The Tribune, Chandigarh, India - Chandigarh Stories

NEIGHBOURHOOD

Screening of ‘Jodha Akbar’ banned
Our Correspondent

Ambala, February 21
Deputy commissioner Mohammad Shayin today imposed a ban on the screening of the film ‘Jodha Akbar’ in the cinema halls of the district. The order will be executed with immediate effect.

The film is being screened in two of the cinema halls of Ambala Cantt and in one in Ambala City.

This order came following a protest march by members of the Rajput community, led by senior Congress leader Chetan Chauhan, in the city today. Later, the group submitted a memorandum to deputy commissioner demanding a ban on the screening of the movie. They said that the film producer had distorted historical facts to defame the Rajput and this had hurt the religious sentiments of the community. The other Rajput leaders who were present on the occasion include Parveen Chauhan, Som Rana, Ravinder Chauhan and Mukesh Rana.

Scooterist killed in road accident
Our Correspondent

Bassi Pathana, February 21
One person was killed and another seriously injured in a road accident near village Peerjain, here last night. Gurmeet Singh (45) and Mandeep Singh (42), working as driver and conductor with Libra Bus, were returning to their native village Isherhail last night on a scooter after parking the bus at Sirhind.

However, they banged into a stationary trolley parked in front of a liquor shop at village Peerjain. Mandeep was blinded by the lights of the vehicle coming from the other side. While Mandeep died on the spot Gurmeet was rushed to the civil hospital. Mandeep’s dead body was handed over to his parents after postmortum. Mandeep’s father Harbans Singh is the press secretary of the State Lambardar Union.

Kidnapping case solved, one held
Our Correspondent

Bassi Pathana, February 21
With the arrest of dreaded criminal Sukhwinder Singh alias Sukhi, a resident of Newanshahar Badala near Kharar, Bassi Pathana police claims to have solved the mystery behind the sensational attempt to kidnap a Class 8th student belonging to Sangrur district.

Giving details, Samsher Singh Boparai, SP (D), and Rajwinder Singh, DSP Bassi Pathana, said

Sukhi along with Inderjit Singh, resident of village Abdulapur in Bassi Pathana, took a contract from Narinder Singh, living in Australia, to kidnap Jagdeep Singh, resident of village Bagrian in Sangrur district, and get certain papers signed from him.

Jagdeep’s sister is living in Australia and Narinder was there on a student visa. He started harassing Jagdeep’s sister and she had lodged complaint with the police there. Just to put pressure on the girl, Narinder gave a contract to the gang to kidnap Jagdeep, studying in Government School Bagrian.

The gang members executed the plan and tried to kidnap Jagdip on gun-point while he was returning from school.

They tried to push Jagdeep in a vehicle, however, when Jagdeep raised an alarm passersby rushed for help. Seeing this, the kidnappers fled leaving Jagdeep behind. Later, a case under sections 363, 511, 34 of IPC was registered in Amargarh police station against unknown persons.

Meanwhile, SP(D) said the accused are on police remand and being interrogated.

Diarrhoea scare
Our Correspondent

Ambala, February 21
Around two dozen residents, including five children, of village Janetpur, close to Ambala City, were detected with symptoms of diarrhoea today evening. Some of the patients were taken to the primary health centre at Panjokra. Later they were discharged.

Dr Arya, PMO Civil Hospital Ambala City, who visited the village said none of the patients were serious. He said the cause of the disease could be the supply of contaminated water. The deputy commissioner has directed the civil surgeon to send a team of doctors to the village and make all the required medicines available at PHC.

SPORTS

First Indian Grand Prix Athletics Meet
Basant Bahadur sets new national record
Ravi Dhaliwal

Patiala, February 21
The first Indian Grand Prix Athletics Meet concluded at the NIS synthetic track today. Basant Bahadur’s new national record in the 50km walk was the highlight of the one-day meet, which assumed all the more significance because of its proximity to the Beijing Olympics.

Seema Antil in action during a discus throw event at NIS in Patiala on Thursday. —A Tribune photograph

The 16-card meet, which according to the Athletic Federation of India (AFI) was a platform for Olympic aspirants, opened with a bang with Basant Bahadur of SSCB creating ripples by shattering the old record in 50km walk for men. The steady Basant Bahadur did not put a step wrong and claimed the gold by clocking 4 hours 10 minutes and 22 seconds.

The Services walker eclipsed the old record of 4:16.22 seconds standing in the name of Gurdev Singh of Hyderabad, which was created in 2005.

Bahadur’s dominance in the event was almost complete as was evident from the fact that the second placed runner P.S Jalan, also of SSCB, walked his way past the tape three minutes later than Basant Bahadur, by timing 4:13.40 seconds.

Services athletes dominated the event. The third walker to follow Bahadur and Jalan past the tape was Harminder Singh of SSCB who clocked 4:14.41 seconds.

In the women’s high jump, Sahana Kumari of Karnataka won the event with a jump of 1.80m, far short of Bobby Aloysius’s national record. Mariyan C Thariyan of CRPF followed Sahana Kumari for a second place finish with a jump of 1.65m while J.J Shobha was relegated to the third place with a weak effort of 1.60m.

Even though the meet was widely touted as a preparatory meet for the Indian athletes for the all-important Olympic games, yet apart from Basant Bahadur’s national record, all other athletes turned out drab performances.

In the 400m for men, although V.Pankaj of Police won the event in 47.51 seconds, yet the runner was far behind K.M Binu’s national record of 45.48 seconds. Pankaj was followed by Kuldev Singh (47.76s) and Amreek Rana of UP (47.81s) in that order.

Results: Men (800m): 1 Rajeev Ramesan (national camp), 2 Sajeesh Joseph (national camp), 3 Ghamanda Ram (national camp); high jump: 1 Hari Shanker Roy (Railways), 2 Pawan Parkash (national camp), 3 V.Tyagi (Police); shot put: 1 Om Parkash (national camp), 2 Satyendra Singh (national camp), 3 P.B Giri (Maharshtra).

Women’s 400m: 1 Chitra K. Soman (ONGC), 2 Mandeep Kaur (ONGC), 3 Manjit Kaur (Punjab Police); 1500m: 1 Sinimol Pallouse (national camp), 2 B. Rajan (national camp), 3 Kiran Tiwari (Uttrakhand).

HEALTH

PGI fund for poor gets ‘richer’
GAIL donates Rs 9 lakh
Pradeep Sharma
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, February 21
The Poor Patient Welfare Fund of the PGI, a unique initiative to fund the treatment of the underprivileged sections of society, got ‘richer’ today. In a gesture worth-emulating by individuals and corporates, Gas Authority of Indian Limited (GAIL) today chipped in with an amount of Rs 9 lakh for the fund as part of its corporate social responsibility (CSR).

Overwhelmed by public sector undertaking’s gesture, the PGI decided to observe March as the GAIL-sponsored month for poor patients’ medical treatment.

In fact, the PGI top brass, including director K.K. Talwar, acting medical superintendent S.K. Jindal and Vipin Kaushal and R.K. Sharma, both deputy medical superintendents, used the opportunity to appeal for generous contributions from the corporates and individuals for the fund, where demand for money usually exceeds the contributions.

In the wake of the prohibitive cost of the medicare, including surgery and medicines, there was an urgent need for donations to the fund which was playing a yeoman’ s service for medical treatment of the persons, who could not afford costly treatment at the private hospitals, PGI officials highlighted.

GAIL director A.K. Kundra said the company had always lived up to its social commitment and it had been decided to allocate about 1 per cent of its net profit (over Rs 20 crore) per annum for the projects for society’s benefits.

“At GAIL, the CSR stands for continuing commitment for operating the core business in socially-responsible way, complimented by investment in communities to produce an overall positive impact on society,” Alka Kumar, general manager (CSR), claimed.

Lauding the company for its contribution for the fund, Talwar appealed to the corporate sector to live up its social commitment and donate for the fund to compliment the PGI’s efforts in providing treatment to the underprivileged sections of society. He also promised to make the disbursement under the fund “hassle-free” for the benefits of the poor patients.

Meanwhile, Rs 24.64 lakh has been sanctioned to poor patients during the last six months as against a donation of Rs 28.67 lakh. A total expenditure of Rs 33.51 lakh was incurred on these treatments during this period.

It may be recalled that this is for the first time that a corporate had spared a thought for donating to fund at the PGI. During the past, a large number of individuals have contributed to the funds with several persons donating huge amounts.

The PGI has formed a high-powered committee to sanction treatment cost to the below poverty line (BPL) patients. The non-BPL, but needy patients are also sanctioned the cost of the treatment depending upon their needs.

Lend a Helping Hand

Corporates and individuals wanting to donate for the Poor Patient Welfare Fund can contact the Poor Patient Cell at the PGI at (0172) 2756006. The donations to the fund are exempt from the income tax.

‘Conduct clinical trials ethically’
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh February 21
The fourth day of the ongoing national workshop on clinical pharmacology at PGI started with a demonstration of various clinical pharmacological methods to equip the delegates with knowledge on conducting cardiovascular, psychopharmacological tests and pharmacokinetic tests in a validated way.

Addressing the workshop, J.S. Srivastava, deputy director, Central Drug Research Institute (CDRI), Lucknow, spoke about ethical issues in clinical research. He stressed on need to conduct clinical trials ethically so that the patients are not harmed by inclusion in the clinical trials.

O.P.Asthana, deputy director and head, clinical and experimental medicine, spoke about the clinical trials with plant based new investigational drugs. Shekhar Potkar, director-clinical research, Pfizer Limited, Mumbai, spoke on the process of managing data from clinical trials.

Rare breast cancer surgery performed
Tribune News Service

Mohali, February 21
The Ivy hospital doctors here claim to have performed a rare breast conservative surgery (BCS) on a 34-year old cancer patient. The six-hour long surgery conducted by Dr Vijay Bansal, consultant oncosurgeon at the hospital, aimed at removing the cancerous cells while retaining the breast with implants.

Sharing the details, Dr Bansal said the patient was unwilling at first and only when convinced that it would not involve breast removal did she agree to undergo the surgery. “It's a common syndrome among patients who are bogged down by the sheer thought of a mastectomy or breast removal,” he said.