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HSIIDC or real estate agent?
Kidney Scam
Employment Guarantee Scheme
ACP’s Murder
Rs 3,500 cr farm loans to be waived
Maths paper leaked?
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Free computer training for
SC students
DNA lab at Madhuban by month-end
State police goes green
Dy CM withdraws suit against Tribune
Bypoll Win
Panchayat byelection schedule announced
Rain throws life out of gear
Deadline set for road repairs
HP okays road to temple
2 of family die in accident
2 cops held on bribe charge
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HSIIDC or real estate agent?
Bahadurgarh (Jhajjar), June 3 The HSIIDC acquired farmers’ land falling in Kasar village near here at a rate of nearly Rs 22 lakh per acre to develop an industrial sector around two years ago. The land was allotted to a Japanese multinational tyre-manufacturing company Yokohama at the rate of Rs 1,750 per square metre. Thus, the company got the land - acquired from farmers at Rs 22 lakh per acre - for nearly Rs 70 lakh per acre. The moot question here is: Can the huge difference in the prices be considered “reasonable” on account of development charges? Another interesting point here is that the market price of land in the said area is more than Rs 1 crore per acre. Had the company purchased the land directly from the farmers, they would have been benefited. But apparently in the given case, the state agency benefited itself, instead of letting the farmers share the monetary gains. Moreover, in view of the considerable difference in the price at which the company got the land and the market price of the land, the possibility of some underhand transaction having taken place in the process can also not be ruled out. The villagers whose land was acquired naturally feel cheated. “We would have got much more money in case we had sold our land directly to the company,” maintains a villager. Many villagers have moved court to get enhanced compensation for the acquired land. The Kasar sarpanch, Rahul Mudgal, said the village panchayat had passed a resolution demanding that the residential limit (lal dora) of the village be extended, but it was not accepted by the authorities concerned. Then another resolution was passed demanding that a stretch measuring 2 acres around the village periphery should not be acquired, but it was also turned down. “Now, we are demanding that the village youth be preferred in jobs at the company’s industrial unit being set up at the acquired land,” the sarpanch asserts. The “bhoomi-poojan” ceremony organised by the company here yesterday was attended by Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and HSIIDC chief Vinay Rathi among others. Whether the state authorities show similar attachment with the villagers remains, however, to be seen.
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Kidney Scam
Ambala, June 3 Dr Sarj and Jagdish had filed interim bail applications in this court on the grounds that their family members were sick and required their presence. Manoj had filed an application for regular bail. Earlier, the CBI magistrate had dismissed their bail pleas. In the kidney scam case, all nine accused, including Dr Amit and his brother Dr Jeevan, were produced in the court of CBI magistrate Abdul Majid. On the request of the CBI and defence counsel, the court adjourned the hearing for June 11. No argument could be conducted today. The CBI has already filed an interim chargesheet in this case. The CBI could file a supplementary chargesheet, sources said. The augments on framing charges against the kidney accused are yet to be started. |
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Employment Guarantee Scheme
Fatehabad, June 3 Of the 25,000-odd poor families who have shown interest in getting employment under this scheme and actually procured application forms from the authorities, only 1,677 have so far been able to get job cards, which are a prerequisite for demanding job under the scheme. The NREGS is a much hyped scheme of the government under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), which provides right to work as a guarantee to villagers. The scheme envisages that the authorities are bound to provide 100 man days of labour work to villagers who are willing to do so. The scheme also provides that the authorities will have to provide compensation to those who want to do manual work but are not provided job by the authorities within 15 days of his demand. The scheme was implemented throughout the country from April 1, 2008, except for 82 districts of the country where it came into being as a pilot project in 2006. “I got the form from Fatehabad but did not know how to fill it. Somehow, I got it filled from a teacher but now bank officials are reluctant to open my account. Unless my bank account is opened, no job card will be issued for my household and in the absence of the job card, I am neither entitled to get employment nor compensation in the event of its denial,” says Om Parkash of Bhirdana village near here. “Opening of bank accounts is definitely a problem being faced by villagers. But it is more due to ignorance of people than due to the attitude of bank officials. Villagers, as bankers have informed us, visit banks without the requisite documents, identity proof and photographs,” says C.G. Rajnikanthan, additional deputy commissioner, Fatehabad. Rajnikanthan says that a meeting of the bankers was called recently where they were told to expedite the opening of accounts. “As far as filling forms is concerned, these are quite simple and in Hindi. The villagers have only to provide information about there family members and bank account numbers,” the ADC says. “On our part, we have already identified 568 projects in the district where work can begin almost immediately. The total budget of these projects is Rs 16.67 crore and these will provide 8,52,061 man days of labour. This means in the first phase of the scheme itself, we are in a position to provide 100 man days of work to 8,520 households in the district,” Rajnikanthan adds.
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ACP’s Murder
Gurgaon, June 3 Led by IG Arun Kumar, the team reached the office of the alleged accused on the Mehrauli-Gurgaon road here around 3.30 pm and started making investigations. No details could be immediately known. The investigations were continuing till the filing of this report. The area was cordoned off and remained out of bounds for mediapersons. The CBI was handed the probe of the murder case in April by the union government on the recommendations of the Haryana government. The family of the slain police officer had voiced suspicion that the killing was the outcome of a conspiracy while the Gurgaon police, which had conducted the initial probe, had ruled out the conspiracy angle. |
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Rs 3,500 cr farm loans to be waived
Chandigarh, June 3 All banks involved with the loan waiver have been asked to draw up lists of beneficiaries in 10-day time and present these to the Haryana government. The coordination committee for the loan waiver, which met for the first time today under the chairmanship of chief secretary Dharam Vir, discussed the plan for execution of the waiver. Sources said while 100 per cent loan waiver would be given to marginal and small farmers, who have land less than one hectare and two hectares, respectively, those farmers with more than two hectares of land would get a 25 per cent waiver if they paid pending loans in three instalments. At the meeting it was decided that exhaustive publicity should be given to the waiver so that no beneficiary gets left out while the banks had been asked to appoint grievance officers. These would be designated in all banks and every branch dealing with the agricultural credit. While asking the banks to hasten the process of loan waiver, they have been directed to ensure that crop loans for kharif (2008) are not put on hold. The meeting was attended by representatives of the leading banks of the state, the Reserve Bank of India, officials of the Department of Cooperation, which has been identified as the nodal department for loan waiver, as also the Agriculture Department. |
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Maths paper leaked?
Yamunanagar, June 3 However, the institute denied any leakage and termed the matter as ‘rumour’. The examination for the second semester started at the institute in the morning. Some students told others that the paper had leaked out and even told the questions being asked in the question paper. Interestingly, the students claimed that all questions they were told before the start of the exam were actually there in the question paper. Principal of the institute Anil Budhiraja claimed that there was no leakage. “The rumour started from Ambala centre and it reached here”, said Bhudhiraja. He informed that director of the Technical Education had started an enquiry into the matter. |
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Free computer training for
SC students
Chandigarh, June 3 While stating this here today, Haryana education minister Mange Ram Gupta said that free computer training would be provided to those who had appeared in university examinations held in April or May, 2008 (TDC-I and TDC II of all faculties). Students who were already studying computers as a subject in TDC-I and TDC-II would not be included in this training programme. Gupta said the department would also provide free computers to Scheduled Castes students of government colleges who had appeared in April or May, 2008, in TDC-II examinations and secured 60 per cent marks in computer training and a minimum of 40 per cent marks in the previous (TDC-I) university examination. |
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DNA lab at Madhuban by month-end
Chandigarh, June 3 He said this would be the first and only laboratory in the state with facilities for NARCO analysis and brain mapping. These facilities would be provided in this laboratory by the end of this year. The spokesman said Dr Pandu Guguloth from the State Forensic Science Laboratory, Andhra Pradesh, had been appointed on deputation as assistant director. |
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State police goes green
Karnal, June 3 Following directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, the police has finally said goodbye to the highly objectionable practice of uncontrolled burning of seized narcotic drugs. The state police headquarters had directed the IGPs of all police ranges and district police heads to immediately discontinue the practice of unscientific burning of drugs. Confirming this, Rohtak range IGP Anil Dawar said efforts were on to identify incinerators at government hospitals or those owned by private entrepreneurs for environment-friendly disposal of drugs. The high court had directed the state police for “scientific incineration” of the seizure under the NDPS Act. Also, the department had been directed to certify that the disposal practice did not cause any pollution and harm to human beings, animals and trees. Each year, tonnes of seized drugs are burnt by the police. Enormous amounts of firewood and petroleum products are required for the unscientific disposal of these. In the absence of any guidelines, the state agency was continuing with the controversial practice. Last year on May 12, The Tribune had first highlighted the environmentally hazardous style of burning of drugs in the open. Taking suo motu notice of the story, the Haryana Pollution Control Board (HPCB) directed the state to adopt scientific methods. The state was asked to go in for scientific incineration. The court has also directed that the drugs be forwarded to the officer in charge of the nearest police station or to the officer empowered under Section 53 of the NDPS Act and that these be disposed of within seven days. The narcotics will be destroyed by incineration at a place where adequate facilities and security arrangements are provided. Before the destruction of the case property, the disposal committee will be required to get a certificate from the supervisory officer. Committees have been instructed to submit a weekly report to the state police headquarters after disposing of the drugs, it is learnt.
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Dy CM withdraws suit against Tribune
Chandigarh, June 3 Chander Mohan mentioned in the letter addressed to his counsel Ambrish Sharma, “Since I no longer wish to pursue this complaint, you are requested to kindly withdraw the same on my behalf. I am grateful for your valuable services and appreciate the same. The inconvenience is regretted.” According to the complainant, acting president of the Haryana Pradesh Congress Committee Ram Prakash alleged in a press conference in Gurgaon that Bhajan Lal, his son and three members of the Haryana Legislative Assembly had committed an immoral act of not voting for the Congress candidate in the presidential elections in 2007. He added that the MLAs should have resigned from the party before doing so. Furthermore, the news item stated that Chander Mohan, Bhajan Lal, Dharam Pal Malik and Rakesh Kamboj were among those who voted against the Congress candidate and the fifth person wrongly cast his vote by mistake. Ram Parkash challenged that if Chander Mohan and Bhajan Lal had not voted against the Congress, they should say so openly before the public. The news item had stated that according to the constitution of the party, action would be taken against the erring MLAs. The election to the office of the President was held on July 19, 2007. The plaintiff said in the complaint that he received several calls from Congress politicians stating that they were disturbed after reading the report. Chander Mohan asserted in the complaint that the defamatory material published in the newspaper had tarnished his image. Thus a defamation suit under Sections 500, 501 and 502 of the IPC was filed. |
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Bypoll Win
Chandigarh, June 3 He said the victory margin of the Congress in comparison to the first bypoll after the party came to power had fallen considerably. From a convincing win by over three lakh votes from the Kiloi, Tosham and Hisar seats in the first year, the party victory margin came down phenomenally in the recent byelections, he said. “Byelections always swing in favour of the party in power. Although the Congress won convincingly in Gohana, it nearly lost Indri since a 5000-vote lead is no lead at all, especially when the party pumped in everything within its power to secure a win,” he claimed. However, perturbed by his party candidate’s performance in Gohana, Bishnoi yesterday announced the dissolution of the district’s unit while addressing party workers. He also announced the formation of a three-member committee comprising Subhash Batra, Devinder Sharma and Jagbir Singh to look into the Gohana debacle and submit a report in three days. On his resignation from the Lok Sabha, he said the Congress was playing politics by delaying acceptance of his resignation. Ruling out any alliance in the Lok Sabha election, Bishnoi added that the party would field candidates from all 10 seats and announce their names shortly.
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Panchayat byelection schedule announced
Chandigarh, June 3 While the nomination papers would be scrutinised on June 14, the last date for withdrawls had been fixed for June 16. The date of the polling , if required, would be June 22. In the case of the election of panches and sarpanches, the votes would be counted immediately after the close of the polling at the polling stations. In case of the election of members of panchayat samitis, the counting would be held on June 23 at 8 a.m. at the block headquarters at places to be specified and notified by the district election officer (panchayat). |
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Rain throws life out of gear
Fatehabad, June 3 Electricity services in the town were totally paralysed. Power went off immediately after it started raining with strong winds shortly after noon and could be restored only after five in the evening. Though it rained only for an hour, the intensity of rain was such that all roads were submerged under rainwater. Today’s rain has disappointed Cotton growers, who have already sown their crop twice or thrice. “This sowing season has been particularly bad for farmers. Despite spending twice or thrice on inputs, a majority of the farmers are back to where they started from,” said Ranbir Singh Chaudhary, district president of the Young Farmers Association, Fatehabad. SIRSA: Meanwhile, residents of Sirsa and nearby village got reprieve from the scorching heat when the rain struck the area for at least half an hour. It was followed by cool winds that turned weather pleasant for the rest of the day. However, Prem Singh of Bhawdin village, a labourer with the Canal Department, was killed after being hit by lightning at Darba village near here today. He was engaged in laying of pipes near Darba village when the incident occurred. |
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Deadline set for road repairs
Gurgaon, June 3 Presiding over a meeting on repair of roads, deputy commissioner Rakesh Gupta fixed a deadline for the purpose. The progress of repair work would be reviewed by him after 10 days. Local MLA Dharambir Gaba and Ravinder Kataria, president of the Gurgaon Municipal Council, who were present at the meeting, apprised the DC of the plight of city roads and that almost all of these were full of potholes. Instructions for repair were given to the PWD (B&R), the Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA) and the municipal council. The city’s image took a beating as untimely rain last month exposed the vulnerability of the road network. Not even a single road remained unaffected, rendering them hazardous to ply on. Residents and visitors were exposed to great inconvenience due to this. The situation was made all the more difficult by the ongoing digging work for laying water and sewer pipes as well as underground cables. The PWD (B&R) was asked to repair the road leading to the bus stand from Mahavir Chowk within a week. Directions were issued to the MC authorities to get the roadside cleared of vendors. Similarly, the repair of road from Gurgaon village to Dronacharya College, Khera Devat to Bhim Nagar Chowk would be completed July 15. A 10-day deadline was given in the case of the road from the local Head Post Office Chowk to Sector 4/7 Chowk via the new railway road and patchwork on the Rajendra Park-Bajghera Road. Similarly, HUDA executive engineers were asked to make the road from Sector 10 to Khandsa motorable within 10 days and to complete its carpeting by August 15. Another deadline of June 30 was given for the repair of roads in Sector 15, from Shama Tourist Complex to the NH-8 via Jharsa. Directions were also given to remove encroachments from the Sukhrali main road and to complete its repair after constructing dividers within a month. At present, there is no channel to drain out storm water; as a result it gets accumulated on roads, causing damage to them. So the DC directed the water services and sanitation department to make gullies on all roads for evacuation of water during rain. The officials were asked to complete work on laying storm water channel along the Madanpuri road by June 25. Following this, the MC authorities would complete the construction of the remaining part of this road by July 10. Meanwhile, the PWD has decided to spend a sum of about Rs 8 crore on two major projects of strengthening and repair of the Mandkola-Hathin road falling in Mewat district and widening and strengthening of the road from Chandhat Chowk to Gurwari to Pehladpur in Gurgaon district. The PWD (B&R) minister, Capt Ajay Singh Yadav, said here today that the department would carry out special repair work of strengthening of the Mandkola-Hathin road at a cost of Rs 5.06 crore. Similarly, work on widening and strengthening of Chandhat Chowk to Gurwari to Pehladpur road would be carried out at a cost of Rs 2.65 crore. |
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HP okays road to temple
Yamunanagar, June 3 The road, work on which is likely to start soon, will give a boost to religious tourism in Kapal Mochan and Adi Badri areas of the district. Presently, there is a motorable road to the Adi Badri temple and from there a cattle track, which leads to the temple. Thousands of pilgrims from all over the country visit the temple annually. However, the flow of pilgrims virtually comes to a halt during rains or whenever the level of Som river rises. The Adi Badri area also assumes significance as it is widely believed that it is the originating point of Saraswati river. The road to be constructed at a cost of Rs 13.51 lakh will be completed in six months. The executive agency for the laying of the road is DFO, Nahan, HP. Deputy commissioner of Sirmour district Pushpendra Rajput said the road was demanded by the local people. The road would boost tourism in the area. Darshan Lal Jain, chairman of the Saraswati Nadi Sodh Sansthan, Haryana, who has been actively campaigning for the revival of the Saraswati river, has welcomed the move of the HP government. Once the road is built, pilgrims travelling from Yamunangar side will have to go to Kapal Mochan from there to Ranjitpur and from there to Mattar village. |
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2 of family die in accident
Ambala, June 3 Sundari Verma, wife of the deceased Satpal Verma, and her nephew Anil Shandan died on the spot. Her son Sundeep Verma and driver Sunny are seriously injured and have been referred to PGI, Chandigarh. According to SHO Pawan Singh of the Saha Police station, the accident occurred when the Qualis they were travelling in was hit by a truck from behind. A case has been registered. |
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2 cops held on bribe charge
Rewari, June 3 Sanjay Kumar at the behest of inspector Mohammad Jamal Khan allegedly accepted a bribe of Rs 20,000 from the complainant Rajbir Singh to facilitate the release of two detainees - Rajesh and his brother Mahavir from “illegal detention.” Rewari tehsildar Tarsem Lal Sharma acted as duty magistrate during the proceedings. A case under various sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act has been registered against the duo. Rajesh and Mahavir, who were apprehended from Kosli on May 30 for their alleged involvement in a case of wire cutting, were brought to the Kasaula police station for interrogation and subsequently kept in illegal detention there. A senior official of the Vigilance Bureau said when the inspector demanded a bribe of Rs 20,000 for the release of the duo, it was brought to the notice of SP (vigilance) following which a trap was laid. |
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Fatehabad, June 3
