Rohtak, May 31
Vigilance sleuths raided the official residence of Sukhbir Singh, former Controller of Examinations (CoE) at Maharshi Dayanand University (MDU) here today. According to Vigilance Bureau sources, simultaneous raids were conducted at 16 or 17 places in Haryana and Delhi this morning.

The raids were conducted in connection with the alleged leakage of MD/MS/PG Diploma entrance test papers. Separate teams of the bureau were sent to Rohtak, Rewari, Faridabad, Ambala, Karnal, Panipat, Gannaur, Jind, Mahendragarh and Delhi.

DSP (Vigilance) Surender Malik, who is the investigating officer in the case, confirmed that VB teams had raided the premises of former MDU CoE Sukhbir Singh and others allegedly involved in the leakage of the paper.

“However, no arrests could be made as none of the persons named in the FIR was available at home,” he maintained. Bank statements and other relevant documents were seized from the premises of the suspects.

Meanwhile, according to informed sources, nine persons named in the FIR, including former MDU CoE Sukhbir Singh, have recently moved bail pleas in a local court.

These persons, apparently apprehending arrest, have gone underground. This was evident from the fact that none of them was available at home even though the raids were conducted in the morning hours.

Fatehabad, May 31
Irked by the alleged maltreatment meted out to a trader by sub-divisional magistrate (SDM) Yogesh Mehta, traders at Ratia town in the district observed strike today. They blocked vehicular traffic at several places and demanded action against the SDM.

Earlier, Vijay Kumar, a cloth dealer at Ratia, said the SDM’s wife had visited his shop on May 29 and he had requested her to keep her shoes outside the shop. Kumar alleged that angered by this, Mehta summoned him to his official residence last evening and started shouting at him. Kumar further alleged that when he tried to reason out with the SDM, he threatened to throw him out of the town. Other shopkeepers were also present with him at that time, said Kumar.

Meanwhile, traders assembled in the main market of Ratia in the morning and blocked traffic at Sanjay Gandhi Chowk and Sukhchain Canal bridge on the Fatehabad road. They have demanded initiation of criminal proceedings against the SDM and also his transfer from Ratia. They have also constituted a 25-member committee to decide the future course of action.

On the other hand, SDM Yogesh Mehta has denied the allegations and said the shopkeeper had supplied some torn cloth to one of his kin. The SDM said the trader had raked up the issue as he was about to initiate action against him.

Chandigarh, May 31
The “Save BJP in Haryana” slogan coined by the state leaders after the dismal performance of the Bharatiya Janta Party in the recent byelections is likely to find echo at the national party executive meeting at Delhi tomorrow.

Called to celebrate the BJP’s Karnataka win, the two-day affair will be chaired by the party’s senior leaders and Haryana state unit is set to draw their attention to the state’s ailing unit. With their guns out and daggers drawn, the leaders want a few heads to roll in the state unit for the “shockingly, shameful” performance of party candidates in the byelections at Indri, Gohana and Adampur. While the candidates failed to secure their deposits, the total votes polled by them were less than 10,000 in the three seats.

In the light of this verdict, the leaders are planning to leave no stone unturned to drive home the fact that the state unit urgently needs a makeover and a change at the top. Sources in the party said with this as the agenda, the leaders will apprise the national leaders about the goings-on in the state unit and the conduct of the top brass before and after the election.

Leaders maintain that the BJP is doomed in the state if the situation is allowed to persist and action against non-performers is allowed to linger on any further. “Though the win in Karnataka is very big and deserves all the celebration, our party’s poor performance in Haryana is the other side of the coin. We need thorough introspection and a complete overhaul within the Haryana BJP if we want to reach somewhere in the Lok Sabha elections next year,” said a senior leader of the party.

The fact that none of the three candidates fielded by the party were in the reckoning during the bypoll has opened up a new front for the state president, Atam Prakash Manchanda, who has been struggling to keep a lid on the simmering discontentment within the party.

Having come under fire for a few appointments in the state unit, opposition has only grown stiffer against him in the last few months. However, Manchanda is unfazed with the party’s performance and has declared that the by-election is no barometer for the party’s popularity. He added that these seats have never been of interest to the BJP and alliance partners have been given these seats in previous elections.

His critics, however, are not convinced and the proceedings at the two-day national executive meet will unravel what the future holds for Manchanda and the BJP in Haryana.

Chandigarh, May 31
The Haryana government has taken up the issue of pollution of the Yamuna with the Chief Ministers of Delhi and Uttar Pradesh since this is an inter-state pollution problem while impressing upon the Central Pollution Control Board to direct the two state governments to adopt pollution-control measures.

This was stated by Haryana minister of state for environment and forests Kiran Choudhry at a press conference here today. She added that the Haryana government has sent a written communication to the Chief Ministers of Delhi and Uttar Pradesh urging them take effective steps to control pollution in the Yamuna in their territory.

She said the Haryana State Pollution Control Board had been monitoring the quality of water in the Yamuna fortnightly by taking samples jointly with the Central Pollution Control Board.

Maintaining that the department was planning to observe Environment Day on June 5 by focusing on creating awareness on environment-related issues, she said a number of environment-friendly decisions had been taken by her ministry.

“On the recommendations of the Central Pollution Control Board, use of waste of plastic carry bags for carpeting and construction of roads has been suggested to the engineer-in-chief, public works (B&R). This will not only help and ensure clog-free flow in the drainage but would also lend strength and durability to roads, besides truncating the cost on bitumen,” she said.

She said a comprehensive policy for management of bio medical waste was in the offing while a restriction on plastic bags had been imposed by specifying their minimum thickness. She said the central government had constituted the State Environment Impact Assessment Authority under the chairpersonship of Promilla Issar, former chief secretary, Haryana, and a state-level expert appraisal committee had been formed for environmental clearance to construction projects.

She said the board had created a website to display latest NOC status of various projects so as to facilitate entrepreneurs.

The board had now constituted a Single Technical Advisory Committee to examine NOC cases which would include representatives of the Pollution Control Board, the environment department, the town and country planning department and the forest department.

She maintained school students would be ambassadors for environment protection by way of eco-clubs which had been constituted and were being strengthened in schools.

Fatehabad, May 31
A large number of people belonging to the Gujjar community today organised a demonstration against the alleged atrocities on Gujjars by the Vasundhara Raje government in Rajasthan.

Led by Kaor Singh Gujjar, state president of the Bharatiya Gujjar Parishad, hundreds of demonstrators blocked traffic on the national highway near the bus stand, Ambedkar Park, Bighar Chowk and the old bus stand.

They burnt an effigy of the Rajasthan Chief Minister on the highway.

Later, they submitted a memorandum addressed to the President and the Rajasthan Governor demanding immediate sack of the Rajasthan government for its alleged atrocious attitude towards Gujjars, compensation of Rs 25 lakh each to the families of firing victims and a job each to one of their members.

They also demanded ST status for the Gujjars.