Chandigarh, October 2
The Punjab Government today said allegations claiming that a former legislator who had been made chairman of the society, which is to run the Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) in Jalandhar, was a front man for Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal and his family were baseless.

The Chief Minister’s media adviser, Harcharan Bains, while speaking about the main allegation of high value land being given for a song to the society, said the value of institutional land could not be compared with that of commercial property. He, however, did not give any figure as to what value had been put on the land by the Punjab Infrastructure Development Authority, which leased it out to the society for Rs 133 crore. Former Chief Minister Amarinder Singh had yesterday alleged that conservative estimates put the value of the land at more than Rs 2,000 crore.

The media adviser also claimed that the previous Congress government led by Amarinder Singh had made all efforts to get the PIMS project funded from the Central Government and even decided to develop this project on a public- private partnership basis through its letter dated August 30, 2006.

Bains claimed an attempt was being made to challenge the selection process in the High Court even though the latter had given the green light to the selection process. He also claimed that according to the Medical Council of India (MCI) guidelines for the establishment of a medical college, an applicant should be either the owner of the land or possesses the land by way of 99 years’ lease.

Therefore, it was mandatory to give land for 99 years’ lease as per the MCI’s guidelines, he added.

Bains also claimed the project was awarded on merit after carrying out a competitive transparent biding process through advertisements in major national newspapers, inviting the expression of interest for the development of the PIMS from the applicants. He said the selected bidder would have to pay a 5 per cent increase on Rs 131 crore every year by way of lease.

Chandigarh, October 2
If warnings issued by meteorologists of widespread rain from this Sunday are any indication, the miseries of farmers are still far from over.

After a weak start, the south-west monsoon this time had shown some glimpses of revival midway and it is threatening to become active again at the fag-end of the season which may add to the problems of farmers.

In some parts of Punjab and Haryana, there were scattered showers this afternoon, leaving the farmers worried.

While farmers are busy harvesting and marketing their produce, incessant rain at this time will affect not only the wrap-up operations of paddy and other seasonal crops but also hit procurement work.

Though rain may ease pressure on the increased demand for power because of sultry weather conditions, it may also add to humidity and the moisture content of soils thus making crops, including vegetables, vulnerable to pest and fungal attacks.

Excess moisture also acts as a catalyst for the blackening of paddy grains thus reducing the chances of their acceptance by procurement agencies.

Director of Punjab Agriculture Balwinder Singh Sidhu said farmers should not irrigate their fields. “Rain will be very detrimental at this stage. I was in Ludhiana when it started raining this afternoon. Only God can have mercy on the farmers of Punjab and Haryana,” he said,” as rain at this stage will hit hard both the harvesting and procurement operations.”

A spokesman of the Haryana Agriculture Department wants that farmers should not irrigate their crops during the next few days.

The crops, which are ready for harvesting, should be harvested immediately to avoid any further damage or losses.

A similar communication has been issued by farm experts in Punjab asking farmers to quicken their harvesting operations and take their produce to markets as quickly as possible to prevent the grains from becoming excessively moist.

Moisture in excess of the prescribed limits creates problems as state agencies refuse to procure the stocks till their moisture content has been reduced to the permissible levels.

Jalandhar, October 2
The Indian government’s callous attitude has compounded the grief of a local elderly couple whose son, Raman Joshi, a pilot employed by Sri Lankan Airlines, was reportedly murdered in Sri Lanka a few days ago. Talking to The Tribune today, Jagan Nath Joshi and his wife Pushpa said officials had not intimated them about their son’s death nor had offered to help in bringing back his body here.

Even a week after receiving the news of the murder of their son, who was living in rented accommodation at Negombo in Colombo, his parents are still waiting for the body to arrive. Though Raman’s body was on September 25 his parents were informed about his death by Sri Lankan Airlines officials only on September 29.

Holding back his tears, Joshi alleged the Sri Lankan government as well as the airline were trying to hush up the case. Contradictory statements issued by a top Sri Lankan police officer have deepened their apprehensions. He recalled that a female official of the airline’s HR department had told them that Raman had suffered a cardiac arrest and was no more. The family was also told the body would be sent to the Amritsar airport on Friday after completing certain formalities following the postmortem.

Amritsar, October 2
After initial hiccups and much criticism for the delay, an expansion plan for the Amritsar International Airport has finally taken off.

The state government today formally handed over 44 acres of adjoining land to the Airport Authority of India (AAI) for raising it as a full-fledged international airport.

The development has belied speculation about Mohali being a favourite destination of the ruling alliance for developing as an international runway and the Amritsar airport being ignored.

Nevertheless, the AAI at present is in possession of 976 acres of land, of which 176 acres has already been in the possession of the airport authorities.

According to this new plan, out of 44 acres of land, 33 acres has been earmarked for constructing a parallel taxi track, which will enable the authorities to increase the runway take off capacity from presently 12 aircrafts to 30 in an hour.

At present, there are 24 commercial aircraft movements daily. Around 10 acres of land will be devoted for the shifting of the Indian Air Force installations that otherwise hinders the proper operationalisation of category-II of the instrument landing system. This mechanism facilitates pilots up to 50-ft height in low visibility conditions to land the aircraft.

“The proper operation of this system will help reduce the cancellation and delays of flights in an inclement weather. Chances of passengers being stranded will also diminish”, said Chinson Pinakal, Director, Airport.

Deputy Commissioner KS Pannu said with this additional land, the airport would now be equipped with new DVOR system for aircraft navigation; latest meteorological equipment to gauge the rainfall; in-line baggage system; new control tower; four crash fire tenders and an equal number of additional aircraft parking bays.

“We have recently introduced CUTE system that facilitates passengers to use any check-in counter available. We foresee that with additional state-of-the-art facilities, it will give boost to the city tourism industry”, he said.

According to airport officials, with the coming up of the new terminal building at a cost of Rs 145 crore, the peak hour passenger handling capacity has been increased from existing 500 passengers (250 arrival and 250 departure) to 1,200 passengers, 600 arrival and equal numbers for departure.

The DC said two aero bridges had already been commissioned and put in use, whereas another two would be installed shortly. However, one acre of land had been kept reserved for the commercial development. 

Amritsar, October 2
Perturbed over the government’s attitude towards the local Government Medical College, and prevailing politics (in the college) badly affecting the services at Guru Nanak Dev Hospital here, Dr Amrik Singh Bhatia, Professor, Department of Surgery, has served a three-month notice to the government for pre-mature voluntary retirement from his post.

Just hours after his submission of notice Professor Bhatia, yesterday evening, was handed over a transfer letter, which stated that keeping in view the “public interest” he had been shifted to Government Medical College, Patiala. This move was condemned by the medical fraternity.

Bhatia had joined the Medical College in 1988 and was to retire on January 2011.

What is more disturbing is that three senior medical teachers and professors of the college have already applied for their pre-mature voluntary retirement to the Principal Secretary, Medical Education and Research, while two professors, including Dr Nitirajan and Dr Jaswinder Pal Kaur Shergill, are going to retire in November this year and January next year, respectively. It is learnt that more teachers were pondering over taking retirements and this step would further cripple the functioning of the college and hospital.

Mincing no words, the Punjab State Medical and Dental Teachers Association in a press note issued today said that Bhatia was victimised, as he was president of the association and was fighting for the welfare of the college.

The association said he was fighting for the welfare of the college and was demanding better facilities for staff, faculty. He also sought upgrading of hospital.

Jalandhar, October 2
In a deal related to the Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences( PIMS), which is in the eye of a political storm, the biggest losers are Punjab Agricultural University and the state farmers.

PIMS, set up with public funds generated after selling a sugar-cane farm owned by PAU, has been given to an NRI consortium headed by an Akali politician Surjit Singh Rakhra from Patiala. Former Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh yesterday alleged that the giving of PIMS, worth more than Rs 2,000 crore to Rakhra and co on a lease for 99 years for Rs 133 crore was a big scandal. He said his party would move court if the lease was not cancelled.

PIMS, which was constructed at a cost of about Rs 150 crore was a sprawling sugarcane research farm owned by PAU. It was spread over about 170 acre on Garha road on the outskirts of the city. In 1997, the state government forced PAU to hand over 61 acre of land establishing PIMS. PAU officials protested but in vain. PAU was given just Rs 3 crore for the land though its actual worth was several crores.

As the government had no money to construct PIMS, it came out with a novel scheme to generate money. It forced PAU to hand over the remaining 109.49 acre of farm to PIMS for further handing over to the Punjab Urban Planning and Development Authority( PUDA). The government got the entire farmland from PAU for Rs 15 crore.

Staff members deployed at the research farm were shifted to PAU at Ludhiana in 2001. It marked the end of the research on the farm. To generate funds, PUDA developed the entire farmland, as a commercial and residential area.

From the sale proceeds of the developed area, PUDA earned Rs 297 crore by April end this year. PUDA has transferred Rs 156 crore to the Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences Society. With that money PIMS has been constructed. The Union government had also given a grant of Rs 25 crore for construction.

As hard cash, generated from the sale of farmland, was available in plenty, there was little check on the spending of the money. An architect was engaged at 4 per cent fee of the total cost of project. Why was the Punjab government’s Architect Department not engaged?

As Rs 150 crore has been spent on PIMS building, the remaining money from the total expected sale proceeds of Rs 420 crore of the farmland, should actually go to PAU, which was forced to part with the farmland. PAU, credited with bringing a green revolution, is already starved of funds and its research work is in doll drums. 

Chandigarh, October 2
“Clerical” mistakes are apparently not notified. At least not in Punjab even if the state Pay Commission has made them.

The “mistakes”, even if they defied logic, had bought the silence of agitating teachers and nurses during the run-up to the parliamentary elections in April this year. Employees, who were expecting to receive last month’s pay according to the revised grades, were disappointed with the government sticking to the original recommendations made by the pay commission.

The commission had on April 21 claimed that after the submission of its report it was observed that some paragraphs had typographical mistakes. The commission, while correcting the errors, revised the salaries of various employees concerned with public dealing.

The corrections, however, did not indicate any typo errors. For instance, in the case of head teachers the earlier pay scale of Rs 5910- Rs 20200 was revised to Rs 10300 - Rs 34800. The grade pay of head teachers was revised to Rs 4200 from the earlier declared pay of Rs 3,000. In the case of nursing staff the grade pay of a staff nurse was revised to Rs 4,600 from the earlier Rs 3,200. The grade pay of matrons has been revised from Rs 4,200 to Rs 5,400 and the grade pay of nursing sister from Rs 3,800 to Rs 4,800 besides other categories.

Employees now claim they were “fooled” by the government at a time when the latter was at “their mercy”. “Now things have changed and we are running after them to plead for the implementation of the revised pay bands”, an employees’ leader said. State Democratic Teachers Front president Bhupinder Singh Waraich said employees were not being told that they would get the revised pay only after the economic condition of the state takes a turn for the better.

Sources disclosed that the Pay Commission’s letter regarding “clerical mistakes” was sent to the Finance Department, which, however, did not approve it and the corrections were not notified. Now, they said, the issue had been referred to the Implementation Committee headed by the Chief Secretary.

Employees, however, are gearing up to agitate for their “rights” with union leader Harcharan Singh Channa saying dharnas would be held across the state this month in case the issue was not resolved quickly. Punjab Nurses Association president Jeewanpreet Kaur said nurses were hopeful that justice would be done to them in due course.

Pathankot, October 2
In an effort to conserve the few remaining vultures in Punjab, a ‘restaurant for vultures’ - the first of its kind in the state - will be formally opened here on October 12 to provide safe food for the highly endangered species. The aim is to double their population within a year and a half.

The number of vultures in the state, which used to be in the hundreds of thousands in the 1960s and 1970s, has dwindled to less a thousand over the past few years. This has disturbed the environmental food chain, which in turn has led to a rising incidence of various types of diseases.

Vultures have now become a rare sight in Punjab as most of them were killed after feeding on the flesh of dead animals that had been administered diclofenac, a painkiller medicine.

The situation has reached a point where the population of three species belonging to the genus Gyps - the white rumped (Gyps bengalensis), slender billed (Gyps tenuirostris) and long billed (Gyps indicus) - was greatly threatened across the Indian subcontinent. They have now been listed as a critically endangered species by the International Union of Conservation of Nature & Natural Resources (IUCN), points out Gurdaspur district forest officer (wildlife) SP Singh.

Singh, who underwent training in vulture preservation, breeding and care at the Vulture Care Centre, Pinjore, run by the UK and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), observed in the past Punjab had had a fairly large population of vultures.

He said the ‘vulture restaurant’ would provide dioclofenac-free food to vultures and assist in their natural breeding in an effort to increase their population, which would also be beneficial for the natural environment. “The idea of opening a ‘vulture restaurant’ in Punjab is feasible and practical as the state is rich in cattle population such as sheep and goats, which could serve as potential food for the vultures”, he noted.

He added the environment & forests ministry had provided an initial grant of Rs 16 lakh for the venture and would regularly contribute funds for its successful operation.

The main species that used to be earlier reported by various birdwatchers were the white rumped, slender billed, long billed, Egyptian, Indian griffon and king vultures.

However, sightings, especially of the Gyps species, have now become very rare. Species reported to have been seen include Gyps bengalensis in Niari Dhar village in Gurdaspur district (20-22 birds), along the Chakki river separating Himachal Pradesh and Punjab (35-37 birds) and near the Kathlaur wildlife sanctuary in Narot Jaimal Singh (50-55 birds). 

Chandigarh, October 2
The Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee commemorated the 140th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi -The Father of the Nation and 106th birth anniversary of former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Sashtri today at the Congress Bhawan here. PPCC president Mohinder Singh Kaypee presided over a simple function held on the occasion, which was also followed by religious discourses, by priest from all religions.

SANGRUR: The district unit of the Congress too observed birth anniversaries of Father of the Nation Mahatama Gandhi and former Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri on the premises of Aggarwal Bhawan here. Floral tributes were also paid to to them by leaders and others.

Ropar, October 2
The Punjab government would soon tie up with Centre to ensure marketing network and infrastructure support through self-help groups for promotion of rural artefacts and handicrafts in state.

Addressing a gathering after inaugurating the national Sale of Articles of Rural Artisans Societies (SARAS) fair here at local Nehru Stadium, Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal said main objective of the state government is to give boost to rural crafts that symbolise our cultural heritage. He added that 7,100 self-help groups (SHG) have been constituted under different schemes by providing loans, so that they could earn their livelihood.

He further said the fair would provide golden opportunity to the SHG members to share their knowledge with their counterparts from other states and enhance their marketing skills. “People should extend patronage to products of SHGs. Their support would motivate SHGs and help in improving rural economy,” he said.Badal called upon SHGs to come forward and participate in exhibitions to sell their products.

 He asserted that as many as 200 artisans from 25 states across country have been taking part in the fair. On the occasion of Gandhi Jayanti, he also paid rich tributes to father of nation Mahatma Gandhi.National SARAS Fair has an array of products, including handcrafts, gift articles, dolls, woodcarvings, night lamps, handloom garments, footwear, screens with rich embroidery works, herbal products and pickles were displayed in the fair. The fair is slated to go on till October 12.

Patiala, October 2 
Despite the state government’s tall claims of turning Patiala into an ultra-modern city, the city is yet to witness any major change as far as its infrastructure is concerned. 

Though Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal had announced grants worth crores for all wards of the city, still the condition of most of the areas here present a different picture all together. 

City residents are aghast by the condition of the roads, so much so that even the main road of the city at which Gurdwara Dukhviwaran Sahib is located, is no better. The condition of the roads has worsened after the recent rains.

 Roads in all major areas like Urban Estate, Mall Road, Officers Colony, all markets etc. are equally bad and the condition of the roads is deteriorating day by day.

 Amarinder Singh, a teacher, blames the inefficiency of the Patiala Municipal Corporation for this situation. “Despite crores in their kitty, the MC is not actually ready to spend it for constructive work. 

Almost all city roads have developed potholes, which can be terrible not just for vehicles but for human life as well,” he added. “We want the government to keep a check on the grants allotted to various wards and seek details of their expenditure. Its only then the MC officials would take up the problem seriously,” added another resident.

Chandigarh, October 2
Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today called upon the medical experts, scientists and doctors to carry out an extensive research for the curative treatment of the chronic diseases, besides bringing awareness amongst the patients about the lifestyle diseases like hypertension, diabetes, etc.

This was stated by Badal, while addressing doctors, medical scientists and researchers from all over the world during the inaugural function of 43rd Annual Conference of the Indian College of Allergy, Asthma & Applied Immunology here at the Government Medical college and Hospital, Sector 32. — TNS

Patiala, October 2
The IRB First Excise Battalion today confiscated 1,000 quintals of sugar, market value of which is approximately Rs 30 lakh.It was being smuggled into Ludhiana and Jalandhar from Ambala.The operation was jointly conducted by IRB and excise department officials, Patiala, and was led by IRB Excise Battalion Commandant Mandeep Singh Sidhu, DSP Gurcharan Singh and Excise and Taxation Officer Prithpal.

Five trucks, belonging to Isshu, Mohit and Sushil, were impounded at Uccha Pind, Sanghol in Fatehgarh Sahib this morning.

On a tip-off, cops intercepted one truck at Uccha Pind, Sanghol. During checking, they found 20 tonnes of sugar in the truck that was being smuggled from Ambala into Punjab without paying the requisite tax.

“The normal route is Ambala-Shambu Barrier-Rajpura-Ludhiana, but to evade tax the accused opted for Ambala-Panchkula-Chandigarh-Morinda”, said Mandeep Sidhu.

Each truck had 20 tonnes of sugar.

The officials said the modus operandi being adopted was that all trucks did not move together.

“In case of any trouble, the driver of one truck used to alert the other ones. However, we conducted the operation in such a manner that all five trucks were intercepted one by one”, Mandeep Sidhu revealed.