EDUCATION

NCTE derecognises NTT course in city institute
Fresh admissions banned
Monica Sharma

“We have filed appeal against the order of the NCTE’s regional office, Jaipur, because all the objections raised by the council are not true. All staff members are qualified as per the norms of the NCTE. Till our appeal is not accepted we will not seek fresh admissions.” said Director of the Raja Rama Mohan Roy Institute of Vocational Studies, Mr Lakhwinder Singh.

Admn told to pay dues to PhD lecturers
Chitleen K. Sethi
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 7
The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) has asked the Director Public Instructions (Colleges) and the UT Administration to consider the grant of advance increments that are due to college lecturers who have PhD degrees.

The order will benefit those PhD-holder lecturers who joined various government and private colleges of the city between 1986 and 1996. They are eligible for three advance increments for being PhD-holders and one increment for being M.Phil-holders at the time of joining the service, under the 1986 UGC guidelines. However, due to one reason or the other, the UT Administration has been delaying a decision on this.

The CAT order said, “The Original Application (in the case of Dr Seema Gupta and others vs the Union Of India and others) is disposed of with a direction to the respondent to consider the applicants for the grant of advance increments for possessing the PhD-M.Phil degrees. It is hoped that the needful will be done within four months of the order and the arrears will be paid to them within two months, thereafter.”

Lecturers of all colleges here had given a large number of representations to the DPI (Colleges) in this regard, which had been fruitless. However, the increments are being given to all those who joined the colleges after 1996, as per the latest UGC guidelines adopted by the Punjab Government and followed by the UT Administration.

The Punjab Government has been giving advance increments to its lecturers, in accordance with its notification of February 24, 1989. The notification states, “In order to encourage research in continuation of postgraduate studies, candidates, who possess PhD or M.Phil degrees at the time of their recruitment as lecturers, will get three and one advance increments, respectively, with the benefit of corresponding years of service for promotion.”

The Administration is following this notification only for the promotion of lecturers and for those who joined the service with research degrees between 1986 and 1996.

Delegations of teachers have been visiting the DPI (colleges), who advises them to meet the Registrar Education (Colleges), Mr Nanda, for a quick redressing of their grievances. In another representation to the DPI (Colleges), these lecturers have said that Mr Nanda is aware of their case, but nothing positive has been achieved by meeting him.

“The UT Education Department has not even bothered to read the contents of our representations,” the lecturers say. Today, the delegation also met the DPI (Colleges), who promised them a positive result in the case.

Minister resents result ‘leakage’
Tribune News Service

SAS Nagar, June 7
Expressing serious concern over the “leakage” of the Class XII result (science and commerce stream) to certain mediapersons, the State Education Minister, Mr Tota Singh, said the board authorities had been strictly told to avoid such a situation in the future.

Talking to mediapersons here today, he said he had told the Controller of Examination to release the result in future through the Public Relations Officer as had been the trend in the past. He said he had expressed his annoyance with the Chairman and the Controller of Examination over the developments in the past two days. He said he was told by the Chairman that the Controller of Examination had misinformed him about the release of result to media.

PU entrance tests between June 9, 14
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 7
The Combined Entrance Tests (CET) for various courses of Panjab University except the medical and engineering streams are scheduled between June 9 and June 14, an official press release said here today.

Although entrance tests to all subjects are covered by the common CET cell, however, PU has already completed the examination to the engineering, medical, architecture, pharmacy, Ayurveda and homeopathy. The remaining tests are being referred to “other than CET” which are scheduled June 9 onwards.

Mercy chance for BCA, BBA compartment students
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 7
Panjab University has decided to give a mercy chance to students of Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA-part I) and Bachelor of Computer Application (BCA-part I) who failed to clear their compartment in two consecutive chances.

The decision was taken by the Vice Chancellor on behalf of the university syndicate. The issue has also been cleared by the university senate.

The change is specifically for “candidates of BBA and BCA (part I) examination who failed in two consecutive chances of compartment paper.” The statement says that the candidate, however, should have passed the BBA II or BCA II examination.

It has also been pointed out that “in case the student fails to qualify in the compartment subject even in the additional chance, he shall be declared fail and his result for BBA II or BCA II will be cancelled”.

Workshop helps kids bring out their creative best
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 7
In the host of summer camps being conducted in almost every nook and corner of the City Beautiful, this one stands out for various reasons. These reasons begin to be spelt out as soon as one enters the premises of Hotel Park View in Sector 24. The happy sounds reverberating in the banquet hall of the hotel tell an objective visitor that something interesting is cooking.

Some steps down into the hall and one knows what has warranted so much of spirited activity. Here are an 100 odd elves who have been roped in by city-based Vimmi Singh and ZED education to learn the skills of arts and craft and create something magical. They are all sitting in bunches of 20 to 30, trying hard to imbibe artistic, theatrical and dance skills. Interestingly, none of the participants brings anything from home expect lunch and water. Entire artistic paraphernalia is being provided by Camelin. Not to forget the mention of a greeting card contest which Camelin organised during this workshop some days back.

What makes the workshop novel is the fact that the training being imparted is sensible despite huge strength of the camp. This camp is being conducted for the third year in continuation under the title of “Elves at work”. Talking to The Tribune about the agenda today, Vimmi Singh said: “The focus is on a multifarious development of these children. We teach through the medium of story telling. Our special interest lies in working on areas of concern of the parents of each child attending this camp.”

The camp has been divided into two groups — three to five years of age, where the main stress is on development of IQ, apart from motor scale activities. The other group comprises children between six and 12 years of age. The best part of the show is that 12 techniques of painting are being taught by special instructors posted with the camp by Camelin for its entire duration. This includes glass panting, pot painting and acrylic paintings.

Then there is the theatre workshop being conducted by Sumit Sood. He has been approached through the Punjab Kala Bhawan. Dance sequences are being taken care of by another person engaged especially for the purpose.

Said Vimmi: “The young ones are being taught the concept of squares, circles and other shapes in a playway method. We are also adding one word to their vocabulary on a daily basis.”

The engrossment of kids reflected the success of the workshop, which has been going on for about 20 days now. Interacting with the little ones was very interesting. For Altaf Randhawa (11 years) of St Stephen’s School, holiday time could not have been better invested. “We are being taught how to make greeting cards, create art out of waste products which includes the making of puppets, pencil frames and pencil masks. I enjoy theatre the most.”

For Daksh Kapoor (7 years), painting is the best engagement. He has already learnt to handle the water colours well. Komal Gupta (11 years) was particularly excited about the dances being taught during the camp. “We are learning how to dance on various hot numbers like ‘One, two, three’ by steps and ‘Mehboob mere’ from ‘Fiza’.”

4,370 to appear for NET on June 24
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 7
A total of 4,370 candidates will appear for the national eligibility test (NET) to be conducted by the University Grants Commission (UGC) here on June 24.

Sources said here yesterday that the NET was mandatory for junior research fellowships and eligibility for lecturership in universities and colleges. The qualifying candidate needs to have secured at least 55 per cent marks at the postgraduation level in the subject concerned.

Panjab University has created 13 centres on the campus itself.

Languages top the number of applicants for the test. There are 526 candidates appearing for the NET in Punjabi alone, 274 are appearing for English and 386 for Hindi. Economics with 276 and business management with 257 are the other two areas witnessing the maximum applicants.

Papers in comparative literature, women studies, social medicine and community health, Kashmiri Indian culture, archaeology, criminology, Persian and a significant number of other state languages of the country have witnessed no applications.

The lowest applications have been witnessed by social work with four applicants; Arabic with one candidate, German with two and human rights and duties got two applicants only.

Computer training camp for kids
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 7
Computer Maintenance Corporation (CMC) Ltd., a Government of India enterprise, has started a summer training camp for school kids in the age group of five to 15 years to give the child a good start by familiarising him with computer at an early stage.

According to Ms Shalini Bhatia, centre head, the 60-hour programme spreads over two hours daily giving them exposure to Internet, e-mail, multimedia, power-point and knowledge of many other exciting applications.

CMC Limited, she said here today, had been conducting a large number of computer education and training programmes round the year. The course ranged from one/two-year diploma/advanced diploma courses to short-term courses.

CULTURE

Your chance to date radio jockeying
Tribune News Service

This 20-day-long workshop will focus on 13 days of intensive basic theory and seven days of practical training at the AIR and digital sound recording studios. Topics to be covered include introduction to FM radio, script writing, intensive delivery, voice training, voice modulation, pronunciation, diction and clarity. Techniques of newsreading (Hindi, Punjabi and English), physical appearance on screen, satellite news uplinking and live reporting will also form a part of the workshop agenda. This one will be held at SCO 13, Sector 34 A.

A fight against social evils
Our Correspondent

Chandigarh, June 7
The Collegiate Drama Club has made an attempt to fight evils like drug addiction and communalism in its plays, ‘Mitti Rudan Karey’ and ‘Munshi Khan’, that were staged in the Sector 16 Punjab Kala Bhavan here today.

The first play, ‘Mitti Rudan Karey’ has a simple storyline and highlights the agony of the wife of a drug addict. The wife, who refuses to shed tears when everybody has presumed her husband, Baru, to be dead, breaks down when he returns to life.

Written by Dev Singh Moga and directed by Suleman Bhatt, this half-hour play does not provide much scope for the actors to show their talent, though the character of the wife has a lot of emotions, especially in the last scene. Kanchan, in the role of the wife, has done a good job.

The rest of the cast included Jaswinder Singh in the role of Baru, Gopal Sandhu as Baru’s father, Harish Verma as his brother and Anita as his mother.

The second play, ‘Munshi Khan’, which is written by Gursharan Singh and directed by Suleman Bhatt, is based on the story of a Muslim man named Munshi Khan who changes his name to Sujjan Singh to escape the brunt of the Partition. Though he manages to lead a happy life in a village dominated by the Sikh community, his last wish, that he be buried and not cremated, ignites a riot in the village.

The story is based on a poem by Joga Singh who is also the lead character in the play. The character of Munshi Khan is played by Jaswinder Singh, The role of Subedar, Munshi’s close friend, is played by Gopal Verma. H.Walia has been cast in the role of Joga Singh.

Nehi Chaudhry to perform on June 11
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, June 7
The 53rd monthly baithak of the Pracheen Kala Kendra, Sector 35 comes with a promise of melody and delight for its regular viewers. Holding the stage on the occasion, which falls on June 11, will be Nehi Choudhary, the illustrious disciple of Jayalakshmi Ishwar, renowned dancer of the Bharatanatyam school of dance.

This young exponent of the Indian classical dance form, Nehi has been trained in both Pandanallur and Kalashatra styles of Bharatanatyam. In a powerful combination of tradition and versatility, Nehi endows her dance with an unusually attractive appeal. And this appeal pleases all the senses, caters to both spiritual and aesthetic senses. Her command over abhinaya is amazing in that she reflects even in her reticence.

Nehi is also an A-grade artiste of Delhi Doordarshan and has also performed during various prestigious dance festivals.

Cultural exchange programme
Our Correspondent

Panchkula, June 7
As part of the inter-state cultural exchange programme, The Ghoomer Academy of Arts and Culture will organise a training workshop based on dances and music of Rajasthan in collaboration with the Nehru Yuva Kendra at DAV Senior Secondary School, Sector 8, Chandigarh, from June 9 to 17.

According to Ms Suneeta Dhaliwal, General Secretary, over 50 children and youngsters in the age group of eight to 25 years will take part in the workshop. The main attraction of the workshop will be traditional dances of Rajasthan.