Hisar, November 19
Justice Iqbal Singh (retd), heading the one-man commission probing violence against Dalits in Mirchpur village of the district, today issued bailable warrants against Pardeep, son of Tara Chand, who was burnt alive along with his teenaged daughter when their house was torched by a crowd of upper caste villagers.

The judge said Pardeep was supposed to appear before him for recording of statement but he had neither appeared in person nor informed him of the reasons for his absence.

Another important witness, Chander Singh, had also not appeared before him but he had informed him about the reasons for his absence.

Justice Iqbal Singh said he had summoned 14 persons for recording their statements. Today five witnesses recorded their statements. They were: Rajmal, Bijendra, Baniya, Jai Singh and Sushil.

Two important witnesses who were out of town and could not appear were: Satyavaan and Jaswant. Justice Iqbal Singh said his mandate was to assess the losses suffered by the victims, look into the compensation given to them and suggest ways for restoring harmony in the village.

He said if need be, he would visit the village again. Besides, those who had failed to appear before the commission would be given another opportunity to do so.

Asked for his reaction to reports of witnesses turning hostile, he said: “ It is up to them. The commission’s job is to hear what they have to say.”

The judge had set up a temporary office in the local PWD Rest House. Thisi s the panel’s second visit to Hisar to record statements. Interestingly, a local court is also holding hearings in the criminal case registered after the violence.

The court has recorded the evidence of several residents of the village. Nine of the witnesses have turned hostile during the proceedings. The Supreme Court has been told of the development.

Karnal, November 19
Adding a new dimension to rural development and strengthening of democracy at the grassroots, the Kachhwa panchayat on the periphery of Karnal town has emerged as a model of development.

On the pattern of the state cabinet, sarpanch Chander Mani Narang has allotted various departments to his 19 panches, who function with active participation of the people.

With the panchayat administration having been decentralised, the villagers are not required to run after the sarpanch for petty works. Narang has retainedfinance and other important portfolios.

Almost all seven women panches have been made charge of a department while two panches, Sunehara Singh and Mahinder Kumar, have been appointed secretary to the sarpanch on the pattern of Parliamentary Secretaries.

A woman panch, Leela Devi, entrusted with the responsibility of looking into the problems of Ranbir Nagar, is virtually functioning as Mayor. The major objective of the panchayat is to ensure speedy development and keep panchayat affairs free from politics, says sarpanch Narang, adding that the system was working well.

All panches were accountable for the proper functioning of their departments, he said. Narang claimed that owing to the efforts of the panchayat, power supply had improved and a sum of Rs 21 Lakh deposited with the Vidyut Nigam for connecting the village to the main supply line in Karnal which would ensure power supply for 20 to 22 hours.

“Uninterrrupted power supply will change the face of the village,” said a village elder, Jasbir.

Panch Jyoti Sharma along with other two other panches, Billu and Bobby, have

been entrusted with “higher education and old-age and pension department” while Man Singh, Gurnam Singh and Lakhvinder are “in charge of Rai Farm.”

The “sanitation and hygiene” department is being looked after by Singu Ram and Jitendra. Heaps of garbage have been removed from the village in the past four months which now looks clean. Sumita Devi and Usha Bhatia hold the portfolio of “anganwadi and works under ASHA” while “health and animal husbandry and law” is being looked after by Mamu Devi and Joginder Kaur.

In order to give a boost to agriculture and motivate farmers to adopt modern techniques, the “agriculture department” has been allotted to panch Tejbhan, a progressive farmer. Panch Dinesh is in charge of “public grievances.”

Rohtak, November 19
The authorities of Maharshi Dayanand University (MDU) are all set to take action against those responsible for a blunder that enabled a girl student of an affiliated college to clear her BCom (Part-II) exam even before she had passed her Class XII exam, the basic qualification required for admission in college. The Vice Chancellor has ordered that the erring officials be charge-sheeted in this connection.

The matter came up in the meeting of the Academic Council, which recommended action in this regard. The student was granted provisional admission in B.Com (Part-I) by Vaish Mahila Mahavidyalaya affiliated in 2008-09. The student had to re-appear in one of the Class XII exams either during the supplementary exams in 2008 or the annual exams in 2009, held simultaneously with the university exams.

But the candidate failed to clear the Class XII paper.

The result branch of the university declared her result as “pass” without verifying facts. In the meantime, the student managed admission in Part- II on the basis of the result card of B.Com-I issued wrongly by the university.

She attended classes and sat for B.Com-II exams in April, 2010. The authorities realised their mistake when she applied for admission in Part- III. The college officials shot off a letter to the university, seeking a clarification if she could take admission in the next class as she had cleared the Class XII exams in March, 2010.

The case was placed before the VC who referred it to Academic Council. While a direction has been issued to charge-sheet the officials concerned, the council has recommended that a warning be sent to the college and a fine imposed. Several years ago, a student had cleared the three-year LLB course even before clearing the Class XII exams.

Yamunanagar, November 19
Ashok Sangwan, DC, inaugurated the Kapal Mochan fair here today. More than 4 lakh pilgrims descended on the religious town to take a holy dip in three sarovars on the first day of the fair.

All roads leading to the town were jammed. People were seen travelling on trucks, trailers, buses and two-wheelers. Special arrangements were made to ferry the pilgrims.Tents have been erected, the water tanks chlorinated and 500 temporary toilets raised for the pilgrims. Five ambulances, one in each sector, were on standby. Vita milk huts had been installed at different sectors for providing milk to the visitors. The three-day meladraws lakhs of devotees from Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Uttarakhand. The devotees come to bathe in the holy Kapal Mochan sarovar in the belief that they will attain salvation. Over 9 lakh pilgrims are expected to reach here tomorrow. On the third day of the fair is Kartik Purnima.

The mela area, spread over 80 acres, has been divided into five sectors. Tents have been pitched on 60 acres for the pilgrims by private parties aand the administration.

Rewari, November 19
Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda laid the foundation stone of a 132 kV substation at Gangaicha Jat village, near here, yesterday. Constructed at a cost of Rs. 38 crore, it will benefit consumers in 72 villages.

The CM reiterated his government resolve to make the state self-sufficient in power and to strengthen the transmission and distribution system. The government was determined to add an additional 5000 mw by March, 2012, to bridge the gap between demand and supply.

To achieve the above target, while generation of power from the 600 mw Deshbandhu Chhotu Ram Thermal Power Plant, Yamunanagar, and the 1,200 mw Rajiv Gandhi Thermal Power Plant at Khedar (Hisar) had already begun, the first unit of the 500 mw Indira Gandhi Super Thermal Power Station at Jhajjar had also been synchronised whereas its second and third units of 500 mw each were expected to be ready by January and February next, respectively. As much as 1700 mw of additional power would be available from private power plants in Gujarat and Orissa.

Gurgaon, November 19
A blood donation camp was organised to mark the birth anniversary of the late Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, here today.

Rohtak MP Deepender Singh Hooda, who is also the vice-chairman of the blood donation wing of the Indian Red Cross Society, was the chief guest.

As many as 482 units of blood was collected during the camp organised at Dronacharya Government College by Rotary Club (South City). A large number of students, including girls, turned up for blood donation. However, nearly 150 girls were not allowed to donate blood because of their low haemoglobin (Hb) level.

Paying floral tributes to the late leader, Hooda pointed out that she played an instrumental role in resolving disputes of south Asia.

“She not only launched the first atomic research plant in India, but also laid the foundation of green revolution to meet the country’s foodgrain demand,” he asserted.

The MP congratulated and encouraged the blood donors and observed that though science had progressed a lot, it had not been able to discover or invent any alternative of blood. Hence, donating blood was a noble act of human service, he added.

Referring to the demand of a blood bank in Gurgaon put up by Rotary Club (South City) president Mukesh Sharma, Hooda assured that he along with Minister of State for Agriculture and Cooperatives Sukhbir Kataria and HPCC working president Kuldeep Sharma would forcefully put their demand before the Chief Minister.

Sharma had asked only for land and maintained that they would construct the blood-bank building on their own. At another programme organised at the mini-secretariat, the birth anniversary of the late Prime Minister was observed as Qaumi Ekta Day (Communal Harmony Day) by the district administration. City Magistrate KK Gupta administered the oath of communal harmony to local government officials. The officials also paid floral tributes to the departed leader.

Chandigarh, November 19
Three engineers of the Haryana Irrigation Department will be charge-sheeted for allegedly causing loss to the state exchequer to the extent of Rs 7.50 lakh due to ill planning.

While retired XEN JK Giridhar and retired SDO VK Singla will be charge-sheeted under Rule 2.2 (B) of CSR Volume II, Assistant Sub-divisional Engineer RS Verma, who was junior engineer at that time, will be charge-sheeted under Rule 7 of P&A Rules-1987.

According to official sources, these officers were responsible for repairing the Atela distributary in Bhiwani. The distributary was repaired in 2007 at a cost of Rs 7.50 lakh, but it was damaged the very next year. — TNS

Fatehabad, November 19
A senior citizen couple has lost their gold ornaments weighing 20 tolas, which they had placed in the lockers of the main branch of the State Bank of India here.

The bank officers have disowned responsibility for the loss and have attributed it to the negligence of customers.

Gian Chand Chaudhary, whose wife Krishna Chaudhary has a locker in the bank, said that the bank informed them on November 17 that their locker appeared to be unlocked.

He said when he and his wife reached the bank, they found the gold ornaments as well as a fixed deposit certificate missing.

He said his wife had operated the locker last on September 27 when she had sought the help of an officer for locking it.

Chaudhary alleged that earlier the bank manager assured them that the bank would find out the persons behind the theft through the CCTV footage within two days, but he told them today that the bank could not do anything in this case.Branch manager RM Madan maintained that the bank had no responsibility for the loss.

He maintained that he took two days’ time from the couple, as he had to prepare a reply to the customer’s complaint after consultation with his seniors. Upma Bansal, deputy manager of the bank, who facilitated the operation of the locker on both occasions, said the bank called up Chaudhary on November 17 when she found her locker ajar. “We found that the couple had put an additional lock on locker number 224 instead of their own 239, which was found open and empty,” Upma added.

Rewari, November 19
Following a breach in a water channel of the Public Health Department at Kohard village, 35 km from here, last night, canal water entered the fields and damaged the nascent (newly grown) mustard and wheat crops.

The channel carries canal water from the Chirya minor to the storage tank of the Public Health Department at Khurshid Nagar village near Kosli.

Ranbir Singh, Rakesh Kumar and other aggrieved farmers have demanded compensation for their damaged crops while seeking speedy repair of the breached channel.

Karnal, November 19
A married woman, Anita (26), allegedly committed suicide by hanging herself at her in-laws’ house in Vasant Vihar here today.

Anil, brother of the deceased hailing from Jalmama village in Panipat district, alleged that his sister was tortured and ill treated by her husband Karamvir for more dowry.

He said in the past six years, they had already demanded a motorcycle and many other things. Last night, he demanded a juicer-grinder and his sister was found dead in the morning.

He said his sister’s in-laws called them and informed about Anita’ death at 1 am. However, when they reached Karnal, she was found hanging.

The family of the deceased suspected a foul play and said there were injury marks on Anita’s body. The police has registered a case under Section 304 (B) and 34 of the IPC against Karamvir, his brother Binda, father-in-law Jeet Ram and mother-in-law Murti Devi. The body has been sent for a postmortem.