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HC notice to bank for harassment
Ex-bank chief held for fraud
Encroachers corner protected sites
NGO warns against unplanned development
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Popularity of DU language courses speaks volumes
Miranda House, every male student’s fancy
NCERT workshops on video script writing
‘Green city’ campaign launched by L-G at Lodhi Garden
Management expert’s foray into astrology
Lid off 10 robbery cases
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HC notice to bank for harassment
New Delhi, June 5 Justice H. R. Malhotra directed the bank and the police to respond to the petition filed by Yogesh Sharma, an Associate Professor at the Centre for Historical Research, JNU, within eight weeks and posted the matter for hearing on July 25. The court also asked the respondents to file a status report in this regard before the next date. Sharma alleged that the bank deliberately blocked payment to his brother Rakesh, who lost his mental balance. He went missing and was found dead in Mumbai on October 18 last. He accused the police of not taking any action when Rakesh went missing. In his petition filed through counsel N. K. Jha, he pointed out that as per the bank’s statement, on September 2004 the credit card outstanding was only Rs 7,966 when the card holder was alive. But immediately after his death, the bank inflated the bill to Rs 95,390, he alleged. The bank even illegally transferred the bank balance towards credit card outstanding after Rakesh’ death. Accusing the bank of using criminals to intimidate him so as to force him to make the payment, he said even his old parents were being harassed.
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Ex-bank chief held for fraud
Noida, June 5 The arrest was made in Noida by a team of CBCID from Meerut. According to sources, the ex-chief of the Urban Cooperative Bank is now involved in property business in Sector-12, Noida. The accused is a partner of one R. D. Sharma, who had been arrested by the Ghaziabad Police a few months ago. The accused R. C. Kaushik was sent on remand till June 17 by the judge of a Special Court in Meerut yesterday. According to information available, Kaushik was Chairman of the Urban Cooperative Bank in Saharanpur under Behat police station. According to a case registered in Saharanpur Kotwali on June 17, 2002, Kaushik had tampered with the bank documents and defrauded the bank of Rs 2.34 crore along with an associate, Ravi Kant Sharma. Kaushik was residing in Sector-12, Noida and was working as a property dealer. Meanwhile, the case was handed over to the CBCID. The SI in charge of police post Sector12-22 led the raid on Kaushik’s house in Sector-12 from where he was nabbed. The CBCID team left for Meerut on Saturday morning along with Kaushik. Kaushik confessed that he had accepted deposits in the Urban Cooperative Bank and distributed loans to people, but fake cheques were issued to the public, according to police sources. Through this method, Kaushik had embezzled Rs 2.34 crore from the bank, it was alleged.
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Encroachers corner protected sites
New Delhi, June 5 Topping the list of such protected monuments is Kashmere Gate in the walled city area. Kashmere Gate and a portion of the city wall, including the water bastions at the northern corner of the wall as also the ditch outside are encroached upon, the officials said, adding action for removal of encroachment was underway. Located in the Kashmere Gate area, The Lothian Road Cemetery is also plagued by encroachment. The encroachers have been issued notices as per provisions of the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958 and Rules, 1959. A small portion of the protected area at the Purana Qila has been encroached upon by the priest of Kunti Temple, the officials said. Situated in the Shahjahabad area of Delhi, the tomb of Razia Sultan in Mohalla Bulbuli Khana stands out as a classic example of a historical monument losing out in the tussle between the old and the new. The tomb has been encroached and is being misused by some members of the public. The Sarai Shahji located near Shivalik in Malviya Nagar in South Delhi has been encroached upon since the time it was declared a protected monument. Besides, a ‘maulvi’ is using the mosque there for running a madarsa. However, some local persons have got stay orders to maintain status-quo from the Delhi High Court, the officials said. Another monument, the Sunehri Masjid near Red Fort, is encroached since the time of its protection. Also among the encroached monuments and sites are the Tughluqabad area, the Begampuri Masjid, Lal Gumbad, Arab ki Sarai, Rajpur (Mutiny) Cemetery and the D’Eremao Cemetery. The officials said appropriate action under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act, 1958 and Public Premises Act, 1971, has been initiated by the Archaeological Survey of India for removal of encroachments.
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NGO warns against unplanned development
Gurgaon, June 5 A delegation of SURGE, a non-government organisation floated in 2000 under the Chairmanship of late J. N. Dixit, former National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, met the district authorities and presented the body’s vision of the growth of Gurgaon. SURGE was set up to play a prominent role to ensure a balanced and planed development of Gurgaon city. The broad sweep of the vision was that the city should develop with a soul, and should also emerge as a hub of cultural and educational activities. The delegation of SURGE that met the authorities included Mr M. C. Gupta, Mr P. M. Sinha, chief of Bata India, Mr Jyoti Sagar, a well-known lawyer, Mr M. N. Sharma, a former Engineer-in-Chief of Haryana and Mr Darshan Singh. Among the officials present in the meeting included the Deputy Commissioner, Gurgaon, Mr Sudhir Rajpal, HUDA Administrator, Gurgaon, Mr Anurag Aggarwal and the district police chief, Mr Yogender Nehra. The SURGE members impressed upon the need for planned growth of the city keeping future exigencies in view. The members apprehend that without conscious planning and expansion of the city there was a possibility of it converting into congested and clogged areas. The authorities were receptive to the ideas and suggestions from SURGE. A decision was taken in the meeting to shortlist issues and prepare action-points on which both the district administration and SURGE could harmonise their intellectual and material resources in the welfare of the city. A member of SURGE said that the meeting was successful and another round of meeting with the district authorities will be held shortly.
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Popularity of DU language courses speaks volumes
New Delhi, June 5 With work opportunities having long transcended geographical boundaries and shattered the barriers of language, fluency in a foreign tongue is considered a more paying proposition. “There is a great demand for students knowing foreign languages. Opportunities both in India and abroad are plenty, which is why the enrolment figures are increasing each year,” said an official in Delhi University’s Arabic Department. The department offers a certificate course, a diploma, an advanced diploma apart from MA, M.Phil. and Ph.D. programmes. “There are many takers for the courses. There are more than 20 countries that use the Arabic language, besides its use in embassies and translation jobs,” he said. Echoing the view that language experts have takers, Dr Shashwati Mazumdar, HOD, Department of Germanic and Romance Studies said, “There are jobs in the tourism industry, the corporate sector and the multinationals. The Indian tourism industry particularly is looking out for those who have learnt a foreign language.” And with increasing vistas, it is no longer just French and German. “There are students opting for Portuguese and Hispanic,” Dr Mazumdar said. Citing other reasons for the popularity of the courses, he said, “The CBSE has decided to expand the component of foreign languages in school curriculum and even the European Union is investing in the standardisation of language teaching programs.” And while most students make a beeline for popular courses like English and Economics, there is a substantial number, which is opting for Chinese, Japanese and Korean. “We have 50 seats in each language and students are keen to enrol for our courses. If in the past, it was Japanese and Korean that were more popular, now students are as interested in Chinese,” said an official at the Department of East Asian Studies. “We run both part-time and full-time courses. Job avenues for our students are plenty. There are embassies and even airlines that send us information about vacancies,” he said. While the Department of Modern Indian Languages, which offers 11 languages also claims that with the translation of Indian languages and research gaining importance globally, students are keen to enrol. However, sources said the popularity of the courses is on the decline. “If the emoluments are increased, there are a lot more students who would love to go for teaching. There are quite a few openings for teachers of Indian languages, be it Telegu, Manipuri, Bengali or Oriya,” said Ms Pramodini of the Department. But sources said, “Competition and lack of time to devote for an in-depth study and research are responsible for not many opting for the Indian languages, because the returns are less.” There is a need for more support to the Indian languages, to make them lucrative. Another official of the department said, “There should be more money sanctioned for research and teaching of these languages, otherwise there will be few takers for them.”
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Miranda House, every male student’s fancy
New Delhi, June 5 Akhil Kumar is hoping to make it to “the college that has attracted every male student’s fancy”, by enrolling for an add-on course. “We were always curious about what happens inside MH (as the college is popularly known),” he said. Fulfilling that desire, the college started vocational courses for boys for the first time last year. The college opened its doors to boys and six lucky ones joined the theatre direction course. “They were the few who found out about the course, but this year the list of applicants is fairly long,” said Akhil. The decision to open its doors for male students was welcomed by both girls and boys. While the mainstream courses are strictly meant for girls, boys can only
be admitted to the vocational courses. The University Grants Commission (UGC) had sent a circular to some of the girls’ colleges in Delhi University to admit boys in the vocational courses such as theatre direction, web designing and office automation and tourism. The admissions to these courses were held in August, because of delay in implementation and time-consuming procedures. These courses are self-financed and held in the afternoon to facilitate the college students to pursue them after their regular course, said the college official. Each of these courses has 20 seats and come at a price. While the tourism course costs Rs 35,000, theatre direction and web designing cost Rs 15,000 each. The theatre production course is run in collaboration with the National School of Drama (NSD) and the tourism course is run in collaboration with Birds travel agency.
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NCERT workshops on video script writing
New Delhi, June 5 The 10-day workshop for script writing and TV production and a six-day workshop on animation is being organised in collaboration with National Bal Bhawan. The workshops will be organised from June 6 to 16, 2005 for Video Script Writing & TV Production and from June 15 to 22, 2005 for Animation. The Video Script Writing & Production Workshop will take the child participants through a journey of evolving a script for a video programme, doing research for it and finally writing a story board and then producing the programme, first using non-professional equipment and then professional equipment. The Animation workshop would encourage the children to evolve an animated character and then sketch and finalise it, weave a story around that character and do the animation accordingly. Expected by-product of these two workshops is that they may generate software for children by the children.
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‘Green city’ campaign launched by L-G at Lodhi Garden
New Delhi, June 5 The apex trading chamber, the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Assocham), in collaboration with the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) and Green Circle today launched a massive movement of planting at least three lakh plants in and around the national Capital on the occasion of World Environment Day. The “Greening the City Campaign’’, was launched by the Delhi Lt-Governor, Mr B. L. Joshi, here at the Lodhi Garden today. Speaking on the occasion, Mr Joshi said, ‘’Apart from the people, it is the children who need to be totally committed and conscious about the planet’s life. Only then can we have a totally green world.’’ He also said the government has also initiated several schemes to maintain and preserve the ecological balance by way of recycling the waste materials gathered from various locations in Delhi. The Governor, however, called upon the people to establish partnership with the nature and environment to regenerate it for the future generation. The Chairman of Assocham Expert Committee on Environment, Shekhar Borker, said Lodhi Garden had been chosen as the venue of the event as it has become a focal point of the successful greening of Delhi. ‘’Moreover, Lodhi Garden was selected as the best urban oasis in Asia by the ‘’Time’’ Magazine recently, he said. According to an Assocham official, the campaign is basically an awareness programme, which would be taken further with the help of other environmental organisations and NGOs. The Assocham has already launched a campaign among its constituents to plant saplings in over 7,000 villages across the country, he said.
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Project on garbage disposal in trans-Yamuna
New Delhi, June 5 According to the Chairman of the Trans-Yamuna Development Board, Dr Narendra Nath, 32 hydraulic trucks and 1,600 big plastic dustbins have been purchased at a cost of Rs 9 crore to initiate this unique project. “The cost of a single truck is Rs 11 lakh and that of a dustbin Rs 34,000. Every constituency will be provided with two trucks and 100 dustbins. The garbage storage capacity of each dustbin is 6 cubic metre tons. It is equivalent to the storage capacity of a common truck. The firm through which the trucks have been purchased will take the responsibility of maintaining these trucks for at least five years.” Dr Nath informed that apart from the MLAs and councillors, the board is also going to seek the help of the Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs), especially to monitor the project. “The dustbins will be set up in different locations on the advice of RWAs. The collected garbage will be transported to the nearest sanitary landfill areas by these trucks. The project is likely to be inaugurated by the Chief Minister, Mrs Sheila Dikshit, in the third week of this month,” said Dr Nath. A meeting in this regard was recently held at the board’s office in which apart from Dr Nath, the board’s Vice-Chairman, Mr A. S. Gulati, Chairman of the East Delhi Vikas Samiti, Mr Amrish Singh Gautam and the Chairman of the North-East District Vikas Samiti, Mr Vir Singh Dhigan, were also present.
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Tuning in to Santhal life to commemorate World Environment Day
Ravi Bhatia Tribune News Service
New Delhi, June 5 The soaring temperatures in the Capital have had a dampening effect on the art scene. There have been no major exhibitions or shows in the past few days which, according to those who claim to be in the know of things, is indicative of the general lethargy that the heat has spawned. This is cyclical, they would have us believe. Once the weather improves, things would be back to normal, they assure. But heat has not held back a few die-hard artists who have struggled in the heat and dust to put up exhibitions to commemorate the World Environment Day today. An exhibition of paintings by Dhananjay entitled, “The Tune of Santhal Life in Summer,” is on at the Habiart Gallery here and will continue till June 15. Another exhibition, this of photographs by Ravi Shekhar on sustainable cities, is also on till June 30 at Delhi O’ Delhi. Vatsalaya with its slogan of ‘Awareness Through Art’, ‘Thinking Through the Heart’, is holding an exhibition of paintings of Yavnika Khanna and Pulkit Khanna. Both Yavnika and Pulkit excel in painting animals in their natural habitat. The exhibition is on till June 9. Exhibition of indigenous cartoon characters
Those who are interested in the genesis of the Hindi comic strip would do well to take a walk down to the Visual Art Gallery here any day from June 10 to July 31. The Gallery is hosting a unique exhibition of characters out of the popular Hindi comic strip by the well- known veteran cartoonist
Pran, who has regaled thousands of readers every day through the antics of famous characters like Chacha Chowdhary,
Sabu, Pinki, Babloo and Shrimatiji. This is perhaps for the first time that the entire exhibition has been devoted to indigenous cartoon characters straight out of the comic strips.
Fusion of Nritya and Natya at IIC
Delhi-based Sadanand Biswas, young up-and-coming Kathak exponent, will present a fusion of Nritya and Natya at the India International Centre here on June 10. The performance, titled
“Abhiman”, will depict the pangs of separation suffered by Radha when Krishana repeatedly spurns her entreaties to visit
Vrindavan. Sadanand, a disciple of Guru Rajendra Kumar Gangani, received his initial training in the traditional dance form under the guidance of Mr Nirmal Nag. Simultaneously, he learnt the creative dance style of Rabindra Nritya from Mr Kartik Saha. Because of his intense interest in Kathak, he went on to join the National Institute of Kathak Dance here and trained under Guru Gangani of the Jaipur
Gharana. During this period, he received several scholarships because of his total devotion to the
art. Sadanand has participated in several solo and group performances in the country and abroad.
Best of François Truffaut at Alliance Française
Alliance Française, the Embassy of France and Federation of Film Societies of India are jointly bringing nine of legendary director Francois Truffaut’s most acclaimed films from June 6 to June 12, as a tribute to the master. All the films will be screened at the Alliance headquarters in Lodhi Estate and will have English sub-titles. An influential film critic, leading new wave director and an heir to the humanistic cinematic tradition of Jean Renoir, Truffaut made films that reflected his three professed passions–a love of cinema, an intense interest in male/female relationship and a fascination with children.
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Slowdown in land-buying activity in NCR: Report
New Delhi, June 5 In its latest market report, Cushman & Wakefield (C&W) said, “The purchase activity in the middle-income segment has witnessed a decline as compared to the scenario in last 9-12 months.” Demand for residential space would remain active across NCR and would be met through a combination of existing and new supplies. “Thereby values are expected to remain stable,” C&W said. Suburbs like Gurgaon saw lower off-take in the secondary market, indicating signs of stabilisation of capital values. Average price of independent residential house in Grade A locations of the Capital ranged between Rs 75,000 - Rs 1.75 lakh per square yard. However, ongoing supply of residential space coupled with intense retail activity and infrastructure developments, including the metro rail network have kept interest active.
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Management expert’s foray into astrology
New Delhi, June 5 According to Dr Shanker Adawal, who is currently with the Reliance group, got interested in astrology when he was very young, thanks to the influence of his father, who had authored a book on the effect of Venus in astrology after decades of research. Dr Adawal did his jyotishacharaya (the MBA and the Ph.D. came much later) and has been pursuing the subject with relentless energy despite his busy scheduled as a top executive. The book, “Bhrigu Samhita – Predicted Techniques Deciphered,” is the result of over three decades research on the subject. Dr Adawal claims that his desire to share the findings of this research along with the new dimensions that can be added to this ancient science prompted him to write. The book, liberally splattered with explanatory charts, gives and in depth study of the various permutations and combinations that help in forecasting events. The book is of considerable value to both the practicing astrologer as well as the lay man to comprehend the often confusing and confounding system in the traditional form of astrology.
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Lid off 10 robbery cases
New Delhi, June 5 The police said that the gang adopted a unique modus operandi for committing the crime. First they asked for bidi (smoking) or ‘khaini’ from a person whom they wanted to rob. As the person engaged in conversation, the other members of the gang caught hold of the person and took him to an isolated place where they committed sodomy and then robbed him of his belongings. In 2003, the accused killed one Savita Dhamija, a resident of West Patel Nagar and looted a sum of Rs 70,000 and gold chain from her possession. The police claimed to have recovered the gold chain from their possession. “There are a number of similar incidents where the accused looted a number of persons and killed him thereafter,” the police said.
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Wanted criminal held with weapons
New Delhi, June 5 The police said that the accused was the member of Anwar Thakur Gang and was on run for many months. While most of the other members of the gang were in jail, he was evading arrest for a long time.
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Yoga cure for cervical spondylitis
New Delhi, June 5 It was emphasised in the seminar that instead of taking medicines, people should make exercise as well as comforting gentle message on the neck with herbal oil followed by a few minutes in the steam room that will give a permanent relief to the patient.
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Cambridge scholarship
New Delhi, June 5
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