H I M A C H A L   P R A D E S H

Forest land under cannabis cultivation
Shimla, December 11
With regular raids to check drug trafficking and its cultivation in various parts of the state, people have now shifted their poppy and cannabis plantations from private holdings to the forest areas.

Probe indicts power board officers for delay in project
Shimla, December 11
The inquiry ordered by the state electricity regulatory commission into the escalation and inordinate delay in the completion of the 126 MW Larji Project has detected large-scale irregularities in the execution of the project and held the Chairman, members and the chief engineers concerned of the state power board responsible for the huge cost and time overruns.

MLA misleading CM, says Youth Cong chief
Kangra, December 11
Controversy among the Congress rank and file came to fore when the Kangra District Youth Congress chief, Mr Ajay Verma charged local Congress MLA, Mr Surender Kaku, with misleading the Chief Minister and getting his nomination papers rejected unlawfully from the local municipal committee poll fray.

No clarity on poll expenditure
Solan, December 11
With no clear instructions about the expenditure limit for the ensuing urban and rural civic bodies elections, confusion prevails both among the candidates as well as the officials.

HPCC chief seeks details of assets
Shimla, December 11
Ms Viplove Thakur, state Congress president, has directed all the pradesh congress committee members to furnish the details of their movable and immovable assets by January 15,2005.

Virbhadra violating code of conduct: BJP
Shimla, December 11
Mr Suresh Bharadwaj, state BJP chief, today waned the state election commission and officers involved in the conduct of panchayat and local body poll not to work under pressure either from the government or the ruling party.

BJP airs concern over rising prices
Shimla, December 11
The BJP has expressed concern over the rising prices of gold and essential commodities and urged the government to provide assistance to poor families for marriage of girls.

Forest land under cannabis cultivation
Pratibha Chauhan

Shimla, December 11
With regular raids to check drug trafficking and its cultivation in various parts of the state, people have now shifted their poppy and cannabis plantations from private holdings to the forest areas.

Cannabis and opium plantations have come up on large portions of remote and inaccessible forest areas in district Kullu and Mandi, as there is practically no check from either the forest department or the revenue authorities. According to estimates of the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB), almost 6,000 hectares of forest land in districts of Kullu, Mandi and Chamba is under poppy and cannabis cultivation.

Deodar and oak tress along with other varieties are being chopped to make way for cultivating the high-return narcotic substances in areas like Malana, Magic, Bhelang, Melandar and Kutlah in Parbati valley and Thachi area of Mandi. High-yield hybrid varieties imported from Holland and Russia are being planted on big forest patches with practically no fear from any government agency.

With the NCB, police and Customs Department undertaking regular operations to check this illegal activity, people have started planting these drugs on forest land as they cannot be punished even if there is a raid.

“I would say that this shift from private land to forest land is nothing less than ‘jhum’ cultivation where forest patches are being cleared to grow opium and cannabis,” said Mr O.P. Sharma, Superintendent, NCB. He added that during raids to such remote areas he had seen that vast portions of forests had been cleared as a result of this shift from private to forest land for cultivating opium and cannabis.

Earlier, the drug mafia, including a large number of foreigners would take land on lease for cultivating Malana crème, and Parbati crème. However, with regular raids and operations to destroy opium and cannabis crops, the locals have started using forest land as practically no one can be punished for it.

In the month of September, the NCB along with the local police had destroyed opium and cannabis on almost 4,200 bighas in Malandar and Kutlah area of Kullu district and 218 bighas in Thachi, falling under Bali Chowki area of Mandi district.

Though the government has been talking of launching an alternate farming project in the opium and cannabis growing areas of the state, the project has only remained on paper. A state level apex committee has also been constituted to prepare a project, which met here almost a week back.

Probe indicts power board officers for delay in project
Rakesh Lohumi
Tribune News Service

Shimla, December 11
The inquiry ordered by the state electricity regulatory commission into the escalation and inordinate delay in the completion of the 126 MW Larji Project has detected large-scale irregularities in the execution of the project and held the Chairman, members and the chief engineers concerned of the state power board responsible for the huge cost and time overruns.

The panel attributed the cost and time overruns to “greatly non-productive” sanctions in favour of contractors, the so-called “compressed schedule” and “ineffective monitoring”. It also pointed out serious shortcomings in the execution and recommended action against erring officers. It also came to the conclusion after the scrutiny of records that no action was necessary against lower rung officers (below the rank of chief engineer) as they could have worked under pressure.

The two-member expert committee comprising Mr R.N. Aggrawal, a former Chairman of the BBMB, and Mr C.L. Aggrawal, a former General Manager of the Thein Dam project, also prima facie found evidence of large payments to contractors on “non-competitive” rates under extraneous pressures and recommended further Vigilance probe.

It worked out the reasonable cost of the project. As per the revised project report framed at March 1999 price level and approved by the Central Electricity Authority (CEA) in March 2000, the cost of the project was estimated at Rs 640 crore with civil works accounting for Rs 419 crore. It was revised to Rs 746 crore in August 2001, Rs 1012 crore in March 2004 and finally to Rs 1221 crore. A striking feature was that the cost of civil works doubled over the period. The cost will go up further as the project will not be completed even as per the revised schedule.

Changes in designs requiring substitution of items provided in contract which led to over 30 per cent increase in quantities beyond contract, additional payment to contractors for “gates and hoists” to reduce erection period, extra expenditure incurred on leads for muck disposal, change in design of the coffer dam, addition of highway tunnel, wrong method of measurement of excavated areas and time extensions beyond the contract period contributed to the huge cost overrun.

The board disregarded the advice of the resident geologist (on which it spends Rs 7,000 per day) which led to excessive overbreaks during excavation and improperly designed dewatering arrangements resulted in uncontrolled dewatering expenses.

The increase in quantity of excavation increased the cost by Rs 20 crore while the enhanced quantities of concrete, steel and grouting resulted in an additional expenditure of Rs 109 crore.

MLA misleading CM, says Youth Cong chief
Our Correspondent

Kangra, December 11
Controversy among the Congress rank and file came to fore when the Kangra District Youth Congress chief, Mr Ajay Verma charged local Congress MLA, Mr Surender Kaku, with misleading the Chief Minister and getting his nomination papers rejected unlawfully from the local municipal committee poll fray.

Mr Ajay Verma at a press conference here yesterday levelled that the charges against the local MLA and his supporter, who is contesting from ward No 3 where from Ajay Verma’s papers were rejected. Mr Ved Sharma, according to Mr Ajay Verma, had approached the local SDM that Verma had encroached the government land and the SDM asked Verma to disprove it.

He alleged that it was under the pressure of the MLA Surender Kaku that the required NOC was not issued by the local Naib Tehsildar despite the fact that patwari concerned had given his report that no encroachment was made by him.

Mr Verma said despite the encroachment of government land by Mr Ved Prakash his papers were not rejected. He has approached the state election commission in this regard. He also circulated documents of these encroachments among the mediapersons.

Mr Verma said he would meet the Chief Minister to clear the misunderstanding created in his mind by the local MLA against him and would move Himachal Pradesh High Court against the rejection of his nomination paper unlawfully.

Accompanied by a brigade of Youth Congress workers at the press conference, Mr Verma said that he would shortly meet the AICC President Sonia Gandhi in Delhi to tell her how Congress was being weakened by Congress men themselves.

No clarity on poll expenditure
Our Correspondent

Solan, December 11
With no clear instructions about the expenditure limit for the ensuing urban and rural civic bodies elections, confusion prevails both among the candidates as well as the officials.

While the officials insist that no recent instructions have been issued to keep a check on the expenditure, the candidates plead that despite receiving an exhaustive list of instructions from the election returning officers there was virtually no mention of the poll expenditure.

Senior officials in the Panchayati Raj department maintain that the instructions issued in 2000 would be held valid though an amendment was effected in the act in 2001. As per these instructions a zila parishad aspirant could spend Rs 30,000 while there was no limit for the BDC members, panchayat pradhan and ward members. The information was yet to be sent to the district panchayat officers.

A cross-section of candidates when asked about the expenditure limit said though they were instructed to submit the poll expenditure to the respective ROs within one month from the declaration of results but no limit had been specified as yet. They were now awaiting these instructions.

An aspirant of Zila Parishad, however, specified that since no fresh instructions had been issued they were going by the earlier instructions where the expenditure was fixed at Rs 1 lakh, Rs 40,000 and Rs 25,000 for the Zila Parishad aspirant, BDC member and a panchayat pradhan, respectively. The expenditures for the ward members was difficult to monitor hence it was not specified added the candidates.

The Deputy Commissioner, Mr Rajesh Kumar, said that they had received the due instructions and they would be made available to the candidates soon.

The convenor of the BJP’s election cell, Mr H.N. Kashyap, however, alleged that the poll expenditure of a few Congress-supported candidates contesting for the Zila Parishad post in Solan district would surpass the specified limit as dozens of vehicles were running daily in the poll campaign.

HPCC chief seeks details of assets
Tribune News Service

Shimla, December 11
Ms Viplove Thakur, state Congress president, has directed all the pradesh congress committee members to furnish the details of their movable and immovable assets by January 15,2005.

Ms Thakur has taken this step inspite of reservations expressed by Mr Virbhadra Singh, Chief Minister, who maintained that the ministers and legislators were not required to submit the details of their assets to the PCC Chief.

A letter from the party chief to all the PCC members, including ministers, legislators and co-opted members, said they were required to give the details of assets by the stipulated date so for submission to the party high command.

The move of Ms Thakur to seek the details of assets from senior party leaders had triggered off a controversy, as the Chief Minister did not approve of it. He is of the view that ministers and legislators have been giving the details of their assets to the leader of legislative group.

According to party sources, Ms Thakur had taken the step after seeking approval from the national party president, Ms Sonia Gandhi, whom she met on November 22 last.

The ministers and the legislators have been caught in a catch-22 situation. They could neither dare to defy the directive of the party president nor go against the wishes of the Chief Minister.

Virbhadra violating code of conduct: BJP
Tribune News Service

Shimla, December 11
Mr Suresh Bharadwaj, state BJP chief, today waned the state election commission and officers involved in the conduct of panchayat and local body poll not to work under pressure either from the government or the ruling party. He said his party was keeping a close watch and it would take all the cases of irregularities to the court.

He lamented that the election commission had failed to take any action on the complaints of misuse of official machinery and violation of the model code of conduct submitted by the BJP. He said the Chief Minister, Mr Virbhadra Singh, in particular, was making announcements and promises in blatant violation of the code of conduct.

He said despite the misuse of official machinery and announcements regarding opening of a university and other institutions, the BJP would sweep the elections. Already a large number of the BJP-sponsored candidates had been elected as pradhans and up-pradhans unopposed.

BJP airs concern over rising prices
Tribune News Service

Shimla, December 11
The BJP has expressed concern over the rising prices of gold and essential commodities and urged the government to provide assistance to poor families for marriage of girls.

Mr Ganesh Dut, a senior BJP leader, said poor families were being forced to raise loan to buy “mangalsutra” for their daughter’s marriage, which was an essential item.

He said the UPA government had failed to keep prices in check and rates of essential commodities like sugar, diesel , petrol and kerosene had been hiked several times and there was a move to increase the rates of cooking gas refill by Rs 100 in two instalments.

He said the Congress and the Left parties should apologise for making a false promise to the people during elections that on coming to power they would bring down the prices.