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Group Housing Societies raided by CBI, Rs 50 lakh seized
Tandoor case: Defence questions body’s identity
South Korean minister is all praise for metro
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Implement Right to Information Act: UGC
VAT Committee calls meeting on Aug 7
Ayodhya terrorists’ links with Loni exposed
House looted in Loni area
Tributes paid to Tilak on anniversary
Pirated books racket busted, three arrested
Project to augment water supply in 116 villages
Noida plagued by prolonged power cuts
Dharna by TU leaders in Faridabad
In Parliament
Delhi govt hospitals to go online
Reinstatement of workers a partial victory: Dasgupta
Illyasi receives ‘threat’
Meera Malhotra, Regional Head, ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company, hands over an insurance policy to Lt. Gen M.G. Girish, Director General, Discipline, Ceremonial & Welfare, Army Headquarters in the Capital on Monday.
— Tribune photo
Four yrs RI for dacoits
Two jailed for robbery
Traffic stalled due to kanwarias
Ganga close to danger mark
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Group Housing Societies raided by CBI, Rs 50 lakh seized
New Delhi, August 1 In the raids, the central agency seized Rs 50 lakh in cash, a large number of documents, truck-loads of files and a blank stamp paper. The searches were carried out at the premises of presidents, secretaries and registrars of various societies, besides a retired IAS official Narayan Diwaker. The IAS Officer, hailing from AGMU Cadre, was the Registrar Cooperative Societies, Delhi during the period when most of these Societies were revived and recommended to DDA for allotment of land. A CBI spokesperson said that there were allegations that the ‘so-called’ cooperative societies after acquiring land had sold it to ‘land mafias’ who later constructed flats on them and sold it at heavy premium. The raids come in the wake of four cases being registered on Friday involving the UNI Cooperative Group Housing Society (CGHS), Sartaj Cooperative Group Housing Society, Taj Cooperative Group Housing Society and Rajeshwari Cooperative Group Housing Society. According to the FIRs, between 1970 and 1980 or thereafter a number of Cooperative Group Housing Societies (CGHS) were registered in Delhi, including the four against which the CBI had registered the cases, the spokesman said. Some of these societies became defunct due to either non-operation or non-submission of auditable accounts, membership list and other documents to RCS for verification which are mandatory requirements as per the Delhi Cooperative Societies Act, 1972, the law under which the CGHS are registered and regulated, he said. It is alleged that in several cases due to various reasons, including non-allotment of land, the Societies were wound up subsequently by the RCS. In 2003, when Delhi Development Authority (DDA) was in the process of developing plots of land in five areas for allotment to about 80 CGHS, certain builders and other persons hatched a conspiracy in collusion with the then Registrar of Cooperative Societies, the then Assistant Registrar (SW) and other officials of the then RCS to fraudulently revive these CGHS on the basis of false or forged documents and recommend them to DDA for allotment of land to these Societies, the spokesman alleged. With this intention, these accused persons caused the disappearance of the main original files of these CGHS and constructed new files by accepting bogus or forged records from the so-called office bearers of these societies, the CBI spokesman alleged. The then officials of the RCS deliberately decided not to approach DA for the original files as DDA was also maintaining separate files of these CGHS. Subsequently, the Cooperative Inspectors submitted bogus or fake inspection reports claiming to have visited the offices of these societies, examined the records and also submitted bogus or fake photo copies of ration cards of the members of these societies as proof of their residence.
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Tandoor case: Defence questions body’s identity
New Delhi, August 1 “The prosecution has tried to prove the case with the help of easily procurable witnesses,” senior counsel K K Sud submitted before a Division Bench of Justice Manmohan Sarin and Justice Rekha Sharma. Sud raised questions on the matter in which Matloob Karim, who had developed intimate relations with Sahni, identified her badly-charred body after seeing her nose. Sud said the whole story about the accused being upset over Naina’s relations with Karim was cooked up to prove the motive behind the murder. Former Delhi Youth Congress leader Sushil Sharma was convicted and sentenced to death by a sessions court here in November 2003 for killing his partner Naina Sahni and then attempting to burn her body in an oven of a restaurant in July 1995. In the appeal filed in December 2003, Sharma’s counsel Jayant Sud claimed that the case was based on circumstantial evidence and the link connecting the crime to the accused was missing at several places. He had also claimed that the trial court failed to appreciate that there was no evidence to support the use of firearms in the
murder. The High Court is also hearing the death sentence sent to it by the trial court as no convict can be hanged unless a death sentence is confirmed by it.
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South Korean minister is all praise for metro
New Delhi, August 1 He was accompanied by DMRC Managing Director E. Sreedharan, Korean ambassador to India Jung-il CHOI and Indian Ambassador to South Korea P S Ray, besides several senior officials. In any case, the Delhi metro has a strong South Korean connection with its 14 sets of trains for the elevated section and one train for the underground section being manufactured at Changwon in South Korea. Besides this, Samsung, an international Korean company, is one of the civil contractors and played a vital role in the construction of the underground section between Central Secretariat and Kashmere Gate. Terming the Delhi metro “excellent”, the minister praised the metro system and said India and South Korea would work together to make Delhi more dynamic through further cooperation, a press note issued by the DMRC stated. Meanwhile, five states have approached the Centre for either setting up or expanding Metro-like new rail-based mass rapid transit systems in their cities. Sources said Maharashtra, West Bengal, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Delhi have submitted proposals for the expansion of or setting up such systems in Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Delhi. However, the schedule for starting or extending operations in the cities would be as per the detailed project reports prepared by the state governments.
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Implement Right to Information Act: UGC
New Delhi, August 1 The University Grants Commission (UGC) has asked affiliated universities and colleges to implement the Right to Information Act, 2005 (22 of 2005), which has been enacted by Parliament and has come into force from 15 June, 2005. The directive will ensure that colleges and universities will no longer be able to dodge questions and information would be in public domain. “We have been asked to provide the names of all the people who will be authorised to answer any questions that have been put out for the college. These people will be responsible for providing any information that is required, except for what is confidential,” said Dr Meera Ramachandran, Principal, Gargi College. While most colleges and universities provide details vis-à-vis admissions criteria, fee structure, faculty details, courses on offer among other things in the prospectus and on their websites, the Act will ensure that queries apart from those mentioned above will have to be answered. “Most colleges anyway put out the information, but there are certain areas which are confidential and we cannot divulge any details about them,” said Dr. Ramachandran. The Act provides for right to information for citizens to secure access to information under the control of public authorities in order to promote transparency and accountability in the working of every public authority. All Universities and Colleges established by law made by Parliament or by State Legislature or by notification by the appropriate Government or owned, controlled or substantially financed directly or indirectly by funds provided by the Government shall come within the meaning of a Public Authority under this Act. The UGC has advised all universities and colleges, “to carefully go through this Act and take necessary steps for implementation of various provisions including proactive disclosure of certain kind of information. Such information shall be made available to the public at large through the website by the concerned university/college”. It has also been pointed out that while some provisions of this act have come into effect immediately on its enactment on 15 June 2005, other provisions shall come into effect on 100 / 120 days of its enactment.
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VAT Committee calls meeting on Aug 7
New Delhi, August 1 The Empowered Committee had earlier directed all the states to impose at least one per cent tax on bullion from August 1. Delhi Finance Minister Dr A K Walia said, “I talked to the chairman of the Empowered Committee Asim Dasgupta, who said that another meeting will be called on the issue by August 7”. Delhi Government will wait till the meeting before deciding on reducing the VAT rate on bullion in the Capital, he said. Delhi had complained to the VAT panel about shift of trade in bullion to Rajasthan and Gujarat following violation of common minimum tax rate on the precious metals by the two states. Around 80-90 per cent of bullion trade has shifted from Delhi to Rajasthan and Gujarat, he said, adding this would result in an annual loss of around Rs 40 crore. While the VAT on bullion in Delhi is one per cent, states like Rajasthan and Gujarat tax bullion at a rate of less than .25 per cent, Dr Walia told Mr Dasgupta. Mr Dasgupta, who is the West Bengal Finance Minister, has also talked to Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram on the issue. “If the other states do not reduce the tax rate on bullion, we will be forced to bring down the VAT on bullion here,” Dr Walia said.
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Ayodhya terrorists’ links with Loni exposed
Ghaziabad, August 1 According to UP police, Loni had links with the ISI agents and Pak-trained terrorists in the past also. During investigation, four terrorists who were arrested from Jammu, disclosed that the Lakshre-e-Toiba outfit had planned the Ayodhya attack. Police team of a few districts along with the intelligence agencies had visited Loni on Saturday night. Sleuths of the intelligence agencies, LIU and policemen from Saharanpur and Faizabad had grilled the terrorists. Declining to give any information, the officials said the details would be made public on the completion of interrogation. According to sources, even one of the terrorists, Ijaz, who had conspired the attack on Akshardham Temple in Gujarat, had also been arrested from Upper Kot Mohalla in 2003. The terrorists involved in this attack had stayed in Upper Kot, Mohalla Loni, in the house of a Nepali who was also arrested by the Gujarat police.
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House looted in Loni area
Ghaziabad, August 1 Before leaving, the intruders tied the hands and feet of the family members and locked them into a room. Jagmohan Singh Rana had gone home at 10 pm after closing his store in Budh Vihar Colony. At about 2 am, four armed miscreants came to Rana’s house after scaling the boundary wall. They put a gun on Rana’s head and demanded keys to the safe and almirahs. The intruders beat up all the inmates when they resisted and dumped them into a room with hands and feet tied. For the next two hours, they ransacked the house and went out from the main door after collecting Rs 45,000, jewellery including two gold pendants, two pairs of gold bangles, two rings, tops, earrings, two anklets, mangal sutra, etc. After the criminals had left, Rana somehow freed himself and informed his neighbours and showed them the ransacked house. The police were informed on phone and a written complaint was made later, but have failed to register an FIR.
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Tributes paid to Tilak on anniversary
New Delhi, August 1 Among the dignitaries who paid homage to the late leader at his statue here this morning were Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil, Delhi Lt Governor B L Joshi, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and senior Congress leader Vasant Sathe. Patil, who was chief guest at the function organised by Sarvajanik Utsav Samiti, said Tilak’s ideals were relevant even today and people should draw inspiration from them. “A lot can be learnt from the life of Lokmanya. His life was full of struggles, but he was never scared of struggle,” the Home Minister said. Joshi recalled Tilak’s contribution to the freedom struggle, saying he led the independence movement prior to the era of Mahatma Gandhi. “He took the idea of freedom from intellectual circles to the common people,” he said. Chief Minister Dikshit said Tilak’s dream of `Poorna Swaraj’ was incomplete till the poor of the country were uplifted. A large number of children from Marathi schools in the Capital were present on the occasion to pay homage to Tilak.
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Pirated books racket busted, three arrested
New Delhi, August 1 The accused persons who were arrested have been identified as Rajeev Tomar (32), Mahinder Gupta (41) and Vipin (32), all residents of Shahdara. On July 31, the police received a tip-off that one Rajeev had been printing pirated material of Harry Porter and The Half Blood Prince. A raid was conducted along with authorised representatives and the suspects nabbed. During search, the police recovered 2,700 books and machines that were used to print the pirated material. Rajeev told the police that he had already sent about 5300 pirated books for binding to one Mahinder Gupta. At the instance of Mahinder, the police recovered the pirated material from him. On the information of Rajeev, his other associate identified as Vipin was also nabbed and 850 coloured cover pages were recovered from his possession. The police have now launched a massive hunt to trace the suppliers identified as Vikky Malhotra and Kedar Nath Gupta. In another case, the Crime Branch of the Delhi Police have arrested three persons including two pimps and a woman for indulging in prostitution in South Delhi. The accused persons were identified Hitesh Aggarwal alias Sanjay (26), resident of Hapur, Kamlesh Kumar (29), resident of Malviya Nagar and Shabnam (21), resident of Chattarpur. Based on an advertisement in a leading national daily, the sleuths contacted the pimp identified as Hitesh and struck a deal for Rs 7,000. The three were nabbed while they came to Lajpat Nagar in an Indica car for meeting the decoy customer.
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Project to augment water supply in 116 villages
Faridabad, August 1 The Public Health Circle here has been looking after the water supply in 404 villages of Faridabad, Mewat and Gurgaon districts. The supply in six villages of this district is under the jurisdiction of the public health division, Sohna, a sub-divisional town of Gurgaon. All the villages are being supplied with drinking water through tubewells and handpumps. As per the details, as many as 19 villages of the total 23 villages of Faridabad assembly segment get the supply at the rate of 40 litres. According to the district authorities, the government had sanctioned Rs 19.50 crore under the NCR project to raise the supply level to 70 litres in 116 villages during the next three years. Under this project, 164 tubewells would be bored and a pipeline of about 347 km laid. Though the Union government had launched ‘Swajaldhara’ scheme a couple of years ago, under which 10 per cent of the cost was to be borne by the beneficiaries, the response to it seems to be poor as only two villages—Ahmedpur and Dhatir—have applied for augmentation. There are dozens of colonies where there is an acute shortage of water for past many years.
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Noida plagued by prolonged power cuts
Noida, August 1 On Sunday, people from Noida to Greater Noida and Dadri had to go without power from 9 am to 6 pm. Such a long power cut also affected the water supply in the town. It was promised that 400 MV Pali power house would become operational by July 31. Mr Alok Sinha, Managing Director, Pashimanchal Power Co, has called for a meeting of the CS software company in Meerut. Mr Sinha said he would seek explanation as to why the consumers were being slapped with inflated bills. If the bills were received late, the company could not ask for surcharge, he added. He has asked the officials concerned to prepare a list of the consumers.
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Dharna by TU leaders in Faridabad
Faridabad, August 1 The dharna was organised by the Joint Trade Union Council to mark the ‘protest day’ on a call given by the Central Trade Unions across the country. A memorandum was submitted to the Union Labour Minister through the DLC office here. Addressing the gathering, various leaders of the trade unions, which included AITUC, CITU, HMS, All Escorts Employees Union and the Sarva Karamchari Sangh Haryana, regretted that the recent case of the Honda Motors was still to be settled. The state government had not suspended any of the officials responsible and the criminals cases against the Honda employees had not been withdrawn, the leaders said. They demanded withdrawal of all ‘false’ cases booked against the trade union Highlighting the ‘indifference’ of the authorities to implement the labour laws, the speakers claimed that at least a dozen units in Faridabad were facing labour unrest. The situation could turn ugly any day. Alleging gross violations of the labour laws in the majority of the units, they said it was mainly due to a nexus between the authorities and the management of the units. They both serve the interest of each other rather than solving the problems of employees. In the memorandum submitted to the Union Labour Minister, the Joint Trade Union Council has demanded proper implementation of the norms and an action against the corrupt officials of the labour department. It asked the government not to let any case pending in the labour court for over three months. A copy of the memorandum was also sent to the Chief Minister, Haryana.
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27 hospitals in dock for failure to treat poor
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, August 1 These include the Rajiv Gandhi Cancer Society, Manav Sevarath Trust, Delhi ENT Hospital and Research Centre, Sunder Lal Jain Charitable Trust, A S Batra Hospital and Nirogi Charitable Hospital. The Delhi Development Authority (DDA) had allotted land to the institutions at concessional rate for setting up hospitals and dispensaries on the condition that they would serve as general public hospitals with at least 25 per cent total indoor beds reserved for free treatment of Union Urban Development Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, in a written reply, said DDA had not imposed the condition on the 27 institutions. He said notices had been issued in all cases where the conditions were violated by the institutions and a system of fortnightly checks put into place. Officials found responsible for “specific acts of omission and commission in this regard” were liable for action, the Minister said.
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Delhi govt hospitals to go online
New Delhi, August 1 In the first phase of the project, cleared by the Cabinet in its meeting chaired by Chief Minister Mrs.Sheila Dikshit, six government hospitals will be linked by computers in an effort to make patient management more systematic, officials said. A budget of Rs 60 lakh has been earmarked for Phase I of the project. Information about patients will be put online so that a computerised patient history can be maintained. Records regarding medicines and equipment will also be saved online, the officials said. The computerised information system will also make possible interaction between hospitals regarding patient care or medicine and equipment availability.
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Reinstatement of workers a partial victory: Dasgupta
Gurgaon, August 1 “This is only a partial victory. We will continue our fight for the release of our comrades in jail and we will constitute a legal aid committee to facilitate their release,” Dasgupta said addressing a gathering of around 300 workers of the company. The meeting was part of left parties’ expression of nationwide protests against police ‘violence’ on Honda workers here last week. He said the trade unions will take up with the Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda the issue of providing the workers compensation and guaranteed trade union rights for the workers. Dasgupta demanded a judicial probe by a sitting Supreme Court judge into last week’s violence. Dasgupta, who was among the demonstrators here last week when violence broke out, said that an all-India strike against exploitation of workers, anti-labour policies and unemployment will be held on September 29. Asked whether he was happy with the agreement reached between the company and the agitating workers, Dasgupta said that he had no objection to the settlement.
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Illyasi receives ‘threat’
Noida, August 1 The letter, written in Hindi and received at the office of his ‘Aalia Productions’ in here, threatened to kill him if he went ahead with the scheduled telecast of programmes on other militants of BKI and Khalistan Commando Force, Ilyasi said. Ilyasi said he has lodged a First Information Report (FIR) with the Noida police.
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Special insurance for army education society
New Delhi, August 1 The policy will provide insurance cover of Rs 1 lakh in the event of death and permanent total disability because of accident. It will also take care of further education if an earning parent of a student expires. Speaking on the occasion, Ms Meera Malhotra, Regional Head ICICI Lombard, said, “the policy will go a long way in ensuring that the education of the students in Army Public Schools could now be completed without any financial hindrance. The quick and hassle-free, efficient claims process would ensure policy benefits are accrued to the students and the staff at the earliest”.
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Four yrs RI for dacoits
New Delhi, August 1 Additional Sessions Judge S C Rajan awarded the punishment to Satpal, Pratap, Roop Basant after finding them guilty under section 307 (attempt to murder), 186 (obstructing public servants from discharging public functions) and section 25 of the Arms Act. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 1700 on each convict. On receiving information on March 31, 2003 that the three were planning a dacoity hiding behind a school in Samaypur Badli, a police team arrested them from the spot.
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Two jailed for robbery
New Delhi, August 1 Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Mamta Sehgal held Devender and Alim Khan guilty of robbing Rs 1,06,870 from Dhirender Singh, Chief cashier, Panchsheel Enclave and sentenced Devender and Alim Khan to four years and seven years rigorous imprisonment respectively. The court also slapped a fin of Rs 2000 on each of the convicts. On August 1, 2001, at 11 am hrs, Dhirender was taking cash of Rs 1,06,870 to deposit in the SBI, Masjid Moth branch. When he reached the Masjid Moth flyover, two boys came in front of his scooter and pushed him. Dhirender had identified both of them and deposed in the court that, Devender and Alim snatched his cash and gave a knife blow to him and fled from the spot. Both of them were arrested from Kalkaji crossing near Punj factory. There were twenty five Prosecution witnesses (PW) in this case, according to the prosecution. Both were convicted under sections 120-B (Criminal conspiracy), 201 (giving false information to screen the offender), 392 (Robbery), 394 (Voluntarily causing hurt), 397 (Robbing with an attempt to cause serious injury), 411 (Dishonestly receiving stolen property) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
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Traffic stalled due to kanwarias
Ghaziabad, August 1 The district administration has diverted traffic on several routes taken by ‘kanwarias’ (Shiv devotees) till August 3. Sector Magistrates have been appointed to control the expected crowd of nearly 25 lakh devotees, District Magistrate Santosh Yadav said. Vehicular traffic has been diverted via Loni for Saharanpur and Dehradun, and via Hapur for Meerut and Hardwar, SSP Sai Narain Singh said.
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Ganga close to danger mark
Ghaziabad, August 1 Officials here have warned the villagers living in low-lying areas of the danger and construction work at a railway bridge over the river at Brijghat was stopped. Water level is continuously increasing for the last two days, flowing just 59 cms below the danger mark. Madhya Ganga Superintendent Engineer said that in low-lying areas of Meerut, Kanpur, Bulandshhar and Ghaziabad, a flood like situation may develop.
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