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Sale of deity land
Closure of rail crossing
Planetary ecological park for Hamirpur
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New course to study conservation of natural resources
vignettes
Absence of garbage bins in Kullu makes life miserable
Himachal diary
Bada Bhangal habitat beyond civilisation
Nod to irrigation project
Seabuckthorn’s commercial potential unexplored
Tribune Adalat
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Sale of deity land
Shimla, July 14 Falling prey to commercialisation on account of skyrocketing prices of the land, the alleged sale of community land registered in the name of the deity by custodians (kardars) of the land is causing resentment among the villagers. The INTACH and the Himalaya Niti Abhiyaan have decided to take up the matter with the government as well as fight it out legally. Several cases of this disturbing trend, where the land of the deity recorded in the name of the kardars in the revenue records has been sold off, have come to notice in Banjar and other areas of Kullu district. Sizeable chunk of the land have remained in the name of the deities and treated as the community land for all practical purposes have been sold off despite the opposition by people. “We will urge the government to record the ownership of this land as the community land as the kardars are only custodians of the land and not its actual owners, says BS Malhans,” state convener of the Himachal Chapter of INTACH. He says seeing the relevance and standing of the deity in the social, cultural and religious life of the villages the government should make a provision to mark this land as community land of the deities. This, he said, would prevent the custodians from selling this land. Till some time back people would never dare to sell of these land for the fear of incurring wrath of deity, but with prices of land being too high people were selling off the land. With the land being in the name of the kardars in the revenue records there was little that could be done to prevent this kind of an illegal act. The Himalaya Niti Abhiyaan, which has been lending its voice to all such issues concerning the common man, is also in favour of reforms in the Act. Seeing the relevance and high esteem in which the devataas are held in most parts of the state, the government must make some amendments to prevent the sale of land which has been the property of the devataas since times immemorial, says Guman Singh, convener of the Abhiyaan. He said some people were planning to take the matter to court to ensure that the land sold illegally was restored back in the name of the deity. With Kullu being known as the valley of Gods people have deep faith in their deities and the socio-cultural lives of the people is literally dictated by this belief. The issue, which is causing great resentment among the people, is also being taken up legally by some people who want that something needs to be done to put an end to this disturbing trend.
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Closure of rail crossing
Nurpur, July 14 The irate villagers who have formed an action committee headed by Balwant Singh recently submitted a memorandum to union ministers Virbhadra Singh and Anand Sharma along with MP Rajan Sushant demanding their intervention. They rued that the authorities had closed the crossing on May 5. The affected villagers had even boycotted the Lok Sabha elections in protest against the action. The villagers lamented that school kids and patients had to walk a long distance to reach their destinations after the closure of the crossing. Moreover, pilgrims visiting the historical Kote Wali Mata Temple on the Raja Ka Talab- Guriyal link road were also facing inconvenience. A number of metalled link roads connecting surrounding villages and built under the Prime Minister’s Gramin Sarak Yozna had been rendered useless following the closure.
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Planetary ecological park for Hamirpur
Hamirpur, July 14 The ecological park, which would come up at Baba Balak Nath temple, Deothsidh, would have trees linked with nine planets according to information contained in our ancient scriptures, besides modern attractions of a park like children play area, fountains, musical light facilities for spiritual
practices etc. To popularise such trees, the forest department would also make arrangements to supply their saplings to visitors and nature lovers. Being raised at a cost of about Rs 20 lakh, Navagrah Vatika would be based
on our ancient knowledge from old scriptures like the Puranas, Vedas and the
Geeta. Divisional forest officer, Hamirpur, Sanjay Sood, who has gathered the information regarding the planetary effects of trees, told The Tribune that all our
Puranas, especially Matsaya and Vishnu Purana, Vedas and other ancient scriptures had several references about the planetary effects of trees. He said this park would also help in checking soil erosion and curbing monkey menace in the area. The tress which would be planted are aak
(calotrasfisprosera) for sun sign, plash (buteamanospeema) for moon, khair (acacia
cactechu) for Venus, putkai (acaranthuspra) for Mercury, pipal (ficus
religiousa) for Brihaspati, gular (ficus glomerta) for Venus, shammi (prosopis
cinnercia) for Saturn, drub (cynodon dectylon) for dragon (Rahu) and kusha
(desmostaicia bipaerata) for treating effects of Ketu.
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New course to study conservation of natural resources
Solan, July 14 The department admitted 10 students in June when the new academic session started. The new course aims to study the sustainable management and conservation of natural resources vis a vis the changing environmental scenario. It would also encompass regular and continuous monitoring of such changes and would study the impact assessment of the change to help develop adaptation and remedial strategies. Giving information, Vice-chancellor KR Dhiman told The Tribune that the new department would help impart post-graduate education and training on eco-systems and environment interrelationships. It would also conduct applied and strategic research on resource management for sustained productivity and environment amelioration and would provide advisory and consultancy services on environmental monitoring and impact assessment. The students would further undertake research on new and renewable energy sources. With greenhouse gas emissions being recognised as a major cause of global warming and the course would lay emphasis on the sources and sinks of the greenhouse gases, modelling carbon dynamics, chalking out mitigation strategies and also working out a viable policy on greenhouse gases. The most crucial issue of climate variability and change also forms part of its curriculum where the characterisation of spatial and temporal change in key climatic parameters of biodiversity change and agricultural importance would be studied. It would also study the impact, productivity and loss of biodiversity. While closing following the adaptations, including improved genotypes, farming systems and management. The impact of industrial pollution, solid waste management, various aspects of bio-diversity would all form part of the two-year study. Explaining the need for this new course Dr Dhiman added that, “It was crucial to have a global commitment with regional initiatives to make our environment sustainable. Thus implementation of every environmental policy, programme, project and plan comes down to the common denominator environmental education. It is an integrated process which deals with human relationship with his natural and man-made surroundings, including relation of population growth, pollution, resource allocation and depletion, conservation, technology and urban and rural planning to the local human environment.
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vignettes There are two cabinet-rank ministers in the Manmohan Singh government from Himachal Pradesh and both have their houses in Shimla. Virbhadra Singh’s Holly Lodge at Jakhu is known, but that of Anand Sharma, Prabhat Lodge (Anand Bhawan) at Kelston near Bharari, is lesser known. Kelston is a settlement now, but was a structure known as ‘Elysium House’ in 1850 and belonged to the Roman Catholic Society which ran a co-educational school there. By the year 1856, the school was closed and the boys were shifted to Mussoorie and the girls to Chakrata. The house and the estate were then sold to Col Gay who had Sir George Greaves and Sir William Elles,both of whom had served as Adjutant-General of India, as his tenants. Major W. H. Camp purchased the house and the estate on October 8, 1892. Immediately, he wrote a letter to the Shimla Municipal Committee that as the estate remained unoccupied for the past two years, it had become dreadfully overgrown and, therefore, he needed to cut down 20 rhododendron and 15 oak trees plus lopping off the branches 15 feet from the ground of all trees. He had also desired to raise a cowshed there by levelling a piece of land measuring 100 ft by 40 ft and to have a 20 ft square house for establishing a dairy there. The Municipal Committee deputed forest ranger Chajju Ram to inspect the place and give his recommendations. He recommended all that was prayed for but reduced chopping off the branches of trees to a height of 10 feet from the ground. It was on the November 11, 1892, that the committee gave permission to erect a cowshed, a bull shed; two ice pits,a fowl house,a house for dairy purposes and the first well-established Elysium Dairy Farm in Shimla started functioning from the October 13, 1894 under the managerial eye of Finley Pritchard. Meanwhile, India saw the entry of Edward Keventer, a Swede dairy expert, who started his first venture in 1897 at Chherat village in Aligarh district of U.P. He also established a farm at Tara Devi near Shimla. An imported Ayrshire bull was used, as an experiment, at Tara Devi Farm, and the heifers resulting from the cross gave great promise of becoming very valuable cows for dairy purposes. A modern dairy farm here did make a hole in the one at Elysium House. When the dairy business from Elysium was about to dwindle, the house was purchased around 1900 by Lord Harrington, Secretary of State, because Edward Buck has mentioned in “Simla-Past and Present” (1904) about its transference to its new owner who had aesthetically renovated it to be cited as the ‘one of the finest houses.’ The Deputy Commissioner of Shimla PSM Burlton transferred the property in the name of his wife, JWB Harrington, who named it Kelston in 1915. Kelston actually is a small village and civil parish in Somerset, about 7 km North West of Bath. Harrington family belonged to Kelston and so baptized their house at Shimla as such. Uttam Chand Suri, who was an octroi superintendent in the municipal committee, purchased the Kelston estate in 1952 which was ultimately owned by Mrs RK Suri who was principal in Indraprastha Higher Secondary School in Delhi. She started selling the property. Presently, the Housing Board of the State of Himachal Pradesh has set up a self-financing housing colony here to provide adequate shelter to the houseless. Many private buildings have come up here. It is a crowded colony now with lots of brick and mortar that has eaten the space of roads even. A couple of shops cater to the daily needs of the residents. Anand Sharma’s contribution to Kelston is efforts in getting a rain-shelter and a community hall made for the colony; but there lived a great Indian Brigadier, Ravi Datt Mehta here, who had died in the suicide bombing of the Indian Embassy in Kabul while serving as India’s Defence Attache to Afghanistan. Ila Pande, the foremost Kathak dancer of Himachal Pradesh, who has her disciples throughout the length and breadth of the state, nay India, also has her home here. The revered sword and the rhythmic steps have been adding luster to Kelston.
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Absence of garbage bins in Kullu makes life miserable
Kullu, July 14 The Loran Nullah and the Shashtri Nagar Nullah are full of garbage. The same is the case in the Math area in the inner Akhara Bazaar which stinks. The council here seems to be indifferent to the town’s cleanliness. The area around the Regional Hospital at Dhalpur is another health hazard. The hospital waste and other garbage can be seen scattered near the old gate of the hospital surrounded by stray cattle,leading to the place stinking. The condition near Government Senior Secondary School, Dhalpur, Primary School, Gandhi Nagar, and Senior Secondary School For Girls, Sultanpur, is also not different. Heaps of garbage, stacking of building material and haphazard parking of tractors, three-wheelers and rehris near the educational institutions and other places is not only a health hazard, but also unsafe for pedestrians, particularly schoolchildren and motorists. The banks of the Beas and the Sarwari are in a miserable condition. People living on the riverside have not opted for getting sewerage connections, but have extended their sewerage pipes to rivers. The municipal drains are additional carrier of garbage and human waste to these rivers.
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Shrikhand yatra unravels nature’s splendour
Shimla, July 14 The adventurous pilgrimage is much tougher than the Amarnath yatra because of high altitude, uncertain weather and the lack of involvement of the administration which only provides police and medical assistance at halting camps en route. The gruelling five-day trip involving about 60 km of trekking to and fro is not for the weak-hearted. Weather in the high reaches changes without a warning. The snowfall makes the yatra difficult but exciting. This year the first group of pilgrims which started off on July 3 encountered hostile weather beyond the Nain Sarovar. There was a sudden snowfall and the stormy weather forced some of the pilgrims to return halfway through the trek. However, those who braved the inclement weather to reach the top experienced the mystique of Shiva’s abode. A quivering haze obscured the natural lingam amidst falling snow. The ethereal beauty of the landscape and the mystic aura surrounding the symbol of Shiva transported the mortals into the spiritual world. The experience only strengthened the faith of the devotees. Legend has it that Shiva meditated at Shrikhand and that the trek was used by the Pandvas to reach the peak during Mahabaharata. Groups of devotees start trekking in the first week of July and the process continues till mid-August. The main yatra takes place from July 16 to 22. The yatra has become somewhat easier in the recent years with local Sewa Dal organising free langars. This year, the Shrikhand Kailash Yatra Samiti made arrangements for pilgrims at Singhgad, Thachdu and Bheemdwari. The devotees arrive at Jaon village, which is accessible by road, and trek about 3 km to reach the base camp, Singhgad, where registration takes place. After a night halt in tented accommodation, the pilgrims set off for the arduous journey early in the morning. The vertical climb called Danda Dhar continues from the next halting point at Thachdu right up to hilltop from where Kali Ghati begins. Most pilgrims spend the night at Bheemdwari, the next resting place, before undertaking the final trek to the peak which passes through glaciers and steep slippery rocks calling for extreme caution. A single unguarded step could prove fatal. They also come across the frozen Nain Sarovar which presents nature at its best. Its scenic splendour was enhanced by the layer of with fresh snow this time. The pilgrims have to start very early, as soon as the day breaks, as one has to return to the camp before dusk. The final leg is the toughest. The pilgrims who are not trained mountaineers could suffer from high altitude sickness and as such they cannot spend much time at the top. Strong icy winds make life difficult at the top. Moreover, clouds appear from nowhere and it could start snowing any moment. After paying obeisance at the Lingam, they have a brief photo session to savour the memories of the adventurous feat. The delight one experiences on being literally on the “top of the world” is inexpressible. The religious faith apart, the yatra unfolds the rare bounties of nature to the pilgrims who come across valleys flush with rare wild flowers, enchanting waterfalls, glaciers and awesome snow-clad mountains. It not only thrills but also lifts the spirits of devotees who are overwhelmed with divinity.
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Himachal diary
Hailing from Deothi village in Solan, Gupta has during his long literary career enriched the Hindi literature with his outstanding stories and poems, many of which were based on ethos and life in the hills. His works have been published in a number of leading magazines and newspapers and he also has a collection of poems to his credit. He is the only writer from the state to win a prize in the competition for which 221 stories from 21 states in the country were received. Gupta, who retired as an engineer from BSNL, had been writing poetry and stories since early 70s. His writing career got a setback when he suffered a brain stroke and had to undergo a major surgery at the All India Institute of Medical sciences. He could not write for many years. Gupta resumed writing some years ago and has been consistently coming out with stories and poems ever since.
Public toilets to be
renovated
At last, the local municipal corporation has taken note of the dilapidated and unhygienic state of most public toilets in the city. Some of those in and around The Mall remain over crowded causing much inconvenience to both local residents and tourists. The situation has worsened due to the failure of the corporation to reopen the gents’ toilet opposite its head office, which was closed following a landslide. The problem will be solved to an extent with the tourism department agreeing to build a new toilet in place of the damaged one and increasing the capacity of the existing one on The Mall near the Khadi Bhandar. In fact, given the increase in the population of the city and the number of tourists visiting the city some more toilets are needed. The corporation also plans to renovate the existing 146 toilets in a phased manner, which are in bad shape due to prolonged neglect. The plan is to pave the floor with marble and granite and provide modern sanitary fittings. Some of these would be managed with the help of Sulabh International and private parties. It would be ensured that after renovation no toilet was left unmanned.
Cabinet expansion
disappoints many
The expansion of ministry carried out by Chief Minister PK Dhumal early this week has left aspirants from Hamirpur district who have been lobbying intensely for the post of the chief parliamentary secretary (CPS) disappointed. At least two MLAs, Baldev Sharma and Urmil Thakur, had been eyeing the post and their supporters were quite confident that they would be accommodated. But the Chief Minister, it seems, was not keen on giving more representation to his home district. Their chances were also spoiled as the Education Minister refused to accept the offer for the post of adviser and made it clear that he would prefer to remain an MLA, if dropped from the ministry. Had he agreed to the proposal, a berth would have been vacated. The aspirants have, however, not given up hope as only three CPS have been appointed so far and there was a scope for many more. They are eagerly waiting for the next phase of this political exercise. (Contributed by
Rakesh Lohumi and DP Gupta)
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Bada Bhangal habitat beyond civilisation
Chamba, July 14 The main objective was to study the history, culture and socio-economic status of the people and to create awareness among them about the different poverty alleviation policies and programmes of the government. The 87 km-long trek from Chamba to Nayagran
(Holi) is by bus and 14 km on foot up to Dhardi village. From Dhardi village, the trek proceeds to Khanar village that is 5 km and the last village on the Chamba border. Then, the trek moves along the right banks of the Ravi and reaches Bada Bhangal which is 18 km on foot. Altogether, this is a 37-km trek from
Nayagran. The trek is arduous and tiring. In an interview, leader of the expedition Rajesh Charak said Bada Bhangal was a tribal village surrounded by alpine trees along the right banks of the river, inhabited by 700 people. The people of the village, who also used to be known as
‘kannets', claim themselves to be the descendant of Alexander. The main occupation of the people is agriculture and sheep rearing. There is not much development with regard to government jobs. There are a few people who are in the Army, education and other fields. There is one primary and one middle school having inadequate teaching staff and an ayurvedic dispensary has been functioning for a long time. As a result, people have to travel 37 km on foot and further travel 87 km by bus to Chamba for medical treatment. The post office is 87 km away at Beed crossing over the Thamsar Pass. So far, as the forest and the revenue departments are concerned, there is one forest guard and a
patwari. There is also one forest rest house for tourists and visitors, but without furniture. Fortunately, there is a facility of satellite phone which is the only means of communication provided by the government. In the winters, these people migrate to the Beed area. The living conditions of the inhabitants of the village are deplorable, which need immediate attention of the government. The vital demand of the residents of the village is to provide them a motorable road from Nayagram to Bada Bhangal that will not only shorten the distance, but also mitigate their difficulties and inconveniences.
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Nod to irrigation project
Nurpur, July 14 In 1950, he had written a letter to the then deputy commissioner suggesting the diversion of the Chakki rivulet water to farmers’ fields. Now, a Rs 147.15 crore Phinna Singh Irrigation Project (PSIP) has been approved by the Central Water Resources Commission (CWRC). The project had become an issue during every assembly election in the area. The PSIP will benefit 25276 farmers of Danni, Ladorri, Mamooh Gurchal, Suliali, Ther, Pandrer, Kotpalari, Hatli Jawalan and Sadwan panchayats who will get irrigation facility for 4025 hectare of agriculture land.
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Seabuckthorn’s commercial potential unexplored
Palampur, July 14 In India, though the anti-cancer activity of SBT was discovered in early 1971, it is unfortunate that there has been no follow up despite the fact that the plant is available in India in abundance. Seabuckthorn grows naturally along the riversides and slopes in Lahaul-Spiti, Chamba, Kinnaur districts and other parts of the state. There is also a wild growth of the plant in Ladakh and UP hills.
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Tribune Adalat
We had moved an application to tehsildar, Kasauli, Solan district, in 2003, for the partition of our agricultural land in Anji Brahmna Dharampur. After a lengthy process, the tehsildar, ordering the desired partition, sent the relevant file to the kanungo and patwari of the patwar circle, Dharampur, in 2007. After a long wait and repeated requests, the kanungo was kind enough to fix 24.1.2009 for the partition work, asking all shareholders to be present on the spot. The duo did come on the fixed date, took cursory stock of the land to be partitioned and gave yet another date 12.2.2009 for carrying out the partition work. On that day, they came again, but went back, saying that the huge cost of partition which might run into lakhs to be charged by the government at a later stage, would be beyond our capacity hence, we should not go for the partition.
However, after necessary clarification abut the charges, we were able to get yet another date from the kanungo i.e. 27.4.2009 on which date all 17 shareholders, including three government employees, assembled at the spot, but the kanungo and the patwari never turned up. Lok Nath Attri
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Well-known writer Padam Gupta has brought laurels to the hill state by winning the third prize in the All-India Hindi Story Writing Competition 2008,
organised by literary magazine Vipasha, which is published by the state language and culture department.