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| Friday, May 19, 2000, Chandigarh, India  
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Crackdown on ‘nexus’ Importance of being CM’s home
dist Pending bills: HVPN extends waiver Plea for injunction of bungalows
dismissed Info-tech to be part of college
syllabi Bailable warrants against ex-CE |
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Vora defends Bhajan on
shadow Cabinet Haryana may raise aid to
universities Emotional reunion for Pak
delegation UHBVN to sell bill space to
advertisers Health awareness campaign Plan to benefit street children
|
Crackdown on ‘nexus’ ROHTAK, May 18 — The Drug Control Department, Haryana has reportedly taken strict measures to check the sale and storage of medical waste in the state in view of the reports regarding the development of a "nexus" leading to the supply of used disposable syringes and intravenous (IV) sets for recycling and resale in market. According to sources the Drug Control Department has alerted its officials and directed them to conduct raids at clinics and hospitals in rural and urban areas in the state. While the focus area remains the districts lying in proximity of the national Capital, ‘raids’ can be conducted at any clinic anywhere in the state. Officials of the department have conducted several "raids" in Rohtak and Jhajjar districts in the last fortnight. According to reports the authorities had "recovered" used disposable syringes and IV sets weighing about four kg from a clinic run by a registered medical practitioner (RMP) at Barahi village in Bahadurgarh subdivision, about 40 km from here, yesterday. However, some other RMP’s working in the same village fled before the officials reached their clinics. The "accused" medical practitioner is charged with storing used syringes and IV sets instead of destroying these immediately after use. However, no arrest has been made so far. The authorities produced the samples of seized material in the court today. The officials also recovered some expired medicines from a chemists shop at Badli village in Jhajjar district yesterday. The shop is run by Ramesh Kumar. Meanwhile, according to sources raids had also been conducted in Bahadurgarh and Rohtak towns last week, but with no major success. A senior official, however, said raids would continue. The officials reportedly became alert after reports in the media regarding the recovery of two truck loads of medical waste (used syringes and IV sets) from Delhi. The matter became serious when the issue was raised in Parliament and the government assured that proper action would be initiated to check the "entry" of recycled medical waste into market. The recycled hospital waste poses a risk of the spread of AIDS and Hepatitis-B. The Drug Controller, Haryana, has issued instructions to the district drug inspectors and officials of the Health Department to step up the campaign and identify the persons engaged in storing, selling and recycling of medical waste. However, the shortage of
staff and inadequate infrastructure in the department
could hamper the campaign against recycling of medical
waste. |
Importance of being CM’s home
dist CHANDIGARH, May 18 — Bansi Lal developed Bhiwani while Adampur Mandi and Hisar district underwent a transformation with Mr Bhajan Lal as the Chief Minister of Haryana. Now it is Sirsa’s turn to get a facelift. Political circles in the State are discussing the alleged unfair advantage enjoyed by the Chief Minister’s home district over its counterparts. "Sirsa vs rest of Haryana will emerge as a major issue in the State in the days to come", feels a section of senior politicians. In his run up to elections ‘Sarkar Aap ke Dwar’ programme, Mr Chautala made a staggering 2405 promises related to the development of Sirsa. The second largest number of announcements, a quarter of the promises made at Sirsa, were made for Ambala district. The number of announcements was least, 59, for Rohtak, HPCC chief Mr Bhupinder Singh Hooda’s home district. This was followed by 68 announcements at Rewari. The announcement were mostly related to the construction of roads, setting up of minibanks, construction of purchase centres and bus stands. In course of the ‘Sarkar Aap ke Dwar’ programme, Mr Chautala made a total of 2858 announcements. Out of this more than 8000 announcements, work on 803 projects has already been completed. It is, however, Fatehabad which tops the list of districts with maximum number of completed works. Five hundred forty (540) announcements were made at Fatehabad, out of which work on 162 projects has been completed. Next comes Sirsa with 130 completed projects. However, Sirsa has the maximum number of projects for which work has been started. Work has been initiated on 814 projects in Sirsa, followed by 416 in Yamunanagar and 331 in Fatehabad. Sirsa also tops the list of districts where road was being carried out by the Haryana Agricultural Marketing Board. The maximum number of schemes in this regard was taken up at Sirsa. Work in 227 out of 252 schemes in Sirsa district has been completed. The estimated cost of these schemes has been worked out to be Rs 12 crore. Work is now on in 13 schemes in Sirsa. While estimated cost for road repair for Rohtak, Rs 15 crore, is more than Sirsa, only 47 out of 105 schemes have been completed and work on 12 schemes is still on at Rohtak. After Sirsa, the maximum number of 157 schemes have been earmarked for Kurukshetra at an estimated cost of Rs 3.5 crore. Last month the Chief Minister himself laid the foundation stone of a primary health centre, to be set up at a cost of Rs 69 lakh at Sirsa. The Haryana Government has also decided to expand the judicial complex at Sirsa and go ahead with its construction. With development works in Sirsa district going on a war footing, it is no surprise that Mr Abhay Chautala, who was earlier unanimously chosen president of the Sirsa Zila Parishad, will have a cakewalk over his Congress rival at Rori. Interestingly,
Mahendragarh district got a sizeable number of
announcements during the ‘Sarkar aap ke dwar’
programme. Two hundred forty five announcements were made
at the BJP leader, Mr Rambilas Sharma’s home
district which was more than the announcements for
Panipat (232), Faridabad (126), Hisar (114) and Panchkula
(240. However, work on only four projects in Mahendragarh
has been initiated while not a single work in
Mahendragarh has been completed so far. Rewari is the
only other district which figures lower than Mahendragarh
in terms of announcement related works. |
Pending bills: HVPN extends
waiver ROHTAK, May 18 — Encouraged by the response from defaulting consumers, the Haryana Vidyut Parsarn Nigam (HVPN) has extended its special campaign for the recovery of arrears of electricity bills from villages till May 31. The campaign launched in the first week of April envisaged waiving of surcharge and interest if the "defaulters" deposited the amount in one instalment. The scheme was to close on April 30. Since the launch of the scheme, the HVPN has recovered an amount of Rs 9.32 crore till May 15 from the "defaulters" in Rohtak, Jhajjar, Jind and Sonepat districts. A majority of rural consumers in these four districts had not paid their electricity bills for the past five years and more and owed Rs 160 crore, including surcharge at the rate of 15 per cent and interest at the rate of 18 per cent, to the HVPN. The surcharge and the interest constituted nearly 40 per cent of the total amount of arrears. The Deputy Commissioner, Mr Rajesh Khuller, accompanied by Senior Superintendent of Police P.K. Aggarwal and HVPN officials today visited Dobh, Banyani, Marodhi-Jatan and Bhali villages to motivate the "defaulters" to pay their outstanding electricity bills. Nearly 50 per cent of the 2,568 consumers in these four villages have not paid electricity bills for the past three to four years and jointly owe Rs 63.59 lakh to the HVPN. The defaulting consumers assured the Deputy Commissioner that they would clear the pending bills as soon as they got payment for their crop. The requested Mr Khullar to persuade the HVPN to extend the last date in order to enable them to avail the waiver of surcharge and interest. The "defaulters" at Bhali said they were yet to get the payment of sugarcane supplied to the local sugar mills and would pay their bills as soon as they received the money from the fund-starved sugar mills. The case of Mr Sher Singh, a blind consumer of Bhali village was also taken up. He owes Rs 10,163 to the HVPN as he had not paid electricity bills like other consumers of his village for the past over three years. He said he was willing to pay the outstanding bill in installments as he had no source of income. The Deputy Commissioner immediately directed that the name of Mr Sher Singh, son of Jai Lal, should be included among the families living below poverty line. Moved by the plight of Sher Singh, offered to pay 50 per cent of his pending electricity bill from the Red Cross and urged the villagers to help the blind man in paying the remaining amount of Rs 4,033 before May 31 without any surcharge and interest. The consumers at Bhali complained that the HVPN had sent inflated bills without proper meter readings. The Deputy Commissioner directed the HVPN officials to hold a durbar at the village on May 20 to rectify the bills, if necessary. Interestingly, these
villages get power supply on alternate days but today was
an exception as they got electricity for two days in
succession, may be due to the Deputy Commissioner’s
visit. However, most of the "defaulters" at
Marodhi-Jatan preferred to stay at home instead of
attending the meeting convened by the Deputy
Commissioner. |
Plea for injunction of
bungalows dismissed AMBALA, May 18 — The Additional Civil Judge (Senior Division), Ambala, Mr Jagdev Singh Dhanjal, dismissed the applications of interim injunction of nine bungalows in Ambala cantonment. The bungalow owners had filed eight separate suits for declaration against the notice of the Estate Officer, Excise Area, Ambala Sadar-cum-Deputy Commissioner, Ambala, and the state of Haryana. The judge has passed almost similar order in all the cases on May 16. The judge observed in one of his orders: “I hold that plaintiff has no prima facie case who has suppressed the material facts and he is only a holder of occupancy rights and concealed the facts of the notification by which the Estate Officer was empowered to issue an impugned notice for resumption of the property in question and as such an application for seeking an interim injunction under Rules 1 and 2 read with Section 151, CPC, is hereby dismissed being premature, not being maintainable in this court and status quo already granted vide order dated January 17,2000 stands vacated.” Mentioning the details of argument of counsel in the order the judge stated: “Counsel for the plaintiff has argued that defendants did not produce any excision agreement vide which the Haryana Government has become absolute owner of the property in question and the property in question had never been an old grant and, moreover, it is not covered by the rules and regulations of the Cantonment Act. It is also argued that defendants gave one-month notice on the payment of value whereas 15 days were given for filing the reply and as such impugned notice has been issued without hearing the plaintiff. It is also argued that plaintiff is in possession for more than 80 years. It is for the defendants to show the ownership. The judge stated in his order: “I would like to mention that plaintiff had already failed to prove his ownership over the property in question who is proved to be a holder of occupancy rights. It cannot be said by counsel for the plaintiff that defendants are required to prove their ownership. Secondly, excision agreement vide which property owned by the Union of India stood transferred to the state of Haryana. As such plaintiff has no right to challenge the validity of the agreement vide which the state of Haryana has become absolute owner of the property. Thirdly the impugned notice is a show-cause notice issued by the Estate Officer of which plaintiff has submitted a reply on January 7,2000, before the Estate Officer. Thus, it shows that the impugned notice is still pending before the Estate Officer and has not become final. Thus, the present application for interim injunction is premature one.” The Judge observed that
the impugned notice has been issued by the Estate Officer
in pursuance of the gazette notification of the Haryana
Government, Local Government Department issued by the
Governor of Haryana. This court has no jurisdiction to
consider the legality or illegality of the Haryana
Government, the Local Government Department. Notification
issued by the Governor can only be challenged before the
High Court, the judge added. |
Info-tech to be part of
college syllabi CHANDIGARH, May 18 — Information Technology will be included in the syllabi of colleges in Haryana so as to enable the students to get the maximum out of the recently introduced information technology policy of the State. This was stated by the Haryana Minister of State for Education, Mr Bahadur Singh while presiding over a meeting of the principals of government colleges convened here today to discuss various aspects of the new education policy of the State. He said the Haryana Government had brought education at the central stage of its development agenda. He said that keeping in view the prevailing situation and interest of the people, English would be taught in schools from primary level computer education would also be introduced from Class-IX as a compulsory subject. He directed the Directors of the Education Department and the Commissioner, Education to personally inspect the educational institutions. He said that the teachers should be motivated to teach properly in schools instead of asking students to join their tuitions at home. On the occasion of national holidays special programmes should be held in the educational institutions so as to apprise the students about the significance of the day. Earlier, the Financial Commissioner, Education, Mr Prem Prashant, emphasised the need for training of teachers and creation of a cadre of master trainers. He also stressed that hostels for girls should be set up in rural areas so as to reduce the drop out rate among rural girls. Mrs Shakuntala Jakhu,
Director, Higher Education said that students should be
encouraged to take up emerging areas of education for
making education more relevant and job oriented. |
Bailable warrants against ex-CE CHANDIGARH, May 5 — Mr Justice V.M Jain of Punjab and Haryana High Court today issued bailable warrants against Mr J.S. Kalra, former Chief Engineer (Canals), Irrigation Department, Punjab, for May 22, in order to secure his presence in a contempt petition filed by Mr Harjit Singh Bawa and others. Earlier in the case, short cause notices were issued to him, the Irrigation Secretary, Mr Bikramjeet Singh, and Chief Engineer (Canals), Mr P.K. Singla to explain why contempt proceedings should not be initiated against them for non-compliance with the directions issued by this court. The personal presence of respondents were however, exempted. Though the respondents were served notices, no one appeared on behalf of former Chief Engineer and one Superintendent working in the department appeared on behalf of Secretary and LA appeared on behalf of the Chief Engineer. Taking serious note of non-appearance by the respondents, the court held that merely because the personal presence of the respondent was exempted, it did not mean that the respondents would neither appear in person nor appear through counsel and would send some department officers to represent them in the contempt petition. Therefore, it was directed that bailable warrants of Rs 5000, with one surety in a like amount, be issued against respondents no. 1 to 3 in order to secure their presence. Though at one stage,
bailable warrants were issued against Irrigation
Secretary, as well as Chief Minister but before the
rising of the court Mr P.K. Singla, Chief Engineer,
himself and Additional Secretary, Mr Sumir Kumar, put in
his appearance on behalf of the Secretary. Therefore, the
court ordered that the warrants against Secretary, and
the Chief Engineer need not be issued and they were
directed to file their replies two days before the date
fixed with an advance copy to council for the petitioner. |
Vora defends Bhajan on shadow
Cabinet FATEHABAD, May 18 — A former Haryana Chief Minister and the leader of Opposition in the state assembly, Mr Bhajan Lal, got a shot in the arm today when the AICC general secretary and in charge of Haryana affairs, Mr Moti Lal Vora, defended his decision to form a shadow Cabinet in Haryana. Mr Bhupinder Singh Hooda, HPCC chief, who had been placed at number three in the shadow Cabinet, had not only dissociated himself from the shadow Cabinet but had also termed the move as a "futile exercise" as there was no provision for a shadow Cabinet in the Constitution. Mr Vora addressed mediapersons during his brief stopover at the local PWD Rest House today. He was accompanied by Mr Bhajan Lal and a former Union Minister, Ms Selja. The Congress leaders were on their way to Rori in Sirsa district to campaign for the Congress candidate there. Mr Vora complimented Mr Bhajan Lal for forming a shadow Cabinet and said wherever there were governments of opposition parties, shadow Cabinets could serve a useful purpose in exposing the misdeeds of the governments. He said being a member of such a Cabinet was a very responsible job and all Congressmen should work towards making the move a success. He said he was not aware of the reports that the state Congress chief had opposed the move and said the shadow Cabinet was formed after taking everyone in confidence and hence there was no question of opposition from anyone in the party. Mr Vora denied that there was any factionalism in the state unit of the party and said Congress leaders all over the country had been directed by the party high command against issuing any statement against other party leaders. Mr Bhajan Lal said the
Chautala government would not last for more than a year.
He alleged that the state government had little faith in
democratic norms. It had been proved by the way it had
appointed its own men to the posts of presidents of
Panchayati Raj institutions against the wishes of the
elected representatives. He alleged that senior government
officials at the district headquarters had worked hand in
glove with the government in its endeavour to grab key
posts for its men. He further alleged that INLD men had
kidnapped a Dalit member of the Block Samiti, Adampur, as
he was a Congress supporter. |
Haryana may raise aid to
universities KARNAL, May 18 —In order to attract better talent and top academicians to the universities in Haryana the state government is likely to raise its aid in terms of salary component up to 70 per cent. The decision was taken in principle at a high-level meeting held at Chandigarh on Tuesday to review the funding of the universities by the government. The meeting was chaired by Mr Prem Prashant, Financial Commissioner and Secretary of Education to the Government of Haryana, and among others attended by Dr Hoshiar Singh, Vice-Chancellor of Kurukshetra University, Dr Preet Singh, Registrar of Maharshi Dayanand University, Rohtak. Representatives of the Haryana Finance Department were also present. It was felt at the meeting that there was need to radically change the funding of university education from the government side. Highly-placed sources in the Education Department told TNS that the Education Secretary took the initiative in favour of the universities as he was well aware of the financial problems being faced by these institutes of learning. It was pointed out at the meeting that the aid in respect of salary component had been decreasing over the years. Figures available to this correspondent point out that it has come down up to 44 per cent in case of Kurukshetra University. It was amazing that while during 1994-95, the government met up to 90.5 per cent of the salary component of the Kurukshetra University, during 1999-2000, it came down to only 44 per cent. It is noteworthy that while the government financed the salary components in government colleges up to 100 per cent and up to 95 per cent in the affiliated colleges, the varsities were being discriminated against in this respect. Now come then that the universities could meet such a huge deficit from their own internal resources? Because the varsities were unable to meet the salary bills of the highly-qualified teachers academicians of top ranking shunned from coming to universities in Kurukshetra and Rohtak. This has hampered the cause of higher education in the state. While on the one hand, the Haryana Chief Minister, Mr Om Prakash Chautala, is keen to promote Information Technology in the state and the education relating to it, the government has all along neglected the cause of higher education. Statistics gathered by this correspondent show that while the Delhi state spent 24 per cent of its budgetary allocation on higher education, the average all-India spending on the university education was 20 per cent. Interestingly, in the case of Haryana, the spending on higher education was only 13 per cent. It was revealing to find out that while Kurukshetra University had spent Rs 2,637.29 lakh during 1999-2000 on the salary component of the teachers, the government aid was restricted to Rs 1164 lakh only. That was also the reason that top scholars in their field did not join the universities in Haryana. The varsities have a case in demanding increased funding of the salary bill. Even the Punniaya Committee Report has said: "The government must ensure that the maintenance grant covers the large bills of the varsity, including periodic increase in salary". The less spending by the
government on higher education has also led to
disparities in the field of education in the eastern
parts of Haryana on the one hand and the western as well
as southern parts of the state on the other. While
private organisations have chosen to concentrate their
activities in the field of higher education in eastern
and northern Haryana and all along the G.T. Road only,
the southern parts have remained comparatively neglected.
Institutes of repute providing education in medical
sciences and engineering are mostly concentrated in the
eastern parts along the G.T. Road. While very few such
institutions exist in the southern parts. If the aid
component of salary is raised by the government, this may
also lead to an end to regional disparities. |
Emotional reunion for Pak
delegation SONEPAT, May 18 — It was an emotional experience for the members of a delegation from Pakistan as their old friends showered love and affection on them at a function organised by the management of S.M. Hindu Senior Secondary School here yesterday. A five-member delegation from Pakistan was on a goodwill visit to the city. The members had spent their childhood in the city and got education in school. The visit had been arranged by Mr Daya Chand Kaushik, a Canada based NRI hailing from Sonepat. The members of the delegation were touched by the warm welcome given to them by the management of the school and other residents of the city. They interacted with their old companions and reminisced about happy moments with them. The members were overwhelmed with emotions of love and brotherhood that they found it difficult to put these in words. Mr Daya Chand Kaushik had studied at S.M. Hindu High School, Sonepat, when it was set up in 1914. Mr Ali Hussan Zaidi a member of delegation was a student of the same school in 1939 and passed his matriculation examination from this school. Mr Latafat Ali, another member of the delegation, was also a former student of the school. Sayyad Basharat Ali Zaidi, born in 1934 in this city, had passed his middle class examination from CRZ High School, Sonepat before migrating to Pakistan. The members of the delegation expressed hope that the governments of both the countries would encourage citizens to visit each other’s country in order to strengthen the bonds of brotherhood and to establish harmonious relations between the two countries. They also stressed the need for removing misunderstandings between the people of both the countries. The Principal of the school, Mr O.P. Garg, said the citizens of the city wanted to sent a message of love and affection to the people of Pakistan through the members of the delegation. Mementoes titled "Jalaj 2000" were presented to the members of the delegation by the president of the managing body of the school as a token of love on this occasion. A cultural programme was also presented by the students of the school. Earlier, Mr Dharampal Gaur, an old student of this school donated a sum of Rs 1 lakh for the welfare of the students and development of the school. The members of
delegation also called on Mr Sudhir Rajpat, Deputy
Commissioner of Sonepat. |
UHBVN to sell bill space to
advertisers CHANDIGARH, May 18 — The Uttar Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (UHBVN) is likely to generate over Rs 1 crore from its scheme of seeking space to advertisers on power bills. Stating this here today, a spokesman for the UNBVN said both government organisations and private parties would be able to hire 11.7 cm by 2.8 cm (total 33.76 sq. cm.) of space on the electricity bills at a rate of Rs 1280 per sq. cm. He said the UHBVN had a plan to issue such electricity bills to about 40,000 domestic and non-domestic consumers of Panchkula from June 15. Initially the scheme would be introduced in two subdivisions of Panchkula district and later on it would be extended to the entire northern Haryana. In the third phase it would cover the entire State, he added. He said that the text of
the advertisement could be either in Hindi or English. |
Health awareness campaign CHANDIGARH, May 18 — The Haryana Government would launch a statewide family health awareness campaign from June 1 to June 15. Under the programme residents in the age group of 15-49 years would be contacted. The State Chief Secretary, Mr R.S. Verma, who presided over a meeting of the State steering committee on family health awareness campaign today said that the campaign would cover most of the needs concerning the health of the people. A press note issued by
the government said the Commissioner Health, Mr Naresh
Gulati, stressed hospitals should be well prepared for
the campaign. |
Plan to benefit street
children CHANDIGARH, May 18 — The Haryana Government plans to spend Rs 30 lakh to benefit street children during the current financial year. Stating this here today, the Minister of State for Social Welfare, Mr Risal Singh, said at present 930 street children were being benefited under this scheme. He said the scheme was
being implemented in 17 districts through voluntary
organisations by providing them 90 per cent of their
expenditure as grant-in-aid up to a maximum of Rs 2.96
lakh for starting a project covering at last 100
children. |
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