The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

Two MC employees beat colleague to death
Dharmendra Joshi
Tribune News Service

Victim Jaspal Singh was the husband of District President of Mahila Cong

Kapurthala, August 26
A junior assistant with the Municipal Council (MC) here, Jaspal Singh, was allegedly beaten to death by his two colleagues on the MC premises here today.

Jaspal is the husband of the District President of the Mahila Congress, Neelam Sidhu, a former councillor.

As soon as the news of Jaspal’s murder spread, local Congress leaders, councillors and workers blocked the Kapurthala-Sultanpur Lodhi road demanding the registration of an FIR against the alleged culprits. The dharna continued for several hours till a case was registered in this regard.

City SHO Daljit Singh said the FIR had been registered against MC watchman Prabhash Kumar and his brother Subhash Kumar, a clerk, under section 302 of the IPC on the complaint of Jaspal’s wife Neelam Sidhu. Both the accused were still at large.

Neelam alleged Jaspal Singh had gone to the birth and death section of the MC for some work where Prabhash and Subhash attacked him without any provocation. She further alleged they also hit him at his private parts. Subsequently he was rushed to Civil Hospital where he was declared brought dead.

The autopsy could not be done till the filing of this news item as the police had not reportedly provided the required papers. However, a board of three Civil Hospital doctors has been set up to conduct the autopsy.

Neelam Sidhu also alleged in her complaint that MC EO Gurwinder Kaur, former local MC EO S.K. Aggarwal and Jalandhar-based Deputy Director Local bodies I.S. Bhatti should also be booked for murder charges as her husband had allegedly been harassed by them by shifting him repeatedly from one section to the other for the past some time.

The District President of the Mahila Congress said her husband had been shifted thrice in past just three months. He was shifted to the Fire Brigade Department from the License Department. When he sent a legal notice to MC authorities stating that there was no post of clerk in the Fire Brigade Department, he was then transferred to the Jalandhar-based office of Deputy Director Local Bodies some days back.

Neelam further started her husband had met EO Gurwinder Kaur on Tuesday itself to request him not to send him to Jalandhar due to personal reasons.

Jaspal was mentally upset because of the alleged harassment by the officers reportedly at the behest of some politicians belonging to the ruling party, alleged several Congress leaders.

Meanwhile neither Deputy Director Bhatti nor the former Kapurthala EO Agarwal could not contacted, whereas EO Gurwinder Kaur told The Tribune she had joined here just about 20 days back and no official had harassed him.

She said Jaspal was husband of a local Congress leader that was why some politicians were trying to give this incident a political colour. Not only Jaspal but several other MC employees were shifted from one place to the other in routine, she added.

NGO beats MC to make town clean and green
The NGO successfully covers about 75 pc area of district to implement its project
Ravinder Sud

Hoshiarpur, August 26
The Clean and Green Association, a local NGO, has successfully covered about 75 per cent area of Hoshiarpur to implement its clean and green project. There are departments where the NGO has been more successful than the Municipal Council in promoting the cause of a clean and green environment.

Heading towards making the town pollution-free within five years of its inception, the dismal attitude of the municipal authorities and lack of awareness among people about civic amenities, especially cleanliness, have not let it achieve the desired results so far.

NGO Chairman Deepak Mittal, a leading industrialist, told The Tribune that it was started with the association of The Art of Living Organisation, the Forest Department, the MC and the Chamber of Commerce and Industry in June 2004 with an aim to make the town free from pollution.

As many as 24 colonies on the outskirts of the town had been covered where more than 25,000 saplings of various trees had been planted.

To protect the plants and ensure their growth, tree guards were installed and growth of 95 per cent plants was achieved.

The association has provided a dumper to the MC to remove garbage and was giving a monthly salary of Rs 3,700 to its driver. The NGO is also getting the machine repaired from time to time. The association had appointed two gardeners and two safai sewaks to ensure growth of tree plants and cleanliness. The MC did not have adequate staff for the purpose.

The association would start a drive to make people aware of cleanliness in the near future, said Deepak Mittal, adding that local committees had been constituted in all 24 colonies to follow up the project.

GND varisty counselling for BTech courses from Aug
29

Amritsar, August 26
Guru Nanak Dev University would hold two-day counselling for BTech courses for the 85 per cent seats reserved for the domicile of Punjab, based on CET-2009, at Maharaja Ranjit Singh Bhawan in university campus from August 29.

Counselling coordinator Karanjit Singh Kahlon said in all 610 seats are being filled in computer science, engineering, electronics, food science, textile chemistry and urban planning courses, which are being run at its regional campuses in Jalandhar, Gurdaspur besides at the varsity campus here.

The counselling schedule for BTech courses and details of seats are available at the university website. Candidates from the reserved categories would appear on August 29 in the morning while the candidates from general category would appear from 1.30 pm to 3 pm on the same day. — TNS

Villagers made aware on free legal aid scheme
Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, August 26
A legal literacy camp was organised by the District Legal Services Authority at Government School, Jaitewali village.

Assistant District Attorney (Legal Services) Charanjit Singh and advocate Ashish Bhandari discussed various legal aid schemes with the principal, staff, sarpanch, panches and opinion leaders of the village. They said all the children, women, SC/ST persons, persons in remand, mentally challenged persons, industrial labourers, victims of natural calamities and all persons with an annual income of less than Rs 50,000 could avail free legal aid.

They talked about the common laws covered under the right to education, fundamental rights, Consumer Protection Act, Welfare of Senior Citizens Act, CrPC, IPC Act, Domestic Violence Act, Right to Information Act and NREGA.

The villagers were made aware of the benefits of the lok adalats, while informing them that one such camp was scheduled for September 12 and another only for women for September 26.

Pamphlets and banners regarding lok adalats and legal aid were put up at the site. They were told that they could apply for either of the two services by writing an application to the District and Sessions Judge, Civil Judge Senior Division-cum-Secretary, District Legal Services Authority, Additional Civil Judge Senior Division-cum-Assistant District Attorney, Legal Services.

Kaypee-led Cong men block traffic for hours
Were protesting against SAD-BJP ‘misrule’
Chander Parkash/TNS

Gurdaspur, August 26
Hundreds of Congressmen, led by the party’s state unit chief Mohinder Singh Kaypee, staged a dharna and jammed traffic at Hanuman Chowk on the Amritsar-Pathankot road for hours together to lodge their protest against the “misrule” by the SAD-BJP government led by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal.

The Congress leaders, apart from raising issues connected with the people and the state, also predicted fall of the alliance government in Punjab within a few months as sharp differences had been emerging between the alliance partners on many issues.

They added that the people of Punjab could expect assembly elections by March or April, 2010.

Those who participated in the district-level agitation organised by PPCC Secretary Raman Behl, included PPCC spokesman Ashwani Shekri, Sucha Singh Chhotepur and Khushal Behl (former ministers), Ashok Kumar and Ram Sarup Baggi (former MLAs).

Addressing the rally, Kaypee alleged that on the one hand, false cases were being registered against innocent people and Congressmen by the ruling alliance, on the other, it had been causing huge losses to the agricultural and industrial production of Punjab by imposing power cuts ranging from 16 to 18 hours a day.

Not only this, the SAD-BJP government had created a record of sorts as about 50 Congressmen had been murdered out of political vendetta in its two-and-half-year rule. But the murderers were still out of the reach of the police due to political pressure, he further alleged. A large section of policemen, deployed in field postings, had become henchmen of ruling politicians.

It was for the first time in history that the Punjab government had resorted to sale of state securities to arrange funds for the payment of salaries for employees. All the development projects announced by Badal and his colleagues in the past two and a half years had failed to take off due to a paucity of funds.

Shekri said if the government would increase the bus fares, the Congress would resort to traffic jams in every nook and corner of the state.