Shimla, September 13
Fresh war of words between Union Minister Virbhadra Singh and his bete noire Vidya Stokes, Leader of the Opposition, has brought their differences into the open.

While the two leaders have, so far, refrained from attacking each other directly, contents of their statements leave no one in doubt about target of verbal volleys.

The immediate cause of renewed hostilities is the statement of the Union Minister that those hobnobbing with Chief Minister PK Dhumal would be consigned to dustbin by people of the state in the next elections.

He even said that their conduct was against the party principles and that the high command should take notice of it and act against such leaders.

Virbhadra Singh did not name anyone, but Stokes lost no time in firing a salvo against him and promptly issued a written rebuttal that the statement was false and in a bad taste.

She said such misleading allegations were being levelled by senior leaders to hog headlines in the media.

Instead of making public statements, the leaders should place facts before the high command and the PCC chief to help expose the treacherous leaders, she added.

She said the adamant attitude of those who projected themselves as the saviours of the Congress, cost the party the government in 1998 when veteran leader Sukh Ram was virtually forced to support the BJP.

He wanted to support the Congress but had reservations about a particular leader heading it. The BJP would not have come to power if the leader had shown magnanimity and shown a spirit of sacrifice for the sake of the party.

She denied ever saying that political leaders should resign from public office they were holding if an FIR was registered against them.

Common party workers were disillusioned over the senior party leaders making such damaging statements and were at a loss to know why disciplinary action could not be taken against them.

It was time that senior leaders refrained from using media to fight political rivals within party, she added.

Virbhadra Singh, who has been facing the wrath of the Dhumal government and had been booked by the Vigilance in the audio CD case, has been accusing “certain” Congress leaders of being hand in glove with the Chief Minister.

Shimla, September 13
Much maligned for causing pollution, cement plants in the state will soon generate environment-friendly power from waste heat which will not only enable them to earn carbon credits, but also reduce emissions.

The first such power plant is being set up by the ACC Cement manufacturing unit at Barmana which produces 45 lakh tonnes of cement and clinker annually.

The company has submitted a proposal to generate 7.5 MW of power using the waste heat recovery system.

The proposed power plant will incorporate a waste heat recovery boiler in which feed water is heat-exchanged with exhaust gases to produce steam for turbine system.

The Barmana plant has two big kilns which throw out 1,000 tonnes of hot air and gases every hour. At a temperature of 320 degree Celsius, these gases carry abundant energy to generate power.

The biggest advantage is that no fossil fuel or other material input will be required for producing power and it would just like renewable sources.

Senior functionary of the company Arun Mahajan, who is pursuing project, said the power plant would cost about Rs 72 crore which was economical if one took into account the fact that its operation would not require any inputs and it would also earn carbon credits.

Industrially advanced countries like the USA and Japan have been using the waste heat recovery technology for quite sometime and it had been further refined by the Chinese of late.

In case of highly industrialised countries like the USA, its potential 64,000 MW. In India, so far, only five such power plants have been set up by cement manufacturing units in Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh.

Three cement plants were already functioning and eight more were coming up as such waste heat recovery technology could be used to generate about 70 MW of power from the sector.

The government also plans to bring a policy for making use of the technology in all units which throw out hot air and gases.

Power will be virtually a by-product of the manufacturing process which will help bring down cost of production.

Shimla, September 13
With the revised cost shooting past Rs 900 crore, the 100-MW Uhl project, the only major scheme being executed by the state electricity board, is heading for huge time and cost overruns, much like the controversial Larji project.

The central electricity authority had approved a cost of Rs 432 crore in 2002 and it was originally scheduled to be commissioned by March, 2006.

The cost has already more than doubled and even according to the revised completion schedule of March, 2009, it has fallen behind by more than two years.

Obviously, the board has not learnt any lesson from the mistakes committed in the 126 MW Larji projects, the costliest hydroelectric project to date, which stood out only for a large-scale financial bungling, corruption and tardy implementation.

As the government and the management of the board had totally failed to check corruption in the execution of the project, the state electricity regulatory commission was forced to order an independent inquiry to investigate the high cost of Larji project.

Its findings led to registration of vigilance cases against several officials of the board. The situation has worsened as the government has not only been dithering on the issue of unbundling, but has also not taken the required corrective steps to clear the mess in the board. The result is that disastrous performance has been repeated.

Despite all controversies surrounding the Larji project, the board chose to award works of Uhl projects to some of those contractors who had faltered in execution.

The present government had reviewed the progress soon after assuming office and rescinded the contract for some major works like construction of head race tunnel, but that has not helped much.

On completion, the project will only generate 391 million units of power annually and as the cost is likely to go up further, the generation cost will be around Rs 5.50 per unit as against the average sale rate of Rs 3.62 per unit.

As against the average cost of Rs 5.5 crore per megawatt for major hydroelectric projects, the cost of the projects executed by the board has been as high as Rs 10 crore per megawatt.

Even the Asian Development Bank, which is funding four projects of the state power corporation to be executed over the next eight years, has pegged the cost at Rs 6 crore per megawatt.

The government had decided not to give any project of more than 25 MW to the state board power corporation.

However, for reasons best known to the government, the under-construction Uhl project was not handed over to it as was done in case of the Pabbar valley project.

Nurpur, September 13
The UPA government has proved its detractors wrong and achieved its target scheduled for the first 100 days in power by strengthening and expanding the capacity of PSU steel plants in the country in two phases.

This was stated by Union Steel Minister and former Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh while talking to mediapersons at Bassa Waziran near here before leaving for Delhi after his two-day tour in lower Kangra district on Sunday. He said the first phase would be completed in 2011-2012.

Speaking on the issue of complaints of irregularities being received in the central government-sponsored NREGA, he said the Union Government had appointed ombudsman in every district to ensure proper implementation of this scheme.

Reacting over the price rise of essential commodities in the recent past, the minister said there was no dearth of foodgrains in the country but in Himachal Pradesh, the Dhumal government had failed to curb prices of commodities under the garb of drought. He said the government had enacted sufficient laws to check black marketing and hoarding.

He categorically denied the allegations that the UPA government was meting out step-motherly treatment to Himachal Pradesh and added that being an MP of the state, he was keen to extend maximum assistance in development of his native land.

Earlier, the minister was accorded a warm reception by his supporters and was honoured by All-India Youth Congress election authority member Manoj Pathania who presented him a sword.

Nurpur, September 13
The Congress factionalism came to the fore during the two-day visit of Union Steel Minister Virbhadra Singh to the Nurpur Assembly constituency.

Interestingly, district Congress president BB Butail and PCC in charge of Nurpur subdivision Asha Kumari were conspicuous by their absence in Virbhadra Singh’s rallies held in the Jawali and Gangath assembly constituencies.

On record he had to visit the proposed site for the SAIL plant at Kandrori, address a pubic meeting there and join a civic reception organised by the Municipal Council, Nurpur, on Friday.

On Saturday, he had to address a political rally at Fatehpur in the Jawali Assembly constituency in view of the by-elections.

Intriguingly, before joining the civic reception here, he went to the house of a former minister, Sat Mahajan, who had been expelled in 2003 by the Congress following his contesting of Assembly elections against the official Congress candidate.

Till today, his expulsion has not been revoked. He ended his two-day long sojourn in the area by having breakfast with another opponent of Mahajan and party ticket claimant from Bassa Wazira.

“His speech at the Congress workers’ meeting held at Raja Ka Bagh in which he had sought action against those Congressmen who were sharing dais with BJP leaders, reflected his double standards,” lamented a senior Congress leader of the area on condition of anonymity.

Dharamsala, September 13
The call-girls scandal has more to it than what appears on the surface and the case should be handed over to the CBI. It is a racket that involved bribing top bureaucrats of the state by supplying call girls and bagging major projects.

This was stated by Manmohan Katoch, president of the Himachal Pradesh Youth Congress in a press release issued here today.

While demanding a CBI probe into the sex scandal, Katoch alleged that the government was trying to push the issue under the carpet.

That is why no arrest had been made till date in the case and even the alleged call girls and all accused were let off by the Vigilance team, he said.

The resignation of Rajinder Rana in the case was just an eyewash. There were some BJP bigwigs, including a senior minister as well as a senior IAS officers, involved in this issue, he said.

A liquor company has its rest house-cum- office in the private building of a senior Cabinet minister of the state. This rest house is frequented by senior BJP leaders as well as some IAS officers.

That is the reason behind allotting major hydro power projects to this company in the recent past, he added.

Katoch also held the liquor company responsible for indulging in unethical practices in the state. All government works allotted to this company must be cancelled with immediate effect and a CBI probe should be ordered in this episode, he said.

The Youth Congress will go deep into the matter and if required, initiate the agitation in case the matter is hushed up, Katoch added.

Dharamsala, September 13
The indoor sports stadium of Sports Authority of India (SAI) here is an epitome of the way projects get trapped in bureaucratic procedures in the state.

The construction of the indoor stadium was completed about two years back by the Housefed. However, the stadium is yet to be handed over to the SAI authorities.

Despite the fact that the indoor stadium has been there, girls staying in the SAI hostel here have to practice outdoor.

In monsoons, about 80 girl sportspersons have to abandon their crucial practice schedules due to rains.

Dharamsala is the wettest area of north India, especially during monsoon months. Sitting in their hostels, the girls could just watch the locked indoor stadium.

The reason was that the state agency that had been executing the project, wants to put in wooden flooring in the indoor stadium.

The SAI coaches admitted that they had been facing problems due to non-functioning of the indoor stadium.

They said 80 girls in the SAI centre of Dharamsala, who have represented the state in national and international level competitions, had been getting training here. The centre has been providing training in hockey, volleyball, athletics and gymnastics.

In the indoor stadium, facilities have been created for volleyball, athletics, gymnastics and physical training.

“Even if the wooden flooring has not been put, the present concrete floor was good enough for carrying out practice sessions. However, despite repeated requests, the authorities concerned have not been handing over building to us,” coaches said.

A visit to the locked stadium revealed that delay in handing over the indoor stadium has been taking toll over developed infrastructure.

Despite the fact that the stadium was yet to be handed over to SAI, the window and other wooden work at the stadium has started deteriorating.

The termites have attacked the wooden work of indoor stadium and destroyed it at many places.

Since there has been no upkeep of the stadium, nature’s forces have been taking toll over the stadium.

Mehatpur (Una), September 13
A pharmaceutical unit here has been accused of manufacturing drugs under a stolen brand name. The police, along with officials of Pfizer, a multinational pharmaceutical company, raided the Mehatpur-based unit yesterday late in the evening.

Una SP Santosh Patial said they had confiscated “Zichromax”, an antibiotic medicine worth about Rs 2.01 lakh from the premises of Stanford Pharmaceutical Company being run at Mehatpur.

Zichromax is the brand name of Pfizer pharmaceutical company and the company here was producing the drug illegally without any permission.

Besides, 45,000 number of packing material was also recovered. A case under the Copyright Act and Section 420 of the IPC has been registered against MS Duggal and Nishant Duggal, proprietors of the company.

The SP also said the confiscated drugs would be sent to a laboratory to ascertain its authenticity. Till the filing of this report the police had, however, not made any arrests in the case.

MS Duggal, when contacted, alleged that his company premises were raided illegally. He said the people who got the premises raided were not from Pfizer but from a private investigating agency.

They were from Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights, a private agency. He said the raiding party collected data from his computer which was illegal.

He, however, admitted that “Zichromax” was a brand name of Pfizer company and said the company was not producing any drug with the same brand name in India.

Duggal also claimed that he had a valid licence for manufacturing the drug under the brand name from the Himachal government.

He also alleged that under the standard procedure, Pfizer company should have issued a legal notice for violation of the brand name.

According to sources, Zichromax is a generic drug having Zichromycin salt. There are about 20 other generic drugs being manufactured under different brand names but having similar salt as basic content.

However, Standford company took benefit of the fact that Pfizer was not producing the drug under the same brand in India.

It has brought Himachal drug authorities under scanner that had issued licence to the company without verifying the fact that it was violation of the Copyright Act.

There are about 1.5 lakh brands of generic pharmaceutical drugs being manufactured in India. The companies are selling similar salts under different brand names at varied prices at the cost of consumers.

Solan, September 13
The arrest of additional SP (ASP) Mahinder Singh by a team of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau sleuths with cash worth Rs 2.20 lakh on Wednesday has exposed the rampant corruption in the police department and the unholy nexus of police officials with miscreants.

Bureau’s IG SR Marhi said the case pertained to property dispute whose inquiry was underway and further information could not be divulged as it would hamper investigations.

No official was ready to divulge as to who the complainant was or why the cash
had been delivered.

Though it was known that one Kashmira Ram had come to deliver the money and he was an employee of a liquor contractor, but no official came on record to tell what favours were being sought.

Sources, however, revealed that the money had been delivered on behalf of a Chandigarh-based Congress leader who was, sometime back, heading the Chandigarh Youth Congress. A complaint regarding his property dispute was being inquired into by the ASP.

The police official had, earlier, enjoyed hospitality by the political leader at his Kasauli-based bungalow where call girls had also been arranged to entertain the official. Interestingly, these activities had been taped by the leader.

The police had recovered Rs 2.20 lakh from the official’s residence and out of this, Rs 1.70 lakh had been delivered on the day of the arrest.

It was reliably learnt that the ASP had allegedly taken money from the other party also against whom the complaint was being inquired into and later he had demanded money from the politician as well.

A deal was later struck for Rs 2.20 lakh out of which Rs 50,000 was delivered earlier to a policeman posted in the personal staff of the ASP.

The Bureau had, reportedly, taped the conversation wherein the receipt of this amount had been acknowledged by the official’s personal staff.

Sources said things turned sour when the police official started dilly-dallying over the inquiry despite being extended hospitality by the leader and he then made a written complaint to the Bureau where he mentioned about the entire episode.

The Bureau’s efforts in arresting a police official were indeed laudable. While this step had sent the right signal about the Bureau being transparent, but officials from various departments had become cautious while talking on the phone as they feared being under the Bureau’s scanner.

Solan, September 13
With no low cost substitute for the anti-rabies vaccine (ARV) being available in government hospitals, the poor afflicted with the disease are forced to shell out Rs 1,500 for each shot.

The ARV shortage has hit the government hospitals ever since the Kasauli-based Central Research Institute (CRI) stopped ARV vaccine production in December 2004, which was being manufactured from the sheep brain.

The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare had been professing that a cheaper vaccine was being developed and was in trial stages by some private companies.

Its introduction into the market would take another year after successful completion of the trial. The ministry had been simply extending this assurance since the past almost three years with no immediate solution in sight.

In the absence of a cheap substitute for the ARV, the poor people who are afflicted with this disease are forced to shell Rs 1,500 for each shot by purchasing the vaccine developed by private manufacturers.

Since this vaccine is developed using the tissue culture technique it is priced at Rs 1,500. The CRI was the only institute manufacturing the vaccine for the northern states, including Haryana, Punjab, Himachal, Delhi, Jammu and Kashmir and its unavailability had adversely hit the poor.

The vaccine produced earlier at the CRI was phased out as it was found to have an adverse side effect in the form of paralysis, though it was one in 10,000 cases, confided sources in the CRI.

Though soon after the closure of the ARV vaccine the CRI had been trying to switch over to the tissue culture technique, little had been achieved in the past five years.

What made matters worse was suspension of its manufacturing licence in January 2007 after it failed to confirm to the WHO norms.

According to an estimate, each district has hundreds of such cases every month and absence of an affordable vaccine deprived many of the requisite cure in the state.

The CRI was manufacturing the vaccine through the neural tissue technique introduced in 1905 by British national Sir David Semple, who was institute’s director.

Mandi, September 13
Traffic cops have become notorious choosing “soft targets” for challans, targeting especially those vehicles that carry number plates other than those of Mandi for violations like “wrong parking in the town”, which has become a nightmare for law-abiding citizens.

A traffic cop on duty recently targeted vehicles in the back lane of the DC office and challaned vehicles particularly the ones that had outstation numbers.

When this correspondent pointed out as to why he was not challaning vehicles of the LIC employees parked wrongly in front of the deputy director public relations office, he had no answer.

There was no signboard of no parking at the back lane of the DC office, some of the car owners rued. Even then the cops come and target outsiders’ vehicle to get pats from their officers even if the vehicles do not block traffic, they complained.

Office-goers rued that some private house owners have rented their lower floors to the LIC and other offices, but did not allotted them the parking space.

The LIC employees have turned the post office road into a parking lot by parking vehicles right behind the DC office, they rued.

Mandi SP Sonal Agnihotri said the police had been accommodative and only challaned vehicles when things went above head.

The Manali-Leh road has now become an alternate route to the frontier areas of the Leh-Ladakh regions.

Shimla, September 13
The district administration and the police today swung into action to rescue 80-year- old Santosh who was locked up in a house in New Shimla, with her son missing since the past two months.

Frail and sick Santosh is mentally unstable and does not know her own identity, her whereabouts or her relatives.

It was after the news about her appeared in The Tribune that the administration reached her house to make arrangements for shifting her to an old-age home.

A naib tehsildar was deputed by the administration to visit the rented accommodation near DAV School, New Shimla, to find about her.

A police team also arrived as additional SP Anand Dhiman directed the cops to produce the woman in the court of the SDM (urban) tomorrow and complete the formalities for her being shifted to the old-age home.

The maid, who used to visit the woman once in a while to provide her with little food, was also summoned.

With no ration, gas and other provisions, the old woman hardly had anything to eat and remained locked in the house ever since her son, Raju, went missing from New Shimla. The police is also making efforts to trace her son.

Shimla, September 13
The Union Ministry of Power has approved a loan of Rs 81.07 crore for upgradation of power infrastructure to help reduce energy losses of 14 major towns of the state under the restructured accelerated power development and reform programme.

The funds will be utilised by the state power utility to establish baseline data and information technology-enabled applications for energy accounting and auditing at consumer centres.

The towns to be covered include Shimla, Paonta, Baddi, Bilaspur, Chamba, Dharamsala, Hamirpur, Kullu, Mandi, Nahan, Solan, Sundernagar, Una and Yol.

The focus of the scheme is on actual demonstrable performance in terms of sustainable loss data and adoption of information technology for energy accounting.

The performance of the board will be evaluated before and after the implementation of this programme to enhance internal accountability.

The existing data centre will be strengthened and upgraded according to latest architecture and a disaster recovery site in different seismic zones would also be established under the business continuity plan.

The board will also establish online meter-data acquisition and energy accounting for distribution feeders, distribution transformers and HT consumers by providing GPRS-based automatic meter reading system.

The board will be required to reduce auxiliary and technical losses by 1.5 per
cent every year.

With the implementation of the scheme, the data collected through the automatic meter reading system will be collected at the data centre and used for billing, energy accounting and calculating exact losses.

It will enable the board to identify high loss-making areas and improve the distribution network accordingly.

At present the losses in these town are already quite low and the average works out to 17.15 per cent.

On completion of the works in time, the loan will be converted to grant. It will be
followed up by second phase scheme for strengthening the distribution system in
these towns.