Udhampur, August 11
More than one month has passed but the police has failed to get even a clue in the sensational bank robbery case of Kishtwar. Similar is the status of the Udhampur head post office heist case in which the police had picked up about a dozen suspects from the neighbouring state but nothing concrete has emerged from their 
interrogation.

Notwithstanding the claims of the authorities, the police in both the cases has slowed down the investigations without any reason.

Failure of the police to solve these two cases has put question mark over the credibility of the cops who claimed to have taken adequate steps to strengthened security in the militancy-plagued area of Kishtwar. Interestingly, the robbers struck at highly fortified building located in the heart of Kishtwar town where the branch of Jammu and Kashmir Bank is located.

On July 8, a group of unidentified burglars struck at the main branch of Jammu and Kashmir Bank at Kishtwar and decamped with about Rs 1 crore. During preliminary investigation, the police has established the involvement of some insiders in this case, but after sometime the police slowed down the investigation.

“It is still a mystery why the police has virtually stopped investigation in the case,” asked Rajesh Parihar, a local resident. It was just a coincidence that robbers struck on the first day when the new SP had joined Kishtwar.

About half a dozen suspects, including two employees of the same branch of the bank, were picked up by the police for further investigation. During the interrogation, the police allegedly committed atrocities on the arrested bank employees. As the matter took political turn, the police was forced to release the two employees.

“After hue and cry over atrocities on the bank employees who were picked up for questioning, the police has been hesitating to further investigate the case,” Parihar argued.

Echoing similar views, Abdul Majid, a retired government employee, said the investigating authorities should solve this case to revive shattered confidence of people. “This case is a test for the police,” he said.

It is being alleged that robbery in the bank was not possible without the help of insiders. When robbers struck the bank, an amount worth Rs 1 crore was deliberately kept in two boxes to facilitate the robbers to execute their task. Instead of keeping the amount in the chest of strong room, some employees kept the amount in the two boxes which established their involvement in the case.

As far as the robbery in the head post office of Udhampur is concerned, three months have been already passed but the police has so far failed to get lead in this case, which created fear psychosis among the residents of Udhampur and adjoining localities. The police had picked up some suspects from Himachal Pradesh in connection with the sensational head post office robbery case. The arrested suspects were interrogated for more than 10 days, but the police failed to get anything concrete from them.

According to police sources, a gang from outside the state was involved in this robbery case and after looting the post office, the gang managed to cross the state. On May 29, burglars struck head post office in the Dhar road area and decamped with cash worth Rs 5 lakh.

Jammu, August 11
The Jammu Municipal Corporation (JMC) has launched a new scheme of door-to-door collection of garbage in seven selected wards with an aim to improve sanitation in the city.

The scheme has been initially launched in ward numbers 20, 21, 22, 50, 53, 54 and 69. An amount of Rs 50 would be charged as sanitation fee from each household for providing better sanitation services.“This scheme would be extended to other remaining wards of the city in a phased manner,” informed JMC commissioner Mubarak Singh.

The corporation has engaged five garbage-collecting vehicles and additional safai karamcharies in the wards. Additional wheelbarrows, wooden handcarts and disinfectants have also been issued in these wards.

The commissioner has appealed to the public to cooperate and pay the fee fixed by the corporation. While appreciating the efforts of the health wing of the corporation to improve the sanitation system in the city, mayor Kavinder Bushan Gupta said the corporation always endeavoured to improve the sanitary conditions of the city.

Gupta said: “Small vehicles, along with wooden rehries and wheelbarrows, are introduced for cleansing of narrow lanes and general public will have to cooperate with the corporation in making the city clean and garbage free”.

Meanwhile, the corporation has also started night scavenging in the main bazaars, particularly in the old city, where due to narrow lanes the process of cleanliness could be done properly during the night hours only.

“The scheme has been started in the areas like Bikram Chowk, Gandhi Nagar and the Airport Road. One additional vehicle for this purpose has been engaged for the Airport Road only,” said Dr Anwar Choudhary, health officer of the corporation.

“Night duties have been assigned to the safai karamcharis for scavenging during the night hours. Sanitation inspectors would supervise the job during the night hours,” the health officer said. “A proper attendance register has been maintained by the health wing to ensure that nobody remains absent from the duty during the night hours,” he added.

Jammu, August 11
Massive urbanisation in the Jammu region has led to large-scale encroachments on tributaries of various rivers, where plots have been carved out and sold without getting NoC from departments concerned.

The encroachments have blocked the flow of water in the tributaries. A Tribune team visited various localities in and around the city and found that most of the space in the rainfed tributaries has been encroached upon.

“The person who sold us a plot here kept us in dark.H told us that this was a small stream which the municipal corporation had turned into a concrete drain, but later we came to know that it was a rainfed stream,” said Manjeet Singh, a resident of Greater Kailash in Jammu. “Last year, during the monsoon the water pressure was so much that our boundary wall collapsed and the water entered our rooms”, he said.

Not only the local residents but also many industrial units have also encroached upon the bed of the seasonal Balore river in the Kaluchak area.

“For the past many years, there has been large-scale development and many industries have also come up in the area.They have encroached on the bed of the river,” said Krishan Lal, a resident of Kaluchak.

To check the encroachments, the government had taken up remodelling of the Landoi Choe and its tributaries in the Trikuta Nagar- Nanak Nagar areas of Jammu. Landoi Choe and its tributaries constitute an important drainage system for areas comprising Narwal, Transport Nagar, Channi Himmat, Channi Rama, Railway station, Rail head complex, Trikuta Nagar, Nanak Nagar, Gandhi Nagar, Shastri Nagar and finally emerge on National Highway 1A between the milk supply plant and Digiana Industrial estate.

Due to massive urbanisation, the Landoi Choe and its tributaries have also experienced massive encroachments,which eventually results into the flooding of the residential areas.

Solid waste is being dumped into the flood channel and its width has been reduced from the existing about 300m to about 30 meter. This channel has been reduced to a 10-m wide RCC structure, which indeed is too narrow to discharge the floodwater of the vast catchments area.

As per the Jammu and Kashmir chapter of the WWF, in the name of remodelling, the JDA has encroached upon the flood channel making the adjoining habitations flood-prone and converting it into RCC structure has converted an area full of life into a dead concrete structure. “It is, in fact, a big blow to our fast dwindling biodiversity and hence environmentally totally unsustainable venture,” says WWF.

Minister for PHE, Irrigation and Flood Control Taj Mohiuddin said that he would look into the matter personally and take necessary measures to remove the encroachments.

Jammu, August 11
In contravention of rules and regulations, a number of residential houses have been rented out to central and state government offices and societies here.

To add to the woes of the public, the government offices have hired the houses, for unknown reasons, in narrow lanes and lesser- known streets, where it becomes a cumbersome job to locate them.

On the contrary, many a well-furnished multi-complex, raised by different agencies of the state government, are vacant and are lying unoccupied in various parts of the city.

Informed sources said at least, 12 government offices and an equal number of societies and corporations were functioning from the residential houses in localities like Trikutanagar, Gandhinagar, Rehari and Talab Tillo , notwithstanding the fact that such plots were initially allotted to the people only for constructing residential houses.

A full-fledged office of the Central Water Commission, under the Union Ministry of Water Resources, has been operating from an ill-maintained single- storeyed residential house in the Talab Tillo area for the last so many years.

The residents of the area complained that whenever the tenders were to be opened, contractors made a lot of noises in the locality since the building housed the office of the Executive Engineer of the commission as well.

The Regional Directorate of the Narcotics Control Bureau, which works under the Union Ministry of Home Affairs, operates from the highly congested locality of Rehari, where it has hired a double-storeyed residential house.

The Jammu and Kashmir Prevention of AIDS Society operates from a residential house on the outskirts of Trikutanagar. Similarly, offices of the Women’s Welfare Society and oil and gas companies are operating from the Subash Nagar and Gandhinagar areas.

Ironically, a number of government office complexes, constructed by the Jammu Development Authority (JDA) have been lying vacant for the last so many years. Such complexes, located on the main road at Janipur, New Plot and Narwal areas, were constructed for housing the offices, with parking and all other facilities.

An official of the JDA, while admitting that its structures were unoccupied, said the agency had many a time approached all such government offices and corporations which functioned from the private residential houses. “The move could have provided them spacious space besides revenue for the JDA. But for unknown reasons, our suggestions were every time turned down’’, the official said.

He pointed out that there were guidelines for the offices and societies not to operate from the residential areas. “Even public interest litigations have been filed against the functioning of certain private offices from the posh Gandhinagar area of the city’’, the official reminded.

However, the official said a number of government as well as private offices have over the years shifted to JDA-owned office complexes at the Rail Head and Bahu Plaza localities.

Bani, August 11
Twenty years ago, the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) had realigned the Bani-Chatargala road in Bani tehsil, promising villagers better connectivity and compensation against the agricultural land lost to road alignment. However, residents of Badyal village of Lowang in Kathua district, still await compensation and improved connectivity.

The village remained a hotbed of militancy in 2003, but it could not develop roots as people consider themselves as Dogras and part of India. They out rightly rejected any of the militant ideology and remained stick to their stand.

Having witnessed several fierce encounters between militants and armed forces, the village, predominantly a Muslim majority area, came into light again with the arrest of a Hizbul Mujahideen militant, Ashiq Ali Bhat, in Delhi recently.

An old man of the village, Shams-ud-Din, son of Sultan, has been waiting for compensation from the government as he wants to perform Haj after getting claim against his land lost to road alignment.

Shams-ud-Din, who seems disenchanted with the authorities, has almost given up the hope to perform Haj. “Why should I go to Mecca? People go there to pelt the symbolic Satan with stone. I do the same thing over here,” he said.

“Satan encounters me like tigers, dogs, monkeys, snakes, fox etc, but the only difference is that they come in the form of human beings,” he stated in a satirical way.

The octogenarian is a tailor by profession and also owns apple orchards. In his small wooden shop, villagers, including Hindus and Muslims, sit together and listen to radio and discuss political developments at the national or international level. “There was a time when militancy had gripped the entire area. Shams-ud-Din made at least six militants to surrender before the Army in two separate incidents through his knowledge of religion,” revealed Amarnath, a local resident and Shams-ud-Din’s friend.

“Before the Army was deputed in the area, the police would not dare to encounter militants. They would hush up the informers and suggest not to discuss the militants’ presence in the area.”

“Militants would swarm the village for it is a Muslim area. Some militant groups wanted greater Kashmir, some advocated independence while others wanted to go with Pakistan,” recalled Shams-ud-Din and added, “We did not subscribe to their ideology as we consider ourselves as Dogras and part of India.”

About his wish to perform Haj, the octogenarian said, “Tell the government that we don’t expect anything from it. Allah walks through our orchards, protects our fields and showers blessings upon our shelters. What else do we need?”

Nevertheless, maintaining poor means of livelihood more than 50 households in and around the village are in dire need of compensation against their land acquired on account of road alignment. “We met the BRO authorities several times, but they say the government is delaying the grant,” villagers rued while demanding better transport services and blacktopping of the village road.

Srinagar, August 11
With normalcy returning to the Kashmir valley, a change is being witnessed in the conduct of marriage ceremonies in terms of timings.

Though people in the rural areas are still keeping such functions low profile and prefer daytime weddings, the trend has gradually eased out in the urban areas, mainly in Srinagar, where most of the weddings are held during late in the evenings, followed by nightlong celebrations.

This has been a kind of return to the pre-militancy era when the “baraat” used to move late in the night and return after midnight or by early morning with the bride.

The marriage season has picked up over the past one month ahead of Ramazan, the holy month of fasting beginning on August 23, during which weddings normally do not take place.

However, frequent incidents of violence have been playing a spoilsport. It was because of the rape and murder of two women in Shopian that lead to a continued strike in Shopian for 48 days. The incident had its fallout on the rest of the valley as frequent shutdowns against the killings were observed during June and July.

Many residents, apprehending a situation like last year’s Amarnath agitation, had to make certain changes in their wedding ceremonies by inviting least possible guests.

Though everybody is against the wastage of sumptuous meals in “wazwan” during marriage functions in Kashmir, there is some kind of realisation among a section of the people who prefer to take measures in minimising wastage and also serve as per the timings mentioned in the invitation cards.

There have always been complaints about the delay in the arrival of “baraats” or the serving of lunch or dinners during marriages. However, during some recent functions a change has been witnessed. “We were invited (on marriage) on Wednesday for lunch at 2.30 pm. We reached there by 2.15. The service started five minutes before the scheduled time and by 2.35 pm, we started having food,” said Abdul Rafia from Qamarwari. Happy over the punctuality, he added that the women were served at 3.30 p.m. as scheduled.

The “wazwan” requires four persons to be served in one large round copper plate where the chef serves mutton-based dishes one after the other with regular intervals. Abdul Rafia referred to another case where the invitees were asked to be punctual at 2 pm, and advised if they were late, they would have to wait till 5 pm. “This modification with a special note below has been perhaps for the first time”, he said.

But, another lunch during a marriage party at Lal Bazaar recently was served “as usual”, about four hours late, he added.

Jammu, August 11
The fact that differentiates Central University from other universities of the state is that besides providing higher and qualitative education to students, it aims at making students fully skilled.

“The university is expected to provide high-quality education both in the areas of teaching and research,” said Prof Abdul Wahid, Vice-Chancellor of Central University.

“The special advantage of the university will be that it will be funded exclusively by the Government of India, thus making it affordable to go for innovative and prestigious graduation courses outside the state and in any part of the country. Besides pursuing education in selected courses, students will also study skill formation and social-oriented courses like disaster management and environment sciences which will enable them to get jobs easily,” said Wahid.

Wahid assured that graduates produced by the university would be superior to graduate students of other universities. “The university will offer traditional courses which have a job potential and new and innovative courses which are of social importance and are not being offered by the other universities,” he added.

In the beginning, the university would start MPhil courses in English (language and literature), information technology and management studies. Later, it would start postgraduation courses, he said.

“The admission process will be on an all-India basis through an entrance test.Therefore, it would attract more talented students from all over the county which will also add to the cultural interchange,” said the Vice-Chancellor.

Wahid mentioned that the university would recruit talented faculty from all over the country. However, at present, the University of Jammu is offering master’s degree programme in biotechnology, botany,Buddhist studies, business management, chemistry, commerce, computer application, Dogri, economics, education, electronics, English, environmental sciences, geography, geology, Hindi, history, home sciences, library science, mathematics, physics, political science, psychology, Punjabi, Sanskrit, sociology, statistics, tourism management, Urdu, Urdu (professional) and zoology, LLB (Two years and three-year programmes), LLM, BEd, MEd, BLib, MLib, postgraduate diploma in business management (BBM), office management and secretarial practice, applied electronics, computer science and applications, criminology and police science, marketing and sales management and postgraduate course in Sanskrit language, BA/BSC/BCom/BBA (part-I, II and III), preparatory courses in music and bachelor of music, preparatory courses in fine arts and bachelor of fine arts, MBBS, MDMS and diploma courses in faculty of medicines, bachelor’s degree of engineering, bachelor’s degree of ayurvedic medicine and surgery, bachelor’s degree in computer application, MPhil and PhD.

The state government has identified three sites in Jammu for the establishment of the university. The land is about 4,000 kanals at Samba, Chinnor (RS Pura) and near Nandni tunnel, respectively.

Meanwhile,Dr Nirmal Singh, senior BJP leader, has said the party had done a lot for the promotion of education in the state and it always stood up for the education of students.

The leader said during the NDA regime at the Centre, the party had provided 14 new colleges to the state for which money was granted from the Centre.Dr Singh further mentioned that Atal Bihari Vajpayee, former Prime Minister, during his visit to the state sanctioned Rs 30 crore for the development of educational infrastructure which was used for the construction of the General Zorawar Singh Auditorium in the University of Jammu and its sub-campuses at Kathua and Udhampur.

Similarly, Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad state president Suresh Ajay Magotra said being the student organisation, they had forced the University of Jammu to introduce entrance-based admission for postgraduation courses and had struggled for the establishment of law school in the university.

Jammu, August 11
The National Building Construction Committee (NBCC), responsible for laying sewer lines in the city, and the Public Health Engineering (PHE) Department have locked horns with the latter calling the former “unprofessional, careless and unskilled”.

The work is facing problems in old parts of Jammu city because NBCC officials say old buildings can collapse anytime, if utmost care is not taken in sorting out the thickly entangled network of the PHE, water, cable and BSNL lines. The NBCC is moving at a slow pace. The PHE department has accused the committee of reckless behaviour in handling water pipes as a result of which many pipes got damaged, and the public had to suffer.

However,Hemraj, general manager of the committee, said he had no idea about the problem entailing to the old city pattern before taking the contract. He said the pattern had been made in a haphazard manner. He also pulled up the department for not having any record or knowledge of pipes laid under the ground. Due to this, the committee had to dig trenches to know the location of the pipes.

“We are not getting any corridor or space to lay sewer lines with our machinery and workforce, as the roads are narrow, and there is a thick mess of underground pipes. If we occupy the space near the houses to execute our work, old buildings can collapse.We have sought the department’s help in the matter”. The PHE department on the other hand is miffed with the NBCC for being irresponsible in executing its work. VK Abroal, chief engineer, PHE, said:“The committee must have the knowledge of the topography of the old city where the pipes were laid before 1947. Before accepting the contract, they must have known whether they can handle it. Instead of having technically skilled workers, they have unskilled workforce who, instead of working manually in such tiny places, operate big machines”.

The committee has asked the department to clear the mess by removing defunct pipes. “If the department removes the defunct pipes, then we would get the space to execute our work”.Abrol accused the committee of damaging water pipes which put the department in tight spot. “They broke water pipes at many places because of which thousands of people suffered from lack of water for many days. We had to rush to repair those pipes. The committee needs to work cautiously.Otherwise, it will create chaos,” said Abroal.

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