Ludhiana, July 27
Nearly 100 illegal shanties, which had come up illegally on the banks of Budha Nallah, near Chand Cinema, were demolished by a demolition squad of the municipal corporation today.

A team led by assistant town planner Kamaljit Kaur demolished the shanties with the help of bulldozers.

While the MC swooped into action to get the public land vacated, it was a hard day for the dwellers, who were rendered homeless.

Vidya Devi, a 100-year-old dweller, said earlier she used to live at Fatehgarh Mohalla and shifted here three years back. “My son is a dholi and we have meagre resources for livelihood and now have no place left to go. I have saved some of the domestic articles which can prove helpful to us in the hard times,” she said.

Things turned really tough for Geeta who is visually challenged and has also been rendered homeless. A year back she came here and after the death of her husband she is now alone and does not know where to go.

Kanta Devi, who was dwelling here from the past many years, said they had no place left to go. “We have been living here from the past five years. Now, we will be left with nowhere to go. Since it is raining it will become difficult to even spend one day without a roof,” she said.

With his abode turned into wreck, Mohan Lal, a junk dealer, who was living here from the past 10 years, is left with no other option but to take shelter under the Jagraon bridge along with his kids and wife. “We have only a small amount of items of kitchenware as our property. We were able to save the stove and few things to eat that will help us in having our meals for the day,” he added.

Lost in the material scattered outside her dwelling, Sita was busy collecting her books. “All my books have been lost in the ruins. I don’t know how I will be able to go to school tomorrow,” she said.

Shobha Devi and Monaka Devi, both living here for more than 10 years, have still not come out of the shock. “Our home was being razed in front of our eyes, but we could not do anything,” they rued.

Ludhiana, July 27
Swinging into action, a demolition squad of the municipal corporation today dismantled metalled roads and sewer pipelines in three unauthorised colonies in the city’s Kakowal Road area this afternoon. The squad, led by assistant town planner Kamaljit Kaur, razed all the roads and sewer lines within a few hours amid protests by the developers, and even demolished the boundary walls on the perimeter of the adjoining colonies.

The developers of these three colonies, measuring two acres, eight acres and ten acres, respectively, allegedly failed to secure approval from the Punjab Urban Development Authority (PUDA) as well as the MC and were adding to the city’s haphazard growth.

When members of the demolition team arrived at the scene the developers tried to argue with them and stop them from going ahead with the demolition.

‘‘I however refused to budge as I had orders from the top. We went ahead with our task although I was expecting political pressure. But today it was missing so we finished with our task”, said Kamaljit.

MC commissioner AK Sinha had ordered the demolition after receiving a complaint that two colonies were coming up on Kakowal Road without the mandatory approval of the authorities concerned.

‘‘When we went there we found another illegal colony coming up. This too had to go, ’’ said Kamaljit.

As the city is bursting at its seams residents are finding it increasing difficult to own a house within its municipal limits. Taking advantage of the necessity of housing, colonisers began developing colonies at will without getting the MC’s nod. For securing the approval they have to pay development charges and are obliged to provide all basic amenities. They are also required to develop the colonies in such a way so as to provide residents with a good environment to live in.

Ludhiana, July 27
The municipal corporation’s reported refusal to provide more manpower to the health & family welfare department to undertake preventive measures against malaria and dengue fever has come as a setback to the national disease control programme.

Health officials said the civic body flatly rejected their request when they met MC functionaries to chalk out a joint plan of action to take preventive steps against waterborne diseases. "We were refused on the pretext that the MC officials and staff would execute their duties on their own," said district epidemiologist Dr GP Mangla.

Till date 22 cases of malaria have already surfaced in the district, of which 11 are from Sahnewal, Malaud and adjoining villages. Despite having been declared "high risk zones" for malaria, the district administration does not appear to have any concrete plan for preventive measures.

However, health officials claims to have visited various villages and instructed their ‘panchayats’ to spray black oil in ponds and other stagnant water bodies.

Referring to the unavailability of pyrithrim, the medicine used to destroy mosquito larvae, Mangla said: "We drew up a budget of Rs 2.5 lakh to buy pyrithrim and have forwarded to the department. Hopefully stocks of the medicine will be available soon”.

However, the lack of coordination between the MC and the health department is indicative of the haphazard functioning that is evident from the fact that official from both bodies have not visited a large number of disease prone areas.

After conducting a survey recently on the Chandigarh and Ambala Roads as well as in various city areas including Transport Nagar, Sherpur Chowk and Focal Point, the health department had submitted details of puddles of stagnant water to the MC. These puddles, which are breeding grounds for mosquitoes, have to be covered with soil, health officials said.

Both the civic body and the health department have failed to follow up on the directives issued by National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme deputy director Kalpana Barua. The latter had conducted a detailed survey following the dengue outbreak in 2008, wherein she had clearly indicated "missing action plans" on the part of government departments in terms of prevention.

Barua had also circulated written accounts to officials in other departments containing details of causes leading to an outbreak of the disease and its rapid transmission. She also visited the affected areas to take into account the magnitude of the problem so as to devise a plan for effectively controlling the disease.

Mandi Ahmedgarh, July 27
The only way to avoid fake notes is to transact through e-banking, considering the police is finding it difficult to rule out the involvement of senior bank officials and jail authorities in facilitating the circulation of counterfeit currency.

The racketeers have improved the quality of the notes to such an extent that it is difficult for a commoner to differentiate between genuine and counterfeit notes.

Recently, the police had nabbed Akshey Gupta of Jalandhar and Jasbir Singh of Sahnewal, members of a gang involved in the printing and circulation of fake currency, and seized Rs 15 lakh of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 denomination from their possession.

They claimed that officials in some nationalised banks and at the District Jail in Jalandhar were “facilitating” the gang as its kingpin, Jagtar Singh of Shahkot in Jalandhar district, lodged in Jalandhar jail, has been running the trade on his mobile phone for long. Some employees of commercial banks were reportedly helping the gang by facilitating the opening and maintenance of the accounts and providing packets of new currency notes from time to time.

Packets of genuine notes were used to cheat new customers by projecting these as fake. Once the order for fake currency was booked, these packets, along with the fake ones, were deposited in one of the many accounts maintained at some branches of a nationalised bank.

The accused admitted having supplied consignments in Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Patiala, Sangrur, Ahmedgarh and Raikot areas.

Jagtar Singh used to book orders for counterfeit currency by asking customers to deposit 50 per cent of the value of fake notes in either of the two accounts maintained in the name of Sharvan Rai of Sansarpur and his wife Pinki Devi at the agricultural market yard branch of a bank at Sonhauli in Bihar.

After confirming the deposit through sources in some branches in Ludhiana and Jalandhar, Jagtar Singh used to place the order for the consignment.

The perusal of statements of these accounts revealed that huge amounts were withdrawn through the ATM installed at various branches of the same bank.

The police had earlier busted a gang involved in the printing of counterfeit currency at Kup village, near here. The director of a cooperative bank had allegedly facilitated the gang by getting fake notes exchanged with genuine notes through branches of the organisation he managed.

Ludhiana, July 27
Residents of 256 acre Rishi Nagar, a posh residential colony developed by the Ludhiana Improvement Trust on the Humbran Road here, are up in arms over being completely neglected as far as coverage under the proposed city bus service is concerned.

Rishi Nagar (F-Block) Welfare Association in a meeting, held under the presidentship of Satish Thaman here yesterday, decried that none of the proposed 21 routes of city bus service -- the only mass transport system to be introduced in the mega city later this year -- will touch the colony and the residents will be deprived of the facility.

According to Thaman, the only public transport system available to the city residents at present was auto rickshaws, which not only caused extensive air pollution and congestion on roads, but their bumpy rides were also quite uncomfortable, especially for women, children and senior citizens.

The residents’ body urged the district authorities and the management of the Ludhiana City Bus Service Limited (LCBSL) -- a company floated by the civic body to run the affairs of the city bus service -- to provide adequate coverage to Rishi Nagar Colony with proposed stoppages at income tax and central excise offices, telephone exchange, Government Polytechnic College and Kali Mata temple on the Humbran Road.

When contacted the LCBSL chairman and commissioner of the municipal corporation AK Sinha told The Tribune that the city bus service was proposed to be launched tentatively by December and initially only 40 buses would be pressed into service out of a total proposed fleet of 200 buses.

“The proposed routes are tentative and subject to revision from time to time on need basis. With more buses being added to the fleet, we shall cover the left out localities as the objective is to provide the city residents a comprehensive mass transport sleet. We shall cover the left out localities as the objective is to provide the city residents a comprehensive mass transport system,” Sinha added.

Ludhiana, July 27
Monsoon brings along a host of skin problems, acne being the most prominent. In such weather, youngsters and the ones with oily skin suffer from pimples. If one is prone to acute acne problem, it’s best to visit a dermatologist, but for stray zits there are some simple home remedies. Just make sure there is no history of allergies.

Acne usually starts with blackheads, which are formed when oil and dead cells get stuck in pores and turn black. The inflammation, when it turns red, is the unsightly pimple. While a regular clean-up reduces blackheads, here’s what you can do to prevent them.

Ludhiana, July 27
Even though the Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (Powercom) has been making tall claims of big technical breakthroughs and computerisation in the operations and billing systems while also asking the people to avail the facility of online payment of energy bills rather than going to cash counters and wasting time in long queues, the fact remains that online payment facility is simply not available to majority of the consumers and still remains a distant dream.

“The claims about online payment of energy bills are a total farce. Each time I visit the Powercom website to make online payment, fresh bill, which is due for payment, is not shown. Only old bills, which have already been paid, are available on the website,” says Dr Neena Chawla, a teacher in the Punjab Agricultural University, here.

“With the bill, which is due for payment, not being available on the website, there is no other choice but to personally go to the Powercom cash counter and wait in serpentine queues for hours together to make payment of the bill and obtain a receipt,” she adds.

The problem of latest bills not being uploaded on the website is common and many other consumers have similar tales to tell.

Parlad Singh, a senior citizen and a resident of Model Town, has been facing the same problem. “My sons are settled abroad and I am living here with my wife. One of us has to invariably go to the Powercom cash counter and spend considerable time for our turn to pay the bill. At times, we have to miss our lunch in the process,” the retired engineer laments.

“The problem of delay in uploading the fresh energy bills on the website does exists,” admit the senior officials and attribute it to software being used for spot billing by handheld computerised billing machines.

Powercom officials looking after the billing and computer related operations say that the software currently being used for spot billing does not automatically transfer the billing data to the main server.

“The field staff or contractual workers deployed for spot billing have to download the data everyday in the evening on their systems and thereafter it is uploaded on the main server. Since human element is involved in transfer of billing data, at times, the procedure takes time and fresh bills are not immediately available to the consumers on websites,” said a Powercom official.

Maintaining that upgradation of software, which would simultaneously transfer the bill details to the main server, would still take some time to be put in use, the officials added that the consumers still have other options for making payment through some half a dozen “sewak” machines (ATMs) in different parts of the city and also at “easy bill” outlets without having to stand in queues at the cash counters.

Ludhiana, July 27
Coming down heavily on the functioning of two officials of the Punjab State Power Corporation (Powercom), resulting in the harassment of a consumer, the permanent lok adalat has ordered them to compensate the consumer with Rs 35,000 each from their own pocket.

The chairman of the lok adalat, Sukhdarshan Singh Khaira, and its members RS Khokar and Nand Lal have also ordered the officials, assistant executive engineer, Daresi subdivision (east circle), and SDO, commercial wing, City Centre special division, to pay Rs 5,000 as costs of litigation from their own pocket.

The orders came on a complaint moved by Satish Kumar of Mohalla Saidan here. In its order, the lok adalat held, “These officials are working as per their own whims and under an autocratic style, thinking like masters of the public, whereas they are public servants. It is their first and foremost duty to redress grievances of consumers at the earliest. In case of failure, the consumer deserves compensation for not redressing his genuine grievance within a reasonable specified period.”

Powercom officials had kept issuing bills to the consumer with average reading while the electricity meter installed on the premises was in a working condition. Serious allegations had been levelled against the officials, which they had refuted.

The Powercom officials had taken the plea that the meter of the consumer had been changed earlier, but when their representative visited the premises, he did not find the meter at the earlier place.

He had fed the ‘S’ code in the machine and accordingly, consumption bills were prepared and issued. The lok adalat remarked that such a plea could not be accepted for two years.

Ludhiana, July 27
The District Youth Congress (DYC) today launched a signature campaign against drug abuse in Block No 4, Gandhi Nagar, in the course of its ongoing drive against drug addiction. The DYC president, Dimple Rana, led the campaign and a large number of residents and shopkeepers signed the pledge form against the use of drugs and other intoxicating substances.

Rana said the “navi saver” campaign initiated by the party to motivate people to shun drugs had received good response.

“We are distributing pamphlets and hand bills to focus on the disastrous effects of drugs on health. At the same time, awareness lectures and seminars are being organised to motivate people, especially the youth, to fight against the menace of drugs,” he stated.

Tiny tots of Love Dale Montessori celebrate Teej in Ludhiana on Tuesday. Tribune photo: Himanshu Mahajan

LUDHIANA: Punjabi culture came alive at Love Dale Montessori on Tuesday when Teej was celebrated with great fervor. The campus, decked in a traditional Punjabi manner, wore a festive look. Tiny tots came attired in colourful Punjabi dresses and relished kheer-poori at stalls. Girls enjoyed swings and danced to the beats of Punjabi music. Principal Preetima Behl informed that the festival of Teej would be celebrated in the school over the entire week, each day springing a pleasant surprise for the kids, including a rain dance party, kheer-poora party and Sawan Prince and Princess contest.

BBA results

BBA IV semester students of Guru Nanak Institute of Management and Technology exhibited good performance in academics. As per the results declared by Punjab Technical University (PTU) recently, 64 GNIMT students have passed with first division and 19 have got distinction with over 70 per cent. Jasleen Singh, who has consistently topped the PTU merit list, has again stood first by securing 90.33 per cent followed by Yashwardhan Aggarwal who stood second with 85.33 per cent. Sahil Goyal secured third position with 84.33 per cent.

Talent hunt

To explore the hidden talents of students in different spheres, SDP College for Women organised a talent hunt on the college premises on Tuesday. The function was presided over by principal Dr Meenu Sharma. The function began with a religious song. Students from all streams and classes enthusiastically participated in all items.They sang songs, presented mimicry and dances. Modeling was also held. Attired in traditional and modern costumes, the students displayed their talent on the ramp.

MSC results

The declaration of MSc (IT) fourth semester result by Panjab University, Chandigarh, brought laurels for Guru Nanak Girls College, Model Town, as Sandeep Kaur obtained 88.4 per cent and stood second in the university and first in the college. Navsangeet Kaur obtained 87.7 per cent and stood fifth in the university and second in college. Maninder Kaur stood third in college with 84.9 per cent. All students got first division. — TNS

Dehlon (Ludhiana), July 27
Acting on the direction of the Assistant Commissioner of Police (crime), Ludhiana, the Dehlon police has booked four persons under Section 24 of the Immigration Act and Sections 420, 34 and 120-B of the IPC for allegedly duping a resident of Rurka village of Rs 6 lakh.

The victim had fallen prey to the fraud after the accused offered to settle his son and another relative in New Zealand.

Kuldeep Singh of Rurka village in Ludhiana district, Vicky Chauhan of New Janta Nagar Simpla Puri, Rakesh Joshi of Jalandhar and Harminder Singh of Chandigarh were booked by the police for allegedly duping Surinder Pal Singh of Rurka of Rs 6 lakh two years ago.

Perusal of the record revealed that the accused had offered to send Surinder Singh’s son and another relative to New Zealand by charging Rs 6 lakh about two years ago. “They had met me during the marriage ceremony of Kuldeep Singh’s brother,” said Surinder.

Though Surinder and his relatives were not in a position to spend Rs 3 lakh for each youth, they arranged the money by borrowing from friends and relatives and paid the same to the accused.

As it was agreed upon that the final payment would be made after the youths took the flight for New Zealand, the accused, with an intent to show their genuineness, arranged two air tickets for them and made them board a plane. However, they were made to return to India from Hong Kong.

Finding himself duped, Surinder lodged a complaint with the police. The ACP directed the Dehlon police to initiate action against the accused.

SHO Harvinder Singh Cheema said he directed sub-inspector Swaran Singh to conduct raids on hideouts of the accused and nab them. However, no arrest was yet made.

Mandi Ahmedgarh, July 27
Stopping someone from teasing his wife has cost a migrant labourer his life. Umesh Kumar, working with a contractor at the Tara cattle feed factory at Jitwal Kalan, was allegedly killed by Bhola, another worker at the factory.

Umesh’s body was found from a gutter at the factory yesterday. After receiving information about the incident, the police took Umesh to a hospital at Malerkotla, where doctors declared him brought dead.

He had been kicked in the abdomen. Investigations revealed that the victim and the accused had been working at the factory for a long time.

Like many other migrants, Umesh had been living in the colony with his wife. Bhola was engaged in loading and unloading of feed bags. He allegedly used to tease Umesh’s wife and perform obscene acts in front of her.

When Umesh tried to stop Bhola, the latter threatened him of dire consequences. They allegedly had a scuffle when the former went to bathe on Sunday evening.

Police investigations revealed that Bhola had kicked Umesh in the abdomen in the presence of many workers. Later he dragged him and threw him in the gutter. The police registered a case and started a manhunt for the accused.

Ludhiana, July 27
Kundan Vidya Mandir (KVM), Civil Lines, scripted an easy 85-run victory over GRD Academy in the Ludhiana District Inter Zonal Cricket Tournament for boys u-19 being played at Government Model Senior Secondary School, on the PAU campus here today.

Batting first, KVM scored 137 runs for the loss of three wickets in the allotted 12 overs. The main contributors were Abhinav Bhatia (64 n.o.), Abhijit Randhawa (25) and Sunny Pandey (10).

For GRD Academy, Shivam, Anant and Harman claimed one wicket each after conceding 10, 22 and 20 runs, respectively.

GRD Academy were skittled out for a paltry total of 52 runs in just 10 overs. Only batsman Shubham could reach a double figure of 26.

For the winners, Mrinal Partap captured three wickets for 20 runs while Abhinav Bhatia scalped two victims for 4 runs. Paras Bharadwaj and Abhishek Talwar grabbed a wicket each for 17 and 12 runs, respectively.

Ludhiana, July 27
Giving a consistent performance, hosts Bhartiya Vidya Mandir Senior Secondary School, Kitchlu Nagar, secured a berth in the boy’s u-14 final in football in the Ludhiana District Zonal Inter School Tournament being organised by the education department here today.

In the inaugural match, BVM School blanked Green Land School 8-0 to begin their campaign in style.

In the quarter final, BVM recorded 3-0 victory over Bhartiya Vidya Mandir Senior Secondary School, Udham Singh Nagar, to advance into the last four stage.

In another quarter final encounter, GTB Public School got the better of DPS, Ludhiana, whom they pipped 1-0.

The semi final played between Bhartiya Vidya Mandir and Sutlej Public School turned out to be a well-contested affair in which the former managed to scrape past by a narrow margin of 1-0. The all important goal was scored by Yashanjot Sandal in the 10th minute of the first session.