CBI.

In another case, a contractor locked the official of the MC in a room and the corporation debarred the firm. However, the proprietor of the firm registered his firm in another name and is continuing the work.

One of the MC officials said that as there was no check while registering these firms, this results into registration of different firms by a single contractor in the administration or the corporation. Official said that the corporation has no strong clauses for the defaulter contractors as the authority only have the power to fine them or blacklisted them.

Former mayor Subhash Chawla said that there were no strict norms against the firms and contractors who violate rules. He said a survey was conducted by the MC in which it was found that there are limited contractors with the MC who quote prices as per their own will.

Chandigarh, September 25
The issue of non-payment of salaries of the employees of Government Model School, Sector 29, could snowball into a major controversy with the staff, including teachers, threatening to take to streets to protest against the callous attitude of the school authorities.

While it’s almost time to compute the salaries for the month of September for UT employees, the staff of this school still awaits their August’s pay cheques. They squarely blame the principal, Saroj Bhasin, for this inordinate delay and were planning to stage a dharna outside the school later this week.

Bhasin claimed that salaries of 80 per cent of the employees had been cleared and they would be getting their pay cheques within a day or two. However, she failed to justify the delay and also the fact why the rest of the 20 per cent were still denied their salaries. The teachers, however, insisted that she had yet not cleared their salary bill.

The employees claimed that things had gone worse ever since Bhasin had been appointed as the principal. “It has never happened that we haven’t got our salaries for almost a month,” said a teacher.

Speaking to TNS, school clerk Savita accused the principal of harassing her by not allowing her to resume duties after her medical leave.

This is not the first time that this issue had been raised. Earlier this month, an inquiry was conducted on various allegations against her but its fate was still not known. No one from the administration was willing to comment on it.

Chandigarh, September 25
The counting of votes for the graduates’ constituency of PU senate entered the third day today. With the results of five seats already been declared yesterday, the contest was now for the remaining 10 seats. However, as the trends were pouring in, the picture on who will be elected was becoming clearer.

As per the trends, Rabindernath Sharma was leading with 2,203 votes, followed by DAV candidate Kailash Nath Kaul with 2,183 votes, Dharinder Tayal with 2,112 votes, Prabhjit Singh with 2,064 votes, R.K. Sharma with 2,057 votes, Anu Chatrath with 1,995 votes, Munish Verma with 1,979 votes, BJP’s Parveen Sharma with 1,906 votes, S.S. Randhawa with 1,895 votes and Malwinder Singh Kang with 1,839 till the filling of this report.

A total of eight candidates were eliminated today leaving only 29 candidates in fray for 10 seats.

The counting would continue till tomorrow night and would come to a close after all the results will be out.

Mohali, September 25
Occupants of dwelling units in Jhota Kut Colony, Sector 71, thwarted an attempt by GMADA officials to evict them from the illegal colony today.

Last Saturday, GMADA officials had demolished around 130 commercial and residential structures in the colony.

The officials had planned to undertake a second drive for the remaining structures today. However, when they reached the scene, the occupants flashed papers claiming that they had procured stay orders from the court. The officials maintained that the stay had been vacated and they would be evicted.

The officials have now decided to come again with adequate police force.

GMADA has been engaged in a legal battle with the occupants for many years.

The drive was undertaken after petitions of landowners were dismissed by the High Court.

Though the colony has been in existence since 1978, GMADA had gone to court after plots were carved out on a five-acre prime chunk of land.

Though the occupants in the colony complained of forcible eviction, residents of PUDA houses were a happy lot. Due to rearing of milch cattle in the colony, filthy conditions prevailed in the area and the structures had become a traffic bottleneck.

Chandigarh, September 25
It was a day of impassioned performances by students of various colleges in and around the city participating in the Panjab University Youth Festival being organised at MCM DAV College.

The girls depicted various social issues by the medium of their plays, skits and mimes. Be it the increasing craze to marry non-resident Indians or apathy of the government and police towards the concerns of the general public, the themes were taken from all walks of life and were enacted in the best of their forms.

“We took the concept of fraud marriages as they are common these days, especially in Punjab. The play shows the way girls are wooed to marry the NRI and then get exploited in the foreign countries,” said the professor of the participating team of Jhar Sahib College. The college bagged third prize in the skit competition.

“The issues directly concerning people are always preferred as they help the audience to relate to them,” said the professor of MCM DAV College, Sector 36, who won the first prize in mime.

Guru Gobind Singh College for Women, Sector 26, chose the topic of family wars being caused because of the increasing demand of cable and satellite television among the people. “It is a very common scenario in almost everyone’s house where the family members argue and event fight to watch their favourite programmes,” said one of the participants of the play.

Mai Bhago, Ludhiana, won the first prize in the skit competition, while MCM DAV College got the first prize for mimicry.