Chandigarh, July 3
Punjab and Haryana and have jointly agreed to keep a tab on the situation emerging out of Dera Sacha Sauda imbroglio.

The Director General of Police (DGPs) of the two states met this morning and reviewed the situation. Later, they agreed to instruct their subordinates to keep a close watch on the situation and share information on the developments on either side of the state border.

Special emphasis will be given to check anti-social elements from exploiting the situation ahead of a meeting called by the Sikh clergy at Ratia in Fatehabad district on July 11.

Ratia town, a tehsil headquarters is located on the bank of the Ghaggar about 23 km north of Fatehabad. It has Punjab to its north and Hisar to its south.

Senior officials said the Haryana Director General of Police held an hour-long meeting with his officers and gave them detailed instructions about setting up nodal points within the police set up to coordinate policing activities and share information.

Haryana DGP R.S. Dalal and Punjab DGP N.P.S. Aulakh met Haryana chief secretary Prem Parshant and Punjab chief secretary Ramesh Inder Singh two days ago and discussed the dera issue.

It is said that the chief secretaries had decided to ask their state DGPs to hold a meeting to work out modalities for coordination and sharing of information.

According to sources it has been decided that police force on the Punjab - Haryana border will be increased and each vehicle crossing to the other side will be checked.

The police nakas will check the possibility of anti-social elements from crossing over into the other side.

The Punjab Director General of Police is believed to have assured his Haryana counterpart that the Punjab police would step up security around the Dera Sacha Sauda properties and branches in Punjab.

Haryana has also sought Punjab’s help to take any other preventive action to maintain peace and calm.

Earlier in the day, a delegation of women comprising dera followers from Punjab and Haryana met Punjab Governor General S.F Rodrigues and submitted a memorandum demanding adequate security for the dera and its followers and impressed upon the governor to use his good offices to ensure peace and tranquility in the two states.

The district administration apprehends some tension after the dera announced that it will hold “Naam Charcha” at Ratia on July 11.

Senior police officials visited Ratia town today and took stock of the situation.

Meanwhile, on the direction of the Haryana chief secretary, the district administration has constituted peace committees that will prevail upon people to maintain peace.

Chandigarh, July 3
The Haryana Congress has taken a tough line against supporters of suspended MP from Bhiwani Kuldeep Bishnoi.

It has started issuing show-cause notices to those partymen who attend rallies addressed by Bishnoi. Notices have been issued to even those who announced their decision to quit the party at Bishnoi's rallies, asking them to confirm the media reports about their decision. When no reply is received within the stipulated period, the "defaulting" partymen are being "expelled" from the party.

The party recently "expelled" former MLA Rao Narinder Singh; presidents of Ateli and Narnaul block Congress units Rao Dalip Singh and Manoj Kumar, respectively; and Secretary of the Mahendragarh District Congress Committee Abhey Singh. These leaders had announced their decision to quit the party at a rally addressed by Bishnoi in that district last month. None of them had obviously responded to the show-cause notices issued by the party. Their reaction was understandable. When they had already quit the party, why they would explain their conduct to it.

According to informed sources, working president of the Haryana Congress Dr Ram Prakash has issued another show-cause notice to the party's secretary Satpal Kaushik to explain why action should not be taken against him for attending Bishnoi's rally at Chhachhrauli in Yamunanagar district last month.

Earlier also a show-cause notice was issued to Kaushik after the media reported that he had written letters to AICC President Sonia Gandhi criticising the functioning to the state government. While pointing out that in his reply Kaushik had stated that he had not violated the party discipline by doing so, Ram Prakash said it was a fact that he(Kaushik) had addressed the rally organised by the suspended MP on June 27.

Dr Ram Prakash said this was tantamount to breach of the discipline and he(Kaushik) should explain within 15 days why action should not be taken against him. 

Yamunanagar, July 3
Usha Devi, a widow, has threatened to commit suicide along with her four children if the administration did not help her in taking back the possession of her house. She claims that her ancestral house has been forcibly occupied by certain ‘powerful’ people.

She said during the day she made rounds of police stations and district officials seeking help to get her house vacated and in the evenings she and her children slept at the Jagadhri railway station as they had no other place to go.

She alleged that on June 24, a resident of Baba colony accompanied by other men threw all her belongings and took possession of her house in Shivpuri colony. She said she reported the matter to the SP.

She said she had written to the city Magistrate requesting him to get her house cleared of occupation or else she and her children would end their lives and had stated that the administration would be held reponsible for the deaths.

She said she had taken a loan from the Baba colony resident and did not sell the house. The Baba colony resident, on the other hand, claims that he purchased the house and has the power of attorney in his name.

Police sources said Usha Rani had failed to provide any documentary evidence that the house was owned by her, while on the other hand the Baba colony resident had produced relevant documents in his favour.

Sonepat, July 3
Deepender Singh Hooda, MP, has reiterated that equal distribution of canal waters for drinking and irrigational supplies in every part of the state was one of the top priorities of the state government.

Addressing a series of public meetings in villages of Kailana Assembly constituency today, Hooda chided the previous governments in the state for discriminating against Rohtak, Sonepat and Panipat, by diverting the share of canal water supplies in Hissar and Sirsa.

“But now this discrimination will end with the completion of the Hansi link-Butana link canal by November end this year, and this will enable the government to provide equal share of the canal water supplies to the southern districts of the state,” he said.

He said the Hooda government had made the farmers ‘crorepatis’ by giving them compensation of the acquired land 10 times more than the compensation given by the previous governments. This had become difficult for the opposition leaders to digest the pro-farmers’ policies of the Hooda government, he added.

Hooda said the state government had begun a number of power generating projects to achieve the target of producing 5,000 MW of additional power by 2009, to which he added that there would be no shortage of power after the completion of these projects.

He was accompanied by Kailana MLA Jitender Malik, political advisor to CM, Prof. Virender, HPCC organising secretary (Media) Surender Singh and local Congress leaders. — OC

Hisar, July 3
Duloth Ahir village of Mahendragarh district has become the second village in the district to have High Voltage Distribution System (HVDS) for supply of power. The Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN) has installed the system at a cost of Rs 50 lakh. The first HVDS village of the district was Seka which incidentally was also Haryana’s first HVDS village.

A spokesman of the DHBVN said here today that 12 distribution transformers of 25 KVA capacity had been installed in the village. These transformers had been connected to 11KV feeder emanating from 220 KV sub-station, Mahendragarh. For joining the transformers, the feeder had been extended by erecting 62 additional poles. Each consumer of the village had been given connection directly from the transformer by using armoured cable. All low tension lines in the village which were the source of theft of electricity had been dismantled. Power theft had now come to almost zero level.

The spokesman said that before starting the work of laying of HVDS in Duloth Ahir, there were only 495 connections for 750 households. With the installation of the new system the number of connections had increased to 615. The DHBVN authorities expect that the village will soon have metered supply in all the 750 households.

The villagers have replaced about 80 per cent incandescent bulbs with energy efficient compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) and all the meters have already been relocated outside consumers’ premises. 

Fatehabad, July 3
A team of experts from the Chaudhary Charan Singh Haryana Agriculture University (CCSHAU), Hisar, today visited Dhani Sanchla, Dhani Dulet, Dhani Gopal and Dhani Bhojraj villages of the district in the wake of complaints of withering of cotton plants. The team comprising senior cotton scientists will find out what ails the plants, which are withering away fast and will suggest remedies for its cure.

Scores of farmers from these villages have been dropping in the office of the Agriculture Department with complaints that their cotton crops were damaging due to some mysterious infestation.

The farmers said cotton plants which were mostly grown out of Bt 913 seeds, suddenly turned yellow and then started withering away. The loss of crop varies from 5 per cent to 40 per cent in various areas of the district.

Deputy director, Agriculture, R.C. Poonia, said the authorities had brought the matter to the notice of the CCSHAU, which today sent a team of experts to look in to the matter. — OC

Chandigarh, July 3
Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda was today urged to fill the quota of Scheduled Castes and OBC employees in the government by Karamvir Singh, president of the confederation of SC, ST and BC employees, Haryana.

Singh said despite making a promise in the election manifesto by the ruling Congress party about giving adequate representation to Dalits and OBC aspirants in government vacancies, the state government was going slow in this respect.

He said a government instruction issued in July 1995 directed that 20 per cent jobs in the Class I and Class II categories must be reserved for the Scheduled Castes. It also directed that 27 per cent jobs in these two categories should be reserved for OBCs, he added.

However, at present Dalit employees constitute only 9.22 per cent of the workforce in Class I category and 11.22 per cent in Class II category. The OBC employees constitute 5.04 per cent in the Class I category and 10.36 per cent in Class II category.

Singh said out of a total of 2,753 employees of Class I category, 254 are Dalits and 139 are OBCs, and added that among the 10,577 employees of Class II category, only 1,187 are Dalits and 1,096 OBCs.

He requested the Chief Minister to take steps to put an end to the prevailing under-representation of Dalits and OBC employees in government vacancies.

Ambala, July 3
Ambala Sadar municipal councillors today strongly protested against a statement made by executive officer Pratap Singh over the Lal Kurti incident.

Councillors, cutting across party lines, were up in arms over Singh's statement to the police that councillor from Lal Kurti Naveen Yadav had disrupted work being carried out by a government employee.

This morning, a number of residents from the area congregated at the municipal council office and raised slogans against the EO. They demanded that Pratap Singh give a correct statement to the police. Congress and INLD councillors also reached the MC office and jointly demanded that the EO change his statement.

MC president Neelam Sharma supported the protesters and demanded that the EO give a public statement. However, Singh refused to come out of his office. He said he would not interact with the protestors, adding that an attempt was being made to politicise the issue.

A posse of policemen stood guard at the municipal council office. At one instance, a number of protesters rushed into the executive officer's office and the police had a difficult time controlling them.

The protesters pointed out that when Yadav was himself keen to get the work done, there was no reason why he would hinder it.

Finally, after much persuasion, the executive officer agreed to change his statement. But, again there was objection to the way the fresh statement was worded and a third statement was worked out in which the EO clearly stated that Yadav had supported the work and it had been disrupted following an altercation between the people around.

Ambala, July 3
The National Highway Authority and the Town Planning Department jointly launched a demolition drive on the GT Road, Ambala City, this noon.

Six liquor vends and four other constructions located on the GT Road, within a periphery of 30 metres, were demolished. Three J.C.B. machines were pressed into service.

Ambala SDM Mukesh Ahuja and around 50 police constables accompanied thedemolition squad.

A dhaba located in the premises of a petrol pump could not be demolished as the owner produced a status quo order from the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

NHA project director P.K. Sharma said the drive would continue tomorrow as well.

He said illegal constructions on the GT road at Ambala Cantonment would also be demolished.

SDM Ahuja and district town planner R.K. Singh said notices were issued to owners of the demolished shops.

It is to be mentioned that the NHA has issued demolition notices to around owners of 100 constructions which include six dhabas, two public schools, one bank, three petrol pumps and two religious places.

Chandigarh, July 3
The division bench, comprising Justice P.Sathasivam and Justice Rajive Bhalla, of the Punjab and Haryana High Court today adjourned to July 5 the hearing on the writ petition filed by Satpal Singh and 10 others from Palam Vihar and other areas of Gurgaon, seeking directions for re-alignment of three km of the proposed road that connects Dwarka with Manesar urban complex envisioned in the development plan 2021.

The bench issued the notice after taking into consideration the objections and representations submitted by the petitioners. It was also been pointed out that the present alignment of the road would lead to uprooting of 3000 persons and affect livelihood of 10,000 factory workers.

The hearing on the petition was adjourned to enable the counsel for the petitioners to apprise the bench if similar matter had been raised in the court and the fate thereof. 

Panchkula, July 3
Haryana’s first Common Service Centre (CSC) was opened at Chiken village, Pinjore block, here today. The centre was inaugurated by deputy commissioner Neerja in the presence of district administration officers, Hartron officers, the CEO and personnel of the Service Centre Agency (SCA) and villagers from adjoining areas.

B2C services, such as computer literacy, railway information, e-mail and net surfacing, DTP and printing, education and legal consultancy will be provided to the villagers at nominal rates. A host of other B2C services will be added soon.

The company is planning to open one CSC in each block of the district in the next fortnight. The State Government also aims to provide G2C services such as details of land records, electricity bills, birth and death certificates, caste, income, domicile certificate, application form for driving licenses and passports.

The Government of India, under the National e-Governance Plan (NEGP), has targeted to establish 1,00,000 CSCs on the criteria of roughly 1 CSC per 6 villages all over India.

On the guidelines of the Government of India (GOI), the State Government has designated the Haryana State Electronics Development Corporation Ltd (Hartron) as the State-Designated Agency (SDA) for the execution of the CSC scheme in Haryana. Accordingly, 1,159 rural and 104 Urban E-Disha Ekal Sewa Kendras (Common Service Centre) are to be established in the state. Thus, 275,267,294 and 323 rural CSC and 24,25,28 and 27 urban CSCs will be established in Ambala, Rohtak, Gurgaon and Sirsa division, respectively. All the above CSCs are likely to be made operational by April 2008.

Twenty-eight rural and five urban centres will be established in Panchkula. M\s Jak Software Ltd., New Delhi, has been selected as the Service Centre Agency for implementation of the scheme in Ambala division.