HEALTH

Seminar on drugs concludes
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Jan 30 — A two-day workshop on 'Rational Use of drugs', sponsored by the World Health Organisation (WHO), India, under the Essential Drug Programme in collaboration with the Delhi Society for Promotion of Rational Use of Drugs concluded here today at a hotel in Sector 35.

Several eminent health professionals spoke on the ocassion. Prof V. K. Kak, Director, Principal, GMCH-Sector 32, deliberated on 'Pharmaco-economics' and stressed upon the need to have a pooled procurement system of drugs.

This idea was also supported by Dr Joginder Singh, Director, Health Service, UT, who also asked GMCH-32 to develop standard treatment protocol for common diseases prevalent in the area. Prof S. P. Dheer, Joint Medical Superintendent, emphasised that drugs are not commodities and should have special financial rules for their purchase.

Experts at the seminar also advocated that there should be a uniform pattern of standardised prescription, procurement, storage and distribution of drugs for all government institutions, which would be instrumental in cutting down the unnecessary duplicate cross-prescriptions.

Prof H.M.Swami from GMCH-32, emphasised the need to develop standardised treatment protocols which should be need-based for the area and for various levels of health care systems, like primary health centres, and secondary and tertiary health care institutions.

Dr Atul Sahdev gave a talk on the necessity to develop standard treatment protocols in realising the concept of rational use of drugs. Later, Dr R. Jhaj spoke on the issue of 'Pharamaco-ethics'.

Experts also decided to educate the masses and prescribers regarding the judicious use of drugs. Meanwhile, Dr C. S. Gautam of the Department of Pharmacology, GMCH-32, has been asked to streamline the information about the drugs for both masses and prescribers.

The seminar today ended with a vote of thanks given by Prof N. K. Goel, the organising secretary of the workshop.

Immunisation camp by MCC
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Jan 30 — The Municipal Corporation of Chandigarh (MCC) organised a free immunisation camp against hepatitis-B at Janata Colony and Kumhar Colony in Sector 25 here today. Over 700 children were immunised against the disease at the camp which will continue tomorrow.

Earlier, a similar camp was organised on January 28 and 29 at Mother Child Health Centre, Labour Colony No 4, in the Industrial Area (Phase I) in which over 100 children up to five years of age were immunised and given the first dose of the vaccine. The second dose will be given at the same place on March 3 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The camps are being orgainsed under the Swaran Jayanti Shahri Rojgar Yogana in collaboration with the Sharmik Vidya Peeth.

SPORT

Hardeep is Mr Chandigarh
By Our Sports Reporter

CHANDIGARHJan 30 — The 11th Mr Chandigarh Body Building Championship was held today in the auditorium of the Sector 10 DAV College. International body builder and national junior champion in the below 80 kg category, Hardeep Singh, a second-year BA student of DAV College, retained the Mr Chandigarh title.

Hardeep Singh had also reached the semi-finals in the last Junior Asian Body Building Meet held in Taiwan. He is a trainee at the Sector 17 Bon Sante. The meet was organised by the Chandigarh Body Building Association. The weighing-in and pre-judging was done in the morning, while the posing part was held in the evening. Spectators, mainly students, enjoyed every minute contest. In the competition, 48 body builders of various health clubs took part.

Mr Sunil Walia, President of the association, said on February 13, the UT Junior Body Building Championship would also be held. The team for the National Body Building Championship to be held at Bhavnagar (Gujarat) in the third week of February would also be selected on the basis of performance in these meets, said Mr Sudhir Gupta, Treasurer of the association.

The results are: Below 55 kg — Amit 1, Surinder Kumar 2, Dharminder 3; below 60 kg — Gopal Boru 1, Sajid 2, Ajay Kumar 3; below 65 kg — Kulwinderjit Singh 1, Bhupinder Singh 2, Mandeep 3; below 70 kg — Ranjit Singh 1, Haramrit Singh 2, Lalit Kumar 3; below 75 kg — Sukhwinder 1, Anurag Pandey 2, Jagdish 3; below 80 kg — Hardeep Singh 1, Naveen 2, Prem Chaudhary 3; below 85 kg — Tarsem 1, Digvijay 2, Suraj 3; below 90 kg — Hari Narayan 1, Mintoo 2, Vikram Thakur 3; above 90 kg — Sachin 1, Daljeet Kular 2, Gurparvez Sandhu 3.

Karate meet: The Amateur Karate Association of Chandigarh will organise the eighth Chandigarh State Karate Championship-2000 for coloured belts on February 6 at the Sector 10 Skating Rink here.

Entries close with Mr Sukhjeevan Sharma at St Joseph's High School, Sector 44, on February 6.

On the basis of this meet, the UT men's and women's teams for the Senior National Karate Championship to be held at Saharanpur (UP) from February 11 to 13, will also be selected. The Saharanput meet will be organised by the All-India Karate Federation.

ADMINISTRATION

Passport adalats planned
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Jan 30 — A series of Passport Lok Adalats at major district headquarters in Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh have been planned to redress the grievances of the applicants by the Regional Passport Office (RPO) here.

Special teams of officers will be constituted for Punjab, Haryana and Himachal to conduct these adalats from the new financial year. Modalities will be worked out in consultation with the Deputy Commissioners of the districts concerned so that adequate space for holding the adalat is provided. To begin with, 41 districts covered by the RPO will be selected for the conduct of the Lok Adalats.

Talking to The Tribune , the Regional Passport Officer, Mr T. Suresh Babu, said the purpose of organising these Lok Adalats was to go to the people to listen to their grievances and solve them on the spot.

The Chandigarh regional passport office, he said, set a new record by issuing a record number of 19,600 passports in December,1999, alone. The previous highest was less than 14,000 passports in a calendar month.

The new External Affairs Minister had issued a directive to all the regional offices in the country to enter the new millennium with a zero pendency. As a sequel to this directive, the RPO here adopted a number of measures to streamline the functioning of the office and after hard work and strenuous efforts by the staff members, a commendable feat of issuing a record number of 19,600 passports in a month with just 20 working days was achieved, Mr Babu claimed.

In 1999, a little more than 1.23 lakh applications for fresh passports were received and more than 1.22 lakh passports were achieved. Of the 10,052 cases of miscellaneous services, 9304 cases were cleared. All this was achieved with the existing staff strength of 1993. The receipt of applications and issuance of fresh passports has more than doubled in the past seven years.

The officer said the work on the construction of the RPO’s own building was expected to start soon. All formalities, including allotment of land, preparation of drawings, approval of drawings and allocation of funds had been completed.

The External Affairs Minister, Mr Jaswant Singh, may visit the city to lay the foundation stone of the new RPO building. The work would start in summer, Mr Babu said.The new building will come up in Sector 34.

Mr Babu said there was no shortage of passport books. There was shortage of application forms. But now that the government had authorised Jain Book Agency, the forms were available throughout the country at the outlets of this book agency on payment of a nominal price.

One of the problems for the delay in the issuance of passports has been the long time taken by the police in giving verification reports. Mr Babu said he had written letters to all Deputy Commissioners to impress upon the need to be careful in issuance of verification certificates. The District Magistrates had been requested to pass on necessary instructions to their Subdivisional Magistrates.

Passport verification to be computerised
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Jan 30 — The passport verification branch of the police will be fully computersied and the process will be completed by next week.

Sources said once the system is in place, it would become easy to know the fate of any application and to tell an applicant when the verification would be done.

An added advantage for the police would be the availability of the particulars of an applicant, which would act as a ready reckoner. It would aslo be possible to know if a person holds more than one passport.

The branch on the first floor of the office would be shifted downstairs near the reception counter. All information sought by a person would be given to him at the touch of a button.

Multiple entry visa to UK for 18
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, Jan 30 — The last minute cancellation of the visit by British minister of Indian origin, Mr Keith Vaz, notwithstanding, the British High Commission in New Delhi has decided to grant multiple entry gratis visas to 18 citizens of the city as part of the UK visa-related event to be held here in the first week of the next month.

The passports with British visa will be distributed to their actual holders at 584, Sector 16, on February 3 in the presence of a visiting British official, who is yet to be named after the cancellation of the visit of Mr Vaz.

Those who are getting multiple entry visas are Dr S.K. Sharma, the Director-designate of the PGI; Ms Rupan Deol Bajaj; Mr Rakesh Talwar; Ms Reema Mongia; Mr Rajiv Atma Ram; Mrs Gopa Atma Ram; Mr Balraj Singh Hora; Mr Anil Kaushik; Mr Ajit Singh; Dr Jagmohan Singh Verma; Dr Yash Bala; Dr Bhushan Chander Gupta; Ms Sonali Gupta; Mr Rajinder Singh Cheema; Justice Kuldip Singh; Mr Sunil Malhotra; Mr Anil Malhotra and Mr Ranjit Malhotra.

In fact, it is the preliminary exercise in opening a British visa office in the city on the lines of Canadian Consulate Office in Sector 17 here.

The gratis visas on February 3 will be issued from the office of local city lawyers — Mr Anil and Mr Ranjit Malhotra.