Karnal, May 2
Incensed over the failure of the government to ensure the safety of Dalits and initiate stringent action against perpetrators of atrocities in Mirchpur, the Valmiki Yuva Sabha today threatened to resort to religious conversions.

The threat was held out by Dalit leaders at a protest meeting at Karan Park here to condemn the Mirchpur incident and “continued” oppression of Dalits in Haryana.

Joginder Gogripur, chief of the Valmiki Yuva Mahasabha here said a “Bharat bandh” call for May 4 had been given by the Bhagwan Valmiki Aadi Dharam Samaj to protest against the burning down of Dalit houses in Mirchpur and the government inaction.

He said the affected families were not ready to return to the village as they feared threat to their lives. They had refused to accept financial assistance and jobs which indicated that they wanted security and a life of dignity.

Joginder critised the government for inept handling of the Mirchpur incident and demanded the resignation of Chief Minister BS Hooda on moral grounds. Alleging that there was an increase in the incidents of violence agaionst Dalits, Joginder warned that they would be left with no option but to change their religion if the government did not act. The feudal mindset was responsible for the continued injustice and atrocities on Dalits, he added.

A PTI report said shocked Mirchpur Dalits had vowed not to return to the village.

It said Devi, 45, along with her two sons, who are pursuing graduation, was camping at Hisar, along with at least 30 other Dalit families who had fled Mirchpur after their houses were torched.

The affected families were demanding rehabilitation outside Mirchpur. Devi's polio-stricken daughter Suman and her aged husband were trapped inside their burning house when about 18 dwellings were set ablaze allegedly by members of a dominant community.

The report quoted her as saying : "I have lost everything. No one can compensate my loss," said the distraught woman on the monetary relief announced by the Haryana Government to her family.” Meanwhile, BSP general secretary Man Singh Manhera says the government assurance to the affected families that they will be provided adequate security has not been backed by concrete steps. "Assurances are merely on paper. On the ground, there is a fear psychosis among the Dalit families left shaken by the gruesome incident. The burnt houses tell you the entire story," he says.

Krishna Duggal, president of the Akhil Bharatiya Dhanak Samaj, says that the administration is merely providing lip service. No help is being provided to the affected families, he claims. "All 35-40 Dalit families from Mirchpur have been camping at Hisar in a temporary shelter. None has cared to come to them and listen to their problems.

“In this sizzling heat, they are surviving on the food and water being provided by the Dalit organisations and some good Samaritans," Duggal says.

On Thursday, Congress General Secretary Rahul Gandhi made a surprise visit to Mirchpur and met the affected families.Congress President Sonia Gandhi shot off a letter to Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda telling him it was a "matter of shame" and that such incidents could not be allowed.

Hisar Deputy Commissioner OP Sheron maintains that the administration is providing all help to the victims and trying to persuade them to return to the village.

In 2005 too, dwellings of Dalits were torched in Gohana town. 

Hisar, May 2
Vinod Kajal, SHO of the Narnaund police station and naib tehsildar Jage Ram, were today sent to judicial custody for 14 days. They were produced before Judicial Magistrate Gagandeep Mittal today.

They were arrested yesterday on charges of dereliction of duty. They were stationed in Mirchpur village when the houses of Dalits were set ablaze on April 21, leading to two deaths. The affected Dalit families have been demanding registration of a case under the SC and ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

Despite assurances, this has not been done. — TNS

Kaithal, May 2
A khap mahapanchayat held at Pai village in Kaithal district today unanimously resolved to press the Centre and the state government to make an amendment to the Hindu Marriage Act in conformity with the age-old conventions being followed by various khaps prohibiting marriages among girls and boys of the same gotra or those living the same village.

The mahapanchayat decided to gherao the local MP on May 10 in Kaithal on the issue.

In a significant development, the INLD has extended support to the demand of the khaps. Ram Pal Majra, a former Chief Parliamentary Secretary and sitting MLA from Kalayat attended the mahapanchayat and announced from the stage that INLD supremo Om Prakash Chautala had given an assurance to support the demand of the mahapanchayat for an amendement to the marriage Act.

He said khap panchayats had a great importance in society as they were in existence long before the present judicial system came up. Mani Ram Kadiyan of Jakholi village presided over today’s meeting. Mewa Singh Chhatar, president of the mahapanchayat, announced some other decisions taken at today’s meeting. These included a demand for the review of the judgment in the Manoj-Babli murder case and its reinvestigation.

Mewa Singh clarified that no money was being collected or given to the families of those who had been convicted in the Manoj-Babli case. The mahapanchayat also demanded a reinvestigation into the Singhwal murder case. It also demanded that the Mirchpur case relating to the attack on Dalits be handed over to the CBI.

Rohtak: Khap panchayats, facing criticism over their stand on marriages within the same village or gotra, seem to have found support from at least one quarter. A section of doctors feels that couples of the same gotra should avoid getting married.

This view was expressed at a programme under continuing medical education (CME) on “Genetic counselling and bioethics” organised by the Department of Psychiatry in collaboration with RML Hospital, Delhi, and the Indian Psychiatric Society, North Zone (Haryana chapter), at the Psychiatric Department of the PGIMS here today.

Speaking on genetic counselling, Dr Rajiv Gupta cited the burning issue of same-gotra marriages in Haryana. He claimed that such marriages should be avoided because medical science had proved time and again that marriages among close relatives might lead to genetic disorders in the offspring.

The programme was chaired by Dr Smita Deshpande of RML Hospital and Dr Rajiv Gupta, HoD, PGIMS.

The Vice-Chancellor of the Pt BD Sharma University of Health Sciences, Dr SS Sangwan, inaugurated the programme. Some other speakers also shared the view of Dr Gupta on the issue of same-gotra marriages.

The Director of the PGIMS said CME programmes were of vital help in sharing knowledge. He said in earlier times persons suffering for psychological disorders and other genetic disorders were treated as a “stigma” by society but now genetic counselling was a helpful tool to absorb such people in the mainstream.

Speaking on bio ethics, Dr NN Mishra of RML Hospital said it was the moral obligation of doctors to be honest towards the profession and all principles of medical science should be followed in toto. — TNS

Chandigarh, May 2
The forthcoming municipal elections will provide an opportunity to various political parties to test their popularity in urban areas of Haryana.

Though the Congress and the INLD have declared that they would not contest these elections on their party symbols, they would field their candidates. The other urban-based party, the BJP, will contest, as always, the civic elections on its symbol. The Congress and the INLD have decided to form state and district-level committees to identify the candidates, whom these parties would support.

The INLD is one step ahead of the Congress in this regard. It has already formed a seven-member state-level committee under the chairmanship of former minister Subhash Goyal, with former MLA Sita Ram (Sirsa), Baldev Balmiki (Kalayat), former MLA Swatantar Bala Choudhry (Fatehabad), Ram Chander Janghra (Uchana), Surinder Dahiya (Sonepat) and Pritam Singh Guraya (Karnal) as its members.

The INLD has also decided the constitution of the district-level committees, which would be headed by district-unit presidents. The Congress did hold a state-level meeting of its office-bearers and other functionaries to discuss the civic elections here last month.

It was decided at the meeting that state-level and district-level committees should be formed to identify the candidates. The committees are still to be constituted. These parties avoid contesting the civic elections on their symbols because these elections are contested more on local issues than the state or national issues. If the elections are contested on the party symbols, it becomes easier to identify which party has won and which party has lost in particular areas. To avoid any embarrassment later on, the parties prefer not to contest on their symbols so that no quick assessment of the losses and gains can be made. A major issue in the cities this time will be house tax.

The government had abolished tax on self-occupied houses two years ago but rescinded the notification after the Centre withheld grants for urban development.

Ulhawas (Gurgaon), May 2
Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda launched the state-level census programme here today. He announced that after the second phase of this programme, all residents above 18 years of age would get multipurpose identity cards bearing their unique identity number.

Hooda launched the census programme from the house of Tek Ram, son of Badle Ram, in the village.

The CM personally checked the entries made by the enumerator and verified their correctness from Tek Ram. Finally, he handed over the census receipt to Tek Ram and asked him to keep it safe.

Later, addressing a gathering on the premises of a local government school, Hooda urged the people to cooperate in the census programme and provide correct information as this information would be useful in the preparation of future policies and schemes for their welfare.

This time, the fingerprints and photographs of all residents above 15 years of age will be taken and the residents above 18 years of age will be issued special identity cards bearing unique identity (UID) number. Before attaining this age, the UID number of parents will be used. These special identity cards will be useful in getting residence certificate, driving licence and voter card.

For the census programme in Haryana, 53,000 enumerators and supervisors have been deployed and it will cost about Rs 60 crore. The first phase of the census programme will be up to June 15 and the second phase will be organised from February 9 to 28, 2011.

Referring to the demands of the village, the Chief Minister announced the opening of a community centre, arrangement of sewage drainage system, drinking water, streetlights and repairing of the dispensary building.

Earlier, Haryana Census director Neerja Shekhar thanked the Chief Minister for launching the census programme. She assured that the information collected under this programme would be kept confidential. “It will be used only for preparing important programmes like annual and five-year plans of the state and central governments,” she said, adding that the information could also be used in the demarcation of parliamentary and assembly constituencies.

Sirsa, May 2
The internal assessment awarded to girl students by one of the two teachers accused of sexual harassment of a student of the Journalism and Mass Communication (JMC) Department of Chaudhary Devi Lal University, Sirsa, makes for a curious study.

The Tribune has obtained the internal assessment marks from the university authorities under the Right to Information Act.

This particular teacher of the department is said to have told the girl, who has accused him and her guide of sexual exploitation, that “she will have to fulfil the desires of her guide to get her dissertation completed in time and get through her course this year”.

The teacher has been found to be liberal to some girls in awarding assessment marks, irrespective of the fact that they did not score much in the university’s semester tests, while he has been a miser for others, though they went on to do exceedingly well in the university examination.

Performance in the university’s semester examination is no criterion for awarding internal assessment marks in the university and hence it will be wrong to impute any motive to this teacher, but still its looks very nosy as to what prompted him to act in the way he did while deciding the internal assessment marks to some girls.

The teacher gave eight marks out of 20 to a brilliant girl student of the first-year MA (JMC), who eventually went on to top the university in her first semester examinations, the results for which were announced in March this year.

The girl got excellent internal assessment from other teachers of the department, including the one who is alleged to have “observed a discreet silence” when the other teacher made remarks hinging on sexual harassment against a girl.

Another girl from the final-year MA (JMC), who secured the fourth position in the university in her third semester examinations, could get only nine and eight marks out of 20 from the two teachers accused of sexual harassment.

However, a woman teacher of the department awarded this girl 17 marks out of 20 as internal assessment, much nearer to her actual performance in the semester examination.

The girl, who blew the whistle on the two teachers, got nine marks out of 20 from the teacher alleged to have made the remarks “outraging her modesty”.

Her guide, whose “desires the other teacher wanted the girl to fulfil”, however, gave her 16 out of 20 marks.

She scored 396 out of 600 marks in her third semester examinations.

Interestingly, a girl, who could barely manage first division in her third semester examination, managed to get as high as 16 out of 20 marks as assessment from the “tainted teacher”.

She is the same girl who is alleged to have been present during the alleged act of sexual harassment.

She deposed before the university’s inquiry committee as well as the protection officer under the Domestic Violence Act to vouch for the innocence of the accused.

“The complainant is an ill-tempered girl and has levelled false allegations against the teachers,” said the girl benefiting from the “tainted teachers” in the internal assessment in her statement during the inquiry. 

Jhajjar, May 2
Giving a major setback to the family planning campaign of the Haryana government, the Ministry of Health, Union Government, has reduced the financial aid to each district of the state by 80 per cent for conducting vasectomy and tubectomy in the state.

Moreover, the ministry has also imposed a ban on organising vasectomy and tubectomy camps in remote areas and distant places. Hence, all those people will now have to go to the Community Health Centre (CHC), Public Health Centre (PHC) and Civil Hospitals.

According to reports, the ministry has released financial assistance of Rs 2 lakh to each district of the state for the current financial year whereas earlier, each district was given Rs 10 lakh as grant-in-aid for carrying out the family planning campaign in an efficient manner.

Till the last year, teams of the state health department used to go to remote areas and distant places under the family planning campaign in order to make people aware about the scheme through advertisements. However, according to the new directive, now only those centres would be promoted which have already been running the programme under the campaign. Besides, no camp would be organised outside these centres.

Notably, the state government used to rope in its manpower to conduct the campaign while all other expenses were borne by the union government. According to sources, residents of a significant number of villages in the state contributed towards the family planning campaign merely through these camps.

Confirming the union government’s move of curtailing the financial aid, Dr PR Kayatha, Director, Family Planning, Haryana, said grant-in-aid of Rs 2 lakh for each district of Haryana had been released this year which was Rs 8 lakh less then earlier ones. He maintained that camps would not be organised in remote areas and only already running centres would be promoted under the new policy.

Gurgaon, May 2
The Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN) authorities plan to complete the power infrastructure development and augment power supply to Gurgaon, Faridabad and Charkhi Dadri in Haryana under a Rs 430 crore World Bank project.

World Bank had sanctioned Rs 430 crore for the Haryana Power System Improvement Project (HPSIP) in August 2009.

At a recent meeting with the review mission of World Bank, DHBVN representatives maintained that under this project, Rs 119.43 crore would be spent in Gurgaon, Rs 167.41 crore in Faridabad and Rs 27.10 crore in Charkhi Dadri.

An amount of Rs 116.54 crore has been earmarked for the advance metering infrastructure (AMI) in the DHBVN.

The power plan meant for Charkhi Dadri is likely to be completed within 18 months, while the schemes meant for Gurgaon and Faridabad are likely to be completed in 24 months.

Eighty per cent cost of the project would come as loan from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the remaining 20 per cent contributed by the borrower as equity.

Major objectives of the project are reduction in transmission and distribution losses and improvement in revenue collection efficiency, apart from improving power supply to consumers.

“The AMI will facilitate a two-way communication between us and the consumer. The consumer will get to know about the details of his monthly bill, due date and timings for power cuts, and we will know about his problems. The system also has the facility of remote connection/disconnection and centralised control room for meter reading,” asserted Sanjeev Chopra, DGM, DHBVN. He maintained that under this project, the theft-prone naked transmission (LT) lines would be replaced with aerial-bunch cables.

Benefits of the HVDS include proper voltage up to the last distribution transformers of feeders, besides cut in losses and pilferage of power. Old worn-out and undersized conductors will be replaced and the aerial bunched cable (ABC) will be used wherever required.

Energy meters will be installed at all distribution transformers for an accurate account of energy flow down the transformers. This will act as a deterrent against power theft. Under the AMI scheme, there is a provision for installing intelligent meters supporting advance metering infrastructure on power connections of all 78,000 non-high tension consumers in the DHBVN who have connected load of more than 10 kilowatt.

Fatehabad, May 2
The Agarwal community dominates business in Haryana. However, the community’s participation in politics is quite low. Leaders of the Agarwal community today exhorted their members to come out of the confines of their shops and business houses and exhibit their political strength for the overall uplift of the community.

The Agarwal Vaishya Samaj, an organisation of the community, organised a workshop on “Vaishya Samaj and Politics” in the local Agarwal Dharamshala today.

Vijay Inder Singla, Indian Youth Congress leader and Congress MP from the Sangrur parliamentary constituency, was the chief guest.

MLA from Punjab Mangat Ram Bansal was the guest of honour, while Ashok Buwaniwala, former media coordinator to the Haryana Chief Minister, presided over the workshop.

“Education is the key to uplift any community. Educate your children so that they could reach the top position in bureaucracy and politics,” the young MP told members of the Agarwal community.

The MP narrated his own experiences as to how he graduated from a small leader to the Indian Youth Congress leader and came close to AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi, who later fielded him from Sangrur in the last parliamentary elections.

Bansal said in his address that the biggest bane of the Agarwal community was that they were afraid of jumping into politics. He said the amelioration of the general condition of the Agarwal community would not be possible until more members of the community reach to the top positions in politics.

Ashok Buwaniwala, who is also the founder president of the Agarwal Vashya Samaj, said the participation of the Agarwal community in the state politics was too meagre in comparison with their population.

“We have identified 15 assembly constituencies in Haryana, where members of the Agarwal community are in a position to win elections,” Buwaniwala added.

He also called upon members of the community to field common candidates in the coming municipal elections so that more members of the community could reach in municipalities.

Adocate Surya Parkash, a senior lawyer of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, also exhorted members of the community to think beyond business.

Local leaders of the community like Vinod Bansal, Subhash Garg, Sushil Bansal and Satyapal Bansal also addressed the community members.

Kaithal, May 2
Haryana PWD and Public Health Engineering Minister Randeep Singh Surjewala has alleged that the INLD had not deviated from the path of lawlessness.

Addressing a press conference here yesterday, he alleged that the INLD leaders intimidated small shopkeepers to close their establishments on the day of Bharat Bandh.

Surjewala said it was regrettable that the activists of the INLD issued threats to school managements and staff and even forced traders to observe bandh in some parts of the state.

He criticised the holding of meetings by the INLD in the premises of Jat College in Kaithal, adding that the educational institutions were neither offices of any political party nor a personal property of their managements. The minister also inaugurated the orthopaedic wing in the local Aggarsain Charitable Hospital here. — OC

Chandigarh, May 2
The Adarsh Gram Udyog Samiti, Rasina, Kaithal district, has been blacklisted by the Director of Scheduled Castes and Backward Classes Welfare Department, Haryana, as it was found guilty of misappropriation of grants given to it under the grant-in-aid scheme.

The samiti was given a sum of Rs 1,42,155 under the grant-in-aid scheme for imparting training to 50 trainees of the Other Backward Classes.

The funds were sanctioned to the samiti for the period from October 1, 1999, to March 31, 2000. The first installment of Rs 1,58,182 for 2001-02 was released to the samiti on October 29, 2001.

However, the second installment for 2001-02 was recommended to be released on the condition that the samiti would send the attested list of the beneficiaries and other documents to the Union Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment. However, the samiti has failed to submit these documents to the ministry.

The investigation into the issue found the samiti guilty of misappropriation of grants and as such it has been blacklisted.