Phagwara, December 11
More than 12 trading and industrial associations of Phagwara knocked the doors of the Punjab and Haryana High Court against any move of the state government to reimpose octroi in the state and filed a writ petition in the high court today.

Accepting the petition, a bench of judges headed by Chief Justice Vijendera Jain, has fixed the next date of hearing on April 1, 2008. Phagwara industrialists, Ashok Sethi of the Electrical Association, Ashok Gupta of Laghu Udhyog Bharti, Jagdish Veerji of the small-scale industries, Kitti Chadha of the Federation of Small Industries, besides representatives of the Shoe Merchant Associaion, the Chemists Association, the Karyana Merchants Association and the Goldsmiths Association also appeared before the court and pleaded through their lawyer Hitesh Kapilish that the state government had imposed more than 10 per cent VAT which was accepted by the traders and industrialists to compensate the losses of the state government after abolition of octroi, but now the government was trying to reimpose octroi along with VAT which would be intolerable for them as trade and industry of the state were in a bad shape and in an acute financial crisis.

They urged the court to prevent the state government from reimposing octroi.

Jalandhar, December 11
A CT Public School student, Yuvraj Singh Marwaha, is barely 12 years old and has already designed a website for kids.

The site opens by his name www.yuvraj.name where he has posted all the stuff that most children like. From encyclopaedia to mathematical tricks, online games, jokes, cartoon clippings, pictures of prominent personalities, songs, links with search engines and other stuff, he has put all the stuff that schoolchildren would want to see. The whiz kid developed the website nearly six months back and has been regularly making changes in it, adding new stuff and eliminating some that he feels is no more interesting. The best that he has been able to achieve is getting Google’s referral advertisements for which he will be paid $ 1 for every 12 clicks on advertisements. “It was not very easy. His site was regularly monitored for a few months, during which they checked the stuff and ensured that it was regularly updated. He had to exchange a couple of emails with Google officials who sought specific information to check his credentials,” said Yuvraj’s father Balraj Singh, who writes ERPs for food and hotel industry.

The computer buff was also once nominated for the Guiness Book of World Records for being the youngest child to operate computer softwares, including MS Word, Photoshop, Dreamweaver and Flash. “He was in LKG and just three and a half months old. His name could have appeared but another child from Hyderabad who was a little younger to him won the claim,” Yuvraj’s mother Jyoti Marwaha, who runs a computer training institute, recalled. Even more interesting fact about the boy is that he is good at share trading. “He can operate the software Keats where he knows how to sell, buy and hold shares”, his father said. Asked if he could tell any share that was going up, he replied instantaneously, “RPI and Petronet is what you should go for.”

Jyoti tells, “My son is a good learner. He just has to see you operating once and he will be able to do it next time on his own. I have a few clients at my institute 
who come for share trading and he has watched them once or twice.”

A net freak, Yuvraj is also very fond of computer games, especially those on cricket. “I have downloaded the best games on my site for all those who visit it,” he said. He has actually dedicated the site to his school and class for its introductory pages include details about the school, his teachers and his friends.

He plans to add a column on daily homework so that it could help his friends note it down from his site just in case they missed the school. “That will also promote my site among my classmates”, he said. The 12-year-old is also a good piano player. “He is the youngest member of the orchestra team”, said the CT vice-principal, Anumita Gosal. 

Jalandhar, December 11
Within three days of nabbing notorious criminal Gurmel Singh, alias Raj Kumar, alias Raja Saipuriya, from Chintpurni in Himachal Pradesh on Saturday night, the district police succeeded in arresting one of his absconding accomplices Rajeev Gupta, alias Nikku Pandit.

However, Saipuriya’s two accomplices Chintoo, a resident of Preet Nagar, and Bhalu of Rasta Mohalla, are still at large. Talking to mediapersons here today, SP (city-1) S.K. Kalia said Nikku Pandit was nabbed at around 2 pm from the Rama Mandi area. He was wanted in three cases of attempt to murder registered at police divisions one, two and three. Besides, he was a co-accused with Saipuriya. Giving details, Kalia said, “Nikku Pandit was running an astrologer’s shop at Mitha Bazaar and had rivalry with astrologer Bittu. Nikku asked Saipuriya to attack Bittu and the duo seriously injured Bittu in broad daylight in a crowded market.

Meanwhile, the police has recovered a laptop stolen by Raja Saipuriya from a local resident.

Jalandhar, December 11
An international conference on “Futuristic trends in textiles” began at Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute here on Monday.

Being organised by the department of textile technology, the main objective of the conference is to emphasise on newer cutting-edge technologies, which can be implemented in the coming years to synergise textile market activity, upgrade knowledge, manpower and related activities, keeping in view the demands of the modern economy. The programme is being sponsored by technical education quality improvement programme, NIT, Jalandhar; Rieter Machine Works Ltd and Vardhman Textiles Ltd. Experts and speakers from across the globe participated in it. Some of the experts were Jir Militky from Czech Republic, Eskandernejad from Iran, Peter Artzt from Germany, Mohammad Rashid Khalid from Pakistan, M.L. Gulrajani, V.K. Kothari and Kushal Sen from IIT, Delhi, and K.K. Goswami from IICT, Bhadohi.