Chandigarh, June 14
The Chandigarh Police today recovered the knife that was used to kill inspector Sucha Singh. The bloodstained clothes of accused Basant were also recovered.

After interrogating Basant, a team of the Crime Branch led by inspector Ranjodh Singh went to the forest area in Mullanpur and Parol village along with the accused and recovered the knife and clothes.

Earlier, senior police officials interrogated the suspended UT police constable, Basant Kumar. The UT Inspector General (IG) of Police, RP Upadhyaya, and SSP Naunihal Singh separately interrogated Basant, alias Bunty, at the crime branch.

Sources in the crime branch said on being questioned about his identity by inspector Sucha Singh, Basant had addressed the inspector as ‘sir’, to which Sucha Singh said :Tum mulazim to nahin (are you a policeman).” This scared Basant and he pulled out his knife and stabbed Sucha Singh and driver Jetinder Singh, before fleeing from the spot.

The runaway couple was reportedly arrested from a hotel in the Paharganj area in Delhi by the Haryana police. They had committed double murder in Sonepat on April 18 when Basant shot Sarita’s husband and her mother-in-law with his service rifle. On June 8, Basant stabbed inspector Sucha Singh to death as the latter rounded him up during a routine checking.

On Saturday, Basant would be taken to the forest area from where he had escaped along with Sarita. “The accused has not divulged much about the incident,” said a police official.

Panchkula, June 14
The district administration has swung into action following a major fire at Recorders and Medicare Unit Systems in Industrial Area, Phase I, Panchkula, on Thursday.

The administration and the fire department have initiated the process to identify units that were not complying with the fire safety and pollution norms. “Simultaneous raids will be conducted on erring units,” said Panchkula SDM RK Singla.

The fire department served notices on 255 erring units about a year ago. But since then, not even a single factory has been checked for violations.

Panchkula fire officer Shamsher Singh Malik said it was difficult for them to check violations in factories. “We don’t have powers to initiate action against erring units,” he said.

Panchkula Sub-Divisional Magistrate RK Singh said: “We will take action against units violating fire safety norms. We are conducting a survey of all the factories. If they don’t comply with the norms within the given time frame, strict action will be initiated against them.”

Machines worth over Rs 60 crore were gutted in a fire at Recorders and Medicare unit in Industrial Area, Phase I, Panchkula in the wee hours of Thursday.

The state pollution control board is serving notices on factories operating without the consent of the board. An official of the board said 30 factories had been served notices in Panchkula.

Chandigarh, June 14
The Municipal Corporation today served notices on 120 illegal guesthouses that come within the MC limits. Most of the guesthouses are in Kajheri village, Burail, Attawa, Mani Majra, Maloya, Dadu Majra.

The Municipal Corporation and the UT Administration have failed to act against the violators.

Every year, the number of guest houses increases.

A senior official of the Municipal Corporation said the guesthouses had come up in violation of building bylaws. They violation was noticed during a survey, he stated.

Recently, the Chandigarh Administration and the civic body had prepared a draft to check haphazard urbanisation in rural areas. There are 23 villages, of which nine come within the MC limits.

This is for the first time that the building bylaws for controlled development of these villages have been framed.

As per the draft notification of building bylaws in villages, the minimum plot size to run a guesthouse in villages should be 500 sq yards (one kanal). At present, a majority of guesthouses have been constructed on plots measuring 5 marlas to 7 marlas.

The notification states, “A guest house should be constructed along a 22 feet wide road. The minimum plot size should be 500 square yards. Building norms and pollution norms should be adhered to. There should be adequate parking space."

Chandigarh, June 14
Rainwater accumulated around the emergency unit and cardiac centre of the PGIMER has put patients and their attendants to inconvenience.

The level of the road leading to the main entrance of the emergency unit is low.

Every monsoon staff, patients and their attendants grapple with the problem.

The situation is no better on the road leading from the Advanced Cardiac Centre towards hostels and swimming pool. The road has developed potholes.

“The drainage system needs to be improved. We have been visiting the PGI or the past many years. We encountered the same problem last year also. Only the road leading towards the director’s office has culverts," said Mangat Ram, a patient’s attendant.

Panchkula, June 14
In an effort to check the highway crime, smuggling, illegal supply of liquor, the Commissioner of Police, Rajbir Deswal, has ordered to conduct a highway domination at various highways falling in the Panchkula-Ambala Commissionarate. The drive would start from tomorrow night and would continue for a month.

For this purpose, an additional force of over 200 police personnel has also been sought. In this regard, Deswal has convened a meeting tomorrow morning in his office at Panchkula.

According to the Deputy Commissioner, the domination would start at 10 pm and would continue till 4 am. The areas that would be covered under this drive include Kalka-Pinjore-Ramgarh-Barwala, Kalka-Pinjore-Panchkula-Shahbad, Ambala-Maulana, Ambala-Nangal and other link roads joining Raipurrani and Barwala.

The Deputy Commissioner of Police would visit the areas on rotation basis at night along with two Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACPs) and the respective SHOs.

“We have called for an additional force in order to give a breather to the force that would be on duty at night. The additional force would act as a substitute during the day for them,” added Deswal.

This drive has been initiated to check the cattle lifters and the highway crime as well. After the meeting in the morning, other strategic points would also be identified.

Mohali, June 14
Child labour eradication week will be observed in Mohali district from June 17 to June 23. Deputy Commissioner Tejinder Pal Singh Sidhu said here today that special teams would be set up that would carry out checks on hotels, dhabas, industrial units and brick-kilns to find out if children were being made to work there as labourers.

The teams would comprise SDMs, officials from the Labour, Child Welfare, Education, Health and local government Departments and the police.

A child helpline would be set up in the office of the Assistant Labour Commissioner at Municipal Bhawan in Sector 68 here.

Information regarding any child working in a hotel, dhaba, tea stall, industrial unit or in the house of any resident in the district could be given on the helpline number 0172-2216479.

Panchkula, June 14
The non-availability of requisite police force for tomorrow has urged the Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA) to postpone the demolition drive of the 100 shops at Old Panchkula that have encroached the land.

It was just a day earlier, when the department had issued notices to the shopkeepers saying that if they would not vacate the land that had been encroached by them, they would demolish the same on Saturday.

HUDA was all set to demolish the shops at Old Panchkula on Saturday which had been occupied by the shopkeepers for the last fifty years. The department had asked for 250 police personnel in order to conduct the drive.

The Estate Officer, Ashwini Sharma, said that since the requisite force could not be made available to them, they had postponed the drive and as soon as the force was available they would soon conduct the drive.

The shopkeepers alleged that they had been there since 1966 and till the time the department would not give them an alternate space, they would not leave the area. The shopkeepers also went to meet MLA DK Bansal seeking help in the issue, but the latter was not available to address their problems.

The shopkeepers further alleged that just a two-day notice was not sufficient for them to leave a place where they had been running their shops for the last fifty years 

Chandigarh, June 14
The department of psychiatry at the PGI has been reeling under severe shortage of clinical psychologists for the past couple of years. Over the years, all the psychologists have resigned.

The research productivity of the department, which is known for its extensive research involving interviews with a wide variety of persons in order to understand human bahaviour better, has come down significantly, stated the officials during a meeting of the standing academic committee recently. Fearing that research work at the department might come to an end in the absence of psychologists, the department has demanded the creation of three posts of assistant clinical psychologists.

“Earlier, in a period of five years (1997-2001 and 2002-2006), the faculty completed over 30 projects. In the next three years (2006-2009), however, the number of projects came down to seven,” said the department officials. Justifying the requirement for creating the posts, the department officials said, “The faculty can generate research product ideas but cannot collect data.” Hiring these psychologists would add an annual financial load of Rs 7,92,180 on the institution.

The current faculty at the department includes six Professors and five additional professors. The psychiatry OPD is one of the most highly visited OPDs at the premier institute. The department also runs a special evening OPD once a week. 

Chandigarh, June 14
A city resident today filed a criminal complaint against Maneka Gandhi, chairperson, People for Animals, and four other local members of the organisation at the local court. The case has been deferred till July 5.

The complainant, Vinod Kumar, runs a pet shop in Sector 20. He was arrested on May 25 on the charges of keeping variety of birds protected under Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972. The police also registered an FIR against him under Section 11 of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960.

The birds in question were also taken away by the local members of People for Animal.

The complainant, however, contended that Maneka Gandhi and other members should be summoned to face trial for giving false information to the police authorities.

He said the offences as mentioned in the instant FIR were non-cognizable offences and the police had no power to register an FIR under Section 154 of the CrPC.

In his complaint, Vinod Kumar also said that no person could be arrested without warrant in cases of non-cognizable offences.

Chandigarh, June 14
The summer festival of the Chandigarh Administration began today with the performances of Ahmed Hussain and Mohammed Hussain, ghazal singers from Jaipur, at the Tagore Theatre here. Both singers left the audience spellbound with their ghazal and thumri recital.

Dr SK Punia, chief coordinator of the festival, said the event would continue till June 17. Tomorrow, there would be a fusion of sarod, flute and shahnai at 7 pm, followed by another performance “Gaudiya Nritya” at the Tagore Theatre.

While Kaushik Mukherjee and Manab Mukherjee would present the sarod and flute concert, Dr Mahua Mukherjee would present “Gaudiya Nritya”, a classical dance of Bengal.

On June 16, a play, “Hum-Suffer”, would be staged. The festival would conclude on June 17 with Kuchipudi dance by Dr Ananda Shankar Jayant, who is one of India’s most eminent and renowned dancers and is celebrated as one of the country’s leading classical dancers, choreographers and dance scholars, he said.

Chandigarh: The Municipal Corporation on Friday razed illegal constructions at Ram Darbar, Phase II.

During the drive, a portion of a house that was constructed on government land was removed on the direction of the court. The MC staff also removed 25 shanties that had come up on the municipal land. The civic body carried out the drive with the help of police force. — TNS

The college runs a laboratory nursery school, Chaitanya, with 50 students on its roll, attached to the Department of Human Development and Family Relations to impart practical training to its students. The college has made its mark through its participation in the Adult and Community Education Schemes of Panjab University and offers short-term training to gram sevikas and associate village women of Chandigarh.

There are two hostels within the college campus for the students. 

Justice Sabina, a judge at the Punjab and Haryana High Court; fashion designer Poonam Aggarwal; and Madhu Arora, chief dietician at the Government Medical College Hospital, Sector 32, Chandigarh. 

Chandigarh, June 14
National Students Union of India (NSUI) members today submitted a memorandum to the PU authorities demanding that the university should declare the number of vacant seats in each department before holding the entrance test for Phd and MPhil programmes.

NSUI president Manoj Lubana said the number of seats for the enrolment into PhD had not been mentioned in the prospectus.

“There are a large number of candidates who cleared this test last year, but denied enrolment by various faculties and departments,” he said.

He said the problem was more profound in the arts and management faculties where many teachers were not willing to take any PhD student.

Students demanded that they want a transparent method of selection where all eligible candidates who clear the test must be enrolled by the faculty of the department.

“The number of seats should be mentioned in the prospectus and all students who clear the entrance test must be enrolled by the faculty members,” the students said.

Chandigarh, June 14
A delegation of the UT Cadre Educational Employees Union and the Chandigarh UT Subordinate Services Federation met the UT advisor today and demanded immediate promotions of JBT teachers to master/mistress cadre and regularisation of services of contractual teachers. The delegation members said the Education Department had yet not initiated any action in this regard.

The delegation comprised Raghbir Singh Sandhu, Ranjit Singh Hans, Rajinder Kumar, and Swarn Singh Kamboj. — TNS

Chandigarh, June 14
The NSS State Advisory Committee, Chandigarh, in its meeting held today, approved the opening of 400 self-financing units (SFUs) in Chandigarh.

Gurpreet Kaur Sapra, Director, Higher Education, Chandigarh Administration, said the administration had approved the proposal of the NSS Cell for the opening of more self-financing units (SFUs) in schools, colleges and educational institutions to increase the participation of youths in community service.

The funding for the purpose would be met by the Chandigarh Administration from its own budget, she said.

Bikram Rana, State Liaison Officer (NSS), Chandigarh, said the meeting had also approved the holding of adventure programmes at the state level on the pattern of national-level adventure camps so that the maximum number of NSS volunteers could take part in such programmes.

Bikram said the committee had also approved the participation of NSS contingents, comprising 200 NSS volunteers, as separate units like the NCC during the Independence Day and the Republic Day parades at the state level.

He said as the city falls in the Seismic Zone V, it had become paramount to train NSS volunteers in disaster management. Hence, it was also decided that besides community service, NSS volunteers should be imparted training in disaster management so that in the event of any natural calamity, they could assist the authorities in rescue operations.

Keep in view the importance of such training, the committee had approved training to NSS volunteers in disaster management in collaboration with the organisations involved in disaster management, he said.