Karnal, March 17
While the Haryana Higher Education Department is adamant on not allowing the IGNOU to engage the faculty of the government and the government-aided colleges for running its centres in the state, about a dozen retired eminent teachers have come forward to help the IGNOU restart the closed centres.

A meeting to review the situation and also the centres was held at the regional IGNOU centre here and a decision was taken to restart the centre by engaging retired faculty.

As many as eight eminent retired teachers attended the meeting, while two others offered to join the band of select teachers to keep the centres running.

Out of 28 centres of IGNOU, 21 had become non-functional since July 2008 and even the counselling and evaluation work was not undertaken at these centres. The regional centre made special arrangement for evaluation of assignments and the same were sent to Shimla Regional Centre to ensure that thousands of students enrolled in 100-odd courses did not suffer. Special arrangements were also made by the regional centre to conduct the examinations under such odd circumstances and the interests of the students were safeguarded, the students, Dr Ashok Sharma, regional director, IGNOU Regional Centre, and Karnal said.

Retired teachers, Sagar Chand Gupta (Hindu College, Sonepat); Dr SR Goel (Arya PG College, Panipat); ML Agarwal (Vaish College, Bhiwani); VK Tomar (CR College of Education, Rohtak); RS Jakhar (Govt PG College, Hisar); Ashok Bhatia (Govt National College, Sirsa); Harinder Kumar Sharma (Gaur Brahman Degree College, Rohtak) and Dr Vijay Sharma (Govt College for Women, Bhodia Khera), who attended the review meeting have been entrusted the responsibility to provide all type of support services to the students at these centres, he added.

Ashok Sharma said he was still hopeful that Directorate of Higher Education, Haryana, would reconsider its directive, barring their faculty from doing the IGNOU work and recognise the contribution of IGOU, established by an Act of Parliament, in achieving the targets of the Government of India in the field of higher education.

Leharian (Fatehabad), March 17
Watching tiny tots from this rural belt recite English nursery poems like “Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a drop of water” during the first annual function of Gilly Mundi Memorial Community School today must have given satisfaction to Mota Singh, father, and Debbie, widow, respectively, of Gurpreet Singh Mundi, alias Gilly.

Because, Gilly Mundi Memorial Community School has never been a business for Mota Singh, a councillor and former Mayor of the Leamington Spa, or Debbie, the Italian widow of Gilly, but it has become their life’s aim to translate the late Gilly’s dream of running a quality charity school for poor children of this rural area.

Among those who were witness to Gilly’s dream having been translated into reality on his second death anniversary today were academics Lt-Gen Devender Dayal Sandhu, Vice-Chancellor of the Guru Jambeshwar University of Science and Technology, Hisar, Bhim Singh Dahiya, former Vice-Chancellor of Kurukshetra University, DK Kaushik, Principal, and Subhash Sharma, Director of Manohar Memorial Postgraduate College, Fatehabad.

Earlier, Deputy Commissioner JK Ahlawat inaugurated the annual function of the school in the morning today.

Gurpreet Singh Mundi, alias Gilly Mundi, was the UK-born son of Mota Singh, who had left Indian shores in 1963 to settle in the UK.

Gilly worked for a charity engaged in getting justice for victims of custodial death and when he married Debbie in his ancestral village Buwan Kothi in 2005, 4 km from here, he was overwhelmed by the hospitality of villagers.

He resolved to launch a trust in the UK and open a school for the local children in the area out of the money collected through donations from that country. Gilly applied for a charity, Buwan Kothi Charitable Trust, in the UK and the day the trust was registered on March 17, 2007, Gilly died of heart attack at the age of 36.

His father Mota Singh and widow Debbie decided that they would not leave Gilly’s dreams unfulfilled and worked overtime to dedicate Gilly Mundi Memorial Community School to the villagers on the first death anniversary of Gilly on March 17, 2008.

Both Mota Singh and Debbie had come from the UK to attend the first annual function of the school today.

Also participating in the first annual function of the school were several English friends of Debbie and her late crusader husband and Jennet Alty, a trustee of the Buwan Kothi Charitable Trust.

“It gives me great satisfaction seeing little children learn in English medium from the best of teachers,” said Mota Singh in his welcome speech.

Debbie said what Gilly had dreamt a day after his marriage and discussed with “me is in front of my eyes today”.

Karnal, March 17
As many as 600 students of Kumari Vidyavati Anand DAV College for women were awarded degrees at a special convocation held today to mark golden jubilee of the institution. Students from science, commerce and arts streams were awarded degrees in the function.

Justice AL Bahri, vice-president, Managing Committee of the college, who was chief guest on the occasion, exhorted the students to inculcate moral values and carry forward the tradition of simplicity, dedication and hard work.

Justice Bahri also released the news bulletin Sankalp and gave away prizes to meritorious students in academics and the students performing outstandingly in extra and co-curricular activities.

Principal Kamlesh Mishra gave a brief account of activities of the college.

Fatehabad: As many as 316 graduates from the commerce and arts streams received their degrees on Tuesday on the occasion of the 28th convocation of Indira Gandhi Government College, Tohana. The graduates included a sizeable number of girls.

JS Ahlawat, Deputy Commissioner, Fatehabad, delivered the convocation address and gave away the degrees to the students.

In his address, Ahlawat exhorted students to work for making the country stronger and a force to reckon with in the world.

He said the youth had a greater role to play in taking India on the path of development.

Emphasising the need for skill development, Ahlawat said in the present day world, skills had become more important than degrees and the youth must develop skills to get good placements after completing their studies.

College Principal NN Vats welcomed Ahlawat in the college.

Jag Niwas, SDM, Tohana, and faculty members of the college were also present.

Rewari, March 17
Following a “tangible assurance” given by Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda to a delegation of the Haryana School Lecturers’ Association yesterday, all 6,000-odd school lecturers ended their five-day long boycott of marking throughout the state today.

All head examiners and examiners resumed marking of answer-sheets of class XII of the Haryana School Education Board at the on-the-spot marking centres at the district headquarters.

A four-member delegation of the association comprising of its state president Anil Kumar Yadav; state general secretary Jogender Beniwal; Gurgaon district president Bal Kishan Yadav and Rohtak district vice-president Surender Dhaka met the Chief Minister at Haryana Bhawan in Delhi yesterday.

Anil Yadav told the Tribune here today that the Chief Minister gave them a patient hearing following which he assured them that their grievances pertaining to “anomalies” in the implementation of the sixth pay commission’s report and other allied matters would be reasonably addressed after the expiry of the model code of conduct.

Yadav also thanked his colleagues for their united protest which, he asserted, was instrumental in making the state government listen to their grievances.

The association had been demanding removal of anomalies in the implementation of the sixth pay commission’s report as well as adequate hike in remuneration of invigilation duties in the board examinations and evaluation charges of answer-sheets.

Shikohpur (Gurgaon), March 17
In a pioneering initiative aimed at making farmers aware of their legal rights pertaining to the use and sale of seeds, the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI) organised a workshop on the premises of the Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK) here today.

A number of farmers from various parts of Haryana as well as neighbouring states attended the two-day workshop that commenced today.

“The underlying idea behind orgainisng the workshop was to dispel several misconceptions prevalent among the farmers in this regard,” said Dr Malavika Dadlani, head and nodal officer (seeds), Division of Seed Science and Technology of the IARI, while talking to The Tribune on the occasion.

Addressing the participants, Dr Dadlani asserted that the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers' Rights Act, 2001, was being effectively implemented to check the unfair practice of unauthorised persons/companies selling the seeds prepared by some other person/institution.

The enactment of this legislation would also facilitate internationally renowned companies to sell their quality seeds in the country, she added.

As per the provisions of the Act, plant breeders/farmers can get their crop varieties protected, provided these are novel, distinct, stable and uniform.

The breeders are entitled to save, use, sow, re-sow, share, exchange and even sell their seed, but they cannot sell branded seeds of a protected variety. The farmers can claim compensation if a protected variety does not perform as had been claimed by the breeder.

The Union Government has set aside a sum of Rs 2 crore to be utilised by the National Gene Fund to ensure that the due benefit of a protected variety goes to the breeder.

Dr SK Chakrabarty, Principal Scientist, IARI, informed the farmers about the official procedure to get their seeds registered and protected. He explained various aspects and provisions of the Act to the participants.

Dr Shiv Kumar Yadav, Senior Scientist, IARI, gave a detailed audio-visual presentation on the background, scope and significance of the Act and its provisions. Earlier, Dr Anjani Kumar, Programme Coordinator, KVK, briefed them about the purpose and relevance of the campaign.

Hisar, March 17
The shadow of the Election Commission’s model code of conduct loomed large over the inauguration of the two-day annual kisan mela organised by Haryana Agricultural University here today.

Haryana Chief Secretary and Vice-Chancellor of HAU Dharamvir, who was scheduled to inaugurate it, did not turn up. So did Shakuntala Jakhu, Commissioner, Agriculture, Haryana, who was supposed to chair the inaugural function.

This appeared to be a last-minute decision by the two top bureaucrats as the invitation cards carrying their names had been circulated by the university only yesterday.

In their absence, Gurbachan Singh Thind, a member of the Planning Commission’s Agriculture Advisory Group, inaugurated the mela. A progressive farmer, Kushal Pal Sirohi, who is a member of the board of management of HAU, chaired the inaugural function.

In view of the model code of conduct, the university had decided not to invite any politician to the mela. It had also decided not to give awards to progressive farmers this year for this very reason.

However, there was no effect on the farmer turnout. Farmers from all over the state and neighbouring areas of Rajasthan and Punjab started arriving early in the morning mainly to buy seeds and visit demonstration farms.

The presence in the mela this year of a large number of rural women surprised the organisers. These women evinced keen interest in many stalls.

Ambala, March 17
Special Judge, CBI Court, Haryana, AK Verma has directed the Ambala jail administration to produce three of the accused in the kidney scam in the court on the next date positively. The three had been taken on transit remand by the Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh police around two months ago.

The Rajasthan police had taken two of the accused in the kidney scam - Dr Amit and his brother Dr Jeevan - into custody for interrogation as a case of removing kidney is pending against them in Jaipur. The Andhra police had taken another accused in the kidney scam, Dr Upender, on transit remand to Guntoor where a similar case had been registered against him.

The court adjourned the hearing for April 27. The CBI and defence counsel were present in the court during the hearing of the case.