Shimla, June 5
Demanding a rollback of the hike made in the prices of LPG, petrol and diesel, CPM activists today staged a demonstration outside the Deputy Commissioner’s office.

They staged a dharna outside the DC office and later took out a rally which culminated at Naaz. CPM leaders Vijender Mehra and Kishori Dadhwalia demanded that the UPA regime must withdraw the massive hike in the prices of LPG, petrol and diesel.

They criticised the UPA regime for its failure to check price rise which would further increase with the hike in the prices of petrol and diesel. “Rather than passing on the burden on big oil companies the UPA regime chose to make the going even more difficult for the common man,” they said.

They demanded that the people in the hill state, especially the fruit and vegetable growers, would be badly affected as 98 per cent of the modes of transportation were dependent on petrol and diesel. They demanded that the state government, on its part, must reduce the sales tax on petrol and diesel to give some succour to the people.

Nahan: BJP workers on Thursday protested here against the recent hike in fuel prices and submitted a memorandum to the Sirmaur DC, demanding immediate withdrawal of increased prices of petrol, diesel and LPG.

Workers shouted slogans against the union government and alleged that this step of UPA government would further fuel the rising graph of inflation in the country. BJP leaders alleged that the UPA government had never been serious about checking inflation and was merely doing drama in the name of checking prices.

Bilaspur: The state petroleum dealers association has urged Chief Minister P.K. Dhumal to come to their help at this hour of crisis and reduce petroleum price burden on consumers by reducing sales tax (VAT) on these products in the state by at least 4 per cent.

Addressing mediapersons here on Thursday, association state president Sukumar Singh Chandel, accompanied by about six other association leaders, said the increase in prices of petrol and diesel by the Centre would certainly have a damaging effect on trade of these commodities in the state as it had already been facing a number of survival problems since long while this would also have a spiralling effect on prices of a number of other essential items.

Sukumar pleaded that Himachal already had more tax on petrol and diesel than in Punjab and Haryana.

Shimla, June 5
Chief Minister P.K. Dhumal today stressed the need for social audit by every individual so as to ensure that natural resources are used very cautiously without any wastage.

Speaking at the state-level World Environment day function organised here today on the Ridge, Dhumal said: “Water is emerging as a scarce commodity and even the traditional sources were drying up, which makes it all the more essential for us to use every drop very carefully”.

He said children should be made ambassadors to create mass awareness about the importance of environment conservation. “It is the result of unnecessary intervention in nature that had posed a grave challenge before the environmentalists”.

He said with the melting of glaciers, the sole source of river waters, the water level in the rivers was fluctuating drastically causing damage to the river banks, life and property.

Dhumal said the government had been spending huge sums to provide safe drinking water to the people which was also being used by them for non-drinking purposes. He said bona fide use of drinking water could help provide enough water to every individual.

He urged people to inculcate the habit of environment protection in their day-to-day activities and not restricting their involvement to the ritual celebration. While stressing the need for tree plantation, he said efforts must be made to achieve a higher rate of survival under different programmes.

The Chief Minister announced that the state government would accord top priority to construction of check dams in the state with a view to recharging the traditional water bodies.

Dhumal gave away the first prize to the Monal Eco Club, Government Senior Secondary School (GSSS), Makareri, Jogindernagar (Mandi); the second prize to the Mayur Eco Club, GSSS, Galma, Mandi; and the third prize to the Peepal Eco Club, GSSS (Boys), Nahan.

Meanwhile, The Himalayan Forest Research Institute organised an “awareness generation workshop” for school children here today to mark the World Environment Day. A project for the development of a “temperate arboretum and botanical garden” was also initiated on the occasion as part of the Potter Hill Conservation Reserve.

Chief wildLife warden Vinay Tandon while inaugurating the workshop stressed the need for growing more and more trees to check environmental degradation which was leading to drastic changes in seasons and rainfall pattern.

The school children were also taken for a nature walk at the Potter Hill to acquaint them with the flora and fauna. A quiz competition and a writing competition were also organised.

The Gian Vigyan Samiti also organised various activities to mark the day across the state.

Sundernagar: The World Environment Day was celebrated at many places in Mandi district.

They talked on the protection of the environment but did not speak against the installation of a cement plant near Sundernagar.

The locals were demanding to shift the plant from the Khatrwari-Chambi area. However, Sundernagar MLA Roop Singh Thakur talked in favour of the proposed plant.

Speaking at a function organised at DAV Public School by the local unit of Pollution Control Board today, Thakur advocated the cause of setting up the cement plant near Sundernagar. He said the cement plant would be pollution free and provide employment to 11,000 youths of the area.

In another programme, Roop Singh, while speaking at the Community Hall, Sundernagar, criticised farmers. He said they were demanding compensation from the company. Many social organisation, including Sundernagar Sangash Samiti, Kishan Sangh, Paryavaran Sarakshan Samiti and Kishan Sabha, criticised Thakur.

In Mandi, the Himachal Unit of Indian People Theatre Association handed over a memorandum, addressed to Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal, to the Mandi district revenue officer to review the decision of setting up the plant near Sundernagar.

NURPUR: The students of government senior secondary schools and NPS Senior Secondary School held rallies to celebrate the World Environment Day. They raised slogans and appealed to grow trees to protect environment. The state pollution control board also celebrated the day with local municipal council. While the Government Senior Secondary School (boys) organised essay, slogan and painting competitions on ‘save environment’.

Shimla, June 5
Not keen to go ahead with the trifurcation of the Himachal Pradesh State Electricity Board (HPSEB), the state government will take up the issue with Union Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, who is visiting Himachal by month-end.

Chief Minister P.K. Dhumal said here today that there was no need to trifurcate the HPSEB since its performance was far better than boards in other states which had been trifurcated. “The HPSEB’s functioning has been efficient as it has minimum transmission and distribution losses as compared to other states,” he said.

Dhumal said he had already taken up the matter with Shinde who had assured him of all possible help to stop the unbundling process.

The Chief minister lashed out at the UPA regime for failing to check price rise and take remedial steps. “The Centre has reserves of thousands of crores of rupees in the oil pool and import duty earnings which could have been utilised to control prices,” he said. 

Shimla, June 5
The third night of the International Summer festival proved to be a damp squib as rain played spoilsport despite efforts by some artists of Sa Re Ga Ma contest to regale audiences.

With a heavy downpour in the evening the entire area on The Ridge where the summer festival is being held was flooded with water. With the chairs and other sitting area being wet there was hardly any audience.

In fact programmes by school children scheduled for the night could not be performed due to the rain. Even local singer, Rakesh could not perform because of the rain.

Later, little audience attended performance by Sa Re Ga Ma fame Poonam Yadav. She sang popular Hindi movie numbers, including ‘soni de nakhre’ and ‘unke nashe mein’.

Little champs Anamika Chaudhary and Rohanpreet also tried their best to regale the audiences with songs like ‘maiya maiya’, ‘yeh ishq hai jannat’, ‘hangama’ and ‘chandani hai yeh baraat’.

Dharamsala, June 5
The Chari Primary Health Centre, located about 10 km from Dharamsala, caters to about 12 village panchayats, is without any medical officer these days. When The Tribune team visited the area, a multipurpose health worker was managing the hospital and was acting as a pharmacist.

When questioned, the health worker refused to divulge his name. He said the pharmacist, who was sent on deputation at the hospital, had gone to district headquarters and so he was distributing medicine to the patients. Interestingly, the health worker was distributing medicine despite the fact that there was no doctor at the hospital to prescribe the medicine.

Further inquires revealed that there were two doctors posted at the hospital. The lady doctor was on maternity leave whereas the male doctor had also proceeded on leave for personal work.

The district health authorities have failed to depute any doctor at the hospital to replace the doctors on leave. The only pharmacist deputed there had his original posting at Nurpur hospital. From Nurpur hospital he was initially sent on deputation to Shahpur hospital and from there further to Chari hospital.

Crores have been spent on the construction of Chari Primary Health Centre. However, there is no staff to run the hospital. It is presently being run by a pharmacist on deputation and a multipurpose health worker.

Despite the fact that the government had spent crores on the construction of hospital the people of area are still dependent on local quacks for medical care.

District health officials while speaking on the condition of anonymity blamed the present condition of Chari hospital on shortage of doctors.

Solan, June 5
All business establishments remained closed in Dharampur from 9 am to 4 pm today in protest against the lax attitude of the police in handling the suicide case of a local youth Gaurav Rattan.

The people, who had united under the banner of Gaurav Jagriti Manch, later took out a protest march at Dharampur and demanded transfer of the case to an independent agency like the CBI.

Led by senior citizens and veteran leaders like Giani Nanak Chand, comrade Gurdev and other local businessmen the people said it was unfortunate that they had to resort to an extreme step like closure of business establishments for the third time in a span of 12 days. They decried the lack of police action against the guilty.

Dissatisfied with the delay caused in finalising the magisterial inquiry the people said the victimised family failed to get any justice from any quarter and the inquiry appeared to be a mere eye wash.

They lamented that despite a senior police officer being held responsible by the family members of the deceased no action had been initiated against him till now. Earlier, local people and senior BJP leaders, including former minister M.N. Sofat, former MLA Satpal Kamboj visited the house of the deceased youth and prayed for the peace of the departed soul.

Dharamsala, June 5
Kangra DC K. Pant has issued a notice to the Bus Stand Corporation for allowing unauthorised building to be constructed on a piece of land allotted by the previous Congress government for construction of bus stand at McLeodganj.

The notice was issued after the matter was highlighted in The Tribune today. As per the report published in The Tribune, a multi-storeyed building was allowed to be constructed by the concerned authorities despite the fact that it figured nowhere in the original plans.

The Town Planning Department officials allowed the building to be constructed despite the fact that the Supreme Court had stayed its construction as it was being brought up on the forest land. They limited their activity to just issuing notices to those constructing the building to keep their skin safe.

Now that a private company has already put in crores in the construction of building the officials are in the process of shifting blame to each other.

Shimla, June 5
Coming out in support of ADGP B.S.Thind, president of the Shiromani Akali Dal (A) Simranjit Singh Mann today termed the approval granted by the BJP government to register a case against the controversial officer as an instance of persecution of the minorities. Mann, who was in the state capital, asserted that if no case could be made out against Thind earlier when the Congress was in power, there was no reason for implicating him in cases now.

Referring to the Gujjar agitation in Rajasthan he said that the BJP and the RSS, which had been after the minorities like Muslims, Sikhs and Christians, had now started targeting sections of the Hindu community. The massacre of Gujjars was the latest example of it.

Mann criticised the state government for not introducing Punjabi in schools even though the state had a large Punjabi population. He also said that pahari should be made the state language of Himachal Pradesh.

Shimla, June 5
Prof Chaman Lal Gupta has been appointed chairman of the Himachal Board of School Education for the second time. Prof Gupta had held the post last time also when the BJP formed the government in the state in 1998.

He did his postgraduation in Hindi, English and political science from Panjab University and diploma in journalism and translation from IGNOU. He has done his doctorate in Hindi and taught in Himachal Pradesh University for 36 years.

Prof Gupta was head of the Hindi Department for two terms. He has a number of publications to his credit, including eight books and over 100 research papers. 

Nahan, June 5
The state Excise and Taxation Department today raided over four industrial units in the Kala Amb industrial area to detect tax evasion. Steel plants were the main target.

The records of factories were taken into custody by the team, led by deputy commissioner, and industrialists were asked to furnish information required by the department.

Detecting a case of tax evasion in the Paonta industrial area yesterday, the department had imposed a penalty of Rs 15 lakh on the Wood Land shoe company, besides recovering Rs 37 lakhs of sales tax from the company.

In this case, the company was allegedly transporting finished goods from some other state to Paonta and was selling it in other states from its two manufacturing units in Paonta by evading tax.

The company was showing that these items were manufactured at the Paonta units to befool the Taxation Department and get benefits under industrial package.

When officers of the department intercepted a truck loaded with finished goods of the company that was being transported to Paonta from another state, they checked the records of the company and detected a tax evasion of Rs 37 lakh.