Karnal, April 22
The killing of a leopard that strayed into a colony in Karnal by some police personnel on April 19 may boomerang on the policemen who fired the shots.

An inquiry has already been initiated and if it is established that the leopard was not a “man-eater”, a case of poaching could be registered against the policemen involved, highly placed sources in the Forest Department confided.

The top police brass here had described the “shooting” of the scared leopard as a “rare act of bravery” and also congratulated the policemen who pumped bullet into the animal. However, the police have a lot to explain that why the animal could not be captured or allowed to go its way as senior wildlife officers strongly felt that had the leopard not been confronted by the people, it would not have turned violent and attack the people.

Forest conservator Satyawan, who recorded the statements of the injured persons in the hospital on April 20 would record the statements of the policemen soon before submitting his report.

The post-mortem report confirmed that the leopard received three bullets in the stomach, head and left leg and six lathi blows that proved fatal.

The carcass of the leopard was cremated inside the forest complex near Mangalpur Chowk and it took about 20 hours to burn the body. A three-feet-deep pit was dug for cremation and the residual bones were buried in the same pit to ensure that these did not reach the wrong hands, forest officer Azad Singh said.

“Earlier we used to auction the bones and nails which fetched handsome returns but the practice have been abandoned as some unscrupulous people were using the auctioned bones as a shield to carry out their nefarious activities”, he added.

The Wild Life Preservation authorities were perturbed over killing of three leopards in the state in the recent past and describe the brutal killing of a leopard in Jind as totally “unprovoked and uncalled for”. The animal was in the field and was not attacking anyone then where was need to kill it”, they argue.

While the police could be in the dock for “avoidable killing”, the Forest Department too was also on the back foot for not providing tranquiliser guns in each forest range. Parvez Ahmed, Chief WildLife Warden, made an announcement to provide a tranquiliser gun to each DFO only after the killing of three leopards.

It was a sad commentary on the functioning of police and forest department who lacked co-ordination and failed to plan “bloodless” operation. The leopard could be easily overpowered and saved if the forest officials had tranquilizer guns and the injuries to people could also have been avoided, wild life lovers rued.

Parvez Ahmed said it was matter of concern that three leopards had been killed in the recent past in Yamunangar, Jind and Karnal and admitted that the forest officers did not have the tranquiliser guns.

The department had only five tranquiliser guns and now it has been decided to provide a tranquiliser gun to each DFO to avoid the recurrence of such incidents.

Highly placed sources in the department have scotched the rumours that leopards were coming from the Kalesar area along Yamunanagar due to water shortage, claiming that there was no migration of leopards from Kalesar.

Kaithal, April 22
Under its ongoing programme of strengthening transmission network, the Haryana Power Utilities has commissioned 53 new substations, augmented capacity of 90 existing substations and constructed 619-km-long transmission lines with a total investment of Rs 682.54 crore during 2009-10.

A spokesman said the newly constructed substations included one 400 KV, one 220 KV, 11 132 KV, five 66 KV and 35 33 KV substations. The augmentation covered nine 220 KV, 20 132 KV, 27 66 KV and 34 33 KV substations spread in Ambala, Bhiwani, Fatehabad, Faridabad, Gurgaon, Hisar, Jind, Jhajjar, Kaithal, Kurukshetra, Karnal, Mahendragarh, Palwal, Panipat, Panchkula, Rewari, Rohtak, Sirsa and Sonepat districts.

The construction of new substations and capacity augmentation had gone a long way to overcome the low voltage problem of the areas being fed from these substations. It had also enabled the distribution corporations to release pending connections for tubewells and industrial category applicants.

He said the HPU had energised 132-KV substation Bhusthala, 66-KV substation Rattangarh and 33-KV substations at Bazar, Haripur, Bhogipur and Sirsala were commissioned, 10 existing substations 132-KV substation at Nautch, 66-KV substations at Dundahera, Bhagola, Sector-4 IMT Manesar, Sadhopur, Aurangabad and Faridabad and 33-KV substations at Bhud Kalan, Dwarka and Mastgarh augmented and 106.448-km-long transmission lines constructed at a total cost of Rs 70.45 crore.

The expanded transmission and distribution network had enhanced transmission and distribution system reliability. The certified deemed transmission system availability in the state, as per the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission for February was 99.4127 per cent, he added.

Hisar, April 22
Power consumers may get some respite from “high-voltage shocks” they get while dealing with employees of power utilities if Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam’s plans to make the employee-consumer interaction more pleasant succeed.

Sudhir Rajpal, the newly appointed managing director of the nigam, has directed that all employees must attend to public telephone calls and satisfy consumers on their queries about power supply or any other aspect. Senior officers will call nigam officials randomly to check whether they attend the phone calls of consumers and talk to them courteously or not.

The officers will also call members of the public, at random, to know whether the nigam employees in their area attend to their calls properly and courteously. The nigam also plans to provide a mobile phone at each substation for improved communication and timely action on consumer complaints.

Rajpal said consumer satisfaction was the top priority for the nigam for which officials would have to behave courteously with the consumers, keep them informed about the power supply position, schedule of power supply and give advance information on power cuts. For informing consumers about unscheduled power cuts, the officials should ring up some prominent persons of their area who could further disseminate the information to maximum number of consumers.

In order to bring about more transparency, the nigam has decided to make electricity bills and sanctioned load of its all employees public by putting the information on its website www.dhbvn.com.

Rajpal said that would not only bring openness but also discourage consumers from stealing electricity and encourage timely payment of bills. He said as consumers, the nigam employees should be role models for the other consumers.

Rajpal said a consistent improvement in performance was required to achieve the desired level of consumer satisfaction. Power cuts due to local system constraints should be minimised. To meet the eventuality of damage to transformers, every operation division would be provided with five spare distribution transformers of different capacities, particularly during summers.

Each operation circle would have one 500 KVA capacity distribution transformer set up on trolley to meet with emergent requirement and restore power supply immediately in case of damage to transformer. An adequate number of transformers of 200 KVA would be made available in the stores for addition or augmentation in the urban areas.

He asked the officers of Operation Circle, Gurgaon, to bring down aggregate transmission and commercial losses by 4 per cent during the next four months. To achieve the target, he said, whole of the distribution system should be maintained properly and all defective meters should be replaced immediately.

Ambala, April 22
A national-level seminar on quality teacher education in the modern era was held recently at the local Tulsi College of Education for Women.

Lt Gen DDS Sandhu, vice-chancellor, Kurukshetra University, inaugurated the seminar, which was attended by a large number of scholars and educationists.

HB Munjal, chairman of the college, said in Indian culture, the teacher was a firmament of God whose prime responsibility was to help students determine their aims and build career.

The vice-chancellor released the souvenir of the seminar. He stressed on education for women and making them aware of their rights. He said right to education would only be successful when parents were made aware and they start getting their children enrolled in schools.

In the present times, the younger generation has been following the Western culture and teachers have the responsibility to guide them and show them the right path, he added.

The VC said, "It is an era of knowledge explosion and this calls for updating the curriculum with latest trends and teaching should be coupled with technology for effective dissemination of knowledge. Only the quality education will be imparted and this check unemployment as well".

Dr DP Asija, principal, MM College of Education, Mulana, highlighted that education was undergoing changes with time and women needed to be educated. In order to bring quality in education, it was essential to develop requisite skills and also to practice them regularly, he said.

Dr MR Chilana, chairman of the seminar, stated, "We should move towards quality education. A teacher has to nurture the talent of students keeping in view their cognitive and affective aspects. It is essential to make learning effective with technology and equally important to develop moral values among students".

Panipat, April 22
Experts from the field of textile and fashion industry have stressed the need for facing the challenges on design areas in view of paradigm change witnessed in textile industry due to introduction of new technologies.

Issues pertaining to textile designing were deliberated at a workshop on "Imperative Design Solutions For Home Furnishing Industry" organised by the Pearl Academy of Fashion (PAF) in Panipat recently.

The objective of the workshop was to encourage and promote textile industry professionals and entrepreneurs to adopt a design and development-oriented approach to generate product differentiation, create understanding about the relevance of correct interpretations of design and forecast and focus on targeted product development.

Professionals and entrepreneurs from textile industry, textile designers from export and retail segment, creative directors and product development heads, merchandisers and marketing professionals were told to go an extra mile to convert these challenges into opportunities and also to identify newer scope of business.

Addressing the participants, Dr A.K.G Nair, group director, PAF, said the main aim was to develop customised design services to small and medium-level exporters and retailers and afford opportunity to anyone with a creative mind from the field of textile to benefit from this workshop.

The workshop specifically focused on interests and needs of the Panipat home furnishing industry and design development with lots of innovative ideas in the form of fabric swatches with technical and design details.

Dr Nair said the Pearl Academy of Fashion, which started with 47 students in 1993 has 1,600 students on roll in its state-of-the-art campuses in Delhi, Jaipur, Chennai, Dhaka and the UAE.

Kurukshetra, April 22
Higher education in India is presently going through a phase of unprecedented expansion. The country will require 3,000 universities and 50,000 colleges to achieve gross enrolment ratio of 20-25 per cent by 2020. To steer this expansion in the right direction, we need to have structural and curricular changes in our higher education sector.

This was stated by Prof Goverdhan Mehta, chairman, National Assessment and Accreditation Council and national research professor, while speaking as chief guest at an award ceremony of Goyal Prizes held at Kurukshetra University here recently.

Mehta said there was an urgent need to restore autonomy to the universities and other institutes of higher learning to make them free from the tangles of outside monitoring agencies.

He further said, “India needs to be more strategic, proactive and visionary to plan a national vision about science teaching and research to make the country a superpower in the 21st century and our curriculum should be more open, interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary”.

DDS Sandhu, vice-chancellor, Kurukshetra University, said, “It is a great honour for the university to confer the awards on scientists of international fame in recognition to their contribution in respective fields”.

Instituted by late Ram S Goyal, a philanthropist and visionary of Indian-origin from the United States, Goyal Prizes are well recognised by the scientist fraternities from India and abroad. The award was conferred on Prof S Chadershekaran for chemistry, Prof G Padamnabham for life sciences, Prof Mustansir Barma for physics, Dr S Sivaram for applied sciences, Dr Ganesh Pandey for chemistry, Prof TP Singh for life sciences and Dr JN Gosawmi for physics. Goyal Prize for Young Scientists was conferred on Dr Sandeep Verma for chemical sciences, Dr Amit Sharma for life sciences, Dr Kalobaran Maiti for physical sciences, Dr AK Tyagi for chemical sciences, Dr D. Mohanty for life sciences and Dr Manindra Aggarwal for physical sciences.

Rewari, April 22
The Dakshin Haryana Vikas Lok Manch (DHVLM) has sent a communication to Finance, Irrigation, Forest and Environment Minister Capt Ajay Singh Yadav seeking the opening of an agriculture college, an agriculture engineering college, a veterinary college and a home science college in the campus of CCS Haryana Agricultural University’s (CCSHAU) Regional Research Station (RRS) at Bawal in Rewari district from the ensuing academic session of 2010-11 on the pattern of colleges already running at Kaol in Karnal district.

Copies of the communication have also been dispatched to the Chief Minister, the Agriculture Minister, the vice-chancellor of CCSHAU, Hisar, and other dignitaries.

Stating that South Haryana was an entirely arid zone of the state, Prof Ranbir Singh Yadav, general-secretary of the Manch, asserted that there was an urgency of establishing the above colleges at the RRS.

Simultaneously, he pointed out that due to the availability of adequate buildings, laboratories and other allied infrastructure at the RRS, the establishment of the above colleges at Bawal would not put any extra financial burden either on the CCSHAU or the state government.

Prof Yadav further said when the neighbouring Rajasthan has four agricultural colleges and two agricultural colleges are smoothly running in a small state like Himachal Pradesh, it would be in the fitness of things if the Regional Research Station of Bawal, too, is developed into a full-fledged agricultural university expeditiously for the welfare of the peasantry of this arid region.

Chandigarh, April 22
The Haryana government has decided to constitute a task force headed by Deputy Commissioner in each district under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS).

Chief parliamentary secretary Dharambir Singh said here recently that the task force was being constituted to ensure convergence of programmes/schemes for optimum utilisation of resources for improving the quality of life in the rural areas. It would also ensure better coordination with other programmes. Time frame for each activity would also be prescribed by it, besides according approval of cost estimates and administrative sanctions of the schemes.

The chairpersons might co-opt experts and professionals and any other officers from other departments as special invitee. Dharambir Singh said more than Rs 143 crore was spent to generate over 59 lakh jobs under the MGNREGS during 2009-10. The coverage of women workers was more than 35 per cent and 1.52 lakh rural households were provided employment. As many as 4,070 works out of a total of 7,715 works had been completed. Many of these works would be quite useful in providing direct and indirect benefits to the rural people.

Rohtak, April 22
Biotechnology has emerged as a key to nation development and the prime focus should be developing it in the best possible manner so that it comes to the aid of the masses. This technology must be used to develop low-cost medical solutions for the common man and an avenue to generate more resources in the related sector.

This was stated by MP Deepender Singh Hooda while speaking as the chief guest at a valedictory session of the three-day national-level conference organised by the Department of Biotechnology of Maharshi Dayanand University (MDU) that concluded here recently.

Hooda said the stem cell research, development of vaccines and developing innovative medical solutions as part of biotechnological advances would help in managing the health of people.

Claiming that rise in the geriatric population has been a challenge area, he hoped that biotechnological interventions would be devised to take care of the health concerns of the elderly in the near future.

Local MLA BB Batra congratulated the organisers of the conference and asked the scientists and researchers to broad base their work keeping in view the aspirations of the region and society as a whole.

Earlier, Dr Satish Kumar, deputy director, Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad, delivered a special lecture on “Engineering the Mouse Genome to Create Models of Human Diseases” and threw light on molecular mechanism to fight obesity.

Hundreds of delegates from all over the nation took part in the national conference. Faculty members, research scholars and students attended the function.

Sirsa, April 22
Biotechnology Forum of the Department of Biotechnology, Chaudhary Devi Lal University, Sirsa, organised one-day Biotech Fest in the department.

Dr VK Choudhary, Dean, College of Basic Sciences and Humanities, CCS Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar, was the chief guest on the occasion.

A number of competitions were organised in the fest, including biotech song competition, poster-making competition, biotech rangoli and quiz competition.

A play on Bt Brinjal was also staged by the students. Surinder Paul of M.Sc I was selected as the best student on the basis of overall performance. The others who bagged the first position were Surender Sharma (poster making), Surinder Paul and his team (biotech rangoli), Kiran, Kavita and Leena (quiz).

Second position winners were Sikha (biotech song), Anita Gill (poster making) and Arvind, Sukhvinder and Ravi Kiran (quiz).

The play on Bt Brinjal was the centre of attraction in which students tried to give the message about the versions of the government as well as social organisations working in the said direction.

Dr Chaudhary said such type of scientific festivals would inculcate the scientific temperament in the students. Dr SK Gahlawat, chairperson of the Biotechnology Department of the university, said the theme of all activities during the festival were in tune with the department.

In the end, Dr Priyanka, co-coordinator of the Biotech Forum, proposed the vote of thanks.

Prof Shamsher Singh, Prof Ashok Malik, Prof Masheem Miglani, Prof Praveen Aghamkar, Dr Manoj Siwach, Dr Abhay Singh Godara, Dr JS Duhan, Dr KS Sandhu, Dr BS Yadav, Dr Rani Devi, Dr Anju Dalal, Manju and Sanju Bala, all university teachers, were also present.

Karnal, April 22
The practise of burning paddy and wheat stubble in the fields is continuing unabated in spite of a ban imposed by the authorities. Farmers, unmindful of the suffocation and air pollution caused by it, have been perpetuating it simply because it is less expensive and convenient for early sowing of the next crop.

“The problem is grave and it is not easy to dissuade the farmers to abandon the practise which came into play after the replacement of manual labour by “combines” which is a faster operation but left stubble (crop residue), prompting farmers to go in for an easy option of burning it in the fields itself,” says noted environmentalist and professor of chemistry Dr Rakesh Bhardwaj.

Asserting that punitive measures like imposition of Section 144 of the CrPC as had been done by the district administration in some districts to stop farmers from burning stubble in the fields, is not effective, Dr Bhardwaj said the stubble could be mixed with cow dung and used for preparing good quality manure and also used a mix for fodder to feed the livestock.

He said blackened fields with thick smoke emanating from the flames was a common sight along the national highways as farmers were not concerned about the problems being created for environment, animals, flora and fauna and human beings by this practise.

Farmers should be educated about the bad affects of burning of stubble and explained that it not only caused air pollution, but also affected the soil productivity. It also killed much-needed micro-nutrients and friendly pests in the soil thereby affecting the soil quality adversely, he added.

A farmer, who boasted of defying the ban orders with impunity, said: “We burn stubble on the field as it is convenient and if we cut the residue of wheat or paddy crops after harvesting by combines, the labour cost will be so high that it will prove prohibitive.” It would also take much longer to prepare the fields for the next crop, he added.

Earlier, the crops harvested manually were fed into harvesters and no stubble was left on the fields. However, cutting the residue manually was too costly and there were very a few takers for such initiatives.

The smoke generated by open burning of biomass waste affected air quality and visibility as open burning usually occurs under uncontrolled conditions, conducive for forming incomplete combustion products and generating more poly-cyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) than high-temperature and well-controlled combustion.

PAHs were suspected carcinogens and some PAHs were associated with acute and chronic health effects and had high carcinogenic potential, resulting in increase in bronchial asthma in children living close to rice fields during the burning seasons.

Rohtak, April 22
The state police may be claiming to have gone hi-tech with its plan to arm its cops with laptops and other gadgets, the ground reality seems to be pointing towards ‘gaping’ loopholes in the security network, especially at some of the important and vulnerable public places. Metal detectors at several places in the city, which is the hometown of the Chief Minister, are reportedly non-functional.

Take district courts for example. It is always abuzz with people. However, a door frame metal detector (DFMD) installed on the premises has been lying non-functional for the past two months. This equipment has been non-functional since it was installed here, claim the sources in the department. Considering that many accused, hardcore criminals and others visited the courts for hearings daily, it becomes more important to keep a check on the movement of suspicious elements in the premises, said a local lawyer.

Shockingly, nearly half of the 15 metal detectors available in the district are non-functional or require repairs. The police normally installs such a equipment at a venue where VIPs or VVIPs have to mark their presence. While a DFMD has been installed permanently at the residence of the Chief Minister, his camp office has yet to get such a facility, claim the sources.

Another important place where such a facility has been missing is the Mini-Secretariat, which houses the offices of the Deputy Commissioner and the SSP. The local railway station and the office-cum-residence of the IG here do have a DFMD, but PGIMS and the bus stand don’t have one.

Even the situation is not better with the hand handled metal detector (HHMD). About one-fourth of 22 such gadgets are non-functional. Though a local agency has been hired to repair them, it is learnt that these gadgets have been found to be defective many times.

At a recent function which was attended by the Chief Justice of India and the Chief Minister, the HHMD that was used to check the bouquets presented to them was non-functional at that time, it is claimed.

The persons handling these gadgets are hardly provided any training.

SSP AK Rao, however, claimed that though the metal detectors are developing snags frequently, the majority of them remain functional at most of the time. “The department has adequate security gadgets and trained personnel,” he said, adding that a HHMD had been given to cops manning the court premises.

Palwal, April 22
The state Congress appears to have undertaken a bigger role, which includes boosting its central unit in the bordering states.

A senior party leader said Congress’ decision to launch its statewide “janata chaupal” and “Congress workers’ milan” (bonding of workers) programmes from Palwal recently was strategically chosen to consolidate its base in Haryana and to create positive vibrations for party cadre in the bordering states like Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Punjab.

Palwal shares its borders with the districts of Mathura, Ambedkar Nagar and Aligarh in Uttar Pradesh. In fact, there is a lot of cultural homogeneity between Palwal and Faridabad areas with a number of districts of Uttar Pradesh, especially the “Braj” dialect.

While “janata chaupal” programme has been formulated to redress grievances of the people on the spot by Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, the objective of “Congress workers’ milan” programme is to bring about more coordination between the government apparatus and party leaders. Also, party workers would have an opportunity to provide direct feedback to the Chief Minister on government policies and programme.

According to many, intentions of the Haryana Congress to strengthen the organisation and give more voice to the party workers were reflected when Chief Minister said in his speech in Palwal that he had fond memories of the days when he was head of the Haryana Congress and got joy when people addressed him as pradhanji (president).

Senior party leaders are credited with the view that the organisation is well organised and confident enough to expand its base in the state and simultaneously create positive vibrations in the bordering districts of other states.

Gurgaon, April 22
Nostalgic sentiments grip a viewer as he goes through the paintings made by Neenu Vij, a Panchkula-based artist. An exhibition of her works, titled “And so the story goes…”, was organised at epicentre in Apparel House here recently.

Through her creations, the painter talks about ancestral homes, old acquaintances, forgotten faces, bedtime tales told to children by their grandparents, and many such things which have been forgotten by us in the hustle and bustle of our daily routines.

With acrylic on canvas, the painter has made an attempt to take the viewer back to the childhood days of fun, frolic and great imaginations.

“It all started two years ago when I went to visit my ancestral home…or rather the place where it used to be…” recalls the artist on being asked about what led to the concept.

She maintains that indulging oneself in a work of art is no less than meditation as it makes one forget all about oneself and the world.

A postgraduate in Fine Arts having several group and solo shows to her credit, Vij observes that while painting gives a lot of creative satisfaction and sense of achievement to the artist, it is also interesting to note how differently it is perceived and interpreted by different viewers.

Gurgaon, April 22
An academic award function was organised at the Ansal Institute of Technology (AIT) here recently to felicitate the students of various professional programmes for their outstanding performance.

Violeta Talandis, vice-consul at the US Embassy in New Delhi, was the chief guest on the occasion. She gave away 101 awards to meritorious students.

In her address, Talandis took up several pertinent issues relating to education. She exhorted the students to work hard and wished them all success in life.

Prof Sudhir Mehta, associate vice-president (academics) at North Dakota State University in the USA, was the guest of honour.

Prof MP Singh, director, AIT, listed the achievements of the institute’s students. He revealed that an MBA programme for executives from multinational companies in collaboration with the University of California, Los Angeles, was also in the pipeline.

“During the course, the executives will go for a two-week certification programme in international marketing and business strategies,” he added.

Earlier, the AIT, in association with the SPIC MACAY, organised a concert by Padma Shri Geeta Chandran.

Geeta Chandran presented an elegant and rhythmic Bharatnatyam performance on the stage. She presented well-known Pushpanjali, Vande Matram and Meera Bai bhajans. Her skillful weaving of abstract motions of joy, beauty, aspirations, myth and spirituality through concrete bodily rhythms left the audience, comprising AIT faculty, staff, students and their families, mesmerised. “The idea behind the concert was to inculcate a rich cultural taste among our students,” observed Prof Singh.