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Making locals homeless for Tibetans
Anti-encroachment drive loses steam
Subsidised kerosene being sold to truck operators
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BJP opposed to house tax
Onkar Rana backs Mankotia
Motor cycle expedition flagged off
Special chance for compartment cases
A clarification
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Making locals homeless for Tibetans
Sar ki Dhar (Mandi), September 20 The villagers here allege that the government has targeted them, whose ancestors had settled here decades ago, while the Tibetan settlers, who came here in 1957 when the Dalai Lama, their spiritual and temporal head, made Dharamsala his home-in-exile, are getting a free run in the demarcated forest areas(DFA), about 9 km from the pilgrimage centre of Rewalsar in the district. With the help of the local authorities, the Tibetan settlers have been able to bring electricity to the caves, exposing pilgrims and locals along with their herds to the danger of getting electrocuted. The forest officials are slapping notice after notice on the locals in this regard under the Act, but they have not touched the Tibetan refugees, who have got power, water supply and built toilets and houses in and around the caves. Moreover, these caves have been turned into meditation centres for the chomos, Tibetan nuns. Voicing their grouse against the government policy, the villagers say that in 1994 the Forest Department issued eviction orders to certain villagers after the Act came into force. In 1985, the Division Forest Officer, Sundernagar, registered as many as 16 cases against the villagers here and ordered eviction of the houses owned by certain villagers. “We are poor and cannot afford the expenses of litigation. But I got stay orders from civil court, Mandi,” says Sant Ram, a villager, who is still fighting his case with the Forest Department. The Tribune team found that the Tibetans have built 10 small houses inside and around the caves along with toilets inside the DFA , violating the Act. Colourful Tibetan flags can be seen in the forest areas. The cows that graze in the wilds eat those littered on the ground and have died in a few cases, claimed Milki Ram, a villager. “We hold Guru Padsambhava and his consort Mandarva in great esteem. Sar ki Dhar is a pilgrimage centre for the Hindus since ages, but they don’t allow us a single hosue here,” they rued, adding that “it is a matter of livelihood for us as we depend on pilgrims for survival.” There are over 30-35 caves in the forest division of Sundernagar and 10-15 caves under the Mandi division. The Assistant Conservator of Forest(ACF), Sundernagar, had visited the place on June 24, 2003, and found that as many 40-42 refugees, including chomos, were living in caves and had raised meditation centres in the past five years. “But the report, it seems, has been dumped, ” revealed official sources. Mr Chander Shekhar Singh, Forest Conservator, Mandi division, said: “We treat everybody equally. But this is a religious issue and is being handled at a diplomatic level. We have to get permission from the Centre before taking action. We are aware about the violation”. “My grandfather had built the house much before the Act came into being, but the Sundernagar forest officials have booked me under it and demolished my house”, rued Sant Ram. The government is shying away from taking action as this may hurt the Dalai Lama, who has visited the holy caves a couple of times. “We have lighted the caves, got water and built toilets with the help of the government and the local pardhan”, said Sonam Hara, a disciple of guru Rimpoche. “The prayer flags are brought by the pilgrims and we can not hurt their sentiments”, he adds. The Tibetan residents admit that many have got electric shocks from the wires that get exposed during the rains, but add that this will be solved soon. Interestingly, Forest Minister Ram Lal Thakur, who was in Mandi yesterday, had stated that he would not spare the violators in the DFA, but his statement sounds hollow as these violations were brought to his notice. |
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Anti-encroachment drive loses steam
Shimla, September 20 The Forest Department swung into action as soon as the Chief Minister, Mr Virbhadra Singh, announced that encroachers would be ejected from forest land under a special campaign. As many as 643 illegal occupants were evicted and 190 hectares of forest area was freed from their possession in the months of June and July. In Rohru and Jubbal areas, where a number of orchards had come up on the encroached land, apple and other fruit plants were actually axed to teach a lesson to the offenders. Local people extended full support to the officials and in some cases where the officials seemed reluctant to fill the illegal orchards the womenfolk came forward and did the job. Since the Congress had made the disastrous policy of the previous Dhumal regime to regularise encroachments a major election issue, the new government was expected to take effective action to evict the illegal occupants. However, this has not happened. The drive gradually lost steam and it has almost come to a standstill. The policy had led to a spurt in encroachments and the number of such cases on forest land rose from 13,702 to over 72,000 overnight. The villagers took into possession vast tracts of land hoping that they would get the ownership under the regularisation policy. In all over 62,000 persons filed affidavits that they were in possession of forest land and applied for regularisation. It will take decades to evict such a large number of encroachers unless the government shows requisite political will and urgency in the matter. Officers of the Forest Department maintained that the drive was on. They attributed the slackness to delay in demarcation of the encroached land, which has to be carried out by the Revenue Department. The exercise has to be carried out for each case and as such it was bound to take time. The department has to proceed in the matter legally. Already the department has debarred the offenders from availing the TD facility under which timber is supplied to rights holders on concessional rates. Besides, the 62,000 odd cases detected on the basis of affidavits, there were 15,621 other cases involving 3294 hectares of forest land. Out of these, 5002 cases were pending in revenue courts and 5147 in the courts of Divisional Forest Officers and the challan was yet to be put up in the remaining cases. Over the years only 1919 cases were decided to evict encroachers from 764 hectares of land.
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Subsidised kerosene being sold to truck operators
Nurpur, September 20 Over lakh litres kerosene is allocated to 95 fair price shops in Nurpur sub division per month. The fuel meant for cooking purpose is used by the operators in lieu of diesel. Inquiries made by this correspondent reveal that there is a nexus between agents and fair price shops having kerosene-selling outlets. The latter provide kerosene to the operators through their network of reliable agents who collect the fuel from outlets in cans and supply them to the users at a premium of Rs 6 per litre. The consumer price of kerosene is Rs 10 per litre which is available to the operators at Rs 16 per litre whereas, diesel costs them Rs 24 per litre. Hence for them there is a direct saving of Rs 8 per litre. As a result, the operators are saving thousands of rupees daily. Certain fair price shops owners due to their political connection are doing business through this illegal trade. The frequent use of kerosene in diesel-run vehicles not only cause environment pollution but it also adversely affect the eyes of the passengers travelling in the private buses. One of the private operator on the condition of anonymity admitted that the use of kerosene as substitute to diesel has enhanced their profit in the transport industry in the area but its regular use damages carburettors of the vehicles which we have to replace every year by spending only Rs 3000 to 4000. Meanwhile, the police on Saturday arrested Surjeet Kumar, a depot holder while selling two drums of
kerosene to a truck driver at Bagga. A case has been registered against them. Local residents had complained to the police that the depot-holder was refusing kerosene to them but selling it in black. |
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11 pilgrims injured in road accident
Hamirpur, September 20 There were 50 persons in the tempo, according to Mr Madan Lal Grewal, DSP, Hamirpur. Local people gathered at the spot and took part in the rescue operations. The district authorities provided medicines and cash relief to the injured persons. The DSP told The Tribune here that all the seriously injured persons, including the driver, had been admitted to Hamirpur hospital for treatment where they were stated to be in serious condition. The Barsar police has registered a case against the tempo driver. |
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Swami Giri flays Uma for wearing saffron
Chamba, September 20 Addressing mediapersons here today, he said dishonouring the national Tricolour for political ends do not behove a sadhvi. “If Uma Bharti has any disagreement with AICC chief Ms Sonia Gandhi, it should be expressed gracefully and modestly like a sadhvi”, Swami Giri opined. “The people of India by voting Ms Sonia Gandhi to power at the Centre has shown their acceptance for her. Therefore, Uma Bharti should exclude the issue of her foreign origin from her agenda”, Swami Giri advised. Swami Giri said the “Tiranga Yatra” is a BJP’s campaign and not of the National Democratic Alliance
(NDA) as some allies of the NDA were against this shallow campaign. |
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BJP opposed to house tax
Shimla, September 20 In a statement here yesterday, he said self-occupied structures were exempted up to an area of 100 sq metres, keeping in view the fact that these were mostly built by middle-income group employees after raising loans. They would be hit hard due to the proposed tax. He suggested that the corporation should explore other avenues for increasing its income as housing was a basic need. He said eversince the Congress had come to power people were being burdened with taxes. Water charges had been increased manifold and the electricity tariff and parking charges had also been hiked steeply.Motor cycle expedition flagged off |
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Onkar Rana backs Mankotia
Dharamsala, September 20 Addressing a press conference, he gave a deadline of October 2 after which, he said Congress workers would even go to the extent of self-immolating and going on fast. He alleged that these statements criticising Major Mankotia’s concerns about Kangra district were orchestrated by somebody else. |
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Motor cycle expedition flagged off
Kumarhati, September 20 The expedition, organised to commemorate the 72th anniversary of the Indian Air Force, will cross over 2500 km distance in 12 days before reaching Kasauli on October 1. Capt. Mukhopadhyay, while handing over the Air Force Flag to the team leader, Flight Lieutenant V.V. Singh, exhorted the team members to keep alive the spirit of adventure in the life of the Air warriors. |
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Special chance for compartment cases
Shimla, September 20 Mr K.P. Doger, Controller of Examination, said that they could appear during the supplementary examinations to be held in October. He said that the students eligible to appear in the final chance could submit their admission forms with an examination fee of Rs 500 up to October 1 and thereafter a late fee would be charged as per university rules.
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A clarification
Mr B.S. Dehal, Sub-Divisional Magistrate-cum-Chairman, Baba Balak Nath Temple Trust, Barsar writes:
The news-item headlined
“Himachal orders inquiry into temple trust affairs” (September 20) is not factual. All sorts of facilities are provided by the Trust administration to the pilgrims and the pilferage of Trust funds has been plugged. This is evident from the fact that the income of the Trust has broken all records. There was never any problem to the pilgrims. Only those who want to run the affairs of the Trust according to their whims and fancies have been affected. They want to settle scores with the loyalists of the ruling party and in the process they are making me a scapegoat. I am carrying out the orders of the government sincerely, effectively and honestly. |
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