Jhajjar, April 9
Following the directives of the Financial Commissioner and Principal Secretary, Health, the district health authorities have withheld the salary of 67 government doctors, including three senior medical officers (SMOs), nine dental surgeons, and 55 medical officers (MOs), posted at various primary health centres (PHCs), community health centres (CHCs) and general hospitals here.

These doctors had failed to maintain their headquarters and had been commuting daily to reach their places of posting. A detailed report in this regard has also been dispatched to the Director-General of Health Services, Haryana, for further action. Interestingly, the salary will now be released only after the condition of maintaining the headquarters is fulfilled.

The district has four general hospitals, six CHCs and 16 PHCs in which 105 health officers, including SMOs, MOs and doctors, have been posted.

Interestingly, 33 of them stay at their places of posting while the rest leave the headquarters in the evening to stay in their houses located elsewhere. Notwithstanding this, erring doctors feel no hesitation in falsely claiming the house rent allowance (HRA) and the rural allowance.

Financial Commissioner and Principal Secretary, Health, Anuradha Gupta had recently sent a letter to all civil surgeons of the state in which they were directed to take immediate steps to ensure that all doctors working in PHCs, CHCs and general hospitals were immediately advised to stay at the places of their posting and maintain the headquarters. The letter also authorised the civil surgeons for the payment of salaries, the HRA and the rural allowance only after the condition of maintenance of the headquarters is fulfilled.

Jhajjar Civil Surgeon RS Dalal said the action had been taken following the directives of the authorities.

Fatehabad, April 9
Education, healthcare and infrastructure development are on top of the list of priorities of Indian Youth Congress president and Congress nominee for the Sirsa parliamentary constituency Ashok Tanwar.

The Congress nominee, who was here today to address workers of his party at Fatehabad, Ratia and Tohana, spoke about his vision for the constituency he is aspiring to represent in Parliament and also about his priorities if gets elected to the 15th Lok Sabha.

Talking to The Tribune, Tanwar said quality education was the need of the hour given the fact that India today had a vast majority of youth population.

“I will try to bring the best of educational institutions in the area so that local people can have access to whatever best is available to people elsewhere in the country or abroad,” he said and added that quality healthcare facilities were also high on his priority list.

He said the people had the right to get the best medical facilities and he would do his best to bring such services to the Sirsa area.

“Gone are the days when politicians could befool people by flaring up their communal and religious sentiments. Indian people no doubt are emotive about their religion but they understand that at the end of the day it is good governance that is going to ameliorate their fate,” Tanwar said and added that precisely this was the reason why the Bharatiya Janata Party had been virtually wiped out from Uttar Pradesh, where it once played the Hindu card.

He said besides development of the Sirsa area, making the local people free from fear was also on his priority list.

“Though more than four years have passed since the Congress came to power in Haryana, the people here are still being intimidated by those who remained in power earlier. I have taken upon myself to free the local people from their fear,” he added.

Earlier, Tanwar addressed Congress workers in the local Setia Palace.

Ranjit Singh, Deputy Chairman of the Planning Board, Haryana; Dura Ram, Parliamentary Secretary; Kunal Bhadoo, son-in-law of Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda; Jagdish Nehra, a former minister; Kulbir Singh Beniwal, MLA from Bhattu; Arvind Sharma, chairman of the district campaign committee of the Congress; and several other leaders were present.

He was accorded receptions by Parliamentary Secretary Dura Ram and senior Congress leader Virender Siwatch.

Bhisham Pitamah, who recently retired as Joint Commissioner in the Excise and Taxation Department, decided to join the Congress today and organised a reception for Tanwar.

Sirsa, April 9
Atma Singh Gill, the sitting MP from the Sirsa parliamentary seat, who had gone into a defiant mode after he was denied re-nomination, mellowed down today, came back to the party mainstream and shared dais with party nominee Ashok Tanwar, when the latter addressed party workers there.

Gill had adopted rebellious postures after the Congress high command denied the party ticket to him to accommodate IYC president Ashok Tanwar and had announced to contest the forthcoming polls as an Independent candidate.

He had also termed Tanwar as an outsider and had also maintained that the people of the constituency would not accept him as their candidate.

Tanwar had, however, refused to be drawn into an issue with Gill and had said that the MP was a senior member of the party and he would approach him for cooperation.

Tanwar, accompanied by Kunal Bhadoo, son-in-law of Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, and some other local leaders visited Atma Singh Gill’s residence in Baliala village near Ratia town in Fatehabad today to seek his cooperation, where the MP had already made an arrangement for the Congress nominee’s reception.

Gill then accompanied Tanwar to Ratia, where they addressed party workers in the Agarwal Dharamshala.

Ranjit Singh, Deputy Chairman of State Planning Board, Dura Ram, MLA, district president of the party Randhir Singh, former MLAs Ram Swaroop Rama and Jarnail Singh, senior party leaders Jai Pal Singh Lali and Sat Pal Godara were present on this occasion. 

Sirsa, April 9
Dr Sita Ram, the Indian National Lok Dal nominee from the Sirsa parliamentary seat, is contesting the May 7 polls by making the “local” and “outsider” as a major poll issue.

A dental doctor by education, Dr Sita Ram belongs to Chautala village of Sirsa district and has been comparing his local status with the “outsider” status of Congress nominee Ashok Tanwar, who incidentally belongs to Jhajjar district.

Talking to The Tribune today, the INLD candidate, who has represented his party in the state Assembly twice and is a sitting member from Dabwali, said people of Sirsa were not going to vote for an outsider, whose whereabouts would not be known to the electorate, once he was elected.

Dr Sita Ram said discrimination against the Sirsa area in the matter of government jobs was another major issue he had been raising during his campaigning.

“The state government has been overlooking merit and has been giving jobs to people belonging to a particular region, ignoring the youth from the Sirsa parliamentary constituency,” he alleged.

Besides, the law and order situation and scarcity of power and irrigation were also big issues in the area, he added.

Dr Sita Ram said the law and order in the entire state was in a shambles and electricity and water had become scarce commodities.

He said all sections of society were unhappy with the state government and were looking for May 7 to come so that they could vote out the government by bringing the NDA to power at the Centre. 

Karnal, April 9
About 60 per cent firearm licence holders in Karnal district have responded to the orders of the Deputy Commissioner to deposit their licensed arms at their respective police stations in view of the coming Lok Sabha polls while 40 per cent are yet to deposit their arms. The process of depositing arms was started in March and till date only 3,114 of the 5,236 arms licensees have deposited their arms while 2,122 are yet to follow suit.

Karnal SSP AS Chawla said the process was on and besides seizing illegal arms, licence holders were also being persuaded to abide by the orders of the government. He said the number of persons who had not deposited the arms was not very high as certain categories of people were exempted from depositing their arms.

These included security guards and other persons who were required to keep arms with them as part of their duty. However, there was no question of allowing any person to keep illegal arms. The police had seized 21 illegal arms during the current year and five arms had been seized during March.

As per information gathered from different police stations, 571 of the 869 arms licensees have deposited their arms in the Civil Lines police station, 450 of the 836 in the Sadar police station, 365 of the 712 in Indri, 260 of the 896 in Nilokheri, 516 of the 712 in Gharaunda, 495 of the 1,252 in Assandh, 583 of the 1,133 in Nissing and 201 of the 478 in Travadi.

Kaithal, April 9
Shamsher Singh Surjewala, president of the All-India Kisan Khet Majdoor Congress and local MLA, has demanded adequate compensation for farmers whose crops have suffered damage due to untimely rain and hailstorm recently.

Addressing a press conference here today, Surjewala said heavy rain accompanied by strong winds and hailstorm had caused extensive damage to standing and harvested wheat, oilseeds and other crops in Haryana, Punjab and other parts of North India.

The rain was unexpected and thousands of farmers in the affected areas had to bear the burnt of this natural calamity.

The government should order a girdawri to asses the damage and suitably compensate the farmers, he added.

Meanwhile, farmers from dozens of villages affected by the rain and hailstorm today met Deputy Commissioner Amneet P Kumar and Shamsher Singh Surjewala and urged them to provide compensation to them for the damage to crops.

Due to yesterday’s heavy rain, the procurement process in all mandis and purchase centres has come to a standstill in the district as the wheat packed in gunny bags for lifting and the crop lying in the open have become wet.

Sirsa, April 9
A young couple was killed when the Maruti car they were travelling in was hit by a running train on an unmanned railway crossing near Bhangu village in this district this morning.

Dilbagh Singh (30), a resident of Ahmadpur Darewala village in Baraguda block of this district, had come to his in-laws’ house at Dhaba with his wife Kiranjit Kaur (27) and was returning to his village in the morning today.

When the car they were travelling in tried to cross an unmanned railway crossing near Bhangu village, the Hisar-Bathinda train reached there at a high speed and blew away the car.

The car was torn into two pieces and both Dilbagh Singh and Kiranjit Kaur were killed on the spot.

The train stopped after the accident and the Government Railway Police was informed to complete the necessary formalities.

The identity of the couple could be established from the documents recovered from the pocket of Dilbagh Singh.

The young victims were married for two years only.

Sonepat, April 9
Four persons, including three members of a family, lost their lives when they were struck by lightning late last evening. The lightning occurred during thundershowers which struck the district for more than six hours, causing damage to standing and harvested wheat crop as well as to wheat stock in mandis.

According to information, farmer Balbir Singh of Chhichhrana village in Gohana subdivision, along with his wife Kamla and children Monika (12) and Akash(10), was returning from the fields after harvesting wheat when the lightning struck. While Kamla and both children died on the spot, Balbir Singh had a narrow escape as he was a few yards behind them.

In another such incident, Satish of Tazpur village was killed after being struck by lightning in his shop in the village. His father, Dhani Ram, was also present in the shop at that time, but he escaped being hit.

The district received widespread thundershowers which started last evening and continued for a long time. The untimely rain has hampered harvesting work, which was earlier in full swing.

Chandigarh, April 9
The Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA) today decided to proceed against two of its clerks for impersonation in a typing test. The authority will register an FIR against two clerks and two impersonators for criminal conspiracy and impersonation and suspension for two employees. Also, a chargesheet for major penalty against a superintendent entrusted with the fair conduct of the typing test has been approved.

Confirming the orders, HUDA chief administrator TC Gupta said the decision to lodge a criminal case against the two employees was taken only after a detailed inquiry by additional chief engineer Amrik Singh during which they confessed to impersonation.

The case dates back to November 2007 when, after Gupta took over as CA and realised the authority had not conducted the tying test, mandatory after appointment for future increments for clerks. Of 300 clerks, 93 had not cleared the test.

While the process of conducting tests was set in motion right afterwards, 55-year-old Shakuntala Devi’s services were terminated by the department on the basis of “doubtful professional integrity”.

Though she approached the high court and got back her job, the Supreme Court granted stay in the matter.

The first test was conducted on November 30, 2007, and was taken by 21 clerks. While 16 failed, five, including the two clerks, Kararmvir and Hanuman Singh, guilty of impersonation, were declared pass.

After the examination, an anonymous letter to the HUDA CA disclosed that the two had been impersonated by Anil Kumar and Satish Kumar. Later, this fact was admitted by the two clerks, following which the two were suspended and a detailed inquiry was ordered into the case by the CA.

The authority, meanwhile, has gone ahead and conducted similar tests for its remaining employees since the process of computerisation of records and data in the HUDA is near completion and the employees are expected to be well-versed in accessing information on their computers.