|
|
|
|
Dhumal, Jai Ram address voters through mobile
UPA juggling inflation figures: Shanta Kumar
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Hamirpur Seat
Mankotia rules out rejoining Cong
Sonia disappointed people: BJP
Govt ignoring interests of tribals: CPM
‘Thind’s complaint against CM politically motivated’
Ex-servicemen’s samiti supports BJP
Resentment over election duties
Hikkam is state’s highest polling booth
Bali deplores hooliganism in Tanda college
Plea to bring tea business under Dept of Industry
WB concerned over tardy progress of CAT plans
Policy to open medical colleges
Rana flays Narinder Thakur
Four shops gutted
Soldier killed
|
||||||||
|
Dhumal, Jai Ram address voters through mobile
Mandi, May 3 Addressing a series of public meetings in Jogindernagar today, Virbhadra Singh made a dig at the present BJP regime that certain ministers in the Dhumal regime were addressing public meetings in inebriated state stating that all progress was done by the BJP in the state, not by the Congress as the latter was claiming. He further charged that the Dhumal government had lost its credibility as certain ministers were addressing public meeting consuming liquor and charas. This showed the degradation in politics that the BJP has brought about in the state, he charged, urging voters to vote out the BJP from the country
and the state. On the other hand, Chief Minister PK Dhumal and Jai Ram Thakur disappointed the party workers at Bhalkidhar in Chachiot as they could not reach the venue from Bhuntar as the helicopters flying them could not take off due to bad weather, revealed party sources. To save its face, Dhumal and Jai Ram made an appeal using their mobile phones through the mike before the public requesting them to vote for the party. They expressed deep regrets for not being able to attend the meeting. |
||
|
UPA juggling inflation figures: Shanta Kumar
Nurpur, May 3 National vice-president of the BJP and Rajya Sabha member Shanta Kumar stated this in a press conference at the Press Club Building here today. Terming falling inflation figures as deceit to the people, he alleged that the UPA government had been hijacked by capitalists. He said the sugar production during the NDA government was 185 lakh tonnes which had enhanced to 246 lakh tonnes, but the Centre had cut down the quota of levy sugar and it allowed export of 50 lakh tonnes of sugar on which Rs 700 crore is given as transport subsidy to benefit the capitalists. Shanta Kumar rued that during the longest rule of the Congress only handful people had grown rich whereas the country had become poor. “The Congress has given corruption, unemployment, and price rise to the country resulting in inclination of youths towards terrorism,” he added. He claimed that in the Lok Sabha elections the electorate was weighing the regimes of the previous NDA government led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee with that of the present UPA government led by Manmohan Singh and added that the UPA would not form government after the election. “The Third Front sans any policy or leader and NDA is the only alternative to give stable and strong government to the country,” he said. |
||
|
Hamirpur Seat
Hamirpur, May 3 While the BJP has fielded sitting MP Anurag Thakur, son of PK Dhumal, the Congress has nominated Narinder Thakur, son of late Jagdev Chand Thakur, for the election this time. The contest this time has become more interesting as both Anurag and Narinder will be vying for the space created by their fathers, stalwarts of BJP politics, one present CM and other one of the founder members of the party, though from different platforms. Anurag Thakur had won the last byelection from here after stepping in for his father, who vacated the seat after becoming the Chief Minister; while Narinder Thakur had joined the Congress after revolting against the BJP few months back. Interestingly, Jagdev Chand Thakur was the first to contest elections on the Jan Sangh ticket from the Hamirpur constituency in 1967 after creation of this constituency as a result of reorganisation of the states and inclusion of Una and Kangra regions in Himachal Pradesh in 1966. The constituency gained prominence after the present Chief Minister entered the fray and went on to win consecutively in 1989 and 1991 by defeating Congress stalwart Narain Chand Prashar. The constituency witnessed two byelections during the last term of Parliament; once when Suresh Chandel of BJP after getting elected in 2004 was unseated for ‘alleged cash for query scam’ and when PK Dhumal won the seat replacing him in 2007 byelection and once more in 2008, when Dhumal became CM and he quit the seat. In the byelection held after removal of Suresh Chandel in 2007, Dhumal defeated Ram Lal Thakur by over 80,000 votes and in the subsequent byelection Dhumal’s son Anurag Thakur had defeated Congress candidate OP Rattan by a huge margin of 1,74,666 votes. Since the Congress leadership
has fielded Narinder Thakur in the hope of winning the seat by creating a division in support base of BJP capitalising the legacy of Jagdev Chand Thakur, it is to be seen if the Congress could stop the BJP from its sixth consecutive win this time. |
||
|
Mankotia rules out rejoining Cong
Dharamsala, May 3 In an exclusive interview with The Tribune, Mankotia said, “I am not raking up the corruption issue again, as I do not want any political party to benefit from my campaign.” “I raked up the corruption issue in the last Assembly elections and it benefited the BJP. After elections, even the forensic laboratory proved that the allegations levelled by me were true. However, even the present government has not acted in the matter. So, if both major political parties have similar attitude towards corruption in the state, I do not want to rake up the issue again to benefit any political party,” he said. Mankotia’s disenchantment with the present government increased as despite all evidence provided by him, it failed to act against Virbhadra Singh and his loyalists. He also ruled out his joining any mainstream party in near future. When asked to comment on indications that he was likely to join the Congress in near future, he said, “I stand by my decision to quit active politics.” “However, I will continue working against corruption through the recently floated organisation, Court of the People,” he added. His loyalists had taken him into confidence before joining the Congress, he said. “Since I have decided to quit politics, I left it to them to choose any party they wanted to join,” he added. After Mankotia quit the BSP, the lone party MLA from Kangra, Sanjay Chaudhary, had also joined the BJP. |
||
|
Sonia disappointed people: BJP
Shimla, May 3 Addressing a press conference here, he said the people expected the UPA chairperson to speak on these issues, but she chose to sidetrack these. The indifference was visible in the thin attendance and it was quite evident that the effort put in by the party was not equal to the one put in for Virbhadra Singh’s rally at Mandi on the day he filed his nomination. The divide in the Congress was visible on the stage as an attempt was made to seat five-time Chief Minister and four-time MP Virbhadra Singh in the rear row. The Congress leader did not even touch the issue of industrial package, which was quite surprising, he said. She had only created confusion by quoting figure of Rs 23,000 crore and Rs 13,000 crore to deny the charge of discrimination against the state by the Centre. The people wanted Sonia Gandhi to give some assurance on the restoration of industrial package and give a ray of hope to the unemployed, but she failed to do so and left them disappointed, he added. |
||
|
Govt ignoring interests of tribals: CPM
Shimla, May 3 Indiscriminate blasting, unchecked air pollution caused by stone crushers had made the lives of the local people miserable, but there had been no action on the part of the government to rein in the company, member of the state secretariat of the party Tikender Singh said. Among the most affected villages were: Kilba, Punang, Kanai, Sapni, Brua, Chagaon, Meeru, Urni and Yula and many others. Because of air pollution, flowering and subsequent setting of the fruit in the apple orchards had also been affected in the area as a result of which the crop yield was likely to come down. He said the Congress and the BJP were had been favouring the company and it was the main reason behind lack of action against the company. Kilba village, from where the local BJP MLA hails, also fell in the affected zone. However, he had not raised the issue so far. Some of the villagers had even knocked at the doors of the court for compensation for the damage being caused due to pollution emanating from stone crushers run by the company. The party had been regularly drawing attention of the authorities towards to the unscientific dumping of muck by the company, he added. Even the Pollution Control Board had been turning a blind eye to the ongoing illegal construction activity, he added. |
||
|
‘Thind’s complaint against CM politically motivated’
Palampur, May 3 Addressing a news conference here today, Ravi said Thind had filed the complaint at the behest of the Congress leaders with an intention to tarnish Dhumal’s image. He said the allegation levelled against Dhumal had no truth and the BJP was ready to face the charges. Since the matter was before the Lokayukta, he could not say much. “However, the truth will come before the public.” He said the proximity of Thind with former Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh was known to everybody. During the Congress regime Virbhadra Singh had made all efforts to withdraw cases of corruption pending in different courts against Thind, but he failed to do so. Ravi alleged that Virbhadra had played a vital role in filing of complaint against Dhumal to get political mileage in the election. He said Dhumal had a clean record and the people of the state know him well, therefore, the affidavit filed before the Lokayukta would have no effect
on the voters. |
||
|
Ex-servicemen’s samiti supports BJP
Bilaspur, May 3 The decision was unanimously taken by the district executive committee of the samiti here today in a meeting. Later addressing mediapersons, samiti chairman Capt Narender Singh (retd) and president Subedar Prakash Chand said the Central government led by the Congress had provided equal pension for high officers between the years 1970 to 2005 but this benefit had been denied to the lower ranks from Sepoy to Subedar Major. They criticised those ex-servicemen leaders who were still campaigning for the Congress and said such persons were only seeing their personal interests. |
||
|
Resentment over election duties
Shimla, May 3 Most of the scientists who were in the rank of professor are feeling aggrieved as they have been assigned the duty of presiding officers, while much junior officers of the state government like assistant engineers and executive officers have been made sector officers. The matter was brought to the notice of the Chief Electoral Officer in the last week of March soon after duties were assigned. The scientists also met the District Election Officer (DEO), Solan, but no measures have been taken. What anguished the scientists most was that the DEO cancelled the duties of about 200 persons but made it a point not to cancel their duties. Central observer BN Gahlot was also approached but nothing had been done. The scientists alleged that the general principle of administration was not being followed while assigning duties as a result of which officers in higher pay scale had been assigned the lower duties. To substantiate their point to the higher authorities, the scientists had also sought information on these points under the RTI Act, which had not been supplied so far. They have now approached the Chief Election Commissioner and urged him to intervene and ensure that they were not humiliated in this manner. They have also drawn attention to the order of the Supreme Court as per which teachers were not supposed to be put on the election- related work as far as possible and if unavoidable then it should not be during the academic session and working days. They also pointed out that many employees, who had performed duties in the Assembly election in 2007, have not received their TA bills till date. |
||
|
Hikkam is state’s highest polling booth
Shimla, May 3 The polling booth, which is located in the Lahaul and Spiti districts has 321 electors. Chief Electoral Officer Anil Kumar Khachi said the polling station was the farthest from the road head in Bara-Bhangal. It involved 65 km of trekking. Efforts were being made to airlift the polling party to the polling station. In all, there were 43 polling stations, which were at a distance of 10 km or more from the nearest road head. Besides 7,251 main polling stations, two auxiliary polling stations were being set up for election to the four parliamentary constituencies scheduled for May 13. Out of these 1,259 stations had been declared as sensitive, while 708 stations had been classified as hypersensitive to ensure free and fair elections in the state. The maximum number of hyper-sensitive polling stations is 197 in Kangra district. The Mandi constituency had the highest number of 1,921 polling, including an auxiliary station in the Jogindernagar Assembly segment. Khachi said the state had been divided into 706 sectors to be manned by senior officials to ensure fair and peaceful polling. This was in addition to 167 sector magistrates to be deployed for the purpose. He further informed that as per the directions of the Election Commission of India, the number of polling stations were reviewed leading to an increase of 1,019 stations from 6,232 stations in 2004 polls. |
||
|
Bali deplores hooliganism in Tanda college
Kangra, May 3 Bali was addressing a press conference at his residence here. He described the death of the children as unfortunate, but said no one should be allowed to intervene in the functioning of the hospital. Indulging in hooliganism was condemnable, he said. The doctors of Tanda Medical College
(TMC) were competent enough to treat patients and they always tried to save patients’ lives despite being under stress because of staff shortage. He said, “It is a matter of concern that the government is doing nothing to improve the fate of the college.” Chief Minister PK Dhumal should call a meeting of the principal, faculty members, health minister, health secretary and the public representatives to save the institute, he added. Meanwhile, the state government has rejected the request of medical superintendent of the hospital Bhano
Awasthi, who had expressed his inability to continue on the post saying it was becoming increasingly difficult for him to mange the situation and continue to work under adverse circumstances. Sources said the government had asked him to continue on the post in the larger interest of the hospital and
patients. DSP Jamwal said the investigation against former Congress MLA Surender Kaku and others was under progress. |
||
|
Plea to bring tea business under Dept of Industry
Dharamsala, May 3 KG Butail, a tea farmer and former president of the association of tea growers of Kangra, said the tea production in Kangra had touched its peak under the Department of Industries in 1980. The department was keeping separate allocations for tea industry. At times, subsidy up to 50 per cent was provided to tea planters by the department, he said. The technical officer (tea) and his staff had exclusive allocation of funds for the development of the tea industry. However, the industry was brought under to the Department of Agriculture in 1998. “The department has adopted the same approach for tea planters as has been a practice in case of corps like wheat, rice and vegetables. The subsidy on tea was limited to those having holdings up to 7 hectares. However, even that was withdrawn later on,” he added. The farmers also did not get any support from the department for marketing their produce. The result: Tea plantation became unviable for many. “A large numbers of small tea planters have abandoned their tea gardens. The tea production in the district went down from 12,21,500 kg to just 8,50,000 kg last year,” he said. “Tea should not be treated like agriculture and horticulture corps as it is not sown and cultivated during respective seasons. It is harvested every 16th day for seven months in a year. It provides 100 per cent ground coverage and does not allow soil erosion,” he said. As the Department of Agriculture could not meet the needs of tea growers, the subject should be transferred back to the Department of Industry, tea growers have demanded. The state government has obtained geographical indicator (GI) for Kangra tea. However, it is the Department of Industries that can put it to affective use for marketing Kangra tea, they maintain.
|
||
|
WB concerned over tardy progress of CAT plans
Shimla, May 3 A team of the bank, headed by its country director, reviewed the performance of the state on the financial front two days ago. It was reportedly by and large satisfied with the achievement of various fiscal parameters set by it while granting development policy loan of $ 200 million to pull the state out of the debt trap. As per the MoU, the state was to bring down the deficit to 3 per cent of the gross state domestic product (GSDP) by 2008-9, but the Centre had itself raised it to 3.5 per cent in view of the economic slowdown. Keeping in view the fact that the state had to implement revised pay scales during the current year, the planning commission has allowed a deficit up to 4 per cent. The actual deficit was likely to range between 3.5 and 4 per cent that has been acceptable to the bank in the present economic scenario. The total outstanding loans have also been contained at Rs 23,000 crore. According to senior officers, the bank would release the next tranche of $ 100 million over the next two months. The bank has not been pleased with the performance of the Forest Department in the implementation of CAT plans and wanted the government to get these executed by other agencies, including private sector organisations. As against the total size of Rs 146 crore of the four major CAT plans, only Rs 45 crore had been spent all these years. The government has now approached public sector and private sector power companies to take over civil works of the plans so that the Forest Department could focus on plantation work. The companies were reluctant to take up the job. Over the next four years, a sum of Rs 266 crore would be available under CAT plans for the upper Sutlej valley in which two major projects, the Nathpa-Jhakri and the Baspa projects, had been commissioned and six more were coming up. |
||
|
Hearing impairment 10 times more in rural hills
Kangra, May 3 Disclosing this here today, director, Fortis, Delhi, Dr Sanjay Sachdeva and head of the ENT Department said these diseases were more common in the hill state but incidentally were totally preventable. He said the cause of more prevalence of these diseases was lack of awareness, improper education and proper guidance. Sachdeva was here in the town in connection with a two-day free ENT camp organised by the local unit of Vivekananda Kendra. He suggested that the state government should improve health care system and make a thrust on the awareness programmes regarding ear diseases to prevent hearing impairment. He said .05 to 1 per cent population of the state were suffering with deafness in different age groups. Dr Sachdeva examined nearly 100 patients at Gopal Bagh locality of the town today during an ENT OPD and 50 audiometry tests were conducted with help of the Chinmaya Organisation for Rural Development and hearing aids were suggested. |
||
|
Policy to open medical colleges
Chamba, May 3 Since the opening of medical colleges in the government sector requires a huge investment of Rs 500 crore or more, the government keeping in view the limited resources has decided to set up such institutes in participation with the non-government sector in the state. But, a notification on the policy decision with regard to the opening of medical colleges issued by the state government on July 16, 2008, pertains to Hamirpur, Una and Mandi districts only. There is no mention of Chamba district. Hari Ram Puri, president of the Chamba Citizens’ Progressive Council, in a communiqué addressed to the Principal Secretary (Health) has urged to add the district in the notification. |
||
|
Rana flays Narinder Thakur
Hamirpur, May 3 Chairman of the media advisory committee Rajinder Rana criticised Congress candidate Narinder Thakur for levelling unfounded allegations against BJP leaders. He said, “Narinder Thakur has always worked against his own people and always raised a banner of revolt against the party that patronised him.” Rajinder Rana said, “Though the BJP had patronised Narinder Thakur, he not only revolted against it but also tried to damage it. The people of Hamirpur will not tolerate this and he will be punished by them in the elections.” |
||
|
Four shops gutted
Bilaspur, May 3 The fire started from a shop dealing in ready-made garments and it engulfed adjoining shops. Youths tried to douse the flames as the small fire brigade arrived late. However, the fire was too strong for the efforts, particularly when the small fire brigade lost its limited quantity of water within a few minutes. Residents expressed resentment against the fire brigade mismanagement and shouted slogans against the government for such a callous situation. Later, a fire brigade of a project from Barmana joined the operation and the fire was controlled after three hours, but by that time everything in the shops had turned into ashes. Officers of the district administration and the police arrived at the scene, but could not do much due to ferocity of flames. Later, Forest Minister JP Nadda visited the spot and sympathised with the victims and assured financial help from the government. It can be recalled that such a fire had also destroyed three shops here last month. Then also the fire brigade was found wanting. Fire brigade staff expressed helplessness and inability to face such situations with old and obsolete equipment and vehicles. |
||
|
Soldier killed
Hamirpur, May 3 He had joined the Army in 1996 and was at present employed in 8 J&K Rifles. He is survived by two sons, wife Indu Devi, four sisters and parents. |
||
|
| HOME PAGE | |
Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir |
Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs |
Nation | Opinions | | Business | Sports | World | Letters | Chandigarh | Ludhiana | Delhi | | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
