Dehradun, July 23
Increasing accidents in the hilly areas of the state, especially during the "Char Dham Yatra" season, today rocked the Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly, as the opposition MLAs accused the government of failing to take measures to bring down the number of road mishaps.

Taking up the issue during the zero hour of the penultimate day of the budget session of the state assembly, Opposition legislators, including Congress MLA Dinesh Aggarwal, Pritam Singh, Jot Singh Gunsola and Manoj Tiwari, alleged that the BJP government had done nothing to ensure road safety.

Ridiculing the state government for trying to run away from responsibility by giving financial assistance to the families of victims of roads mishaps, Aggarwal said the life of every individual is precious and government needs to undertake all steps to ensure that road accidents are checked.

"Against the approved capacity of 42, there were 93 passengers in the bus that fell into a deep gorge near Kalsi, Chakrata, a couple of days back. Why are these buses not being checked for overloading?" questioned Aggarwal. He alleged that without verification, authorities at the Regional Transport Office (RTO) issue certificates for fitness of the buses.

Congress MLA from Chakrata Pritam Singh also came down heavily on the ruling BJP, stating that drunken driving leads to a majority of accidents but drivers are not being kept in check.

"Besides, second-hand buses, which are in deplorable condition, are being purchased by the state from neighbouring Himachal Pradesh. When unfit buses will ply on roads, accidents will obviously take place," he said.

Opposition legislators also pointed out that as far as accidents were concerned, the track record of Uttarakhand was very poor and hundreds of people from the state lose their lives in road mishaps every year. They asserted that need of the hour was to ensure that guidelines of the Motor Vehicles Act and other rules enforced by the state government as well as the RTO were strictly implemented.

In reply, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Parkash Pant admitted that increasing accidents was indeed a cause of concern.

"As many as 60.14 per cent accidents occur on account of negligence of the drivers, whereas overloading contributes to 15.73 per cent mishaps. Rest of the 22.38 per cent accidents are because of poor road condition or technical reasons. We have already directed the transport authorities, police and administration to work in coordination to ensure that drunken driving and overloading is checked," he said.

Roorkee, July 23
A steep decline in property prices in the region has hit revenue collection hard in the town. According to the data available from the Revenue Department, Roorkee, the revenue from property sale has almost come down to half over the past two years.

Even the authorities are finding it hard to meet the annual targets of the department due to the major fall in business.

In 2006-07, the department had collected revenue worth Rs 27.8 crore against the target of 15 crore in the Roorkee division.

It started declining in 2007-08 when the revenue collected was Rs 17 crore that was Rs 8 crore less than the target of Rs 25 crore.

The collection reduced to a mere Rs 11 crore last year whereas the target was Rs 30 crore for 2008-09.

The authorities are not hoping for any improvement in the state of affairs this year as the revenue collection in the first quarter of the financial year has only touched Rs 3.30 crore.

Seeing the continuous drop in collection figures over the year, the authorities did not increase the target this year that remained Rs 30 crore for 2009-10.

Local market observers and property dealers held the slowdown in property transactions across the country as well as poor policies of the state government responsible for the poor state of affairs.

“Slowdown in property sales may be the main reason behind the dip in revenue but drastic increase in the circle rates for land registration on November 1, 2007, caused a major dent in property business,” said Jagdish Sharma, a local property dealer. He added that radical hike in circle rates had discouraged prospective buyers and sellers of property.

“Adding to our woes, the state government also failed to provide much-needed support and facilities to industrialists from outside the city.

“As a result, many industrialists did not come to Roorkee to set up industries.”

Dehradun, July 23
Union Minister of State for Labour and Employment Harish Rawat has asserted th2at the tenure of the special package of industrial incentives for Uttarakhand would be extended by a year, and a notification regarding this would soon be issued.

Notably, the industry as well as the state government has been demanding the extension up to 2013.

Rawat had on the day of presentation of the Union Budget claimed in a press release that the Union government had decided to extend the much sought after package, which would expire on March 31, 2010.

Since then confusion had been prevailing over the issue as the state government as well as industry organisations contested his claim on the grounds that the Finance Minister had made no mention of this in his budget speech.

Had it been so, the state government would have surely acknowledged it. Rawat, who represents Haridwar parliamentary seat, however, has stuck to his stand saying that the confusion would be cleared with the issuing of the notification.

“The matter is under active consideration of the Union ministry concerned and a formal intimation will be given to the state government soon,” he said.

Former Chief Minister BC Khanduri as well as other senior BJP leaders had put pressure on the recently elected five Congress MPs from the state to contribute their might in getting the extension. Rawat also admitted this.

The industry leaders, however, had attributed the confusion to misunderstanding that appeared in the newspapers. Industries Association of Uttarakhand (IAU) even issued a note to clarify the situation.

Chairman CII Uttarakhand State Council Rakesh Oberoi separately commented that no decision had yet been taken by the Union government. Besides the budget speech, they had referred to the Finance Bill, 2009, for the purpose.

They are still keeping their fingers crossed. “But we will surely be delighted if the extension is announced as claimed by Rawat,” said Pankaj Gupta, chairman IAU. 

Dehradun, July 23
From today, there will be no power cuts for industry that had been subjected to four-hour scheduled cuts for the past one month.

Industry had suffered huge losses as a result of a substantial loss of production hours.

The development followed a meeting of industry leaders with Chief Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank a couple of days earlier.

The CM is understood to have passed strict instructions to the Uttarakhand Power Corporation Limited (UPCL) to do away with the cuts as the situation has become comfortable due to rise in water level in the reservoirs after rain in different parts of the state ended the dry spell.

During the meeting of Pankaj Gupta, Chairman, Industries Association of Uttarakhand (IAU), with Jagmohan Lal, Managing Director, UPCL, here yesterday, the UPCL MD assured to do the needful with immediate effect.

The UPCL had announced scheduled four-hour cut from June 22. But taking into account, the average daily loss of supply for two hours on account of tripping of transformers, breakdowns and low voltage, the industry had to actually bear a six-hour cut.

“Industry has suffered cuts of more than 149 hours due to frequent breakdowns for the past three months. The total power cuts in April and May lasted 104 hours in industrial area, Lal Tappar,” claimed Pankaj Gupta.

Gupta said that they were assured that the cuts would be imposed only in an emergency.

After taking over the reins of the state, Pokhriyal had issued instructions to power secretary and the chiefs of three power corporations of the state to take immediate measures to increase power generation to 6,000 million units (MU) from 4,600 MU.

He had categorically instructed the officialdom to end power cuts. Thereafter, the situation had eased for domestic consumers but the industry continued to struggle for relief.

Dehradun, July 23
To strengthen the swine flu surveillance system and share experiences with other hospitals in the country, a video conferencing was organised today at the department of Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) at the health directorate.

Doctors from the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) also participated at the conference.

Emphasising on the need to maintain maximum alert in the country, Dr Chinmaya Das of the NICD, said that as human-to-human contact was behind the spread of the disease, a careful watch will have to maintained at the domestic level.

“At the moment, we are only maintaining checks at airports and zeroing-in on persons coming from abroad. But in the coming days, we will have to focus on our own cities and towns,” said Dr NK Mishra.

In Dehradun, health authorities are keeping an eye on foreign and non-resident Indian students at different boarding schools.

The authorities have also taken four samples from IIT Roorkee and sent these for tests.

The authorities have taken samples of seven students studying at Shigally hills. “The students, who are being suspected to have the infection, have been quarantined in the school hospital,” said Dr Pankaj Jain, nodal officer, IDSP.

The doctors who attended the video conferencing included Dr Guleria, Prof (Med), AIIMS, Dr Pradeep Jain from NICD, Dr NK Mishra, Dr JK Devshali and Dr Mahabir Singh of Doon Hospital. 

Dehradun, July 23
After conducting an inquiry, the National Council of Teachers Education (NCTE) has slapped show-cause notices for non-compliance of its norms on 24 private self-financed institutes running the B.Ed course.

The move has sent these institutes into a tizzy because their de-recognition is imminent if the apex body of teachers training is dissatisfied with their replies.

As per Section 17 of NCTE Act, if the reply to the notice is not satisfactory, recognition for the B.Ed course can be withdrawn. If that happens, these institutes will not be able to admit students from the next session.

The HNB Garhwal University had earlier recommended de-recognition of 24 institutes to the NCTE after an inquiry conducted by it on the issue of alleged irregularities in admissions.

The matter is pending in the Nainital High Court. The High Court directed the NCTE on June 25 to file a counter affidavit to state the status of the inquiry in which the complaint had been sent to it by the university.

After this, a team of NCTE’s northern regional committee visited the state and found that the institutes were flouting norms with impunity. Based on its findings, the NCTE issued show-cause notices to these institutes and asked them to submit replies within 21 days. It has also posted the names of the institutes on its officials website. Since these started functioning about three years earlier, the quality of teachers’ training being imparted in most of these private institutes is doubtful.

Most institutes were found woefully wanting in required infrastructure, non-availability of language-learning facilities, lack of computers, lack of faculty for teaching methods of certain subjects, playgrounds, rooms for faculty, laboratories. These were operating from rented premises and failed to submit documents regarding the selection of faculty.

Dehradun, July 23
Five unidentified, armed, assailants decamped with cash in lakhs and gold ornaments from the house of a senior official in Oil and Natural Gas Commission (ONGC), located in the posh Vasant Vihar Phase-II colony in Dehradun.

According to information, the armed assailants entered the residence of Narendra Verma while he was away. However, his two sons, wife, servants and gardener were inside the house.

The suspects thrashed his wife and sons, and held all persons present in the house hostage. Three of his family members sustained grievous injuries.

Thereafter, the accused ransacked the entire house and decamped with gold ornaments and cash.

As soon as the police received information, senior officials, including Dehradun SSP Abhinav Kumar, Special Task Force (STF) officials and police personnel in large number reached the spot and initiated investigations.

However, officials refused to divulge any details about the incident to mediapersons.

Notably, during the recent past, there have been several incidents of thefts in the city, which is a cause of grave concern for the residents.

Dehradun, July 23
Sanjay, a student of National Institute for Visually Handicapped (NIVH), Dehradun, did the city proud by bagging the most gold medals by an Indian at the International Blind Sports Association (IBSA) Youth and Students Championship held at Colorado, USA.

He secured three golds for the Indian team. At the Games, NIVH students bagged four gold and two bronze medals. As many as 27 countries participated at the championship.

Addressing a press conference, Sanjay, who is visually challenged, said, “It was a new experience for me to fly to a foreign land and compete with children from different countries. I was a little nervous at the outset but my interaction with some of the athletes made me feel relaxed”.

Sanjay, who is in standard IX, wants to pursue a career in sports and he likes athletics the most. “I just want to run fast - faster than others on the field.”

At the event, he won a gold in 100m, 200m and long jump. To celebrate his success, he plans to give a party to his friends.

Among girls, Gulshan won a bronze medal each in 100 m and long jump. Gulshan, who hails from Saharanpur, said “For me, sports and studies go hand in hand.

“Participating in an international event is a great feeling. I won two bronzes at the meet. I will improve my performance next time,” she said. Gulshan hopes to pursue the medicine after class X.

Gaurav Singh, who won a gold in the javelin event, aims to participate in the Olympics.

“Javelin throw is my favourite sport and I bagged a gold in the event at the national level too. To participate in the Olympics is my dream.

“My parents are very supportive. They also want to see me take part in the Olympics. For me, sports is not all, studies are equally important. After class XII, I wish to do Honours in Political Science.”

Director of NIVH, Anuradha Mohit, was delighted over the children’s achievements. She said, “This is a big achievement for Dehradun. Everyone should recognise what these children have achieved at the international arena.”