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Thursday,
October 31, 2002, Chandigarh, India  
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Punjab wheat reaches Rajasthan
Copters to be used in next round of exercises
with USA
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Militant violence feared in Gujarat Killer of Akali leader held
NY Punjabis to adopt
Indian kids New Delhi, October 30 In yet another jolt to ties between the Sangh Parivar and the BJP-led NDA government, an angry VHP leader Acharya Giriraj Kishore has asked the Union Home Ministry to withdraw his “inadequate” personal security cover as it has been “deliberately” ignoring threats to his life. Study to ascertain epilepsy cause Kirit Raval is Solicitor-General Advani for regional cooperation Farmers’ protest turns violent
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Punjab wheat reaches Rajasthan Bikaner, October 30 The first train-load of wheat sent by the Punjab Government as relief to feed the affected has reached here. It was handed over to Mr Akhil Arora, District Magistrate, and Mr Madhukar Gupta, Divisional Commissioner, by Chowdhary Jagjit Singh, Punjab Local Bodies Minister, who flew in here yesterday from Chandigarh. However, people facing the fifth successive year of drought here need more help, especially in the form of dry and green fodder for livestock, their source of sustenance. They hope that the Punjabis will do more for them. After visiting this part of Rajasthan, one realises that in Punjab, in spite of the failure of the monsoon, farmers have set a new record in paddy production. Contrary to this, life
appears to have come to a standstill in the part of Rajasthan facing famine-like conditions. There is almost complete crop failure in Bikaner, Churu, Badmer, Jaisalmer and a large part of Jodhpur and Udaipur regions. In the desert spread over thousands of miles, one hardly finds a green shrub. There is nothing for sheep and goats to graze. The only tree species to have withstood the wrath of the drought is “khajeri”, popular as “ jand” in Punjab. In fact, khajeri trees are proving a saviour of life, not only for livestock, but also for the rural folk”. Its fruit, called “sangl, is served as a delicacy in form of cooked vegetable in five-star hotels. Local elders compare the prevailing situation in this belt with that of 1956. “The famine of 1956 was akin to what we are facing now,” says Dhanna Ram Chowdhary, a member of the panchayat of Palana village near here. There is acute shortage of drinking water, green and dry fodder and wheat in the drought-hit areas. The buying capacity of the people affected in rural areas has, by and large, been exhausted. To buy dry and green fodder and wheat, they need money. Labour rates have come down to Rs 30 per day from Rs 70. In fact, opportunities of employment of casual labour exist nowhere in the countryside. People have moved to urban areas to work, but there also they face a lot of problems to get work. Bikaner district, one of the worst affected districts, is spread over 30,000 square km. It has about 15 lakh hectares of cultivable land. However, only about 4 lakh hectares of land has irrigation facilities. There are only about 8,000 tubewells in the district. However, the land having irrigation facilities has remained unsown this year because of non-availability of water for irrigation. Mr Gupta says the crop loss because of drought in the district is 100 per cent. Groundnut has been sown in 22,000 hectares, but even this crop has remained fruitless yet. Mr Gupta says the level of subsoil water, earlier at 300 feet, has gone further down. One requires Rs 4 to 6 lakh to instal a tubewell. A total of 47 cattle camps have been set up by the government, where 26,000 cattle heads are looked after by people. The government gives a grant of Rs 10 per cattle for feed etc. The district has the largest population of livestock — 28 lakh. About 10 lakh of these are now in Punjab and Haryana. Mr Gupta says besides cattle camps, depots have been set up to provide dry fodder on subsidy of Rs 60 per quintal. Even after availing themselves of the subsidy buying dry fodder at Rs 210 per quintal is beyond the capacity of most of the people. The dairy sector has started facing crisis as milch cattle has become less productive in the absence of adequate feed. Missed opportunity While farmers in Punjab have burnt lakhs of tonnes of paddy residue, their drought-affected counterparts in Rajasthan are buying it for Rs 100 per quintal. Perhaps the Rajasthan Government, which has been spending lakhs to make dry fodder available to farmers, is not aware of the burning of the residue. “If we had come to know about it, we would have requested our farmers to collect it from farmers in Punjab, who would have provided it free to them instead of burning it”, said a senior official of the Rajasthan Government. “We have missed the opportunity”, he added. |
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BJP concerned at starvation deaths New Delhi, October 30 Alleging that the state government had lifted less than 35 per cent of the total central allocation of foodgrains, party spokesman Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi said the state was allocated a total of 3.31 lakh tonnes under the Sampurna Grameen Rozgar Yojana, but it lifted only 1.14 lakh tonnes. Similarly, 3.72 lakh families in the state’s Bharan district were issued special cards under the Centre’s Antyodaya Yojana but the poor could not avail of it as the state government “miserably failed to implement the Central Government’s food for-work scheme, meant for such people.” |
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Copters to be used in next round of exercises New Delhi, October 30 Sources in the IAF here said that India and the USA were unlikely to enter into actual war games so early and it would only be a gradual progress forward. The next phase of exercises would only involve the helicopters and then would come the stage for war games involving fighter aircraft, sources said. Discounting earlier reports of a possibility of fighter aircraft and helicopters being used together in the next phase of exercises, sources said India and the USA were yet in the process of building confidence between them. The possibility of holding actual war games would come only after the two had complete confidence in each other. While the USA has found India strategically placed for its various operations not only in Afghanistan but also for possibly countering China and operations in West Asia, India is looking at getting closer to Washington to have it act on terrorism from across the border. Sources said not much had been achieved in the first round of exercises and tactically the two countries were still to open up. Not much of tactics were at play during the two rounds of exercises at Agra and another one in Alaska. This was also evident in the units which were used for the exercises. The Indian Army did not use its best paratroopers for the exercises. Similarly, the Americans did little by way of tactics. Incidentally, since not the best men were used during the exercises there were injuries to paratroopers not only on this occasion at Agra, but also in May last. The two air forces have held joint exercises after a gap of 40 years. At the next round of meeting of the joint Indo-US Steering Committee here on November 14 and 15, there is a possibility the two countries work out the schedule for holding joint helicopter exercises. The USA has been taking Indian observers on its helicopters during earlier exercises, but the choppers have actually not been used by the either country for the series. Sources said only after the success of the helicopter exercises would the next step of involving the fighter aircraft for actual war games be thought out. India, incidentally, is to hold the first-ever fighter exercises with France early next year when French Air Force Mirage-2000 would hold joint manoeuvres with the IAF’s Mirage-2000. |
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Indo-US talks on Afghanistan New Delhi, October 30 The US Special Envoy on Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad held consultations with top officials, including Principal Secretary to Prime Minister and National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra, Foreign Secretary Kanwal Sibal and Mr Arun K. Singh, Joint Secretary (Afghanistan) in the Ministry of External Affairs. |
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Militant violence feared in Gujarat New Delhi, October 30 There is classified information here that the feared terrorist violence in Gujarat may be much more severe and ferocious and a substantial number of suicide squads of terrorists could spread mayhem in the western state in the coming weeks. Well-placed sources here disclosed to The Tribune yesterday that the lull in terrorist violence in Jammu and Kashmir since the fourth and last phase of polling on October 8 may be because of tactical and operational reasons. Official figures, made available to The Tribune this evening, reveal the extent of the lull in the terrorist violence in J&K. The figures are given below: Civilians
killed: 204 (Aug-Sept, 2002) as against 31 in the period between October 9 and 26. Militants killed: 327 (Aug-Sept, 2002) as against 90 between October 9 and 26. |
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Killer of Akali leader held New Delhi, October 30 The murder of the Akali leader had sent shock waves in Punjab and there were a large-scale demonstration to pressurise the police to arrest the killer. The south-west district police received information that Jasbir Singh lived in the Capital and had changed his appearance as well as name. He was known as Sukhpal Singh in Delhi. He had now got his hair and beard cut. The police had information that Jassa would reach Priya Cinema at 11 p.m. to meet one of his friends. A police team in plainclothes was deployed around the cinema hall. He was overpowered when he reached there. According to the police, to eliminate the Akali Dal leader, Jassa took the help of Vikram Jeet Singh, Inderjeet Singh, Devender Singh, alias Ballu, Major Singh, Dalbir Singh, Bakhshish Singh and Surjeet Singh. The Akali leader was killed at Patti in Amritsar when he was going in a TATA Sumo. The criminals armed with sophisticated weapons fired indiscriminately, killing six persons on the spot and injuring one. Jasbir peeped inside the vehicle and fired more shots to ensure that all victims were dead. Jassa dropped one of his accomplices at Shahzadpur and left for Mand after the killing. He lived there for two months and then left for Ganganagar in Rajasthan. He stayed there for a few days and then reached Himachal Pradesh. He came to Delhi this month. |
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Rebel MLAs meet Governor Lucknow, October 30 The meeting which lasted over half an hour was attended by 21 legislators, including nine Independents, Legislators told mediapersons outside Raj Bhawan that the Governor had assured all help to them and had said that he would take up the matter with the Chief Minister. The state government has lodged FIRs and started proceedings against three legislators – all of them Independents – who had withdrawn support to the government a week ago. First the residence of Mr Dhananjay Singh was raided, then an FIR was lodged by the Pratapgarh police against Mr Raghuraj Pratap Singh and yesterday the government lodged a fresh case against Lok Janshakti Party MLA Rajaam Pandey, who was a minister in the previous BJP government. “The government is intimidating us,” said Mr Raghuraj Pratap Singh. “But we are not going to bow down to the pressure,” he added. Meanwhile, the rebel BJP legislators are still hopeful of a peaceful solution to this impasse after news that former BJP national President Kushabhau Thakre would meet them in the near future. “We have our demands, if those are fulfilled then we are ready for reconciliation,” said Mr Ramashish Rai, a rebel BJP legislator. Meanwhile, according to a UNI report from New Delhi, the BJP today made it clear that the Central leadership was willing to listen to party dissidents in Uttar Pradesh but not before they explained the reasons for ‘’hobnobbing with the rivals’’. The BJP was ever willing to listen to their grievances, but the party discipline was paramount, BJP General Secretary and spokesman Arun Jaitely told newspersons here. Mr Jaitely, however, ruled out any proposal to remove state party chief Vinay Katiyar and BJP Legislature party leader Lalji Tandon as demanded by the rebels. ‘’Such demands do not hold any ground,’’ he remarked. |
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NY Punjabis to adopt
Indian kids New Delhi, October 30 The WPO has earmarked about $ 25,000 for their education, Secretary General, Mr Vikramjit Singh Sahney, said today. Mr Sahney said the New York WPO headed by Mr Inder Bindra would sponsor their education up to the postgraduate-level. He said innumerable children in the country remained out of school because of poverty and lack of resources. He said the move aimed to encourage more such initiatives towards social causes. Mr Sahney also announced that the WPO would hold its next global meeting in New York in May, which would be attended by Punjabis from around the world. |
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Withdraw security: Giriraj New Delhi, October 30 In a strongly worded letter to the Home Secretary Kamal
Pande, the VHP senior vice-president said the ‘Y’ category security provided to him earlier had now been scaled down to ‘X’ category. Claiming that he had received several threatening letters which he had submitted to the officials concerned through his personal security officer, Mr Kishore said, “under ‘X’ category, no security is provided to me during my overnight stays at places outside Delhi.” He pointed out that no security personnel accompanied him if he happened to go by plane and return by train. Reminding the Home Secretary that he had made several requests to enhance his security cover, he said while for some time, wherever he went some persons were sent, many a time, no security personnel were sent despite intimation about his itinerary.
PTI |
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Study to ascertain epilepsy cause New Delhi, October 30 Prof Brian Neville, Head of Neurosciences at the Institute of Child Health, said the programme for which ground work had already begun, would conduct studies to find out the cause for epilepsy at the PGI in Chandigarh, Bangladesh and Kenya. “The Prince of Wales is the patron for the programme as he strongly feels that epilepsy is a major hidden problem which has not been recognised and given due attention,” said Professor Brian, who is here to attend the International Congress of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Allied Professions. Dr Pratibha Singhi from the Paediatrics Department at the PGI would be the resource person for the programme in India. “ We are already undertaking a study on high incidence of neurocystrcercosis at the PGI, where we have taken up the case of over 100 children,” said Dr Singhi. She said there was need to have a fresh look at the definition of disability as neither epileptic nor other children affected by serious neurological problems were included in the group. Professor Brian said though the incidence of epilepsy was about 0.5 to 1 per cent globally, yet the percentage of children facing seizures was 5 per cent. “The ground work and initial surveys have been undertaken in India, Kenya and Bangladesh as a team of scientists is already on the job,” he revealed. The situation in Kenya is grave, as in the case of children suffering from severe malaria , the problem can be compounded in case of epilepsy, he added. Dr Singhi said 20 to 30 per cent children with epilepsy had serious psycho-somatic problems, where the child is considered very vulnerable and thus over-protected. “Epilepsy is still considered a social stigma in our society with a lot of negative beliefs that go with it, and the treatment being restricted only to drugs as the behavioural problems remain more or less ignored,” she said. Dr Singhi said almost 50 per cent of the children suffering from epilepsy had serious learning problem, as their disease interfered with their performance at school. “However, the type of epilepsy, age at the onset of seizures and the underlying brain damage are the factors which determine the extent to which the child is affected by the disease,” she elaborated. She said epilepsy in children led to a large number of problems like emotional and behavioural disorders and affected their intelligence and learning. |
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Kirit Raval is Solicitor-General New Delhi, October 30 After a stint of four years as the Additional Solicitor-General, Mr Raval has been appointed to the coveted post, top official sources said. With Mr Salve not willing to continue as Law Officer, the government decided to give a promotion to 50-year-old
Raval, who becomes one of the youngest and the first from Gujarat to become the Solicitor-General. Holding an MBA degree from
IIM, Ahmedabad, Mr Raval had a meteoric rise in his career. He was designated Senior Advocate only seven years ago and was appointed as Additional Solicitor-General in May, 1998. Before his promotion, he was presenting the government defence in the Venkataswamy Commission probing into the allegations of corruption in the defence deals in the aftermath of Tehelka expose.
PTI |
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Advani for regional cooperation New Delhi, October 30 Inaugurating a seminar on “Regional co-operation for disaster reduction” organised by the government and the Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre, Mr Advani said, “There is a real threat today of disasters through the weapons of mass destruction including nuclear, biological and chemical related disasters.” |
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Farmers’ protest turns violent Mysore, October 30  |
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