The Tribune, Chandigarh, India - Chandigarh Stories

HEALTH

Camp on sexually transmitted diseases
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, June 12 — Nearly 400 persons visited a family health awareness camp at Civil dispensary, Dadu Majra to know more about sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), reproductive tract Infections (RTIs) and HIV/AIDs. Of these, 85 persons including 71 females and 14 males were detected with symptoms of RTIs/STDs and provided free medicines.

The camp was organised by th UT State AIDS Control Society in collaboration with Indian Red Cross Society as part of the family health awareness drive.

Those who attended the camp were made aware of the routes of transmission and precautions to be taken through lectures, talks and other IEC activities including a street play.

The next camp will be conducted tomorrow at the Panchayat Ghar Colony No 4 in collboration with the Jan Shikhshan Sansthan.

SPORT

“Wicket-keeper’s job is challenging”
By Arvind Katyal

CHANDIGARH, June 12 — ‘The job of a wicket-keeper is challenging and require agility at every step’. These were the views of the India’s renowned wicket-keeper of women’s cricket, Anju Jain, who is in the city these days attending camp at DAV Senior Secondary School, Sector 8. She is preparing for the World Cup to be held in November at New Zealand. Anju who belongs to Delhi had inherited the game from her father, Amrit Lal Jain, a Ranji player.

Anju began cricket in 1988 and her first coach was her father only. She also took guidance from Sunita Sharma and she used to practice at national stadium only. She played her first World Cup in 1993 in the UK where India secured fourth place. Later, in 1997 again she represented the country at World Cup held in India. Anju said that she being an opening batswoman was another challenging task for her as she had to bear the onus of batting line downwards. She had one century to her credit in the Test matches played till now.

Anju joined Air India on contractual basis in 1993 and was appointed as Traffic Assistant in 1997 and posted at Delhi.

She said physical conditioning was more important for the wicket-keeper. The other wicket-keepers attending the camp along with her are Reshma Gandhi, Arundhati and Gurdeep Kaur.

About her role model, she said it was her dad but anyway Sachin Tendulkar could never be forgotten due to his superb style of play. Among present generation of wicket-keepers, Nayan Mongia was one whom she liked most due to his promptness in taking hold of the ball.

Manjit, Mehak win open skating
By Our Sports Reporter

CHANDIGARH, June 12 — Manjit Singh, a class IV student of KB DAV Centenary School, Sector 7, and Mehak Paul of Class III secured first and second position, respectively, in different categories in the open skating event organised by the CITCO at Sukhna Lake here yesterday.

In the one-day event students from various schools of the city took part.

According to Ms Madhu Bahl, Principal, Manjit had earlier bagged silver and bronze medals at the last year’s National School Games held at Moga. Mehak also took part in the 36th National Roller Skating Meet held at Vishakhapatnam.

Coaching camp
Reena of Government Girls Senior Secondary School, Sector 8, has been selected from Chandigarh for the Indian Women Coaching Camp (Juniors) to held from June 21 at Salt Lake Stadium, Calcutta.

Later, the selected will participate in the 6th Asian Women Junior Handball Championship to be held at Dhaka from July 25.

ADMINISTRATION

Systematic issue of smart cards
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, June 12 — The first day of issuing smart cards for registration of vehicles went off smoothly and without glitches as the Registering cum Licencing Authority handed over green-coloured plastic cards to more than 125 city residents, who wanted their vehicles registered here today.

On its face the card carries all information like name of the owners and address, make and colour of vehicle, its cubic capacity, its engine and chassis number, nature of hypothecation and previous owner, if any. The authorities have totally computerised the systems in such a manner that two more officials besides the SDM , Mr Ashish Kundra, have been given the authority to sign. All they need to do is press a code — personalised for each of them — that makes their signatures appear on the card automatically.

For the visitors it was a new experience as the air-cooled office with several counters , each with a computer, were functioning. And unlike in the past there were almost no queues. A huge waiting hall has been set up where residents waited for delivery of their cards. Senior officials were on the spot to oversee the operations. Mr Kundra , the Registering and Licencing Authority, expressed confidence that he would be able to start work of driving licences on this system by the target — that is the last week of June.

Both the subscriber and the public office have a point
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH

Time: 11 a.m.

Place: Sector 20 Post Office

Problem: Long queue of telephone subscribers to pay their bills on the last day today.

Background: The Department of Telecommunication has been continuing with age old practice of getting collection of telephone bills through various post offices in the city. Of late, the department has also opened 10 telecom bureaus with provision for collection of bills. The number of telephone subscribers has multiplied by almost four times during the past 10 years but the number of collection centres has not even doubled during this period.

The subscribers also complain that distribution of telephone bills has not been satisfactory. Instead of getting the usual a fortnight to make the payment, the bills are delivered to them, through post, only three to four days before the actual last date. At times, they say, they get only one to two clear working days to pay the bills, which was against the provisions of the rules.

The department now also disconnects outgoing calls from telephone conections where payment with surcharge is not made five days after the last date of actual payment of bills.

As a result, there is always a big rush of telephone subscribers on the last day of payment of bills. But on the other hand, Post Offices have done precisely a little to handle the last day rush knowing well that the number of subscribers has been constantly increasing.

In fact, the problem has been aggravated by the introduction of the multipurpose windows at each post office. The same clerk now books money orders, registered letters and also accepts payment of telephone bills and at times is required to book parcels, speed post letters and also letters posted Under Postal certificate.The result is obvious. The queues in front of the multipurpose windows keep on growing endlessly on the last day of payment of bills.

Official version: Officials blame telephone subscribers for coming to pay the bills only on last day. Why cannot they come and pay the bills on other days ? This time, the bills were home delivered by us in the first week of June and everybody had clear one week to pay these bills. But see the long queues today. All have to pay their bills today, reveals a functionary of the Sector 20 Post Office.

He admits that the department had given two computer terminals to the Post Office. But the second machine was standby which has now been taken back.

Citizens’ view point: “It will take me couple of hours to pay this bill which was delivered to me only on Friday last,” complained one of the subscribers at the fag end of the queues which extended beyond the corridor of the sector 20-C market.

“We have also been hearing for a long time that the department will soon introduce a new system for payment of bills through banks. But the banks are yet to introduce this scheme,” says another subscriber.

Another subscriber said that he read about postmen collecting telephone bills but again this was in the newspaper. But he wondered when such proposals would be implemented.

41 family benefit plan cases pending
By Vibha Sharma
Tribune News Service

CHANDIGARH, June 12 —As many as 41 cases registered in the year 1999-2000 under the National Family Benefit Scheme are still pending with the Social Welfare Department of the Chandigarh Administration.

This number is besides 37 cases of widows awaiting financial assistance under the national social assistance programme of the Government of India during the current financial year.

However, the department plans to disburse Rs 1,43,000, which it had received recently to 14 such cases pending from last financial year. This number is besides the 41 cases pending from the year 1999-2000.

According to the department, the beneficiaries can expect their cheques any time now.

The scheme, launched for the benefit of the widows falling in the bracket of economically weaker section, is implemented through the state governments concerned, in this case the U.T. Administration, but is fully funded by the Government of India.

According to informed sources, the requisition for the release of money along with the number of cases is sent to the central government with the 'utilisation certificate' of the money given to the previous cases.

The main criteria to avail the benefits under this scheme is that the age of the deceased should be between 18 and 64 years. The family, along with the death certificate, needed to furnish the proof of the residence, besides a certificate saying that the income of the family was below the poverty line.

Taking the average size of the family as five, the figures, as per the government notification dated March 1999, worked out to be Rs 15,976 per annum for the rural areas. For the urban areas it is Rs 21,206 per annum.

Mr Puran Singh, secretary-general, Senior Sikh Intellectual Forum, Chandigarh, plans to file a public interest litigation in the Punjab and Haryana High Court regarding the pending cases of widows under this scheme.

He says that there are an estimated 2000 such cases in Punjab, Haryana and U.T.