Bathinda, March 21
The cold stores in the Malwa belt of Punjab are overflowing with the bumper potato produce this season.

Even as most of the cold stores have already stacked potato bags to their full capacity long queues of potato-laden trucks and tractor-trailers have become a common sight.

Not only local producers but also from the neighbouring states of Haryana and Rajasthan are heading here to store the crop, as there is shortage of storage capacity in the areas of the states bordering the Malwa region.

Daljeet Singh, a potato producer of the Bhai Rupa village, with two tractor-trailers loaded with potatoes was in the queue for the past four days outside a cold store near the village awaiting his turn for offloading the produce.

Another farmer, Sukhchain Singh, was waiting with 650 bags of potato. It was a long queue of potato-laden trailers on both sides of the road as the process of offloading was slow due to shortage of labour.

Moreover, each bag has to be marked before being stacked at one place.

Ranbir Singh said it was a bumper crop this time, but the problem of shortage of storage space has caused sleepless nights to the farmers.

The potato farmers were spending the night on the road outside the cold stores, he said.

The 1.40 lakh bags capacity cold store has already received one lakh bags and many farmers waiting in the queue might not get any space for their produce.

Harbans Lal, a cold store owner here, said the 70,000-bag capacity at his store was almost exhausted and he would have to close the gate after offloading 15 trailers.

Horticulture officer Narinderjeet Singh said the 32 cold stores in the Bathinda district were almost full to their capacity with the potato produce. The situation was same throughout Punjab, he said.

There were longer queues in the Rampura and Phul areas that produce about 70 per cent of the total potato crop here.

Most of the farmers were looking for space in the cold stores to dump the seed potato while the middlemen were stacking table potato. The seed potato would be lifted early November when sowing for the fresh crop would begin.

Bathinda, March 21
The Bathinda excise department’s draw to allot liquor shop licences for the current financial year has proved unlucky for women applicants. While women have been staging anti-liquor agitations all over the country, it is interesting to note that even women did not lag behind their men counterpart in applying for the liquor vends in Punjab.

Jaspal Garg, assistant excise and taxation commissioner, said this time, out of the total 7,208 applicants in Bathinda district, 23 were women.

However, some insiders in the liquor trade industry said almost all of these women were not actively involved in the business.

“To raise their chances of getting licence, many people filled up application forms in the names of their wives, daughters or mothers,” Ritnesh Bagria, a liquor shop owner of Rajasthan who had shown keen interest in liquor vend draw in Bathinda, said.

Bathinda, March 21
The Talwandi Sabo police booked branch manager of the State Bank of India, Maur Mandi, for passing “castist remark.”

According to sources in the police, Harwinder Singh of Maur Mandi lodged a complaint with the police that he went to the bank to get loan but the manager, N.K. Gupta, passed castist remark on him.

On the orders of the duty magistrate, Talwandi Sabo, a case was lodged under the SC/ST provision of the authority Act, 1989.

The accused was yet to be arrested.

When contacted on phone, the manager in question, who was in Delhi, alleged, “It is a trick of a mediaperson of Maur Mandi, against whom I have issued a direction to recover some loan amount. So, he implicated me in this case with the false statement of his servant.”

Bathinda, March 21
The Annual Garden and Flower Show competition concluded at the Chetak Officers Institute in Bathinda Military station today. The competition was an effort to give the residents of cantonment an opportunity to enjoy the beauty of nature.

Those present witnessed the collection of exotic potted plants and muti-hued flowers freshly bathed in vibrant colours.

Chief guest Major-general R.S. Gujral, chief of staff headquarters, 10 Corps, and Pali Gujral, vice-president, Chetak AWWA, gave away the prizes to the winners.

The Major-General appreciated the efforts of the participants and exhorted all to plant more and more trees to make Bathinda a green city.

The competition was organised in five categories consisting of 17 groups.

The winners in the potted plants category group were: Annuals: (1) Brig A.R. Prasad, (2) Colonel Ranjan Kochhar, (3) Anita Sood; Ornamental: (1) Sunita Chauhan, (2) Colonel P.S. Bindra, (3) Shaily Chauhan; Bonsais: (1) Colonel B.S. Grewal, (2) Neerja Koul (3) Colonel Sukhwir Singh.

In the cut flowers category group the winners were: King and Queen: (1) Kiran, (2) Sunita Chauhan; All varities: (1) Anita Sood, (2) 174 MH, (3) Kiran.

Winners under the flower arrangements category group were: Dry arrangements: (1) Mohan Dass (2) Nidhi Madan (3) Preeti Bindra; Fresh arrangements: (1) Sunita Chauhan (2) Anita Grewal (3) Sumeda Kochhar.

Bathinda, March 21
In separate cases, the Kotwali police has booked two persons under section 420 of the IPC on the charges of fleecing money from two persons by assuring them jobs.

In first case, Surinder Singh of village Khemuana has been booked for allegedly duping Surinder Singh of Jodhpur Pakhar village of Rs 50,000. The complainant stated that the accused had promised to provide job to his son and nephew but he fled after receiving the money.

In the other case, Parveen Kumari, a doctor by profession, lodged a complaint against A.V. Aggarwal, managing director of a Himachal Pradesh-based hospital. She alleged that the accused duped her of Rs 5 lakh on the assurance of getting her a contractual job of a medical officer in some agency. But he did not keep the deal. Both the accused are at large. — TNS

Moga, March 21
A 30-year-old widow was allegedly raped here on Friday. The accused also snatched a mobile phone and Rs 10,000 from the victim.

As per sources, the victim, a resident of village Kokri Phoola Singh, was going to village Duneke. She got late and could not get any vehicle from the main square, At about 8.15 pm, a motorcycle-borne youth (25) persuaded her to sit along with him by convincing that he would drop her at her relative's house, stated the woman to the police. 

She trusted him and sat on his motorcycle but the youth drove her to a house at Baggeana Basti. The youth tied the woman's mouth and offered liquor to a migratory labourer who was already there, she added.While the labourer was busy drinking liquor, the youth started sexually abusing the woman. When she tried to resist, he started beating her and raped her. 

She anyhow managed to get out of that house and straightaway went to village Duneke where she narrated the incident to her maternal grandmother.

The incident was brought into the notice of the police at police station (south). The police took the victim to civil hospital for medical examination. After confirmation from the medical report that she was sexually abused a criminal case of rape was registered against the unknown youth.

However, at the time of writing the news report the police was yet to get a breakthrough in this case even as the investigations were in progress. — TNS

Moga, March 21
The district administration has not yet taken any action against Rajinder Bhandari, president of the state unit of the BJP, even after six days of the violation of model code of conduct, probably, under political pressure of the ruling SAD-BJP parties in the state.

The BJP president violated the poll code by holding a conference of the electorate without prior approval from the local administration. Party posters were affixed on private buildings without permission and he also used red light atop his personal vehicle when he came to participate in the election meeting organised by the youth wing of the party here on last Monday.

Chief Electoral Officer of Punjab Kusumjit Kaur Sidhu, while talking to the media at Chandigarh today, said this complaint was “still being examined at the district level”.

It is learnt that the Election Commission may seek an explanation from District Magistrate Satwant Singh Johal as to why the administration is taking such a long time to examine the case.

Sub-divisional Magistrate Ajay Sood while talking to The Tribune revealed that DSP (city) Bhupinder Singh, in a report submitted to him, has confirmed that Bhandari had used red light atop his vehicle when he came here to participate in an election rally.

Executive officer of the MC Brij Mohan Jhamb, in a separate report submitted to the administration also confirmed that the BJP had violated the Defacement of Property Act.

Bathinda, March 21
“It is everybody’s moral duty to prevent unnecessary interference with the nature. If we continued disturbing it, it would reciprocate later. 

To let our posterity live in clean environment, we have to stop the felling of trees and plant as many trees as we can,” said Jasmer Singh, forest officer, Ludhiana, while speaking at the World Forest Day celebration function on the local forest department premises today.

Jasmer said every person expends wood of over 20 trees during one’s lifetime. So, it was the duty of everyone to plant and look after at least 20 trees to pay the debt of the nature.

He said a tree plantation drive under the “Plant Trees, Save Bathinda” scheme would be launched in the district on a war-footing after the LS polls. All the educational, religious and social organisations would be involved in the drive. He said the forest department would provide plants on subsidised rates under the farm forestry scheme. — TNS

Bathinda, March 21
In reply to the complaint against the cable network allegedly controlled by the Badal family, the Bathinda DC, Rahul Tewari, has submitted his report to the chief electoral officer (CEO), Punjab, this evening.

The CEO had yesterday asked all DCs to submit their reports on cable operators telecasting news programmes in violation of the poll code.

Interestingly, the network airs a number of news programmes but the report does not mention anything about it.

Earlier, it was alleged that the SAD leaders had taken over the television business in the state and were also ‘unlawfully’ projecting the SAD leaders through this cable network. Further, it was alleged that they did not have any down linking licence and necessary approvals.

In his report, the DC while mentioning that the Digi Cable & Fastway show the channel in the entire state asked the CEO to get the claim legally examined at their headquarter level.

The managing director of the Fastway , in his reply filed through his local in-charge, said that they were registered under cable TV regulation Act under the registration number in H2/CBW/39/08.

When contacted, the DC said, “The report has been sent to the CEO.”

Mansa, March 21
The Bhartiya Kisan Union (Ugrahan) has demanded compensation for the loss of wheat crops due to storm last night.

Sources said nearly 15 to 25 per cent of wheat crop was damaged by the storm.

The district president of the union, Ram Singh Bhainibagha, said the storm had destroyed the wheat crop in some areas of the district.

He demanded that the affected farmers should be compensation after conducting a girdawari. — OC