Baijnath, January 28
Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh said here today that the top priority of the government would be to revive all development activities which had come to a standstill in the last five years. He said people of the state would see results in the next three months.

Talking to mediapersons this morning, the Chief Minister said development activities had come to a standstill during the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regime because of the lack of political and administrative will despite adequate allocation of funds from the Centre.

He said the condition of national highways, state highways and interior roads had gone from bad to worse in the last five years. He claimed that the BJP government had failed to initiate steps for widening of roads, which was urgently required, even though there had been a manifold increase in vehicular traffic.

He said two major road projects in Una and Shimla districts being executed by a Chinese company with an investment of Rs 350 crore had been left midway, but the BJP government had failed to take action against the company. He said the BJP government had remained a silent spectator despite large-scale protests.

He said his government had directed the company to resume construction before February 15, failing which the government would rescind the work and impose a heavy penalty as per the law. He said the money belonged to the state even though the projects were funded by the World Bank.

The Chief Minister categorically said there would be zero tolerance to corruption in public life. He said vigilance agencies would be strengthened with more powers. He said all efforts would be made for the speedy trial of all corruption cases pending in courts. He said the government would give prosecution sanction in such matters in a time-bound plan.

Urban Development Minister Sudhir Sharma, Baijnath legislator Kishori Lal and hundreds of Congress workers earlier received the Chief Minister at the helipad. He proceeded to the Buddhism Research Centre in Bhattoo to meet Tibetan leaders and scholars. They presented him a white cloth as a symbol of welcome. He spent an hour at the monastery.

Chandigarh, January 28
The Annandale Ground in Shimla, the ownership which has been the bone of contention between the Army and the erstwhile BJP state government for the past some time, is now expected to remain in the possession of the Army.

Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, in a meeting with General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Western Command, Lt-Gen Sanjiv Chachra in Shimla today, assured him that status quo would be maintained in respect of the ground.

The Chief Minister said necessary directions would be given to withdraw the ongoing arbitration proceedings between the defence authorities and the local administration to settle the claim for ownership and possession of the ground.

The Army has consistently been stressing upon the strategic importance and criticality of the Annadale Ground for carrying out operations by the Army along northern borders as well as for any unforeseen disaster relief contingency operations.

There have been attempts by the civilian establishment to take control of the ground, with Anurag Thakur, state BJP leader and son of former Chief Minster PK Dhumal, rooting to set up a cricket stadium at the site.

Lt-General Chachra also raised the issue of jobs for ex-servicemen bringing out that a large number of qualified and skilled ex-servicemen were available in the state who could make a worthwhile contribution to the growth and development of the state. Virbhadra Singh while assuring the Army Commander that necessary steps would be taken in this regard also agreed wholeheartedly to expedite land acquisition and other formalities for the early development of a military station at Una.

The Army Commander also called upon Governor Urmila Singh and discussed various issues concerning the welfare of ex-servicemen with her.

Hamirpur, January 28
With residents raising eyebrows over the construction of and allotment at the shopping complex in Sujanpur, local legislator Rajender Rana has demanded an inquiry into the matter.

Having 26 shops, the shopping complex has been constructed by the nagar panchayat at a cost of about Rs 75 lakh and shops are being allotted.

The contractor had left the work midway and it was completed by the nagar panchayat. Shops are being allotted through open bidding, which is being opposed by shopkeepers.

The nagar panchayat has sought Rs 20,000 as security and Rs 1 lakh as fixed deposit for participating in the bidding. Shops will be given on monthly rent.

Shopkeepers say, “The shops have been constructed for petty shopkeepers. Paying Rs 1 lakh is not possible for them. Rana has asked the nagar panchayat to waive the condition of fixed deposit.”

People desirous of taking shops on rent have opposed the reservation criterion. Differently abled Prithvi Raj says, “Our category has got no reservation in the allotment. Reservation is being given in a pick-and-chooses manner.”

Rana met the Hamirpur Deputy Commissioner recently and demanded a probe into the matter. Nagar panchayat president Manoj Thakur said, “The complex is being dragged into controversy unnecessarily. We have invited open bids along with security deposit as we are pinning hopes on the recurring income to run nagar panchayat affairs.”

Sundernagar, January 28
A majority of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) workers in the Nachan constituency are unhappy as six-time Mandi district unit president Dile Ram and other senior leaders were sidelined during the organisational elections of the Nachan unit which concluded on Saturday.

Some workers have decided to write to the state and national presidents of the BJP to bring this to their notice as such an incident can weaken the party further. The BJP candidate had won from Nachan. Denied the ticket, Dile Ram had helped the party and had not contested as a rebel.

This time, newly elected Nachan legislator Vinod Kumar tried to sideline the veteran leader in the organisational elections. Dile Ram was not given formal information about the elections to two booth-level committees in his locality. The president of his home panchayat was not intimated about the elections.

The panchayat president and the Nachan block unit president of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha are Dile Ram’s sons. Mandi district BJP unit general secretary Ved Parkash and many senior workers were not informed about the elections to the block unit and their respective booth-level committees.

According to a party worker, Dile Ram objected to it and the party ordered the cancellation of elections to two booth-level committees. Ravinder Rana was elected as the block unit president, but only around half of the 101 booth-level committees participated in the elections.

According to a senior worker attending party elections for more than two decades, thousands used to come for elections earlier, but only between 200 and 250 attended the elections this time. When contacted, Dile Ram said he and other senior BJP workers were not invited to the elections, but he did not have any objection to the elections.

Dalhousie, January 28
It is the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) which has brought Chamba district on the power map of the country by constructing and commissioning four hydropower projects, which are under operation and generating additional power capacity of 1,269 MW annually.

This was stated by Sharat Chander Sharma, executive director, National Hydroelectric Power Corporation, Banikhet region, while addressing a gathering on the occasion of Republic Day organised by the NHPC at Banikhet, near here, on Saturday.

He said the NHPC in Chamba district had contributed a lot to the development of the state and the country as well.

Paying tributes to the martyrs who scarified their lives for the freedom struggle of the country, he urged everyone to perform their duty with honesty.

Sharma congratulated the workforce of the National Hydroelectric Power Corporation, the local administration and the public for their contribution in
the construction and commissioning of the four major hydroelectric projects in Chamba.

Earlier, he hoisted the Tricolour. SK Chauhan, General Manager of the corporation, was also present at the function. 

Solan, January 28
Successful development of apple bud wood bank having cultivars with early maturing feature by scientists of the Dr YS Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry, Nauni, has given a new ray of hope to orchardists for a large-scale commercial exploitation.

Research carried out by scientists of the university under the “Network Project on Bud Wood and Rootstock Bank of Temperate Fruits”, which was funded by the Indian Council for Agriculture and Research, has helped prepare this bud wood.

According Dr RC Sharma, director of the research, 13 promising apple cultivars were established in the Apple Block of the Department of Fruit Science in 2008 to maintain and provide true to type bud wood to orchardists. Most of the varieties in the bud wood bank have now passed juvenile phase and produce sample crop to establish their true characters.

Out of the 13 cultivars, eight produced substantial fruits and the cultivars scarlet spur II, early red one, super chief, ace spur, red chief, oregon spur II and gale gala developed full colour by the end of July with good fruit size even under Nauni, Solan conditions. Pollinising cultivar compact winter banana proved to be a good polliniser for spur type cultivars and produced heavy crop at this elevation.

These results have proved encouraging to planners and orchardists of low and mid hill areas to commercially exploit the potential of these new cultivars as they are early maturing, attain intense colour and can fetch remunerative prices. This will also expand the harvest calendar of apple in the state and the new improved varieties will save glut in the market, besides saving the monoculture.

Encouraged by the results, Dr Sharma said this year, the bud wood bank of apple would be further strengthened by planting different improved low chilling cultivars like super chief, scarlet spur, anna, dorset golden, cherry gala and
golden 972 introduced from France through the Department of Horticulture.

The apple cultivation has been facing a serious threat of low productivity and poor quality owing to global warming and non-diversification of improved apple cultivars. The establishment and maintenance of bud wood /rootstock banks and mother orchards is significant for ensuring sustainability of fruit industry in the state. Apples are cultivated over an area of 2,11,295 hectare in the state and its production is 10,22,821 MT with an annual revenue turnover of more than Rs 2,000 crore.

Shimla, January 28
The perennial financial crisis plaguing the Shimla Municipal Corporation (SMC) has been aggravated with the state government turning down the plea of the local body to allow it to impose property tax on the basis of rateable value in accordance with the old system for 2012-13 instead of the new unit area basis.

The BJP government had amended the State Municipal Corporation Act last year to pave the way for the imposition of property tax on unit area basis as part of fiscal reforms, but the SMC, dominated by the CPM and the Congress, had been resisting the switchover to the new method on the grounds that it was not rational and ignored geographical constraints of hill topography and socio-economic conditions of the people.

As per the Act, the new system should have been enforced from February 2012, but the SMC has not raised any bill due to the dispute over the method of imposing the tax. As a result, it stands to lose revenue to the tune of over Rs 10 crore during 2012-13.

It will end up with a deficit of over Rs 5 crore by the end of the current financial year, which is over 10 per cent of the budget. The SMC owes over Rs 130 crore to the Irrigation and Public Health Department, from which it gets the bulk of water supply, even though the newly imposed green tax will fetch about Rs 6 crore.

Deputy Mayor Tikender Panwar maintains that with extended limits, the old system will help double revenue from property tax as the number of tax payers will increase by a few thousand. He says now that the Congress government is in place, the SMC will again take up the matter.

He says the financial woes of the SMC have been multiplying due to the failure of the government to maintain the level of grant being given to compensate for the loss of revenue due to abolition of octroi.

The grant came to 50 per cent of the total income of the local body, initially but it gradually declined and now accounted for only 32 per cent of the income.

The government had also shifted pension liability from the Urban Department to the SMC and it was spending about Rs 5 crore on it annually.

In this situation, the bulk of funds, almost 90 per cent, were being spend on salaries and pensions of employees and hardly any funds were left for development activities.

He says the SMC has to incur expenditure on various other activities as Shimla is the state capital.

He says there is a strong case for providing a capital grant for the purpose. A large number of highly paid officers on deputation from various government departments also put an additional financial burden on SMC.

Kangra, January 28
State Technical Education and Transport Minister GS Bali said today that technical education would be imparted to Class IX and X students of government schools in the state soon.

Bali was addressing an annual day function of Holi Faith Senior Secondary School at Pathiar village of the subdivision today.

He said to provide better technical education to students at their doorsteps, a Rs 100-crore IIT project would be set up in Una district.

Bali said with the expansion of technical education in the state, the burning problem of unemployment would be mitigated to a large extent. He said technical courses would be started in institutes as per the requirement of private sector industries so that the youth after getting training should find job opportunities in the state.

Bali urged the teaching community to render their services sincerely, honestly and without any expectation so that students should become good citizens with good moral values. Earlier, the minister inaugurated a science block of the school. Deepak Sood, principal of the school, read out the annual report.

The minister announced Rs 3 lakh for a Mehla Mandal building at Pathiar, besides Rs 25,000 for the construction of toilets in the school.

He gave Rs 5,000 as financial aid to Kailashoo Devi of Kawari, whose cowshed was burnt in a fire recently.

HPCC secretary Ajay Verma and Kangra SDM Ajeet Bhardwaj were present.

Bilaspur, January 28
All possible steps will be taken to make the Nalwadi fair more attractive and sub-committees will be formed for making proper arrangements.

This was stated by Ram Lal Thakur, chairman, State Planning Development and 20-Point Implementation Committee, while presiding over a meeting of officials regarding fair arrangements here today.

Ram Lal said the fair would be organised at the Luhnu ground from March 17 to 23 and sports like national men and women’s kabaddi, state-level volleyball and hockey competitions and cultural evenings would be the special highlights of the fair.

He said a cultural evening would be reserved for state-level cultural competitions and local artistes would be preferred.

Deputy Commissioner Ajay Sharma said there would be no wastage of funds and all unnecessary expenditures would be curtailed. Local MLA Bambar Thakur was also present at the meeting.

Chowari, January 28
Republic Day was not celebrated in the Bhattiyat subdivision of Chamba district following the death of 25-year-old Lieut Rahul Sharma due to cardiac arrest in Port Blair on January 25.

His body was cremated with full military and state honours in his hometown Chowari yesterday. Subdivisional Magistrate Ashwani Kumar said Maj KP Singh and local legislator Vikram Singh Jaryal attended the cremation.

He further said the programme chalked out to mark Republic Day celebrations were cancelled as a mark of respect to the departed Army officer. — OC

Shimla, January 28
A team of doctors headed by Arvind Kandoria, Associate Professor, Department of Cardiology, successfully implanted for the first time the latest bio-absorbable vascular (BVS) drug eluting stent in a patient at the Indira Gandhi Medical College here.

The stent which costs over Rs 2.5 lakh was provided free of cost by the company to Veer Singh, a 61-year-old patient from Lahaul and Spiti district. The patient was in good shape and the procedure performed last week was successful, Dr Kandoria said.

He said the biggest advantage of the new stent was that unlike the bare metal stents, it got absorbed in the body in due course. The chances of in-stent restenosis in case of bare metal stents was as high as 40 per cent and even in case of drug eluting bare metal stents it was 10 to 20 per cent and the patient was required to take medicines for thinning the blood for a long time.

However, the BVS made from poly lactic, reduced the chances of in-stent restenosis to a negligible zero to 2 per cent. The drug coating got completely absorbed after delivering the drug for a period of time and as a result blood thinning medicines were required only for a short period.

The dissolving stent was most suitable for children, young adults and patients with diabetes, renal failure and contraindications to blood thinning drugs. Moreover, patients implanted with BVS could easily undergo diagnostic procedures like MRI and CT scan.

The new technology spares the patient the burden of a permanent metal implant in the body. Dr Kandoria was assisted by Dr Ravi Kumar, senior resident, and technician Kundan Singh.

Palampur, January 28
The Palampur Welfare and Environment Protections Forum (PWEPF) has demanded district status for Palampur. The forum urged the state government to consider this issue on a priority basis and take a final decision.

The forum in its meeting held here today said the residents of Palampur region had been demanding district status for long. It said the region comprised three sub-divisions and four Assembly segments, therefore, the government should declare Palampur a district.

While briefing mediapersons here, KB Ralhan, spokesperson of the forum, said the recent statement of Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh to constitute a commission for the reorganisation of districts was a “delaying tactics”.

He said instead of forming an administrative commission, the government should adopt a practical approach to respect the sentiments of the residents of the region.

He reminded the Chief Minister that during the recently concluded Assembly poll, the Congress had promised district status for Palampur.

He said the BJP suffered a defeat in the Assembly poll and lost all the four seats from the region because the party “failed to fulfil” the promises made to the voters of the area in this regard.

“If the Congress government adopted an evasive attitude, it will also face a defeat in 2014 parliamentary elections,” he added.

Meanwhile, Jagmel Katoch, president, Palampur Zila Banao Sanghrash Samiti, said if the Chief Minister failed to grant district status to Palampur, the samiti would revive its agitation. He said the samiti would watch the situation till March 31, and, thereafter, would chalk out its plan of action.

Shimla, January 28
In a major reshuffle, the government today shifted 11 IAS and 59 HPAS officers. Two former private secretaries of ex-Chief Minister PK Dhumal, who were awaiting posting for the past one month, were shifted to inconsequential positions. While Arun Sharma has been sent as Director, Revenue Training Institute, Jogindernagar; Ram Swaroop Gupta has been made Commissioner, Departmental Enquiries.

P Mitra, Additional Chief Secretary-cum-Financial Commissioner, Revenue, has also been given the charge of Urban Development, Town and Country Planning, Housing and Fisheries, and Ajay Mittal, Additional Chief Secretary, Transport, has been posted as Additional Chief Secretary, Labour and Employment.

Dr AR Sihag, Principal Secretary, Urban Development, has taken over as Principal Secretary, Rural Development and Agriculture, while PC Dhiman, Principal Secretary, IT, Social Justice, has been given the additional charge of the post of Transport.

RD Dhiman, Chairman-cum-Managing Director, HPSEB, will also hold the additional charge of the post of Managing Director, HP Power Transmission Corporation, relieving Jagdish Chander Sharma, who has been posted as Managing Director, HPMC, with the additional charge of HP Agro Industries Corporation.

Bharat Harbanslal Khera, Secretary, SAD, GAD and Parliamentary Affairs, will hold an additional charge of the post of Divisional Commissioner, Shimla Division.

Amar Singh Rathore, under order of transfer as MD, HP Agro Industries Corporation, takes over as Special Secretary, IT, relieving Meera Mahajan of the additional charge. Dr Purnima Chauhan, Director, Urban Development and Town and Country Planning, Himachal Pradesh, has been made Director, HP Institute of Public Administration. As many as 59 State administrative service officers have also been shifted.

Solan, January 28
A team of income-tax (I-T) officials today conducted raids on the offices of two traders in the town.

The raids which started in the afternoon continued till evening as vehicles of the I-T officials were found parked outside the office of a trader, near Mohan Park on the Chambaghat road, till evening. The trader has several business interests, including real estate, and is also an office-bearer of the BJP.

The premises of another trader, who runs a shop and owns a multi-storey building at Chambaghat, was also raided.

A team of I-T officials had also raided an industrial unit at Paonta Sahib a few days ago.