Jalandhar, November 27
Residents of the Bashirpura locality here were today furious after a two-year-old child fell in an open manhole in the area, carelessly left open by safai karmcharis during the ongoing de-silting process being carried out in the area.

Manholes in the locality had been opened by the MC workers during the de-silting work at 10 am. Two-and-a-half-year-old Chirag fell in a manhole while he was walking down a street in the area with his mother Meenakshi after buying some eatables from a shop.

Walking ahead of his mother, he suddenly fell in it and it was after painstaking efforts by his mother that he was finally taken out of the manhole, totally smeared in silt. There was no MC personnel present at the spot when Chirag fell in the manhole.

Sunil Kumar father of Chirag said, “The depth of the hole was 5 to six 6. If it was a bit deeper, we couldn’t have done anything about it. My son stuck out one of his hands. If he took it down, things could have taken a turn for the worse. There wasn’t a single MC personnel present on the spot when the incident happened. It was his mother’s presence at the place which saved my son.”

Meanwhile, the family of the child as well as residents of the area protested against the administration on the spot, demanding action against the officials responsible for carelessly leaving open the manhole.

The residents said, “This is something we have been seeing for ages. There are 10 to 12 manholes in the street and only four employees to work at a time. In the morning they leave these open and disappear from the sight and come back hours later. The personnel are certainly not concerned about any untoward incident which might happen to children or members of the locality.”

While residents raised an alarm and stuck to the spot demanding action against the personnel responsible for leaving the manholes open, they were pacified only after the XEN, sub-divisional officer and sewer men visited the spot and told them that the incident would not be repeated.

Councillor of ward no. 15 Manjinder Singh Chatha, when contacted on the issue, said, “It is indeed unfortunate that a child fell in a manhole which lay open. It had actually been opened for de-silting and machines were also put on the job. Fortunately, the child was rescued soon. We shall be making sure that such an incident is not repeated. Action shall also be taken against those responsible for leaving the manholes open.”

Jalandhar, November 27
The Jalandhar rural police has claimed to have busted the “Swift car gang” which had been committing robberies in the Jalandhar city in the past few days.

The gang members were identified as Jagsir Singh of Model Town Moga, Gurvinder Singh of Bagha Purana Moga and Jaswant Singh of Kairowal Moga.

The police also recovered a white car PB10 DE 7992 from the accused. The police had been on their toes to nab the gang members had also sounded an alert.

SSP, Jalandhar, Narinder Bhargav and Superintendent of Police, Detective, Jalandhar, Harkanwal Preet Singh Khakh, said the gang had been looting people from the city for the past few days. Last night also, the gang had looted two people of cash from the city and later moved towards Lohian Khas.

The SP said they had already sounded an alert in the district about the white Swift car. Last night, the rural police had installed a naka on the Lohian-Makhu road and after intercepting the white car when cops signaled the vehicle to stop, the car-borne miscreants accelerated it, but were chased by policemen.

• On November 1, a vernacular daily reporter looted near the Focal Point area
• On November 3, handtools trader looted of Rs 30,000 and mobile near Friends Colony. Cash, mobile also looted from Ramnik Avenue
• On November 6, youth looted of Rs 5,000 in the Rama Mandi area.
• On November 9, man looted of Rs 15,000 near Nangal Shama chowk
• On November 18, an Iphone looted from bike-borne persons in Briz Nagar
• On November 19, attempted to loot Activa-borne persons. Were caught on CCTV cameras
• On November 20, man looted of cash near BMC Chowk. Also looted cash from a person in Mohalla Krar Kha and Chandan Nagar level crossing. Also attempted to loot an Activa-borne person near the Gulab Devi road. Looted Rs 52,000 from Activa-borne in Sangat Singh Nagar. Snatched cash from a man in Shashtri Chowk
• On November 26, looted two persons separately of Rs 12,00 and Rs 7,00 from milk plant near Maqsudan and Maqsudan bypass
• Looted Rs 1,000 from a person in Lohian

Jalandhar, November 27
Activists of the joint action committee of Non-Executive BSNL Association today observed a full-day strike at the office and telephone exchanges of the BSNL.

A massive rally was held in front of the GMT office, Jalandhar, to support their demands, which included payment of PLI, settlement of stagnation in cadres of RM group D industrial workers, removal of pay disparity between non-executives appointed before January 1, 2007 and on or before January 1, 2007.

The activists also demanded removal of hardships in getting appointments on compassionate grounds, restoration of LTC, leave encashment and medical advance, immediate implementation of E1 pay scale, change of designations of non-executives without further delay, regular promotion of officiating JTOs, implementation of 30 per cent superannuation benefits to directly recruited employees, relaxation of qualifying marks for SC/ST employees in department/internal promotion examinations, fresh recruitment of staff in non-executive cadres and regularisation of left out TSMs among others.

Revision of pay scales of the cadres of Sr TOA, telecom mechanic and driver, which have already been referred to the promotions committee, was also demanded.

Revision of pension to retired officials based on 78.2 per cent IDA merger, settlement of anomalies arising in the first wage revision, revival of telecom factories and revision of allowances were also demanded by the activists today.

Jalandhar, November 27
National vice president of the Socialist Party (India), Balwant Singh Khera, has written a letter to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to explain the actual conditions prevailing in the state.

The letter has stated that the Indian Government should declare Punjab as an unsuccessful state due to its failure in every field, including health, education, agriculture, and basic infrastructure.

Khera has stated that due to long power cuts, the industry was being shifted to other states. Owing to the same, the younger generation in the state was facing unemployment, he has said.

Punjab has become one of the most debt-ridden states, he added.

He alleged that the Central government had provided heavy funds to the state under various schemes, yet, due to corrupt attitude of politicians in the ruling government, nearly 13,000 village panchayats were devoid of the resulting benefits.

He said the bureaucracy and the administration had become a puppet in the hands of politicians.

He alleged that the ruling dispensation had been more of a ‘business’ rather than a government chosen for the service of the people.

He requested to the PM to intervene and conduct a high-level probe on the aforesaid issues.

Jalandhar, November 27
Students of Polytechnic College, Ladowali Road, Jalandhar, have started a signature campaign against the college authorities for causing problems to them by keeping the main gate of the college closed for the past many months.

As many as 80 girl students of the college, in a complaint, said they were facing a lot of inconvenience. As the college authorities were keeping the main gate of the college closed, they had to use the other gate for which they had to pass through the residential area used by the staff, they added.

Parents of the students said, “While the issue has been brought to the notice of the principal repeatedly, there is no response from his side.”

They said they would submit a complaint to Cabinet Minister Madan Mohan Mittal in this regard.

Principal Narinder Singh said, “If the students have a problem they should have come to me. So far, I have received no complaint regarding the closing of the gate. Moreover, one of the gates has been closed for security purpose. We regularly hold meetings with students and they are encouraged to bring their problems to out notice. So far no such issue has been brought to me.”

Kapurthala, November 27
Levelling allegations of death due to negligence on part of the doctor during a surgery of a patient at the Civil Hospital here, her kin blocked the Sultanpur Lodhi here today.

Bholi, a resident of Razapur village, had reportedly undergone a surgery for the removal of a tumour after which she died. Her brother-in-law Charna alleged that Bholi died due to the negligence of the doctor and lodged a protest along with his kin, blocking the traffic on the Sultanpur Lodhi road for about half an hour.

Jalandhar, November 27
Exposing an export firm practice of depriving an employee of social security benefit i.e. EPF by submitting false information with the PF Department, the regional PF office has filed a prosecution with the courts against the firm.

The prosecution has been initiated against Sharma Exports, Jalandhar, under the Employees Provident Fund and Miscellaneous Provisions (EPF&MP) Act, 1952. The matter came to the fore after an inquiry against the establishment under Section 7-A was initiated by the PF office.

The prosecution was sanctioned by the Regional PF Commissioner-II (a copy of which is with Jalandhar Tribune). The hearing on the prosecution is scheduled to be held on November 28.

According to the PF Department sources, the export firm had misled the PF office by submitting false information pertaining to the employee. The firm had sanctioned the settlement of the PF claims of the employee by showing that the employee had left the organisation. By misrepresenting the facts, the employer has not only debarred the employee from social security benefit like PF, but also other benefits like widow pension, child pension, orphan pension, dependent pension and nominee pension.

“After we received claim form 19 and 10-C mentioning date of leaving the firm, the department started a routine inquiry to inquire that if the employee has left the firm, he must have joined another firm and in that case, he, instead of withdrawing the PF claims, could have transferred the same to his new PF account with the new firm,” an official of the PF Department said.

During inquiries, the PF office came to know that the employee had not left the organisation and was still working in the same organisation. The same facts were also confirmed by the establishment itself through a letter, the official added.

When the employee was still working in the establishment and its employer sought the PF settlement by providing misleading information to the PF office that employee had left, it amounts to the violation with the motive to avoid the deposition of the EPF of employees with the PF Department.

“Whoever, for the purpose of avoiding any payment to be made by himself under this Act (the pension scheme or the insurance scheme) or enabling any other person to avoid such payment, knowingly makes or causes to be made any false statement or false representation, shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year or with fine of Rs 5,000, or with both “read with Para 76 (b) of the Employees Provident Fund Scheme, Para 42(b) of Employees Pension Scheme, and Para 29 (b) of Employees Deposit Linked Insurance for false submission of records”.

Regional PF Commissioner Dheeraj Gupta while confirming the development, said, around 30 per cent employees withdraw balance from their EPF accounts while leaving their current jobs. Such people are devoid of pension as they don’t meet the essential requirement of 10 years of service with one employer, Gupta said, adding that in some cases just to withdraw their PF, both employer and employee, in connivance with each other, give false declaration in claim form that employee has left the job and is unemployed for months, but in reality, the employee is working either in the same company or in some other company.

Jalandhar, November 27
In the yesterday’s firing and brick-pelting incident at the Chaharbagh locality here in which a person had sustained injuries, the victim’s family members, along with the locality people, today held a protest at Phagwara Gate.

The protestors were demanding the registration of an attempt to murder case against the accused, who had resorted to firing in the air.

Balwinder Singh of Chaharbagh had complained to the police that his daughter was being harassed by the sons of Vikas Sharma, alias Chinu, while going to school. Yesterday, his wife Gurvinder had gone to the Vikas’ house to apprise him of the matter.

Later, Chinu also came to their house and allegedly misbehaved with his wife, Balwinder said, adding that he, along with some locality people, had again gone to talk to Vikas to settle the issue. “The moment we reached near Vikas’ house, he started pelting bricks at us in which one of our members got injured. Vikas later also opened fire in the air to terrorise us”

Today, the police registered a case against Vikas and his wife Shally under Sections 452, 323, 427, 336, 148, 149 of the IPC. Residents today staged a protest, seeking the registration of an attempt to murder case against the accused.

After two hours of protest, ACP DD Sharma came to the place and assured the protesters that their demands would be considered. The dharna was later lifted.

Jalandhar, November 27
Horticulture scientists from Israel and other states of India, including Punjab, Haryana, UP, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Maharashtra and West Bengal participated on the first day of the international seminar on ‘Protected Cultivation of Vegetables’ organised by the Horticulture Department, Punjab, at the Centre of Excellence for Vegetables, Kartarpur, which was established under the Indo-Israel Project.

The potato cultivators across the country have been experiencing a major problem called nematode — a micro organism that exists in the soil and starts attacking the potato from its roots. Besides, there are some other threats that the vegetable growers across the country have been facing.

The seminar was a sort of platform for the experts to discuss such problems and find possible solutions for them.

The purpose of the seminar is to find out the possible solutions to the threats to vegetables and conducting more research on protected cultivation of vegetables.

Israeli delegates provided technical information about growing vegetables such as capsicum, cucumber, tomato and other vegetables in polyhouse farming.

Information regarding the proportion of fertilisers and irrigation was also provided on the occasion.

The seminar was inaugurated by Dr Gurkanwal Singh, director, Horticulture-cum-mission director State Horticulture Mission. — TNS

Jalandhar, November 27
Chandigarh Art College Old Students Association (CACOSA) has organised a five-day long art exhibition at Virsa Vihar. The exhibition was inaugurated by the Jalandhar Deputy Commissioner, KK Yadav, who has promised to provide the generator facility to Virsa Vihar.

Girls visit the art exibition organised by Chandigarh Art College Old Students Association (CACOSA) at Virsa Vihar in Jalandhar on Thursday. Photo: Sarabjit Singh

The exhibition includes paintings and sculptures to rekindle the interest in fine arts, especially among the young generation.

As many as 40 alumni of Chandigarh Art College from 1956 to 2014 batches will be displaying their art work.

Speaking to the Jalandhar Tribune, Channi Takulia said it had been observed on various occasions that the inclination of youngsters towards fine arts had been diminishing.

The motive behind these exhibitions is to attract the younger generation towards fine arts, he added.

Commenting upon various fine art colleges and institutions in the state, he said such colleges and institutions had shown that they were business houses as they had failed create any renowned artist.

The artists who have displayed their work are from Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, Canada and Kenya.

Channi said it would not be an exaggeration to term it as international art exhibition.

He said schools and colleges had been informed to bring their students to the exhibition.