Jalandhar, August 6
The engineering aspirants from all over Punjab seem to play safe for their career as most of them opted against the low-profile branches like biotechnical, bio-medical and instrumentation engineering during the PTU-CET counselling.

Interestingly, most of the colleges easily managed to fill seats in streams like electronics and communication, computer science, mechanical, electrical and information technology. But the students’ move of voting against unpopular engineering streams has created a challenge for all the colleges offering these courses. The response has been extremely low as compared to the general expectations. Only one of the 18 seats in bio-medical engineering had been filled at the Adesh Institute of Engineering and Technology, Faridkot, while seats in all other streams had already been filled. Similarly, the College of Engineering and Management, Kapurthala, had been able to fill only two of the 10 seats in instrumentation and control engineering, whereas it managed to fill all 80 general category seats in other streams.

The case is same for even the IIIT Institute of Engineering and Technology, Pojewal, as it managed to fill two each out of 13 and 14 seats in chemical engineering and electronics and instrumentation engineering, respectively.

A course in applied electronics and instrumentation engineering being offered in the newly opened Rayat and Bahra Institute of Engineering and Nanotechnology for Women, Hoshiarpur, and the Rayat and Bahra College of Biotechnology for Women, Kharar, too found little acceptance. The Kharar institute has managed to fill two of the 18 seats, while Hoshiarpur campus has faired slightly better by filling five of the 18 seats. However, in some cases popularity and placements of the institutes have been considered rather than courses due to which streams like production and automobile engineering have been filled.

CET chief coordinator Dr V.K. Arora agreed that there had been a poor response to less common courses and attributed it to lack of awareness about their prospects. “They prefer taking admission in old established courses instead of trekking a new path,” he opined.

Jalandhar, August 6
The PDP voted in favour of the UPA alliance in the motion of confidence to show its gratitude to the Centre for withdrawing the land allotment to the Sri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB).

Sukhminderpal Singh Grewal, chief of the BJP Investor Cell, alleged that the Congress had sold peace in the strife-torn state to save its minority government.

Commenting on the developments, he said the then Congress-PDP combine had transferred nearly 40 hectares of forest land in Baltal to the board for Rs 23.1 million thinking it would win over the Hindus.

But when the PDP saw two bitter factions of the separatists, led by All-Party Hurriyat Conference hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani and moderate Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, vowing to work together to resist the move and the decision of the National Conference to join their ranks, the PDP immediately backed out from its earlier stand.

Later, the PDP started making peace overtures towards the Muslims in an effort to win back their vote bank. They PDP leaders also claimed that they had not been consulted on the issue, he alleged.

But before the Congress could do anything, the Left withdrew support from the UPA government and the PDP knew the importance of its lone vote and it negotiated its vote in favour of the Congress for the vacation of land allotted to the SASB.

That was why the PDP, which withdrew the support from the Jammu and Kashmir Congress-led government on the land row issue, showed confidence in the UPA government and voted in its favour, he asserted.

He held the Congress-PDP combine responsible for vitiating the peace and tranquillity of the valley and demanded that the UPA government hand back the land to the SASB and respect the feelings of Hindus. 

Amritsar, August 6
A wastewater treatment plant was inaugurated at the Guru Nanak Dev University campus by renowned environmentalists Sunderlal Bahuguna and Magsaysay awardee Rajendra Singh on Wednesday.

Vice-chancellor Dr Jai Rup Singh, while giving details, said the plant is built at a cost of Rs 36 lakh and has a treatment capacity of 2.5 million litres per day. “This can be augmented to 5 million litres depending upon the future requirement,” he said, adding that the treated water would be used for the irrigation purposes.

The VC said the plant, jointly designed by the environmental experts of the department of botanical and environmental sciences and the varsity engineering department, has been constructed for re-use of domestic waste water as per the WHO guidelines. The plant has three tanks. The first tank is an aerating one followed by secondary treatment tube deck where sludge process takes place. Finally, the tertiary treatment takes place in the third tank. The plant would use blue green algae and is proposed to achieve zero-waste water discharge.

Among others registrar Dr RS Bawa, environmental scientist Dr AK Thukral, Prof GS Virk, Dr Saroj Arora, Mokesh Kumar Sharma, president of All India Pingalwara Charitable Society Dr Inderjit Kaur and a large number of faculty and staff of the varsity were also present.

Batala, August 6
The services of 18 ETT teachers were terminated by the additional deputy commissioner (development)-cum-chief executive officer, zila parishad, Gurdaspur (vide order 1301-25/ETT dated July 30, 2008).

Information to this effect was given by the chief executive officer of the zila parishad here on Wednesday. These ETT teachers were serving at Batala, Fatehgarh Churian, Shri Hargobindpur,Qadian,Pathankot and Narot Jaimal Singh.

All these teachers were recruited by the zila parishad, Gurdaspur for one year and the qualifications laid was diploma in ETT course.

However, the director of the village development and panchayats, Punjab, directed all the zila parishads to terminate the services of all those teachers who were holders of ETT diploma of one-year duration. Accordingly, the zila parishad, Gurdaspur, served show-cause notices on 18 teachers, Sukhjinder Singh (Kotli Jawahar), Jatinder Pal Singh (Nava Pind Mehmowal), Sonia (Bajjumaan), Didar Singh, Gulzar Singh, Maninder Kaur (all Sandalpur), Uttamjeet Kaur (Khaanpatta) Anu Chandokh (Balewala), Gurpinderpal Kaur (Dhaulpur), Dheeraj Kaur (Kaluwal), Dilawar Singh (Jainpur), Sukhwinder Singh (Dharamkot), Sushma Rani (Bariar), Sukhwinder Singh (Bhol), Rekha Rani (Bharth), Babita (Ama Gujraan), Rita (Chak Manhasa) and Rajwant Kaur (Ghas), and their services were terminated after the completion of the notice period.

All the BDPOs have been directed to relieve these teachers immediately.

The teachers have threatened to launch an agitation in front of the courts because there was no such condition at the time of their appointment. 

Amritsar, August 6
District police today nabbed two persons Visakha Singh (22) and Billa (24) of Chattiwind village in connection with rape of a Rajasthani labourer on the intervening night of August 4 and 5.

In her complaint, the woman alleged that the accused dragged her out of her hut in Chattiwind village here and raped her. The woman claimed that her one-and-a-half-yearold son fell into a nearby nullah and drowned while she was being molested by the accused.

District police chief Kunwar Vijay Partap Singh, in a press release issued today, said a police party headed by SHO Gagandeep Singh arrested the accused from the Chattiwind area. Both the accused have confessed to their crime, he added.

Amritsar, August 6
Indian doctors for peace and development, the Indian counterpart of the international physicians for prevention of nuclear war, observed Hiroshima Day at Government Medical College here today. The activists, along with students, carried out a peach march which culminated at Lawrence Road. A seminar was organised on the medical college campus in this regard.

Dr Arun Mitra, secretary general of international physicians for prevention of nuclear war, and Dr Tejbir Singh, national executive of Indian doctors for peace and development, viewed that the government should decrease the budget on military spending which was almost 40 times more than the budget provided for health, education and social services collectively. — OC