New Delhi, September 10
When the four sisters left for school this ill-fated morning in Khajuri Khas, they had no idea that only three of them would last the test of time.

Mamta Gautam died in the stampede sparked by rumours of a short-circuit in the school. Her sisters Pinky, Sadhna and Poonam were luckier and survived the stampede.

Pinky, who studies in class VIII, rushed to her house in the same area to break the unfortunate news to her father.

“I got to know from my daughter that a stampede has happened in the school. I immediately ran to the school where I came to know that the students had been admitted in GTB Hospital. When I went to the hospital, I was told that Mamta has died,” said Bir Singh, with a heavy voice and moistened eyes.

Like Bir Singh, there were hundreds parents grieving outside the hospital as they were not allowed to meet their children in the wards. A large number of policemen were deployed outside the hospital to control the agitated crowd.

The relatives rued they were being kept in the dark about the condition of their wards.

“I don’t know the condition of my daughter. Somebody told me that she has broken her right leg. But there is no word from the authorities,” said the mother of 14-year-old Mumtaz.

According to a survivor of the tragedy, Radhika a student of the same school, the girl students were made to sit on the first floor of the building where the stampede took place, as they had to appear for a geography exam. The boys had a different sitting arrangement in the other building.

Apart from Mamta, four other girls who died have been identified as Lalita, Ayesha, Asha and Afroz, said the hospital authorities.

A total of 29 students have been admitted in the hospital, of which six are in a serious condition and have been shifted to the ICU. The condition of one is stated to be very critical as she has been put on ventilator.

Medical Superintendent O.P. Kalra said, “Five students are on life support system while others are relatively stable and conscious and are being attended by neuro-surgeons and orthopaedic surgeons.”

Most of the victims died due to suffocation and head injuries. “Most of those who died in the incident lost their lives due to suffocation and head injuries,” said a GTB senior official.

New Delhi, September 10
The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) today instructed its officials to remove NDPL and BSES transformers within the boundary of municipal schools.

Standing Committee chief Ram Kishan Singhal said if it was not possible to remove the transformers near a particular school, it would be separated from the school boundary wall by a separate gate on the road.

He has asked the chief engineer and director (education) to submit a report specifying steps to be taken for removal of transformers within three days.

Meanwhile, the Mayor said the compensation awarded to the families who had lost their children was very less. The compensation given should be much higher than what has been announced, he said.

New Delhi, September 10
It is water everywhere in Delhi once again. The Rain god is blessing the Capital with the much-required dose of rainfall, but the civic authorities don’t know how to manage it.

The heavy showers brought life to a standstill, as roads stood waterlogged, speaking scores about the poor affair of the national Capital’s infrastructure. Most roads were flooded and the out of order traffic lights added to the woes of commuters.

Almost all roads linking to major commercial and business centres of the Capital were choked as office-goers had a harrowing time reaching their destinations.

According to sufferers, while in some cases ten minutes travel time stretched to 40 minutes, in other cases 15-km-stretch took close to two hours.

According to Delhi traffic police, major snarls were witnessed near ITO, Connaught Place, outer and inner Ring Road, Vikas Marg in east Delhi, Delhi Cantt, Aurobindo Marg, Kingsway Camp and Defence Colony.

Rajeev Singh, a businessman who was returning from Palam Airport, said, “It took me more than two hours to reach my house in Mayur Vihar from domestic airport this morning. The roads were clogged with water all around. I was wondering the state of people who were on their way to catch their flights.”

Mamchand, a Noida resident who was on the way to his office in Nehru Place, said that normally it takes 40 minutes to reach office, today it took him about one and a half hours.

Similar tales were heard from hundreds of office-goers in the city. As if the waterlogged roads were not enough, the breakdown of vehicles in the middle of roads led to more jams. As a result, traffic policemen were seen managing the traffic well past lunch hours.

“We usually rest after the peak morning hours, but today there has been no respite. We now pray that the rains stay away from this city,” said one traffic cop.

Meanwhile, the consistent rainfall in the past few days has dropped the temperature by eight degrees with the maximum hovering around 26.4° Celsius. The minimum settled at 23.3°.

The Met officials have recorded a total rainfall of 19.11 mm by the evening. They have predicted that rains might continue for a few more days.

Noida, September 10
Taking a serious view of the slipshod ways of government hospital, Noida, the assistant director of health services, Dr C.S. Mawar, was deputed from Meerut to conduct an enquiry at the district hospital, Noida.

Dr Mawar took all the records pertaining to Aarushi murder case into his possession after recording the statement of the lab technician. But he could not record the statements of former CMS, S.P. Singhal and hospital pathologist Dr Richa Saxena.

It may be mentioned that the media had recently highlighted that the slides sent for examination to Hyderabad lab were not of Aarushi but of some other patient.

UP principal secretary (Health), Pradeep Kumar Shukla deputed Dr Mawar on Wednesday to district hospital, Noida.

Dr Mawar scrutinised all the documents. He also recorded the statement of lab technician, Navneet, who had received Aarushi’s slides.

Navneet told Dr Mawar that he had handed over the slides to pathologist Dr Richa Saxena the same day. But the statement of lab technician, Vikas, was not recorded by the assistant director who could only talk to Dr Saxena on phone.

Sources said Dr Saxena wanted to meet Dr. Manwar separately while former CMS S.C. Singhal told Dr Mawar that he was out of station. The assistant director then seized the medico-legal register, attendance register and all other documents connected with the case from the district hospital, Noida.

Dr Mawar was told by the lab technician that slides of Aarushi were received on May 16 which he had handed over to Dr Saxena for examination.

Dr Sunil Dihre of district hospital conducted the postmortem of Aarushi on May 16 and at 12 noon. He gave the slides to two cops of Sector-20 police, Rajpal and Pawan who packed them in an envelope and handed them to the lab technician of district hospital on May 16 itself.

Dr Saxena, however, said she got the slides on May 17 from Dr S.C. Singhal since she could not come to hospital on May 16.

Ghaziabad, September 10
Perhaps death was calling out to her. What else could have prompted Sangeeta Goel, who was in an advanced stage of pregnancy, to take to the wheel and drive down 200 km from Bijnore town in Uttar Pradesh, putting herself and the unborn child in clear danger?

On the rough and tiring road, she gave birth to a baby girl - but neither made the journey.

Police in Modinagar, the town where Sangeeta and her child died and which is barely 50 km from Delhi, narrated the heartrending incident on Thursday, a day after it occurred.

Sangeeta was in her early 30s. A resident of Defence Colony in south Delhi, she was visiting her in-laws in Bijnore, said Kapil Deo Singh, a Modinagar police officer. It is yet to be ascertained what led her to drive her Zen car from there to Delhi.

Her sister Vineeta, who lives in Noida, told the police it was a call from Sangeeta’s husband that prompted her to do it.

Police quoted Vineeta as saying: “Why did jeeju (Sangeeta’s husband) ask her to reach Delhi in such haste? He didn’t know how she would drive so long in such an advanced stage, but he insisted that she reach Delhi immediately, and it proved fatal.”

“My sister should have defied my brother-in-law’s instructions. But she obeyed like a cow and proceeded to Delhi,” Vineeta said.

When Sangeeta reached near Kadrabad town on the outskirts of Modinagar, she developed labour pain. On her mobile phone, she called Vineeta for help and parked the car on a roadside. She gave birth to her baby girl there.

But it was all in vain.

Without any assistance and in the complete absence of medicare, their condition deteriorated. By the time Vineeta traced the car, after repeatedly calling Sangeeta and getting no reply, both mother and child were dead. Vineeta went on to transfer Sangeeta and the infant’s bodies from the Zen to her own car and drove to Noida without informing the police, police officer Singh said. — IANS

Faridabad, September 10
The past 24-hour drizzle, laced with sudden bursts of sharp showers, has brought cheers to the farmers but disrupted the urban life here due to waterlogging .

The waterlogging, even in posh sectors of Haryana Urban Development Authority (HUDA), has again exposed the lack of preparedness and contingency planning of the district administration.

Name any arterial road or lane in colonies and residential sector of HUDA, virtually all of them have got waterlogged.

The road connecting Delhi-Agra highway to the Mini-Secretariat in Sector 12 was particularly waterlogged. Some areas around Mini-Secretariat were under knee-deep water.

Pools of water were witnessed at various places of the highway resulting in disrupting movement of vehicular traffic. Even the roads in the city were badly affected resulting in chaos.

Although major areas of the city were submerged in storm water, the situation was particularly bad in Janata Colony, Dabua Colony, Sanjay Colony, Jawahar Colony, Parvartia Colony, Sector 15, 15A, 7, 8, 9 of the Old Faridabad area. The entire NH area was badly waterlogged prohibiting even pedestrians to venture out on the roads.

Some of the colonies like Janata Colony were badly affected. Storm water entered the houses as the entire area is low-lying.

The reason for the bad shape of the city is the poor drainage system. Almost all the nullahs which help the storm water to exit are choked. The sewerage system of the city is also in a state of disrepair. What was alarming for the residents is that the administration does not appear to learn from the past experiences.

New Delhi, September 10
The Delhi cabinet has approved constitution of fourth finance commission and de-commissioning of the Indraprastha thermal power station on October 31, 2009. It has also given its nod for appointing nine district-level full-time secretaries along with ancillary staff in the district legal service authorities.

While briefing media after the cabinet meeting, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said the fourth Delhi finance commission would be headed by a chairman and two members, including a member secretary. The commission had been requested to submit its recommendations along with an action taken report during the budget session in February-March 2011, she added.

The commission has been given 15 months time in the first instance. The recommendations would be applicable for five years from April 1, 2011.

The main terms of reference of the commission include distribution between the city government and the municipalities of the net proceeds of the taxes and tolls and fees levied by the city government; determination of taxes, duties, tolls and fees which may be assigned to the municipalities, the grants-in-aid to the municipalities from the consolidated fund of the state government, recommending measures needed to improve the financial position of the municipalities, studying the scope for economy in municipal administration, studying the scope of improvement in resource mobilisation by the municipalities, analysing the tax efforts made by the municipalities and reviewing the functions assigned to the municipalities.

While making its recommendations, the commission will have to consider the overall resource position of the city government and the requirements of the municipal bodies.

The cabinet has decided to de-commission the coal-based Indraprastha power station on October 31, 2009. According to the cabinet, the normal life of a coal-based power generating station is 25 years and the units of this station have outlived their designed life.

The Central Electricity Authority (CEA) recommended for de-commissioning of these units on account of un-economical operation.

Dikshit stated that the cabinet had given its nod for creation of 36 posts in nine district legal service authorities in the Capital.

New Delhi, September 10
Five persons have been arrested for allegedly being involved in human trafficking. They allegedly used to prepare passports under ‘Tatkal’ scheme, using forged letterheads of Army units.

Persons from Army, regional passport office (RPO), post office and agents are involved in the racket. The accused have been identified as Pradeep Sharma, Nihal Singh, Prateek Jain, Shiv Lal and Sher Singh.

Letterheads of Army units, rubber stamps, documents used for passport under ‘Tatkal’ scheme and computer have been seized.

DCP HGS Dhaliwal said Pradeep was arrested on September 4 near RPO, Bhikaiji Cama Place with incriminating documents. He revealed he worked as a broker in passport office where he came in contact with Nihal Singh who worked at the RPO.

“Nihal played middle man between the dealing clerk and Pardeep. He has been working at the RPO for the one year,” said DCP Dhaliwal.

Sher Singh came in contact with Pradeep one year ago and promised him to provide sufficient persons and Rs 50,000 per candidate if he could get their passport prepared.

Pradeep discussed it with Nihal who gave the idea of passport under Tatkal scheme. Nihal provided him with some photostat copies of used documents required for a passport under Tatkal scheme.

Head constable in the Army Shiv Lal was known to Pradeep. He helped Pradeep get the letterheads and verification forms for Tatka’ passports. .

Another accused Parteek Jain is a computer expert who helps to get the original documents scanned and prepared forged documents.

New Delhi, September 10
Burmese leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s decade-old struggle for democracy and freedom in Myanmar was thrown into spotlight in the city with Lady Sri Ram College holding a charged panel discussion on ‘Aung San Suu Kyi – Symbol of Democracy.’

The discussion was followed by the screening of a film, ‘Burma VJ: Reporting from a Close Country.’

The panelists were Thin Thin Aung from the Women’s League of Burma; Ashin Pannasiri, a monk who escaped the military in Myanmar and gave an account of the heart-rending trials he faced there while fighting for his nation’s freedom from the military rule; G. Parthasarthy, former Indian ambassador to Myanmar; Jaya Jaitely, political activist and human rights activist Ravi Nair.

An emotional Thin Thin Aung shared, “Aung San Suu Kyi has sacrificed her life for Burma and its people. She did not meet her husband as he died and has not met her sons. She has been under house arrest for 14 years.”

Thin Thin Aung stressed, “We want the Indian government to talk to the Burmese government but India must also engage in a dialogue with Aung Sang Suu Kyi, the Burmese opposition parties and the activists, then only it can get a fair picture of the situation in Burma. But India chooses not to engage with us.”

Ashim Pannasiri gave an account of the various trials he faced while in Myanmar. Ashim said, “I participated in the uprising of September 2007. I come from a monk’s organisation, Burma Monk’s Alliance. In Burma most people have been suffering under the military rule for decades, there has only been oppression and poverty. In 2007, we organised a peaceful protest march on Rangoon’s roads. However, the military brutally cracked down and this was the beginning of immense suffering I underwent in Burma.”

He adds, “On September 26-27 in 2007, many monastries, including mine, were raided, monk leaders were arrested and thousands of monks were tortured and killed. My friend and I were on the run hiding from the military. I had moved north to Mandalay. I was arrested on October 18 and was taken to the police station. I was tortured for the entire week. Then I was sentenced to three years in jail.”

Continuing his harrowing tale, Ashim said, “It was a terrible situation. There was no proper medical treatment, not enough food and we were tortured.

Later, I was shifted to a labour camp where military officers came and tortured me from 9 am to 6 pm daily. I escaped this camp climbing two fences of 20 metres to 50 metres. After traveling through dense forests, I came to Mizoram in India. The situation in Burma is still terrible, the government is arresting monks. Yesterday only some students and monks were arrested. The situation there is getting worse.”

Ashim’s story is certainly one of the worst and the trials he has faced are unbelievable.

The discussion was followed by the screening of a film coming out of the closed Burma in recent years — ‘Burma VJ: Reporting from a close country’.

The film deals with the courage displayed by the Democratic Voice of Burma, a group of underground journalists who risked their lives to bring a real account of the 2007 uprising against the military junta in Burma. The film is assembled from bold footage and conveys a strong message. The film has won the international documentary prize at Amsterdam Film Festival.