Amritsar, January 6
A school student was killed, while 14 others were injured when two speeding vans collided with each other today.

Kirandeep Kaur (10), a student of DAV Public School, died on the spot, while another student Harsandeep Kaur was critically injured in the mishap.

The incident took place at 8 am just opposite the Ranjit Avenue police chowki when a speeding van of Sri Guru Harkrishan Public School (PB-02-BK-9298) hit another speeding school van (PB-11-Q-5417) carrying children right in the middle of the intersection. The impact was so hard that the school van with the children overturned.

The children were rushed to a nearby private hospital. The police took the drivers of the two vans, identified as Jaswinder Singh and Mantej Singh, into custody and registered a case under Sections 304 and 307 of the IPC against them at Civil Lines police station on the statement of Ashok Kumar, in charge, Ranjit Avenue police chowki.

Those injured include Rooprattan Singh, Harkanwal, Khushpreet Kaur, Harnam Singh, Rajwinder Kaur, Tarveen Kaur, Mandeep Kaur, Ranjit Kaur, Simran, Navdeep Kaur, Harmanpreet Kaur, Harsimrat Kaur, Husnpreet Kaur and Hardeep Kaur. All these children belong to different schools, who hail from various villages situated on the Ajnala Road.

Phagwara, January 6
Public Relation Inspector-cum-Assistant Post Master (Mails) Shri Paul along with six others allegedly beat up Post Master Dilawar Singh Mahi mercilessly at General Post Office (GPO) here today.

Customers at the GPO had to come to the rescue of the Post Master. Though the assailants managed to escape.

Talking to The Tribune, Mahi alleged that the Public relation Inspector used to come late to his duty. On Wednesday, he objected when Paul came to the office at 9.15 am instead of 8.30 am, the scheduled time.

“Paul abused me when I asked him to come on time to his duty to prevent delay in mail distribution,” he further alleged.

Mahi said today the PRI along with his son and others entered Post Master’s cabin and started beating him up.

His turban fell off and he was thrown on the floor. Later, some customers and post office employee Sanjeev intervened and saved him.

Seema, a clerk, said she raised alarm on seeing the manhandling of the Post Master in his office.

Later Mahi was sent to a local hospital for medical examination.

Mahi informed the higher authorities of Post Office.

The police is investigating the matter.

Jalandhar, January 6
In what could be termed as a landmark for the life insurance sector functioning in the state, the Jalandhar division of the Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) has been adjudged the best division of the country for its outstanding performance in the micro-finance category during the last financial year.

Besides, with only less than three months remaining in the culmination of the current financial year, the division is far ahead of the other 109 divisions of the country in the micro-insurance category.

Micro-insurance targets the poorest of the poor segments of the society, especially the BPL families, industrial and agricultural labour, migrant labour and the vulnerable section of aged persons up to the age of 60 years.

Till now, hardly any life insurance firm ever bothered to provide an insurance cover to this section of the society. Micro-insurance is being provided to such sections with a weekly premium as low as Rs 15-25.

The best performance of the Jalandhar division, which oversees the operations in Jalandhar, Kapurthala, Nawanshahr, Moga, Hoshiarpur, Faridkot and Muktasar districts, is in contrast to the socio-economic fabric of the districts.

As such, districts have a large number of families with foreign connections and peasantry.

We have involved around 38 self help groups, which consist of 10-30 individuals each and around 12 non-government organisations (NGOs) actively engaged in our micro-insurance operations,” said Girish Kumar, Senior Divisional Manager, Jalandhar division.

Amritsar, January 6
Alleging police inaction, a rape victim and her husband have approached the Punjab State Human Rights Commission (PSHRC) to intervene and provide justice to them.

The victim, in her petition to the PSHRC, alleged that police officials were pressurising them to arrive at a compromise, failing which they (the police) would close the case in favour of the accused.

The accused persons, who happen to be her relatives, raped her, besides brutally assaulting her husband Dharminder Singh, to avenge the murder of their kin.

They kidnapped the couple in the wee hours of December 20, when they were going to pay obeisance at Gurdwara Shaheed Baba Deep Singh.

According to the complaint registered at the Sultanwind police station, the armed relatives hit their motorcycle and bundled them up in a car.

They took them to a secluded place in Mulle Chak village, where they committed the crime.

“I somehow managed to call my brother and father-in-law when the accused fled from the scene after committing the crime. After reaching the spot, they informed the police who got their medical examination conducted and got a case registered,” Dharminder’s wife said.

On her statement, the police registered a case under Sections 364, 376, 307, 323 and 324 of IPC and Sections 25, 54 and 59 of the Arms Act against Piara Singh, his three sons Pampi, Pappu, Nikka and Joginder Singh and his wife Jeeto, all residents of Ajit Nagar, situated on the Sultanwind Road.

Dharminder was sentenced with a life term, for killing the son of Piara Singh. He was released about five years ago, after the completion of his term.

“The police was providing undue help to the offenders and was shielding them,” alleged the victim, while adding that they were deliberately not arresting the accused.

While rebutting the charges, Balwant Singh, SHO of the Sultanwind police station, said the police was investigating into the case. He said investigations were under progress and action would be taken accordingly.

They termed the allegations, of the accused being shielded, as baseless.

Amritsar, January 6
The work on the much-awaited Personal Rapid Transport System (PRTS) in the holy city has taken off. The authorities here have identified seven locations for establishing stations for ULTra (Urban Light Transport) magnetic pods - the driverless battery operated six-seater vehicles.

The seven stations would be the Gol Bagh Railway Station, Deen Dayal Market, Kairon Market, Galliara parking, the Golden Temple, Bus Stand and Mahan Singh Chowk.

With the Golden Temple as the epicentre, as many as 200 laser-guided pods would start running on the elevated guideway tracks between the Sikh holy shrine and the bus stand.

The Amritsar Municipal Commissioner DPS Kharbanda said the first phase of the project on this route would be completed within 11 months.

“We have made a study, which revealed that more than 65 per cent of the daily commuters and tourists take the bus stand-Golden Temple route. That’s why, we chose to introduce this system on this route primarily,” he said.

A meeting to this effect was held yesterday, with the officials of the Punjab Infrastructure Regulatory Agency, a subsidy of the Punjab Infrastructure Development Board (PIDB).

“It has been deliberated that the execution of the first phase of this 198-crore project should start within a period of two months. We have already done soil testing at different points, where the pillars for the tracks have to be installed,” he said.

The air-conditioned pods, equipped with rubber wheels, would run at a maximum speed of 40 km per hour on 20-foot-high tracks raised on these pillars.

A commuter standing offline, at a call point, would get access control through a swipe card. He would key in his desired destination on the station itself, after which the pod would select the most economical route, after accepting the fare of Rs 15 per head.

Kharbanda said special lifts and escalators would be installed at stations to provide access to the pods positioned over the pillars.

Tarn Taran, January 6
Harjinder Kaur, her husband Piara Singh and son Santokh Singh of Dhianpur village (Baba Bakala), besides their relative Amrik Singh of Khan Kot (Amritsar), have been booked under Section 420 of the IPC, for land fraud, by the Goindwal Sahib police.

Karam Singh of Bhoian village (Khadur Sahib) was the complainant in the case, whom the accused defrauded of Rs 30 lakh, in a land deal concerning a 34 kanal 13 marla piece of land located at the Dhianpur village.

Karam Singh, in his statement to the police, said there was a settlement of Rs 13 lakh per acre for the land and he had given an amount of Rs 30 lakh to the accused in the year 2006.

In the written deed, December 28, 2006 was fixed as the date to write the sale deed.

Karam Singh said the accused, in spite of getting the land transferred to his (Karma Singh’s) name, fraudulently transferred it to the name of Harjinder Kaur (Piara’wife).

A DSP rank officer primarily investigated the case and suggested that a case of fraud be registered.

Jalandhar, January 6
Legal experts here are baffled over the alleged biased conduct of the police in the suicide case of a Nakodar city division Powercom junior engineer Sukhdev Singh Gill. Despite the recovery of a suicide note, the Jalandhar rural police did not register an FIR of abetment to suicide against the XEN concerned.

Though the Nakodar city SHO, Surinder Pal Singh, told TNS that the JE, who committed suicide by hanging himself from a fan at his Nakodar city Powercom office, clearly stated in his suicide note that he was taking this step as the XEN concerned had stopped his salary for the past some time, the police merely took routine action of initiating inquest proceedings under Section 174 of the CrPC.

The police has its own reasoning. SSP Ashish Chaudhary said an FIR was not registered under Section 306 of the IPC as no member of the JE’s family was ready to lodge any complaint in this regard. On the contrary, city advocate KK Arora said there was no need for any member of the victim’s family to lodge any complaint to register an FIR of abetment to suicide in this case, as the investigating officer or any other police personnel might himself become a complainant in this case on the basis of the suicide note.

Citing Section 154 of the CrPC, Arora said: “If the police receives any information of the commission of cognisable offence, it has to register a case on the basis of incriminating evidence.”

In this case, the suicide note was incriminating piece of evidence with the investigating agency and the IO or any other police personnel might act as a complainant if no one from the victim’s family lodged any complainant, he added.

At this, the SSP said if anyone found guilty during inquest proceedings, a case would be registered.

Meanwhile, state senior vice-president of the Council of Junior Engineers Raj Kumar Chaudhary demanded the registration of an FIR for abetment to suicide against Nakodar City XEN Kanwar Jaswant Singh. On the other hand, the XEN said the department had stopped the salary of the deceased along with some other JEs for a few months as they had not submitted any account for material worth lakh of rupees withdrawn from the store. As he was drawing and disbursing officer in his case, the deceased mentioned his name in the suicide note, he added.

However, demanding departmental action against the XEN, Chaudhary said there was no rule to stop the salary of a JE even if he failed to submit account. Meanwhile, Kapurthala circle SE Iqbal Singh Mann said he had sought a report in this regard and was waiting for the same.