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Youth held for raping minor
Two lose fight against AIDS
Laying of foundation stone
HIV in school curriculum still a distant dream
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PDP backs farm technocrats
Lt-Gen Jaswal inaugurates sports complex
Varsity students bring laurels
Nod to 2,000 medical, paramedical posts Amandeep Murder Case Talks remain inconclusive, PDD staff threaten blackout
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Youth held for raping minor
Jammu, December 1 Official sources said the victim was found in the field by her family members this morning after she went missing from her grandfather's home in Chowki village late last night. They said the SDPO, Akhnoor, picked up some suspects from the village and during questioning Davinder, aged around 17 to 18 years, confessed to having committed the crime. Being well known to the family and parents of the victim, Davinder took the girl to a nearby field and raped her, said Additional SP (Rural) Mohan Lal. The girl along with her parents had gone to the house of her grandfather to take part in a jagran being organised by the family, the sources said. The jagran was being organised in the honour of the grandfather, who had retired recently. When the family members and other close relatives were busy in the function, Davinder took the girl to a nearby field and raped her. The sources said finding the girl missing, her family members started searching for her around 4 am today and found her in the field located at some distance from the house. The victim, who was in a state of shock, narrated the entire incident to her family. The girl's family lodged a complaint with Akhnoor police. The victim did not know the name of the accused, but claimed she could identify him, said Mohan Lal. She was taken to the Akhnoor Hospital, from where she was referred to the SMGS Hospital in Jammu for a medical examination, he added. "Since the girl is under treatment and in a state of shock, we have not recorded her statement. A case under Section 376 of the RPC stands registered at Akhnoor police station," said the Addl SP. The girl lived in the Bikram Chowk area here along with her parents, who had recently moved to Jammu from Chowki Choura. Her father worked at a shop at Bikram Chowk. |
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Two lose fight against AIDS
Jammu, December 1 A 45-year-old truck driver died on Sunday while a 39-year-old labourer breathed his last yesterday. They had been undergoing treatment at the centre for the past over one week. Both patients had been suffering from tuberculosis, fever and dysentery when they came to the centre. “Since the opening of the centre, as many as five persons living with HIV have died here,” project coordinator DP Sharma said. “With medicines and counselling we can enhance the longevity of life but the patients usually die of malnutrition or under-nutrition in the absence of livelihood,” he said. He said the government as well as multinational companies must give them employment so that they could afford healthy lifestyle for comparatively enhanced lifespan. The centre, which is first of its kind in the state, started functioning in April. It provides a free of cost boarding and lodging facilities to the patients, besides providing them counselling and medication. “Maximum number of patients visiting the centre are transporters or migrant labourers. They belong to Heeranagar tehsil of Kathua district of Jammu province,” Sharma said. To look after the patients at the centre that is being run by Bee En Trust and National AIDS Prevention and Control Society, there are two doctors, 3 nurses and 4 outreach workers. To keep the patients physically-fit, Yoga instructors keep frequenting the centre. “People still feel scary about living amongst the HIV patients. Three nurses appointed at the centre left their jobs just within two days after taking up their assignments for fear of contracting the disease. You can well imagine the mindset over this disease outside,” BR Bawa, a doctor at the centre, said. |
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MLA stays away from function
Raju William Tribune News Service
Udhampur, December 1 Revenue and Relief Minister Raman Bhalla laid the foundation stone. This happened despite official invite to the area MLA whose name too was mentioned on the foundation stone. It is learnt that the Singh was unhappy over the delay in the start of the construction work for which funds had allegedly been released in April, 2008. “Yes, I did not attend the function in protest and I hold the district administration responsible for sitting on the funds for so long,” he told The Tribune. But Udhampur Deputy Commissioner Ajay Khajuria refuted the allegation. Harsh Dev Singh was miffed over the ‘official negligence’ in kick-starting the construction work which should have been completed long ago, especially in view of the fact that all other new districts as well tehsils created in 2006 had their infrastructure in place. “I demand an enquiry into the inexplicable delay, especially because I have been repeatedly raising this issue in the state Assembly for long. It is the height of official negligence. The officials concerned must be held accountable for the delay in the utilisation of the funds,” he added. The new building is to be constructed at an estimated cost of more than Rs 95 lakh.Since the tehsil’s inception in 2006, the office of the tehsildar has been functioning from the office of Naib Tehsildar (Niabet building) set up in 1953.
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HIV in school curriculum still a distant dream
Jammu, December 1 However, the SAPCS attributed the delay to objections raised by some religious organisations in four states, including Madhya Pradesh. “After some religious organisations objected to it, the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) formed a committee inviting stakeholders, including religious leaders. The module was finally cleared last month and hopefully it would be introduced in the school curriculum in the state and across the country this year, may be within a couple of months,” SAPCS project director MA Wani told The Tribune. However, the subject would now be introduced as moral education and not sex education as conceived earlier, he added. Though the state Education Department here was ready to introduce AIDS/HIV in school curriculum, after four states created furore we also put it on hold, sources in the Education Department said. It may be stated here that awareness was being dubbed as the most power tool to fight the lethal infection, which has no cure so far across the globe. According to sources, India today has 21 lakh HIV positive children. While the NACO finally succeeded in evolving a consensus over the issue of significance, the school education authorities here were surprisingly caught in the time warp. Director, School Education, Zahida Parveen Khan said: “No meeting has been conducted with the State Board for School Education so far regarding this proposal but we will definitely think over it in the next meeting.” She felt that the students were already overburdened with the present syllabus and introduction of AIDS as a subject in their curriculum would add to
their burden. But Krishan Lal Gupta, a businessman, felt that the Education Department should consider the proposal of introducing sex education vis-à-vis AIDS/HIV as a subject from school-level. |
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PDP backs farm technocrats
Jammu, December 1 This assurance was given by former Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed while interacting with a delegation of the agricultural technocrats who called on him at his residence this morning. Mufti assured the agitating technocrats that the PDP would support their demands.He asked them to wait till December 5 as it was their deadline for the government to accept their demands. According to a handout issued by the party, while interacting with the former Chief Minister, the agitating technocrats informed him that they were forced to launch the stir as the coalition regime headed by the National Conference had failed to fulfil its promises. They reminded that on July 31 this year,the political adviser to Chief Minister Omar Abdullah had promised to solve their demands.It was only after his assurance that they had suspended their agitation. The delegation further informed that the Agriculture Minister had also announced on the floor of the assembly that the government would formulate a comprehensive policy to solve problems of those agricultural technocrats who had been engaged as Rehbar-e-Zierat. The delegation regretted that despite assurances on the floor of the House, the government had failed to take any step. |
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Lt-Gen Jaswal inaugurates sports complex
Jammu, December 1 The Dhruva Indoor Sports Complex has a state-of-the art indoor basketball court, two badminton courts, two modern gymnasiums with state-of-the art sports equipment for strengthening and aerobic exercises. “The Army believes in the dictum that a healthy mind stays in a healthy body. As part of giving a boost to the physical fitness of soldiers and their families at Udhampur Military Station, the Dhruva Indoor Sports Complex was inaugurated,” an Army spokesman said. |
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Varsity students bring laurels
Jammu, December 1 The students participated in a national seminar,” Scaling New Zeniths in Biosciences”, held at HMV College , Jalandhar on November 26 and an international colloquium on biotechnology, organised at DAV College, Jalandhar, from November 27 to 28. At the national seminar , Radhika Khandelwal won the first prize whereas three second prizes were bagged by Barneet Singh, Vasundhara Sharma and Mowkshi Khullar in B.Sc/B.Tech. and M.Sc. categories. Besides this, three prizes were won at the “International Colloquium on Biotechnology” by Priyanka Mahajan, Vasundhara Sharma and Mowkshi Khullar for excellent poster presentation. |
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Nod to 2,000 medical, paramedical posts Jammu, December 1 The decision in this regard was taken at a high-level meeting that was also attended by Health Minister Sham Lal Sharma in Jammu today. Principal Secretary, Finance, Sudhanshu Pandey, Commissioner/Secretary Health and Medical Education Atal Duloo were also present. Speaking on the occasion, the Finance Minister said the government was committed to providing better medical facilities to patients, for which liberal financial support was being provided. He said the creation of additional 2,000 posts in the Health Department was a step forward to mitigate the sufferings of patients in staff-starved hospitals. Rather said Chief Minister Omar Abdullah was also keen on improving and upgrading the health infrastructure in the state. Priority was being given to providing modern diagnostic equipment in hospitals and constructing spacious hospital buildings with focus on remote areas of the state, he added. The Health Minister said a series of measures had been initiated to bring reforms in the health sector. Rationalisation of staff in the hospitals was being affected soon so that requisite staff was posted in hospitals, he added. Sham Lal said professional auditing had been started in each hospital to make doctors and paramedical staff accountable. “We have to adopt a realistic and need-based approach to make health institutions adequately functional to meet the expectations of the people,” Sham Lal said. Sham Lal said a foolproof system had been adopted in the hospitals to check the pilferage of revenue on account of admit cards and for conducting various diagnostic tests. The funds so generated would be used for repairing and maintaining the hospitals, he added.
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Witnesses have identified weapon of offence: SIT Ravi Krishnan Khajuria Tribune News Service Jammu, December 1 On August 29, Nagar Singh’s son Jatinder Singh, aka Raja, had shot dead Amandeep Singh, son of former MLC Deepinder Kour, outside the Shastri Nagar house of the latter with this gun. “The four witnesses in the presence of a magistrate today identified the weapon,” DIG, Jammu-Kathua range, Farooq Khan, who is heading the SIT, told The Tribune. It was the same weapon that was used in the crime on August 29 and later seized by the police on August 30, said the DIG. After the weapon was identified by the witnesses it was re-sealed in the presence of the magistrate and it would be reaching the Forensic Sciences Laboratory for further investigations tomorrow, added Khan. On August 30, the weapon was seized from Kissan Flour Mill owned by Nagar Singh. However, after a huge money allegedly exchanged hands it was replaced with a rusted weapon of similar make. Sources said the SIT had to open the seized weapon at the insistence of Nagar Singh yesterday, but the identification process could not be conducted because of the absence of one of the four witnesses. The SIT had also identified people, who had harboured Nagar Singh and his two brothers Rakesh and Ujagar after a local court had issued a proclamation against them setting November 20 as the last date for their surrender. “We have identified places and people, who harboured Nagar Singh and his brothers, and action under law would be initiated against them. However, as of now the SIT had been focusing on the case,” said the sources. They also disclosed that the SIT had been trying to ascertain how much bribe had allegedly been paid to police and FSL officers by Nagar Singh. After his son murdered Amandeep on August 29, Nagar Singh within a week of the incident had withdrawn Rs 6.25 crore from SBI’s Hari Market branch, the sources said.
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Talks remain inconclusive, PDD staff threaten blackout Jammu, December 1 The ongoing indefinite strike by around 7000 daily wage employees of the PDD yesterday continued for the eighth day as the employee leaders held a round of talks with commissioner/ secretary (Power) BR Sharma, which remained inconclusive. “We told him about our demands and the meeting, which lasted for more than one hour, remained inconclusive and they called us to meet on December 14 for next round of talks,” president of the association Tarun Gupta said. He said they had served an ultimatum on the government till Tuesday to fulfil their demands.Otherwise, there would be a complete blackout of power in the Jammu region. “We have warned them to intensify our stir from Wednesday and the government would be responsible for the blackout in the region. We want them to fulfil our genuine demands,” Gupta said, adding that the association had decided to intensify its stir and come on roads from Wednesday. The PDD daily wage employees have been demanding regularisation of the employees who had completed seven years of tenure in the department, conversion of need-based employment to casual daily labour and release of the pending salaries for the past over 35 months. The daily wage PDD employees are manning the critical power generation and supply system in the state and over 100 employees have lost their lives in the past while discharging their duties. The daily wage employees have threatened to suspend the work on all power projects in the state and have threatened to stop the working on all projects. Earlier this week, when the agitating employees tried to come out of the power house, Janipur, to protest on the road they were stopped by the police. Irked by the police intervention, the PDD daily wage employees switched off the power supply to three districts of Jammu, Poonch and Rajouri for several hours. |
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Army organises education tour Jammu, December 1 The aim was to sensitise the young minds to development in other states and motivate them to be good citizens and pursue their ambitions in life. It will also provide an exposure to the children about the rich cultural heritage of the country and ensure social, cultural and religious interaction amongst them. The tour was flagged off by the Commanding Officer, Rashtriya Rifles (Grenadiers) from the Lower Krishna Ghati (LKG) area of Poonch. |
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