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Garbage spills over as dumping site reaches saturation point
Sidhu releases blue print for tourism development in holy city
PSPCL prepares proposal for 24x7 power supply to Amritsar airport
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Pingalwara pays tributes to its founder with exhibition, blood donation camp
Test tussle continues between MGNREGS employees, admn
Workshop on organic basmati held
World Breast-feeding Week celebrated
Bharatnatyam treat at Spring Dale
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Garbage spills over as dumping site reaches saturation point
Amritsar, August 5 The dumping site spread over 21 acres, which was selected in 2007, at Bhagtanwala near the grain market, has reached its saturation point. The situation is so pathetic that all the sides of the grain market, comprising at least 40 shops, have been covered with garbage piles. The market place, which otherwise was meant to keep paddy and wheat during procurement season, too has been covered with garbage. The piles of garbage are also leading to the residences and fields. Satbir Singh, who is a grain commission agent and has an office in the same market, said, “The corporation allotted the shops and now we are forced to live under such filthy condition. This place has become nothing less than an inferno. It has become difficult to even breathe here. Despite approaching the AMC office numerous times, the authorities did not spare time to listen to our grievances,” he said. “When the solid waste management plant was announced, it had raised new hopes among us that we would soon be relieved from living in hell-like situation but it all vanished when we discovered that hoards of garbage are being stocked right on the passages leading to our fields, shops and houses,” regretted Sajjan Singh. OfficialSpeak AMC Commissioner Dharampal Gupta (who assumed the charge recently): I agree that the MC should have timely identified another dumping site. I have instructed to deploy more ditch machines and chain bulldozers to organise the garbage. The problem has become grave with garbage getting wet. Now it is difficult to settle the garbage down. But, we are on the job to mange it. Manjinder Singh, manager operations, Antony Waste Handlings Cell Private Ltd: We face the problem of lifting garbage because no other alternate site has been designated to us by the AMC. The dumping site has been jammed so we had no alternative but to pile up garbage on the vacant plots. What else can we do? Kishore Lal, Naib Daroga, AMC, deputed at Bhagtanwala: The dumping ground has been filled to its capacity. Since, the department has not designated another site, the garbage is piled up here. The situation becomes worse during rainy season, because in the absence of concrete roads, the vehicles too fail to reach the other deserted places nearby the site, which can, temporarily, be used for dumping garbage.
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Sidhu releases blue print for tourism development in holy city
Amritsar, August 5 Sidhu said Amritsar could be developed as a multi-functional centre, commercial and trade capital of the state. He said due to its geographical location, the city could be used as the gateway to the Central Asia for trade. “A master plan for the holistic growth of the city, including, tourism, aviation and hospitality, should be developed,” he added. The blue print stated that all stakeholders must be involved in planning, development, marketing and management of these activities and urged the government to declare Amritsar a national heritage city of India. It opined that in order to develop Amritsar as a tourism hub it should be placed in a special circuit and it could be turned into a conference-convention city. It said the city has remarkable infrastructure to become aviation hub of the Northern India with night parking and maintenance facilities. It advocated setting up of eco-zones for industrial, commercial, tourist and recreational
regions. It stressed upon actively engaging NRIs for development projects and work for capacity building and preparing adequate workforce with necessary skills for employment and entrepreneurship. It maintained that the ‘PPP model’ should be encouraged in hospitality, infrastructural and other projects. Sidhu said an estimated 45 per cent of the passengers at the Delhi airport were Punjabi-origin NRIs. He said this caused about Rs 800 crore annual revenue losses to the state. The traffic could be turned to Amritsar airport. The airport here had export facility of perishable fruits and vegetables. Ajay Gupta, ITM Director, said the motive behind holding the exhibition was to create awareness among people for adopting organised travel agencies while planning for holidays. He said the inflow of domestic and outbound tourists was expected to increase in the coming months and Punjab would play a vital role in the promotion of tourism. |
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PSPCL prepares proposal for 24x7 power supply to Amritsar airport
Amritsar, August 5 The move came following the taking up of the matter of frequent power cuts and fluctuations with senior officials of the PSPCL by Amritsar Airport Director Sunil Dutt. Power supply interruptions are deteriorating the efficiency of numerous gadgets at the airport. The passengers had also voiced their concerns following nearly five-hour-long power supply cut on July 23. The PSPCL made a provision of standby electricity supply from Harsha Chhina 66 KV power station to Sri Guru Ramdas Ji International Airport. The Chief Engineer (Border Range), PSPCL, S.S. Sandhu, said Harsha Chhina power station would be connected with 220 KV Khasa He said as per the proposal from the PSPCL, the work would be finished within the next three months and the airport would be ensured 24x7 power supply. At present the international airport is being fed power by an 11 KV line. In case of power breakdown and fluctuation, officials of the Airport Authority of India (AAI) have to rely on generator sets to run the operations. Frequent power cuts and fluctuation caused many vital gadgets to remain non-functional and developed snags in them, said Dutt. He said the airport paid on an average Rs 50 lakh per month to the PSPCL for power bill. The international airport located in the border district is strategically significant for the country’s defence and needs regular and quality power supply. The power supply consumption of the airport increased considerably after the commissioning of new integrated terminal building in 2009. Former Union Aviation Minister Praful Patel had inaugurated a Rs 145-crore integrated arrival terminal building at the Amritsar international airport on February 25, 2009. Spread in an area of 40175 sq m, the airport has state-of-the-art facilities, like inline X-ray baggage inspection system integrated with the baggage conveyor system, escalators, public address system, Flight Information Display System (FIDS), CCTVs for surveillance, check-in counters with Common Use Terminal Equipment (CUTE) and car parking. The airport commands peak-hour handling capacity of 1,200 passengers and annual handling capacity of 14.6 lakh passengers. The integrated building has 30 check-in counters, four X-ray scanners (for baggage); 26 immigration counters; 10 custom counters; 12 security check booths and four conveyor belt arrival. The apron has been extended to cater for parking of total of 14 aircraft from the earlier capacity of 10 aircraft. Keeping in view the gigantic setup, uninterrupted power supply is mostly needed. |
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Pingalwara pays tributes to its founder with exhibition, blood donation camp
Amritsar, August 5 On the concluding day today various eminent personalities speaking on the occasion called upon the people to follow the path shown by the great social worker. Sundar Lal Bahuguna, famous environmentalist and founder of the Chipku Andolan, urged every household to keep a share in their earning and food for the inmates of the Pingalwara. Giani Kewal Singh, former jathedar of Takht Damdama Sahib, who now runs Bhai Gurdas Academy at Pandori Ran Singh village, announced to provide 50 quintals of rice for the inhabitants of the Pingalwara. Dr Inderjit Kaur, Director, Pingalwara, said the people should follow the path shown by Bhagat Puran Singh, which would help in spreading peace and harmony among the citizens of the world. Earlier, Gurbani kirtan was recited by the jathas, who use to recite Gurbani at Gthe olden Temple, after holding the bhog of the akhand path. Eminent personalities discussed the life and works of Bhagat ji besides various environmental issues. During the three-day programme, the society organised a blood donation camp, which was inaugurated by Deputy Commissioner Rajat Agarwal, and an exhibition of goods made by inhabitants of the Pingalwara. The society, which is also doing yeoman services towards environmental issues, also displayed farm products produced by way of natural farming on the land owned by the Pingalwara at Dhirekot village. A free prosthetic camp for physically challenged persons was also held. People and various dignitaries, who thronged the Pingalwara to pay tributes to Bhagat Puran Singh, appreciated the works being done by the society for the welfare of destitute, diseased and mentally challenged persons and children. On August 4, a “kavi darbar” was organised in which the poets of repute, including Gurcharan Singh Gill, Dr Shayam Sundar Deepti, Jaswant Singh, Dev Dard, Dr H.S. Bedi, etc, highlighted the selfless service of Bhagat Puran Singh.
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Test tussle continues between MGNREGS employees, admn
Amritsar, August 5 They were opposing the administration’s recent move to test their talent. On the other hand, the Deputy Commissioner, Rajat Aggarwal, maintained that the scheme under which they were employed demanded performance-based work. Nevertheless, the administration made arrangement at Government Senior Secondary School, Mall Mandi, for conducting the test for 60 gram rozgaar sewaks and 9 accountants today, but nobody appeared for the test. Harinder Pal Singh, press secretary of MGNREGS Mulazam Union, Punjab, said the administration was setting a wrong precedent by conducting such a test. “No district in the state ever conducted such a test. As we opposed the move, nobody appeared for the test,” he said. While showing a letter, the agitating employees said the administration had said their employment depends on the test. The Deputy Commissioner clarified that no employee deployed under MGNREGS would be fired even if they fail the test. “This test was just to have an idea about their knowledge on computers, so that they should be put to right training programme to further brush-up their skills”, he said. “Moreover, no comparison can be made between the two districts. Every place has got its own parameters and the rules are designed on need basis only,” he said. |
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Workshop on organic basmati held
Amritsar, August 5 Dr Sharma was speaking during an awareness workshop on organic basmati rice production and marketing, conducted by the Indian Institute of Industrial Economics and Development Society (IIEDS) in collaboration with the Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) here yesterday. Hundreds of farmers attended the workshop on an open invitation. The Basmati Export Development Foundation is going to organise similar workshops in six more districts to make the farmers aware of the benefits of organic farming. “There is a state-of-the-art laboratory established at Modipuram from where the farmers can get pure and organic seeds,” he said. DGM of APEDA Navneesh Sharma apprised the farmers of the quality of basmati rice and advised them to refrain from using insecticide. —
TNS |
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World Breast-feeding Week celebrated
Amritsar, August 5 Dr Hardeep Singh Ghai said the infant should be breast-fed after half an hour of his or her birth. Women who don't have health problems should try to give their babies breast milk for at least first six months of birth. Meanwhile, a health baby show contest was also organised on the occasion wherein prizes were presented to Guntaaz, Krishna, Aashu, Harpreet and Krishna. Apart from this, the expectant mothers, who gave answers to experts’ questions, also got prizes.
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Bharatnatyam treat at Spring Dale
Amritsar, August 5 The occasion was the inauguration of the Virasat-2011 of the Society for Promotion of Indian Classical Music and Culture Amongst Youth (SPICMACAY) here, which brought Rama Vaidyanathan to Spring Dales. The function started with a performance by, a classical dancer, Dakshina Vaidyanathan, an engineer and Rama Vaidyanathan’s daughter. The experience of Rama Vaidyanathan as a Bharatnatyam exponent spans more than two decades. A disciple of legendary dancer Yamini Krishnamurti and Guru Saroja Vaidyanathan, she has dedicated herself to the cause of promoting the tradition of Bharatnatyam among the youth. She is one of the most sought -fter Bharatnatyam dancers of India. This danseuse comes under the outstanding category of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR) of the Government of India. Her popularity can also be gauged from the fact that the ICCR has presented her in many concerts in India and abroad. She was also honoured by the Department of Cultural Affairs, Government of Sri Lanka, with the title of “Jewel of India” in Colombo in 1998. While deeply rooted in tradition, she has evolved her own individual style without compromising with the core principles of Bharatnatyam. The students were enthralled to see her interpret stories related to Lord Shiva and Lord Krishna in her own inimitable style. Later, during her interaction with the students, she surprised them by pointing out the geometric representation of the rhythmic aspect of the dance form. Rajiv Kumar Sharma, Principal, Spring Dale Senior School, who is also the coordinator for SPICMACAY, said that Virasat-2011, which took off on Friday, would continue till December this year. He added that SPICMACAY intended to organise various programmes during the Virasat series. “Our aim is to reach out to the educational institutions in the region and expose the students to the best of Indian heritage through different dance forms, theatre traditions, music, art and craft related to the Indian culture,” he said.
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Even as the Amritsar Municipal Corporation (AMC) has got a green signal from the government to establish Rs 80-crore solid waste management project here, the problem of garbage cries for an immediate attention.
Navjot Singh Sidhu, MP, released a blue print for the development of tourism in the holy city here today.
He released the blue print following the inauguration of the International Travel and Tourism Exhibition.
Amritsar, August 5
