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Gurgaon publicity mafia offered me money: Minister
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Plan to restrict the number of Blue Line buses plying in city
Directorate on road safety to be set up
MCD to repair roads after end of monsoon season
Spy network in league with Pak mission
Sales Tax site making our secrets public, allege traders
Controversy over Delimitation Commission’s proposal
Pak nationals queue up for liver transplants
Tree plantation campaign by WWF-India
Three-day NCERT meeting begins
Life for man who kidnapped minor for ransom
Two gangsters arrested
Police station gheraoed over murder
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‘Enraged’ man shoots wife, kills 2 children
New Delhi, July 18 While the two children, Manav (9) and Manavi (7) died instantaneously, the woman Meenu Ahuja is struggling for her life in a Delhi Hospital. The businessman, Naveen Ahuja, later surrendered to the police and said that he had committed the acts in a fit of rage. The country-made pistol with which he shot his wife has been recovered by the police. The police said that the businessman was going through a period of extreme depression for the last few days because of heavy financial losses of about Rs 50 lakh. The accused owns a sweets shop in Satya Niketan in Moti Bagh area. He had shifted to the Dwarka flat only two days ago from Gautam Nagar area in South Delhi. While his son studied in Father Agnel school in Gautam Nagar, his daughter was a student of Bal Bharti school. The police said that the incident took place at around 6.15 am this morning when the victims were sleeping. The accused first shot his wife and then threw his son from the front balcony. He then strangulated his daughter and threw her from the second balcony of his seventh floor flat. Incidentally, when the incident took place, Ahuja’s mother and sister were also present in the house. The police are now questioning the accused about the incident and also about the weapon. The accused reportedly told the police that he tried to commit suicide after committing the crime, but the weapon failed to fire. Hundreds of residents of the predominantly middle class colony came out of their homes as the news of the tragedy spread in the colony at about 8 am. this morning, only to watch in awe the bodies of the two young children lying spread-eagled on the concrete outside the multi-storeyed residential building.
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Gurgaon publicity mafia offered me money: Minister
Gurgaon, July 18 While speaking to mediapersons here today, Capt Ajay Yadav alleged that he was offered Rs 1 crore per month for keeping out of the hoarding issue in Gurgaon district. Capt Yadav was here to chair a meeting of the district officials for addressing public grievances. It may be recalled that Capt Yadav has been raising the hoarding issue since the Congress government came into power in the state. The District administration had recently cancelled five agreements executed with different advertisement agencies during the tenure of the previous government. Of the five agreements, three agreements were signed by the Estate Officer (EO) and two agreements by the Executive Engineers of Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA), allegedly without taking permission from their seniors. HUDA Administrator Anurag Aggarwal did not rule out the involvement of some staff members in the scam as some of the important files were found missing from the office when the scam was unearthed two months back. Afterwards the administration had floated open tenders for putting advertisements and hoarding in the city, dividing it into six parts. However, the advertisement agencies whose agreements were cancelled approached the court against the tender process and took a stay from the Punjab and Haryana High Court. Interestingly, on July 16, the court extended the stay for one month, up to August 17, the next date of hearing. Gurgaon Deputy Commissioner Sudhir Rajpal informed that the administration had decided to approach the court for an early hearing of the case as the administration would suffer huge financial losses due to the stay. According to sources close to ad agencies, Gurgaon is the first district in Haryana which has floated tenders for advertisement agencies. It might get around Rs 10 crore as revenue in the process. If the scheme is implemented properly here, it can be expanded to other parts of the state, said Mr Sudhir Rajpal.
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Plan to restrict the number of Blue Line buses plying in city
New Delhi, July 18 Since there are about 4,500 Blue Line buses in Delhi, the resultant unhealthy competition leads to route and time table violations, over-speeding and accidents, many of them fatal. While violations of statutory provisions regarding duty hours of drivers by operators were rampant, drivers and conductors were insensitive and discourteous to commuters, often leading to ugly scenes. As permits had been issued to owners with even one bus, the State Transport Department finds it impossible to have effective control over the 3,000 plus bus operators, who in turn are at the mercy of limited number of authorised drivers, Delhi Government sources said. Things had come to such a pass that this year alone, 221 buses had been prosecuted or ‘challaned’ for various offences, including involvement in fatal accidents up to ten times, 136 buses 10 to 15 times, 52 buses 15 to 20 times and as many as 24 buses 20 to 40 times! Therefore, the only effective answer was to vest ownership of all private stage carriage buses in the hands of selected, fewer operators, a senior official of the Transport department said. This would give the department an advantage of controlling only a handful of operators instead of thousands. And such corporate operators would have an effective control over drivers and conductors. While unhealthy competition on the roads would be eliminated through this proposal, better-maintained buses could be insisted upon. To bring about this change, bus routes in Delhi would be divided into five or six equitable zones and only ‘corporate’ or ‘co-operative’ entities having 700 to 800 buses each would be allowed to bid for running buses in the zones. No more than two or three players would be allowed in each zone, in order to ensure healthy competition. Present bus owners would be free to become part of the new corporate entities. While the present drivers could be employed by these entities after re-training, buses too could be re-deployed after carrying out the necessary repairs.
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Directorate on road safety to be set up
New Delhi, July 18 The Capital, which boasts of more vehicles than all the other three metros put together, also has the dubious distinction of having the maximum number of road accidents and fatalities. In 2003, as many as 8,864 accidents were recorded and 1,841 people were killed, while in 2004 the number of accidents grew to 9,083 and 1,832 fatalities. This year as many as 3,468 accidents had been recorded with 673 deaths by May 15. The number of persons injured was about ten times higher. It is precisely for this reason that the authorities have now proposed the setting up of Directorate of Road Safety (DRS) to enforce laws pertaining to road safety, traffic control and maintenance of vehicles, and educate the public, drivers and pedestrians on safe road behaviour. It would also adopt international standards and practices for road signs and signal systems, besides setting up standards for road construction, road re-engineering and road furniture. Clearance from DRS would be mandatory for road construction and re-engineering. Delhi government sources said that the Secretary (Transport) would be re-designated as Secretary (Transport and Road Safety). DRS would initially have about eight officials with relevant experience on deputation basis. Two other measures proposed for ensuring road safety were: banning non-motorised vehicles from entering major roads and constructing pedestrian footpaths and bicycle tracks along all to roads in a phased manner. Working on the assumption that accidents did not just happen and are caused by human, machine or system failure, accidents would be investigated and analysed so that they could be prevented in future. The directorate would also step up rescue and aid to accident victims.
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MCD to repair roads after end of monsoon season
New Delhi, July 18 He said that MCD maintained 30,000 kilometres of roads in Delhi. Of them, only 10 square
kilometre roads have potholes. These potholes will be filled up by bricks during rainy season and after the end of rains, they would be repaired properly, he said. Earlier, water-logging was reported in a number of places like ITO, Minto Road, Zakhira Bridge and other places. When it rained, there were traffic jams in these areas. But this year, there was no water-logging as the majority of drains were desilted timely and silt was also transported from the drains to landfill sites. This issue was raised in today’s meeting of the corporation in which the opposition led by Subhash Arya demanded Municipal Commissioner’s statement in connection with broken roads. Replying to a question from Congress Councillor from Seelampur, Zameer Ahmed Munna, the Municipal Commissioner said old age pension would be given through cheque only. Earlier it was given in cash. Later Central Vigilance Commissioner ordered that pension be paid through cheque only prevent corruption. A CBI inquiry is being conducted in Shahdara South Zone in this case and all documents concerned have been seized, resulting in hampering of audit report of the zone. When Mr Munna said that there was neither a bank nor a post office in his segment and elderly people would have problem to go far of areas to open their accounts, the Mayor assured him of working out his problem. However, the opposition insisted that pension should be paid through cheque alleging that five councillors were involved in the pension scam. “If bank and post office are not in any segment of the corporation, government can make alternate arrangements,” it said.
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Spy network in league with Pak mission
Noida, July 18 Hanif, arrested in Noida, was allegedly having
links with the High Commission. On instructions from Hanif, his two accomplices, Rani and Kiran used to collect secret defence information and pass it on to the officials of the High Commission. Their meeting point used to be the Delhi Zoo. This has been stated by both the women to Indian intelligence agencies during interrogation. Hanif is said to be having “close contacts” with both these woman, who handed over secret documents to the Pak officials. Kiran, whose husband has died, is virtually living as Hanif’s wife in Faridabad. Rani was contacted by Hanif through Kiran. Both these women had been used for passing secret documents to the enemy agents and all three had often visited Guwahati where they used to stay in hotel together, so that nobody could suspect Hanif. Apart from his Army friends, Hanif had enlisted help of his son Javed, a clerk in 18 J.N. He had struck roots in the intelligence wing of the Army. The Defence authorities are now understood to be preparing to court-marshal Hanif. According to police, the ISI agents use emotional appeal of religion to strike roots. The agents are trying to scout for unemployed Muslim youth in Delhi these days.
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Sales Tax site making our secrets public, allege traders
New Delhi, July 18 “If any Delhi trader wishes to acquire secret information about his competitor or any dealer registered with sales tax department of Delhi Government, he need not make any efforts as this information is now available free of cost on website of the department,” Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) alleged. “The competitor simply has to log on the website and write last seven digits of TIN number of any trader and information about the source of raw material purchased in the last two years would be available,” CAIT Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal said. “This will provide trade secrets to our competitors about who we are purchasing our material from and at what price,” he said, and asked under which provision such information was being made public. However, Delhi Sales Tax Commissioner R K Verma said user ID, password or TIN number were required to access the information. If traders have given their TIN numbers to lawyers who can provide them to their rivals, it was not the department’s fault, he said. Meanwhile, the particular link – tax/forms/DCR (demand and collection register) detail – on the site, which traders said contains the secret details, was not accessible as it was being ‘updated’.
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Controversy over Delimitation Commission’s proposal
New Delhi, July 18 As per the Delimitation Commission’s fresh proposal these 16 seats are - Karawal Nagar, Mustafabad, Gokulpuri, Seemapuri, Nand Nagari, Ghoda, Seelampur,Babarpur, Gandhi Nagar, Shahdara, Viswash Nagar, Geeta Colony, Laxmi Nagar, Patpargang, Kondli and Trilokpuri. The local leaders are quite miffed with this proposal, with some even planning to move court. Sensing this, the commission has decided to convene an open floor meeting of its associate members and representatives of recognised political parties to discuss the matter and evolve a consensus on July 21. A senior leader of this area alleged that besides nixing the Yamuna Vihar seat, some other constituencies had been redefined to benefit others, specially politicians of the ruling party. “It is strange that no consultation was held with the associate members and the representatives of recognised political parties while preparing the proposal. Apart from this, demographic limitations and population density have also been overlooked. According to the Delimitation Commission Act - 2002, one assembly seat in Delhi can be constituted over a population of 1.97 lakh. However, seeing some limitations of this act, the commission also provides 10 per cent relaxation while setting up an assembly seat. Which means that no assembly constituency can have a population of less than 1.78 lakh or more than 2.16 lakh. However, there are six seats proposed by the commission where population is more than 2.16 lakhs. These seats are Mustafabad, Seemapuri, Nand Nagari, Shalimar Bagh, Patel Nagar and Madipur. Besides, four constituencies proposed by the commission have a population of less than 1.78 lakh: Chhattarpur, Bijwasan, Ambedkar Nagar and Hauz Khas. A local politician and president of Bihar Morcha, Mr. Narender Kumar Singh said that in the constitution of some seats, the commission has “cleverly” added some parts in the form of Enumeration Block (EB). It means that a portion cannot be enumerated or the local people do not have any idea as to their population patterns. “ The commission has used the municipal ward as its base while forming the assembly seats. Two-three such wards are enough to set up an assembly seat. Surprisingly, in some cases, five-six such wards were divided to carve out assembly segments,” he claimed.
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Pak nationals queue up for liver transplants
New Delhi, July 18 In the last one year, five patients from Pakistan have undergone successful liver transplants at the hospital. Having discharged
42-year-old Hamayun Khan from Rawalpindi on Monday following a successful liver transplant, liver transplant surgeons are now busy scheduling surgeries of three more Pakistani nationals. The hospital on Monday admitted Mohammad Faizuddin (59), a Pakistani national living in Bangladesh for liver transplant assessment. Malik Masood (52), a senior government officer and Zia Mahmood (48), are already awaiting liver transplant surgeries. Yet another Dhaka-based Pakistani national, Arif Mahmood Khalid (36), underwent a successful liver transplant in December
and is here for follow-up treatment. Dr A.S. Soin, Senior Consultant Liver Transplant Surgeon at Sir Ganga Ram hospital told TNS that the rise in number of cases from Pakistan for liver trasplant surgeries in the last one year is a new trend. “I think Hepatitis C is the most common disease they come with. It is a virus that causes chronic liver disease and is transmitted by blood transfusion, sexual transmission, sharing and handling of needles.” “It is only in the last three years that blood banks in Pakistan have started screening for Hepatitis C. Pakistan has a large prevalence of Hepatitis C liver disease. They are not equipped to do liver transplants. Doctors from UK have done a few cases of liver transplant at the Sind Institute of Urology and Transplant at Karachi,”
he said. “In centres in Western countries, liver transplant surgery costs over Rs one crore. Here we offer a package of Rs 15 lakh that takes care of the hospital bills, medicines and doctors fee. We do the transplant at one-sixth the cost abroad,”
he added. Dr Soin said that except Faizuddin, the other patients were diagnosed with Hepatitis C liver disease. “They got the disease at a time when Hepatitis C was not even known. Hepatitis C takes 15 to 25 years to irreversibly damage the liver.” Dr Subhash Gupta, senior Liver Transplant Surgeon says that the hospital is getting patients from Bangladesh, Kenya and Nigeria as well. “Most of them have relatives in Australia, Middle East and U.K. who are aware that liver transplant is being done here as it is unaffordable in the West. We have developed hepatobiliary surgery to an extent that it can be done very safely,” he said. The transplant unit at the hospital, set up three years ago, claims a success rate of 83 per cent in these highly challenging transplant surgeries that can stretch to 20 hours. “We are reaching the international standard of 85 per cent,” said Dr Soin. Aware of the non-availability of cadaver livers for transplant, most patients are advised to come with live donors after basic screening tests in their own country. For instance, Hamayun Khan who was discharged on Monday, was fortunate to get a part of the liver from his nephew. Arif Mahmood Khalid got half of his younger brother Iftikhar Khan’s liver. In the case of the Pakistani national from Bangladesh, the wife and son have volunteered to donate a part of the liver. Similarly, Malik Masood and Zia Mahmood’s sons have come forward to donate a part of their liver. Transplant surgeons plan the surgery a few days in advance by matching the liver size and the blood group of the donor and the recipient. “The liver size is ascertained by triphasic spiral CT Scan that involves a CT volumetry to find out the volume and weight of different parts of the liver. We work on the CT work station and look at the 3D images of the liver. It is a virtual surgery where we slice the liver on the screen to see if the portion that is going to be removed is adequate for the recipient and the remaining half enough for the donor,” explained Dr Soin. He said that while the operation of the donor takes 6 to 8 hours, the recipient transplant takes 10 to 12 hours. “Post operation, the donor is discharged after a
week while the recipient is discharged after three weeks, including five to ten days in the Intensive Care Unit. The donor is free to lead a normal life but is advised to avoid excessive physical exercise. The recipient is advised rest for six to eight weeks and is asked to avoid physical exercise for three months,” he said. The recipient is required to be on a life-long dose of immuno-suppressants.
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Tree plantation campaign by WWF-India
New Delhi, July 18 “Most people plant a tree and forget about it. We have seen that government agencies, schools and even the private sector are quick to hand over saplings, especially during the monsoon season, but once these are planted, it is often left to nature to look after the plants,” points out the CEO and Secretary General of WWF-India, Mr Ravi Singh. To ensure that the sapling that has been planted does not die for want of care and attention and to make the planters more responsible, WWF-India has initiated a programme called ‘Adopt a plant’. Explaining the rationale behind the initiative, Singh said, “we want bring urban people closer to conservation. When you see something growing in front of you and monitor its growth, then you tend to conserve it”. The programme, which is being initiated in the Capital on July 28 by former Prime Minister, Mr I K Gujral, is being seen as a corrective measure in the prevailing climatic changes and pollution in the city. As a part of a sustainable drive, WWF-India, is organising this mass campaign towards creating more green lungs in Delhi and the NCR region. “We have invited our supporters and people from all walks of life to come forward and take free saplings from us, but with a pledge that the person will nurture it into a tree. We, in turn, will regularly monitor the growth of the tree,” pointed out Mr Singh. Another feature that makes this campaign environment-friendly is the type of saplings that have been chosen. “These saplings are scientifically chosen on the basis of their capacity to give more oxygen and less carbon and sapping of less ground water”, said Singh. To help people get an insight into how to care for the trees, a tree specialist will educate people about the sapling they have chosen to plant. People will be taught how to plant it and the kind of soil and conditions that are suitable for it. “We will expect people to abide by the pledge that we will get them to sign. This written pledge specifies that whoever plants a sapling will commit to take care of it and see it blossoming into a tree,” the WWF official said.
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Three-day NCERT meeting begins
New Delhi, July 18 Under the chairmanship of Prof Yash Pal, former chairperson of UGC, the members will discuss the salient comments on National Curriculum Framework that emerged during the meetings of the Executive Committee, Governing Council of NCERT and CABE committee. The members will also discuss the steps at different levels of governance and by different institutions in the light of NCF. There will be various plenary sessions and parallel sessions on different curricular areas in which the faculty of NCERT will interact with the members. This meeting is a part of the ongoing process of the National Curriculum Framework - 2005; NCERT has already submitted the draft report to CABE. For the first time the draft has also been translated into different Indian languages and sent to the states for their suggestions and discussions. NCERT has already received many suggestions and comments for improving the NCF
draft. — TNS
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Life for man who kidnapped minor for ransom
New Delhi, July 18 Additional Sessions Judge Rajnish Bhatnagar handed down the extreme punishment to Imran Ansari after finding him guilty under Section 364 A (kidnapping a minor for ransom) for abducting four-and-half-year-old Prithivi Sagar and demanding a ransom of Rs 5 lakh for his release. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on the convict and 6 months simple imprisonment in case of default of payment of the amount. The boy was on way to his tuition class near his house in Prashad Nagar in north Delhi on August 2, 2002 when
the convict kidnapped him and took him to a hideout inside a jungle in Ghaziabad. After waiting for two days, the kid’s father Anil Kumar informed the police which tracked down the kidnapper through a cellphone number on which the ransom calls were being made. Raiding his jungle hideout, they arrested the convict and rescued the boy on August 5. The prosecution examined 11 witnesses to prove their case.
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Two gangsters arrested
New Delhi, July 18 In the first case, the sleuths received a secret information that one Surender alias Mannu, involved in at least 30 cases of contract killings, dacoity, robbery, attempt to murder etc in Haryana, Punjab and Rajasthan would be coming to Delhi to meet an associate. Accordingly, a trap was laid for him today at around 12.15 pm at Kanjhawala Road and the gangster nabbed after a brief encounter. In the second incident, one Jitender Rathee alias Kala, a notorious gangster of Sandeep alias Bhoori gang was nabbed from Rohini area. He is allegedly involved in at least 10 cases of murder, attempt to murder, kidnapping, robbery and criminal
intimidation. — TNS
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Police station gheraoed over murder
Ghaziabad, July 18 The protesters were demanding the arrest of the culprits. They lifted their picketing only after getting assurances from the police circle officer. Rupender, alias Bablu, son of Ram Rattan of Panchi village in Meerut, had been working as a ‘munshi’ at Satyam brick kiln in village Shahpur in Muradnagar. On Saturday evening, he had gone to drop a relative of the brick kiln owner, Deshpal Singh, to village Bhikanpur, but did not return from there till late in the night. Next morning, his body was found lying in jungle near the village. He had been stabbed repeatedly. When Rupender’s family and co-workers came to know of his death, they marched to the Muradnagar police station in hundreds and gheraoed the police station, clamouring for the arrest of the culprits.
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