Jalandhar, September 20
Illegal structures and vends on the Garha-bus stand road here were demolished by the local civic body staff amid protests by shopkeepers and vendors.

Interestingly, the local BJP leaders opposed the move, and the demolition squad had to stall its work due to the stiff opposition of the affected vendors and shopkeepers, who got emboldened due to political interference.

The shopkeepers and vendors alleged that the MC had not given any notice to them before carrying out the demolition, and the sudden MC exercise had resulted in a huge financial loss to them as their goods worth lakhs of rupees had got destroyed in the demolition.

“They razed our shops in front of us and did not give any time to us to take out our goods from our establishments,” alleged Ajit Kumar, a shopkeeper.

A delegation of the affected vendors also met the local MC Commissioner, Mr S.S. Johl, and demanded that they be allowed to carry on their business as usual as they had established their shops years ago. 

Kapurthala, September 20
Now voters will not have to wait for months to get their photo-identity cards. They will be issued their photo-identity cards on the spot, thanks to the online system.

The online system for issuing photo-identity cards was started under a special campaign in the district today. Two types of voters will be covered under the campaign. New cards will be issued to voters who didn’t have these cards earlier.

Apart from this, duplicate cards will be given to those voters whose cards were lost, mutilated, or whose earlier-issued cards bear some wrong information.

The photograph-clicking of the voters and the issuance of the cards are being done for 
Sultanpur and Bholath Assembly constituencies from September 21 to October 3, and from September 25 to October 28, respectively.

Three teams of photographers will take the photographs of the voters concerned at each place from nine am to five pm.

Kapurthala Deputy Commissioner cum District Returning Officer, Mr Raminder Singh, said the Electoral Registration Officers concerned were distributing the identity slips to the voters. The SDMs of both sub-divisions Sultanpur and Bholath are the Electoral Registration Officers of their Assembly constituencies concerned, the DC added. 

Jalandhar, September 20
The cable war in the city has started hotting up with the entry of another local network company. This assumes significance as residents of various areas, with the help of their respective societies, have been up in arms against a local cable network company for enhancing subscription charges.

While the new company has offered a highly-competitive subscription rate to the tune of Rs 100, the two main cable operators here had enhanced their rates from Rs 100 to Rs 280 in many areas a few months back. After this, the residents had taken up the matter in the Grievances Committee meeting and then in the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum.

The new company was launched just three days back by Ms Ragini Thakur, Managing Director of Ragini Entertainments, who had earlier been running dance and art classes in the same office near Nakodar Chowk here. The fact that the launching ceremony was performed by the owner of a vernacular newspaper group that has been at loggerheads with a top businessman of the city owning a cable network is another indication of political reasons behind the entry of this company.

Even as the company has not laid connections completely, a battle has ensued between the two groups. Both have lodged their complaints in Police Station Division No. 4. While Ms Thakur has alleged that the rival group was deliberately snapping its cable wires, the other group has complained that Ragini Entertainments was “trying to steal their signals”.

Ms Thakur alleged that even as her complaints had been received by police officials, no one had approached her to seek further details or make any effort to nab the “culprits”. She said that each joint that had to be set to join the broken wires cost her Rs 300, and she was spending anywhere between Rs 1500 and Rs 2100 per day for this. She added that the fibre cables were not just being torn but also stolen at many places. This “compounded her problems”.

“Instead of acting on my complaint, the police officials have been siding with the other party on whose complaint they raided my premises yesterday,” she further alleged. Mr Narinder Sethi, GM of Win Cable, when contacted, alleged, “The signals of our channels were being stolen. This could be easily established as our logo was coming on cable programmes telecast in certain new areas where the new company has started its relay. The new company is also showing movies for which it does not have any rights. They are charging low as no channel telecast by them is paid. They are showing all free-to-air channels.”

But 26-year-old Ragini Thakur has countered their claims, saying, “No theft could be established in our office or else we would have been booked. I have a digital system to transmit 46 channels. While many news and music channels are free-to-air, we are buying others for Rs 5 per connection. We are yet to buy more channels, but we would not raise our charges.”

“The cable operators here have bought monopoly for distributorship in the city at a premium, due to which the subscribers are being asked to shell out more,” she alleged.

Mr Sethi, however, denied the allegations, saying that getting a monopoly was not possible and it was simply a counterattack on them.

The SHO of Division No. 4 said that he had not got any complaint from the owners of the firm, but he said he had checked their premises as there had been a complaint of some kind of kundi connection. He said that since the matter involved technical understanding, he could not find any faults immediately. 

Phagwara, September 20
Legislations for empowering women are widely misused, particularly those pertaining to dowry and sexual harassment cases. This is what experts say. The number of complaints by women against men, particularly in family dispute cases, is going up day by day. Though a large number of these complaints are settled in the panchayats or in women’s cells, in many cases both parties fight for years in courts.

Phagwara ASP, Dr Sukhchain Singh Gill, says, “A large number of criminal cases filed by women are used as a negotiation tool to extract financial benefits from boys and their families. Sexual harassment cases are sometimes registered for blackmailing purposes. In matrimonial dispute cases, old parents of the boy and his unmarried sisters are dragged in without any fault of theirs. The boy’s distant relatives are also not spared to mount pressure on his family. Because of this, genuine sufferers are not getting justice.”

A Nawanshahr-based advocate, Mr R.S. Talwar, said, “In 80 to 95 per cent of the cases ego problem in women and a fast lifestyle are major causes of marital conflict. The girls find it difficult to accept that their life partner is less educated as compared to them. When the in-laws of a newly-married girl express their inability to fulfill her demands, she refuses to compromise and there is conflict in the family.”

Mr Talwar further said, “Under such circumstances, the girl usually alleges that her in-laws are demanding dowry, and the boy, to counter this, goes to the extent of indulging in her character assassination.” It was intolerance that was breaking families, he added.

A police inspector, Ms Gurmel Kaur, who deals with women’s complaints in the Women’s Cell of Phagwara police, said, “It is the prime duty of a newcomer in any house to adjust to the new environment. When this fact is ignored, conflict begins.”

She was of the view that parents of girls should verify everything, including the boy’s qualification, financial position, social status, and the nature of the family before marriage. She said dowry was not demanded in every case, but in most of the marital dispute cases complaints were made on the basis of dowry harassment.

 Talking about sexual harassment, Inspector Gurmel Kaur said generally women avoided complaining. But sometimes mischievous elements misused the law to settle personal scores or to blackmail the targeted person, she added. 

Phagwara, September 20
In view of the dengue scare, Mr T.R. Sarangal, Managing Director, Punjab Health System Corporation, visited Jalandhar and Amritsar on Monday to take stock of the situation.  

The director said that the Health Department authorities had been instructed to make arrangements for proper focal spray in affected areas, and that civic bodies had been asked to do proper fogging.

He added that the teams of the Health Department had been instructed to take samples of the entire population around 200 mt of the affected areas.

He further disclosed that only 40 dengue cases had been detected in Punjab last year and that now all necessary preventive measures were being taken.

Phagwara, September 20
Ajay Kumar (23), a newly-married youth and resident of Amritsar, was electrocuted to death here on Tuesday.

According to available information from family sources, the deceased, along with his wife, had come to his uncle’s house in Prempura Mohalla in Phagwara on Monday. He was sleeping on the roof of the house. As he was about to climb down the stairs in the morning on Tuesday, he accidentally came in contact with a high-tension wire passing through the roof of the house. He died on the spot. The deceased had been married barely two months ago. — TNS