Hisar, September 30
The Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam has launched an incentive scheme for panchayats for the recovery of power dues under which they will get 5 per cent of the revenue these help recover over and above the current percentage of recovery.

Sudhir Rajpal, managing director, DHBVN, said in case a panchayat ensured timely payment of electricity bills it would get 5 per cent of the amount realised over the current level of revenue recovery.

He said the officers in the area of operation circle, Bhiwani and Hisar, were asked to contact the panchayats and explore possibility of success of the scheme. There had been enthusiastic response to the initiative and as many as 55 panchayats had agreed to implement the scheme. In view the good response, the DHBVN had decided to launch the scheme in all 11 districts in its area.

Rajpal said for the last two consecutive months, the monthly revenue collection stood at record Rs 400 crore. He expected the revenue to cross this figure this month also.

He said DHBVN had adopted a three-pronged strategy to increase revenue by making extra efforts to recover the billed amount, curbing pilferage of electricity and by strengthening power distribution system to check technical line losses.

Under a maintenance drive, DHBVN has overhauled 1,139 feeders. All overloaded distribution transformers were being replaced with transformers of higher capacities.

Regarding power supply on domestic mode to “dhanies”, Rajpal said the government would bear 50 per cent of the expenditure on shifting the hamlets from agricultural feeders to domestic feeder. Residents of about 45 “dhanies” in Hisar had agreed to it and had deposited 50 per cent of the estimated expenditure.

However, the change in mode of supply will be made only in those “dhanies” that had no defaulters. This is a one-time measure and not an ongoing programme, hence, it is meant for existing “dhanies” only as per the survey conducted.

Yamunanagar, September 30
The overflowing Yamuna has damaged crops and property in over 100 villages in the district, besides playing havoc in low-lying areas of other districts in the state, including Karnal, Panipat and Sonepat.

Residents of nearby villages alleged that erosion caused due to illegal mining led to floods in the area.

Lakhmir Singh, a resident of Mandewala village, said Deputy Commissioner Ashok Sangwan conducted a surprise check a few months ago along with the police force at the banks of the Yamuna river and Som Nadi and found some people involved in illegal mining. He sent all people to the police station and instructed the police officers to take action against them.

Mining of sand and stone at a depth of 5 to 15 metres in the riverbed and on the agricultural land situated on the banks of the Yamuna river is one of the reasons of breach at the embankment of Yamuna on September 22.

Mining is banned since February 28, following court orders. The mining mafia has been using JCB machines to extract sand and stone from the riverbed in several villages of the district. The extent of illegal mining can easily be gauged from the large number of trucks and tractor-trailers carrying sand and stone on the NH 73-A passing through Khijrabad and Chhachhrauli roads.

All this is happening despite police posts situated near the mining sites in Khijrabad, Kalesar and Chhachhrauli, sources said.

Residents of nearby villages rue that despite the ban, on an average 500 to 1,000 trucks and tractor-trailers carrying sand and stone can be seen passing from the district everyday, but the authorities concerned have done little to check this.

Sirsa, September 30
Melting down of inheritance and hardships in eking out a living from agriculture are the main reasons behind the support the Jat reservation activists have received in Haryana.

Social cornering of Jats in the recent times on the issue of Khap Panchayats and honor killings and the Mirchpur incident has acted as catalysts in agitation becoming violent.

Jats, who undoubtedly are socially the most dominant class in Haryana, hated being bracketed with backward classes till recently.

Their coming on to the streets for seeking OBC status has not surprised social activists, including intellectuals coming from the Jat community, although none subscribes to the violent means adopted by the agitators.

“The dwindling of agriculture landholdings has created an employment crisis for the youth in Haryanavi society. Opportunities do not match the number of job seekers, which is leading to frustration among Jat youth,” said Dr Jagmati Sangwan, director of the Women Studies and Research Centre, MDU, Rohtak.

She said it was time that the creamy layer of those communities, who have been getting benefits of reservation, be replaced with poorer sections of the other castes. She added that women should be given more reservation, irrespective of caste, as most of the government departments have practically no representation of women.

Dr Bhim Singh Dahiya, a former vice-chancellor of Kurukshetra University said reservation based on caste would not work in the present scenario.

“Unless reservation on economic basis is implemented, agitations like this will continue. Today, Jats are agitating for quota. Tomorrow, other castes will follow the suit,” said Dr Dahiya.

Dr Mahabir Jaglan, chairperson of the Geography Department of Kurukshetra University, said the constitutional provision of reservation in government jobs and educational institutions was originally envisaged for the uplift of socially and economically deprived sections of society.

“Now people belonging to socially dominant caste i.e. Jats, who hate being bracketed with socially backward communities are demanding reservation”.

“Similar demands at times have even been heard in the gathering of higher castes such as Brahmins and Rajputs. Such demands in fact are reflecting the hollowness of the economic model operating in the state where the agricultural economy of late has stagnated and jobs are scarce,” added Dr Jaglan.

He said the agitation was led by the middle-class who in every category of reservation had taken the bulk share in butter. For an ordinary man in every caste, it was a fight for buttermilk, he added.

Rohtak, September 30
In view of reports of paddy crop in the region under attack from pests, experts have come out with recommendations of tackling the problem with traditional home remedies, besides using chemicals to control the attack.

The remedies were discussed at a recently concluded seminar at MD University here.

According to Subhash Palekar, expert of Zero Budget Farming, spray of 3 litre of sour butter milk mixed with 100 litre of water can be used to control fungus if one has not used treated seeds before plantation.

He said the proportions of the local treatment could be 100 litre for an acre of land. In case of sever attack, farmers should use 200 gm of dry ginger powder boiled in 2 litre of water. The mixture should be kept covered while boiling and should be boiled till the concoction was reduced to half. After allowing it to cool and separately boiling 5 litre of cow or buffalo milk, both mixtures should be mixed with about 200 litre of water. This should be stained and sprayed in the affected areas.

“For spraying these home remedies, pumps used for chemical spray should not be used and separate pump should be kept for the purpose,” the expert added.

Less use of chemicals would lead to an increase in the living organisms in soil, which coupled with adoption of a few other practices based on local resources, would ensure that there would be much less disease and pest attack, said another expert Naresh Balhara of Bahujmalpur, Rohtak.

If no chemical pesticides were used, then naturally available spiders were effective in pest control. The existence of spider webs in the field would ensure a proper check against minor pest attack, he added.

“If the pest outbreak is severe, then crush 5 kg neem leaves or its seeds and add 100 litre of water in it. After that, add 5 litre of cow urine and 1 kg of cow dung to it. After 48 to 72 hours, this can be filtered and sprayed,” Dalip Singh, a farmer of Titoli added.

He said like human beings, plants too needed additional nutrition in case of disease or pest attack. Hence, along with these sprays, additional nutrition might be provided in the form of liquid manure called jeevamrit.

Rajinder Chaudhary, professor of economics, MD University, Rohtak, said these measures were quite effective, adding that if farmers do not feel confident about the home remedies, they should try it on a part of their farm and compare its results with that of the chemical sprays. 

Sirsa, September 30
Taking cognisance of a news report, “Notices: We are being targeted, say doctors,” published in The Tribune on September 11 regarding biomedical waste ending up in the municipal waste in Sirsa, local doctors and the Synergy Waste Management, the service provider for this district, have taken several steps to improve the management of biomedical waste.

The Tribune had published reports regarding service of notices to several general hospitals in this region by the Haryana State Pollution Board after they were found dumping their biomedical waste in the open.

In a follow up of the news report, some local private doctors had alleged that the notices served by the pollution control board were merely a cover-up exercise and large quantities of biomedical waste were still ending up in the municipal waste.

The doctors had also accused the board of giving monopoly to the service providers, who they alleged, fleeced doctors by heavy charges and lesser services.

“After the reports were published, the doctors as well as representatives of the service providing company held a series of meetings to improve management of biomedical waste,” said Dr KK Goyal, president of the Private Practitioners Association, Sirsa.

Dr Parveen Garg, president of the Sirsa chapter of the Indian Medical Association, Dr Dinesh Gijwani and Dr Ashish Khurana attended the meetings from the doctors side, while Rakesh Pandey, marketing manager of the Synergy Waste Management represented the service providers.

“We have provided a dedicated vehicle for Sirsa so that the waste produced by hospitals and nursing homes was collected on daily basis,” said Pandey about the measures taken by his company.

The waste so collected, was taken to Hisar in another vehicle, where it was treated as per specifications of the pollution board, he added.

Meanwhile, the company has also restructured the service charges for private doctors in the district. Dr Ved Beniwal, patron of the Haryana chapter of the IMA, said instead of the earlier across the board rate of Rs 850 per nursing home, the service provider has now fixed charges of Rs 700 per month for doctors maintaining OPDs and those producing lesser waste. The charges for those having operation theatres or those nursing homes having more than one doctor have been fixed at Rs 1,100 per month. He said the move had removed the condition of weight and, hence, there would be no scope for doctors throwing their biomedical waste in the municipal waste.

Panipat, September 30
Expressing concerns over various issues related to cyber security, a number of experts who gathered at the Asia Pacific Institute of Information Technology to participate in a one-day seminar on cyber crime, stated that with the advent of more technologies, risk of cyber attacks was also increasing with each passing day.

The seminar that was organised by Reliance World witnessed experts in the fields discussing solutions to cyber attacks.

Ankit Fadia, a 24-year-old independent computer security and digital intelligence consultant with definitive experience in the field of internet security, who is based in the Silicon Valley in California, USA, gave answers to questions like What had to be done to prevent a criminal from wiping out all money from your bank account? What to do to prevent your competitor from spying on you? What should be done to prevent company employees from selling company secrets to competitors? What would you do to prevent your identity from being stolen on Internet? What would you do if your password was cracked and somebody started controlling your computer? How criminals break into mobile phones, ATMs and computers?

During his educative speech, Fadia also interacted with students and provided interesting information. The students also learned how to protect themselves and their business from computer criminals.

Parag Chitnavis, circle head (Punjab and Haryana) of Reliance Webstore, said the seminar was organised for the benefit of students in order to equip them with the latest techniques to protect themselves and their businesses from any cyber attack. In future also, Reliance would keep organising such seminars.

He said with the correct mix of technical explanations and real life case studies, students could be provided with some real information that could be used in daily lives.

Karnal, September 30
The Haryana Pradesh Rice Millers and Dealers Association has blamed the wrong and faulty polices of the central and the state governments for creating crisis for rice millers and made several demands and suggestions to bring the milling industry out of the present morass.

The association, which met here under the chairmanship of its president Ajaad Singh Rathi here recently, demanded roll back of “unjustified” hoarding charges from the back date, payment for loading and unloading of paddy, payment of freight charges for paddy lifted by the millers from more than 8 km distance and payment for depreciation of “bardana” used by millers.

The association pressed for raising the milling charges to Rs 40 per quintal and argued that the same were stagnant at Rs 15 per quintal for the past eight years even as cost of milling and allied operations have gone up phenomenally. The association urged the government to raise the percentage of grain damaged due to rains to 4.5 and discoloured grain to 4 besides decreasing yield of rice to 64 per cent.

The association further demanded that paddy purchased by procurement agencies should be allowed to be stored in millers premises without agreement, paddy should be lifted by agencies from mandis and purchase centres and not by millers and levy should be stopped.

Gurgaon, September 30
With a view to catering to the special needs of children suffering from learning disabilities, Pathways World School here has set up a Special Education Needs (SEN) Department.

A Teacher Referral Form, shared with teachers in the beginning of the term, helps in identifying the academic problems faced by the students.

The department then carries out necessary classroom observations, followed by a discussion with the relevant teachers.

After seeking permission from parents, child’s performance is assessed. A pre-screening test (DTLD - diagnostic test for learning disability) is conducted and the report is shared with the concerned principals, form tutors and subject teachers. The child is then inducted into the programme.

Following this, children selected for the programme are provided support in various phases, which include in-class support, remedial support and preparation for exams. The school authorities claim that apart from the academic aspect, social and psychological needs of the children are also addressed.

“The underlying idea behind the programme is to enable the pupils with disabilities to achieve their highest possible potential,” they maintain.

Rewari, September 30
The Bar Council of the Punjab and Haryana High Court has envisaged several worthwhile projects for providing requisite legal training to young lawyers as well as for the provision of pertinent legal data to lawyers in the state.

Furnishing details in this regard at a press conference here recently, Gurinderpal Singh, chairman of the Bar Council, said while the Advocate Welfare Act, 2001, was in the implementation mode, they were now going to launch a legal training scheme for young lawyers throughout the state. The training, which would be imparted to young lawyers at the district level, would comprise their interaction with jurists and judges as well as dissemination of requisite professional technicalities to be pursued by them at the courts.

The chairman further said the Council had made an allocation of Rs 25 lakh for the provision of two computers each at the district level and one computer each at the sub-divisional level.

These computers would contain full-fledged information regarding the apex court and the high court verdicts of vital importance for practising advocates. Besides, the Council would soon set up an evening library in Chandigarh, which would remain open from 5 pm to 10 pm. The library would provide an easy access to less resourceful lawyers to expensive reference books as well as other allied material for their cases.

Kaithal, September 30
An act of increasing intolerance came to light here recently when a customer reportedly set on fire his motorcycle outside an automobile agency workshop as a mark of protest against alleged delay in carrying on repairs of his bike by an auto dealer.

While noticing the bike on fire, a large number of people gathered at the site and a fire tender reached the spot and doused the flame. The police also reached the spot to investigate the matter and take follow-up action. Till the filing of this report, the investigation was going on and the police was taking statements of the dealer and the customer and no case was registered.

According to information, Suresh Kumar, a customer from Kheri Sheru village near here, reached an auto showroom and workshop on the Ambala road in the morning and asked the staff to rectify the defect in his bike. He reportedly left the vehicle and went out. He returned in the afternoon and enquired about the status of his vehicle. He was told that some spare part was not available in the workshop and it may take a few days to get it from company. The man got infuriated and allegedly started creating scene. He took his 2007-model motorcycle out of the workshop on the main road and after sprinkling some fuel, set it on fire.

Auto dealer Anand Khurania said his staff told him that when Suresh returned back in the afternoon, he was in an inebriated condition and after taking the delivery of his bike, he set it on fire. Khurania also said a few months ago, this bike was damaged in an accident and it was repaired. The customer could not be contacted for his version.

Panipat, September 30
A newly evolved concept of university-society interface by the Bhagat Phool Singh Women University (BPSWU), which dwells upon societal development astounded top-notch educationists from 30 universities (both from India and UK) at the India-UK higher education leadership programme.

Vice-Chancellor of Bhagat Phool Singh Mahila Vishwavidyalaya, Khanpur Kalan, Dr Pankaj Mittal, who recently attended a week-long programme in the UK and Scotland, said the concept that was also one of the major aims of the university was widely appreciated by India and UK university educationists.

She was leading a delegation of 15 VCs chosen from throughout the country for visiting UK under the collaborative programme. The programme aimed at building bridges and promotion of strong leadership in institutions of higher learning of both the countries.

The academic leaders from Indian universities had detailed deliberations with corresponding 15 UK universities.

Dr Mittal said a UK delegation would visit the country in January next year under the programme to further explore the areas of joint collaboration. 

Rewari, September 30
Vishnu Dutt, popularly known as Halchal Haryanvi, a noted poet, humorist and satirist and a native of Bikaner village in Rewari district, has been honoured with the “Hindi Sewa Samman” award by the Hindi Sewa Samiti (HSS), a literary organization of Madhya Pradesh, for his meritorious services in the domain of Hindi literature during the past three decades.

The award was presented to him at a function held at Kailaras in Madhya Pradesh recently by lyricist Munshi Lal Verma, who was the chief guest of the function. Besides him, Pushp Raj Jayant and Mahesh Verma, both distinguished Hindi poets of Madhya Pradesh, were also honoured on the occasion.

However, Halchal Haryanvi was also honoured with the ‘Hasya Avtar’ (Icon of witticism) award by the Akhil Bharatiya Sahitya Sangam, a prominent literary organization of Rajasthan, at Udaipur in 2006, for his excellence in the field of repartee in poesy.

Haryanvi, 62, an aurvedic medical practitioner, with melodious recitations of his poems has regaled audiences in numerous kavi sammelans held at various cities and towns of Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Delhi during the past three decades.

He has composed satiric poems, both in Hindi and Haryanvi dialect with equal felicity. Two anthologies of his poetic compositions entitled ‘Jhoom Uthe Hum’ (Hindi) and ‘Mauj Hori Se’ (Haryanvi) have already been published, two other collections titled ‘ Halchal Ke Chauke Chhakke’ (Hindi) and ‘Budhapa Beri Ghana’ ( Haryanvi) are presently on the anvil.

Chandigarh, September 30
State Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda described Gandhism as the only way to maintain peace in the world, adding that Mahatma Gandhi infused among the people a strong desire for freedom.

The Chief Minister said this after receiving Mahatma Gandhi Sewa Medal presented to honour freedom fighter Ch Ranbir Singh, posthumously by the Gandhi Global Family at a function held here recently. The medal was presented by Vice-President of the Gandhi Global Family SP Verma. The medal bears the embossed signatures of Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi and the words “My life is my message” inscribed around the signatures.

The Chief Minister was also presented with a black and white mounted group photograph of the office-bearers and the standing committee conveners of the Congress party in Parliament in 1973-74, depicting Ch Ranbir Singh as one of them along with Indira Gandhi as the leader. Thanking the Gandhi Global Family for honouring his father, Hooda said by presenting this medal, they have honoured the Gandhism and not his father as an individual. He also spoke about the contribution made by his grandfather and father in the freedom struggle of the country. — TNS

Sonepat, September 30
Priti, a resident of Murthal village, was given a rousing welcome by sports personalities and football fans of the district on her arrival here recently at the Railway Station after participating in six-day Asian Junior Women (under-19) Football Championship concluded in Bangladesh on September 25.

District sports officer Prakash Dahiya, assistant education officer (sports) Jagbir Malik, president of the Nehru Yuva Sports Club Krishan Kumar Antil, football coach Balbir Sharma, DPE Bijender, secretary, district football association, Dharam Pal Dahiya, and football girls of Murthal village were among those who received her at the station.

In the championship, India bagged silver medal losing to Iran by 4-2 in the finals and Priti played pivotal role for taking the Indian squad in the finals by scoring five goals in four matches. Her most outstanding performance in the championship was her two goals against Iran in the inaugural match, which India won by 2-1.

Priti, who is known as goal machine and plays as midfielder, was the only footballer from Haryana to find place in under-19 India-11. She bagged the Best Footballer Award of the state in her age group for the past three consecutive years and had represented Haryana in as many as 14 national championships so far.

Talking to mediapersons, Priti said it was the dream of her father Ramesh Kumar Antil that she should find a place in the Indian team.

“It is proud for a village girl to become part of the national team and I will continue to work hard to give better performance,” she added.

Priti’s father is a farmer of the village and mother Suman a housewife and the couple had six daughters and one son. Her elder sister, Raj Rani, had also represented the state in as many as six national championships.

According to DPE Bijender Singh and coach Balbir Sharma, Priti is the second girl from Murthal village who represented the country. Earlier, Deepa of the same village was the member of Indian Junior Squad, which played in the Asian Junior Football Championship held in Doha (Qatar) in 2007.

Directed by: Siddharth Anand

Former Yash Raj favourite Siddharth Anand first time joins hands with Sajid Nadiadwala. They have come up with a love story “Anjaana Anjaani”, which is reportedly a remake of a French film, “The Girl on the Bridge”, but the makers deny it and say it is penned by Advaita Kala and Siddharth Anand.

Ranbir Kapoor and Priyanka Chopra are two strangers. Both have failed in their romantic and professional lives. They part as they met but at the end of their friendship or a new beginning?