Shimla, November 15
With government agencies not doing much for marketing of vegetables, growers of Solan have joined hands for directly selling their produce to consumers to get rid of the middlemen.

The national highway from Shimla to Dharampur is dotted with make-shift shelters set up by the vegetables growers. Almost all seasonal vegetables are available at these shops as some enterprising growers are not only selling their produce but also of other local growers’.

Some of them are even procuring vegetables from the plains to make the vends one-stop outlet. Some new varieties of cucumber (small size), beans and other vegetables are being sown and sold.

“Eliminating middlemen enables the growers to get 35 to 40 per cent higher returns, the only constraint is that the local demand is limited”, says Balbir, a farmer of Kandaghat.

Moreover, for sending the produce directly to markets in Chandigarh, Shimla and other places, the growers were entirely at the mercy of arhtias (commission agents). Direct selling to consumers also gave them idea about the market rates of vegetables. Increasing returns was important as out of the total 25 bighas of land, he had only about five bighas suitable for farming, he added.

Ram Swaroop, another grower from Mathia village, said he had also sold vegetables of other farmers at a nominal margin of Rs 2 per kg only to encourage others to go for direct selling. Their effort would get a big boost if the government started Apni Mandi at more places and on a daily basis.

At present, it is being held only on Sundays and that too only in major towns like Shimla and Solan. With a production of 3.50 lakh, Solan district produces almost one-third of the state’s total production which required a big marketing effort.

Director of agriculture J C Rana said the government had decided to introduce Apni Mandi right down to the sub-divisional level and it would provide direct selling platform to more farmers.

In Andhra Pradesh, growers are allotted sheds in marketing yards on hourly basis for selling their produce and facility to transport it in state buses in which room has been created by removing some seats in the rear portion. In Himachal, most of the farmers have small holdings and hardly any facilities are available for transportation of produce.

Shimla, November 15
A plant to produce milk powder will be set up near Rampur at a cost of Rs 5 crore to give boost to dairy farming in the area.

Stating this while presiding over the concluding function of the four-day international Lavi fair at Rampur last evening, Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal said all left out 1,272 gram panchayats would be provided veterinary dispensary over the next two years to make the state a role model for hill states in dairy farming.

He said the local bus stand would be completed within next three months and the construction of arts block in college and Rs 8 crore multi-purpose hall would be over by March, 2011. The government had taken up the demand for according the Scheduled Tribe area status to Pandrah-Beesh, Dodra Kwar area in Shimla, Bara Bhangal in Kangra, Chuhar valley of Mandi and the Trans Giri area of Sirmaur with Government of India. It was also pursuing various other pending issues.

Dhumal said Lavi was one of the oldest trade fair of the state which was known for cross-border trading of domestic products since centuries. He said the character and complexion of the fair was changing with the passage of time and appealed to the people to uphold the traditional sanctity of the Lavi fair for the future generations.

The Chief Minister also gave away prizes to the winners of various events organised during the fair. He also visited exhibitions organised during the fair. He also assured that the educational institutions fulfilling mandatory requirement would also be upgraded to provide higher educational facilities to the local students.

The Chief Minister also released “Satluj Ghati ke Utsav Geet” book compiled by Deepak Sharma of Nirmand village to help revive old traditional songs and educate young generation about the rich cultural heritage.

Shimla, November 15
The HP High Court today sentenced Satpal of Kangra to seven years of rigorous imprisonment for raping a minor girl.

While setting aside the acquittal order, passed by the Additional District & Sessions Judge, Kangra, a division bench comprising Justice R.B.Misra and Justice V.K.Sharma convicted the accused and awarded seven-year imprisonment to him.

As per the prosecution case, Sat Pal, on the night of October 11, 1996, had kidnapped a minor girl, about six years from her house at Kursan village in Kangra district and was subjected to sexual assault in an orchard and also causing injuries on her.

The Kangra court acquitted the accused on the ground that there was delay in lodging the FIR by 12 hours though police station was near the hospital, where the victim was medically examined. There was enmity in the family of accused and the parents of the victim, which was the cause of falsely implicating the accused in the offence.

While setting aside the judgement of the trial court, the bench observed, “In the facts and circumstances, the testimony of the victim alone is sufficient to conclude that the prosecution has proved its case beyond a reasonable doubt.

We find that the Additional Sessions Judge had not made a proper appraisal of the prosecution witnesses and medical evidence and by overlooking the materials on record, he has wrongly given the benefit of the doubt to the accused.

In our considered view, the impugned judgment is not legally sustainable and is set aside and we held Sat Pal guilty of the offences.

Hamirpur, November 15
State-level Bal Vigyan Sammelan-2010 (children science conference) was inaugurated on Sunday evening by Chief Secretary Rajwant Sandhu at Government Senior Secondary School, Hamirpur.

Addressing the students on the occasion, she said science fairs could play a vital role in developing scientific temper among children.

She said India had shown a new path to the world in the field of science and technology and scientists like Aryabhatta and Bhaskracharaya had impressed the world with their findings.

The Chief Secretary announced that a Science Activity Centre would be established near Shimla soon and 2,000 eco clubs have been constituted in different schools of the state and appealed the students to join a campaign in protecting our environment.

The Vigyan Sammelan is being organised by the State Science, Technology and Environment Council in collaboration with the Education Department of the state and young scientists from 11 districts of the state are participating in this conference.

Chamba, November 15
With a view to exploring the tourism potential in the picturesque Chamba district, the Department of Tourism and Civil Aviation has drawn a heli-taxi service scheme to facilitate tourists hailing from both home and abroad.

The initiative of the department has been widely acknowledged in the region and the people engaged in the thriving tourism industry have volunteered to include heli-taxi service in their package. District Tourism Development Officer (DTDO) Kishori Lal said the heli-taxi service would link the entire district as there were about six heliports in the district, including the mountainous tribal areas of Pangi and Bharmour. The heli-taxi service envisaged to connect the airports located in Jammu, Amritsar and Pathankot of the neighbouring states, where the tourists would be able to travel around the adjoining hill stations of Dalhousie, Khajjiar, Chamba, Tissa, Holi, Bharmour and Pangi, the DTDO said.

The DTDO said the heli-taxi service would also discover the beauty spots of the district, where the tourists could enjoy the bliss of natural sights and sounds making their journey a ‘leisure for pleasure’ forever.

The heli-taxi service would be made affordable as soon as the department receives positive proposals from hoteliers and tour operators of the region, he informed. He said water sports in the Chamera reservoir, which were going to begin shortly in a big way, would be another attraction to the adventure loving tourists.

Shimla, November 15
Green NGOs have sought the intervention of UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi to get the Renuka dam project scrapped.

In a joint memorandum submitted to Sonia Gandhi in New Delhi today, the Himalaya Niti Abhiyaan, the Renuka Bandh Sangharsh Samiti and the Environics Trust appreciated the fact that the Centre was now considering the viewpoint of the local communities opposing dams and hydroelectric projects in Uttarakhand and the North-East. They urged her to adopt the same yardstick in respect of Himachal.

They drew her attention to the fact that the Ministry of Environment and Forests had already rejected the forest clearance for the second time in view of massive deforestation and submergence that would take place but the state government was forcefully acquiring agriculture land.

A land compensation of Rs 722 lakh had been forcefully distributed for 447 bighas. The land had thick forest and state-owned HPCCL (the developer) had enumerated 32,640 trees for felling. Initially, the 778 m high dam was proposed but now a fresh proposal with reduced dam height of 762 m was being prepared. In all, a total of 1,51,439 trees were enumerated at 778 m, while the actual number of trees to be cut were more than 2,50,000.

According to official records, the total cultivated area in Sirmaur district was 70,000 hectare under the mixture of cash crops like tomatoes, ginger, garlic, and peas, as well as floriculture and horticulture crops such as peach, pears, mango, citrus fruit, pomegranate and apple. It was ecologically sustainable subsistence agriculture for growers.

Activists of Renuka Bandh Sangharsh Samiti would sit on a hunger strike on November 16 when the Chief Minister visits the place for inaugurating the Renuka Mela.

Shimla, November 15
Two private medical college and hospitals are likely to be set up in Hamirpur and Sirmaur districts with the government finalising the technical bids for the projects aimed at providing better medical facilities to the people.

Though the government is keen to set up medical institutions in the private sector, till now the response has been poor. However, now with two groups showing keenness, it is expected that the medical colleges will come up within the next two years.

Kala Amb-based Maa Saraswati Trust has expressed the desire to set up a 100-seat medical college along with a 150-bedded hospital in Sirmaur district. On the other hand, it is Vocational Education Foundation, which is keen to set up a medical college with 100 seats in Hamirpur district. “The government has finalised the technical bids of the two projects while the financial bids are still being scrutinised,” confirmed Dr Jaishree Sharma, director, Medical Education.

She added that the two medical colleges were likely to come up within the next two years. With 200 more MBBS seats at the two colleges, the state would be in a better position as far as filling of the existing 400 posts of MBBS doctors was concerned.

Officials pointed out that private land would be taken by the private players for setting up of the hospital and medical college. They have also been asked to set up 150-bedded hospital, a mandatory condition as per the Medical Council of India (MCI) guideline as government health institutes would not be attached with them.

Keeping in view the constraint of land in hilly areas, the minimum land requirement has been scaled down to 20 acres from 25 acres, which is mandatory in the plains. Besides this, another relaxation that has been made in case of hills is that the hospital and medical college can be at two places within a distance of 10 km.

Another government proposal for setting up of medical schools offering 3.5 years course in Bachelor of Rural Health Care System is likely to go a long way in improving health services in the rural areas. There is a proposal to set up these schools in Hamirpur, Chamba and Sarkaghat in the government sector so that the pass outs can be spotted in rural areas where MBBS doctors are reluctant to serve.

These medical schools will have either 25 or 50 seats with almost one third seats to be paid seats. Besides the Indira Gandhi Medical College (IGMC) and the Tanda medical college, a Central government ESI hospital has come up in Mandi. In the private sector there is the Vivekanand Medical and Research Institute at Palampur being set up jointly with JP group and the Markandeshwar Medical University in Solan.

Mandi, November 15
The Rs 2.36 crore paragliding hostel-cum-training centre at Delu near Jogindernagar, the foundation stone for which was laid by the then Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh in 2006, has run into rough weather, thanks to the apathy of the Department of Tourism and Civil Aviation (DTCA). Besides, the HPSEB and encroachers have almost spelt doom for the centre.

The foundation stone has been removed and now the DTCA has claimed that it will create a tourist information centre and some facilities for the aerosports there.

But aerosports enthusiasts rued that the proposed centre would have provided lodging and training facilities for the beginners. But for the last four years all that has happened at Delu is that the foundation stone has been removed and nothing has been done in terms of creating the basic infrastructure for the learners, they revealed.

As the DTCA remained in slumber for the last four years, the HPSEB has laid the high tension (HT) transmission lines near the proposed centre. Even the encroacher has taken over the land, making a mockery of the proposed centre, said paragliding pilots.

According to sources, the DTCA did not bother to acquire the private land at the entry point, instead gave a field day to the encroacher to run the workshop there, though the owner claimed the “land belongs to him”.

Former Jogindernagar MLA Surinderpal Singh said he was surprised that the foundation stone laid for the training centre was removed and nothing was being done to develop aeropsorts facilities there.

The deputy director, tourism, Manoj Sharma said the main problem was that the HT lines ran over the site and the private land was not acquired so far. But the department was trying to develop the information centre and facilities for the aerosports, he added.

The DTCA officials said they were not aware of the fact that the land was encrcoached upon and the foundation stone was removed from the site.