Hanumangarh/Sriganganagar/Abohar, January 5
Religious fervor and gaiety seem to be at its best as thousands of Sikhs including women and children started thronging the Gurdwaras early in the morning not only in urban but rural areas also to celebrate the birthday of Guru Gobind Singh.

In Tibbi near Hanumangarh, the road that leads to the Gurdwara was crowded by women and children so much that it virtually wore a look of some Punjab town.

In Hanumangarh, students overwhelmingly participated in declamation contest remembering teachings of the 10th Sikh guru during celebrations in Seth Hans Raj Senior Secondary School, the winners got prizes. The NSS unit in Guru Nanak Khalsa Public Senior Secondary School besides celebrating the day organised traffic awareness rally which was flagged off by the superintendent of police Navjyoti Gogoi.

Abohar MLA Sunil Jakhar along with district youth Congress president Sandeep Jakhar participated in the Parkash Divas celebrations at Gurdwara Danewala Satkosi near their native village. They also joined the Sikh sangat in ardas for "sarbat da bhala" and at langar.

Impressive processions preceded celebrations in Srikaranpur, Kesarisinghpur and Suratgarh areas of Sriganganagar district.

Large number of devotees responded to shabad kirtan programme in Gurdwara Singh Sabha at Sriganganagar.

Abohar, January 5
The participants in the National seminar on "Innovations in teaching and learning" convened by Maharishi Dayanand College of Education here today were of the view that learning strategies can be defined as behaviors and thoughts in which a learner engages and which are intended to influence the learner's encoding process.

Thus, the goal of any particular learning strategy may be to affect the way in which the learner selects, acquires, organises, or integrates new knowledge. Good teaching includes teaching students how to learn, remember, think, and motivate themselves.

Some of them, who arrived here from different states, said teachers enter the classroom with two distinctly different kinds of goals, which are teaching students "what" to learn and teaching students "how" to learn. Some major categories of learning strategies are rehearsal strategies such as copying, underlining, or shadowing, elaboration strategies such as paraphrasing or summarising, organisational strategies such as outlining or creating a hierarchy, comprehension monitoring strategies such as checking for comprehension failures and affective strategies such as being alert and relaxed. Many current approaches to classroom learning emphasise the role of the learner in creating, monitoring and controlling a suitable learning environment. Learning strategies research, by providing strong evidence that these learning strategies can be taught, is creating a useful database from which applications can be derived.

The seminar was inaugurated by Prof. S C Gakhar from Panjab University. Distinguished speakers included T.S. Gill, Surinder Saharan, Rajinder Godara, Sandeep Sharma, Purshotam Swami, Shabnam Bano, Sumedh Podya, Jaspal Singh, Pritam Kaur, Rajnish Kamra, Manjinder Singh and Sunita Chhabra. Raminder Singh from Punjabi University chaired the second session. Convener Prabhjot Kaur and director Anurag Asija thanked the dignitaries and delegates.

Bathinda, January 5
Channu, a village situated in Lambi, the home constituency of Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal in Muktsar district, is one of the worst water-logged villages of the state with 2000 acres land of 192 owners affected by the problem. It is not the end of misery of the residents there as the village has 12 patients of cancer while seven are suffering from tuberculosis (TB). During the past two-and-a-half years, around 10 persons have died due to cancer.

According to a recent survey conducted by Mohammad Tayyab, IAS, assistant commissioner (UT), the ground water level is just two to five feet in the seepage affected area. The reason for high rate of cancer and TB could be water pollution, as toxic salts are present in the seepage.

The report reveals many shocking details about the village as more than 50 per cent of the total population of the village is landless farm labourers and almost half of the village land is affected with seepage/water logging.

The underground water level is rising and shifting towards south west, causing the submergence of land that is generally called waterlogging or ‘Sem’. The ‘Sem’ contains toxic alkaline salts called ‘Shora’ (fluoride), which makes it unfit for drinking, household use, fishery and irrigation.

As per the details available, the village was infested with the problem in 1997-98. Earlier, the depth of water was about 40-60 feet. Now, about 2,000 acres of land is infested with the ‘Sem’, including 400 acre of totally submerged land. Since 1997-98, the watertable is rising at the rate of 2-3 feet a year.

In this village, many cases of skin diseases (dermatitis, skin allergy, scabies), common cold, tuberculosis and cancer have been reported.

It is shocking that in such a disease-prone village, there is only one MBBS doctor, who provides health services and that too on contract basis under the state government scheme.

The report reveals that cancer is one of the major threat to the villagers. The village doctor refers cancer cases to the PHC at Lambi while some go to Bikaner in Rajasthan for treatment.

The report also shows Sem as the major cause of poverty in the village. It was also placed in front of the chairman of the 13th Finance Commission, Vijay Kelker, who had visited the village on December 5. But the whole village is still waiting for a positive action from the government.

Abohar, January 5
The district BJP has formed a monitoring committee to keep vigil on the development grants released recently by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal, general secretary Arun Narang informed today.

Briefing newspersons after a meeting that was presided over by the district president Mohinder Partap Dhingra here, Narang said that local unit presidents Ravi Setia, Geeta Chaudhary, Fazilka unit president Satish Setia, Ashok Chhabra, Bhupinder Snehi, Amar Chetiwal, Dev Raj Monga, Mohinder Bawa, Paramjit Dhamija, Brij Mohan Kerakhera and Atma Ram Kamboj have been nominated as members of the committee. They will ensure that the grants are utilised in a fair and transparent manner.

Bathinda, January 5
The 20th annual function of Sri Guru Harkrishan Public School, Bathinda, was held on Saturday with Tamil Nadu Governor and former Punjab CM S.S. Barnala gracing the occasion as the chief guest.

The function was spectacular and the children enthralled the guests with their performances. Items like “Bharat ke sunehre rang” and “Girl child, parents’ pride” moved the spectators. Shabad recited by the principal of the school, Jaswinder Singh, was an apt beginning for the function, highlighting the theme of the function, ‘Ek pita ekas ke hum barik’ (we are but the children of one god), in an unusual way.

Other dignitaries present on the occasion were Dr Surjit Patar, a renowned international literary figure and Dr. G.P. Gupta, national president of the Independent Schools’ Federation of India having 8,000 schools as its members.

In his speech, the chief guest praised the missionary zeal of Mahant Kahan Singh Ji, H.S. Sandhu, the honorary secretary, H.S. Mokha, the assistant secretary. He also released a book written by the school principal titled ‘Spoken English For Me.’

The chief guest also praised the academic performance of the school whose students have secured 100 per cent Board results with no failures and 92 per cent first division in CBSE’s AISSE exam.

Surjit Patar charmed the gathering by reciting a poem, ‘Chalo is mulk noon badaliye.’ A science block and a playstation for tiny-tots named after Mahant Tirath Singh Ji, who started this school in 1987, were also inaugurated. The school has at present 1874 students. 

Abohar, January 5
Seven members of a family sustained injuries as the driver of a Scorpio van in which they were returning from a religious function lost its control resulting in collision first with a canter and then with a truck near Gurdwara Damdama sahib here on Monday. All the injured were admitted to the civil hospital, sources said in the evening. The vehicles were badly damaged.

Bathinda, January 5
A detailed study report on blood pressure presented by a renowned physician hailing from the city, Dr Vitull K Gupta, revealed startling facts about the knowledge, awareness profile and status of control of blood pressure (BP) in patients of hypertension in Punjab.

In the report, he mentioned that hypertension or high blood pressure is one of the major risk factors for coronary heart disease and stroke. The World Health Organization (WHO) has estimated that about 62 per cent of cerebrovascular disease and 49 per cent of ischemic heart disease are attributable to suboptimal control of blood pressure levels.

Gupta presented the report at the 60th Annual Conference of the Cardiological Society of India at Chennai held from December 4-7, which reportedly, gave him yet another chance to earn appreciation from people.

According to the recent survey, high BP is estimated to cause 7.1 million deaths annually accounting for 13 per cent of all deaths globally.

Overall 26.4 per cent (972 million) of the adult world population was estimated to have high blood pressure in the year 2000, a figure that is projected to increase to 29.2 per cent (1.56 billion) by the year 2025.

Expressing concern about the lack of proper knowledge about the disease among people, he said while BP related complications are preventable, lack of public awareness and misconceptions about high BP and its complications are common resulting in inadequate treatment and control rates for blood pressure.

In India, there is paucity of information in the peer-reviewed literature about knowledge, awareness profile and status of control of blood pressure in hypertensive patients and on the role of education and motivation.

Dr Gupta along with the co-authors of this study, Dr Sonia Gupta, Dr Yashpal Jassi and Dr Jigyasa Tewari, reportedly studied 2619 patients of high blood pressure attending the OPD of their own hospital and diabetes care centre, who were already on anti-hypertensive treatment.

Study concludes that education and motivation plays a major role in improving knowledge, awareness profile, compliance and control rate of hypertension.

This part is often neglected by the doctors who for several reasons may fail to educate and make the patients aware of the dangers of high BP, its complications and proper treatment.

Abohar, January 5
Dramatic Club AKS while celebrating its 17th founder’s day has elected a new team. It will have SDM N.S. Brar as chairman, Mangat Ram Verma as president, Deepak Kamboj as general secretary, Surinder Narula as director, Ashwani Miglani as cashier, a press release said today.

The associate members listed therein included Veena Nagpal, Snehlata, Astha, Babalpreet, Gaganpreet, Deepika, Minni, Anjum Gulati, Satish Patel, Vikram Kamra, Anshuman Gandhi, Roop Singh, Rakesh Sain, Sandeep Verma, Gurdev Singh, Jaspal Singh, Tarun Kumar, Rakesh Narula, Pardeep Thukral, Bobby Sangha, Shailey Setia, Monty Singh, Munna Lal, Kuljit Singh, Gautam, Sarthak Narula, Pankaj Garg, Ravi and Manak Shah.

The meeting also resolved to stage a play on the World Theatre Day on March 27.

Abohar, January 5
The new executive committee of the Teachers Club has been announced by the president Amrik Singh Kukkar.

It will have Capt. S.K. Dutta as chief patron, Harbans Singh Chahal, Baldev Singh Pyasa and G.L. Nagpal as patrons, Asha Chhabra, Ved Parkash Rustogi and Krishan Lal Baghla as senior vice-presidents, Chetan Parkash Bulandi, D.K. Chaitley and Shishpal Jyani as vice-presidents, Sushil Rattan Jhamb as general secretary, Rakesh Raheja as office secretary, Subhash Sharma as press secretary, Arun Girdhar as cashier, Suresh Jagga as joint cashier, Radhey Shyam Sharma and R.C. Thakur as auditors.