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| Thursday,
April 3, 2003, Chandigarh, India
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Truckers hurt in group clash Dera Bassi, April 2 According to sources, the problem brewed during the election process of the union held in the office of the truck operators union this afternoon. Mr Surjit Lal of Meerpur village was elected president of the union but some members of the union allegedly tried to grab the stage in protest against the presidentship. Armed with sharp-edged weapons, the resenting group, accompanied by some students of the local college, attacked members of the rival group leaving Mr Gurcharan Singh, former president of the union , and Mr Tajinder Singh severely injured. Mr Gurcharan Singh sustained severe injuries on his head, eye and all over the body while middle finger of the right hand of Mr Tajinder Singh was chopped off in the clash. Mr Sarabjit Singh, alias Tinka, also sustained injuries. All three
injured were admitted to the local Civil Hospital. The armed persons stormed into the union office, raised slogans, pelted stones and smashed the windowpanes of the rooms. They fled from the scene after leaving behind an Indica car (PB-11R-0065). The incident occurred two hours after the election was held peacefully. Meanwhile, the police has started investigating the matter but no case was registered till late in the evening. |
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City to have 19 ‘e-centres’ Chandigarh, April 2 The "e-centres" will be the first major step towards the idea of "e-governance", floated by the Chandigarh Administration. The centres will be located at the existing 19 bill collection centres of the Electricity Department. At a high-level meeting, chaired by
the Adviser to the UT Administrator, Mr Virendra Singh, it was decided to have a citizen’s portal on which various services will be launched. With the new system, work relating to the registration of vehicles, registration of birth and deaths, sales tax, estate office, power department, all offices of the Municipal Corporation and the Chandigarh Housing Board, would be carried out at a single window. At present, residents have to travel to these offices to deposit money. Once the single-window system is in place, a man living in Mani Majra and wanting to pay a bill need not go far away but just to the nearest bill collection centre. Meanwhile, heads of all departments were called in to prepare their own backgrounders on what kind of changes will be required in the functioning of departments to implement the e-governance project. At the outset, the proposal is to have payment of all bills like power and water payable at any of these centres. Similarly, thousands of city residents deposit monthly instalments for the CHB flats and lease money with the Estate Office. The single windows will also include registration of vehicles, depositing of forms, money and deliver registration certificates. The same will be the formula for the registration of births and deaths. Mr Karan Avatar Singh, Secretary, Information Technology, said top software companies would be called in to prepare the software for running these centres. |
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Red alert sounded on ‘pneumonia’ Chandigarh, April 2 The UT Administrator, Lt-Gen J.F.R. Jacob (retd), has directed the Health Department and the GMCH-32 to coordinate so that all preventive measures could be taken in case of an emergency. He asked them to specially screen foreign tourists coming from the affected countries. In response to the communication received from the Union Ministry for Health and Family Welfare, the Director Health Services, Dr C.P. Bansal, today chalked out an extensive plan to deal with the situation in case of an emergency due to the mysterious pneumonia, also known as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). One ward each in the General Hospital and the GMCH-32 have been set up so that the condition of patients reporting to emergency could be monitored. “We have sent a copy of the WHO surveillance report to all private doctors, the Indian Medical Association and heads of department so that any patient showing symptoms of the killer disease is immediately isolated and his condition monitored," said Dr Bansal. He added that all cases of high fever with respiratory symptoms would be examined by medical specialists round the clock in three shifts and complete record would be maintained. “The causative organism and the mode of transportation of SARS has not been identified so far. The infection is perhaps spreading through aerosol/ droplets in persons having close contact with the cases, especially healthcare workers," read the communication from the Union Health Ministry, sent to the Advisor, Mr Virender Singh. Dr J.K. Kalra, has been made the nodal officer who shall remain in touch with the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD). The Female Trauma Ward with 12 beds has been readied , while the para medical staff has been asked to take precautionary measures by wearing gloves and masks. It has been ensured that IV fluids and medicine stocks are kept ready. If any case is reported, blood samples will be sent to the NICD and the PGI.
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TRIBUNE EXCLUSIVE
Chandigarh, April 2 The notice has been issued by the department in the wake of the recent landmark judgment of the Supreme Court, whereby it has been made clear that the telecom companies are liable to pay sales tax on telephone rentals also. The BSNL has been asked to produce details of rentals collected from subscribers between March 8, 1999 and March 31, 2003, by April 7 this year, failing which the department will proceed on its own. The rate of sales tax, it may be mentioned was 13.2 per cent (in 1999). Now it rests at 4.4 per cent. Earlier under the Department of Telecom (now BSNL is a limited company under the disinvestment scheme), the BSNL was the sole agency providing telephone connections throughout the region. In that system, it used to supply telephone sets to consumers and charge subscribers for the use of these instruments. Apart from this, the BSNL has also been collecting rentals from telephone subscribers for using land line telephone facilities, but has not been paying any sales tax on the same, on grounds that this provision is covered under service and not sale. Now that the apex court has stepped in with its judgement, upholding that even the telephone rentals collected from subscribers are covered under the definition of sales and hence sales tax would be liable on them, the Administration has decided to swing into action to realise sales tax on telephone rentals. Officials say that the amount thus collected will be phenomenal. According to sources in Excise and Taxation Department, the notices for procuring sales tax on telephone rentals are being issued for the first time.  |
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Carnivores get meat after two days Chhat Bir (Patiala), April 2 As the bell rang at about 5.30 pm, the lion safari inmates assembled in front of the gates and pounced upon the meat chunks after they were permitted to enter their houses. The zoo authorities had sent a team of employees, led by Mr Arun Kumar, Range Officer, to Saharanpur to procure the required quantity of meat last night. The team returned this afternoon with the feed. Sources in the zoo said last night some big cats along with their newborn cubs were fed chicken, which is comparatively soft for the cubs. The chickens were purchased from the open market. When contacted, Mr Kuldeep Kumar, zoo Director, termed the accident of the official Canter as unfortunate incident, which forced the animals to go without food. “My priority was to procure food for the carnivores, which had to suffer because of the fault of others. Since there was no slaughtering in Saharanpur due to the ongoing agitation against VAT, the meat was procured on a special demand today,” claimed Mr Kumar. He further informed that meat for two days — Thursday and Friday — would be procured in bulk on Thursday itself as the slaughter houses would be closed on Friday. Their quota of meat for Friday would be procured on Thursday only, he said. Meanwhile, efforts were being made to purchase meat from slaughter houses from places like Meerut and Muzaffarnagar to meet the requirement in case of any emergency, he added. It may be recalled that over 100 carnivores of the zoo went without food on Tuesday because of an accident of the vehicle that was sent to Saharanpur to procure buffalo meat. The zoo vehicle that was being used in transporting the food stuff reportedly had a collision with a motor cycle, accompanying a protest rally organised against VAT near Saharanpur. Irate protesters had also assaulted three zoo employees — Mr Harpal Singh, a forest guard, Mr Prem Dutt, a cook, and Mr Manoj Kumar, a driver — travelling in the vehicle. |
No check on sale of adulterated food items SAS Nagar, April 2 With the onset of summer, rehriwallahs are doing brisk business, selling everything from cut fruit, non-branded ice creams, ice candies, sugarcane juice to locally manufactured soft drinks, most of them openly flouting the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act. However, no action has been taken to prevent the spread of summer-related diseases due to the uncontrolled sale of these items by the district health officials in Ropar. Operating from markets and public parks, these rehri and phari wallahs are selling cool relief for cheap. A locally made ice cream costs anything between Rs 2 to Rs 5, while a branded ice cream is available for Rs 5 to Rs 30. According to food inspectors working in Chandigarh, there locally made ice creams are generally prepared in unhygienic conditions and are not up to the mark in the content ratio of fat, milk and sugar for which there should to be checked. Doctors point out that merely getting glasses washed before consuming juices from rehris is not enough to ensure that the product is hygienic. Ice candies are the most dangerous, they say. The ice used by them is sub-standard and the colours used are non-permissible and carcinogenic. Similarly water used for washing and keeping cut fruit and salad items may also are cause many diseases. Dr A.P. Choudhry District Health Officer, Ropar, who heads a team of food inspectors, says they are aware of the problems and will start taking samples of these products soon. ‘Iin case these items are found to be adulterated these will be destroyed and the sale of such products will be banned,” he says. However, he also points out that the results of these samples are not available before 40 days and no action can be taken before that. |
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16,000 trees behind Sukhna saved Chandigarh, April 2 According to the proposal, the silt dredged from the lake bed was to be dumped in about 28 hectares of forest land behind the lake. But the Forest Department opposed it pointing out that the trees once buried under the silt dredged from the lake bed would not grow again. The department would instead have to go for the plantation of fresh trees and shrubs. This would take years for the vegetation to renew itself. Despite resistance from the department, the administration did not give up the proposal land, forcing the department to approach the Government of India for permission to utilise the Forest Department for non-forest purposes. It was pointed out that prior approval of the Centre was required under Section 2 of the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980. The permission was granted by the Union Government vide its communication dated February 26, 2002, but it was subject to certain conditions which were as follows: a. Legal status of forest land shall remain unchanged. b. After temporary use of the forest land, the area would be planted up with local species. c. The 11 hectares of private land acquired for the purpose of dumping site shall be transferred and mutated in favour of the Forest Department, Chandigarh. After completion of works, the area would be planted with local species which would be subsequently declared reserved or protected forest under the Indian Forest Act, 1927. However, now that the Administration has given up the proposal, the sword of Damocles which hung over the forest behind the lake has been removed for the time being. But the Administration’s new proposal to raise by a couple of feet the level of the sill on which the radial gates of the regulator rest is also mired in controversy and it is not certain if the Administration would finally go ahead with it or not. |
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INLD wooing BJP councillors
Panchkula, April 2 With Chief Minister, Om Prakash Chautala today himself asking BJP Councillor and the Haryana Beopar Mandal chief, Mr Chander Bhan Goel, to play the kingmaker, speculations of a possible truck between the two parties, at least in the Municipal Council, have increased. The Chief Minister reportedly asked Mr Goel to ensure that the president of the council here was elected by consensus, though he yet again disappointed local councillors by not giving any indication for his choice of the president . Today’s move of wooing the BJP councillors is being seen as a last-ditch effort on part of the INLD to get absolute majority and thus elect their own president. The BJP had won three seats in the Municipal Council elections held in January this year. The INLD had won a mere seven seats, while 16 seats were won by the Congressmen, who had defied party diktats by jumping in the fray. The remaining five were won by independents. The HPCC, which had earlier boycotted the polls, too, prodded by the win of its members, threw its hat in the ring for the post of president. Though the INLD finally managed to win over five councillors, originally belonging to the Congress, and the independents, thus increasing its strength to 16, the Congress again managed to reorganise its partymen and win at least three of these councillors back. It was thus that the INLD-backed 14 councillors formed the Panchkula Development Group, while the Congress-backed 12 councillors formed the Progressive Councillors Group. These councillors, in their effort to gain control over the MC, decided to shed their party affiliation and projected themselves as belonging to an independent group, opposed to the Panchkula Development Group of the INLD-backed councillors. The latter are projecting Ms Seema Chaudhary, wife of the INLD state secretary, Mr Amardeep Chaudhary, as their presidential candidate. It is in such a scenario that Mr Chautala has now tried to woo the three BJP councillors on their side , who will be the deciding factor in the appointment of the president of the first Municipal Council of Panchkula. |
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Navratra Fair begins
Panchkula, April 2 The Haryana Chief Minister, Mr Om Prakash Chautala, accompanied by his wife Ms Sneh Lata and the Minister of State for Urban Development, Mr Subhash Goyal, was among the first persons who paid obeisance at the shrine. Earlier, they also performed a ‘Yajna’ at the complex. Mr Chautala also released a cassette of ‘Bhajans’ entitled ‘Shri Mata Mansa Devi Bhakti Geet’. He honoured Dr Mathura Dutt Pandey for writing the ‘bhajans’ and getting the cassette prepared on his own. Later, Mr Chautala inaugurated a 66-KV sub-station at the complex constructed at a cost of Rs 3.36 crore. Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Minister said the Haryana Power Utilities had supplied 53 per cent more power to the agriculture sector during the past year to save the crops from the drought conditions. Efforts were being made to increase the generation of power as a result of which Haryana would be able to supply power to the deficit states after two years, he added. A sum of Rs 56 crore has so far been spent by the present Government to improve the availability of power in Panchkula district. A 66-KV sub-station was under construction at Kalka and the work to set up a similar sub-station in Sector 3 of Panchkula has also been taken in hand. The over-loaded 11-KV sub-stations would be bifurcated into seven small feeders, he added. |
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Dog menace triggers panic Mullanpur Garibdass, April 2 As per information, the woman, Jagir Kaur, who was bitten by a dog on February 19, died on March 30 due to rabies. During the past two months nearly 24 cases of dog bite had been reported from the area. However, the UT Health authorities said they had no such information, but they would look into the matter in case such incidents had taken place. Villagers said during the past few days a large number of victims had visited the Sector 19 Civil Dispensary, Chandigarh. The villagers said the victims include Jaswinder, Manpreet, Gurdeep, Kulwant and Randhir. At least five such cases had been reported from Majra village. Similar cases were also reported at Jayanti Majri village. Ram Pal, who is also a victim, said he got the anti-rabies vaccines from the Sector 19 Civil Dispensary. “In the absence of proper medical facilities available in the area, the victims had to rush to Chandigarh”, lamented Mr Hardyal Singh, lambardar of Majra village . The Chief Medical Officer, Ropar, could not be contacted for his comments. |
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Project
launched Chandigarh, April 2 This will include vermiculture, bio-technology, information
and communication technology and macro-water harvesting, said
Mr Deepak Saini, Technical Director of the NGO.
In a press note issued here today, he said, the first
awareness workshop on vermiculture would be at Kajheri village
on April 6.
This would be followed by an introduction on Simputer on
the same day by Mr Jagdish Singh Ranawat. |
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Defence Ministry team visits firm Chandigarh, April 2 The visit was scheduled to supervise quality assurance of their products. This team comprised Director General and Deputy Director General. |
Local doctor booked Panchkula, April 2 Dr Tarsem Lal Jindal, Nirmal and two others reportedly threatened Harbans Lal on March 27 with a gun and forcibly took away Rs 4.5 lakh from him. A case under Sections 406, 420 and 506 of the IPC has been registered. Meanwhile, Dr Jindal has alleged that he has been framed in this case. Talking to Chandigarh Tribune, he said Harbans Lal, who was a friend turned foe had borrowed Rs 5 lakh from him last year in August and in spite of repeated reminders had failed to give him the money back. He said Harbans Lal gave him a cheque for the said sum which bounced. He had filed a case under Section 138 of Negotiable Instruments Act against Harbans Lal. Dr Jindal said Mr Harbans Lal had got him booked in the case to get even with him. Purse stolen: Senior journalist Kidar Nath’s pocket was picked by a miscreant, when he had gone to pay obeisance at the Mansa Devi temple on Wednesday. A sum of Rs 1500, bank ATM cards, and some documents were in the purse. |
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Excise evasion of 1.70 cr detected Panchkula, April 2 This commissionerate covers six districts namely Panchkula, Karnal, Ambala, Kaithal, Kurukshetra and Yamunanagar. Officials of the commissionerate say the maximum evasion of the central excise is from the brass and copper sector. Presently, the commissionerate has 550 assessees. Mr Sirohi also informed that a new service tax division here had been set up. He said as now 51 services were covered under the service tax. He said revenue from the service tax had shown an increase from Rs 9.32 crore last year to Rs 13. 38 crore this year. |
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3 held in rape case Chandigarh, April 2 The three accused — Jai Mangal of Mauli Jagran and Badal and Ravinder Singh of Bapu Dham Colony — were named in the FIR registered on March 28. |
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1.1 quintal meat, pork seized Chandigarh, April 2 A senior official of the MOH wing told TNS that the meat and pork was unstamped and was not slaughtered at the slaughter house of the MC. The fish was being sold in the open outside the shop. |
MARKET SPOTLIGHT SECTOR-19-D ONE of the oldest markets in the city is Sector 19-D. It has 46 shops and another 16 booths. First shops here had started coming up in 1956. Today 45 years later, it has some of the better known shops selling cloth, leading departmental store and a leading stationery shop which stocks all kinds of forms required in government transactions, besides shops selling photographic equipment. In all these years the city has grown. The market, despite its quite upper-end clientele, needs total revamping. Its parking is cramped and in certain areas almost non-existent. The concept of having living quarters for shopkeepers above their own shops seems outdated. Shopkeepers want a change and have requested the Chandigarh Administration to permit commercial activity on the first and second floor instead of the living quarters. The president of the market, Mr Jagdish Kapoor, informs that no one uses the living quarters provided on the upper floors for residential purposes. The change from residential to commercial use should be allowed immediately. The Administration can levy a conversion fee, he says, and permit it. This is one of the major demands of the market. A majority of the shopkeepers are owners and they want to expand their establishments due to a rise in the number of family members who are dependent upon trade. The market was the third market to come up after Sectors 22 and 27 markets. About four decades ago the old Kalka-Ropar road used to run very near to the market. Also, the market was very near to the Nagla adda which was then an important bus-stop on the route coming from Punjab. Le-Courbusier and his team also built quarters for themselves in Sector 19, and important offices of the Punjab government moved into the old building, which now houses the Forest Department. Slowly, the market started developing as a counter-magnet to the one in Sector 22. As Chandigarh was established in the early fifties, a large number of people who had migrated from areas which now comprise Pakistan arrived in the city. Some of them opted to have shops in Sector 19. Now doubt sentiments run deep. A leading shop is Pindi Emporium. This denotes that the shopkeeper has arrived from Rawalpindi in Pakistan. Another departmental store is called Peshawari, which tells that the owners had come in from Peshawar, also in Pakistan. The president of the market sums it up when he traces his own origins, saying “we are refugees.’’ Now the market needs a parking lot. Due to faulty planning some of the shops have no parking places in front of them. A row of booths also have no parking. The Municipal Corporation is planning to do something as the shopkeepers met the local MP, Mr Pawan Bansal, for funds from his local area development fund. Among the major demands include creation of more parking. Probably the wide footpaths will have to give away for extending the parking. Right opposite the market in Sector 19-A, there is an open area which is not to be used for any purpose. Shopkeepers demand that this open area should be the parking lot so that at least some cars can be parked there. Secretary of the market Madal Lal Sachdeva tells that he collects Rs 100 from all shop owners and Rs 60 from all booth owners . This is required for the watchman and other small expenses. Mr Ashok Sachdeva, whose father came here in 1957, forms the younger lot of shopkeepers. In his opinion the market can even be better. He explains how the matter of converting residential areas into commercial areas is vital for growth. The market has about 10 shops where ladies dress material is sold, making it a must visit for women of the city and also from surrounding townships. Within the market, all in not well. Residents of Sector 19-D say besides the parking problem there is also a case of blocking of pathways by some shops, making it difficult for visitors to even walk. This needs to be cleared up as some shopkeepers have just extended their shops. |
Mobile card
launched Chandigarh, April 2
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