tribuneindia... Haryana

H A R Y A N A

Saturday, July 25, 1998

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BJP MLA's speech embarrasses govt
CHANDIGARH, July 24 — The Treasury Benches in the Haryana Assembly were visibly embarrassed by a critical speech of a dissident BJP MLA, Mr Chander Bhatia (Faridabad), today.

7 killed in police custody,
16 in firing
CHANDIGARH, July 24 — The state Home Minister today told the Haryana Assembly that seven persons had died in police custody and 16 persons were killed in police firing since April, 1996.

Hunt on to nab kidnappers
SONEPAT, July 24 — The police has launched a hunt to nab the culprits involved in kidnapping two students of the local Holy Child School.

MPs write to CM in support of nurses
BHIWANI, July 24 — As many as 55 MPs wrote a letter to the Haryana Chief Minister today expressing concern over the nurses' strike in the state since May 31.
Restaurant owner, 3 others arrested
FARIDABAD, July 24 — The police today arrested four persons, including the proprietor of a restaurant of Sector 19, on a charge of beating two RSS workers last night.
Haryana team scales Mt Kamet
CHANDIGARH, July 24 — Five members of the Mountaineering and Allied Sports Association, Haryana, have scaled Mt Kamet.
Delhi CM exhorts students to join armed forces
KARNAL, July 24 — The Delhi Chief Minister, Mr Sahib Singh Verma, today called upon students to serve their motherland by joining the armed forces.
Open darbar held in village
PANCHKULA, July 24 — Residents of several villages in the Barwala block presented their problems at an open darbar organised by the district administration at Toka village here yesterday.
Minister’s car taken away at gunpoint
ROHTAK, July 24 — A private Maruti car owned by Housing Minister S.N. Lathar was taken away at gunpoint on the Rohtak-Jind road last evening.
Bid to loot petrol pump foiled
FATEHABAD, July 24 — Timely action by the police here last night foiled an attempt by four persons to loot a petrol pump at Bharolawali in the district.

BJP MLA's speech embarrasses govt
Tribune News Service
CHANDIGARH, July 24 — The Treasury Benches in the Haryana Assembly were visibly embarrassed by a critical speech of a dissident BJP MLA, Mr Chander Bhatia (Faridabad), today.
Mr Bhatia started with good words for the Budget and went on to air his long-standing grievances against the district administration. Using respectable words for the Chief Minister, Mr Bhatia alleged that he had been implicated in false cases when he protested against the discrimination against his constituency. He urged the Speaker to set up a committee to inquire into the cases against him to know the truth.
Mr Bhatia said some of his colleagues claimed that a lot of development works had been started. "This may be true for their constituencies, but not for mine." He said the Faridabad Municipal Corporation had received a grant of Rs 1 crore for improvement of slum areas but money was not spent and the funds were allowed to be lapsed.
While there were red faces in the ruling parties, the Opposition thumped the desks to "congratulate the MLA who had shown the courage to speak the truth".
Coming down heavily on the Deputy Commissioner, Faridabad, Mr Bhatia alleged that there was wide-spread corruption in the district administration and several officers were not interested in undertaking development works. There was drinking water shortage in the summer and no arrangement existed to drain out rain water. A railway flyover (Bata Bridge) was lying incomplete for several years.
Mr Bhatia, whose absence along with that his colleague, Mr Anand Sharma, was commented upon by the Opposition yesterday, said it was true (as stated by Mr Ram Bilas Sharma) that one of his relatives was admitted to a Delhi hospital, but he and his colleague could not come to attend the session because the administration had demolished certain constructions in his constituency two days ago. This, he said, had happened after the Chief Minister had directed the administration earlier not to launch any demolition drive.
Hoping that the Chief Minister and Mr Sharma would pay attention to their constituencies, Mr Bhatia said rumours about exchange of money in police recruitment had been damaging the image of Mr Bansi Lal. Therefore, the government should clarify the situation through wide publicity.
The Treasury Benches immediately launched a damage control exercise with several ministers belonging to Faridabad district contradicting the allegations of Mr Bhatia. Mr Harsh Kumar said Mr Bhatia was highlighting the hurt sentiments of his constituents but the demolitions were necessary to remove silt from the Gurgaon canal. Mr Dalal said no one could accuse any ruling party member in Faridabad district of taking money in police recruitments. Earlier, several ministers were seen trying to persuade Mr Bhatia not to speak further.

Questions in assembly
7 killed in police custody, 16 in firing
Tribune News Service
CHANDIGARH, July 24 — There was quite an uproar in the Haryana Vidhan Sabha during question hour here today when the Home Minister, Mr Mani Ram Godara remained evasive to a repeated question by Mr Sampat Singh who had asked about the action taken in cases of deaths in police custody and police firing at various places in the State.
In fact, Mr Mani Ram Godara, told the House that seven persons had died in police custody and 16 persons were killed in police firing during the period from April, 1996, till date.
Mr Sampat Singh had claimed that this was perhaps the highest figure of deaths in police custody and police firing during a short period of two years.
As for the action taken, Mr Godara insisted that the State Government was following a procedure which had been laid for such inquiries long before his government came to power. His references to the Meham incident also provoked noisy scenes.
The Opposition leaders insisted that such cases of enquiry should be entrusted to sitting Judges of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and not to the retired ones.
The Chief Minister, Mr Bansi Lal, had to intervene to satisfy some of the agitated members. He said that near relations of one of the two persons killed in the police firing in the air resorted to contain a restive crowd at the police station which they wanted to burn, had already been paid a sum of Rs 1 lakh as compensation. In the case of other person, the Cabinet had already given approval to the appointment of his wife in government service.
To a specific question regarding upgradation of a 33 KV sub-station at Sanjarwas village in Bhiwani district, Mr Attar Singh Saini Minister of State for Power, said that a provision of Rs 155 crore had been made in the Budget to improve the power supply position both qualitatively and quantitatively during the next one and a half years. The Speaker, Mr Chhattar Singh also admitted that the power position had been quite bad during the past eight to nine years.
The Chief Minister told the House in reply to a question by Mr Krishan Lal that 158 cases of corruption/embezzlement were referred to the Vigilance Department from September last onwards. It was not in public interest, he said, to disclose the detail of the cases. However, he added, that in four inquiries criminal cases had been registered against four gazetted officers, five non-gazetted officials and one other public servant. In 11 inquiries, directions had been issued for taking suitable departmental action against the concerned officials. As charges were not substantiated in 22 cases, the inquiries had been filed.
During zero hour when a member raised the issue of daylight dacoity at Taraori by persons released on parole, Mr Bansi Lal assured the House that no one involved in the case would be spared and action would be promptly taken in the case.
When Mr Om Parkash Chautala, Leader of the Opposition, and several others raised the issue of increasing waterlogging in the State, the Chief Minister again assured the House that a Rs 33 crore scheme had been planned to take care of the problem in Sirsa, Hisar and other areas of the State. However, discussion on the problem at length was not allowed by the Speaker.
Leaders of both the ruling parties and the Opposition tried to score over each other for securing credit for having got the SYL canal work done in Punjab and Haryana.
Replying to a call attention notice by Mr Ashok Kumar and Mr Jaswinder Singh, the Finance Minister told the House that there were no floods in Thanesar and Pehowa constituencies as claimed by the members. However, he said, 150 acres of land in Gulabgarh, 75 acres in Narkatari, 150 acres in Jogna Khera, 200 acres in Chhaila, 600 acres in Surmi, 625 acres in Chinarheri and 1200 acres in Adhowa were temporarily submerged in water because of heavy rain but this water had now been drained out. Loss to standing crops in these villages was said to be less than 25 per cent.
The Finance Minister also told the House the suitable action would be taken after receiving reports from the Deputy Commissioners concerned.

Hunt on to nab boys' kidnappers
From Our Correspondent
SONEPAT, July 24 — The police here has launched a hunt to nab the culprits involved in kidnapping of two students of the local Holy Child School. The students — Ankur (13) and Anuj (7) — are sons of a resident of Model Town here.
According to an FIR lodged with the police, the boys failed to reach home from their school after its closure.
According to some eye-witnesses when the duo came outside the school after the closure of the school, they were asked by an unknown person to accompany him as their father had sent a car for bringing them. Thereupon, the two boys boarded a white- coloured Maruti van, without bearing any number plate and taken away.
It is stated that a telephonic call was received by the parents of the boys at night in which a demand of Rs 7 lakh as ransom amount was made.

MPs write to CM in support of nurses
From Our Correspondent
BHIWANI, July 24 — As many as 55 MPs wrote a letter to the Haryana Chief Minister today expressing concern over the nurses' strike in the state since May 31. These MPs in their letter have drawn the attention of the Chief Minister to the fact that the demand of Haryana nurses were genuine since the Central government had provided several facilities to the nurses of Delhi hospitals as allowances.
The MPs have urged that the matter should be resolved through negotiations with a view to finding an amicable solution to the outstanding issue so that the hardship being faced by the patients in the government hospitals is brought to an end.
The MPs deplored that the state government promulgated ESMA and terminated the services of the nursing staff instead of resolving the dispute through mutual understanding. Terming such action as vindictive in nature, they have requested the government to rescind its orders.
The letter has been signed by MPs Bharti Rai, Jayanti Natrajan, Geeta Mukerjee, Chanderkala Pandey, Sandhya Badi, Vasudev Acharya, Surender Singh Barwala, Sudhir Giri, Roop Chand Murmoo, Ajay Chadravarti, Laxman Seth and Meenati Sain among others.

Restaurant owner, 3 others arrested
Tribune News Service
FARIDABAD, July 24 — The police today arrested four persons, including the proprietor of a restaurant of Sector 19, on a charge of beating two RSS workers last night.
Yogesh and Jitender, the RSS workers, had gone to the restaurant to ask the youth who were dancing and singing not to disturb the neighbours as it was well past midnight.
Later Inder Kumar, proprietor of the restaurant and several others went to the nearby RSS office and beat up Yogesh and Jitender, who were admitted to B.K. Hospital with multiple injuries.
The Old Faridabad police today registered a case and arrested Inder Kumar and three others.

Haryana team scales Mt Kamet
From Our Correspondent
CHANDIGARH, July 24 — Five members of the Mountaineering and Allied Sports Association, Haryana, have scaled Mt Kamet. At a height of 25,600 feet, it is the third highest peak of the country.
A 12-member team was flagged off from the Haryana Raj Bhavan here on May 22.
The leader of the team, Mr Rajiv Midha, told mediapersons here this morning that on July 12, the team set up the summit camp at Meades Col opposite Abi-Gamin Peak and on July 14, the five members — Rajiv Midha, Rakesh Kumar (deputy leader), Sukhvinder Kaur, K. Krishnamurthy and Sabita Panda started at 4.30 a.m. and after climbing for 12 hours, they found themselves on the summit at 4.37 p.m. Rajiv Midha and Rakesh Kumar are the first civilians from Haryana to climb the mountain while Sukhvinder Kaur is the first woman from Punjab and Sabita Panda first from Orissa.
The other members in the team were Santosh Kumar, Jarminder Singh, Joginder Saini, Ashwani, Lakhwinder Kaur, Hans Raj and Dr Rajiv Saluja.

Delhi CM exhorts students to join armed forces
Tribune News Service
KARNAL, July 24 — The Delhi Chief Minister, Mr Sahib Singh Verma, today said that Haryana and Delhi had contributed their mite towards the armed forces. The soldiers from the two states had not only carved a niche for themselves, but also blazed a trail of glory, he said.
Mr Verma was addressing the students and staff of the Sainik School, Kunjpura, 9 km from here, on the 38th Founders' Day celebrations.
The Chief Minister called upon students of the school to serve their motherland by joining the armed forces.
Mr Verma decorated students of the school on the occasion. He laid a wreath at the Saikunj War Heroes memorial.
Commodore V.K. Verma, Principal of the school, stated that so far 484 students of the school had joined the National Defence Academy, while an equal number had joined the Indian Military Academy, Dehradun, the Officers Training Academy, Madras and the Air Force Academy, Hyderabad.

Open darbar held in village
From Our Correspondent
PANCHKULA, July 24 — Residents of several villages in the Barwala block besides members of gram panchayats of Toka, Koth, Shahjanpur and Alipur villages presented their problems at an open darbar organised by the district administration at Toka village here yesterday.
The gram panchayat of Toka village sought the construction of an overhead water tank, drinking water taps and starting of a bus service.
Damage caused to the earthen dams constructed was highlighted by the sarpanch of Shahjanpur village, Mr Natha Ram. The sarpanch of Alipur village, Mr Gulzar Singh, demanded the payment of compensation for the land acquired by the HSIDC for the industrial estate in the village.

Minister’s car taken away at gunpoint
Tribune News Service
ROHTAK, July 24 -- A private Maruti car owned by Housing Minister S.N. Lathar was taken away at gunpoint on the Rohtak-Jind road last evening.
Minister’s son Jitendra Lathar was driving the car. The car has a temporary registration number.
Senior police officers have gone to Bhagwatipur village from where the car was taken away.

Bid to loot petrol pump foiled
From Our Correspondent
FATEHABAD, July 24 — Timely action by the police here last night foiled an attempt by four persons to loot a petrol pump at Bharolawali under Hanspur police post in the district.
According to the police, two .12 bore guns, 11 live cartridges an iron chain and an iron rod were seized from the four men. The four accused, Gurdeep, Jagga, Balkar and Sanjay were found hiding in a house in the fields. The four reportedly admitted that they were hatching a conspiracy to loot the petrol pump.
The police has registered a case under Section 399 and 402 of the IPC, and taken the four into custody. The fifth accused Amir Singh, managed to escape under the cover of darkness.