Kurukshetra, July 27
The Haryana government intends to divide the Sikhs in the state by allegedly supporting the formation of a separate gurdwara prabandhak committee.

Alleging this here recently, Haryana State Sikh Forum president Jagjit Singh Virk said, “There are about 18 lakh Sikhs in the state and majority of them have full faith in the Shiromani Gurdwara Prabandhak Committee (SGPC) and they don’t want to be divided by forming a separate committee for the state. The Sikhs have not forgotten the riots of 1984 and a separate committee is not in the interest of the Sikhs of the state”.

Virk emphasised that keeping in view the interest of the Sikhs, who had settled in various states of India after partition in 1947, the Gurdwara Act, 1925, needs to be modified and amended so that the Sikhs of all states get more powers and rights and for this, the management of all gurdwaras falling under each state should be given to the Sikhs of that particular state.

He demanded that to keep the Sikhs united, an All-India Sikh Gurdwara Act should be framed so that all committee of all states could function under one Act.

Narrating the history of amending the Gurdwara Act, he said, “An All-India Sikh Gurdwara Bill was prepared in 1986. The Sikhs of the state have been supporting that Bill and have been appealing to the SGPC that the Bill of 1986 be passed by the SGPC and sent to the Central government. But nothing fruitful happened and again a Bill was prepared in 1999 and sent to the Punjab government and now in the recent past, a union minister has given a statement that due to the lack of consensus, the Bill would not be tabled in Parliament in 2009 session”.

After the Emergency in 1979, when a non-Congress government was formed at the Centre, on the demand of the Akali Dal, a committee under the chairmanship of Shiromani justice Harbans Singh was formed for preparing a draft for the All-India Gurdwara Act. The committee prepared the draft and sent it to the Central government and the Punjab government, but before any action could be taken on that report, the Central government collapsed.

Again a demand for amendment in this Act was raised in 1985 and the Central government assured the Sikhs that their demand would be fulfilled. But till today, neither the Punjab government nor the SGPC or the Shiromani Akali Dal has bothered to send its views in this regard, as a result of which the prepared draft is still gathering dust in some government offices. The plight of both the Bills from 1986 to 2009 is obvious and has made to gather dust and when the Punjab government has also been issuing different statements since 1979 to 2009, the statement of the union minister is a mockery and joke with the Sikhs, he alleged.

Commenting on the proposal of the government’s plan to set up a separate committee in the state, Virk claimed that the government could neither change nor amend the Sikh Gurdwara Act, 1925. However, the Central government could amend the Gurdwara Act under section 146 and place it before both the houses of Parliament and get their consent or the SGPC with the consent of 3/5th members can make any change or amend the committee.

According to the Sikh Gurdwara Act, 1925, all historical Gurdwaras of Punjab, Haryana, Himachal and Chandigarh fall under this Act which was framed for the then united Punjab comprising Punjab, Haryana, Himachal and Chandigarh. The SGPC manages all the property and land, which is recorded in the revenue record. The managements of these historical Gurdwaras send 15 per cent of the income to the SGPC for the preaching of religion, but the SGPC spends much more for the schools and colleges of the state. The Central government has formed these committees for the management of these Gurdwaras under section 43 and these committees manage and work under section 125. Above this, a judicial commission has been formed under section 130, he informed.

He further stressed that according to the Act of 1966, the SGPC, the Punjab government and the Central government, the powers which were given to the Sikhs of the state according to the re-organisation Act were worth being considered. Akal Takht is the only supreme power for the Sikhs in the world. The Sikhs worldwide abide by the rules and regulations of Akal Takht be it Sikhs settled in Haryana, Delhi or any other state or in any other country.

Virk further added that the history of Sikhism was full of sacrifices and bravery. Sikh religion might be younger to other religions by age, but its principles, culture, morality and philosophy was modern as compared to other religions of the world and it showed a path for the welfare of all humanity, he claimed.

Jhajjar, July 27
Dr Suresh Chander Malik, Professor, Department of Statistics of Maharshi Dayanand University (MDU), has been invited by the Forum for Interdisciplinary Mathematics (FIM) for sharing his research findings at the 18th International Conference scheduled to be held from August 2 to 4, 2009.

The conference, which would be organised at the Jaypee University of Information and Technology, Waknaghat in Solan (Himachal Pradesh) would be based on interdisciplinary mathematical and statistical techniques and over 500 connoisseurs working in the area of mathematical sciences from numerous nations are likely to participate in this mega event. They will also discuss various features and modern trends of mathematical sciences in the era of globalisation and will place their research-based opinion on the theme.

Dr Malik, who has been carrying out research in the field of reliability of operating systems for the past 20 years, will present his research paper on the profit analysis of reliability models with inspection at different levels of damages subject to degradation and no operation in abnormal weather.

It may be noted that around 50 research papers of Dr Malik have so far been published in various national/international journals. He himself has presented more than 30 research papers at various national/international conferences.

Besides, five research scholars, MS Barak, RK Bhardwaj, Jitender Kumar, Jyoti Anand and Meena Kumari, who are conducting research study under the supervision of Dr Malik, will also present their research papers on the subject area, “reliability”.

Sonepat, July 27
There is a saying in the state, “Aayee Teej, Bogi Beej”, meaning the Teej festival has come and sown the seed of festivals. And “Aayee Holi, bhar le gayee jholi”, meaning Holi has come and taken away the bag of festivals. Earlier, people, particularly those in the rural areas, used to celebrate Teej in a big way.But with the passage of time, the festivities have lost their glory and are confined to a few common places like educational institutions in the urban areas and symbolic celebrations for the entertainment of children in villages.

Though it is like any other festival for children, according to elderly persons, Teej celebrations nowadays are vapid due to many reasons, mainly the growing individualism in the society, degradation of social values, change in the professional temperament of people, and missing of big trees of peepal and neem on the banks of village ponds and outskirts of the village which used to serve the purpose for putting swings earlier.

Vidyavati, 65, recalled that women used to go in groups for swinging in gardens after completing their domestic chores. On double rope swings, two women used to sit on the swing, two used to swing it and several others sing shravan folk songs. Everyone would get the chance to enjoy the swing turn by turn.

Ram Dei recalled that there were huge neem and peepal tress and womenfolk used to go there in the afternoon wearing new clothes and singing songs praising the month.

One Chand Kaur recalled the instances when married women used to avail the services of brother-in-laws for helping them swing. “But this is hardly seen nowadays,” she lamented.

“Many of them would feel dizzy during swinging, but never missed a chance to accompany others to the village pond or to huge trees around the village. There used to be a competition in swinging the highest and plucking leaves of the tree,” 60-year-old Maya Kaur said, and added with the passage of time, the charm of the festival had diminished.

Sunita, a journalist, attributed this trend to the rapid growth of entertainment means through electronic media. “Earlier, major occasions of entertainment used to be the festivals,” she said, and added, “Today’s young girls hardly remember shravan folk songs and it shows a decline in our folk culture”.

Sonepat, July 27
During the monsoon, bazaars of Sonepat are filled with the heady fragrance of a traditional sweet, “ghewar”. The famous Bada Bazaar remains a crowded place for three months as every shop has a heap of well-decorated layers of the milk-made sweet on its counter. The mouthwatering sweetmeat is especially prepared during the rainy season. It is so popular during the monsoon that every family waiting for any relative to arrive has only wish that he will bring “ghewar” with him. And if he has brought Sonepat's “ghewar”, the visitor is definitely in for a special treat.

People in the rural areas have a special charm for it due to its sweetness and milk content. "Just as mango is the king of fruits, ‘ghewar’ is the king of sweets, at least in rural Haryana,” comments Tarun Jain, owner of the famous Sunder Misthan Bhandar.

He said traditionally, the season of “ghewar” began with the festival of Teej and ended with Janamasthmi. He informed that they had a couple of varieties differently made of milk. Recently, they had started mixing kesar in it to enrich its taste and quality, which was also being liked. "It is made of a mixture of milk and maida, which is dripped in boiling ghee drop by drop to fry and finally given a round shape. After it is well fried, the rounds were drenched in a sweet liquid (chasni),” Jain said.

Its popularity can be gauged from the fact that there is a demand of 8,000 to 10,000 kg of “ghewar” every day in Sonepat district alone. Though the halwais don’t prefer to divulge their own sales figure, sources said a famous shop like Sunder’s and RK’s would be selling not less than 500 kg of this sweet daily and there were about 300 sweetmeat shops in the district”.

"There is a tradition to give ‘ghewar’ to sister on the occasion of Teej and other festivals following it,” maintained Rajesh, a resident of a nearby village. Even people living in other cities like Delhi would make demands to their friends and colleagues coming from Sonepat to bring “ghewar”. Even politicians of Haryana have a special charm for Sonepat's “ghewar”. Recalling an incident, an old-timer in Bada Bazaar said once late Bansi Lal expressed his desire to eat Sonepat's “ghewar” during off-season. Then, a local specially prepared the sweet for him.

However, consumers are complaining about the sharp increase in the price of “ghewar”. Last year, it was sold from Rs 40 to 100 per kg, but this season, the prices have shot up to Rs 80 to 150 per kg.

Rohtak, July 27
Emulating and following the teachings of yoga guru Ramdev may not be an easy task, but doing a bit of the work like him at the ground level can make a difference. This approach has inspired 24-year-old Somvir Arya, who has been involved in creating awareness about the importance and need of yoga.

Arya is a resident of Kharkara village in the district. Having qualifications like degrees in yoga, Sanskrit and French, this youth has a bent of mind in social service and activities related to the Arya Samaj movement. He is perhaps one of the few youths in the state who has taken up the task of teaching people in the rural areas at their doorsteps.

Without any financial help or direct support of any organisation or department, Arya, who is pursuing his Acharya degree and post-graduation in yoga from Uttarakhand Sanskrit University, has been able to organise about 600 yoga camps in the district and other parts of the state in the past over six years.

District president of a yoga body set up by Baba Ramdev and an active office-bearer of the Arya Samaj in the region, Arya devotes at least 15-20 days in a month in organising camps. He has covered nearly 80 per cent villages of Meham subdivision and about 25 per cent villages in Rohtak district so far.

He had been invited by several organisations, including the ABVP, Manav Sewa Sangh, RSS, NCC and the NSS, for holding special camps. Nearly all such camps were free. Arya has decided to hold three camps in a year at his native Kharkara village in memory of Commandant Rajinder Singh Ahlawat, a martyr, who laid his life while fighting infiltrators in Jammu and Kashmir in June 2001.

He said his every effort in this field was dedicated to the martyrs and individuals who were committed towards a social or national cause.

Karnal, July 27
The two-day review and planning workshop of Indo-US AKI projects has expressed satisfaction over the achievements and success stories of AKI projects in various universities and farm institutions in India.

The workshop that concluded here recently recorded with satisfaction that experiments in four projects, namely water harvesting for groundwater recharge and bio-drainage of salinity control, sustainable water resource management, information and communication technologies for efficient water management, and on farm water management for rain-fed agriculture had yielded desired results.

During the meeting, it was informed that three distant learning systems using breeze online software had been made functional in the UAS (Bangalore), PAU (Ludhiana) and the GB Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pant Nagar, to interact with the US-based facility and take online lectures.

Further, six postgraduate students from the Indian participating centres had been admitted to master sandwich research programme in the US for short duration, while two US students carried out three-months research programmes from May 24 to August 25, 2008, at the CSSRI, Karnal.

It was further disclosed at the meeting that reusable learning objects (RLO) had been developed thematically for water management issues like the water user association, soil and water conservation and gender dimension and a water management website in Hindi named “Grameen Soochana and Gyan Kendra” had been registered and updated to facilitate the farmers.

As many as 55 principal investigators (PIs), including five scientists and students from three US universities, participated in the workshop inaugurated by AK Singh, deputy director general, Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).

Gurbachan Singh, director, ICSSR, and nodal officer for AKI projects, referred to financial constraints from the US side due to the non-availability of competitive grants, while the ICAR had kept the Indian allocations ready.

Expressing satisfaction over the success stories of the projects, Singh stressed the need for groundwater recharge in the declining water table areas due to increased pumping, monsoon aberration and bio-drainage in the waterlogging areas this year.

Hisar, July 27
Opposition parties in Haryana are in complete disarray and ill prepared for the coming Assembly elections.

While the INLD is yet to recover from the losses suffered in the recent Lok Sabha elections and thereafter desertion of a number of senior party leaders, the HJC (BL) is engaged in a bitter turf war.

Their allies are placed no better. The BJP is without a popular base and is hoping against hope to gain some lost ground with the inception of a new party chief, Krishan Pal Gujjar.

On the other hand, the BSP, which performed well in the Lok Sabha polls in terms of vote share, is still without effective state leadership. Its tie-up with the HJC post-parliamentary poll has not really been able to take off partially due to the HJC’s turf war.

So far as the INLD is concerned, it never looked more vulnerable than now. Former Finance Minister Sampat Singh, former MP Kailasho Saini, sitting legislator Sushil Indora and two former senior members of the Om Parkash Chautala cabinet, ML Ranga and Bahadur Singh, have left the party, creating a huge vacuum.

Although their departure is unlikely to result in significant losses to the party in terms of votes, the psychological impact of their departure on party supporters is huge. While nobody believes that they left due to the difference of opinion, their exit has certainly raised doubts about the ability of INLD supremo Om Parkash Chautala to hold his flock together.

As it is, the INLD leadership is now perceived to be completely limited to Chautala and his two sons even though it does not change the ground reality that they had been calling the shots all along.

Nevertheless, even its die-hard supporters now find that those who had some say in the affairs of the party are not there anymore.

The HJC has likewise witnessed a rebellion by its senior leaders, including Subhash Batra and Krishn Moorty Hooda. Many of those who had joined it after they found themselves marginalised in their own original parties have left the party seeking greener pastures. The party which boasted of forming the government in the next Assembly poll is now grappling with the problem of finding suitable candidates for the 90 seats.

The BJP is hardly a credible opposition party in the state given its shrunken base. Even its new president Gujjar is an unknown entity in Haryana. But for making the right noises in the media, there is little the party can expect from him and his team.

The BSP, despite its tie-up with the HJC, suffers from a similar malady. It lacks leaders who can capitalise on the situation in Haryana. Mayawati’s failure to become a force at the Centre after the Lok Sabha elections has affected the party’s appeal adversely.

Chandigarh, July 27
From 200 institutions in 2007 to 470 plus in 2009 and still counting - it’s been a virtual explosion of Bachelor of Education (BEd) colleges in Haryana in the past two years.

If that’s not all, 90-odd applications for the opening of new BEd colleges are pending approval with the National Council of Technical Education (NCTE).

Clearly baffled at handling this problem of plenty, the Haryana government, in a written request, has urged the council to exercise restraint in granting approval to more private BEd colleges in the state. This time , the government is hoping the NCTE will heed its request, unlike the previous one.

Sources said according to last year’s figures, there were 60,000 seats available in the BEd colleges of which 53,000 have been filled while the rest went vacant. Though the department had conducted an entrance test which was cleared by 33,000 students, the high court, following a petition, had directed the government to open admission to all.

In fact, at a recent meeting convened under the chairmanship of Chief Secretary Dharamvir on the issuing of land-use certificates for opening private BEd colleges in controlled and uncontrolled areas, the large number of BEd colleges came up for discussion.

At the meeting one of the major reasons identified for the opening of a huge number of colleges was that no permission was required in rural land outside the controlled area and colleges were set up after obtaining a “no objection certificate” from the respective village panchayats.

Sources said in 2007 there were 200 BEd colleges in Haryana. In late 2007, it was observed by the government that since too many colleges had been opened, there was no need to open more in the state.

The decision of the government was duly conveyed to the NCTE. However, disregarding the views of the government, the NCTE continued to allow the opening of new colleges, resulting in the swelling of their numbers. Sources added that according to several rulings of the court, the state government was left with no authority once the approval for the opening of a BEd college was granted by the NCTE. Consequently, these colleges were not only being opened but also getting affiliation from Haryana universities.

Officials add that while it has become impossible to regulate such a huge number of private BEd colleges, most of them are working without adequate staff and infrastructure.

“While classes are not held regularly and students become degree holders for appointment as school teachers, the quality of school education is compromised,” an official admits.

Gurgaon, July 27
PVR Blu-O, a joint venture between PVR and Thailand’s major cineplex, has organised a Pin Strike, country’s first-ever corporate bowling tournament here. Sponsored by Lufthansa Airlines, the first edition of the tournament has 48 teams from a variety of companies competing with each other for the championship. The competition which started recently will end on August 12.

As many as 12 teams vying for the championship slug it out every Wednesday to decide the top eight teams that will enter the finals. The event features HV Sharda, country’s leading bowling player who has represented the country at many international bowling events, as the official umpire.

Gautam Dutta, CEO, PVR Blu-O, said: “Pin Strike will prove to be the turning point for bowling in India and will contribute towards reinstating it as an ultimate choice in sports entertainment. The event will bring to the fore many a hidden talent that can be honed and might move on to represent the country at many prestigious international events as the love for bowling tends to grow on you”.

“The tremendous response we have received from the corporate world makes us confident that the tournament will prove to be even a bigger draw in the times to come. These companies appreciate the bonding that develops between the team members by participating in a competition like Pin Strike. This bonding can reach to the corporate boardrooms as well and translate into major wins,” he added, and claimed that the Blu-O was the country’s largest bowling centre equipped with 24 cosmic bowling lanes.

“We aim to redefine the sports entertainment in India by bringing the international bowling experience to the country,” Dutta affirmed.

Rewari, July 27
The cases of abduction are on the rise in Rewari. Of late, the district has witnessed a spurt in the incidents of “elopement” of teenaged girls, mostly students, with youths.

While owing to such incidents, the parents are a worried lot, the police, too, is often confronted with a tricky situation in tackling such cases which involve tacit concurrence of the girls as well.

In a recent case, a 17-year-old student of Class XII was abducted from Manethi village under Khol police station of the district allegedly by a youth, Navin Kumar Yadav. The girl was taken to Kotputli town in Rajasthan where she was allegedly raped.

The police raided the hideout at Kotputli and apprehended the accused and recovered the girl as well.

In another such case, a teenaged girl (17) was lured and abducted from Qutubpur Colony here allegedly by Rajender Saklani, a resident of Nainital district of Uttarakhand, who was employed in a factory at Bawal.

Sources said Rajender, who was living in a rented accommodation near the victim’s house, developed intimacy with the girl and later eloped with her.

The Rampura police, which has registered a case of abduction on a complaint filed by the girl’s father, Ranbir Singh Yadav, has been unable to trace the whereabouts of the duo so far.

A third such case pertains to the disappearance of a teenaged girl (17), who was abducted allegedly by a youth, Sunil Kumar, in connivance with his two accomplices, Surender and Kala, from Vijay Nagar Colony here recently.

Sunil, a resident of Bhiwani district, used to visit his sister’s house in the colony. He lured the girl by promising to marry her.

The Model Town police, which registered a case of abduction against the trio on a complaint filed by the girl’s mother, is investigating the matter.

In another such case, a teenaged girl (17) was abducted from Ajay Nagar Colony here allegedly by a youth, Sony, in connivance with other members of his family.

Sources said the girl was taken to the family’s residence in Madipura Colony of Delhi where the boy and the girl got married.

On a petition filed by the girl’s mother, a local court recently issued a directive following which the police registered a case of abduction, criminal intimidation and criminal conspiracy against Sony, his mother Munni Devi, and two others, all residents of Madipura Colony of Delhi.