The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Tension over refusal to bury woman
Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, March 20
Tension prevails in Barwali village for the past two days over the village panchayat’s orders of stopping a family belonging to a minority community to bury a priestess of the community in the village graveyard. The priestess, Mrs Earnest, had died of old age yesterday morning and after waiting for almost two days was being brought to Ludhiana for burial at a graveyard near CMC today evening.

The village has five Christian families and all of them have been burying their dead in the Barwali village graveyard for a long time. However, the village sarpanch allegedly stopped Mr Earnest, also a priest, from performing the last rites of his wife, arguing that the village panchayat did not allow for the burial of ‘outsiders’ in the graveyard.

The 75-year-old woman is survived by three children and had come to the village several decades ago with her husband. Her family and a number of other relatives in the village said they were shocked at the move and called in Christian preachers from several parts of the state to convince the village panchayat, but they too failed to resolve the deadlock.

The village sarpanch, Mr Karamjit Singh could not be contacted. Mr Sukhminder Singh Brar, SDM, Samrala, said the matter came to his knowledge today afternoon only and he has called up the village sarpanch for an explanation. He said he has also learnt that in the past members of the community were going to Kharar and Ludhiana for burial and he would inquire what the detail of the case were.

According to Ms Daisy John and Mr Janes, a daughter and son-in-law respectively of the deceased, the family had been living in the village for the past 50 years. “All the Christian families of Samrala and Barwali village used to bury their dead at Barwali graveyard. But despite persistent requests since yesterday sarpanch of Barwali did not allow us to dig the grave”.

They said the family then contacted the official in-charge of different cremation yards and graveyards of the surrounding areas including Khanna, Gobindgarh and Ludhiana and Robert S. Lal of Ludhiana ultimately arranged for the burial at a graveyard near CMC College where one of the daughters of the deceased is also working. The burial will take place either in the late evening today or tomorrow morning, they said.

Mr William, priest of Gobindgarh, claimed that three bigha of land had been earmarked in the village for the graveyard since 1940, but the land was allegedly grabbed by some persons in the 60s. Christians of the area have urged the civil authorities to look into the matter.

Encroachment mafia flexing muscles
D.B. Chopra

Ludhiana, March 20
The encroachment mafia has started showing its muscles once again in the wake of the victory of all the four city seats by the Congress candidates in the recently concluded state Assembly elections.

While the Municipal Corporation is constantly in news for the past fortnight or so because of its so-called anti-encroachment drive under which unauthorised houses, buildings and other constructions are being demolished, encroachments on the busy streets of the city are rapidly rising.

The current MC drive against unauthorised structures is said to be motivated by financial reasons as the civic body has virtually gone bankrupt following octroi abolition. Observers of the scene say that by levying hefty fines on building by-laws’ defaulters, the civic body was trying to improve its worsening financial situation. Scooters and motor cycles are also being lifted from roadsides by the Tehbazari Department to raise the much-needed funds by way of fines. One has to pay Rs 500 and face harassment for three to four days before one is able to get the ‘impounded’ vehicle back.

But the authorities concerned are not trying to devise a system by which they can tap an income of about Rs 1 crore per month, which is currently going to the encroachment mafia dons in various parts of the city and its outer areas as well. These dons collect the ‘monthlies’ from the roadside business-makers and pass on the same to the various officials of the Tehbazari Department. Shares from the huge booty go the councillors, police officers and other politicians. The whole racket is so well-entrenched that it is indeed very difficult, if not impossible, to rescue the city roads from the clutches of the encroachment mafia.

After the Congress rode to power in the state, its candidates, who won all the four city seats, have been attending various functions and making speeches as usual. They have been generally speaking about taking the city to a new path of progress and blah, blah, blah...., but none of them has uttered a word about the hellish traffic situation in the city at the root of which lies the interests of the encroachment mafia. Observers further opine that they cannot afford to do so in view of the approaching elections to the Municipal Corporation which the Congress hopes to win comprehensively.

Another reason for the spurt in roadside encroachments , apart from the political factor, is the approaching summer season. Thousands of rehris selling sugarcane juice, ice candies, and other summer favourites have already appeared on the city roads, adding to the mess and congesting the traffic further. Already, colourful beach-umbrellas have come up on all city roads. Near the Ghanta Ghar, the city’s icon, a seller of mango-shake and ice-cream has duly put up chairs on the vacant lot in front of the lottery market and converted a large portion into a sort of open air ice-cream parlour where one can relax and relish something cold.

There are other roadside sellers of various eatables around him who also do brisk business throughout the day. Since these people earn plenty of money, they are paying Rs. one 100 per day on an average. Half of this money is paid to the shopkeeper outside whose shop the rehri is stationed. Then comes the cop and the man from the encroachment mafia who take away Rs 25 or so each. With so many vested interests involved, the racket goes on and on, irrespective of who is at the helm of the city’s affairs.

Undertrial escapes from hospital
Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, March 20
Even as the district police is yet to catch at least three undertrials who had run away from the Civil Hospital and Bakshikhanna building in the district courts in the recent past, yet another undertrial made good his escape from the civil hospital early this morning.

The Division No. 2 police has registered a case against the undertrial. DSP Ashwani Kumar said the police was taking action against some constables posted on security duty of the undertrial in the hospital.

Dalbir Singh, an undertrial under the NDPS Act, was shifted to the Civil Hospital about a week ago from the Ludhiana Central Jail where he was imprisoned three months ago. He had complained of some stomach disease and was admitted to the Civil Hospital on the recommendation of the doctors in the jail, sources said.

The undertrial went to the bathroom at about 6 a.m. and ran away. The police personnel and the hospital staff learnt about his escape about a half an hour later. The police flashed the red alert in the district. Raids were being conducted to know his whereabouts.

Jail Superintendent G.S. Sidhu said the security outside the jail was of the Punjab police and he had nothing to do with it. He, however, expressed his concern and said he had written to the Punjab police authorities for the need to tone up the security of the undertrials outside the jail. He said the undertrial also had a date in a district court today.

The under trial's escape has once again brought to limelight the issue of security of the undertrials outside the Central Jail. A number of undertrials had run from the civil hospital and district court in the last few months. The police had arrested some of the escapees but three are still absconding.

MC closes units, wants arrears
Our Correspondent

Ludhiana, March 20
There has been a dispute among the Municipal Corporation and owners of a large number of industrial units in Phases VI and VII of Focal Point here over house tax arrears from 1997 onwards.

Owners of these units squatted in front of their factories and raised slogans against the civic administration on Tuesday when the MC Joint Commissioner, Mr Harjinder Singh, came there with a huge police force and asked them to come out of their factories, so that, the MC could lock up the units for non-payment of house tax arrears. Workers of these factories also joined in the protest and opposed the MC move.

Officials of the MC say that the action has been taken after repeated reminders and recovery notices for one year failed to yield any response from industrialists. The recovery proceedings include auction of the property.

However, Mr Ram Lubhaya, president of the Focal Point Industries Welfare Association, who led the protest and, later, met the MC Commissioner, Mr R.L. Kalsia, said the MC decision was arbitrary. He said the area had been developed by the Punjab Small Industries and Export Corporation (PSIEC) and transferred for maintenance to the MC only in January 2001. They said, for this reason, the MC had no right to demand house tax from them for the period before it took over.

The members of the association said, earlier, senior officials of the MC had agreed that the industrialists should pay only current house-tax bills. The association had persuaded its members to make this payment, but, when the MC was given the cheques, it said a part payment would not be accepted.

When contacted, the MC Commissioner, Mr R.L. Kalsia, said the MC action was justified because the industrialists were liable to pay house tax from 1997 onwards. “We have even given them the offer of paying only 50 per cent of the arrears and getting the balance deferred. The MC has no power to write off any amount and it has to take action against defaulters,” he said.

A battle for hegemony?
Vimal Sumbly
Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, March 20
There seems to be a difference of opinion between the new Ludhiana Deputy Commissioner, Mr Anurag Aggarwal, and the Senior Superintendent of Police, Mr Harpreet Sidhu. The DC, who is also the District Magistrate, is learnt to have expressed his reservations on the reshuffling of the SHOs by the SSP.

Sources in the administration say that the DCs in the state have been asked to restore the supremacy of the DM over the SSP. The police had gained an upper hand during the decade-long militancy in Punjab. Now, the state government has asked the DCs to write the ACRs of the SSPs.

Though Mr Aggarwal may only be trying to implement the government’s decision, as his rank is higher than that of the SSP and all others in the district administration, usually the SSP transfers junior police officials on his own.

The new DC is believed to be strictly going by the book. The two officials have been meeting often and the DC is learnt to have told the SSP about his reservations. “The new DC wants to be aware of every administrative decision,” an official in the district administration said.

The sources also said the SSP considered it his prerogative to transfer officials for effective policing as he knew his department better than anyone else. “Moreover, the SSP does not like any interference in his work,” they said.

Mr Aggarwal, reportedly, has not been able to make a rapport with junior officials. At the time of Mr Aggarwal’s predecessor, Mr S.K. Sandhu, the access to the DC’s office was more unrestricted. Now, visitors to the DC’s office have to wait for hours on end to see him.

PAU Kisan Mela begins today
Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, March 20
With a significant theme on precision farming for high profits, the two-day Kisan mela, the biggest gathering of the state farmers, will begin on the Punjab Agricultural University campus here tomorrow.

As many as 26 committees have been formed to make various arrangements relating to agro-industrial exhibitions, field agro-industrial exhibitions, field demonstrations, stage programmes, plant diagnostic services, enquiries and registrations. These committees have begun giving final touches to their programmes.

Dr Jaspinder Singh Kolar, Director, Extension Education of the university, who had reviewed the arrangements at a meeting, said all arrangements had been made to provide suitable guidance to the visiting farmers. The Director (Farms), Dr Gurkirpal Singh, said about 23,000 bags/packets of improved seeds of different crops had been prepared for sale. The important varieties include Moong-668, chilli hybrid CH-1, watermelon ''sugar bby'', cotton LD-694 and 1554 and soyabean SL-295.

Congress workers feel let down
Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, March 20
Most of the Congress workers here seem to be feeling let down over the attitude of the local administration, particularly the Deputy Commissioner, Mr Anurag Aggarwal, who kept them waiting for hours and made a quiet exit from the backdoor without meeting them. Interestingly those kept waiting outside included a senior office-bearer of the District Youth Congress.

The workers led by the Youth Congress leader had gone to meet the new DC. However, they were asked to wait outside as the DC was supposedly in the midst of a meeting. One of the workers disclosed that in fact the DC was “gossiping” with two local MLAs who went inside in their presence. “We were made to wait for about two hours and told at the end that the DC had already left”, one of the workers disclosed.

Expressing resentment at this attitude, the Congress workers pointed out that the Chief Minister, Capt Amarinder Singh, had announced that the officers would always remain available and accessible to the general public and more so to the party workers. “However, we had a bitter experience,” another worker regretted, while pointing out that earlier, during the tenure of Mr S.K. Sandhu, the door of the DC’s office never remained closed.

‘Right to information must to check corruption’
Manoj Kumar
Tribune News Service

Ajit Bhattacharjea

Ludhiana, March 20
“Most of the public and private institutions in India have become corrupt and inefficient and there is no way to improve them except to empower the public with right to information. It would force the institutions, including the print and electronic media, to become more transparent and accountable towards the public. There is need to check the media, a section of which has become a tool in the hands of advertisers, industrial houses and pressure groups to serve the cause of vested interests. Most of the papers are simply indifferent to issues of national importance like agriculture, public health and unemployment,’’ says Mr Ajit Bhattacharjea, former editor of the Indian Express and Hindustan Times, and currently Director, Press Institute of India, New Delhi.

He is in the city to participate in a three-day workshop on ‘ Media and Human Development.’ In an interview to The Tribune, he said that he was shocked by the high level of corruption in Punjab and even in some of its prestigious institutions. The present laws and institutions have failed to nip the evil in the bud, so there is a need to look for alternative avenues. ‘‘Some of the states like Rajasthan have already taken initiative by passing a legislation to grant ‘Right to Information’ to the public, with some provisions however to not disclose certain information for national security reasons. The media and other concerned persons would have to build public opinion to force the Parliament and state legislative assemblies to enact this law at the earliest. How can mediapersons report accurately and comprehensively when some heads of knowledge houses are behaving like autocrats to curb the smooth flow of information in the interest of public?,” he asked.

Asked about the role of media in the recent Gujarat riots, Mr Bhattacharjea admitted that reportage of communal riots has always been a daunting task, but it was only due to the wide coverage of the carnage in the media that the lapses on the part of police and state government were highlighted at the national level. There was no justification in the criticism of media by the state’s ruling party for providing wide coverage to the brutal killings. However, the electronic media could have avoided the telecast of charred bodies repeatedly, he said.

Rejecting the critics’ views that the standard of reporting in the print media had declined over the past few years, he said,‘‘ Today’s newspapers are more professional and cover a wider range of subjects and issues. Despite the commercialisation of papers, which was now a worldwide phenomenon, newspapers like New York Times and Washington Post in the USA have accepted the challenge and are presenting public issues in a balanced manner. We must also take inspiration from them.’’

Mr Ajit Bhattacharjea is also an editor of ‘Grassroots’, a monthly news letter, which reports on rural issues, including agriculture, public health and gender among others. He says, in the present scenario, the English language newspapers could not be expected to give proportionate space to rural issues, due to the clash of interest of both group of readers and interest of paper’s stake-holders. But there was a need to sensitise the journalists of the language dailies to cover these issues on a larger scale. Lamenting wide-spread illiteracy in the country, Mr Bhattacharjea asserted,‘‘ A large section of our population is still unable to read newspapers and do not have access to television or internet media due to their low purchasing power and inadequate infrastructure. The community radio could be an effective medium to communicate and empower the marginalised sections of the society so government and other funding agencies should pay attention to this alternative medium.’’

Asked about the need of introspection or some code of ethics to check corruption, biased reporting and yellow journalism, he said,‘‘ The Editor’s Guild and Press Council of India had been entrusted to play the role of watchdog of the industry. However, due to lack of any statuary powers, these bodies have failed to check the maladies. I am sorry to say that some of the papers have not even cared to publish the resolutions of the council itself. Moreover, there were a number of papers, where journalists are also exploited.’’ The only way to stem the rot, he says, is to provide some statuary powers to the Press Council so that it can safeguard the interests of industry, readers and journalists as well.

Contract system opposed
Our Correspondent

Ludhiana, March 20
The Safai Karamchari Union in the Municipal Corporation here has demanded the scrapping of the ban on new recruitment of safai workers. The ban is in force since 1986. The union has also demanded fresh recruitment of at least 5,000 safai workers, 2,000 sewer men and 1,000 beldars from the approved list to cope with the sanitation needs of the city.

In a memorandum submitted to the Punjab Minister for Local Bodies, Choudhry Jagjit Singh, the union has further asked the state government to do away with the contract system of labour in the sanitation wing of the civic body and regularise the safai workers, employed by the Mohalla Sanitation Committees on Rs 1,200 per month.

According to Mr Hans Raj Gagat, president of the union, the then Congress government had decided in 1994-95 that the contract labour system would not be made applicable to Class IV employees, but the SAD-BJP government, which took over in 1997, deliberately chose to flout the assurance given to the trade unions of safai workers.

The union urged the government that pending the fresh recruitment of safai workers in the city, the vacancies against permanent posts of sewer men and beldars should be immediately filled up from among the approved list of 789 daily wage safai workers, prepared in 1988.

Mr Gagat called upon the government to initiate steps for acceptance and implementation of their outstanding demands, including payment of bonus and regularisation of part-time safai workers.

Man beaten up at Focal Point
Our Correspondent

Ludhiana, March 20
Ashok Kumar , a resident of HL Colony in the Focal Point area falling under the Moti Nagar police station, was allegedly beaten up by a scrap-dealer, Bunty, here this morning.

According to information, a dispute had been going on between the two for the past fortnight or so over the issue of some payment which the victim owed to the alleged attacker. The dispute took an ugly turn last night when Ashok Kumar allegedly threatened Bunty when he demanded the money. Bunty went home last night but returned the next morning to ‘settle’ the dispute. No report had been lodged with the police so far.

Gas cylinder bursts, child sustains burns: Twelve-year-old Arvind, employed as help at Garg Gas Agency, located behind the Civil Hospital, received serious burn injuries when a gas cylinder caught fire due to a leaking pipe in the company’s godown here yesterday. According to information, as soon as the boy lighted a gas stove to make some tea in the morning, the gas accumulated in the room due to a leaking pipe, caught fire and the room was engulfed with fire as a result of which one of the cylinders burst. The burst was so loud that it shook the area around the godown and anxious residents rushed to the spot. The roof of the godown was blown off completely due to the impact of the blast. A bigger tragedy could have occurred, had the fire reached any of the two trucks, loaded with LPG cylinders, which were parked outside at the time of the accident.

Youth crushed to death: Twenty two-year-old Binder Kumar, son of Roshan Lal, resident of Bharoli village, died on the spot yesterday after falling from a loaded tractor-trailer near Jackson Hotel on the National Highway falling under the Sadar police station. According to information, the head of the fallen youth was crushed under the loaded trailer’s tyre. The body of the deceased was handed over to his kin by the police after an autopsy at the local Civil Hospital.

Burn victim dies: Shambhu, 35, a rickshaw puller, who had been admitted to the Civil hospital, with serious burns on March 11, succumbed to his injuries here yesterday. He had received burn injuries while cooking in his room at Kot Mangal Singh due to a sudden burst of the kerosene stove.

SAHNEWAL
Gambling: Two cases of gambling were registered by the Doraha police last night. While patrolling, the police nabbed Vikas Goyal of Samrala Road, Khanna, and seized Rs 513 from him near the Doraha flyover. In a similar case, the police seized Rs 232 from a Khanna resident near Sidhu Hospital, Doraha. Both have been booked under Sections 13-A, 13, and 67 of the Gambling Act.

Playwin launches online lottery
Tribune News Service

Ludhiana, March 20
Amidst controversy to ban any online lottery of any other state in Punjab due to press reports by the Directorate of Lotteries, the Playwin Infravest Pvt. Ltd., a company promoted by Zee Network’s Essel Group, launched the first online lottery in the region here yesterday. The promoters claimed that the Punjab Government had no jurisdiction to ban the lottery of other states under the National Lottery Act.

Mr Sanjay Dass, Chief Executive Officer of the company, while launching the lottery asserted that besides Sikkim, the subsidiaries of Essel Group have been appointed marketing agents for online lottery by the Government of Maharshtra and Karnataka. These subsidiaries in turn have appointed Playwin as their sub-agent to create the necessary infrastructure and market for online gaming.

He said, “Online lotteries worldover are recognised as a major source of revenues for social causes. As opposed to the 1 per cent revenue which most state governments earn from the conventional paper lottery, Essel Group subsidiaries have assured them a revenue in the range of 20 to 25 per cent, more than Rs 3,000 crore to three states during the license period of five to 10 years. ’’This would not only boost the economy of the states but would also provide funds for education, rural housing, sanitation and infrastructure development, he said.

Talking to the media persons later, he clarified that their subsidiaries were in the process of entering into a contract with other states as well to launch additional online lotteries. They had already proceeded to enter into a contract with the Punjab Government by offering the highest price, but some bureaucrats and competitors were spreading rumours against them.