Jalandhar, January 9
Owing to truckers’ strike, prices of various commodities, especially sugar, onion and citrus fruits such as orange and kinnow, continue to go up. However, the price of potato has come down.

Onion price has registered a 25 per cent increase in the past three days. Its price has gone up to Rs 25 per kg from Rs 20. Likewise sugar price has registered an increase of 15 per cent. Its price has gone up to Rs 23 per kg from Rs 20. Market sources said there had been Rs 100 per quintal increase in the sugar price in the wholesale market.

The prices of orange and kinnow have gone up to Rs 25 per dozen from Rs 15. However, there has been only marginal increase in the price of apple. “As apple is stacked in local cold stores, its supply has not been affected much,” said a fruit merchant. Hence there has been no big increase in its price in the wholesale market. However, the local vendors have increased the price by Rs 2 to 4 per kg, he added.

The potato price has come down from Rs 5 per kg to Rs 3. As the fresh potato crop has started landing in the local market, its price has crashed. Most of the potato available in the market is sent to other parts of the country. The Doaba belt is known for high production of potato. Truckers' strike has affected the supply of potato to other parts in a big way.

There has been an increase of Rs 4 per kg in the price of green peas. A few days ago, these were available for Rs 14 per kg. Likewise the price of mushroom has almost doubled. Most of the traders have been sourcing the supply of mushroom from Himachal Pradesh. However, now most of the traders are selling local mushroom. The mushroom price has doubled per 100 gm packet. Earlier, it was available for Rs 10 and now its price is being quoted Rs 20 per packet.

The price of egg has come down marginally. Earlier, the egg was selling for Rs 232 per 100 eggs and now its price has gone down by Rs 3 per 100 eggs. Traders said that egg was supplied mostly to Delhi and J and K from the local market. However, the supply to Delhi and J and K has been impeded due to the strike. But thanks to the prevailing cold conditions, the demand for eggs has gone up in this region also.

The prices of pulses, refined oils and rice continue to be stable. However, if the truckers’ strike persisted for a few more days, there is the possibility of an increase in the prices of pulses etc., say traders.

Hoshiarpur, January 9
The vigilance sleuths, led by DSP Daljeet Singh, raided the block development office, Hajipur, this evening and caught red-handed its secretary Kuldeep Kumar and junior engineer Shiv Nath while they were accepting a bribe of Rs 3,000 and Rs 2,000, respectively.

According to Daljeet Singh, Khizarpur sarpanch Ranjit Singh today approached the Vigilance Department and complained about the bribe demanded by these officials for issuing a utilisation certificate of the grant spent by the village panchayat under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) on development works. The duo had demanded Rs 10,000 from him for issuing the certificate.

Later, the deal was struck at Rs 5,000 and the Vigilance Department caught them while they were accepting the bribe. The department also recovered the amount paid by Ranjit Singh to them.

Gurdaspur, January 9
Hundreds of members of the B.Ed Teachers Front, Punjab, today jammed traffic on the main crossings in the town, held a march and a rally to lodge their protest against the Punjab government for not carrying out the recruitment of ETT teachers in this district in a proper manner.

The activists held out a threat that if their problems were not solved by the government, then they would play a key role in the coming Lok Sabha elections and would oppose the SAD-BJP alliance candidates tooth and nail.

They alleged that the Punjab government started recruiting about 10,000 ETT teachers in different districts. About 945 posts of ETT teacher were to be filled in Gurdaspur district alone. The authorities concerned had filled only 472 posts so far and the remaining 473 posts were yet to be filled.

They alleged that the authorities concerned had been delaying the recruitment of 473 teachers on flimsy grounds. They added that they had submitted demand charters to the deputy commissioner, the district education officer and the subdivisional magistrate in this connection, but nothing concrete had been done by the authorities concerned so far.

They said they were also agitated over the fact that education minister Upinderjit Kaur had been misleading the people and unemployed teachers also by repeatedly claiming that 14,000 posts of teacher had been filled in the state. They added that this was absolutely false claim of the minister.

The activists added that if the government was serious about fulfilling its promises of filling all the vacancies of teacher in the state, it should give appointment letters to the deserving candidates without any delay.

Kapurthala, January 9
Deputy commissioner J.M. Balamurugan today said with the active participation of NRIs in development works, the administration had taken up the project of reconstruction and alteration of the building of Government Senior Secondary School, Dhilwan.

The initiative has been taken as per the laid-down scheme of the Punjab government development projects at Dhilwan village and Athauli. For this purpose, an MoU was signed by Cherry Blair, president of Pushpa Loomba Memorial Trust, New Delhi, and the Punjab government on 50:50 partnership.

Balamurugan said under this project Rs 1 crore had already been approved. The Loomba trust and the state government had contributed Rs 50 lakh each. The inauguration of the newly constructed building of the main hall of the school was done by Cherry Blair on November 18 last year. “The construction of the central block of the school is still going on and it would be completed by February-end,” he added.

He said the NRI department of the state government had approved a project to lay underground sewerage at a cost of Rs 67.80 lakh in Athauli village of Phagwara by Bhai Dhesiji Development Committee of the village. The project had taken off with the financial contribution of NRIs. So far Rs 33.90 lakh had been deposited. Even the government had released the first instalment of Rs 16.95 lakh. “Till date, Rs 63.08 lakh has been spent on the project,” he said. — TNS

Nawanshahr, January 9
The district-level NGOs coordination society, UPKAR and Sankalp Welfare and Awareness Society (SWAS), jointly organised an awareness seminar on drug addiction and female foeticide here on Thursday. Deputy commissioner Nilkanth Avhad was the chief guest.

Avhad, while lauding the efforts of the NGOs in making the people aware of the twin evils of drug addiction and female foeticide, called for concerted efforts for converting the drive into a mass movement. “People at the grassroots-level should be mobilised to fight the menace of drug addiction and female foeticide,’’ said Nilkanth, adding that these evils were giving rise to a number of crimes and other problems.

“Though there are laws and the administration was keeping an eye on the medical stores and the scan centres to curb the social evils, yet merely the enactment or implementation of the laws could not put a check on the social evils unless there is a change in the mindset of society,” added the DC. Teachers and students could play a vital role in creating a positive change in society, he said.

Among others, civil surgeon Dr Chitranjan Singh Brar, Gurcharan Singh Basiala, Jaspal Singh Gidda, president and general secretary, UPKAR, and SWAS chairperson Sukhwinder Kaur also spoke on the occasion.