Manali, January 25
Solang valley, 13 km north of Manali, offers one of the most spectacular ski slopes in the Western Himalayas and extensive views of the mighty Pir Panjal range. Today, it is a popular destination among tourists.

Till recently, locals could have hardly imagined that these very meadows and slopes would become a paradise for adventure lovers. Now, this enchanting locale has turned a perfect destination for winter and adventure sports, particularly after the opening of a ropeway-cum-ski centre.

With its inauguration by Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal, another milestone has been achieved. The ropeway-cum-ski center, which has been set up on BOT basis by Ski Himalayas Ropeway, connects the main ski slopes to the top of Mount Phatru at an elevation of 3,200 m.

Though Solang gets tourists throughout the year, adventure seekers and nature lovers flock this place mainly in winter due to the craze for skiing, snowboarding and riding on snowmobiles.

A snowmobile carries two persons apart from its driver. The ride starts from the main ground and extends up to one kilometer upstream the slope, which proves an unusual thrill for tourists. This year, Manali and its surroundings experienced early snowfall. With this, a number of temporary kiosks have come up in the entire upper Manali areas, offering snowshoes, woolens, overcoats, caps etc for the unprepared tourists.

The ski slopes in Solang have the distinction of hosting a number of national and state-level championships. A number of local youth have taken up this sport with enthusiasm and have risen to fame at the national as well as international levels.

Palampur, January 25
The misuse of government rest houses maintained by the PWD, the IPH and HP Power Company Limited (HPPCL) in Palampur and its adjoining areas has become a matter of concern. The state government owns over 12 rest houses in the Palampur region. It is alleged that most of the rest houses of the state were being misused by politicians, state government officials and other government functionaries.

Though the state government has banned the use of liquor in these guest houses, still it is being served without any hesitation. A large number of empty liquor bottles can be seen outside these guest houses daily. Enquiries made by The Tribune reveal that officials on government duty never get accommodations in these rest houses, whereas persons without valid permission easily find their way in. Most of them neither fill up visitor book nor pay the tariff fixed by the government.

In Palampur town alone, there are six rest houses owned by the state government, but for the common man or for ordinary state government officials it is very difficult to get accommodation here even for a single day as 90 per cent rooms were all the time remained occupied or reserved for political leaders and senior bureaucrats.

A senior officer of the PWD admitted the misuse of government rest houses and said the use of liquor was strictly banned by the government, still it was served inside them. It looks that there was none in the PWD, the IPH or HPCCL to implement the orders of the government. He disclosed that most of the bookings were made in the names of MLAs and ministers or other political leaders on phone and they further allow their workers or other persons to occupy the rooms allotted in their names.

He said such illegal occupancy in the government rest houses was not only causing inconvenience to the general public, but also resulting in huge losses to the state exchequer.

He stated that there were loopholes in the system as the tariff for persons on official duty or for MLAs was fixed only `50 per day, but the tariff for persons other than official duty was `500 per day without subsidised food, therefore the misuse of rest houses was going on unchecked.

It is also learnt that many officers have converted some of the rest houses into their residences and had occupied rooms for months together. Many times, they do not fill up the daily visitor book and the rooms occupied by them are shown as vacant.

Official sources said the annual expenditure on the maintenance and the salary of the staff of these rest houses was over Rs 1 crore.

Shimla, January 25
The stock of the chilgoza pine trees in the tribal areas of the state is dwindling at an alarming rate with the local people giving a go by to the traditional good harvesting practices, which ensured natural regeneration of the species all these years.

A study conducted by Delhi-based economic anthropologist Dr Rinki Sarkar for the Forest Department to assess the livelihood linkages and regeneration status of chilgoza pine in the Kinnaur, Pangi and Bharmour areas has revealed that the pressure on the pine trees has increased manifold due to the increasing value of the edible chilgoza seeds.

The seeds which fetched `10 per kg five decades ago are now being sold for `500 per kg. The change of occupation, which is taking place at a rapid pace, is not doing any good as the local right holders were hiring the services of contractors for the collection of seed.

As a result, the traditional practices followed by the tribal people are no longer in vogue and there is hardly any seed left on the forest floor for natural regeneration. Excessive grazing, low-moisture regime and use of the tree for fuel wood purpose have further aggravated the regeneration problem.

The findings of the study were discussed at a conference presided over by Sudipto Roy, principal secretary, Forests, here, recently. He expressed concern as to how the traditionally wise tribal people could allow the plunder of their natural resource. He stressed the need for evolving an effective strategy to ensure that the valuable resource was available on a sustainable basis.

Vinay Tandon, principal chief conservator of forests, expressed optimism that the department would be able to replenish the dwindling stock of chilgoza pine trees by raising new plantations using its own nurseries. He further stressed the need to provide better and tall plants to the local tribal people for plantation. To start with, even plantation of 5,000 saplings would be a good beginning.

GS Goraya, chief conservatory of forests, non-timber forest produce and biodiversity, who has been coordinating the study, informed that the department would shortly frame an action plan to tackle the problem of regeneration being chilgoza pine trees faced in. The action plan would deal with all aspects of livelihood, regeneration and peoples’ participation.

Hamirpur, January 25
The Forest Department, which has been working towards soil and water conservation in the state for quite some time, is now adopting a new approach for the purpose.

Instead of adopting target-oriented conservation schemes with emphasis on civil construction, the department is trying to implement a strategy of planting more trees for the purpose. For adoption of this strategy, the department is organising workshops and training programmes at the regional level throughout the state.

In this series, a three-day workshop on integrated soil and water conservation was organised in Hamirpur from December 17 to 19 for the field staff of Hamirpur and Dharamsala forest circles. How much importance the department is giving to this programme can be gauged from the fact that from principal chief conservator of forest and all other top officers are attending the workshops.

An expert on soil and water conservation, Dr SS Grewal is being specially invited to these workshops as a resource person. Speaking about the purpose of workshops and change in strategy, Vinay Tondon, principal chief conservator of forest, said, “As a concept, our emphasis used to be on target-oriented civil works for carrying soil and water conservation, but now we have changed this strategy to lay emphasis on adopting bioengineering technology”.

“Under this strategy, we are stressing on planting more trees to create more moisture in soil to arrest soil erosion,” he added. The bioengineering technology focuses plantation of herbs and other such plants so that water flows in natural ways and conserved, besides maintaining moisture in soil. The department has now decided to use at least 50 per cent funds meant for this purpose for bioengineering works by adopting watershed schemes and technological interventions for soil and water conservation in the river basins of the state.

“With the Union Territory of Chandigarh and Himachal banning the use of plastics, neighbouring Haryana should also take a cue and ban its use,” opined Balkrishen Sharma, an environmentalist from Him Parivesh.

Ashok Sharma, CEO, Shiwalik Hazardous Waste Management Plant, said the problem arose as the industry’s concern for environment protection was half-hearted and they indulged in selling waste to the unauthorised scrap dealers while passing only a part of the chemical waste for scientific treatment to the authorised dealers. The board was unable to check this practice in the absence of an online system which would automatically make available details of scrap disposed of by any industry.

The prevailing system would continue to pollute the area and little would be achieved in improving the Comprehensive Environment Pollution Index which was rated as critically polluted less than a year ago unless concerted efforts were made to regulate waste management.

The works of Bhadar Singh displayed at four-day exhibition "Yadein Gaon Ki" at Gaiety Theatre in Shimla (See photo)left no one is doubt that he is a "master in the making". The 30 paintings and two metal sculptures provided a vivid picture of the life and culture of the hill people.

The hill state is known as the 'land of gods" and almost every village has its own deity and temple. Not surprisingly temples feature predominantly in the works of Bhadar Singh, who comes from Mandhol, one such village in Jubbal.

He has in particular focused on the temple bells and used different styles of shadings to make the similarly shaped bells look different in each painting.

"I have been visiting temples since childhood and the sound emanating from bells of different shapes or sizes always filled him with a mysterious ethereal energy. I always felt that the sound waves generated a spiritual aura which not only purified the environment but also the minds of the devotees", he said while explaining his obsession with temple bells.

The greenery of hills, the apple orchards and women carrying "kiltas" on their back also feature in the paintings. In fact, Bhadar Singh, who is currently pursuing his Ph.D., had written his M.Phil thesis on "kiltas" which, he points out, reflect the simplicity and strength of the hill people. The "kiltas" are woven without a knot and strong enough to carry heavy loads.

Dharamsala, January 25
A rare brain surgery performed recently on a two-month-old child at a private hospital in Kangra has proved successful as the child has responded well and is recovering.

The surgery was performed by Dr Naresh Kalia at Balaji Hospital. The news about the surgery is disclosed after a month as Ashutosh (the patient) was under observation and now, he has been responding well, said the doctor.

Dr Kalia decided to perform the surgery with his team as they had no other option and time. "There was no other option but to perform the surgery. There was water in the child's brain by birth, which we removed with the help of a tube. Generally, in the cases of small children, surgeries are being performed in summer so that they don't die of hypothermia but we didn't have the time to wait till summer as a lot of damage could have been done to the brain by then. Therefore, we operated the child," said Dr Kalia.

He also informed that the financial condition of the parents was not that comfortable that they could go to PGI in Chandigarh or any other private hospital where the surgery could have cost them Rs 40,000 and Rs 2 lakh, respectively, said the doctor, adding that the treatment at Balaji cost them Rs 35,000 only.

Devraj, father of Ashutosh, is a daily wager and belongs to an interior village of Mandi. Devraj took his child to Tanda medical college from where Aushotosh was referred to PGI, but Devraj decided to bring the child to Balaji Hospital.

This was first-of-its-kind surgery performed on an infant, added Dr Kalia, who has earlier worked in IGMC and Tanda medical college.

Shimla, January 25
The State Forest Corporation has surpassed all the previous annual financial achievements by the end of December itself with the last one quarter of the current fiscal still to go. Presiding over a meting to review the performance of the corporation, principal secretary Sudipto Roy said the record turnover of 2009-10 amounting to `148 crore had been exceeded by achieving Rs 149.50 crore.

It had also achieved a record net profit of Rs 7.71 crore last year by prudent rosin and turpentine management to cash in on the better market conditions and pricing the products as per the market inputs. The turnover increased from Rs 110 crore in 2004-05 to Rs 148 crore last year.

RK Gupta, managing director of the corporation, informed about the efforts of the corporation towards diversification in eco-tourism, marketing of joinery products and sale of timber in its retail sale depots after treatment. He said the corporation had been providing fuel wood to the tribal areas despite cost constraints and for cremation purposes with a discount of `50 per quintal.

However, he expressed concern over the declining number of resin blazes and quantity of standing volume marked in salvage markings as being handed over by the Forest Department for working year after year.

Against 3.25 lakh cubic m in 2004-05, only 2.50 lakh cubic m of timber was available this year. Similarly, the number of resin blazes had come down to 15.78 lakh from 21.53 lakh in 2006-07.

The depletion of truck fleet to 17 was hampering the transportation of timber, resin, fuel wood and other forest produce to the desired destinations. On the other hand, hiring of trucks from the market was both expensive and time consuming. Moreover, during apple season, trucks were not available.

Palampur, January 25
Over 91-year-old building of the Palampur police station is in poor condition and cries for immediate attention of the authorities concerned and if no early measures were adopted to repair it, the building can collapse at any time.

Palampur police station is among the oldest police stations of the state and it was established by Britishers about 100 years ago. The building of the police station was constructed in 1919 after the 1905 Kangra earthquake, which had razed most of the buildings of the town to ground. Two maalkhana rooms of the building had already collapsed.

Despite the fact that the state government was well conversant with the situation, no efforts were made in the past 15 years for the construction of a new police station complex at Palampur. This police station is among the important police stations of the district and it looks after the security and safety of over two lakh residents of the region comprising Palampur, Panchrukhi, Toshijong, Dadh, Holta, HPAU, Gopalpur, Malan, Darang, Maranda Bundla, Kandwari, Rajpur Patti areas.

This complex was constructed by mud-missionary technique and no cement was used in it. Since then, not even a single brick was added to the building. According to the local PWD experts, the building had already lived its life and needed total dismantling immediately. The experts said they had long back sent a detailed project report for the construction of a new building to the government, but no funds were sanctioned. The matter was also taken up with top brass of the police, but all in vain. Even funds for repairs were also not sanctioned.

The staff working inside the building feels insecure as all internal and external walls have developed major cracks. There is no place to store seized items. At present, all seized items are lying open in the compound or verandah of the station. Even old records of the police station have also been damaged by insects. Almost all rooms of the police station leak in rainy season as CGI sheets have developed big holes.

Residences of SHO and other police officers, which were also built in 1919, are on the verge of collapse. Even minor earthquake can raze these buildings to ground.

Barracks of policemen are not worth living. Their roofs and floors have developed big cracks. Many times, snakes and other insects enter into barracks. There is no cupboard inside the barracks to keep the valuables of policemen.

There is an acute shortage of constabulary in the police station. The crime graph in the past 10 years has almost doubled, but the strength of cops in the police station is same as it was in 2001. The total sanctioned strength of constabulary in the police station was 35, including two lady constables, but the same has been reduced to 22 by the government without specifying any reason. Out of the 22 constables, three remain busy with court matters for the service of summons and warrants, two have been working as munshi and one is driver of the police jeep. One or two remain on leave. It was not possible to carry on the work only with 14 constables, said a police officer.

A senior officer of the police said the Palampur police station building had been declared as "heritage property" by the government, therefore only higher-ups in the government would take final decision for its repair and dismantling. He admitted that the building needed immediate repair keeping in view the safety of the staff working here. However, on the website of the state government, Palampur police station never figures in the list of "heritage property".