Dehradun, December 14
They do not claim to wipe out poverty. Neither do they wear charity on their sleeves. They are here to make a tangible difference.

They are a group of students from India and abroad doing hard labour at Fatehgram, a village near Herbertpur, 30 km from here.

A group of students from four countries pass on construction material with unwavering attention, hand to hand. This is their daily routine, from dawn to dusk, with breaks in between.

Nineteen students and five staff members have been working since the last five days at the village and hope to complete two houses in the next few days.

They are part of the Social Service and Community Initiative started by schools from different countries, including the Doon School here.

These schools are members of the Round Square Social Organisation. Students from these schools render social service in selected villages.

In all, 75 schools from all over the world are members of the organisation. Doon School, founding member of the initiative, has started two social projects in the country. Besides the Fathegram project that was started in 2007, the other one is in Ladakh.

“It is an endeavour to bring alive the ideals of Kurt Han, a German educationist who propounded that school students should once in a while be pulled out from their comfort zone and left to their devices to tackle real-life situations so that they not only enhanced their survival skills but also developed compassion for others,” informed Arvind Chalsani, in charge of the Doon School social and community service project.

Since the adoption if the village by students, the fortunes of villagers have changed radically. There is a marked change in the way they go about their business.

Said 75-year-old Ram Pyari of the village: “I came here as a young bride. There was no roof over my head. I never dreamt that I would one day live in a pucca house. Now, I am doing just that. There is electricity in my house. What more do I need?”

The student labour has borne fruit. They have built nine houses and only three are left. Also, a community centre has been built in association with Appleby, a Canadian school that is one of the partners in the project.

Before zeroing in on the village, the ground work was carried out by Dr Mohan Joshi, dean, Doon School.

“When we started in September 2004, there were just four families living here. The men were engaged in farming activity or worked as labourers at construction sites. What attracted us were the two gharats.

“We were influenced by Dr Anil Joshi, patron of Himalayan Environmental studies and Conservation Organisation (HESCO), a voluntary group, who wanted public schools to take up socially productive work in villages and inculcate in the students dignity of labour,” informed Joshi.

That’s not all, for all-round development of villagers, the women folk are taught pickle-making and bakery and their grown-up children are imparted vocational skills.

Two gharats (watermills) have been modernised. The primitive gharats have been improvised with a metallic shaft, enhancing their potential to a micro hydel power plant.

Premvati, wife of Rangee Lal, who runs one of the gharats, is seeing better days now. A fund of Rs 40,000 was provided by Doon School and HESCO (which is providing technology) towards upgradation of the gharat.

The gharat now supplies power to the village at night. “We are able to get electricity for 48 hours. Besides, during the day, the gharat is used for grinding wheat, rice and other coarse grain and also animal feed,” said Rangee Lal.

Attracting much attention, the volunteers from abroad are seeping in the sights and smells of the village that has been their home for some weeks now.

“It has been an enriching experience. We have huge farms in Cananda and farmers there are prosperous. Here, it is different,” observed Emily from St Clement’s School, Canada.

Knowing full well that it is difficult to remove poverty, “these young students, who hail from the upper echelon of society, want to make a small difference. They realise that affluence is not enough, that it does not strengthen human relationships. Rather, it negates these,” said Sarah, a teacher at Collingwood School, Vancouver, Canada.

“The students have plenty of lessons and experiences to take back home,” said Erhard Back, a teacher from Salem school in Germany.

Said Sidhant Gupta of Mayo College and Rishi and Aditi Joshi of Doon School: “We are here of our own volition.The experience has been extraordinary, very enriching.”

Mussoorie, December 14
Amidst recurring incidents of vandalism targeting churches, in a rare gesture of communal amity, a Hindu has contributed towards the renovation of a historical church here.

The renovation of the 168-year-old church have been completed, thanks to the contribution by Sanjay Narang, an alumnus of Woodstock School here.

Sanjay has borne the cost of restoration works of the historic church, bringing much cheer to the Christian community of this hill resort.

At a thanksgiving ceremony, Reverend Erik Templeton expressed gratitude to Sanjay for his gesture. The Reverend said the church had special place in the history of Mussoorie and that it was a splendid moment for the community that the church had regained its lost glory.

Sanjay Mark, secretary of the Pastorate Committee is delighted. “Since the past many years, the church’s roof was leaking. Repairs were needed at other places too, but with God’s grace all work has been completed.”

Sanjay says there could be “no better way to contribute towards social harmony.” St. Paul’s occupies a special place in the history of Mussoorie.

According to historians, the church was consecrated 168 years ago, on May 1, 1840, by Daniel Wilson, bishop of Calcutta.

During 1840 to 1947, the church was revered by military chaplains for British residents of the cantonment and the British military hospital.

A number of renowned personalities have taken marital vows at this church, ost notable among them being Christopher and Janet, parents of legendary hunter and author Jim Corbett. They were married in this church on October 13, 1859.

Ajay Mark, a teacher at Woodstock, said Bollywood actor Tom Alter was also married at St. Paul’s.

Dehradun, December 14
A specially designed auditory cricket ball has not only helped the visually impaired break barriers, but also given them an opportunity to display their cricketing skills at the national and international level.

The credit goes to the sports instructor (Model Senior Secondary School) and M.L Mishra and the design team of manufacturers of braille appliances of the National Institute of Visually Handicap.

Anand Sharma, who captained the first World Cup played in 1998 in New Delhi, learnt initial cricketing here.l So did Manvender Singh Patwal of Kotdwar, who led the Indian team in the second World Cup.

The ball, weighing 85 gm with steel ball bearings stuffed inside, (without the steel ball bearings, it weighs 65 gm) has flummoxed several designers from Australia and Russia, who have been unable to come out with a ball that can replace this one.

“Earlier, the ball used was the one made by Australian designers. It was made of cane. It failed miserably.The ball could not be deciphered by the visually impaired during trials,” informed ML Mishra.

The institute ball has been stuffed with steel ball bearings which when thrown make a sound that can be easily detected by players.

Underarm bowling is done as opposed to overarm. And the bowler asks if the batsmen is ready and then bowls, saying “play.” The life of the ball is six months.

In fact, at the first World Cricket Cup (Kanishka) in 1998 for the visually impaired, in which England, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, South Africa and India (the host country) participated, the ball used not only passed the test with flying colours, but was much talked off and debated.

“Prior to the World Cup, the rattled Australian and English cricket team authorities came up with several modalities and tried to dictate terms that would have favoured their ball and their own pitch.

“However, we stood our ground and gave them a leeway in deciding only the category of vision impairment for selection of players,” informed Mishra, who coached the Indian team.

The cricket pitch is demarcated into two parts and the wickets are made of steel, the reason being that the sound of the bat and the ball striking on the hard surface is clearly audible.

The cricket field is between 50-60 yards. Category B1 comprises players who can see a little, but cannot make out the shape of their hand. Four players from this category are selected in the team of 11.

Three players in the team are from Category B2 with visual acuity up to 2/60 in the better eye after correction and four from Category B3 players with visual acuity in the range of 2/60 to 6/60 in the better eye after correction.

Dehradun, December 14
Uttarakhand has recorded an 11 per cent increase in the population of leopards within a span of two years.

While their number today stands at 2,343, it stood at 2,105 in 2005, says a 2008 census report revealed at the recently held Uttarakhand State Wild Life Board meeting here.

Corbett continues to hold on to its reputation of an excellent wildlife habitat recording a total of 115 leopards within the territories of Corbett National Park, Corbett Buffer Zone and Sonanandi Sanctuary.

Another key protected area, Rajaji National Park, this time recorded the presence of 220 leopards, an increase of six from the last census figure. Nanda Devi National Park recorded 47 leopards, six more than 41 recorded in 2005.

In other forest divisions of the state, the Tehri division recorded 253 leopards this census. Similarly, the Pithoragarh forest division recorded the presence of 276 leopards, Bageshwar 125, and Garhwal 228. The Badrinath forest division too recorded 36 leopards this time.

Significantly, the forest authorities had strictly adhered to field protocols this time, thereby ensuring that the census was made foolproof with no cases on interpolations (counting a leopard twice due to its movement from one division to other).

Interestingly, there has been a steady rise in the number of leopards in the past two years, this despite the fact that they continue to be targeted by poachers.

Haridwar, December 14
The newly-appointed commissioner of Garhwal, Umakant Pawar, yesterday advised the Kumbh Mela authorities to create a website for Kumbh mela and to put all the mela related information on the website.

He advised that this would help people to get information at a click of the mouse, bring transparency and speed to the undergoing Kumbh projects.

Commissioner was on his first visit to Haridwar on Saturday after taking over the charge. He further said that all the details, activities and facilities associated with the Kumbh mela should be displayed on the website to help people in get information easily.

He reviewed the development work of the Kumbh mela projects and later presided a meeting of district officers of various departments.

Mela officer, Anand Vardhan, informed the commissioner to have more space for the ongoing projects new vacated lands are being marked and with the increase in vehicles since last decade more space is being allotted for the parking purpose.

Commissioner strongly objected the non-appointment of mela nodal officers by several departments. Pawar also suggested that since more than a crore people are expected to turn up for the Kumbh Mela, a garbage management agency should be hired to manage the garbage during mela days.

At the meeting SSP Sanjay Gunjiyal, SP Asim Srivastava, CDO Ravinath Raman, HDA Secretary Ranvir Singh Chauhan and OSD Mela DD Sharma were present.

Dehradun, December 14
Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) at New Delhi on December 11 for mutual cooperation in the fields of oil and gas exploration, production and marketing.

The MoU envisages ONGC supporting IOC in exploration under NELP, and IOC supporting ONGC for marketing its Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF); the two companies will jointly forge strategies for marketing of Natural Gas produced by ONGC.

The MoU also incorporates IOC supplying HSD to ONGC for meeting latter's operational requirements.

The umbrella understanding, which also includes finalisation of the long-pending Crude Oil Supply Agreement (COSA), will facilitate development of mutually beneficial agreements in the identified areas of cooperation and provide a platform to resolve commercial issues between the two.

Present at the occasion, R.S. Sharma, CMD, ONGC said, "It is indeed a momentous day for two giant organisations to leverage their synergies, culminating today in the form of a MoU. Joining and alliance with Indian Oil is a matter of pride for us. We need to see the generic aspects get translated into more definitive agreements.”

Underlining the importance of joint efforts, Sharma added, "E&P is highly capital and risk intensive. Our collaborative efforts paid off in the Farsi Block indicating an in place reserves of 14 TCF of Gas. It is therefore incumbent that we work together more intensely".