Bathinda, March 16
Death of a 40-year-old man at the Civil Hospital here triggered protest this evening. The man was brought to the hospital with injuries suffered in an road accident.

Volunteers of the Naujwan Welfare Society, an NGO, along with kin of the deceased raised slogans against the health authorities and accused a doctor on emergency duty of callousness in diagnosing the patient.

Lodging a protest outside the emergency ward, president of the NGO Sonu Maheshvari told media that on receiving a call of truck-car collision on the Goniana road, the NGO volunteers rushed to the spot and brought the injured, Manjeet Singh of Hodla village in Mansa district, to the hospital.

“Initially, emergency medical officer (EMO) HS Hayer dilly-dallied in checking the patient. Finding no external injury, he administered an injection and asked us to take him away,” he alleged.

Maheshwari further alleged, “We were on way to leave him at the spot of accident where his kin were getting the truck repaired, but he started feeling uneasy. Finding his condition serious, we took him back to the hospital where the EMO resisted in admitting him. Instead of checking the patient, the doctor indulged in grumbling and used derogatory language. However, with the intervention of other doctors, the patient was admitted but within two minutes he died.”

A volunteer of the NGO, Rohit Garg, openly accused Dr Hayer of general misbehaviour with NGO volunteers who bring the injured to the hospital.

To pacify the protesters, many senior doctors, including assistant civil surgeon IB Aggarwal and SMO Vinod Garg, assured to investigate the matter through a special panel of doctors.

They added that the post-mortem examination of the body would also be conducted through a board of doctors.

Dr HS Hayer was not available for his comments.

Bathinda, March 16
The excise and taxation department earned about Rs 9.5 crore from nearly 6,000 applications received for allotment of 380 vends in the district. Today was the last date for the receipt of applications. The allotment of vends would be done through a draw system on March 19.

Compared to the previous year, the number of vends for the Punjab Medium Liquor (L-14 A) and Indian Made Foreign Liquor (L-2) have increased from 346 to 380 but the number of applications has been decreased from 7,207 to 6,000.

Sources in the office of the assistant excise and taxation commissioner (AETC), Bathinda, informed that most of the big players of the trade had applied in partnership.

Giving details, they stated that two major groups, namely Shivji Ram and Pawan Groups, were the biggest applicants with around 450 applications. Meanwhile, three other renowned groups running under the names of Paunty Chadha, Shiv Lal and Deep Malhotra also jointly participated by submitting about 325 applications under different names. Further, the Harish-Punia group and the Bahia group have also come up with large number of applications of about 200 and 300 applications, respectively.

The excise officials witnessed a race for Kanakwal group of vends, which includes four vends of Punjab Medium Liquor (PML) in three villages of Kanakwal, Ramsara and Phulokhari. The villages are situated around the Guru Gobind Singh refinery where thousand of migrant labourers are settled these days. The group is to be allotted with a license fee of Rs 70 lakh. Over 400 applications have been received for the same with Rs 10,000 as application fee.

Number of applicants for 70 vends located within the limits of Bathinda Municipal Corporation (BMC) has witnessed a downfall in comparison to the last year when the number was 621. This time, due to the hike in license fee and enlargement of groups, the department has received only 185 applications.

AETC, Bathinda, Pawan Garg informed that the liquor quota for both the PML and IMFL, which was fixed at 47.6 lakh proof litres for previous year, had now been increased to 56.38 lakh proof litres for the coming year.

He added that last year, the department earned Rs 64.25 crore revenue through licence fee, which has now been fixed at Rs 82.32 crore for the coming financial year.

Bathinda, March 16
Sleuths of the Vigilance Bureau (Bathinda range) today caught a doctor of the Civil Hospital, Sardoolgarh, red-handed while he was accepting a bribe of Rs 5,000 from a farmer, whose daughter was allegedly killed by her in-laws.

The doctor, Vijay Kumar Arora, was reportedly accepting the bribe as a token money for writing his opinion on the viscera report of the deceased.

Speaking to TNS, the complainant, Amarjeet Singh of village Fatta Malo Ka (Mansa), stated that his daughter Amandeep Kaur (23) was married to Gurjeet Singh of Ghuddu Wala village and was blessed with a son but her husband and in-laws kept harassing her for dowry.

“She used to remain under depression. On December 23, 2009, we visited her in-laws house by chance and found Gurjeet, his mother Surjeet Kaur and father Joginder Singh pouring some poisonous liquid in her mouth. Rescuing her from the custody of the trio, we rushed her to the Civil Hospital, Sardoolgarh. From there, she was referred to the Civil Hospital, Mansa, where she died,” claimed Amarjeet Singh.

“Informing the police, we took the body to our house. On the next day, we took it to the Civil Hospital, Sardoolgarh, for post-mortem examination and noticed marks of strangulation on her neck,” he added.

Amarjeet said, “A two-member board of doctors conducted her post-mortem examination and sent the viscera for a lab test. In the post-mortem examination report, the doctors did not mention that poisonous substance caused the death. Acting upon our statement, the Jhunir police lodged a case of dowry death under sections 304-B and 34 of the IPC against Gurjeet and his parents.”

“However, the police kept on delaying the arrest of the accused trio stating that they were waiting for the viscera report to establish the charge. Irked over the delay, we met several police officials but in vain. Finally, the viscera report confirmed poisoning as a cause of death. Then, the police began waiting for the opinion of the doctor, who conducted the post-mortem examination,” the complainant claimed.

About today’s development, he said, “I urged Dr Vijay Kumar Arora to complete the legal formality but he flatly refused to give his opinion unless he got was given a sum of Rs 20,000. Later, the deal was fixed at Rs 5,000 as token money and the rest amount was to be paid on receipt of documents. Meanwhile, I contacted the VB sleuths, who laid a trap and nabbed the doctor while he was receiving the amount from me at his office today,” he alleged.

Confirming the facts, SSP VB (Bathinda range) Chaman Lal said a team of VB sleuths, led by DSP (VB) Mansa Narender Pal Singh, nabbed the doctor red-handed in the presence of witnesses and shadow witnesses. After completing legal formalities, the accused had been booked under the Prevention of Corruption Act, the SSP added.

Abohar, March 16
Evergreen Bollywood movie “Waqt” truly depicts the sentiments of about 64 families who survived during the unprecedented demolition operation in the ancient Mud Fort area on September 26 last year. Some of them complain of having sleepless nights as their houses were left isolated or partially demolished. Their appeals against dispossession are pending with the Punjab and Haryana High Court that had granted stay orders initially.

Meanwhile, the Archeological Survey of India (ASI) has almost completed encircling of the vacated space of the Mud Fort spread over eight acre with barbed wire under its 22.5 lakh budget. Pucca pillars were installed to ensure that the barbed wire fencing is not damaged.

Notably, most of the houses were razed to the ground by the sub-divisional administration by using half a dozen JCB machines under security cover provided by the district police on September 26 last year.

The authorities had reportedly turned down verbal requests made by some political leaders as the ASI had been under heavy fire thrice in the Parliament for not getting ancient monument vacated; Mud Fort was the only monument that figured in the list for Punjab.

Most of the displaced families have now raised makeshift houses near the historic Panjpeer mound but there were some who could not arrange money and have to take shelter in huts those are covered by polythene sheets.

It needs to be mentioned that most of the families, who were rendered roofless due to demolition of houses, belonged to the Rai Sikh community. They had migrated from West Punjab province (now in Pakistan) due to the partition of the country in August 1947. These illegal occupants of the Mud Fort area were provided with electricity, sewerage and water supply connections thanks to the vote bank politics. Sewerage pipeline still exists in the area besides streetlight poles.

The government has not ordered probe to identify the officials who allowed encroachments/amenities during the past four decades.

Mud Fort is believed to be a part of the old town identified as Abha Nagari/Abu Nagari in the history dated back to 14th century and was ruled by Rajput kings of Jodhpur and Bikaner states. 

Moga, March 16
The Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY), an ambitious project of the Union Government to provide health insurance cover to the people living below the poverty line (BPL), has practically failed to take off in the Moga district probably due to negligence of the service providing agency and the state health corporation even as 6,916 smart cards had already been made during the past six months.

Though the Union Government announced this scheme on October 2, 2007, the enrollment of the BPL families for making smart cards started on August 24, 2009 in this district.

So far, ‘safeway’ the service providing agency has managed to enroll only 6,916 BPL families out of the total of 19,339 families (as per the BPL survey of 2002) and that too with a technical mistake of making enteries of only the heads of the BPL families in the biometric-enabled smart cards, containing fingerprints and photographs of the bearer.

The other family members apart from the heads had not been enrolled and their data has also not been updated in the online system. As such, the system of providing insurance to the poor families has not yet begun in the district.

An official of the state government revealed to The Tribune that the process of making fresh smart cards was stopped a few weeks back for the time being due to which 12,423 families had been left uncovered under the scheme.

The Union Government had given enough time to the service providing agency and the state government to make smart cards of all the BPL families but this work could not be completed in time.

As per the reports, no insurance claim has been made as on date in Moga even as some patients had started coming to the hospitals including both private and government approved by the Union Government for the purpose.

As many as 17 private and six government hospitals had been approved by the government under this scheme here.

It was learnt that the local authorities of the health coporation, which is the monitoring agency, did not even possess the record of the smart cards made by the agency and the progress report of the insurance claims and the patients that had visited the hospitals.

The District Magistrate SS Johal has called a meeting of the health authorities and the service providing agency on Wednesday to review this scheme.

Bathinda, March 16
Alleging that the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) is not being implemented properly in Punjab, leaders of the CPI (ML), the Mazdoor Mukti Morcha (MMM) and the Punjab Kisan Union today demanded at least Rs 300 (in place of Rs 123) per day as wages for NREGA workers along with work for 200 days instead of 100 days a year.

State general secretary of the MMM Bhagwant Singh Samao alleged that despite guaranteed 100 days work for job card holders prepared under the NREGA, 100 days work was not being provided to the workers in various parts of the state. Besides, their attendance was also not being marked on the job cards at several places. Thus, a big fraud was being committed by the authorities concerned in the implementation of the NREG scheme, he further alleged. Samao demanded a CBI inquiry into the alleged fraud.

Samao said Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal was claiming that the workers were not ready to work under the NREGA scheme in a big way due to lesser wages. He said if the CM thought so then he should enhance their wages as Haryana was already paying Rs 3,700 as minimum wages to the NREG scheme workers.

State secretary of the CPI (ML) Rajwinder Singh Rana and president of the Punjab Kisan Union Ruldu Singh Mansa said more than 3,000 activists of the CPI (ML), farmers and labourers would stage a dharna in front of the Parliament on March 26 in Delhi to demand land for landless labourers, employment for agriculture workers, respect for all labourers, control over rising prices.

The dharna was being organised by the CPI (ML), they added.

Both leaders also demanded strict implementation of 18 acre land ceiling in letter and spirit. They also said the land ceiling should be extended to the industrial units also.

Abohar, March 16
A minor boy who was pulling a bullock cart was crushed to death by an unidentified jeep on the Subhash Nagar bypass here last night, sources confirmed today.

As per the information, Ranbir (13), a migrant from Uttar Pradesh, along with two friends was transporting green fodder from the fields to his residence in Subhash Nagar when a speedy jeep hit him and escaped.

The city police shifted the body to the civil hospital where postmortem was conducted today before handing it over to the parents.

Meanwhile, another report received from Sriganganagar said one Gursewak Singh (25) was crushed under the wheels when an overloaded private bus overturned near village Chak 3K on Sriganganagar- Mirzewala border road late last evening.

The bus fell down in a khud close to the railway line. SHO Suresh Meena said two other passengers had sustained injuries. The driver escaped after the mishap. A case has been registered in this regard, sources said.— OC

Bathinda, March 16
On the call of Private College Non-Teaching Employees Union (Punjab and Chandigarh), the non-teaching staff of local DAV college on Tuesday observed a strike and staged a dharna at the college gate for several hours.

These employees have been boycotting practical and theory examinations of the universities since March 7 in support of their demands, including implementation of new pay scales from January 1, 2006, interim relief from November 1, 2006, hike in medical allowance, lifting of ban imposed on new recruitments.

Bathinda, March 16
On the occasion of bhog ceremony of late Ramji Dass Singla, his sons donated Rs 21,000 to Sahara Jan Sewa, a local NGO, for the welfare of those persons, who have no one to support them. — TNS

Moga, March 16
A minor Dalit girl Mamta Rani has been kidnapped from her house from Lahorian Mohalla of Moga by a youth living in her neighbourhood.

The police has registered a criminal case under sections 363 and 366-A of the IPC against Kala Singh on the statement of Luxmi Devi, mother of the girl in the city police station (South) last evening.

The mother has alleged that Kala had abducted her daughter from their house. There were no whereabouts of the girl and no arrest was made, said a police officer, when the news report was last filed.