Chandigarh, August 18
Deputy Speaker of the state Vidhan Sabha Satpal Gosain has written to the Chief Minister to challenge in the high court the filing of the charge sheet by the CBI against Speaker Nirmal Singh Kahlon in a graft case.

Talking to TNS, Gosain said in the letter, he had pointed out that when the state government had categorically denied prosecution sanction to the CBI with regard to the Speaker, the CBI had no business to file a charge sheet against him.

“This is a violation of federal powers of the state,” said Gosain, adding that the state should challenge the CBI’s move in the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

Chief Secretary SC Aggarwal said the proposal by the Deputy Speaker had been sent to the CM but no final decision regarding this had been conveyed to him.

“The Speaker and the Deputy Speaker met the CM today but what has transpired is not known to me,” he added. The acting state Advocate-General, Rupinder Khosla, said no directions to move the HC in this regard had been received yet.

Sources, however, said in case the government decided to secure relief for the Speaker, it would be a rare move. “The onus of defending himself lies with the Speaker. The state has no business to take on this responsibility,” they added.

Other than legal questions that are likely to be raised with such a move, sources said it would also lay bare the “collusion” of the state government in various acts that got the Speaker into this trouble. “First the state goes out of its way to deny sanction to the CBI to proceed against the Speaker. Then to go a step further and start defending an accused in the court as its own cause will only mean that the state not only looks the other way when it comes to corruption but also encourages corruption,” added the sources.

The Special CBI court had granted interim bail to Kahlon till August 26. Kahlon has been describing the case against him part of “political vendetta against him and his party”. 

Attari, August 18
In a goodwill gesture, as many as 25 Pakistani prisoners, including two who had allegedly aided a bank heist in Maharashtra to fund the sensational 1999 Kandahar hijacking of Indian Airlines’ IC-814 flight, were finally deported to Pakistan via Attari-Wagah border checkpost today.

An interesting case was that of Sukhawat Ali, a resident of Daud Bhainian in Pakistan’s Lahore district. Sukhawat Ali was arrested by the Punjab police in 1997 along with 48 kg of heroin and 5 kg of opium in the “biggest haul” of heroin from a single person in Punjab at that time. He was sentenced to undergo imprisonment for 12 years along with a fine of Rs 2 lakh. Earlier, Haji Mohammad Iqbal Khokhar and Mohammad Asif could not be deported even after two and a half years of their release in February 2008 from the Nashik jail due to vexed deportation formalities.

Their long stay at the Borivali police station, Mumbai, was also attributed by the Mumbai police to their alleged involvement in funding of the sensational hijack drama that was considered to have triggered a heightened terror game plan of terror-mongers in the southern parts of Asia.

Both Khokhar and Asif tried to evade queries regarding their involvement in the hijacking of the IC-814 aircraft from the Tribhuvan airport in Kathmandu, even as they smiled at each other every now and then. Khokhar, a resident of Chack No. 100 in Dharamkot township of Multan (Pakistan) asserted that he had come to “see India” after crossing over the border via Kashmir without any valid travel document and was “implicated” in the incident about which he knew nothing. Khokhar and Asif had allegedly aided three others in looting Rs 7.5 lakh from the Borivali branch of Maharashtra State Cooperative Bank in 1999 and the heist money was allegedly transferred to the hijack masterminds.

As many as 28 Pakistanis were to be released from morning till evening but, three of them were still awaiting their release as the customs officials were yet to arrange exchange of currency for them till the filing of this report. 

Abohar/Fazilka, August 18
The situation in the canal irrigation system catering to Abohar and Fazilka subdivisions and its neighbouring areas, including the Lambi Assembly segment represented by CM Parkash Singh Badal, has taken an ugly turn as hyacinth has started causing breaches in different distributaries, causing an irrevocable damage to paddy and cotton growers of the region.

Official sources said today that the Arniwala distributary witnessed a breach of 75 ft near Dhipanwali village and yesterday a breach of 70 ft occurred in the Lambi distributary near Radhe Wala village after these were chocked by hyacinth and subsequently overflowed.

“Though these two breaches have flooded negligible area, which is under cotton and paddy crops, the exact loss to crops can be measured by officials of the Revenue or Agriculture Departments,” said senior officials, adding that the Arniwala distributary had breached twice in the past one month.

Sensing that it is difficult to curb the problem of hyacinth, which has acquired menacing dimensions after the volume of water being released from Harike headworks to different irrigation channels increased, the authorities have started sounding alerts to officials manning all canals and distributaries originating from it.

About three weeks ago, officials of the Irrigation Department had reduced the flow of water into the Abohar canal system due to chocking of its beds and banks by hyacinth.

Executive engineer (Harike headworks) Prem Chand said men and machines had been put on job round the clock on all bridges to remove hyacinth so that the flow of water into all irrigation channels could be kept smooth and these could be protected from breaching.

It is learnt that irrigation officials had been finding it difficult to engage private contractors to remove hyacinth at number of places, as the department had no money to pay them wages.

Executive engineer (Abohar subdivision) Ramesh Kumar Gupta said two breaches in the Lambi and Arniwala distributaries were being plugged. He added that measures had been taken to save the canal system from being damaged by hyacinth by reducing the flow of water into the same.

Chandigarh, August 18
In a bid to decentralise urban development, the Punjab government has decided to extend the jurisdiction of six developmental authorities of Mohali, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Amritsar, Patiala and Bathinda to cover the entire state.

This was stated here today by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal during a media interaction. He said these authorities would now also provide services to the public at the local level for the change of land use, licensing of colonies, completion certificates besides addressing grievances of plot holders and regulating urban development in the respective areas.

Badal said that Greater Mohali Area Development Authority would now also look after Ropar, Fatehgarh Sahib and Rajpura in Patiala district. Likewise, the jurisdiction of Greater Ludhiana Area Development Authority had been extended to Moga, Nawanshahr, Ferozepur and Phillaur in Jalandhar district.

The Chief Minister said that 49,474 jobs had already been given to eligible people, while another 18,968 jobs would be filled soon. Further to cater to the need of the security sector, Punjab’s youth was being trained to take up the task of security personnel in the private sector.

Badal said the state was building the Maharaja Ranjit Singh Institute for Military Training for Punjab’s youth where they would be provided training to make them perform better for selection in the Indian Army and other security agencies. The institute at Mohali would start imparting training from the next academic session.

Similarly, a Maritime Academy was being set up near Ropar to prepare manpower for the shipping industry. On the cleaning of rivers, water supply and sewerage projects, the Chief Minister said the state government had embarked upon a plan to cover 44 towns at a cost of Rs 2,055 crore.

The objective of the entire project was to check the pollution caused by the discharge of untreated sewage of the cities, villages and industrial waste in the rivers of Sutlej, Beas and Ghaggar. An amount of Rs 1,342 crore had been sanctioned for the execution of works in 18 towns in the first phase.

He said the work on the first phase of the project would be completed by November 2011. Badal also informed that Rs 68 crore had been sanctioned for the cleaning of Budda Nallah in Ludhiana. 

Chandigarh, August 18
Union Sports Minister Manohar Singh Gill has taken up the cause of Gurjant Singh, a truck driver from Sangrur, charged with conspiring to kill Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee.

Gill, in a letter to Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram, wants him to look into the matter and “ensure justice and fair play for the poor man.”

Talking to The Tribune over the phone, Gill said he had been following the case from newspaper reports for the past several days. Responding to page 1 anchor in The Tribune today, he said he felt concerned, as were many people in Punjab, because Gurjant Singh appears to be “an innocent victim of political tussle in Bengal.”

From the newspaper reports of August 11 and 12, especially those published by a leading English daily of Kolkata, it was clear that it was an innocent accident due to problems in the truck.

The police investigated and charged Gurjant Singh for rash and negligent driving after which he was released on bail. Subsequently, another case was registered against him and now he has been remanded in police custody on the charge of conspiring to murder Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee.

On August 9, Gurjant Singh’s truck hit a car in Mamata Banerjee’s convoy at Kolaghat Bridge in East Midnapore. Mamata Banerjee was returning to Kolkata from a rally in Lalgarh.

“I have not only written to the Home Minister but also spoken to the Union Minister of State for Health, Dinesh Trivedi, who belongs to the Trinamool Congress. He was in Kolkata,” he said.

“Trivedi has assured me that he will see into it that no injustice is done to this innocent driver,” adds Gill, maintaining that investigating agencies would be fair to him.

Chandigarh, August 18
The Punjab Police has not only achieved the distinction of being the first state in the country to submit a comprehensive report on the establishment of the Crime/Criminal Tracking Network System (CCTNS) but has also created 200 information technology trainers and provided basic computer knowledge to 12,600 police personnel.

The CCTNS project envisages nationwide integration of crime and criminal information through adequate networking and web-based applications. The project is expected to give a fillip to the state’s ongoing drive against drug trafficking as well as efforts to check the revival of militancy and emerging cases of cyber crime.

The Punjab Police has established two training laboratories at its headquarters here where IT personnel are being trained besides the provision of basic computer skills to police personnel. A mother lab with 50 points has been created at the Punjab Police Academy, Phillaur. Six laboratories have also been established at the range level and hardware has been dispatched for the creation of similar laboratories in 24 districts in the state. The labs in the districts are expected to come up soon.

Computer and Telecommunication wing Inspector-General of Police Jagdish Kumar, when questioned on the issue, told TNS the wing had a target to train 38,000 district police personnel in computer skills in 11 months. “We are confident of achieving this”, he said, adding this was necessary to digitise the records in police stations.

“We want to digitise all data in 25 registers in each of our police stations” Jagdish Kumar said, adding the records of the past 10 years would be taken up for digitisation. He said police personnel would then be trained to fill in all data, including FIR and its status, prosecution as well as public interface for open access on the web to anyone needing to consult it.

The CCTNS system, when in place, will allow all police officers, prosecution, courts, jail administration and hospitals instant access to it. Punjab has already submitted a PIM (Project Implementation and Monitoring Report) to the National Crime Records Bureau that has been accepted.

Bhamarsi (Fatehgarh Sahib), August 18
Two people have died and over 100 villagers, including elderly, women and children have fallen ill after consuming contaminated water from the village taps. Matter came to light when two villagers from Bhamarsi with symptoms of diarrhoea were admitted to the civil hospital today morning.

They informed doctors that a large number of other villagers in Bhamarsi Jer, Basti and Bhamarsi Neecha villages were also suffering with such symptoms and were unable to visit hospital.

Villagers informed that Paramjit Singh (38) and Manjit Kaur (50), residents of Bhamarsi Jer, died last night, as they were suffering from fever, vomiting and diarrhoea for past around a week. They said cause behind the contamination could be stealing of water by puncturing water pipes by the villagers. Following the revelation, a team of doctors rushed to the village, wherein they provided medicines to more than 100 villagers. Doctors said exact cause of deaths was yet to be ascertained.

Water contamination could be problem and medical reports of the deceased would be obtained from the village doctor, who treated two villagers before their death.

“Fifty patients, most of them children and elderly, have symptoms of diarrhoea and are provided with free medicines. Situation is now under control and nobody is in critical condition,” said chief medical officer Dr Reena Sandhu.

She added that the deceased woman could have been suffering from diarrhoea, but man who died last night was a drug addict and could have died due to both, his habit and water contamination. Health department officials, senior administrative officials visited the village and assured all possible medial help to the villagers.

Fatehgarh Sahib Deputy Commissioner Yashvir Mahajan said water contamination was suspected from the water tank and its supply has been snapped. “Potable water in the water tankers have been pressed into service, besides the doctors have been made available for the villagers round the clock and two ambulances have also been stationed there. The situation is now under control,” he said.

Villagers alleged that they had complained about broken water pipes umpteen times, but nothing has been done in this regard and people have been forced to drink impure water. Raju, pump operator deployed at the government water tank in the village said the machine that purifies entire water has not been functioning for the past three years and matter was brought to notice of the villagers and the officials of the Public Health Department.

Amritsar, August 18
Hundreds of ‘birs’ of Guru Granth Sahib and over 2,500 copies of Sikh religious scriptures excavated by Sikh devotees from an abandoned basement of a Delhi-based publishing house will be cremated in accordance with Sikh rituals at Goindwal Sahib on August 22.

The cremation of these damaged ‘birs’ and holy books, which are at present placed at Goindwal-based Guru Granth Sahib Bhawan, will take place under the supervision of Akal Takht Jathedar Giani Gurbachan Singh and other Sikh high priests.

As many as 98 printed ‘birs’ with cover, 2,325 without cover, hundreds of ‘birs’ in parts, over 1.25 lakh ‘pothis’ and hundreds of printed copies of holy books like the Gita, Bible and Koran were found lying in a damaged state in an abandoned basement of a Delhi-based publishing house on August 11. 

Patiala, August 18
The Punjab Education Department has changed the science syllabus of Class IX just 15 days before the conduct of the exams for the first semester. This has shocked both the teachers and the students, as they have been studying the previous syllabus since a long time and had almost finished it.

According to sources, there has been a change in 11 chapters and 11 practicals. Many of the chapters that have already been studied have been shifted to the second semester syllabus, whereas the ones that were scheduled for second semester have been shifted for first semester.

With only 15 days left for the exams, teachers feel that it is very difficult to teach these chapters at this point of time and what is worst is that in case the students do not perform well, the teachers will be held accountable for the bad results.

“The government school students are already very poor in subjects like science and math and with this last minute change, I do not know how the students wil l manage to successfully complete the syllabus and perform well,” added one of the teachers.

Another teacher said this was sheer negligence on the part of the Education Department. “When they have a complete panel to review the syllabus, what were they doing earlier? Moreover, this last-minute change will not only affect the students’ psychology, but will also make it difficult for the teachers.”

Assistant State Project Director (Science), Nirmal Kaur said, “There was a confusion because the syllabus that was put on the Internet was different than the hard copy. But now we have changed the online syllabus. In fact, as per the new syllabus, they had to study four chapters in August, but now they will have to study only two.”

Patiala, August 18
In order to effectively implement the Tobacco Control Act, 2003 in the district, there is a need for a concerted effort from all sections of the society. Patiala DC Dipinder Singh asserted that unless and until common people would cooperate with the government initiatives for controlling the tobacco consumption, the desired results would not come.

Chairing the meeting of the Tobacco Control Committee held recently, the DC said the rate at which youths were falling prey to tobacco products was a matter of concern and all NGOs should come contribute in spreading awareness about the ill effects of the tobacco consumption on human health.

Dipinder further stated that addiction to the psychotropic drugs and other habit-forming drugs was also increasing among the youth. He issued directions to Patiala Civil Surgeon Dr Sham Lal Mahajan to keep an eye on the drug stores selling psychotropic drugs without prescription. “Surprise raids should be conducted in different areas of the district in order to check the practice,” he said. — TNS

Chandigarh, August 18
From an Army officer to a judicial magistrate, Hardeep Singh Grewal has travelled far. But ask him, and he says the journey has just begun. Less than a week after he put in his papers as the Patiala chief judicial magistrate, Grewal has been appointed as the Punjab Public Service Commission (PPSC) member.

Grewal had sought permission for premature retirement from the Punjab and Haryana High Court last week. After chief justice Mukul Mudgal accorded permission, the state government accepted the resignation. Subsequently, the Chief Minister approved the decision to appoint Grewal as the PPSC member and the file was forwarded to Punjab Governor Shivraj Patil for consent.

As per Article 316 of the Constitution, Governor appoints the chairperson and the PPSC members.

Expected to be administered oath in the next couple of days, Grewal says his top priority will be to uphold the traditions and integrity of the PPSC; and his experience in the Army, and the judiciary, will only help him in carrying out the task assigned to him in a more disciplined manner.

Chandigarh, August 18
The fact that Punjab gets tourists but is not able to keep them for long has made the state Tourism Department start the process for the creation of specialised guides at all three demonstration projects being taken up for development under a United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) initiative.

According to the latest central survey commissioned in May, it was revealed that tourists were not stopping for more than one and a half days at any of the prominent tourist sites in the state. Even Amritsar, which has the Golden Temple as well as the Wagah border, is not able to attract tourists for an average of more than 1.2 days. Besides religious tourism, which is the main reason for most people visiting Punjab, there is scope for culture tourism in Patiala where Qila Mubarak and museum attracted more than 25,000 visitors in May.

Director, Tourism, Hussan Lal, when questioned on this by TNS, said efforts were on to prepare a profile of tourists visiting the state as well as build capacity at the three demonstration projects of Patiala, Sultanpur Lodhi and Ropar. Lal said the latest tourism survey on Punjab had come up with average figures of guests checking in at various accommodation units in major cities.

“In the case of Amritsar 1.17 lakh guests check in at various types of accommodation which itself gives an idea of the revenue which could be collected if their stay is extended beyond one day”. The Director, Tourism, said the profiling of tourists would result in a need-based plan that could be put into place to benefit both tourists as well as the local economy.

Punjab Heritage and Tourism Promotion Board Executive Director V B Kumar said the new initiatives included having tourist guides in all major cities. He said the board was in the process of tying up with the IITM, Gwalior, that would train personnel from the state as tourist guides. He said licences would be issued to such guides and the board would advertise their mobile numbers.

The Tourism Department has also decided to tie up with Karnataka’s prestigious Jungle Lodges for the training of nature guides from the state. These guides will initially function at the eco wetland project that will come up in Ropar. UNWTO expert Hans Carl Jacobsen said nature guides could also help revive the 12 km-long old English army trail from Ropar to Khanpur Khui village.

Nangal, August 18
The authorities of the Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB) today opened all four floodgates of the Bhakra reservoir for testing purposes. The gates were opened around 12.45 pm and closed at 12.50 pm.

Sources said within these five minutes, the water level went down by almost a foot.

BBMB member (Irrigation) MK Gupta said the floodgates were tested twice a year. “First they are opened when the water level is below the gates and the second time when it is above the gates. Testing has been done successfully,” he said.

With the water level reaching 1,670 ft in the Bhakra reservoir, the BBMB will siphon off water in such a way that it does not increase in the reservoir beyond a foot a day.

Meanwhile, the water level was 1664.50 ft today with the inflow of 82, 192 cusecs and the outflow of 36265 cusecs. Nearly, 12,500 cusecs were released in the Nangal hydel channel, 10,150 in the Anandpur Sahib hydel channel and 14,350 cusecs in the Sutlej.

The corresponding day last year, the water level was 1602.5 ft with the inflow of 35,091 cusecs and the outflow of 17,461 cusecs.

Bathinda, August 18
In protest against the hike in the fees of some MA Part-1 courses by Punjabi University, Patiala, students of English, Punjabi and economics postgraduate classes of the Punjabi University Regional Centre, Bathinda, today held a protest on the campus and stayed away from classes after the second period.

They also raised slogans against the university authorities and the Punjab government besides demanding withdrawal of hike in the fee immediately. The student leaders also announced that their agitation would continue till the university authorities withdrew the hike in the fees.