Chandigarh, June 1
Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda today announced a bonanza for state roadways drivers and conductors.

Henceforth, the initial salary of the drivers and conductors will be more than doubled.

The decision will give a financial benefit to the roadways employees to the tune of Rs 50 crore per annum. The employees will also get a bonus of Rs 3,500 on Diwali.

The initial pay of the Roadways drivers, which was Rs 4,236 for the first four years of their service, has now been enhanced to Rs 10,000 per month.

Similarly, the pay of the conductors will now be Rs 8,000 per month instead of Rs 3,976, which they were getting for the first four years of the service.The Roadways employees will now be given the minimum pay scale after three years, whereas earlier they were given fixed pay for four years.

As per the new decision, after three years of induction, the monthly pay of the drivers and the conductors will be Rs 13,500 and Rs 11,540, respectively. The employees will get the normal pay scale from the sixth year, which was earlier seven years.

These announcements were made by Hooda at a meeting with representatives of the Haryana Roadways Workers Union affiliated with the INTUC, labour wing of the Congress. No representative of other unions was present at the meeting.

Hooda also announced that 6,000 vacant posts in the Transport Department would be filled and 1,500 new buses would be purchased during the current financial year. He also accepted a long-pending demand of calculating the earned leave of more than 300 days for drivers, conductors and workshop workers.

Earlier, this benefit was not available to them. In another major decision, the demand of scraping the post of fitter in workshop was accepted. Now, they would be designated as mechanic and their promotional avenues would be increased.

The other demands of regularisation of service after 240 days and regularising the services of employees recruited in 1993 strike have been referred to a committee headed by the Chief Secretary.

The union delegation was led by Dharambir Singh, Jangbir Singh Lakra and Azad Singh Malik.

Karnal, June 1
Faced with the challenge of breaking yield barriers and to cater to the needs to all sections of dairy farmers, the National Dairy Research Institute has taken a major initiative- to launch National Academy of Dairy Sciences-which would be its think tank.

The academy would give advice on policy matters for growth of quality dairy farming education and research, act as a nucleus for promoting inter-institutional collaboration, facilitate conduct of national and international workshops and act as a forum for nomenclature of degrees.

The initiative was taken at a national workshop held here to draw the road map for dairy farming education and research in India so as to make it more relevant to serve the needs of large and small milk-processing units and also include business management as part of the curriculum.

Eminent scientists and policy-makers from all professional dairy education institutes in India, who participated, were in total agreement that that a graduate and postgraduate student in dairy farming must be equipped for serving the needs of large and small milk processing units and with business and marketing skills.

Inaugurating the workshop, Dr RB Singh, former chairman, Agricultural Scientist Recruitment Board, New Delhi, said there were about 1 billion people in the world who went hungry and 40 per cent children in India were malnourished. In this presidential address, Dr AK Srivastava, director, NDRI, informed that the livestock sector contributed 28-30 per cent to the agricultural GDP and milk contributed 70 per cent to the livestock GDP.

He expressed concern over the wage disparity in the dairy and non-dairy sector.

The NDRI launched its new website (www.ndri.res.in.) which was inaugurated by Dr RB Singh, chairman, Agricultural Scientists Recruitment Board.

Karnal, June 1
Cries of labourers rent the air as a dozen makeshift hutments of Bihari labourers were gutted in Sector 7 this morning. At least 30 children sitting under the shade of a tree away from their huts had a lucky escape.

Eyewitnesses said suddenly one of the huts caught fire and within an hour everything was turned into ashes.

The fire brigade and police came 30 minutes after the incident.

A water tanker of HUDA’s horticulture department was put to use to douse the flames but the water pressure was not sufficient enough for the task.

The children were all by themselves when the fire broke out with their parents, mostly labourers, out at work.

The scorching heat drove them away to look for relief, which they found under a grove of trees at somer distance from their homes. This proved to be a lucky co-incident and none of them were hurt.

Social organisations like the MDD Bal Bhavan, the Manav Seva Sangh and the Jan Seva Dal came forward to provide food, water, utensils and clothing to the victims.

The administration is yet

to provide any succour to the hapless labourers who mostly hail from Darbhanga in Bihar.

Fatehabad: A woman died in a local private hospital hours after her delivery in the early hours of Tuesday, ostensibly due to reaction of the blood administered to her.

The newborn too died in the hospital. — TNS

Rohtak, June 1
Taking a serious view of misconduct and mental and physical intimidation of two students of the Institute of Management Studies and Research by three senior students, the Vice-Chancellor of Maharshi Dayanand University (MDU) has suspended the three students with immediate effect.

Exercising his powers under the provisions of Statute-39 of the MDU Act, VC RP Hooda has ordered the suspension of three students identified as Aman Redhu, Surender Bishnoi and Anil Dalal. They have been accused of ragging their juniors in the institute.

According to the varsity authorities, the entry of the accused students has been banned into the varsity campus till further orders. Their rooms in the hostel have been sealed.

Besides, orders have been passed for withholding the results of their last examination.

The VC has passed orders to the proctor to hold an inquiry into the matter.

The VC said act(s) of indiscipline and misconduct would not be tolerated on the campus and strict disciplinary action be taken against such delinquent students.

Meanwhile, the authorities have expelled the third student involved in the alleged molestation and misbehaviour with two girl students of the law department that took place on the campus on May 19.

The student identified as Ravi Parkash (BA-I) has been expelled, his entry into the university campus banned and he has been debarred from taking admission in any course of the university or its affiliated institution(s).

Earlier, the varsity officials had taken a similar action against two students, who were involved in this act of misconduct.

Chandigarh, June 1
Two days after Karnataka Governor and former Union Law Minister HR Bhardwaj said demand for a separate high court for Haryana at Chandigarh was a political ploy and could never come into existence, state Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda today said he was determined to make it a reality.

In an exclusive interview with The Tribune, Hooda questioned: “If the two states of Punjab and Haryana can have a separate secretariats in one city, why can’t there be two high courts?”

The Chief Minister asserted he was working towards the creation of a separate high court, while reiterating that it was their legitimate right to have it.

Hooda added that he wanted it to be located at Chandigarh, as the city was Haryana’s capital too.

Hooda asserted that funds would be released immediately for the upgrade of the infrastructure, once the decision to carve out a separate court would be taken.

Expressing similar views, Additional Solicitor-General Mohan Jain said he did not see any problem in the co-existence of the two high courts at the same place.

Talking to The Tribune from abroad, Jain said there was no harm in having two high courts at the same place, especially when two Chief Ministers, two Speakers and two Governors could stay side by side in the same city. Haryana’s Advocate-General Hawa Singh Hooda said they were all for a separate high court and it could come up in the comparatively new block of the high court. Bhardwaj’s recent statement came at a time when the momentum in favour of a separate high court was building up.

Even the Supreme Court was not disinclined towards having a separate high court, if former Chief Justice of India KG Balakrishnan’s assertion still was an indicator.

In an interview recently, he had stated it could be “anywhere” and every state has a constitutional right to have its own high court.

Sirsa, June 1
Dera Sacha Sauda chief Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh today appeared before the CBI court through video conferencing from district courts, Sirsa, in connection with the Ram Chander Chhaterpatti murder case.

The dera chief entered the court complex amidst heavy security at about 8.30 am and remained there till 3 in the afternoon.

He went straight to the videoconferencing room set up on the court complex to appear before the CBI court, where advocates of the dera chief’s co-accused Nirmal and Kuldeep cross-examined Aridaman Singh, son of Ram Chander Chhaterpatti, slain editor of evening daily Poora Sach published from Sirsa.

The next date of hearing in this case is June 15, but the dera chief will have to appear before the court on June 2 in connection with the Ranjit Singh murder case and on June 4 and 5 in connection with the alleged sexual exploitation of dera sadhvis and argument to decide the cancellation of his bail.

The dera chief’s followers stood guard on both sides of the road from the dera headquarters to the court complex and waited there till he went back.