Jalandhar, March 7
The Jalandhar (Rural) police has nabbed an elderly couple at Dyalpur village on the charge of duping youths in the name of providing them jobs in the Merchant Navy.

The couple - Mohinder Singh and wife Surinder Kaur - who had been eluding the police for a long time, were picked up by the Kartarpur police last night from their relative’s house where they had been with some work.

Inspector Inderjit Singh, in charge Kartarpur police station, revealed that the couple was accused of duping youths in the name of providing them jobs in the Merchant Navy and forcing them to work as labourers at some islands in Malaysia.

Two victims, Gurtavar Singh and Harbhajan Singh of Moosarpur village, had lodged a complaint against them at the Kartarpur police station in July 2012. The complainant had alleged that the couple had allured them with getting jobs in the Merchant Navy and duped them of lakhs of rupees.

Inderjit Singh said the complainants had alleged that charging lakhs of rupees in advance from them before sending them to Secunderabad and Banaras for training in institutes run by their son and daughter-in-law, the couple had been offering fake certificates to them. The youths were then transported to an island in Malaysia and used as “bonded” labourers.

The complainants had also revealed that more than 300 youths, who were duped by the couple, were still stranded on the island and forced to work as labourers, he added.

The police had registered a case under Sections 406 and 420 of the IPC against the couple. The couple, residents of Dure village, had been on the run since the registration of the case.

Abandoning the house in Dure village they shifted to Nagra village and then to Agra. The police on a tip-off that the couple was in Dyalpur village, laid a tap and arrested the duo.

They were today produced before a local court and were remanded in police custody for two days, Inderjit Singh revealed.

Jalandhar, March 7
The city is currently being commanded by quite a few women officials. The Jalandhar Tribune interacts with these women of substance on the eve of Women’s Day and asks them how they feel to be in the top post.

Gurpreet Deo, IG, Police

Even though she has been the first woman IPS officer to have become DIG and then IG in the Punjab cadre, Gurpreet Deo does not like to brag about the same. “It was a sheer matter of chance that there were just about four women who got inducted in my batch in 1993 and got the Punjab cadre allocated,” she tries to keep it a little low.

Asked as to how and why she chose to appear for the IPS, she assigns quite a few reasons, “I felt that I was outgoing, proactive in my approach and good at public interaction. So I thought my attitude was fit to join the forces. The tales that my father used to tell about my grandfather also inspired me somewhat. My grandfather was with the Punjab Police and retired as DSP in 1955. The disciplined regime that I grew up with being an Army officer’s daughter was yet another factor that helped in my initial grooming for the job”.

Even being in a male-dominated bastion, Deo tells that she has never found it difficult to command men. “I entered at a level at which there is not any problems and the officer has sufficient power to wield. There of course has been a challenge of proving oneself in terms of professional competency with the counterparts.”

Asked if she faced any problems at home because of work pressure, she tells, “Not really. My husband is with Merchant Navy and is currently based overseas. I have my 10-year-old son with me who understands my problems.”

On women issues, she tells, “There has been a societal tendency to make women feel that they are weak and that they should not speak up. But that should not be the case now. To impart a sense of more security among women and taking into account the socio-economic changes, there has been a massive induction of women in the force in the recent past. Of the nearly 4,000 women constables in the police, 3,000 have joined just in the past four years. Even in the IPS, there used to be just 10 per cent women candidates, but the number is now about 33 per cent.”

Shruti Singh, DC

Having got posted in Jalandhar about two months back, the 2004-batch IAS officer Shruti Singh, too, has a first attached to her name. She is the first woman Deputy Commissioner (DC) of the district. Asked how she felt about the same, she tells, “It makes me all the more confident, derives me towards my goal of being a good administrator and makes me feel very positive.”

She adds, “Jalandhar being a big station has more law and order problems than other districts like Nawanshahr, which makes this posting quite challenging.”

Being IPS officer Ashish Chaudhary’s wife, Shruti tells that it makes her fully understand the problems of police working, which has helped her in better administration-police coordination in her career so far.

On the flip side, she adds, “There are problems too for we rarely find time together and be with our four-year-old son. Ever since I have got married, we have been together for just a few months. We were together in Jalandhar when I got two months of additional charge here during the period when previous DC Priyank Bharti was away on training. We were also together for sometime in Ludhiana when I was posted there as Chief Administrator, GLADA, and he was SSP (Rural).”

Regarding her priorities, she said she was currently working for improving services through Suvidha Centre for the residents. “I am working on to help people avail themselves of maximum possible facilities through the single-window service.”

Sarojini Gautam Sharda, ACA, PUDA

It was in 1981 that Sarojini Gautam Sharda, then aged 22, made her "first". She was then the first woman tehsildar in North India. Comparing the system now and 32 years down the line, she recalls, “There were women in the clerical staff, but a very few women officials at that time. It was a completely different work environment. I used to be the only woman officer in meetings and the only woman officer at parties. This really made me feel a little uncomfortable at parties. When I used to quickly sneak out, I still remember that even men used to be visibly relieved at this.”

She shared other memories, “At times when I was on a site visit, people would come up not to tell their side of story, but to see a woman officer at work. There even have been instances when some people used to doubly check whether the woman in the seat was actually the officer. In those days, they have had inhibitions in walking into my office, but not any longer.”

Sharda tells that she has never faced any problem in holding any of the charge, be it that of ADC, MC Commissioner, Deputy Director, Local Bodies, Registrar, PTU, or elsewhere. “The only fact that I do not like is that a woman is always under scanner of the colleagues and superiors. Being a woman, they would also keep on testing your capabilities and relate your successes and failures to being a woman.”

The officer considers her father as her role model. “He has guided me from day one coercing me to always help the underprivileged. I still remember his words when I took over as MC Commissioner, “Do not become an officer who remains busy with cutting ribbons. Concentrate on good work.”

Jalandhar, March 7
“aDAVitya”, a three-day annual technical festival of the DAV Institute of Engineering and Technology (DAVIET) was inaugurated today.

Around 100 events have been organised by departments of computer science engineering, IT, mechanical, electronics and communication engineering, civil engineering and electrical engineering under the categories of literary, fun, arts, quiz and more.

To keep the students abreast of the latest in their respective fields, workshops on ethical hacking and cyber forensics, applications of Android system, concrete mix design and robotics were also organised. Students from Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar, Panjab University, Chandigarh, Chitkara Institute of Technology, Dr BR Ambedkar NIT, Jalandhar, SLIET, Longowal, Beant College of Engineering and Technology, Gurdaspur, are attending the festival.

Dr AL Sangal, Principal, DAVIET, said, “Technology is evolving at a very fast pace. If budding technocrats and professionals do not keep themselves abreast of the latest in their fields then they can’t make place for themselves in this fast-changing competitive world.”

Jalandhar, March 7
The Punjab Congress will raise the issue of imposition of property tax in the forthcoming Budget Session of Assembly.

Talking to mediaperons at Congress Bhavan here today, former Punjab ministers Chaudhary Jagjit Singh and Ajit Singh Samra said they would apprise Congress Legislative Party (CLP) leader Sunil Jakhar about the resentment among masses against the imposition of property tax, that too retrospectively.

Flaying the SAD-BJP government for imposing property tax, Jagjit and Samra said, “Even the owners of small houses have not been spared from the property tax and in such a way they have been made tenants in their own houses.”

Jagjit and Samra, accompanied by PPCC secretary Virendra Sharma and DCC (Urban) president Arun Walia, said, “They would start a public agitation against putting an extra burden on the common masses by imposing the property tax.”

Welcoming the appointment of Gurdaspur MP Partap Singh Bajwa as Punjab Congress president, Jagjit and Samra said electronic voting machines (EVMs) should not be used in the next general elections, scheduled to be held next year, as they might be tampered with.

The senior Congress leaders said, “Voting should be done through traditional ballot papers to avoid any possibility of tampering of EVMs.”

Alleging that the EVMs were tampered with by Akalis in the Moga byelection and last Assembly elections last year, Jagjit and Samra said they would write to the Election Commission of India (ECI) to hold voting through ballot papers.

Giving reasoning to their statement, they said, “A number of countries, including the USA, use ballot-papers in elections to avoid any possibility of tempering of EVMs.”