Phagwara, June 26
The police booked an independent candidate for the local municipal council election, Jeewan Kumar, and his several supporters on the charge of blocking the national highway here for nearly half an hour on Wednesday night.

Jeewan Kumar is contesting from Ward 16 in the municipal council elections scheduled to be held on June 30.

Jeewan Kumar and his supporters had blocked the national highway at Chahal Nagar Chowk, near the civil hospital, here at around 9.30 pm alleging that they were not allowed to enter the residential colony of the Phagwara sugar mill for electioneering.

A case has been registered against Jeewan Kumar, Satwinder, alias Sonu, and his several unidentified supporters under sections 283, 427, 148 and 149 of the IPC at city police station.

According to sources, Jeewan Kumar and his supporters tried to enter the residential colony of the sugar mill for electioneering at around 8 pm on Wednesday but they were stopped by the gatekeeper for getting permission from the owner of the mill for their entry into the colony.

At this, they started raising slogans against mill owner Jarnail Singh Wahid, also a local SAD leader.

Jeewan Kumar alleged that he and his supporters were not allowed to enter the colony as being a SAD leader the owner of the mill wanted to ensure victory of SAD candidate Ranjit Singh Khurana.

On the other hand, denying the allegation, mill officials said there were general directions to the gatekeeper that no outsider should be allowed to enter the colony without prior permission from the mill officials for security reasons.

After getting the information, SHO Sarwan Singh Bal reached there and told Jeewan Kumar and his supporters that the matter would be resolved after talking to the mill officials the next morning.

But the independent candidate and his supporters blocked the national highway. Following which, they were booked on Thursday for blocking the Delhi-Amritsar national highway.

Hoshiarpur, June 26
Unscheduled power cuts imposed by the PSEB in the sweltering heat since 8 pm last night, threw life out of gear in the city. The power cuts badly affected the daily water supply too.

People spent a restless night in the muggy weather as their alternative power supply system like invertors failed due to prolonged power failure which lasted from 8 pm to 11.45 pm.

The power cut continued intermittently throughout the day. People in the city got only about 2 hours of intermittent power supply till the filing of this story.

The phone lines of the electricity department seem to be flooded with complaints about power failure.

The worst condition is of the people living in the periphery of the city and its adjoining villages claimed some inhabitants viz Balbir Singh of Bikhowal, Sukhwinder Singh of Bhulewal Rathan and Ajay of Banjar Bagh.

The executive engineer of the PSEB city unit Harish Sharma said, “Due to a snag encountered at the 100 MVA transformer at 220 KV sub-station, Mahilpur, from where the power was being provided to the area, the power supply had adversely been affected.”

“Out of two installed transformers of the same capacity, supply was being given provided through just one. Replacement of the defected transformer was being done and it was expected that normal power supply would resume in the late hours of the evening,” he added.

Hoshiarpur, June 26
Five of the SAD’s newly elected members of the Dasuya block samiti joined hands with the Congress in the election of the chairman of the samiti on Tuesday to defeat the official SAD-BJP alliance nominee.

BJP MLA of the area Amarjit Singh Sahi told The Tribune on the telephone that the election for the chairman of the Dasuya block samiti was held on Tuesday.

In a house of 19 members, the BJP had three, the SAD 11 and the Congress five. Sahi was an ex-officio member of the house.

Keeping in view the strength of the SAD-BJP alliance in the house, it was certain that its candidate would win the post.

The name of Des Raj Singh (SAD-BJP) was proposed for the post, but SAD political affairs committee member Sampuran Singh Cheema allegedly in connivance with former Congress minister Romesh Chander Dogra got the name of Balkar Singh (SAD rebel) proposed for the post, whereas Congress members had already proposed the name of Girdhari Lal.

Girdhari Lal could not secure even a single vote, whereas Des Raj Singh and Balkar Singh secured 10 votes each. Later, Balkar Singh was elected through a toss.

Criticising Cheema for joining hands with Dogra to defeat the SAD-BJP nominee, Amarjit Singh Sahi alleged that in the past, the former had always supported the Congress in the assembly elections to defeat Bharatiya Janta Party candidate Mahant Ram Parkash Dass and added that he would not only take up the issue with the BJP high command but also with the senior leadership of the Shiromani Akali Dal.

The SAD-BJP alliance has captured the block samitis of Mahilpur and Mukerian. Ajay Kaushal of the Bhartiya Janta Party was elected chairman, while Tilak Raj of the Shiromani Akali Dal was elected as vice-chairman of the Mukerian block samiti. In Mahilpur, Paramjit Singh (SAD) and Kuldip (BJP) were elected chairman and vice-chairman, respectively.

Hoshiarpur, June 26
A special investigation team (SIT) constituted by the Punjab DGP N.P.S. Aulakh and supervised by Hoshiarpur SSP Sukhchain Singh Gill, visited the site at Balachaur yesterday from where the body of Sandeep was found on May 28, 2008.

According to police sources, the DGP constituted an SIT for which police officials of Hoshiarpur, including the SP (H), the DSP, the Garhshankar SHO and CIA staff sub-inspector have been nominated as members.

Gill said though the SIT had visited the site, it would arrive at a conclusion after complete investigation. The S IT would submit a weekly investigation report to the DIG, Jalandhar  range. — OC