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CHB notifies 40 need-based changes
Chandigarh, March 27 As per the notification effective from March 23, residents can now make the changes as per their requirements except, however, for those, which require the board’s ratification and submission of a subsequent plan. Another 13 ‘need-based’ changes are in the pipeline and are in the process of being notified which will take the total to 52. While efforts have been since 2005 to introduce these changes, it was only in November last year that a final meeting was held and these changes, as recommended by a committee, were approved. As per its notification, changes can now be made in doors and windows. In addition cantilevers can be put up. The board has allowed a three-foot balcony on fascias in the front and rear where no terraces exist by providing pillars from the ground not covering more than two thirds of the width of the facade, but with its prior approval to maintain uniformity. The board has further allowed coverage on the balconies wherever not provided with lightweight material like fiberglass. It has also allowed a steel grill in verandas where light and ventilation of the adjacent room is not affected, but could provide security to the house. The residents can now increase the height of the existing windows by lowering the sill or additional window subject to uniformity in a block. For this, the residents would have to submit the plan in advance to the board. The board has also allowed construction of a car park covered with a fiberglass roof in the front courtyard of the ground floor. With this, it has also allowed converting the scooter and car garage
into a store, but only for personal use. It has also allowed underground PVC water tank within the building line and structural stability of the house and adjoining house as well. It must be mentioned that the changes would come as a breather for those who had already made these changes and the changes would only be regularised.
GMADA to replicate
The Greater Mohali Area Development (GMADA) will follow the Chandigarh Housing Board (CHB) in allowing the need-based changes in the houses in Mohali. A special committee constituted to study need-based changes in the building bylaws has already recommended full coverage of the second floor on the pattern of Chandigarh. While allowing full coverage on the second floor, mumty of 7’-6” has been recommended on the roof of the second floor to approach the terrace. After analyzing the representations of different resident welfare associations, the committee comprising the Additional Chief Administrator, Estate Officer, Senior Architect and the District Town Planner had made the recommendations to the authority. “ Since the need-based changes in flats has now been notified by the Chandigarh Housing Board, we would take up the issue for approval,” said senior GMADA official.
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Director higher education flip-flops
Suspends teacher, lets him off in evening Sumedha Sharma Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, March 27 Incidentally, the complainant is not the alleged victim, but a college lecturer. The accused, however, claims that he is being victimised. Coming in aid of the accused is none other than the alleged victim’s mother, who vehemently denied that her daughter was molested. As for the student, she was not in the city. The drama commenced in the morning when just after UT Home Secretary Ram Niwas’ convocation address one the lecturers apprised the authorities of the matter and an enquiry was initiated on the spot. More than the incident it was the manner in which the director higher education conducted an ‘enquiry’, who was also present during the convocation address. College principal, J Raghu’s, room was transformed into a battleground with college lecturers leveling allegations and counter-allegations against each other. The drama witnessed submission of at least two more complaints before the director, higher education-both against the teacher, who has brought the alleged incident to the notice of the authorities. It started with a college lecturer claiming that a student of the music department had confided in her that a lecturer had tried to molest her and had even submitted a written complaint, which, she claimed had been subsequently ‘burnt’ under pressure. “This student came to me and said this lecturer had invited her to a house in Sector 20 on the pretext of giving her extra classes but had then tried to outrage her modesty. The student even wrote a complaint, which I took to the principal who then asked that the student redraft her complaint since “it was too vague”. The student came to my house to get the complaint re-written. But hours later, her mother landed up and urged me to tear the letter as it would defame the girl. The accused lecturer was threatening her with dire consequences so the mother asked me to destroy the letter and even threatened to accuse me of using the girl. I was forced to burn it but I brought everything to the notice of the principal,” she added. The accused, however, denied all allegations and pleaded that he was being victimised due to the ongoing politics over the award of roll of honour to one of his students. “It is a complaint by a lecturer and not the student herself. We have a very talented student who I wanted to get on the roll of honor. But the complainant lecturer was dead against it. To settle the score she dictated the entire complaint to the girl at her own residence and forced her to sign, which she refused. You can see that the girl in question has rated me as ‘good’ in her feedback form. She is otherwise an irregular student.” The inquiry committee, which sought to speak to the student, was unable to do so as she was not in the city. “That lecturer made my daughter to copy and sign a letter. When I got to know of the matter I went to her house and informed the accused lecturer. She threatened to murder us if we told anybody that what she was plotting,” claimed the mother. Eventually the mother ended up filing a complaint against the very lecturer who was arguing her daughter’s case.
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Teacher exposed of baring
Chandigarh, March 27 The movie, which is now in circulation, was captured by students on their cell phones when a lecturer, who is reportedly suffering from acute depression, removed his clothes and danced nude in the canteen. The startling incident, which was kept under wraps, has now surfaced following transmission of these clippings through bluetooth in cell phones by the department students. The teacher (name withheld), who otherwise has an impressive academic career, is a post-doctorate from an American university. He joined the university as a lecturer on contract basis only a year ago. Following the incident, officials of the department got the lecturer admitted to the PGI for treatment. “Until he furnishes a medical fitness certificate, the teacher will not be allowed to teach in the department,” said Renu Vig, chairperson of the department, while confirming the incident. Narrating the incident, an eyewitness, who is a student at the department, “We were sitting in the canteen when the teacher came and started removing his clothes. He suddenly began to sing and dance in front of the girls and behaved in a rather unusual manner. We were shocked and watched his antics for a while before a female teacher entered the canteen and asked the male teachers of the department to intervene. Some students even captured the entire thing in their cameras.” The incident lasted half-and- hour, said the student. Later, when the department got in touch with the teacher’s mother, she revealed that he lost his father at a young age and encountered a “bad” incident while doing his post-doctorate in the USA. Many of his students were otherwise full of praise for his teaching style and claimed that he was among the finest teachers in the department.
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7 arrested for cheating finance co
Chandigarh, March 27 While probing the case, the police stumbled upon the facts that those shown as government servants were rather taxi drivers, tailors or engaged in other sundry jobs. So far, the police believes the loss to be estimated around Rs 40 lakhs. Today, the police arrested seven persons, including a woman and two employees of Fultron Finance Company, Sector 8-C. Among those arrested happens to be the mother of one of the employees, who had also taken a loan by furnishing fake documents. The accused have been identified as Nawab Ali, the prime suspect, who was assigned the job of verifying the documents submitted by
the applicants for loans; Sunny Gill, a peon in the company, along with his mother Jasmin Gill; Mohan Kumar, Salvester, Vikram Ram and Hem Raj. All accused happens to be the residents of Dadu Majra Colony. Nawab allegedly left the company after coming into contact with the frauds. Sub-inspector Navin Kumar, Economic Offences Wing (EOW), Chandigarh Police, said, “Nawab Ali is the mastermind behind the fraud. He used to allure people by promising to give them Rs 10,000 for producing fake documents showing them as government employees. Besides this, he also used to raise loan worth Rs 80,000 in their names. He used to keep rest of the amount. The fraud was detected when the company found that the list of defaulters included the applicants that Nawab Ali had verified. “Nawab made fake identity cards to show the applicants, who were originally taxi drivers or were into petty private jobs, as employees of the PGI, Panjab University, BSNL and other government organisations. He had facilitated loans for over 12 persons in this fashion, said DSP Baljit Singh Chadha. Though the police has registered a case of cheating, forgery and criminal conspiracy under various provisions of the IPC on May 8, last, the accused were arrested today. The case was registered on a complaint lodged by Sanjeev Kumar Das, legal manager, Fultron Finance Company, Sector 8-C. Sources in the economic offences wing of the Chandigarh Police said the police was gathering evidences from the PGI, BSNL and the university to verify the documents submitted for the loans with that of the originals to find out whether anybody else from these organisations were also hand-in-glove with the prime accused. More persons were likely to be arrested in the near future. About the delay in the arrest sources said earlier the case was being handled by the Sector 3 police station as the amount involved in the case was less than Rs 2 lakh. Later during the probe it was established that the money involved in the case ran into several lakhs and the investigation was transferred to the economic offences wing. The accused were later produced before a local court, which remanded Nawab in the police custody for three days. Others were sent to a jail.
Modus Operandi
Nawab Ali, the mastermind, used to allure people by promising them to give Rs 10,000 for impersonating as government employees on fake documents. His job in the company was to verify antecedents of the applicants. He gave Rs 10,000 to the ‘applicant” and took Rs 70,000 out of the total loan amount of
Rs 80,000.
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Abducted son of industrialist recovered
Panchkula, March 27 According to information, the kidnappers called Nipun (21), the son of the industrialist, Amit Gupta, outside his house in Sector 7 and took him away in their car. Later they demanded Rs 80 lakh from his father for his release. The accused also told his father that if he informed the police or failed to pay the ransom they would kill his son. SP Maneesh Chaudhary said after receiving the complaint the police immediately swung into action and tapped the phone calls of the kidnappers. He said after identifying the exact location a police team was rushed to the spot where the kidnappers, along with Nipun, were waiting in their car. The SP said after seeing the police team approaching towards them they threw the youth out of the car and escaped from the spot taking the advantage of the darkness. He said the hands and legs of Nipun were tied with a rope. A case had been registered under relevant sections of the IPC and efforts were being made to nab the culprits as soon as possible, said the SP.
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Illegal Kundi Connections
Panchkula, March 27 As the power men accompanied by policemen reached the main chowk in the colony and removed the main cable, which supplied power to the area, hundreds of women took to the streets, blocking vehicular traffic for about an hour. Some children also damaged windowpanes of the complaint van of the department. Officials of the nigam asked residents to apply for single-point connection, which would be released on priority basis, and added that the applicant would have to deposit the consumption security besides completing other formalities. The officials further said it was being done to maintain proper account of the energy consumed by residents. Meanwhile, nigam officials tested the accuracy of meters and sealed meters without seal or broken seals at Saketri village. The billing staff of the operation sub-division were also present to address complaints of wrong billing. Around 12 cases of power theft and unauthorised extension of load were detected in the area and nigam officials imposed a penalty over Rs 1.5 lakh on erring consumers. As many as 50 consumers deposited the penalty amount and outstanding electricity bills on the spot to avoid further action by the nigam. Senior officers of the nigam, including managing director Vijayendra Kumar, director (projects) TK Dhinga, director (operations) AK Jain and chief engineer (operations) NK Jain were present to supervise the proceedings.
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Girl’s father seeks probe
Tribune News Service
Panchkula, March 27 Kanwar said he had submitted a written complaint to Deputy Commissioner Pankaj Yadav and urged him to get a probe, both departmental as well as independent, conducted into the mismanagement and deficiency in medical facilities in the residential school located 24-km from here. He said he had also demanded the registration of a criminal case against the Thai girls and Devpriya Jain, wife of school’s manager Vikas Jain, who allegedly protected the accused girls from disciplinary/criminal actions being taken by the school’s management under Section 120B of the IPC. He added that even though he had submitted the application to SP Maneesh Chaudhary for registering cases against the foreign students and the school management but nothing concrete had been done by the police in this regard. However, the Deputy Commissioner said he was not aware of the application submitted by Dr Kanwar as was not in the office today. But, added that would look into the matter after going through the application. Earlier, Principal Sanjiv Menon had maintained that students clashed over a minor issue as it generally happens in other boarding institutions. He said the Thai girls were protesting against the lights during late night hours as it disturbed their sleep. He said the girl was taken to a local hospital where she was discharged after first aid. Dr Chattar Singh said if no action was taken against the Thai students or the college management he would file a suit in this regard after March 29
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Rs 12.5-cr aid sought for development
Fatehgarh Sahib, March 27 Chander Shekhar was here to attend a state-level meeting of the Police State Apex Committee. He said, “The total population of Punjab is 2.7 crore and the number of vehicles here is more than 50 lakh.” He said the increased vehicular traffic and lack of infrastructure had led to an upsurge in the number of accidents. He said there was a need to deploy more traffic police personnel on highways and other busy roads, where number of
accidents had increased in the recent past.
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No foul play in JE’s death, says police
Tribune News Service
Mohali, March 27 The SHO, Nayagoan, Lakwinder Singh, said the body had been examined thoroughly and no foul play had been noticed. Inquest proceedings He said the victim was undergoing depression treatment at the PGI and blood pressure problem. The junior engineer had left his Panchkula home on Thursday, but never reached office. The victim was one of the witnesses in the cement pilferage scam. On Thursday, around 1 pm the manager of Mayur Palace called the Mohali police informing it that a guest did not open his door. The cement pilferage scam came into light on March 21 when the UT vigilance bureau arrested three persons for pilfering 200 bags of cement from the sub-store of the corporation in Sector 17. The bags were being dispatched to a private contractor, Harshwardhan, at Barwala, who is untraceable. The police had nabbed the truck driver, Hawinder Singh, and after interrogating him, arrested the father of the contractor, Jawahar Jindal, who was supposed to receive the truck. The police also arrested Chhedi Lal, the storekeeper of the sub-store of the corporation.
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Minimum temperature rises in city
Chandigarh, March 27 Even as the city is battling an unusually hot March, the heat is likely to intensify in the coming days with areas around the city also experiencing high temperatures. The heat is likely to continue in the next 24 hours with the weatherman forecasting the minimum temperature to remain around 20 °C. While Ludhiana and Patiala registered a maximum of 36.5 °C and 36.7 °C, respectively, in Punjab, Ambala recorded 36.6 °C in Haryana. “Minimum temperature in March is generally around 15 °C each year. However, the night temperature is around five to seven degrees above normal at around 20 °C and the trend will continue throughout this week,” a meteorological department official said. The day’s temperature will hover around 36 °C for the next two days following western disturbance over Jammu and Kashmir, the official said. The department has forecast mainly clear sky and dry weather during the next 24 hours over the region.
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Zirakpur residents rue inflated power bills
Zirakpur, March 27 They said the on-the-spot billing scheme of the board has not solved the electricity bill related problems. Dalbir Singh, a local resident, claimed that from the past six months, the PSEB was giving bills on average reading. Another resident Joginder Singh said the board had been slapping hefty electricity bills without taking meter reading. “Why should we pay more than the actual reading? It is the duty of the PSEB to ensure that the bill is genuine. They should generate the bill based on our meter reading,” said another resident. However, PSEB officials assured them of an early solution. “We have saved the data of every consumer in the machine and they would now get bills as per the meter reading,” said an official. —
TNS
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Tribune correspondent bereaved
Ambala, March 27 He had been unwell for some time. His cremation will take place at Ambala City at 11 am tomorrow.
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Nair to meet entrepreneurs
Chandigarh, March 27 More than 60 entrepreneurs from Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Chandigarh are expected to be at the session besides the representatives of the PHD chambers of commerce and industry and other associations. The PM had met representatives of 19 prominent MSME associations in August 2009, to discuss matter impacting the growth of the MSME sector. During the meeting, several important issues were highlighted by the MSME associations including, shortage of credit, need for focused procurement policy, prompt payment of dues, simplification of labour laws, formulation of one time settlement policy to strengthen the MSMEs and removal of bottlenecks in their development.
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Colourful events mark annual fest
Chandigarh, March 27 The function began around 11am and continued till post lunch, after which titles were given and prizes were announced. Hoots and cheers marked the mime and laughter shows at the boys’ hostels. On the other hand, colourful curtains at the girls’ hostels added to the whole ambience. Members of the Panjab University campus
student council (PUCSC) were also present at the function in hostels. Juniors bid adieu to seniors. Students had also prepared special tags and titles for their seniors. “We have been preparing for the function for the past six or seven days. It seems our efforts have finally paid off,” said Namrata, a student of MA II.
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Surgeon to get UK varsity fellowship
Chandigarh, March 27 The president of Royal College of Surgeons will confer the fellowship on him at the University of Glasgow, UK, on March 31. — TNS
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Book released
Chandigarh, March 27 “Lack of accountability is the basic malaise threatening self esteem and sense of social
justice. Recent example of merciless beating of unarmed helpless citizens demanding clean drinking water in Mumbai, and one of them losing his life for water, is a slur on the Indian system,”
said Sodhi.
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