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Poultry coming into Capital to be screened
Encroachers take over proposed FNG Expressway
BSES adopts ‘zero tolerance’ policy to tackle power theft
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She took to crime to raise money for her jailed husband
DUJ starts Save Journalism Week
Police accused of partisan role in suicide case
‘Implementation of social welfare schemes unsatisfactory’
EPCH to adopt aggressive marketing techniques to increase exports
Panels upgraded at Mayur Vihar sub-station
Man’s best friend indeed!
More agencies to take care of school infrastructure
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Poultry coming into Capital to be screened
New Delhi, February 20 Health Minister Yoga Nand Shastri held an emergency high-level meeting to review precautionary measures and arrangements to deal with the situation in the Capital in the light of bird flu cases being reported among poultry in Maharashtra. The government has decided to constitute a panel of 42 doctors to keep an eye on each of the 42 poultry farms in the city. There are about four lakh birds in these farms. “So far, in Delhi no case of bird flu has been reported and there is no need to panic. But we are alert to the situation and hospitals have been asked to be ready with medicines and other requirements,” Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said. She said a laboratory was being set up at Maulana Azad Medical College to check any suspected case of bird flu. Food and Civil Supplies Minister Rajkumar Chauhan, who inspected the Ghazipur Mandi to check the precautionary measures being taken there, said a high alert had been sounded and special emphasis would be laid on cleanliness in the market and over 40 doctors would be deployed to check birds at the wholesale market as well as the 40 odd poultry farms here. “Till now, we had two doctors checking the poultry being brought at the Mandi. From today, four doctors have been deployed there in view of the bird flu scare,” Mr Chauhan said. Surveillance teams were also being deployed at the borders to check the poultry coming into the city. The Delhi Government is also getting pamphlets printed to make people aware about the dos and donts for bird flu. Mr Chauhan said poultry was supplied to Delhi from neighbouring states such as Haryana, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, with the daily requirement being that of 1.5 lakh chickens. There are no supplies coming in from Maharashtra, the place affected by the avian disease, he added. Meanwhile, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi has geared up its hospitals to meet the threat of bird flu to human beings. The civic body has kept three hospitals – Hindu Rao, Maharishi Balmiki Infectious Diseases and Swami Dayanand Hospitals — for handling cases of the flu. Special isolation wards had been kept in reserve and trained doctors were in readiness to handle any emergency. All municipal hospitals had been advised to take steps for early detection of the disease and its management, an MCD spokesman said. The MCD, which had successfully tackled SARS cases earlier, was confident of handling the threat of the bird flue menace. A high-level committee has been set up in the corporation under the Additional Commissioner (Health) to monitor the preparedness. A massive surveillance programme has been launched by the MCD to tackle the potential thread of the bird flu in Delhi. As a first step, it has been decided to inspect the birds coming to the main poultry market at Ghazipur. All poultry being brought to Delhi from outside must come through the Ghazipur market and carry a certificate to that effect. The entry of the poultry through non-Ghazipur routes has been strictly restricted. Health inspectors and the Animal Husbandry Department of the Government of Delhi and the MCD will inspect the poultry and enforce the restriction. Vehicles carrying poultry without the certificate of the Delhi Agricultural Marketing Board Authority at Ghazipur will not be allowed movement.
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Encroachers take over proposed FNG Expressway
Noida, February 20 Noida CEO Sanjeev Saran is reported to have laid a fresh anti-encroachment strategy to deal with this situation by cancelling all previous rules on the subject. Under the new policy enumerated, revenue department, civil construction wing, protection wing, building construction wing and forest department, all have been given separate and specific responsibilities. It had been decided earlier that the two mobile units would daily work in the development sectors for evaluating and removing encroachments. Chief Project Engineers will present a daily progress report to the CEO/ACEO. It was also decided that the ultimate responsibility of enforcing and removing encroachments on the notified area would be that of the land department. This system was introduced 90 days ago and during these three months, nothing much has been accomplished by squads in clearing encroachments in Ilabans and Yakubpur villages. The land sharks have become quite active around this Faridabad-Noida-Ghaziabad Expressway area due to slackness of the Noida authority. This highway has been planned to pass from the Hindon River bank touching Garhi, Behalolpur, Parthala, Khanjarpur, Ilabans, Yakubpur, Shahadara, Mohijarpur, Chhaprauli and Sangrauli. The land mafia is buying land in these villages only, so that they may cash it on later. Even some politicians, bureaucrats and land mafia are reported to be working here. According to some junior revenue officials, reports about the illegal occupation of land are being submitted to administration officers and even CEO and Additional CEOs regularly, but even they seem to be observing a studied silence in the matter. The matter of ‘abadi’ rules has been pending with the administration for the last five years. The delay in finalizing the rules only helps those involved in illegal buying and selling of the land. CEO Noida, Sanjeev Saran is likely to review this policy and set right all rules of the anti-encroachment procedures. The work on identification of the proposed route of Faridabad-Noida-Ghaziabad (FNG) Expressway will be taken up on a war-footing, Mr Saran said.
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BSES adopts ‘zero tolerance’ policy to tackle power theft
New Delhi, February 20 A whopping 35 per cent of power supplied in Delhi is stolen by people from all stratas of society, causing a potential revenue loss of over Rs 2100 crore to the discoms, as a mere one per cent loss translates to a revenue loss of around Rs 60 crore. According to Mr Lalit Jalan, BSES, “To deal with this growing epidemic of power theft, the BSES has put into place ‘zero tolerance’ policy, a policy that takes a 360 degree approach to power theft.” The policy, besides detecting and controlling power theft, takes a holistic view to power theft. The policy tried to go to the root cause of power theft and then addressed each of the issues from a very holistic point of view, he added. The BSES has decided to go after the big fish. He said the menace of power theft had taken the proportion of an epidemic afflicting all strata of society. Recent raids and surveys by the BSES had shown a very disturbing pattern - the rich, the educated and the respected paying and even bribing the local electricians to tamper their meters. In most of the cases, the meters were found deliberately slowed down by more than 60 per cent. Recent raids in Neelkanth Apartments, Page 3 restaurants and guesthouses in Malviya Nagar are a case in point. These high profile raids, it is hoped, will service as a deterrent to others indulging in this menace. The BSES has mapped its entire consumer base down to the last detail, using the latest Geographical Information System (GIS) and other such modern technologies.
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She took to crime to raise money for her jailed husband
Noida, February 20 What prompted Renu to enter the world of crime makes an interesting story. She had jumped into the world of crime, supposedly a man’s preserve, to arrange a bail for her husband, and raise the money for the purpose. She took to crimes like loot, waylaying, etc. Renu’s husband, R. Naresh, a dreaded criminal, has been lodged in Tihar Jail for last three years in connection with a murder case. He is wanted in a number of cases of murder, loot and dacoity by the Bulandshahr police. Mother of two, Renu became part of the gang of criminals–all accomplices of her husband. She told the police that Naresh was her cousin— son of elder brother of her father. She was abducted by Naresh while she was only 13 reportedly due to some enmity. He kept her in his gang and later married her, Renu disclosed. After Naresh had gone to jail for three years, she started living with an aunt in Khora Colony. Subsequently, she worked in an export factory in Mammura. One day four youths abducted her while she was returning home. They raped her. The family did not report to the police as she was the wife of a person with a criminal record. An accomplice of her husband Satish had helped her occasionally. Satish, she said, had forced her to join him in crimes so that they could get her husband out on bail. She formed her own gang under Satish along with a nephew, Kaluwa. She donned a pant-shirt dress with a revolver holster dangling from her hips. If need be, she would not hesitate to fire shots while committing robbery. She played with revolvers and bullets since she was 14, Renu told the police. She kept her husband’s weapons after he went to jail. According to SO Sector-58 police, police are trying to nab Satish and Kaluwa. SO said Renu was a shrewd woman who had often changed her statements to mislead the police. But eventually she had confessed and told police all about her husband during intense interrogation.
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Sikh schoolkids hold protest against turban ban in France
New Delhi, February 20 Led by religious leader Manjit Singh, the school children carried placards urging the visiting French President to exempt Sikh pupils in France from the ban. France banned religious symbols such as Sikh turbans and Muslim headscarves in state schools in 2004 in a move aimed at checking what officials said was the rising influence of radical Islam among France’s large Muslim population. “This march does not just challenge a law but the Western way of thinking,” Mr Manjit Singh, a senior member of the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee (DSGMC) and head of the Shiromani Akali Dal (Panthak), said. The schoolchildren, who walked from Gurdwara Bangla Sahib to Parliament Street, later submitted a memorandum at the French Embassy also. In a separate memorandum addressed to Mr Chirac, supporters of former Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal also demanded the ban be revoked. “We find no reason in imposing such a ban on turbans. Are Sikhs living there not Europeans?” asked Mr Avtar Singh Hit, who heads Mr Badal’s party in Delhi.
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DUJ starts Save Journalism Week
New Delhi, February 20 The meeting resolved to extend total support to the All India Confederation of Newspaper and News Agency Employees in their march to Parliament on February 23 and added that on the question of a new Wage Board, a Media Commission, illegal retrenchments in the newspaper industry and a witch-hunt of newspaper unionists. The government seemed to be numbed into masterly inactivity. Wearing black badges, they resolved to carry on a week’s campaign to focus on Murdochisation of the media and its replicas, the increasing lack of security or even a risk insurance cover and adverse changes in the service conditions of press persons. The meeting charged that starvation deaths and virtual starvation was gripping various small and medium newspapers and even the presspersons of newspapers connected with the freedom struggle like the Patriot and the Link were being starved while banks and select news barons made merry at the cost of the paper founded by freedom fighter Aruna Asaf Ali. The meeting resolved to bring out an expose of the curious goings-on in certain industrial houses to kill journalism, all forms of alternate journalism and that press workers die. The needle of suspicion, the meeting charged, was pointing out clearly to a politico-big business nexus. A preliminary investigation has already begun, the DUJ President, Mr S. K. Pande and veteran journalist Anand Prakash announced at the meeting. Resolutions on Wage Board, Murdochisation and trivialisation and mass victimisation of press persons were unanimously passed.
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Police accused of partisan role in suicide case
Gurgaon, February 20 The complainant, Mr Mani Chabbra, son of the deceased, has sought the transfer of investigation of the case and charged the local police, including the district police chief, Mr Hanif Qureshi, with “partisan role”. It may be recalled that the police had registered a case under Section 306(abetting suicide) of the Indian Penal Code(IPC) against the wife of the complainant on September 30, 2005, the day Mrs Kaur allegedly committed suicide. However, the accused was not arrested for 68 days even though she was present in persons before the police personnel. Mr Chabbra alleged that the CID Haryana has submitted to the Punjab and Haryana High Court the inadequacies and irregularities in the investigation. It was also stated that the CID has held that neither Forensic Science Laboratory(FSL) team was called on the spot on the day incident, nor examination of the postmortem report was carried out by the Investigating
Officer. When contacted, the Director General of Police, Mr Nirmal Singh, confirmed today that the CID had made submission before the High Court. However, he clarified that it was no reflection on the Gurgaon police. It was his suggestion that in case the complainant was not satisfied with the investigation by the Gurgaon police, the case may be investigated by the state’s Crime Branch. He said the police had to be very sure before arresting the accused. The Additional Director General of Police (CID), Mr P.V.Rathee, however, could not be contacted for his comments.
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‘Implementation of social welfare schemes unsatisfactory’
Faridabad, February 20 A spokesperson of the Shakti Vahini, an NGO based here, which co-hosted a conference-cum- workshop on child trafficking recently at Jaipur, said there was lack of seriousness on the part of the state government while implementing the Union Government sponsored schemes. According to the spokesperson, bureaucratic hurdles and red-tapism had limited the benefits from the schemes to a considerable extent. The performance of the state governments, including Haryana, had been ‘unsatisfactory’ under the ‘Balika Samridhi Yojna’ in the 9th and 10th five years plans, the spokesperson said. An amount of just Rs 216 crore had been used by the states out of the estimated Rs 1500 crore. There were insufficient numbers of shelters for poor and destitute women, even though the number of girls rescued from traffickers has increased. It may be pointed out that Mewat region of the State has become a hub for trafficking of girls brought from Assam, West Bengal and Jharkhand. Presently, there exists just a single such shelter located at Karnal.
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EPCH to adopt aggressive marketing techniques to increase exports
Noida, February 20 According to the Export Promotion Council for Handicrafts (EPCH) the exports are targeted to increase by three fold in the next 5 years. The EPCH proposes to increase its exports by adopting aggressive marketing techniques, creating infrastructure and improvement in production techniques. The EPCH has set up ‘Common Facility Centres’ at Saharanpur and Jodhpur. A technology up-gradation centre is being set up soon at Saharanpur for improving production technology. The design development facility has also been created at Moradabad for helping exporters in developing new designs. The EPCH is setting up special economic zone for handicrafts and other synergic products at Noida. Special marketing projects have been devised and implemented for development of new designs and products for exports for North-Eastern states. The EPCH plans to concentrate on focused publicity in focused markets, generic promotion in special trade shows, specialised seminars on sourcing and contact programmes.
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Panels upgraded at Mayur Vihar sub-station
New Delhi, February 20 The new state-of-the art vacuum circuit breakers are automatic and connected to the central systems. Earlier, these panels had to be manually operated by people. These panels will ensure faster fault detection and restoration. They will help in ensuring better, frequent and stable power supply in various parts of Mayur Vihar -I, including pockets-I, II, III, IV and V. A large number of societies and apartments will benefit from the upgradation of the
system. More than 50,000 residents of the area will benefit from the upgraded
systems.
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Man’s best friend indeed!
Ghaziabad, February 20 Mohinder Singh’s three-year-old grandson, Satinder, was playing with other children outside the house yesterday when two youths atop a bike picked up the child and tried to flee towards Kajoda Kalan. But the two canine companions of Mohinder Singh chased the miscreants for about a km, jumping and often attacking them on the way. The kidnappers left the child ultimately and took to their heels.
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More agencies to take care of school infrastructure
New Delhi, February 20 “The government today decided that other agencies such as the DTDC, the DSIDC and the Irrigation and Floods Department would also be asked to take care of the school infrastructure,” Education Minister Arvinder Singh Lovely said.
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