Ner Chowk (Mandi), February 22
The Rs 650 crore Employees’ State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) 500-bedded medical college and hospital, its first greenfield project in the country, being founded here tomorrow by Central Labour Minister Oscar Fernandes and Chief Minister PK Dhumal will not only provide 40 per cent seats for the state students, but it will transform the face of the Mandi region as the ESIC is making it a state-of-art super-speciality hospital open to the pubic.

“We have heard that we will not have to go to PGI or Shimla for treatment when the hospital will be ready here,” said Jagdish, a beldar, who lives in Majathal village at the boundary of the 31 acres land site of the ESIC medical college. “But most of the people are poor and we have no money to start some small business,” he added, echoing sentiments of 15 boys most of them poor, looking for some work in the college.

On the other hand, director-general, ESIC, Prabhat Chaturvedi, who is monitoring the arrangements for the foundation stone laying function here tomorrow said, “The ESIC medical college will reserve 40 per cent seats for the state students, 40 per cent for all-India merit basis open for state’s students also, 10 per cent for ESIC beneficiaries, 5 per cent for the industry owners and 5 per cent for students of the ESIC employees.”

Chutervedi said the ESIC is amending the Act, which hopefully would be okayed in the coming parliament session that would enable all patients regardless of whether they come under the ESIC scheme to get benefits of the hospital. The 30-bedded emergency of the hospital would be open for 24 hours for patients and the 300-bedded hospital would start operation here in the first phase in 2010, he added.

He said the ESIC would sign five years bond with the new graduates and would give them best packages in the country, taking care of shortage of doctors in the state as they are also welcome here. “It will have 50-seated dental college and 50-seated nursing school,” he informed.

He said the ESIC had hired top consultants and hospital engineering architect, as it is its first project in the country. The staff, students and faculties would have 100 per cent accommodation on the 31-acre campus, he added.

Mandi, February 22
Stage has been set for the week-long international Shivratri festival that will be inaugurated by Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal on February 24 here. Around 215 “devtas” will bless the visitors, including tourists from across the country.

The Seri Munch has arranged for “star night” performances during the festival period.

However, the list of artistes, released by the DC-cum chairperson of the Shivratri Mela committee, does not includes names of very renowned artistes, except Vadali Brothers, who will perform on February 25.

Apart from the Himachali artistes, these cultural nights will mostly feature small-time performers and television artistes.

Playback singers Jubeen Garg and Arshprit will perform on the inaugural day.

The mela committee is also trying to rope in a foreign troupe or artistes from the Council of Cultural Relations, New Delhi, to perform on February 26.

NDTV show Janoon-fame Hardeep Kaur and the Voice of India-fame Sonu Marval will perform on February 27.

Laugher Challenge-stars Bharti Singh and Srikant Maski will perform on February 28.

SaReGaMa-fame Himani Kapur will perform on March 1.

Shimla, February 22
Accusing the BJP regime in the state of adopting a dual policy to dissuade people from filing their claims under the Forest Tribal Act 2006, the CPM yesterday demanded that a massive regularisation campaign should be launched, especially in the tribal areas to make people owners of the land they have been occupying.

In a statement issued here yesterday, member, state secretariat of the CPM, Tikender Singh Panwar, lashed out at the government for fixing March 15 as the last date for filing of applications under the Forest Tribal Act 2006. “It is absurd to expect people to submit their applications before March 15 as the land occupied by them in the higher reaches is covered under snow and it is simply not possible to measure it,” he quipped.

He demanded that in case the government was sincere in its intentions to bring benefit to people who are landless or possess less than 20 bighas of land then this date must be extended till June. “The government is simply making mockery of the Forest Tribal Act 2006 by imposing conditions which will prevent the benefit from reaching out to those for whom it is meant,” he remarked.

Panwar accused the BJP regime of hoodwinking the people once again as even in 2002 they had sought details from people about the encroachment done by them on government or forest land. “The people no longer trust the BJP regime as despite filing their claims in 2002 they did not get anything and now government agencies are discouraging them from making claims once again,” he said.

Shimla, February 22
Reserved category candidates are fast catching up with general category candidates in competitive examinations. Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) candidates have been outperforming students from Other Backward Classes (OBC).

This is evident from the marks secured by candidates of various categories in the written examination, physical proficiency test and interviews conducted by the State Subordinate Services Selection Board for recruitment of sub-inspectors to fill 41 posts in the police department. The information was obtained by Dev Ahshish Bhattacharya, an RTI activist, under the Right to Information Act.

Out of the maximum 150 marks for the written test, the average marks obtained by SC candidates that qualified for the interview were 96.21 as against 95.92 for OBC and 101.04 for the general category candidates. In case of candidates who were finally selected, the average was 107.06 marks for general category, followed by ST (101), SC (100) and OBC (98.37).

The marks obtained by toppers were 118 (general category), 114 (OBC), 110 (SC) and 113 (ST). Interestingly, many of those who did well in the written test could not be selected as they fared badly in the physical proficiency test (PPT). Unlike Delhi and some other states where the candidates have to qualify minimum standards under the PPT but no marks are awarded, the candidates were given marks here depending on their performance in 100m race, long jump, high jump and 800m race.

Bhattacharya maintains that the sub-inspector was a key functionary of the police department who initiated all the inquiries, conducted investigations and pursued cases in the court of law and as such the effort should be to select the most intelligent candidates. This could be achieved by making PPT just a qualifying test and awarding no marks for it.

His viewpoint is vindicated if one analyses the details of marks and prepares a list without taking into account the PPT marks. Detail of marks in written examination in case of general category candidates reveals that out of the top 15 candidates (12 unreserved) only four got selected for the post.

Shimla, February 22
Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal said today the Steel Authority of India would soon set up a plant at Nahan after fulfilling necessary codal formalities.

Addressing a public meeting at Nahan, he said issues like availability of 30 acres of land, water and electricity were being pursued to start work on the project at the earliest. He had detailed discussion in that regard with Chairman of SAIL SK Roongta at Damtal yesterday.

Referring to the Renuka Dam project, he said the government was making every effort to rehabilitate the families to be affected by the project. They would get 100 units of electricity free of cost every month and in case of non-consumption, these could be got “en-cashed”. An insurance scheme had been introduced for ginger crop for the benefit of farmers.

He said Sirmaur district had the distinction of having the first university and nursing college in the private sector in the state (at Baru Sahib). A polytechnic college was also set up at Paonta Sahib.

Dhumal also inaugurated a hostel for SC and ST girls (built at a cost of Rs 1.06 crore) and a police station building constructed at a cost of Rs 63 lakh at Sarhan.

He announced Rs 39 lakh for the construction and upgrading of nine roads, including Panch Peer-Dhamesha, Gogio-Anj-Ki-Ghat, Bagthan-Marighat, Kasar-Sarsoo, Dinger-Kinger-Khal Drabal, Chimunji-Bairi, Sarahan Chowki-Charech and Dalig Ghat-Sitbar roads. He also announced upgrading of three primary schools as middle schools and three middle schools as high schools.

Manali, February 22
The rescue operations continued for the second day today at the site of the accident that took place yesterday at Kothi on the Manali-Rohtang road. The bodies of the two tourists have been retrieved from the deep gorge.

The rescue team led by Manali DSP Ashish Sharma and Atal Bihari Vajpayee Institute of Mountaineering and Allied Sports, Manali, deputy director Rajiv Sharma helped in finding the bodies. Due to dark the rescue operation was not completed yesterday.

According to the DSP, the bodies of the deceased, Kuldeep and Hari Om, have been sent for a post-mortem.