Ferozepur, March 31
Thousands of members of the Indian community particularly Sikhs would stage a dharna in front of the office of the Indian embassy at Milan in Italy on April 2 and would take out a march to lodge their protest against the alleged unsatisfying working of the embassy and misconduct of a section of official working in the same.

Harwant Singh Daduwal, president, National Sikh Gurudwara Parbandhak Committee and representative of Associazone Sikhismo Religione Italia, rued that they had been forced to take these steps as their repeated pleas made to various functionaries of the Indian government including the union minister concerned to take action against the erring officials of the embassy fell on deaf ears.

He alleged that a section of officials of the embassy had been forcing the baptised Sikhs to remove the sword (kirpan), which is a religious symbol before allowing them entry into the premises of the embassy. “We are being badly mistreated, disrespected and unheard by these officials when we go to them to take some help for our genuine and legal problems, which are being lingered on deliberately. A section of the officials have created some illegal agencies to earn money through these persons,” alleged Daduwal while talking to TNS on phone today.

"Our agitation is not against the government of India but it is against the unbecoming behaviour of a section of officials posted in the Indian embassies in Italy and corruption prevailing into same," he pointed out.

"Our organisation has taken permission to stage a dharna and hold a protest march on April 2, 2010 from the government of Italy. We have requested other organisations of the Indian community dealing with sports, immigration, cultural activities and other social acts to join the agitation," disclosed Manjeet Singh another representative of the National Sikh Gurudwara Parbandhak Committee.

He said that members of the Indian community demanded the immediate transfer of S. Chakarwarti, general consulate, passport must be given to trouble facing persons to regularise their stay in Italy without any delay, the information and verification reports from India be sent in short time and high-level inquiry should be done to find out illegal agents and their co-partners working in these offices.

Sources in the union external affairs ministry revealed that the Indian government was already seized of the matter and had been trying to find out a solution of the problem being faced by the members of the Indian community in Italy.

Bathinda, March 31
At the eleventh hour of the last working day of the current financial year, the issuance of sanction for releasing funds to the districts under Indira Gandhi National Old Age Pension Scheme may be a matter of satisfaction for the beneficiaries of the scheme, but it is otherwise a mockery of the existing bureaucratic and political system that compels the beneficiaries to wait for their social security pensions for months together.

Sources in the Planning Department said this evening that the sanction letter to release funds of about Rs 13.21 crore under the said pension scheme was sent to the deputy commissioner-cum-secretary of the district planning committees of all districts in the state this afternoon by the state planning department. However, in this sanction list there is no mention about the Barnala district.

The government today sent sanction to release funds of about Rs 43.71 lakh for the month of November 2009 for 21,859 beneficiaries of the scheme of the SAS Nagar, Sangrur and Taran Tarn districts.

Besides, the government has also sent sanctions to release funds of about Rs 12.78 crore, for the months of December 2009, January, February and March 2010 for 1,59,752 beneficiaries of the scheme belonging to the 19 districts of the state. These include about Rs 1.10 crore for 13,749 beneficiaries of Amritsar district; about Rs 1.44 crore for 18,086 beneficiaries of Ferozepur district; about Rs 1.57 crore for 19,711 beneficiaries of Gurdaspur district; about Rs 1.42 crore for 17,850 beneficiaries of Ludhiana district; and about Rs 1.40 crore for 17,572 beneficiaries of the Sangrur district. Under the scheme, each beneficiary is given Rs 200 per month.

Sources said the district social security offices of the respective districts would get the sanction letter from the office concerned at their respective district headquarters to submit the bills to the district treasury offices for clearance today. So, it was difficult to say at this stage whether they would be able to get the bills cleared from the treasury offices as due to the last day of the current financial year the treasury offices had already been facing a lot of work load.

Bathinda, March 31
Intensifying their pen down-cum-tool down protest against the alleged misbehaviour of former municipal councillor and a BJP leader, employees of the Bathinda Municipal Corporation (BMC) on the second consecutive day of the protest today choked the BMC complex with a number of vehicles loaded with garbage and emitting foul smell.

The activists of the Municipal Workers Union and Safai Karamchari Union of the BMC first stalled the garbage-loaded vehicles in the VIP parking and later, blocked the main entrance as well as the street leading to the BMC from the railway station side.

Significantly, the Mayor and the deputy Mayor had to park their vehicles at a distance outside the main gate and had to enter the complex through alternate doors.

The protesters staged dharna in the complex and raised slogans. They demanded registration of a case against the leader in question, Basant Agrohia, for allegedly using derogatory language against an employee.

They also warned the Mayor and his colleagues that they would dump garbage in the complex if they did not support their demand.

“We have given an ultimatum to the authorities till Thursday noon that either support us in getting a case lodged against Agrohia or make him tender an apology for the words he used against our staff,” said union leaders.

Mayor Baljeet Singh Birbehman said table talks would be arranged between both parties to find out an amicable solution.

Bathinda, March 31
In the much-hyped Rs 2.5 crore-worth General Provident Fund (GPF) scam in Government Senior Secondary (Girls) School, Goniana, sleuths of the Vigilance Bureau (VB) today arrested the alleged kingpin, the clerk who was absconding since the case was registered against her on January 1.

Surinder Kaur, the clerk in question, was accused of preparing fake GPF bills with “intentional” irregularities related to the details of the beneficiaries and also for withdrawing the amount from treasury accounts.

She came under the scanner when an official of the treasury department suspected the authenticity of the signatures on the bills.

Acting upon the suspicion, the education department held a departmental inquiry and found the clerk accused of making discrepancies since 2007. It had come to their notice that total 27 bills were “coercively” withdrawn and the last detected case was of February 2009.

On finding herself trapped, the accused clerk partially admitted to the fault and deposited Rs 35 lakh in the account concerned. However, the education department suspended her and put the matter in the notice of VB officials. Meanwhile, she was transferred to the DEO office, Mansa, from where she was evading arrest.

Launching an investigation, sleuths of VB (Bathinda range) had established the dubious role of the clerk and booked her under sections 420, 409, 467, 468, 471 and 120-B of the IPC.

When the case was opened to ascertain further details, the VB officials suspected the role of four persons, who had remained principals in the school during the period in question.

Confirming the arrest, DSP VB, Bathinda, Des Raj said, “We have been suspecting the role of more than one person in the crime. Now, the lady has been arrested and we are hopeful of some surprising facts emerging.”

Bathinda, March 31
The Broadband services in Bathinda and Mansa districts underwent a generational shift today as telecom major Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) launched its epoch-making Wireless Internet Services using the cutting-edge WiMax technology.

The WiMax provides a broadband service over wireless media with the minimum speed of 512 Kbps whereas the highest speed could be upto 7 Mbps.

Besides the district headquarters of Bathinda and Mansa, the service will be available to the customers in other important towns, including Rampura Phul, Bhucho, Goniana, Lehra Mohabat, Bhikhi, Bareta, Raman, Budhlada, Talwandi Sabo and Maur.

As per BSNL officials, the customers have to install Customer Premises Equipment (CPE). In layman’s term, with the help of one Base Transmission System (BTS), commonly known as tower, the company would be able to provide signals to its CPEs installed at subscribers’ premises within a radius of 15 km. The CPE would catch the signals and no wire would be used to complete the process, they added.  

General manager, BSNL, Bathinda, Vinod Parkash, said the company is introducing seven plans, including four plans for unlimited use of broadband. The fixed monthly charges will vary from Rs 220 to Rs 750 for plans having limited use and from Rs 999 to Rs 7,000 for plans having unlimited down/upload.

Bathinda, March 31
Local Pioneer Imaging and Diagnostics has started a multi-slice spiral CT scan diagnostic centre in the town at a cost of Rs 4 crore. An amount of Rs 2.5 crore has been spent on the Germany-made machine and remaining amount on the accessories. This is the third such machine in Punjab. The other two are already in operation at Ludhiana and Amritsar.

Addressing a press conference here today, director of the Pioneer Health Care, Bathinda Dr GS Shekhawat said the machine would help in detecting cancer at an early stage besides detection of fractures in a thin section in multiple fractures.

Dr Shekhawat said his was the only diagnostics centre in the Malwa region of Punjab and adjoining parts of Haryana and Rajasthan, which is equipped with multi-slice spiral CT scan.

Abohar, March 31
The proposed focal point in Dutaranwali village that falls under the wildlife sanctuary area has resulted in a tug of war with the Dalit community on the one hand and Bhartiya Kisan Union (Lakhowal) and gram panchayat on the other.

The BKU said today at the Kisan Bhawan here that it would support the village panchayat that had resolved to provide the land in question for opening purchase centre by next month.

However, members of the Dalit community who staged a dharna and held demonstration at the site claimed that 210 residential plots had been earmarked for a Dalit colony in 1974-75.

They were unable to build the houses as no grant was released under any housing scheme even when successive governments in the state repeatedly made false claims over providing a shelter to the Dalits. “We have hardly been able to arrange for two square meals a day and have to keep our children off from the school for assisting us during the harvesting of crops,” they said.

“Use of force to remove our huts for developing the purchase centre would be resisted tooth and nail,” they warned. However, the officials of the Block Development and Panchayat office as well as the Market Committee who last evening visited the village said about four dozen families were residing in hutments by encroaching upon the land earmarked for the focal point. But none of them possess documents to support the claim that plots had been allotted to them for developing the colony.

Abohar, March 31
The superintendent of the PSEB matriculation exam centre in the Government High School at Ghubaya, native village of an MP, located on the Abohar-Jalalabad road, has been relieved of duty after consulting the district authorities by the flying squad that was led by the principal of a senior secondary school from Abohar, sources confirmed today.

The squad reportedly found that two students shared each desk in violation of the norms set by the PSEB.

The superintendent reportedly failed to justify the seat arrangement by contending that the students were provided different question papers. There were 96 boys and 69 girl students appearing in the exam but only one female teacher was found on the supervising duty. She is not supposed to frisk the teenaged boys, members of the squad said.

The squad consulted the district officials and deployed her as deputy superintendent besides recommending other measures with immediate effect, sources added.

The visiting members of the squad were reportedly told by the locals that mass copying has been going in many schools in the border belt throughout the district.

However, neither any squad from Mohali nor from the district headquarter had so far inspected such centres.

The squad rushed to village Dhandi Kadeem and reportedly found scores of help books stacked in a room of Government High School.

Fazilka, March 31
“The Punjab Agriculture University (PAU) has launched 45 new varieties of different crops in the last two years. Moreover, the university has so far launched a total of 580 varieties of crops which is a record,” claimed PAU vice-chancellor Dr Manjit Singh Kang while addressing a large gathering at village Ghattianwali of Fazilka sub-division recently.

Nauzwan Kisan Club of village Aliana led by its president Karnail Singh organised an agriculture awareness seminar to inform the farmers of the latest techniques to cultivate cotton, horticulture and the pest management skills. Assistant general manager of Chandigarh region of the State Bank of India OP Bhatt participated in the seminar as the chief guest.

OP Bhatt highlighted the different easy installment loan schemes for farmers. He claimed that the SBI is the first bank in the country who has introduced facilities like credit card and gold card.

Bathinda, March 31
Annual athletic meet was held in the Dasmesh Girls College of Education, Badal (Muktsar), today. S. Rajpal Singh, captain of the national hockey team was the chief guest on the occasion while IS Marshall was the guest of honour.

Other distinguished guests included Olympian Avneet Sidhu (international shooter) and Manish Kumar, fellow, Panjab University.

The athletic meet began with the march past. The finals of 100m, 200m, sack race, three-legged race, 400m and relay race were held.

Amarjeet, a student of MEd, was adjudged the best athlete. The second best athlete was Bhinderjeet Kaur, a BEd student. Amrita Pritam House was declared the Best House in sports.

The winners of the relay race were Lakshmi Bai House, Amrita Pritam House and Mother Teresa House, respectively.

Ferozepur, March 31
The operation to curb the smuggling of narcotics launched by the police yielded another success with the arrest of Lakhbir Singh, a resident of village Gulaba Bhaini bordering Pakistan, with two kilograms of heroin by a police party led by the DSP Karamjit Singh, today.

SPS Parmar, SSP, talking to the media said that Lakhbir Singh, who was moving in the border area with a bag, was asked to stop at a check point especially laid near village Hasta Kalan of this sub-division for keeping a watch on the anti-national elements.

When a search of the bag possessed by Lakhbir Singh was carried out as per the established norms, two packets containing one kilogram of heroin each were recovered. The international market of the heroin recovered from Lakhbir Singh was estimated around Rs 10 crores.

He added that a case in this connection had been registered under NDPS Act in Sadar police station, Fazilka.

Meanwhile, information gathered by TNS revealed that Lakhbir Singh, whose piece of agriculture land was situated close to fencing wire erected on the Indo-Pak border, was working as courier of Resham Singh and Sukhwinder Singh alias Sukha, who were arrested yesterday.

The police would also send Lakhbir Singh to joint interrogation centre (JIC) to extract more information in connection with their racket from him.

Sriganganagar/Abohar, March 31
A married woman identified by Suratgarh police as Saraswati of village 8SD succumbed to her burns today in the civil hospital. She had allegedly committed suicide by setting herself ablaze, police sources said.

Meanwhile, in Raisinghnagar, one Pawan Kumar Nayak of ward number seven drowned in a reservoir, the police said. — OC