Shimla, April 13
After introducing the carbon credit facility (CCF) to encourage people to raise forests on private and community land under the World Bank-funded mid-Himalayan watershed development project the government plans to take advantage of the massive opportunity offered by the CCF by promoting clean development mechanism (CDM).

The UN framework convention on climate change (UNFCC) provides vast scope for a hill state like Himachal Pradesh with a huge potential for hydroelectric generation to earn carbon credits.

The hydroelectric projects provide ‘clean’ power compared to the highly polluting coal-based thermal plants.

Emissions from thermal plants contain carbon dioxide, sulphur dioxide and other gases that not only cause air pollution but also contribute to climate change.

There ware several other sectors like mega cement plants, industrial units and use of CFL devices for lighting that can help earn carbon credits.

The government is formulating a policy on climate change specifically with a view to earning carbon credits and protecting the fragile hill environment, says Chief Minister P.K. Dhumal.

The final document will be ready by December after which schemes will be framed in various sectors for earning carbon credits.

According to director of environment department Nagin Nanda, a draft policy has already been circulated among the departments concerned for suggestions.

The schemes for carbon credits will be finalised with the technical help of the World Bank which had the requisite expertise.

These will be submitted to the National Clean Development Mechanism Authority
for approval.

The projects will be registered with the designated national authority after which the UNFCC will carry out third party validation before issuing certifying emission reduction units (CERs). It could be sold like any other financial instrument.

The facility is available for 10 years but the CERs every year would ensure that the norms of clean development mechanism were being adhered to.

Already some private sector micro-hydel projects and the 192-MW Allain Duhangan project have registered themselves with designated authority for earning CERs.

Himachal last year became the first state in Asia and only second in the world to introduce a scheme for selling carbon credits to the World Bank directly for villagers who could earn Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000 per hectare annually from the plantations for 30 years.

The scheme will provide the much-needed fillip to the participatory forest management programme in the country.

In all new plantations will be raised over 12,000 hectare of degraded and fallow land under the scheme in a phased manner. Only land lying fallow since 1990 can be used for plantation.

The forest department has identified 25 species, including fruit and medicinal plants like mango, fig and aonla, which not only have a good capacity of carbon sequestration but also help regulate the hydrological cycle.

Bangana (Una), April 13
Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal said addressing a public rally here today that the government planned to recruit 18000 teachers and 250 MBBS doctors in the next financial year, aimed at filling vacant posts in the Education and Health Departments.

The Chief Minister made many announcements for the Kutlehar constituency that has been electing BJP MLAs for the past 25 years.

He announced a new tunnel to link Bangana with the Thaneta area, which would reduce the distance between the two places by about 20 kilometers.

On the demand of local BJP MLA Varinder Kanwar he announced the upgradation of the existing substation to 66 kva in the Thanaklan area.

The augmented sub-station would help improve the erratic power supply in the area. He also announced the upgradation of five schools in the Kutlehar constituency and a new drinking water scheme.

He also laid the foundation stone of a government college at Bangana and announced a grant of Rs 2 crore for its building.

Earlier, the CM inaugurated the Rs 236-crore second phase of canalisation of the Swan in which the river stretch from Gagret to Jhalera would be canalised. He also inaugurated a bridge over a rivulet in Chaproh village.

Solan, April 13
Advocate Hari Dass Tanwar, accused of killing Flight Lieutenant Anubhav Rao, was today produced in the court of JMIC, Kasauli, who remanded him to the police custody till April 16.

Alleged accused Hari Dass Tanwar, currently residing in Garkhal is an advocate-cum-public notary and was practising in the Kasauli courts.

The police was yet to recover the weapon of offence and it was awaiting the autopsy report for establishing the cause of death.

Investigations were underway to establish the actual sequence of events, which led to murder of the Air Force Officer.

Meanwhile, the police was awaiting the post-mortem report, which would finally establish the actual cause of death.

Hand pumps would also be installed in these areas to remove scarcity of drinking water, he added.

He ordered the PWD to prepare construction expenditure report for link roads in the Dabar area.

Shimla, April 13
Terming Virbhadra Singh’s outburst as a manifestation of his frustration, three ministers said today that the former Chief Minister was making false and misleading statements on the performance of the BJP government just to keep himself afloat politically.

In a rejoinder here Ravinder Ravi, Ramesh Dhawala, and Rajiv Bindal, all ministers, asserted that Virbhadra Singh was finding the highly imaginative and innovative decisions taken by the government too much to digest.

Virbhadra Singh was in the habit of seeing the things through his own lens and he had conveniently overlooked the formulation of a pro-employee transfer policy, which he failed to do during his regime.

Instead of framing a policy he indulged in nepotism and ordered mass-scale transfers. Virbhadra Singh, they said, remained intolerant towards his political adversaries throughout his political career and humiliated even his own party leaders.

His attitude towards other political parties and opponents had always been contemptuous. Congress leaders like Vijay Singh Mankotia, Vijay Joshi and Kewal Singh Pathania, who were forced to leave the party, had all been victims of his vendetta.

Regarding the inauguration of Giri Ganga Drinking Water Scheme for Solan and Bamson-Mewa scheme for Hamirpur the ministers reminded that these were formulated by the BJP during its previous tenure and had been completed during its current tenure.

Shimla, April 13
The Third State Finance Commission has recommended resource devolution to the tune of Rs 451.30 crore to the panchayati raj institutions (PRIs) and urban local bodies for the 2007-12 period.

Presenting the recommendations in the Vidhan Sabha, Chief Minister P.K. Dhumal said the report had been accepted and a requisite provision made in the budget for 2008-09.

In all Rs 228.28 crore would provided to the PRIs and Rs 223.02 crore to the urban local bodies over the five-year period.

The devolution for the PRIs for the current year is Rs 53.64 crore, which will be Rs 49.05 crore in 2011-12.

The devolution for the urban local bodies will go up from Rs 41.76 crore to Rs 51.88 crore in the last year.

The commission is of the opinion that resource transfers to the local government institutions may not be passed on as grants-in-aid as was the case in the earlier two commissions.

Instead, it may be more appropriate if the government fixes the resource transfers as a percentage of its own tax and non-tax revenues.

For 2008-09 the transfers are recommended at 3.02 per cent of the
state’s revenue.

Further, the proceeds of cess on liquor be equitably distributed among panchayats irrespective of the fact whether a liquor vend in its territory existed or not.

The total proceeds should be divided into rural and urban pools on the basis of the ratio of population as per the 2001 Census.

The entire proceeds at the rate of Rs 2 per bottle be transferred and the government should not retain the half of it.

In case the government wishes to retain Re 1 per bottle the rate should be increased to Rs 3 per bottle.

The collection of water charges for private domestic connections be entrusted to the gram panchayats and they should be allowed to retain 50 per cent of the amount.

They should also collect abiana charges for irrigation and retain 50 per cent
of the collections.

The fee for registration of marriage and birth and death be fixed at Rs 200 and Rs 100, respectively, with a provision for concession to IRDP families which should be charged at the rate of Rs 25 in both cases.

Mandi, April 13
The fate of over 700 physical education teachers continues to be in the doldrums since 1973.

The government has yet to decide whether they be kept in elementary schools or senior secondary schools as their long-pending demand to treat them on a par with school lectures has fallen on deaf ears.

Newly elected state president of the DPEs Association Dinesh Jhagta and general secretary Rajinder Sharma have urged Chief Minister P.K. Dhumal to consider their long-pending demand of giving them the designation of school lecturers.

Jhagta said DPEs had no channel of promotion, although their workload had increased more than that of other schoolteachers.

“We have to conduct morning assemblies each day and teach subject in classes and then we conduct other assignments like zonal tournaments,” he added.

They had taken up the matter with the previous government also, but to
no avail.

Jhagta said they would now take up the issue with the CM and education minister I.D. Dhiman.