R E G I O N A L   B R I E F S

• Regional potpourri

PUNJAB

ABOHAR
Child abandoned : A newly born female child was found at the entry point of Gurdwara Nanaksar Tobha here on Friday morning. The managing committee contacted the SDM, Mr Jaskiran Singh, to get the baby admitted to Nehru Memorial Civil Hospital. The SMO of the hospital, however, said that the post of the child specialist had been lying vacant for a couple of months. The baby was then rushed to a private clinic. The doctor said the child had been delivered only few hours back and was in a critical condition. 

Mission Olympics: Shriyanka Sadangi (10) of Army School has been selected for the ‘Mission Olympics-Catch them Young Talent Hunt’. She will represent the South-West Command in the arena of shooting. The mission’s aim is nurturing young talents for future olympics.

BATALA
Annual function: The ninth annual prize distribution function of City Young’s Public School was held here on Friday on the school campus. The chief guest of the function, Mr Ashok Kumar, Bishop of Amritsar, said it was the duty of the parents and teachers to look after the younger generation. He asked the children to take inspiration from personalities like Lala Lajpat Rai, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and Mrs Indira Gandhi to build a strong nation. 

Hoshiarpur
Meeting  held: A meeting of the Principals of Non-Government Colleges Association, affiliated to Panjab University, Chandigarh, was held at Ludhiana on Friday. Dr Janmeet Singh, general secretary of the association said their demands were ban on filling of vacant posts be immediately withdrawn, grant in aid, pension and gratuity be paid to colleges, Professor grade for Principals and merger of 50 per cent DA in the basic pay.

Held for carrying smack: The police has arrested Tilak Raj, alias Bhola of Labh Nagar, Jalandhar, and Sandip Kumar of Bassi Khwaju Mohalla and seized 16 gm of smack and 209 injections of morphin. Both were booked under the NDPS Act. 

Ludhiana
Workshop: A workshop on personality development for teachers was organised by Ratna Sagar Publication at BVM Senior Secondary School, Udham Singh Nagar, here on Sunday. Teachers from different schools of the city attended and actively participated in the workshop. Mr Surya Narayan Bahadur was the resource person. He discussed the ways and means by which teachers could motivate students to concentrate on their studies and succeed in achieving their goals. 

Mandi Ahmedgarh
Awarded: In recognition of his research work on Brahmin Vedang Jyotish and Sanskar, Pandit Lalit Mohan Pabbi, a local astrologer, was awarded Vedang Jyotash Maharanva, a degree in astrology, by Jammu University at an interuniversity conference organised by the International Federation of Astrology and Spiritual Sciences, Colombo, Punjab University and Jammu University at Tavi recently.

Moga
Shopkeeper held: The police arrested a shopkeeper from Tavtej Singh Market complex and seized 45 gm of smack from his possession here on Saturday. The shopkeeper identified as Sachan Bansal has been booked under the NDPS Act. 

Reader arrested: The police arrested Naresh Kumar, a reader of the Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM) of Nihalsinghwala on charges of embezzling Rs 2,500 from the government treasury here on Saturday. The alleged accused was arrested on the complaint of a retired PSEB Junior Engineer. He was booked under Section 409 of the IPC. 

Samrala
CLERKS’ STRIKE: On the call given by the Clerical Association of the State Bank of Patiala, clerks of the local branch of the State Bank of Patiala, observed a full-day strike, causing great harship to customers of the bank as well as the clients who had to deposit their challans in the government treasury, regarding registries, motor vehicle taxes etc.

X’MAS FUNCTION: The first Christmas function at the Bethel Children’s Home (Bethel Ashram) in Ghulal village, 5 km from here, will be celebrated with great pomp and show, according to director Bishop Geogre Joshph. 

PROMOTED: Samrala-based advocate Shan Sunder Kalyan has been promoted as District Attorney in Judicial Courts, Kapurthala. Earlier, Mr Kalyan was posted as Assistant District Attorney in Khanna courts.

HIMACHAL PRADESH

KANGRA
Blast in furnace: One person was seriously injured and property close to a lakh was destroyed following a blast in a furnace at the fruit mandi near Gupt Ganga on Friday. Mr Tilak Bhaloria, Fire Officer, said that the blast was so powerful that the cement slab of the room was blown up leaving Shiv Kumar, (35) seriously injured. He said property worth more than a lakh was destroyed.

Shimla
Tribunal member: Mr Vijay Pal Singh, a retired IPS officer, took over as member (Administrative) in the Himachal Pradesh Administrative Tribunal on Friday. The Registrar, of the tribunal, read out the appointment warrant issued by the President of India. 

REGIONAL POTPOURRI

Hollywood’s Hisar connection

It’s not only Bollywood stars that’re getting to work for some of the big names in Hollywood. Kuldeep Khangarot, who is at the Doordarshan Kendra, Hisar, and hails from Rajasthan, has been assisting Oscar-winning director Jane Campean and has worked with ‘Titanic’-fame Kate Winslet apart from working as location manager and casting director in other films and commercials.

On the home front, he has been associated with Shashi Kapoor’s son Kunal, Kamal Hasan and Ashwin, whose short Indian film “Little Terrorist.” was nominated for the Oscars. Khangarot wrote the dialogues in Rajasthani.

Khangarot, who holds an MA in fine arts from Rajasthan University, did theatre during his college days and along with friends, formed a theatre group ‘The Performers’. He made his debut with a foreign tele-serial ‘Queenie’. After that came a host of commercials, the prominent ones being for Audi, Fevicol, Shell Oil, Dabur, Wagon R and Cobra beer.

In the meanwhile, he started getting work in films as well. He assisted Campean in Australian feature film “Holy Smoke” and was location manager for Neeri Parenti’s Italian film “Christmas in India.”

Khangarot worked as the chief assistant director in BBC’s docu-drama “Millennium” for the episodes shot in India. All this while, he was working as a casual production assistant with Doordarshan. Last year, he got a regular appointment after court intervention.

An ardent lover of pets, Khangarot admires the westerners for their professionalism and asserts that sincerity and devotion to duty are two qualities we can learn from them.

“Though destiny also plays a role, there are no short-cuts to success,” he observes.

Poachers’ progress

Human interference is eating into the flora and fauna in many forest areas of Punjab, especially the Shivalik foothills. Besides loss and degradation of habitat, poaching is posing a major threat to various species.

The Shivaliks are home to many species, from minute algae and lichen to the spectacular Indian rock python. Stretching from north-west to south-east along the Himachal Pradesh border, the Shivalik range spreads over four districts of Punjab - Ropar, Hoshiarpur, Nawanshahr and Gurdaspur - covering 9,448 sq km.

The Sikligar, Bangala, Bawria and the Chirimar are some of the poaching tribes active in Punjab. During a recent visit to various areas along the Swan river, a tributary of the Sutlej, from Nangal to Santoshgarh village in Una district, a group of poachers were seen hunting turtles. They were using nets and fishhooks to trap turtles and fish in ponds.

Sajan, one of the hunters, says they also hunt birds for meat, black magic and religious purposes. The horned owl is usually hunted for black magic.

Prabhat Bhatti, director, Jagriti, a Nangal-based NGO working on environmental issues, says the areas along the Himachal border are more affected by the poaching. Most of the hunters migrate towards Himachal after killing animals in Punjab.

This highlights the need for an anti-poaching cell. Bio-rich areas like the Guru Gobind Singh Nature Reserve and Sadavrat forest in Ropar district; Dholbaha-Kukanet and Nara forests in Hoshiarpur; and Dhar and Dunera forests in Gurdaspur need to be protected.

Says Sudhir Mishra, principal legal adviser, Wildlife Protection Society of India, New Delhi, “There is a need to educate the officials dealing with wildlife crimes and to create special wildlife courts to deal with the backlog of cases.”

Painting with knives

Dr Rajni Bala shows visitors around an exhibition of her paintings at Rohtak recently.

Dr Rajni Bala, a lecturer in Fine Arts at the Government College for Women, Rohtak, is one of those artists who paints in the traditional genre to keep alive ancient Indian art forms. She employs a unique style. Instead of brushes, she uses specially built knives for her oil paintings.

The art of oil-and-knife painting originated in Europe and is built on the concept of “patch-work”. It is considered the most difficult of all styles owing to the complexity and cost involved.

Although Dr. Bala has painted on almost all aspects of life, her works show a leaning towards the classical Kishangarh style.

Kishangarh is a tiny area in Rajasthan, where a unique style of painting rich in exotic colors, love, devotion, poetry and mysticism originated way back in the 18th century.

Dr. Bala claims to have revived this art form. Her favourite subject is Radha-Krishna. Born at Aligarh in 1952, she did her Master’s and Ph.D in Fine Arts from Agra University. The subject of her thesis too was Kishangarh paintings.

She has won several awards, including the Vishishta Seva Pramaan Patra from the Haryana Government. Exhibitions of her work have been held all over the country and also in the USA. ——— Contributed by Sunit Dhawan, Vishal Gulati and Raman Mohan