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CM asks civic agencies to pull up their
socks
UP Govt reserves 50 pc municipal
MCD Inspector, SHO in CBI net
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Old man found murdered in sleep
Eight workers killed in steel unit blast
Kidnapped boy found in Noida
Inquiry into patient’s death at Apollo Hospital
DMRC begins trial runs of Metro on new section
Ban on commercial use of farm houses to continue
Need to give quality education at school level: Governor
High Court examines ‘rejected’ DUTA ballots
Designer files defamation case
Lt-Gen Sadhotra takes over as DGMS
SHO hauled up for not filing FIR
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CM asks civic agencies to pull up their
socks
New Delhi, September 30 This issue was discussed in detail in a meeting with MPs and MLAs which was also attended by all Cabinet Ministers and senior officials of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, New Delhi Municipal Council, private electricity distribution companies (Discoms), Delhi Jal Board and other agencies concerned. Apart from around three dozen MLAs cutting across party line, Union Minister Kapil Sibal and Lok Sabha Member Sandeep Dikshit were also present in The meeting, which turned out to be an open session for the legislators, proved to be helpful in taking some concrete decisions. The Chief Minister exhorted the city agencies to get ready to provide the best possible civic amenities during the festive season. She directed Discoms to ensure proper functioning of streetlights and highmast lights whereas MCD was asked to take care of semi-high mast lights and lighting in the parks. The instructions came following a row between MCD and Discoms over who would repair and maintain streetlights. Ms Dikshit also stressed the need of power conservation and directed that streetlights should be switched off the during the day-time. MCD and NDMC were directed to intensify their sanitation operations and provide extra personnel in Muslim-dominated localities during Ramzan to ensure sweeping thrice a day. DJB had also been instructed to provide uninterrupted water supply in these areas. Special sanitation operations would be effected near Mosques and temples. MCD had assured that entire length of roads under its jurisdiction would be repaired within a week or so. Ms Dikshit had requested Legislators to monitor implementation of these instructions and inform of any hindrances. It was also decided in the meeting that construction of Gokulpur Drain would start by October 15 and loading trucks to remove garbage would be made available in the constituencies of legislators in East Delhi on October 4. A number of Legislators raised issues relating to dumping of ‘malba’ and garbage, cutting on roads, silt in the ‘nallahs’, non-functioning of streetlights, power cuts, in-adequate water supply and slackness on the part of CSE Department of MCD whereas some legislators complimented the role of CSE. MLAs Bheeshm Sharma, Ramesh Lamba, Shoaib Iqbal, Vir Singh Dhingan, P S Sawhney, Rajesh Jain, O P Babbar, Bijender Singh, Mangeram Garg, Zile Singh Chauhan, Baljor Singh, Motilal Sodhi, Balram Tanwar, P C Yogi, Dharam Dev Solanki, Charan Singh Kandera, Ramakant Goswami, Subhash Sachdeva, Amrish Gautam and Kiran Walia were prominent in raising issues relating to preparedness of the government for the coming festive season.
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UP Govt reserves 50 pc municipal seats for SCs
Ghaziabad, September 30 As a result of these changes, the seat of Ghaziabad Mayor has been reserved for women. At present, Mr Dinesh Chand Garg of the BJP is the Mayor of Ghaziabad. In a final reservation list issued by the state government on Thursday, Mayors for 422 nagar panchayats, 194 nagar palikas (municipal committees) and 12 nagar nigams (municipal corporations) have been put in the reserved category. While both men and women can contest for the post of Mayor for Lucknow,
Kanpur, Allahabad, Aligarh and Murad Nagar municipal committees/corporations, the posts of Mayor for Ghaziabad and Bareilly have been reserved for women. The Mayor’s seat for Jhansi municipality has been reserved for a Scheduled Caste candidate while the Agra mayoralty has been reserved for a woman from the Scheduled Caste. All District Magistrates have been instructed to ensure the publication of this list by October 1 so that within a week objections or suggestions addressed to the Secretary, Nagar Vikas, could be received within seven days for quick disposal by the Nagar Vikas Department. Some 258 seats will be in the unreserved category, out of which 87 seats will be for women from unreserved category. Out of 194 municipal councillors’ seats in the state, 23 have been reserved for mayors of Scheduled Castes while eight will be reserved for women. Among the backward classes, there are 52 seats of mayors, out of which 18 are for women belonging to backward classes. Out of the 119 unreserved seats of mayors, 39 have been reserved for women of unreserved category, it is learnt.
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MCD Inspector, SHO in CBI net
New Delhi, September 30 Among others whose offices have been raided are said to be three officials of the Income Tax Department, according to sources. Delhi Police Inspector Ishwar Singh, who exposed the match-fixing scandal in 2000 allegedly involving late South African captain Hansie Cronje, was today booked by CBI for allegedly possessing assets disproportionate to his known sources income. Singh, now posted as Station House Officer of Tughlaq Road police station, got a surprise this morning when he found sleuths of CBI’s anti-corruption branch knocking at his duplex-flat at posh Vasant Kunj area of South Delhi. The CBI slueths began their exercise of ascertaining his wealth after the agency had registered a case that the cop had allegedly amassed assets worth Rs 40 lakh disproportionate to his known sources of income. During the searches, CBI sleuths claimed to have recovered Rs 1.07 lakh cash and assets worth Rs 75 lakh.
Singh was the person who had exposed the conversation between Cronje and alleged bookie Sanjeev Chawla. The conversation had opened a can of worms after which Indian cricket team was subjected to scrutiny by various agencies including CBI. The match-fixing controversy saw an
unceremonious exit of Mohammed Azharuddin from cricket. Following the raid, Singh has been transferred to Foreigners Regional Registration Office (FRRO) with immediate effect. The MCD Sanitary Inspector Naresh Chand’s four residential premises at Ashok Nagar and Shahdara and that of a doctor in South Extension Part I were also raided. These raids were part of the CBI’s country-wide raid at the residential and official premises of about 50 government officials at nearly 90 places in eight towns, including Amritsar, Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata. In a separate development on Thursday, the CBI raided the office and residential premises of a MCD Councillor in Trilokpuri area in connection with the alleged misappropriation of funds in the temporary appointment of ‘safai karamcharis’ on Thursday. The raids at the residence of the Councillor, Ms Pravin Massey, were conducted after the CBI filed a case against her for showing appointment of temporary employees against leave vacancy of MCD ‘safai karamcharis’ (sweepers), according to the CBI spokesman. “She would show temporary appointments on paper but in actual there would be no such appointments. Instead, she would mop up the funds allotted in lieu of the said appointments.” Several documents were also seized from the residence and office of Ms Massey, a Councillor from Trilokpuri Ward No 68. The case was referred to the CBI by the Delhi High Court after it was notified of large-scale bungling in the MCD over ‘such’ appointments.
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Student stabbed to death, 2 injured in group clash
New Delhi, September 30 While the victim has been identified as one Rinku (18), resident of Fatehpur Beri and a class 12 student pursuing his studies in open school, the injured were identified as Sandeep and Pradeep, both students of Aurobindo College. The police said that there was some party in the college and some outsiders were trying to gain entry into the campus to which the college students took objection. Later at around 10.30 a.m. this morning, students from rival groups clashed near the DDA market outside the college and Rinku and two others sustained serious injuries. Later, Rinku succumbed to his injuries. The college students said that three days ago students belonging to different groups fought over some issue and they wanted to settle scores during the party today. The police have identified five persons suspected to be involved in the murder and are investigating the matter.
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Old man found murdered in sleep
Greater Noida, September 30 The police suspect it to be a vengeance killing due to some land dispute. A murder case has been registered against unidentified killers. SO A.K. Sharma of Kasna police said that Prem Raj, 70, of Sirsa village used to sleep at the tubewell in his farm. When his sons Phirey Ram and Chahat brought dinner for him at the tubewell, they were shocked to find their father lying in a pool of blood. They told the police that they did not have enmity with anybody. However, they said they had seen Munevar, Rajbeer, Zite Singh and Balla of the same village, sitting in their farm a few days ago. There was a tiff between Munevar and Rajbeer when their father Prem Raj had only said that they should not quarrel at his tubewell. At this, they had left threatening “we will fix you,
old man”. The police are still investigating.
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Eight workers killed in steel unit blast
Ghaziabad, September 30 A truck loaded with magnetic steel strips had reached the factory in the afternoon. It was also carrying some inflammable material, possibly some rockets which got ignited and exploded with steel strips grazing against it. The explosion was so powerful that workers in other three factories were also injured. Some eyewitnesses said that the consignment had come from Iran, but SO Link Road police station, S. Chaudhri denied such a possibility. Some 20 labourers were busy unloading the magnetic strips when one magnet is suspected to have charged a rocket which exploded, killing eight labourers and injuring another 11, some of whom are seriously injured. The injured were rushed to Meenakshi Nursing Home in the area. Ghaziabad D.M. Santosh Yadav has ordered a magistrate’s inquiry into the explosion. Senior officers from Meerut division also rushed to the spot.
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Kidnapped boy found in Noida
Noida, September 30 According to police, Sonu, son of Raju, a barber, had gone missing while playing outside his house. A missing report had been filed in the Dadri Kotwali on September 15. Raju had accused a neighbour of kidnapping his son. The villagers had called a meeting of the panchayat for October 2 against the police failure to recover the boy. The SI, Mr Deepak Chaturvedi, and the in-charge of the police post, Mr R. B. S. Kaul, were on patrol duty when they found Sonu hanging around near the jhuggis in Sector 9. During interrogation, the boy said he belonged to Chithera and some people had brought him here a few days ago. Now, he did not know where they had gone. Sonu’s parents have taken him back to their village.
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Inquiry into patient’s death at Apollo Hospital
New Delhi, September 30 “The Health Department of Delhi Government will hold an inquiry into the death of the patient, and we have sought details about the case from the hospital,” Health Minister Yoganand Shastri told reporters here. He said if anything “substantial” was discovered in this preliminary inquiry, a high-level inquiry could be ordered. Prem Rishi Bhatnagar was admitted to Indraprastha Hospital here on September seven with a heart ailment and during the course of his stay he fell from his bed on September 14. A CT Scan of the head revealed internal bleeding in the brain at many places. A operation was carried out to evacuate the blood clot but the patient died on September 29. However, the hospital strongly denied any claims of medical negligence saying it was purely an unfortunate incident and one in which no precautions could be taken. The Hospital also refuted all claims that the patient was left unattended and said a nurse was present at
that time.
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DMRC begins trial runs of Metro on new section
The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation today began integrated trial runs on the
Barakhamba The trial on the 4.05-km Barakhamba-Karol Bagh section started this morning with overhead electrification, signaling, track and other control systems being tested. They will continue for about next two months and subsequently, extend up to Dwarka. The DMRC Managing Director, E Sreedharan, Director (P&P) C. B. K. Rao, Director (RSE) Satish Kumar and Director (Finance) R. N. Joshi were present during the first trial today. The 23-km route is scheduled to be open to public in December and small stretches on both ends by March 2006. The civil works on the 7-km Dwarka to Dwarka sub-city stretch are about 80 per cent complete and about 30 per cent on the 3-km section between Barakhamba and Indraprastha. The major part of this line is elevated and will have 31 stations. The estimated cost of completing this line is about Rs 3,000 crore. The Barakhamba Metro Station is the first underground station to be built completely with Indian expertise and Indian contractors. The ride from Connaught Place to Dwarka will take 45 minutes. The line passing through one of the busiest areas in West Delhi will give a huge fillip to commuter ridership on the other two lines as well. With the completion of this line, daily ridership in Phase I is expected to touch about 22 lakh passengers per day. The line is an example of engineering expertise. The train will run at a depth of about 16 m in Connaught Place and gradually climbing to a height of 10.5 m. The track will scale a height of 17.5 m, the highest so far for the Delhi Metro, at the Raja Garden crossing as it crosses over an existing fly-over there. The DMRC has followed the road alignment most of the way, even when the route was narrow and congested and the road had numerous utilities running beneath it. Having had the experience of working on Line I and Line II, some changes had been incorporated in Line III to cut costs and time as making the facility more user-friendly. U-shaped girders, which are cost effective, aesthetic and sound absorbent, have been used and steel has replaced cement in many places to save time. Toilets have also been designed in unpaved areas on stations on this line. The line has been designed in such a way that housing the track and stations take up minimum space on the road and causes minimal hindrance to vehicles underneath. After its work gets complete, the Delhi Metro will leave a six-lane road along the way, something which was originally not there, and also re-design three intersections for better traffic movement.
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Ban on commercial use of farm houses to continue
New Delhi, September 30 A Division Bench of Acting Chief Justice B A Khan and Justice A K Sikri asked the MCD to file its policy, if any, on the subject within four weeks and fixed November 7 for further hearing. Earlier, the court had asked the civic body to spell out its policy on commercial use of farm houses, banquet halls and parks in the capital by today as its last policy expired on March 31, 2005. In a fresh application filed in the court, the MCD said it has already requested Delhi Government for extension of its policy/guidelines up to March 2007 till some alternative arrangements were made by the statutory authorities. MCD counsel Ashok Bhasin urged the court to adjourn the hearing on the case by 12 weeks saying a meeting of Urban Development Ministry and city Government was held on September 27 in which it was assured that the policy would be extended. Under the policy/guidelines which expired on March 2005, farm houses had been allowed to hold social functions and marriages subject to a payment of a fee of Rs 40,000 and Rs 20,000 depending upon their size. Earlier, it had sought permission to continue social functions in farm houses and banquet halls till December 2006. Manjit Singh Ahluwalia, counsel for petitioner Bhrashtachar Virodhi Sangathan on whose PIL the July 6 order was passed, opposed MCD’s plea.
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Need to give quality education at school level: Governor
Faridabad, September 30 Speaking as chief guest at the annual appreciation and award presentation function of DAV School at Sector 14 here today, Mr Kidwai called on teachers and students to work hard to produce better results. He said India had emerged a hub of talent and produced scholars in many fields in the past few years. Indian scientists and engineers figured prominently even in the most developed countries like the USA and Britain which, he said, was due to sheer hardwork and their rich educational and qualified background. He said though the country had earned quite a name for itself and made its presence felt in fields like information technology, computers, aeronautical sciences, health and other sectors, there was a lot to do in view of the emergence of global society and the receding economic and trade barriers across the world. Stating that only the fittest would be able to survive, he claimed the need of the hour was to make improvements constantly in the field of education to ensure that the foundation of the students was solid and they could come up to the expectations and standards internationally. Stating that simple graduation and postgraduation may not serve the purpose, he said the emphasis should be on providing professional and technical expertise in the related areas so that students could go for higher education and make headway in various sectors where growth was required to be made.
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High Court examines ‘rejected’ DUTA ballots
New Delhi, September 30 After examining about 267 ‘rejected’ ballot papers in the presence of Election Officer S N Singh, Justice Vikramajit Sen fixed Monday for further hearing. Earlier, elected candidate Amar Dev Sharma had sought recall of the court’s order summoning the ballot papers. Sharma has contended that the court could not have summoned the ballots for re-examination. The court is hearing Siddiqui’s petition seeking quashing of Sharma’s election as DUTA President. Siddiqui, who was defeated in the DUTA polls by a margin of 12 votes by Sharma, alleged that many of his votes were illegally declared invalid by the Election Officer after certain last-minute changes in the counting rules. DUTA counsel has been opposing the petition, saying it was not maintainable as disputed questions of facts could not be raised in writ jurisdiction, particularly because DUTA was not a state within the meaning of Article 12 of Constitution. In his petition filed through counsel Sarabjit Sharma, Siddiqui has demanded quashing of Sharma’s election to the post of DUTA President and recounting of ballots under the supervision of the High Court.
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Designer files defamation case
New Delhi, September 30 In a complaint which came up before Metropolitan Magistrate L K Gaur today, Narula contended that he never said he designed the ‘Blue Poncho’ worn by actress Rani Mukherjee in the blockbuster ‘Bunty aur Babli’ as alleged by Verma. Narula’s complainant says that on April 4, this year at the ‘India Fashion Week’ held at the Grand Hotel in New Delhi, Verma had been telling people that the dress worn by the actress in the movie was actually his creation. Narula, who claims to have designed the costumes for ‘Bunty aur Babli’, said in his complainant that he purchased the said dress from a shopping mall at Ville Parle in Mumbai. At the Fashion Week also he had explained his position to Verma. Yet, two days later, he held a press conference and levelled allegations of plagiarism, the complaint alleges. The Delhi High court is hearing a suit filed by Verma against Narula seeking Rs 2 crore damages from him for allegedly copying his creation blue puncho and multi-hued pants which actor
Rani Mukherjee donned in the movie. In his suit, Verma claimed that Narula must have earned Rs two crore after the success and wide publicity received by the scenes in which Mukherjee wore the dress.
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Lt-Gen Sadhotra takes over as DGMS
New Delhi, September 30
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SHO hauled up for not filing FIR
New Delhi, September 30 Metropolitan Magistrate Bharat Parashar, while directing Lalit Mohan, SHO of Civil Lines Police Station, to file an FIR and submit a probe report by November 21, observed, “It is clear that no procedure as laid down under the law has been followed and the matter has not been properly looked into by
them.” — TNS
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New Delhi, September 30
New Delhi, September 30