NEIGHBOURHOOD

3-yr-old, mother killed in accident
Tribune News Service

Kalka, July 9
Residents of Kalka and Pinjore are sore over the delay in Pinjore-Kalka-Parwanoo bypass project, as it has become a major traffic bottleneck on the NH-22 and NH-21A. “Traffic chaos starts early in the morning. The situation remains the same throughout the day and aggravates in the evening hours,” said Suresh Kumar Thama, a resident of Kalka. It takes him more than one hour to reach Pinjore from Surajpur owing to traffic jam.

“According to a survey report, an average of over 25,000 vehicles pass on the highway on a daily basis. The Pinjore-Kalka-Parwanoo bypass road is the only viable solution to lessen traffic congestion,” said Sucha Ram, former president of Pinjore MC.

The long jams puts patients and students to inconvenience and have claimed many lives in the last couple of weeks. Although the Pinjore-Kalka-Parwanoo bypass, which had been hanging fire since the past 25 years, has been given a nod by the state government and was to be started before March 31 by NHAI, the work has not been started till day.

The residents have now urged the Central and state governments to start the work on this project as early as possible.

Kalka, July 9
The 105-year old Kalka-Shimla rail track, which is 96 km long with 103 tunnels, has made it to UN’s World Heritage list, but much of its equipment is lying in a state of neglect.

A rare 100-year-old trolley has been reduced to a scrap. It was run on a narrow gauge 100-metre track with the help of cables attached to a motor.The trolley was installed in 1903.

The rare machine is of no use to local officials as they consider its maintenance a mere waste of time.

The rare hydraulic shock observers (hydraulic buffers) installed 93 years back at the Kalka railway station are gathering dust. This system has been installed at only two places in the country- Kalka and Kolkata.The system is in a dire need of repairs , which would cost Rs 10 lakh , according to a railway official.

These buffers were used to stop trains or locomotives in case of over-speeding or breaks failure.

Of the 14 locomotives being run on the Kalka-Shimla rail section, 10 are outdated(1971-2007). Frequent failure of these locomotives causes much inconvenience to the passengers.

The railway authorities of the Kalka diesel shed had sent a proposal to Northern Railway Headquarters for 10 more locomotives, which was rejected. Sources said the railway board had given the nod to four locomotives, which were being prepared at a workshop in Mumbai.

Ambala, July 9
The construction committee of the Punjab and Haryana High Court has cleared the site plan of lawyers’ chambers to be constructed on the court premises at Ambala City.

A three-member deputation of the Ambala Bar Association, comprising S.M. Sharma, Umreesh Gandhi and Rajinder Vig, met the chairman of the construction committee at Chandigarh yesterday.

Gandhi said the construction committee had cleared the site plan of the Ambala lawyers' chambers. He said a three-storeyed building would be constructed in which provision for 323 chambers would be made. He said as many as 310 lawyers of Ambala had already applied for chambers by depositing Rs 10,000 as margin money. He said construction of the chambers would start soon.

It is to be mentioned that lawyers of Ambala have been demanding chambers for a long time. Recently, when the construction committee of the high court had visited the chamber site at Ambala City, the bar association had raised the matter before them.

Punjab and Haryana High Court Judge Nabab Singh had also supported the demand of the Ambala Bar Association as he had been its member for several years.

Fatehgarh Sahib, July 9
The Pakistan rugby team, visiting Fatehgarh Sahib and Mohali, is impressed with Indian hospitality.

"Right from the Wagah border to Fatehgarh Sahib, Indian hospitality has come unmatched. We are just bowled over by the warm welcome," said Riaz Fatyana, president of the Rugby Union of Pakistan.

Riaz is also a Pakistan MP and chairman of the Parliamentarians Commission for Human Rights, Pakistan.

Team members paid obeisance at Roza Sharif and Gurdwara Fatehgarh Sahib yesterday.

The visiting team will play one friendly match each at Baba Banda Singh Bahadur Engineering College, Fatehgarh Sahib, and Shaheed Udham Singh College of Engineering, Tangori. This is the first one of a tri-series match. During its next visit, scheduled after a few months, the team will visit Ajmer Sharif, Agra, and other states to play Rugby.

Coach Raja Akram, manager Altaf and seven other officials are accompanying the team of 20 players led by captain Usmaan Butt.

The players belong to different parts of Sindh, Balochistan, North West Frontier Province and Punjab province of Pakistan. The team will stay in Punjab till July 16.

Riaz Fatyana said the idea of holding rugby matches between the two countries was conceived at an international education conference held in Delhi.

"It was a tri-nation conference of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. During this conference, I came across people from Punjab, India, who were keen to initiate a friendly match series," added Riaz. Dr Darshan Singh from Baba Banda Singh Bahadur Engineering College had invited Riaz.

Patiala, July 9
Patiala district athletics meet will be held at the Punjabi University athletics track on July 12. The athletes will be divided in four categories, under-16 (boys and girls), under-18 (boys and girls), under-20 (boys and girls) and open category for men and women. The athletes should report at 8 am at the tracks along with original date of birth certificates, informed Ajaib Singh Kaleka, president of the Patiala Athletics Association.

He said the district team would be selected on the basis of this tournament and the chosen players will represent Patiala in the state athletics meet, which would be held at the same venue from July 19 to 21.

Mohali, July 9
The day belonged to seeded players as all got through to the quarterfinals in the ongoing Manav Mangal AITA Total Tennis Talent Series being held at Manav Mangal Smart School, Phase X, here today.

In the boys under-12 age category, top seed Ishaque Eqbal, second seed Nihit Rawal, third seed Fatehdeep Singh and fourth seed Sumit Pal Singh secured their berths in the quarterfinal stage.

In the boys under-14 age category, top seed Mandeep Kumar, Manik Joshi, Ishaque Eqbal, Dheeranush Bhatti, Fatehdeep, Nishat Eqbal, Srijan Uppal and Bhavtaranpreet Singh made it to the top-16 stage.

The boys under-12 quarterfinal matches will be played tomorrow and all the girls’ (under-12 and under-14) matches will commence at 3 pm.

The results are:

Main draw, boys under-12 (second round): Ishaque Eqbal (WB) beat Santbir Singh (Chd) 4-1, 5-3; Abhijet Singh (Chd) beat Qumar Faisal(Raj) 4-0, 4-2; Dhruv Pal (UK) beat Paarth Sharma (Dli) 4-1, 4-1; Rahul Pooria(HR) beat Sumit Pal Singh (JK) 4-0, 4-0; Ankit Parasrampuria (Raj) beat Param Pun 5-3, 1-4, 5-4; Fatehdeep Singh (Pb) beat Akhil Ranjan (Dli) 4-0, 4-0; Mayuk Rawat (UK) beat Gagan Sharma (Raj) 5-3, 4-2; and Dheeranush Bhatti (Chd) beat Nihit Rawal (Chd) 4-2, 4-2 (4)

Boys under 14 main draw second round: Mandeep Kumar (Chd) beat Vikas Berwal (HR) 4-1, 4-1; Manik Joshi (Chd) beat Dhruv Pal (UK) 4-1, 4-2; Ishaque Eqbal (WB) beat Paarth Sharma (Dli) 4-1, 4-1; Dheeranush Bhatti (Chd) beat Sonu (Pb) 5-3, 4-1; Fatehdeep Singh (Pb) beat Shubham Vij (Chd) 4-0, 4-0; Nishat Eqbal(WB) beat Andrew Pardeep (Chd) 3-5, 5-4 (1), 4-2; Srijan Uppal (Chd) beat Anhad Soin (PB) 5-4(3), 4-2; and Bhavtaranpreet Singh (Chd) beat Mrinal Kanwar (Dli) 4-0, 4-1.

Chandigarh, July 9
Ashish of AG Punjab lifted the trophy in the singles category, beating Vijay of Delhi Audit 21-16, 21-15 in the IA & AD North Zone Badminton Tournament that concluded here today.

The Delhi team emerged champion in the team championship. The team consisting of Rajiv Sharma, Sunil, Apinder Singh and Vijay beat Punjab team 3-2 to bag the top position.

The results are as follow:

Men’s singles (final): Ashish of AG PB beat Vijay of Delhi Audit 21-16, 21-15

Men’s doubles (final): Ashish and Amit of AG PB beat Apinderpal Singh and Sunil of Delhi Audit 21-15, 21-16

Team championship (final): Delhi Audit beat AG PB 3-2

Rajiv Sharma of Delhi Audit lost to Amit of AG PB (14-21, 24-22, 17-21); Sunil of Delhi Audit beat Lav Kumar of AG PB (21-12, 21-11); Apinderpal Singh and Rajiv of Delhi Audit beat Ashish and Amit of AG PB (19-21, 21-14, 21-19); Vijay of Delhi Audit lost to Ashish of AG PB (21-19, 19-21, 22-24); and Vijay and Sunil of Delhi Audit beat Vikas and Lav Kumar of AG PB (21-10, 21-14)

Mohinder Singh, accountant-general (A&E) Haryana, Chandigarh, gave away the prizes.

Chandigarh, July 9
The Twenty20 Cricket Federation of India was reorganised today following the appointment of new office-bearers.

Deepak Joshi, president of World Cricket T20 (UK) and Baseball Federation, has been appointed president of the federation. The other office-bearers are Sutixen Mehta (general secretary), Capt Deepak Saini (vice-president), Rai Bahadur (coach), Veena Mehta (treasurer) and Vikram Verma (technical adviser).

The association has 23 active members and 24 state chapters. Twenty 20 CFI is affiliated to the World Cricket T20 UK.Representatives were present at the federation meeting from Haryana, UP, Punjab, Delhi, J&K, Andhra Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttaranchal. Also present were ex-Ranji players like Neeraj Rana, Vikaram Duggal, Sutixen Mehta,Sanjeev Sharma, Sarbpreet Singh Saini and Rai Bahadur.

On the agenda was to play combined school and senior teams for UK club matches on August 2 and select and prepare team for the Euro Asia Cricket Cup in September for the under-18 age group. T-20 CFI will be holding zonal cricket tournaments for all five zones, national-level tournaments and later federation cup in the senior level.