Hamirpur, February 28
While registration process under the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna (RSBY) for families living below poverty line (BPL) has begun in the state, restricting this scheme to five members of a family is creating awkward situation in some of the cases.

Since many of the BPL families are living in joint families with more than five members, it is becoming a difficult choice for heads of such families to select five family members to include under the health insurance scheme and exclude others.

The RSBY has been launched by the Central government throughout the country through the state governments under which people living under the BPL would get health 
insurance cover of Rs 30,000 made towards medical expenses in a year.

In some cases of chronic diseases, medical expenses up to Rs 1.75 lakh would also be reimbursed under this scheme.

The respective block development officers have started the process of registration of five members of every such family who would be issued “smart cards” for getting their treatment at government and a few other hospitals.

The block offices are now in the process of issuing these cards to persons qualifying the norms for the BPL families as per records of such families falling in that area.

According to the norms fixed by the Central government, only five members of a family can be covered under the RSBY to adhere the family planning standard of two children.

During the registerstain process, the head of the families are being asked the option of five members to be covered under the scheme which is becoming a ticklish choice; more so since such choice could lead to family discords.

State health services director Dr Nagesh Verma said, “RSBY norms have been fixed by the Central government and heads of families should not include healthy members of families to get health cover. They can opt for other members in case of such need next year.” 

Mandi, February 28
Thanks to political apathy, there is just “one room without any surgeon and a mobile X-ray” in the name of “casualty services” at Mandi zonal hospital. Accident cases or trauma patients have to fend for themselves as “round-the-clock” emergency services here remain on papers only.

A visit to the hospital reveals that there is just one doctor after the working hours in the hospital after 4 pm. He looks after 300 patients in wards of the 300-bed hospital. The doctor on duty is also supposed to attend patients who are rushed in from different parts of the region as emergency cases.

Patients blame Mandi MLAs and ministers, who have not even bothered to take up the matter of starting “casualty services” in Mandi over the years.

There is no surgeon in the hospital, leave alone a neurosurgeon. The only surgeon at zonal hospital here, Dr AB Gupta, has been appointed as chief medical officer, Mandi.

As a result, patients needing surgeries are being referred to the IGMC, Shimla, or PGI, Chandigarh. The worst suffers are the accident victims as there is no surgeon to attend to on them, patients rued.

They cited a recent case of two accident victims---Amardeep and Gunjan--- both students of Sundernagar polytechnic college. Amardeep died on way to the PGI on February 17 while Gunjan is still in a critical condition at the PGI as they did not get emergency care at zonal hospital, private Hari Har hospital and Sundernagar hospital.

There is just a room that mentions “casualty services” at the zonal hospital. There is no mobile X-ray, proper examination room and a dedicated doctor, pharmacist and nurses to take care of emergency patients.

Dr AB Gupta said there was not much that he could do as there was no other surgeon to take case of casualty cases. However, we make special arrangements in case of accidents, he added.

Dr Gupta said in emergency cases, they had a roster under which doctors were available on calls whenever there was a need. “We need 15 more doctors and 10 pharmacists with other mandatory equipment to start the casualty services,” he said.

Doctors at the zonal hospital say critical patients are referred to tertiary care hospitals, the IGMC and PGI, where neurosurgeons are available. “We cannot do much in cases of critical injuries other than giving the first aids,” they claim.

Health services director Dr Nagesh Verma said the department would appoint a surgeon at the zonal hospital and had already directed the Mandi CMO to start the 24-hour emergency services.

Shimla, February 28
Search of the CID for CDs, allegedly containing sting operations involving politicians and officers, which were likely to surface, has led to an unexpected breakthrough with the arrest of two persons who were trying to sell one such CD to make money.

Ever since the triple CD issue surfaced, there have been rumours that more such CDs were likely to surface and names of various politicians, including ministers, MPs and officers, were in circulation in this connection. The police, on the basis of secret information, found that a CD with the recording of an audio-visual clipping shot by mobile phone featuring a divisional forest officer was being sold and a sum of Rs 10 lakh was being demanded.

The CID promptly organised an operation late in the evening and nabbed one Rahul Kumar, a former bank employee hailing from Bihar who was convicted for fraud, and 21-year-old Guarav who also had criminal background, and recovered two CDs from them. The CDs contained the conversation with the officer in which the person, conducting the alleged sting operation, had himself made some references to the forest minister. The operation was carried by one Brij Lal, a Shiv Sena leader.

According to sources, there was nothing incriminating in the CD and the purpose seemed to extort money through blackmail.

Additional Director General of Police ID Bhandari said the high court had banned circulation of such CDs and the police had been on the job. The officer concerned had also lodged a complaint and a case of extortion and conspiracy had been registered under Section 384 and 120 (B) of the IPC.

He said the two CDs were over 90 minutes long and the police was in the process of taking the transcript and if anything incriminating was found, adequate action would be taken. He said the two persons had contacted various people, including TV channels, for selling the CD and name of another political person, not connected with any major party, also figured. However, facts would be known only after detailed investigation, he added.

Meanwhile, the politicians and officers will be a relieved lot with the breakthrough achieved by the police.

Solan, February 28
Faced with increasing price and scarcity of various raw material, paper mills were incurring heavy losses, forcing them to shut their operations every now and then. While the packaging industry has been alleging abrupt hike in paper prices, the All India Kraft and Recycle Paper Mill Association has decided to announce a hike of Rs 2 from April 1.

This decision was taken at a recent meeting of the association where it was decided not to bring about any more hike in the paper prices for April and May. The association will, however, convene a review meeting on May 15 and take a decision on further price hike if the market situation did not improve, confided its chairman Rajeshwar Garg.

The decision comes in the wake of a five-day shutdown call given by the North India Packagers’ Association in lieu of the hike in paper prices.

About 300 paper mills in north India have been going through tough times with majority of them incurring losses due to hike in prices of various raw materials. Earlier, these mills used bagasse (crushed sugarcane pulp). Since the sugarcane mills in Uttar Pradesh, which was the major supplier, have been directed to use this as a boiler fuel instead of the earlier coal due to pollution concerns, it has become a scarce commodity. Moreover, the increased coal prices have also deterred the industry. Bagasse comprises almost 50 per cent raw material of the paper mills.

A part of this scarcity has now been met by importing waste which comprises almost 25 per cent of the raw material. The abrupt price hike of this imported waste from $100 to $240in the past one year by the US, Europe, Canada and Australia, has further burdened the mills, forcing them to hike paper prices. Further, the inclement weather in these countries has added to the scarcity.

The input cost has thereby been hiked by as much as 70 per cent while the paper mills were barely getting 30 per cent price hike. The packagers had made a huge hue and cry over this hike as well, lamented paper mill owners. The small paper mills have incurred losses to the tune of one crore each in a single year as the situation has remained unchanged. They are finding it difficult to meet the recurring expenditure, confided mill owners.

Almost 10,000 tonnes of paper was used by the Baddi-Barotiwala-Nalagarh industrial area every month and a majority of it was imported from other states.

The packagers, on the other hand, have been alleging that the paper mills were indulging in undue and abrupt price hikes.

Shimla, February 28
It has become easier for advocates to qualify for examination for recruitment to the state higher judicial services than the in-service judges with the high court prescribing lower minimum marks for the former for passing the written examination.

Information obtained by RTI activist Dev Ashish Bhattacharya under the Right to Information (RTI) Act reveals that initially same qualifying criteria was laid down for appointment to the cadre of district judges and additional district judges for both in-service judges and the advocates under direct recruitment. According to the rule framed in May, 2005, for holding the limited competitive examination for in-service judges, “no candidate shall be considered to have qualified the test unless he obtained a minimum of 60 percent marks in each individual paper and an aggregate of 66 per cent marks in all papers put together. A similar criteria was laid down for holding the examination for direct recruitment from the bar in the rules framed in August, 2005.

However, during amendment in the rules effected subsequently, first in April, 2006, and than in March, 2009, the minimum qualifying marks for advocates to be inducted through direct recruitment were lowered. The minimum qualifying marks in each individual paper were reduced from 60 to 50 per cent and in aggregate from 66 to 55 per cent. However, no such relaxation was granted to the in-service candidates.

The reasons for having different criteria for in-service judges and advocates could not be ascertained as the reply of public information officer Ashwini Sharma to all queries in this regard was “no such information is available”. Bhattacharya had asked three specific queries. Besides seeking reasons for fixing different minimum marks for qualifying the examination for judicial officers and the advocates for recruitment to the same cadre, he had also specifically asked whether there was any direction of the Supreme Court (SC) to fix the qualifying marks on the lower side for the advocates and also the purpose to be achieved by lowering the qualifying marks for direct recruitment.

Bhattacharya points out that the Shetty Commission had dealt with the issue in detail and while accepting its recommendation, the Supreme Court had fixed the minimum qualifying marks for each individual paper at 60 per cent.

Shimla, February 28
The police last night arrested Gaurav Verma, a student of IIT Roorkee, for the alleged murder of Pragati, a student of IIT Delhi, who was found dead in a local hotel yesterday.

He was travelling by Haridwar-Barmer train and the railway police nabbed him at Jagadhari on an information provided by the director of the IIT, Roorkee. The state police team, which was already on way, reached Jagadhari in the wee hours today and brought him to Shimla.

Superintendent of Police RM Sharma said the accused had confessed to the crime carried out in desperation. He had also tried to commit suicide by cutting his vein and consuming phenyl. The two were friends and the act was committed after they had consumed liquor.

The murder was committed at 1.30 pm on Friday and the accused remained in the hotel till 2.30 am the next day. Thereafter, he went to Chandigarh by taxi and stayed in a hotel where he tried to consume phenyl, the evidence of which was found by the police team. Thereafter, he went to Roorkee and boarded the train in the evening.

Sharma said while the post-mortem report was awaited, there was enough evidence against the accused. The victim did struggle before being killed as evident from the hair of the accused found from the scene of crime. Apart from knife, the victim was also attacked with the empty liquor bottle. While reasons for the murder would be known only after detailed investigations, initial interrogation indicate that it was an act of desperation.

The accused will be produced in the court tomorrow.

Shimla, February 28
Fragrance of flowers produced in the hill state is spreading across the northern region as more and more farmers have been diversifying to floriculture from traditional crops.

Floriculture has indeed made a headway over the past decade and it is today generating an economy of about Rs 28 crore annually with more than 2,800 farmers directly engaged in the vocation. Flowers grown in the state are in great demand in Delhi, the main market, and other other parts of the country. It is a commercially viable proposition, fetching remunerative returns to farmers.

Implementation of the Horticulture Technology Mission, under which subsidies were provided for setting up of poly houses and development of water resources, has helped a great deal in promoting commercial floriculture.

From a meagre 30 hectare in 1993-94, the area under floriculture increased to 617.65 hectare in the year 2008-09. Today, the estimated turnover of floriculture produce is around Rs 27.33 crore.

The first model floriculture centre was established at Mahog Bag near Chail in Solan with 1,706.5 sqm of green house area. It also has a post-harvest handling unit and three cool chambers for the storage capacity of 4 lakh bulbs and 10,000 cut flowers. It is acting as a nucleus for the propagation of commercial floriculture providing improved germ-plasm to the commercial flower growers and nurseries, besides training. Scientific facilities for the post harvest management of floriculture produce is also being looked after by this centre.

The Department of Horticulture has established seven floriculture nurseries in different zones of the state. These include Nav Bahar, Chharabra, Mahog Bag, Parwanoo, Bajaura Dharamsala and Bhatoon. They play a key role in introduction and multiplication of planting material, bulbs and seeds of improved flower varieties.

The department organises short duration training programme for the growers. Study tours for flower growers are also being organised from time to time to create awareness among them and expose them to new trends and technologies in floriculture. Under the technical assistance programme, free technical advice is also made available by the Department of Horticulture to floriculturists.

Hamirpur, February 28
The online learners licensing system at the e-governance centre in Hamirpur was launched here today by Member of Parliament Anurag Thakur by clicking a mouse.

After introduction of this system, the applicants seeking learning driving licence would be able to secure their licences almost immediately after their registration in the office of licensing authority by passing an online driving test through a touch screen.

Addressing the gathering on the occasion, Thakur said after the introduction of this system people would be benefited since a large number of people were coming to obtain their driving licences. He said the system would also enable to create more awareness and knowledge required for driving and help in checking road accidents, besides improving the skill of driving and congratulated the district administration for taking this new initiative.

Talking about various initiatives of the state government to improve environment and ecology of the state, he said the government had banned felling of trees and use of polythene and introduced CFL bulbs, besides introducing this eco “friendly driving licensing system”.

He said by adopting all these measures Himachal Pradesh had emerged as a model state in the country.

DC Abhishek Jain said after introduction of online licensing system obtaining this licence would become very easy and also make this process more objective as touch screen test would increase the knowledge of applicant on driving skills.