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Polluted Sutlej bane of villagers
Power, water woes hit wheat yield
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Rising mercury worries farmers
Chandigarh, April 18 Unprecedented rise in day and night temperatures coupled with growing shortage of water and power as well as non-availability of migrant labour for harvesting operations are making farmers and farm experts of Punjab and Haryana a worried lot.
UAE Court Verdict
Moga college gets animal tissue culture lab
Centre seeks 40 days to solve toll row
8,000 employees not paid for 3 months
Checking Inflow of Narcotics
City bus service set to make inroads in Amritsar, Ludhiana
Power cuts exceed promised limits
Labour Shortage
Bon Sante: Gyms set up in five govt schools
Varsity holds marathon against foeticide FCI to buy more storage space
Heroin worth Rs 4.5 cr seized, govt officer among four held
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Polluted Sutlej bane of villagers
Teja Rawela (Fazilka), April 18 The situation has reached such a point where one can easily find villagers in this and neighbouring village Dona Nanka suffering from some diseases, mostly related with contaminated water. Dozens of residents have been suffering from severe skin diseases, bending of limbs, stomach problems and cancer. The Sutlej waters have been polluted by sewage of Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Kapurthala and Ferozepur and industrial wastes of tanneries of Jalandhar. “Almost all families have come under heavy debt as they have to borrow money to make arrangements for the treatment of their relatives,” pointed out Mohan Singh, whose two sons have turned handicapped due to consumption of the contaminated water. “Blatant ignorance of our problems by the district administration has been adding insult to injuries,” said Jagtar Singh, adding that there were 10 residents of the village afflicted with polio. “There is no dispensary for the population of 2,000 and doctors are rarely available in nearby dispensary situated in Mahatam Nagar village,” he said. “To whom we should turn to for the redressal of our grievances, we don’t know,” pointed out a section of residents. Even the fertility of agriculture land had been affected due to use of contaminated water and yield of wheat and paddy had come down drastically, they said.
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Power, water woes hit wheat yield
Chandigarh, April 18 It is not only the lack of power that failed the farmers. Areas that are covered by canal irrigation also did not get water due to the plummeting levels of the Bhakra and Pong Dams in Himachal Pradesh. The state production of wheat, which was expected to touch 160 lakh metric tonnes this year, is only likely to average 150 lakh metric tonnes. The state had witnessed a wheat production of 157.20 lakh metric tonnes last year. Farmers got a little power during a crucial period despite an advisory from the State Agriculture Department on May 22 and May 23 urging light irrigation was necessary to offset the effect of soaring temperatures on wheat yield. “All that happened was release of statements from the government promising power which never came”, says BKU (Rajewal) leader Balbir Singh Rajewal. The kisan leader, who is from the mainstream farmer organisations that have stood by the government in recent times, blames the state for the loss suffered by farmers. “Farmers in the state got power for two hours on alternate days for agriculture operations even though they were supposed to get four hours of regular supply as claimed by the government and the PSEB,” Rajewal said. He said he had appealed to the PSEB every day to release more power to farmers. “I was told lies and given assurances which never materialized,” he said adding that in direct contrast, farmers got regular power supply during crucial periods during the Capt Amarinder Singh-led Congress government earlier. Another pro-government kisan leader Ajmer Singh Lakhowal, who is chairman of the State Mandi Board, says yield is likely to reduce by two to four quintals per hectare. He attributes this to increased temperatures. Farmers, who are already reeling from the after effects of reduced yields, are now being advised to reduce the area under paddy cultivation with the government unlikely to meet the power requirement for this crop too. The State Agriculture department has issued an advisory in this regard. Sources said according to present estimates, the monsoon is likely to arrive in Punjab on June 29. Farmers will have to be supplied with at least eight hours of regular supply on a daily basis for at least 19 days if the paddy crop is to survive. Paddy plantation starts on June 10 and will effectively be over within one week, as the government has banned plantation before this date due to the depleting water table. Farmers are reluctant to choose any other alternative crop. “The government is asking us to plant sugarcane but it is not giving more than one hour of power on alternate dates for irrigating our fields at present. How will it survive”, says Joginder Singh of Kauli village in Patiala district. He says similar is the case of vegetables which are wilting due to lack of power availability.
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Rising mercury worries farmers
Chandigarh, April 18 Though harvesting of wheat is almost half way through, the state governments have been cautioning farmers against “saatha” or early maturing varieties of paddy. Instead, the farmers are being encouraged to go for seasonal vegetables as an alternate crop and wait till end of June or beginning of July for the paddy transplantation. “It is the rush for the third crop that is forcing the farmers to defy the government instructions in burning wheat stubbles in the fields,” said a member of the Punjab Pollution Control Board maintaining that “reports of wheat stubble burning have started coming from different parts of the state and have been on the rise.” He said, “Unmindful of the rising temperature, many of the reluctant farmers are continuing to burn the stubble to aggravate the weather conditions. By setting their harvested fields on fire, they are also finishing whatever little moisture was left behind in their fields after the wheat crop.” The situation is no better in neighbouring Haryana, where the state government had announced a lucrative cash incentive scheme for the blocks that have the minimum incidence of burning of the wheat stubble. “The farmers are realising that by burning the stubble they are losing money. They can get as much money as they are getting from food grains provided they use reapers-cum-binding machines and make pellets for sale to agro-industry. Even the price of wheat husk used for feeding cattle has doubled this year. Rice husk is selling at Rs 260 a quintal. But then they are working against the time. They do not want to leave their fields uncultivated till paddy cultivation.” “The farmers want to go for manual harvesting, so that they can save the wheat straw or husk and sell it to biomass plants, paper mills or even distilleries and breweries for use as an alternate fuel. But then shortage of migrant labour is making things difficult for them. The basic interest of a farmer is to get his fields ready for the third crop that may be vegetables, maize or fodder for cattle,” said Pishaura Singh, a farmer leader. Most of the organisations of the farmers of Punjab and Haryana are also skeptical about the water and power supply positions in the coming months.
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UAE Court Verdict Kanchan Vasdev Tribune News Service
Ludhiana, April 18 While other options like blood money would be considered at a later stage, the foremost option remains the mercy petition as was described to Lok Bhalai Party (LBP) supremo Balwant Singh Ramoowalia by Consular General Sanjay Verma in Dubai. Talking to the Tribune over the phone today, Ramoowalia, who landed in Dubai last night to take up the issue of these youths, said scenario was not as dismal as it looked. ‘‘The consulate is constantly in touch with various authorities of Sharjah. We had a meeting with Verma for an hour and we returned content that they are sympathetically considering the matter of youths and their families,’’ said Ramoowalia, who is accompanied by his aides Avtar Sigh Mullanpuri and Amrik Singh Varpal. The LBP chief said he gained a lot of confidence after meeting Verma and was now trying for meetings with director-general, Islamic Affairs, Sharjah, Talib Ibrahim Ali Al Noori and Chief Justice of Sheriat Courts, Sharjah, Justice Saleem Ali Al Hussain. ‘‘I have already moved a request to meet both the dignitaries to understand the case better. I hope they grant us time, ’’ he said. Meanwhile, he said, possibilities were also being explored to contact the relatives of the murdered Pakistani youth for whose murder Indian youths were facing a sentence. ‘‘If the relatives, who are said to be in Pakistan, are contacted something positive would come out of it, ’’ he said. He also said he was content that the Indian Consulate had already filed an appeal well in time. ‘‘If we act in time, half the battle is won.’’
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Moga college gets animal tissue culture lab
Moga, April 18 Set-up with modern techniques, this laboratory will help to guide the research students in working the effect of drugs on the human body and reduce need of experiments on animals. While addressing the students, Buta Singh appreciated the efforts of the college for introducing latest techniques and said such efforts would help the pharmacy education to achieve new heights at par with the developed countries of the world. With the inauguration of the laboratory, ISF College of Pharmacy has become one of the few institutes in the country to have the facility of animal tissue culture. In charge of the laboratory Sumit Arora revealed that this lab would help in study of cancer with the help of nano-technology. He added that various organs of the human body like lungs, brain etc would be preserved, so that instead of animal body the effects of drugs could be directly seen on the tissues of the human body for developing more effective medicines. —
TNS
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Centre seeks 40 days to solve toll row
Jalandhar, April 18 President of the organisation Charan Singh Lohara today said the government had already agreed to issue a notification with regard to the allotment of national permit for trucks. He said after charging Rs 15,000 per annum, the government would allot national permit to a truck, enabling it to enter any state without paying permit fee. Earlier, for entering each state, truck operators had to pay Rs 5,000 per state. Charan Singh said a committee of officials representing various states had permitted the government to issue the national permit to trucks. The income from the national permits would be distributed among the states by the government on the basis of agreed formula. A notification for giving the national permit to trucks is likely to be issued in the next few days. Charan Singh said the toll system had become the biggest source of exploitation of road users, especially owners of heavy vehicles. "We have urged the government to set up a committee of transporters to examine all contracts given so far and in future road users should be informed about the estimated cost of the project" said Charan Singh. He alleged that the contracts of various highways were highly inflated and need to scrutinised. The government has promised to fix the rate of Rs 1.40 per km for toll roads. However, it had now gone up to Rs 4.20 per km on the Delhi-Ambala-Amritsar road. Moreover, now toll companies had introduced more categories of vehicles to mint money.
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8,000 employees not paid for 3 months
Jalandhar, April 18 The government has not released grant-in-aid for these schools since January this year. “We need money to pay admission fee and other charges of our children. Delay in the release of salary has made things difficult for us,” said general-secretary of the Government Aided School Teachers and Other Employees Union NN Saini. Even the government has not implemented new pay scales in case of teachers of aided schools. “The government has done it in case of teachers of aided colleges. However, in our case it is silent,” said press secretary of the union Ashwani Kumar. Even pensionery benefits for retired teachers and other employees of these schools have not been released yet. Pensionery benefits had not been released despite firm assurance given by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal in this regard. President of the Lajpat Rai School, Dera Bassi, Nakesh Jindal said the government had not even given permission to fill vacant posts in these schools. There were about 2,000 posts vacant in these schools. These were sanctioned posts, which fell vacant over the years. However, the government was not allowing to make recruitment against these posts. Meanwhile, official sources said the government has increased the grant-in-aid for these schools to Rs 134 crore this year, whereas it was Rs 124 crore last year. In case of primary aided schools, the government has increased the grant-in-aid to Rs 5 crore from Rs 3
crore.
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Cops step up drive
Chander Parkash Tribune News Service
Abohar, April 18 Though to curb the smuggling of narcotics was on the agenda of the police, smugglers have been finding new ways and means to transport contrabands to Punjab from other states and from Pakistan. The addiction to poppy husk developed in the state as farmers had started supplying an adequate quantity of poppy husk to migratory as well as Punjabi labourers to extract maximum work from them during the harvesting season. Jammu and Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh, which never figured in the illegal business of narcotics earlier, have also become new and main suppliers of poppy busk, opium and charas to Punjab. Earlier, poppy husk and opium would come to the state from Madhya Pardesh and Rajasthan only. “Narcotics have also been finding their way to the state from Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand. Even charas has been coming from Nepal,” pointed out RP Meena, head, Anti-Narcotics Task Force, Punjab, adding that Haryana had become a transit point for smuggling activities. Yesterday, a unit of the narcotics cell had impounded a truck carrying grocery items. Nearly 13 bags of poppy husk and one kg of opium were also seized in the border area of this subdivision, he added. Meena pointed out that during the harvesting season, the demand of poppy husk increased manifold as even migratory labourers, who participated in manual harvesting operations, had been hooked to the same.
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City bus service set to make inroads in Amritsar, Ludhiana
Amritsar, April 18 Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal had inaugurated the low-floored city bus service in Jalandhar in 2008, under Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode, in a bid to provide residents with comfortable and affordable mode pf transport within municipal limits of the city. But, the service had run into red for a number of factors, including heavy density of illegally plying three-wheelers in the city. This had fuelled speculations that the concept had failed altogether. But, the service has managed to resurrect itself like a proverbial phoenix with the civic authorities turning tough towards malpractices like three-wheeler overloading, enforcement of pollution norms to some extent and due to the resultant 100 per cent increase in fares by auto-wallahs all of a sudden. The comfort coupled with affordability has given such a boost to the city bus service that its daily sale of tickets has jumped from a meagre Rs 35,000 to Rs 80,000 within a short period of past one month. “We are so encouraged by the complete turnaround and success of city bus service in Jalandhar, that we are going to provide similar public transport service to people of mega cities of Amritsar and Ludhiana within a period of one year. The residents of these two cities will also be able to travel within city limits by paying a meagre amount of Re One/km to the civic bodies. Not only this, I have discussed the idea of introduction of 7-10 seater three-wheelers in these cities with Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal, as it had emerged as a need of the hour after implementation of stern restrictions on overloading in case of three-wheelers in these cities,” said the Punjab Local Bodies’ Minister Manoranjan Kalia, while talking to The Tribune over phone. He has reportedly taken up the case with the state government that the civic bodies should be allowed to operate city bus services in villages and townships surrounding all three mega cities of the state. Moreover, since the department’s experiment with the pre-fabricated inter-locking tiles has turned out to be a huge success in Jalandhar, it has also decided to do away with the age-old concrete flooring concept by using new-age interlocking tiles for laying of floorings of narrow streets and lanes in all major cities in its bid to give a new look to these cities in future. He said all the civic bodies of the state have been asked to introduce the use of pre-fabricated interlocking tiles for laying of floors of streets and lanes narrower than width of 20 feet after success of Rs 1 crore interlocking tile-laying project in Jalandhar. “These tiles are cost effective in longer run, as one could easily remove particular cluster of damaged tiles instead of replacement of whole concrete blocks. The civic bodies’ will be providing contractors with these tiles, so as to ensure uniformity in design and quality of the material,” said
Kalia.
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Power cuts exceed promised limits
Patiala, April 18 The power board had issued the schedule on April 14, which mentioned that in all cities and district headquarters of the state, there would be four-hour cut in two shifts for domestic consumers. However, in some districts like Faridkot, residents are experiencing eight-hour cut in a day while others districts face cuts of more than four hours. “There has been almost eight-hour cut in our district from morning till evening in several shifts. The problem of water has also aggravated because of long power cuts,” said Jaswainder Singh of Faridkot. In Ludhiana and Patiala also, cuts are not being imposed as per the announced schedule. “If the authorities do not want to stick to the announced schedule, why to befool consumers. There has been power shutdown for at least four to six times in a day at Rajpura Colony, Patiala,” said Swaranjeet Panaich, a housewife. Ludhiana has been divided into three categories for scheduled power cuts, but the process being followed is not in compliance with the announced power schedule. “Due to rise in temperature, there has been a spurt in the demand of power, but still we are trying to impose minimum cuts,” said officials, adding that at present there is a shortfall of almost 250 lakh units of power in the state. They added that it had already been mentioned in the power schedule that scheduled cuts did not include cuts to be imposed by the local PSEB administration for the maintenance and upkeep of lines and equipment.
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Farmers go in for combine harvesters
SP Sharma Tribune News Service
Bathinda, April 18 Arrival of migrants from Bihar, UP and Jharkhand has been dwindling over the years, resulting in crisis in the farm sector in the state. However, most farmers in rural areas of the Malwa region have found the answer to the problem by hiring combine harvesters to do the work mechanically. They feel that this is cheaper and a quick alternative to manual labour. Gurdev Singh, a farmer from Bir-Behman, near here, said fed up with constant labour crisis, he has now purchased his own combine harvester for his 80 acres of landholding. He said the cost of harvesting each acre manually came to about Rs 1,000 while with the combine harvester it was a little over Rs 500. He is now planning to purchase a machine that would do the job of sowing the next paddy crop. Another farmer from Balluana village, Gurdeep Singh, said due to climate change resulting in the early summer, farmers had suffered an enormous loss as the yield of wheat had reduced by 2 to 4 quintals per acre. This has resulted in less maturity of grain that was smaller in size. Ashok Kumar Dhunikey, a commission agent, said the arrival of wheat in the market was early this time. Normally, the grain landed in the market around the second week of May. Three government agencies - Pungrain, Markfed and Punsup- were engaged in the procurement of wheat, but their staff was sitting idle because of the poor arrival. According to market committee officials, a total of 73,000 quintals of wheat had been procured by these agencies during the past 10 days. Today’s arrival was around 9,000 quintals. TR Goyal of Pungrain said the agency had procured 2,500 tonnes of wheat here so far.
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Bon Sante: Gyms set up in five govt schools Patiala, April 18 Assistant Education Officer Jagtar Singh Tiwana said these gyms would be open to school students free of cost. Tiwana said many government schoolchildren were very good in sports and often won medals at district, state and national level. These gyms would further give them an opportunity to train in better conditions and maintain fitness even as the scorching heat makes it impossible to train outside. The kids, too, are equally excited about the project. Students of Mandor School where the gym has been inaugurated recently by DEO (Secondary) Surinder Kaur Verma, children are looking forward to put this gym to full use. “It is going to be very beneficial enabling us to work out inside instead of fighting with the heat. Also for playing certain games, particular training equipments are required and this gym has provided us with all facilities now,” they added.
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Varsity holds marathon against foeticide Patiala, April 18 Around 1,000 residents, including schools and university students, elderly women, took part in the marathon that was flagged off by the MP from Sangrur, Vijender Singla. The marathon began from Thapar University and covered a distance of 11 km. Passing through Gurdwara Dukhnivaran Sahib, Chotti Baradari, Sheran Wala Gate, Fuvara Chowk, the marathon finally ended at the university again. While addressing the gathering, Director of the university Abhijeet Mukherjee condemned the practice. Expressing concern over skewed sex ratio, Mukherjee said such practice was against the cultural tradition of the country. He urged people to create awareness against female foeticide, protect women and work for peace and happiness. He said, “People worship girls in all religions. And yet they don’t feel shy of killing them before birth.” He called upon a social awareness drive to change the deep-rooted bias against women by involving the NGOs and the youth.
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FCI to buy more storage space Sirhind/Banur, April 18 Expressing satisfaction over the process of procurement, he lent an ear to the problems of farmers and commission agents. He assured commission agents to speed up the process of procurement and lifting of crop from grain markets by the FCI. Hussain said the FCI had set target to procure 115 lakh metric tonnes of wheat, out of which 55 lakh metric tonnes have already been procured in the state. Some commission agents brought to his notice the issue of shortage of gunny bags for storing procured wheat and demanded that they be allowed to use old gunny bags so that process of procurement does not get stalled. Reacting to the demand of the use of gunny bags, Hussian assured agents that he would consult officials and revert within 24 hours on this. He also visited Saddo Majra village wherein nearly 2.5 lakh wheat bags are lying rotting for the past few years. He ordered lifting of the wheat immediately and ordered segregating of rotten wheat and that fit for human consumption. He also ordered an enquiry into the reason behind rotting of wheat and said that stringent action would be initiated against officials responsible for delay in lifting of wheat from the open godowns. Deputy Commissioner, Fatehgarh Sahib, Yashvir Mahajan informed him that 2.10 lakh metric tonnes wheat is expected to arrive in various grain markets of district and 90 per cent of wheat has already been procured and rest would be procured in coming next few days.
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Heroin worth Rs 4.5 cr seized, govt officer among four held Khanna, April 18 While three of them were travelling a car, the fourth accused was following them on a bike. Mann said 870 gm of heroin had been recovered from their possession which was kept in polythene bags in the car. It is presumed that they were on their way to sell it off in Khanna and adjoining areas. The accused SIPO, Ranjodh Singh, created a scene during arrest when he showed the ID card issued to him by the state government. He claimed himself to be District Manager in the Industry Department. However, no such post exists. Ranjodh is at present deployed in District Industry Department, Patiala, and Mukhtiar Singh had retired from the PWD Department two years ago. Police officials said two of the arrested were relatives as Gurmej’s daughter had been married to Mukhtiar’s son. The police said Ranjodh was earlier deployed as an inspector with Industry Department, Rajpura, and had been involved in terrorist activities during the time of terrorism in Punjab. He was, however, allowed to come into the mainstream by the government and also offered a job. In charge, CIA, Ramandeep Singh and Sadar police station in charge Krishan Kumar Panthey, who interrogated the accused said that all accused had an old liaison with each other and they had been planning to earn fast bucks by hook or crook. Interestingly, during investigation the police found that the accused had paid obeisance at Gurdwara Rara Sahib in Khanna and also performed ardas to get a good deal in lieu of the contraband. The accused have yet not revealed source of heroin and whom they were going to sell the same.
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Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Badal, who won the Jalalabad assembly byelection, promised everything while seeking votes for himself, including providing potable water to this village.
Khanna, April 18
