Jalandhar, October 22
As two dengue cases have already been reported in the Civil Hospital, it seems that city is on the verge of an endemic outbreak. Though both Health Department and Municipal Corporation are working hard to contain the incidence of dengue by doing exercises like fogging and spray, existence of numerous cesspools and ponds, which are continuously acting as breeding grounds for dengue-causing larvae, is already haunting the preventive exercises of both departments.

As per the record of the corporation, nearly 32 per cent areas, which come under the jurisdiction of the MC, are without sewerage facility. “In outer areas, which are recently included in the municipal corporation, there is no provision for proper drainage. There are number of ponds in these areas where larvae breed at a very high rate,” said an official of the Municipal Corporation.

Moreover, the corporation is already languishing with the scarcity of paraphernalia. There are 16 sanctioned posts of sanitary inspector in the corporation. Only four sanitary inspectors are on rolls at present. As per information, six sanitary inspectors have been transferred to the Ludhiana Municipal Corporation, but none of them has joined yet.

Similarly, there are two sanctioned posts of chief sanitary inspector and both these posts are also lying vacant. The responsibility of proper water supply and drainage and prevention of pooling of water lies with this core team of supervisors. It seems impossible to prevent water pooling, both fresh and contaminated, in the absence of the three-fourth part of the core team.

It is important to note that on the notice of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, the state government had formed committees at both state and district levels for the prevention and control of water and vector-borne diseases in July, 2009. As per the directions, it has been mandatory for district committees to conduct survey of affected areas before the next monsoon. As per the directions, both Health Departments and corporations/committees are held equally responsible for the prevention and management of any water or vector-borne endemic.

“We are doing fogging in three wards per day. Our workers need to get copies signed by the councillors of those ward. But in some parts of the city, water drainage system has crumbled up to unmanageable limit. In these conditions we can’t claim absolute prevention of any endemic. Moreover, we don’t have that much manpower or resources that we can conduct door-to-door campaign to inculcate positive temper in city residents,” said a health official.

“Every year we do extensive work and invest crores of rupees to check breeding of microorganisms in poorly sanitised areas. This is a sheer temporary solution as there is no concrete plan for the permanent management of numerous cesspools, ponds, blocked water tributaries, etc,” he added.

Jalandhar, October 22
Two cases of dengue fever were confirmed positive today in the Civil Hospital, Jalandhar. Two patients identified as Monica and Rajesh of Basti Danishmandaan area of city were admitted to the hospital yesterday and tested positive for Mac ELISA. As per information, 14 suspected cases of dengue, with fever and lowered platelets count has been reported so far. All other 12 patients were tested negative for Mac ELISA.

District Health Officer Dr Roop Lal said 151 primary and community health centres, 45 laboratories, 167 sub-centres and all major private nursing homes and super specialty hospitals are working as reporting units for suspected dengue patients. As many as 1,003 fever surveys and 199 house surveys were conducted as preventive measure and 55 blood slides has been prepared till now of suspected cases. Anti-larval unit of 52 multi-purpose health workers, 23 supervisory inspectors, 3 supervisors and 1 assistant malarial officer has been formed to do regular sampling and spray in prone areas. 

Jalandhar, October 22
Sky isn’t the limit for this mountaineer girl who recently returned after attending a 10-day national-level mountaineering expedition organised by the NCC.

Shweta Vaid (19), a student of the local Prem Chand Markanda SD College for Women, scaled a height of 19,000 feet to reach the Lamkhaga peak in the interiors of Uttarakhand.

She was the only NCC cadet from 2 Punjab Girls Battalion to get selected for this expedition from the region comprising Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Chandigarh. Sharing her experience, the mountaineer said the main motive behind the expedition was to make the cadets aware of the harmful effects of environment pollution.

“The expedition was an eye-opening experience for me as we were close to nature. Initially, we felt scared but as we moved ahead, trekking turned out to be an amazing experience,” she added.

Shweta was accompanied by 20 other NCC cadets from across the country, three GCIs (girl cadet inspectors) two WTOs, (whole time lady officers) and two commanding officers (CO). She is working hard to join the armed forces. Talking about her selection, she said the selection trials were held in January this year at 2 Punjab Girls Battalion where girls from all the colleges took part. Later the girls went to attend a medical camp in Delhi after which they were selected.

The NCC cadets went for river crossing, rock climbing, trekking and walking across difficult terrains as well. “I would love to scale the Everest one day to fulfil my dream,” she said.

Jalandhar, October 22
The prices of seasonal vegetables and commodities of daily use this week did not witness any decline as expected after the festival season. Rather prices of some vegetables and sugar shot up by few rupees.

Among the seasonal vegetables, cauliflower saw an increase of Rs 5 in its prices. It was available at Rs 35 per kg last week. After touching the reasonable limit of Rs 55 per kg, prices of peas has again touched almost Rs 70 per kg this week. As use of ginger increases due to change in weather, its prices have increased from Rs 60 per kg last week to Rs 65 per kg this week.

Onion, after witnessing decline of Rs 3 per kg last week again encountered price decrease pf Rs 4 per kg. Fresh prices of onion are Rs 23 per kg this week There is no change in the prices of tomato, beans and potatoes. Price of potatoes and beans was Rs 17 and Rs 38 per kg respectively last week. Similarly, price of tomato was Rs 18 per kg last week and remained unchanged this week also. Prices of Dal Moong witnessed an increase of Rs 3 per kg. It was Rs 80 per kg last week and shot up to Rs 83 per kg this week. Similarly price of sugar has also increased from Rs 31 per kg last week to Rs 33 per kg this week — TNS

Jalandhar, October 22
Suggestion boxes are meant to act as a connecting link between the general public and persons sitting on top hierarchical positions. But in some public welfare institutions, these boxes can be reduced to missing links.

The state of suggestion boxes lying ignored at the Civil Hospital in Jalandhar is no different.

The trouble might lie in the fact that there is nobody to open them. Nobody from the staff of the hospital can exactly recollect the date of installation of these complaint-cum-suggestion boxes.

The Tribune demanded information, of the past six months, of the number and nature of grievances of the public dropped in the form of suggestions or complaints in the complaint box, from the office of the Medical Superintendent under the Right to Information Act, 2005.

The startling reply of the office of the Medical Superintendent was that the suggestion box has not been opened for the past six months. The reply also made clear that the box was not opened as an eminent political personality of city wanted his personal presence at the time when the box is opened.

Hence goes the reply received in letter number 6691, duly signed by the Medical Superintendent:

“You are being informed that the Complaint Box installed in the premises of the civil hospital has not been opened for the last six months as respected Chief Parliamentary Secretary Avinash Chander instructed that the box should be opened only in his presence.”

The irony is that adjacent to the same complaint box, it is clearly written on the Citizen’s Charter that the complaint box would be opened every Monday in the presence of Medical Superintendent or In charge of the hospital and all the complaints would be resolved on the spot. It is also mentioned that whosoever is not satisfied, can pursue his or her case to the higher authorities.

Meanwhile, Chief Parliamentary Secretary Avinash Chander could not be contacted even after repeated attempts.

It is learnt that the hospital authorities never bothered to pursue this case with the higher authorities and had never made request to open the complaint box.

As a common man hardly has any reach to the offices of the Medical Superintendent and other concerned authorities, these boxes are the only justified link between the masses and top officials. 

Jalandhar, October 22
In the light of the fact that the industry in Punjab is in direct competition with the industry in Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh owing to massive tax exemptions in these states and poor supply of electricity for the past five months in Punjab, major industrialist groups of the district have demanded special attention and intervention from the office of the Chief Minister.

Representatives of the Jalandhar Chamber of Industries and Commerce, at a meeting with the Chief Minister and Minister of Local Bodies and Industry, urged the CM to intervene in the issue of 10 per cent hike in electricity tariff that the PSEB is going to charge from April 2009.

“For the past five months, we are running our factories four days a week for a maximum of 10 hours a day. This has eventually decreased our production up to 50 per cent.

Moreover, due to location constraint, we need to spend at least 20 per cent of our production cost to freight raw material and products to Kolkata, Mumbai, Bangalore, etc., said general secretary of the Chamber Charanjit Singh Maingi.

The chamber also demanded reduction in electricity duty which remained 11 paise per unit for 30 years, increased to 5 per cent in 2003, and later was increased to 10 per cent.

“It is learnt from reliable sources that house tax is again being imposed and new procedure of assessment of house tax for industry, commercial undertakings and residences is being introduced,” said Maingi, while demanding that new procedures should be discussed with industrialists before implementation.

Representatives aired the demand that meetings of industrial boards should be held at the district-level by involving all industrialists and the Deputy Commissioner

Jalandhar, October 22
As part of diamond jubilee celebrations of the Vajra Corps, a multi-dimensional expedition of an Independent Engineer Squadron was flagged in on Wednesday at Virbhadra Barrage, Rishikesh, by Col R.S. Bhatti.

The expedition culminated in White River Rafting from Rudraprayag to Rishikesh. The expedition was flagged off by Brigadier S.K. Gadeock on September 9. The expedition comprised of three phases including cycling, trekking and white river rafting.

In the cycling leg, the team traversed the plains of hinterland Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and rugged hilly terrain of Uttarakhand covering 700 kms, in 11 days. During the trekking leg, the expedition team was divided into two sub-teams, each trekked approximately 200 kms in 9 days in general area of Gangotri-Tapovan and Sonprayag-Malla.

Jalandhar, October 22
A faculty development programme was held at the Government Polytechnic College for Girls in association with the Regional Centre for Entrepreneurships Development here today. The programme was organised by the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India.

As many as 22 faculty members from different engineering colleges as well as polytechnic colleges participated in the programme. Punjab Khadi and Village Industries Board Chairman Vijay Sampla was the chief guest.

Tech event at LPU

EMC2, an international IT storage company, in collaboration with Lovely Professional University celebrated EMC Technology Day at LPU on Wednesday. The one-day event was celebrated for the students of B.Tech (CSE, IT, ECE) and MCA (II and III). The focus was on topics like storage system, storage networking technologies, visualisation, business continuity, storage security and management. The fair was attended by nearly 2,000 students from the field of computer science engineering, IT engineering and electronics. Officials of EMC2 gave prizes to the winners and certificates to students with more than 65 per cent marks.

Sports day

To promote sportsmanship among kids a sports day was organised at St Soldier Divine Public School under the guidance of Vice-Chairperson Sangeeta Chopra. Pritham Singh, Charanjit and Aman got the first positions in banana race, Karan, Rajwinder and Amanpreet in dress-up race, Komal, Simran and Barleen in lemon race and Ravneet in skipping race.

Chess champ

Aakarshan Gupta, a student of MGN Public School, Adarsh Nagar, got the gold medal by winning all the six games in the U-14 category of the CBSE north zone chess tournament held at Ludhiana.

World Food Day

The Department of Food Science and Microbiology of Kanya Maha Vidyalaya celebrated World Food Day and put on display exotic food products like pickles of aloe vera, onion, capsicum, pears, etc.

Scholarship awarded

A special scholarship award function was held at CT Institute to honour students who secured above 80 per cent marks. As many as 80 students were honoured with medals and cheques worth Rs 3.5 lakh. Students from various disciplines like MBA, MCA, pharmacy, hotel management, airlines, tourism, etc. were felicitated.

Guruta Gaddi Divas

Students of Guru Amar Dass Public School organised a programme to mark the 301st Guruta Gaddi Divas, which falls on October 20. The programme concluded with recitation of poetry and speeches by students.

Declamation contest

A declamation and extempore competition was held at the Government College of Education, Ladowali Road, on Wednesday. The winners were awarded prizes.

Certificates given

Students of Police DAV Public School, under the NASA Cloudsat project, were given certificates sent by NASA, USA. This is an ongoing project in which the students make their contribution by sending data when they are informed by NASA regarding the passing of the satellite over Jalandhar. Through this project, NASA scientists are trying to predict the effect of clouds on weather forecast more accurately.

University toppers

Meena Srivastava, a student of diploma in cosmetology at the Prem Chand Markanda SD College for Women secured the first position in Guru Nanak Dev University. The second position was achieved by Isha, followed by Bharti.

Lecture held

The Department of Physiotherapy of Lyallpur Khalsa College organised a guest lecture on Wednesday. Dr Sudhir Sood, a renowned neurosurgeon, was the resource person. He enlightened the students about the anatomy and diseases of brain and spine.

Jalandhar, October 22
Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and MLU DAV College, Phagwara won the overall trophy in the three-day zonal youth festival for Kapurthala and Nawanshahr districts here yesterday. The event was held at Guru Nanak Dev University, Regional Campus, Ladhewali.

Daljeet Singh, Senior Director of Doordarshan, along with Jagjit Kaur, Director, Youth Welfare Department, gave away prizes to the winning teams. The winning teams would now compete at the upcoming zonal youth festival to be held at GNDU, Amritsar, at the end of November. Meanwhile, the zonal youth festival for the Jalandhar district would be held from November 3 to 6.

Results:

Folk song: 1) A.S. Shergill Memorial College, 2) GRD College for Women and Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala, 3) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara, and SHD Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian.

Geet/Ghazal: 1) GRD College for Women, Phagwara, 2) A.S. Shergill Memorial College, Mukandpur and 3) SHD Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian and Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala.

Shabad/Bhajan: 1) G.N. College, Sultanpur Lodhi, 2) G.N.P.K. College, Nadala and MLU DAV College, Phagwara and 3) SHD Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian.

Group Shabad/Bhajan: 1) A.S. Shergill Memorial College, Mukandpur, 2) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and G.N. College, Sultanpur Lodhi and 3) GNBL Ramgarhia College for Women, Phagwara and Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara.

Sketching: 1) Guru Nanak College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara, 2) Kamla Nehru College for Women and 3) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and MLU DAV College, Phagwara.

Cartooning: 1) Guru Nanak College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara, 2) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and 2) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara.

Poster Making: 1) Guru Nanak College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara, 2) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and 3) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara.

Collage: 1) MLU DAV College, Phagwara, 2) St Soldier College, Phagwara and A.S. Shergill Memorial College, Mukandpur and 3) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala.

Clay Modeling: 1) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala, SHD 2) Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian and 3) G.N. Khalsa College, Sultanpur Lodhi and Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara.

Skit: 1) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala, 2) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and 3) St. Soldier College, Phagwara.

Mimicry: 1) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara, 2) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and 3) St. Soldier College, Phagwara.

Mime: 1) MLU DAV College, Phagwara, 2) St Soldier College, Phagwara 
and 3) Guru Nanak 
College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara.

Poetical symposium: 1) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala (Navneet Bajwa), 2) MLU DAV College, Phagwara (Navjeet Kaur) and 3) GRD College for Women, Phagwara (Preeti) and St Soldier College, Phagwara.

Elocution: 1) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala, 2) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and 3) S.D. College for Women, Sultanpur Lodhi.

Flower Arrangement (Fresh): 1) Guru Nanak College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara, 2) GRD College for Women, Phagwara and 3) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and SHD Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian.

Flower Arrangement (Dry): 1) GNBL Ramgarhia College for Women, Phagwara, 2) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and 3) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and SHD Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian.

Rangoli: 1) SHD Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian, 2) MLU DAV College, Phagwara and Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and 3) St. Soldier College, Phagwara.

Phulkari: 1) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala, 2) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and 3) GNBL Ramgarhia College for Women, Phagwara and GRD College for Women, Phagwara.

Vaar Singing: 1) Guru Nanak College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara, 2) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and 3) St. Soldier College, Phagwara.

Group Song (Indian): 1) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara, 2) Hindu Kanya College, Kapurthala and Guru Nanak College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara and 3) SHD Kanya Maha Vidyalaya, Kala Sanghian and GNBL Ramgarhia College for Women.

Painting (Landscape): 1) MLU DAV College, Phagwara, 2) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and 3) G.N. Khalsa College, Sultanpur Lodhi.

Painting (still life): 1) MLU DAV College, Phagwara, 2) Kamla Nehru College for Women, Phagwara and 3) St. Soldier College, Phagwara and Guru Nanak College Sukhchainia Sahib, Phagwara.