Shimla, October 4
Festivities and camaraderie at Lawrence School, Sanawar, came to a close as the three-day 163rd Founder’s Day Celebrations concluded today with the prize distribution function.

“While the Commonwealth Games are on in Delhi, we are having our own Olympics in Sanawar,” headmaster Praveen Vasisht said, expressing his joy over the success of the event.

MP Naveen Jindal was the chief guest at the concluding function. An NCC parade by the students followed by a march past by about 100 old students of 1960, 1980 and 2000 batches celebrating their golden, silver and tin jubilees, respectively, were the highlights of the function.

Vasisht said the school had done well on the academic front and the board results of class X showed substantial improvement. The class average was 78.8 per cent, an increase of 2.1 per cent over the last year, and 13 students scored above 90 per cent.

Meanwhile, Jindal was highly impressed with the performance of the school band and said it was the best he had ever seen in a school. He delved into the strong military background of the school and urged the students to carry their ethos and traditions forward to attain more laurels and higher glory for their alma mater. 

Shimla, October 4
State-owned power generating companies have joined hands under the banner of National Forum of Power Generation Utilities (NFPGU) to cooperate in the filed of research and development, share technical and evolve a common approach to deal with issues related to environment and rehabilitation.

The forum will also explore the possibilities to have fruitful co-operation in power sector with independent power producers (IPPs) to help promote joint ventures and Public Private Partnership (PPP) to rapidly enhance the power generation capacity in the country.

The forum, at its first meeting here yesterday, passed a resolution, recognising the need to share the knowledge banks, trained and skilled human resource and existing training facilities of the member utilities to help each other to build human resource capacity.

Managing director of the Himachal Pradesh Power Corporation Tarun Kapoor, who took the initiative for setting up the forum, has been made the chairman and a former member of the state electricity board CM Walia the secretary general. It was also decided that headquarters of the forum would be established at Delhi being a central place for meeting of the members and their nodal officers to carry forward the activities.

Kapoor said the forum would play a key role in shaping the power sector as more than 50 per cent of the country’s power needs were being met by the state sector power generation utilities. It had much to contribute in capacity addition to meet the future power requirement. Mutual cooperation was the key to efficient, low cost quality power generation and to seek policy interventions from Centre and state governments in the overall interest of the sector which was reeling under shortages both in terms of energy and peak demand.

Representatives of a number of power companies owned and controlled by various state governments, including Assam, Delhi, Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh, attended the meeting.

The state power companies of Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Orissa, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal have also conveyed their consent for forming the national-level body.

Shimla, October 4
Chief Minister PK Dhumal said today that the state was receiving less funds from the Centre due to faulty recommendations of the 13th Finance Commission.

Addressing the inaugural ceremony of the 5th National State Government Employees’ Federation here, he said the total annual burden on account of salary was Rs 4,450 crore over the salary bills of its employees annually.

Besides, an amount of over Rs 1,850 crore was being spent on pensions. However, the Finance Commission had under-assessed these committed liabilities of the state. The salary bill was assessed at Rs 3,600 crore and annual pension liability at Rs 1,400 crore, he added.

However, despite this, the government had fulfilled all commitments to its employees and granted them various financial benefits from time to time. Not only that, the daily wages had been raised by Rs 45 over the 30 months. Working women had been given public holiday on Raksha Bandhan, Bhaiya Dooj and Karva Chauth with free travelling facility in the state road transport corporation buses on these days. Muslim women had also been granted free travelling facility on Eid festival, he claimed.

He said the state had repeatedly been raising its demand for abolishing Recruitable Male Population (RMP) formula for entry into armed forces as serving in the Army was a tradition in the state. Himachal, being a small hill state, had very negligible quota in new recruitments. He expressed disappointment over the attitude of the Centre which had withdrawn the special industrial package granted by the NDA government.

President of the federation Mohinder Jain said delegates from 18 states were participating in the national conference.

Dharamsala, October 4
Tibetans-in-exile have condemned the Nepal government for disrupting Tibetan preliminary assembly elections held yesterday.

Tibetans living in Nepal went to cast their votes to nominate candidates for the post of Tibetan Prime Minister-in-exile and parliament. However, the Nepalese police arrived in full riot gear at three polling booths in Kathmandu and ransacked them. The police took away ballot boxes an hour before the voting was to be completed.

According to sources, Tibetan youth activist group Students for Free Tibet (SFT), and the regional Tibetan Youth Congress (TYC) of New York and New Jersey will hold “Give Back Our Ballot Box” protest at the Nepal Consulate in New York city.

“We strongly appeal to the Nepal government to reverse this blatant violation of human rights and the right to vote. We also urge international communities, including the United Nations, to intervene in this matter immediately,” said Tsewang Rigzin, president, TYC, the largest Tibetan NGO seeking complete independence from China.

Nepal, which is home to some 20,000 Tibetans, has, since 2008, hardened its stance on Tibetan refugees. This is allegedly due to its increasing ties with China, claimed the sources.

According to Jamphel Choesang, chief election commissioner of the Tibetan government-in-exile, their representative Thinley Gyatso had duly informed and obtained permission from the district authorities for the election process.

Despite this, Nepali security forces, at the direction of the Home Ministry of Nepal, arrived in at least two polling booths at Boudha and Swyambhu and confiscated the ballot boxes, he said.

“We condemn this heinous act of repression by the Nepali authorities. Tibetans in Nepal have, for decades, participated in the Tibetan democratic process and should be allowed to do so,” said various Tibetan leaders in a statement issued here today.

In July, Nepal had banned the birthday celebrations of Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama. A month earlier, it had forcibly handed over three fleeing Tibetan refugees to Chinese authorities.

China had recently announced that it would give the Nepal’s Ministry of Home Affair $1.47 m (10 million Yuan) every year to strengthen its security apparatus to curb anti-China activities on its soil, the Tibetans here alleged.

Shimla, October 4
While belated withdrawal of monsoon has finally allowed the Public Works Department (PWD) to undertake restoration of damaged roads on a war footing, the extremely dusty conditions are making driving a nightmare, particularly in the upper areas of Shimla district.

With the sun shining hard, the slushy rain-soaked roads have been virtually transformed into dust bowls. The asphalt surfacing on the metalled highways has come off over long stretches, converting these into veritable “kutcha” roads. Each passing vehicle raises a cloud of dust. The thick pall of dust not only reduces visibility affecting movement of traffic, but also the health of people.

Shopkeepers of Dhalli market on the outskirts of the city have threatened to start a stir if the road was not metalled immediately to save them from dust.

Out of the 226 roads which were blocked by landslips in the last week of September, 201 have been opened, though it will take a month or even more to fill up the potholes and remove debris.

All main roads are through and only link roads, mostly in the interior of Shimla and Sirmour districts, are still blocked. The department has pressed into service 137 dozers and 199 earthmovers to clear the landslips.

In addition, 199 private machines have also been deployed for the purpose. The remaining roads, barring two or three where large stretches have been completely wiped out, will be restored within a week.

The damage has been extensive and there is hardly any road that was not blocked at some point of time. Landslips apart, the heavy movement of vehicles on rain-soaked roads, particularly in the apple belt, made things worse. The total damage has been estimated at Rs 1,009 crore, reveals Principal Secretary, PWD, PC Kapoor.

The government has released Rs 37 crore and the department has already spent more than Rs 20 crore for opening the roads, he added.

The immediate focus is on filling up potholes and carrying out patchwork. In the next phase, landslips will be cleared and the stretches where surfacing has come off will be re-metalled to ensure smooth movement of vehicles. The field staff have been given 30 to 45 days, depending on the state of road and region, to complete the job. Metalling work in the higher hills will be completed by November 15 as low temperature during winter affects biding of asphalt.

Dharamsala, October 4
Paragliding event, in which pilots from across the world participate, would be organised in the Bir Billing area of Kangra district from October 29 to November 2. An announcement to this effect was made by Chief Minister PK Dhumal here today.

Dhumal was here to preside over the closing ceremony of state-level women sports festival organised at the police ground.

The Chief Minister said the paragliding event would help in promotion of tourism in the district and would be organised by the State Youth and Sports Welfare Department.

The event was marred in controversy last year as the state government did not allow the local paragliding association to hold the pre-world cup paragliding event, citing security of pilots as the reason. The apprehensions came true when two Russian pilots lost their lives after getting trapped in higher reaches of Dhauladhar mountains.

However, the paragliding association alleged that the event was not being organised due to political reasons. The charges were, however, denied by the government that maintained that organisers of the event did not have requisite permission from aviation authorities.

Bir Billing, over a period of years, has picked up as a paragliding site for adventure sports lovers from across the world. Many of them converge to the place every year for paragliding in the months of October and November.

Dhumal said the state had decided to develop Dharamsala as a sports city. It will provide land in all districts to the Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association (HPCA) for construction of stadia. Special indoor volleyball stadia are also being developed in Una, Bilaspur and Shimla.

Dhumal announced that the next state-level women sports meet would be held at Mandi. 

Shimla, October 4
Frequent killing of dogs and cattle by leopards who often stray into inhabited areas has created scare among residents, especially those living on the outskirts of the town and close to the forest area.

With the wildlife wing getting requests time and again from people about leopards straying into thickly populated areas, one such animal was caught in the trap laid in Phase-III of New Shimla by the Forest Department today. The animal has been kept at the Rehabilitation and Rescue Centre at Tutikandi and will be released into the forest area later.

What is most surprising is that the presence of leopards is not just confined to the suburbs but they also stray into places like New Shimla, which is practically a concrete jungle. It was a few days back that a leopard had killed a cow in New Shimla close to the office of the Pollution Control Board.

In the recent past leopards have been caught from a classroom in St Bede’s College, from the Mall and it even entered into the kitchen of a government primary school near the Mahunag temple. “It is possibly in search of feed that the animal normally strays into inhabited areas and, moreover, it seems to be quite fond of dogs,” said RK Raj, DFO (Wildlife), Shimla.

Prompted by these frequent forays of leopards into the inhabited areas, the Forest Department has introduced radio collaring of the animal. A radio collar has been put around the neck of a female leopard that had been caught from the Bharari area of the town.

Even though it is on an experimental basis that the radio collar has been put, the Wildlife Department has plans to use it on more animals so as to study the behaviour of the animal and understand why they are heading more and more towards the town. The department is considering putting another collar around a male leopard and monitor its movement, food habits and interaction with other wildlife animals.

With regard to the exact number of leopards in the state and whether their population has increased or decreased, there is no authentic data. Even though a census had been undertaken about the number of leopards some time back, with the figure being disputed there is no estimation about their strength.

However, people feel that steps must be taken to ensure that the leopards do not stray into inhabited areas as there have been occasions when they have not only attacked animals but also human beings, especially children.

Shimla, October 4
The local Special Court today deferred the hearing on the challan filed by the State Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau against Union Steel Minister Virbhadra Singh and his wife Pratibha Singh in the audio-CD case.

Special Judge BL Soni could not proceed with the case as the vigilance had no submitted the certified copy of the high court judgment with the challan. The case has now been listed for October 6.

The challan was filed on Friday after the HC dismissed the plea of Virbhadra for transfer of the case to the CBI.

Shimla, October 4
As part of the wildlife week celebrations, the Forest Department will hold a photography competition on the theme of “wildlife” and “forestry”.

During the event, which is celebrated from October 2 to 8, a number of activities are organised to create awareness about wildlife. While the entries for the photo competition are still open, exhibition of the photos will be put up at the Gaiety Theatre from October 6 to 8. — TNS