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Politicians enter cyber world to contact voters
Transfer policy
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Dalai Lama urged to drop retirement plan
First calf born using embryo transfer tech in state
anti-polythene drive
Plea to review AMASR Act
vignettes
Hobby classes at Shimla's Gaiety great success
Ambulance service gets good response
57 girls benefit under state scheme
Handloom exhibition
Mock firefighting drill at Tanda college
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Politicians enter cyber world to contact voters
Dharamsala, January 11 Anurag Thakur, the youngest of them, has maximum followers. Around 2,117 people follow his blogs on Facebook. He seems to be regularly interacting with his followers and friends. In the most recent communication, he has used his Facebook blog to urge his followers to participate in the Rashtriya Ekta Yatra. He is also fond of uploading his photograph on Facebook and has many photos in different poses, including the ones clicked while playing cricket. Virbhadra Singh has 540 followers. Sources say his Facebook account is being managed by his staff, as the minister is not computer savvy. In a recent communication, Vibhadra Singh has lamented that the country failed to capitalise on Rs 105 lakh crore projects proposed by giants like Posco and Arcelor Mittal. Such mega plans are being dealt with in a routine matter, he stated. The communication has attracted response from many followers who generally endorse his plans. He has just one profile photo and a few photos of his participation in political functions. Kaul Singh Thakur has just 165 followers. Interestingly, he likes the blog of Virbhadra Singh with whom he is not going well politically. The sources say Kaul Singh’s blog is also being managed by his supporters. After the municipal council elections in the state, Kaul Singh has used his blog to pacify the feelings of party leaders who were suspended for challenging official nominees of the party. He has stated on Facebook that Congress rebels had only been suspended and not expelled and the party would reconsider its decision. He has also added his latest interview with a regional new channel on his blog. Kaul Singh also has just one profile photo on his blog. Two young Congress MLA’s, Mukesh Agnihotri from Santokhgarh and Sudhir Sharma from Baijnath, also have their Facebook accounts. The accounts are being used for interacting with friends. These MLAs are not using their accounts for political ends. The Congressmen from the state have taken a lead in using blogs on Facebook to reach out to their supporters and educate the youth while in the BJP, only Anurag is net savvy. Besides, politicians have also been making the use of latest communication tools to reach out voters during elections. The BJP, in the last parliamentary elections, extensively used SMSes to deliver messages to voters. However, using blogs on the internet is the recent trend which is likely to assume significance in view of the widening of the reach of the internet, particularly among the youth.
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HC intervention to help revamp education system
Vijay Arora
Shimla, January 11 The government while framing a separate transfer policy for the Education Department has taken care of the directions issued by the Division Bench, comprising Chief Justice Kurian Joseph and Justice Kuldip Singh, that the transfer of teachers will be made only in administrative exigencies and not on the pressure from external quarters. While issuing these directions, the court had also given a suggestion that “the Education Department should avoid the transfer of teacher in the midst of an academic year and that any deviation should only be in extreme situation where it is extremely required to deviate”. In view of this, the government has laid down that general transfers will normally be ordered in April and there will be a ban on transfers after April 30. Thereafter, transfers can be ordered with the prior approval of the Chief Minister under circumstances such as due to promotion, retirement, death, deputation, resignation, suspension, proceeding on a long leave of a teacher, due to creation, abolition or shifting of post on rationalisation, on the basis of complaint after verifying facts, due to poor academic performance or misconduct, allocation from institutions of lower enrolment to institutions of higher student enrolments. The court had also observed that the department should ensure that a teacher once posted at a place remains there at least for three academic years. Further, in the event of transfer, the teacher should join the duty only when the person occupying the post was relieved. These directions had been duly included in the policy, which envisages that normal posting period of all categories of teachers will be three academic years. However, this will be subject to continued good performance and administrative requirements. The normal stay in case of first appointments in tribal, difficult, hard and rural areas will be five years. The court also observed that to ensure transparency, the department would publish the policy so that there was no undue pressure for deviation from it. The court had passed the order on a contempt petition filed by a teacher, Joginder Singh, in which he has alleged that the Rajiv Sharma, director, education, had not complied with the orders of the court in his transfer. The unnecessary litigation due to such type of transfer problems prompted the court to direct the government to frame a separate transfer policy for the Education Department. The policy will provide relief to the teachers who will not have to run after politicians to ensure that they were not shifted before the completion of the tenure and they will be able to concentrate on teaching the students. However, politically influential teachers will have reasons to be worried as they will no longer be able to stay put at a convenient station for long.
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Dalai Lama urged to drop retirement plan
Dharamsala, January 11 In the memorandum, the Standing Committee of the Tibetan parliament-in-exile said it held successive meetings over the Dalai Lama's wish to take complete retirement from governmental roles. The Dalai Lama has been spiritual and temporal head of the Tibetans, especially those living in-exile. Though some young hard line Tibetans who are for complete freedom from China now question the middle path approach of the Dalai Lama, majority of Tibetans still do not dare to differ with his views. After being conferred the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, the Dalai Lama carried out extensive foreign tours and has now become a brand ambassador for Tibet, especially in the West. The protests in Tibet just before the Beijing Olympics in 2008 also illustrated that though in-exile for more than 50 years now the Dalai Lama still exercises control over Tibetans living in Tibet. These protests shook China and it adopted a more aggressive policy against the Dalai Lama. China started opposing visa to the Dalai Lama and his followers by western countries and also started exerting more control over monasteries in Tibet. Reports indicated that China was also trying to revive the Golden Urn method for the selection of new Dalai Lama. A large numbers of Tibetans-in-exile fear that successors of the Dalai Lama might not get that much international importance and the Tibetan movement might go weak after him. In the memorandum submitted to the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan parliament-in-exile has stated that Tibetans both in Tibet and in-exile have been greatly concerned and grieved by his retirement plans. They have been continuing to petition the Dalai Lama, beseeching that he never entertains any thought about carrying out a plan for such a decision. The memorandum also cites various resolutions adopted by the Tibetan administration, including the First Special General Meeting of Tibetans held in November, 2008, and a unanimous resolution adopted during the ninth session of the 14th Tibetan parliament-in-exile that gave the Dalai Lama full authority in dealing with the future course of action for resolving the issue of Tibet. The Dalai Lama, however, insists that it will be his moral responsibility to continue to act as the free spokesperson of Tibetan people until a mutually satisfactory solution to the Tibet problem is found.
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Tallest flying bird sarus sighted in Una
Una, January 11 Bird enthusiasts are excited after their regular sightings in marshy and agricultural fields along the Swan river, a tributary of the Sutlej. Prabhat Bhatti, a bird watcher and wildlife photographer based in Nangal, , has spotted the bird a number of times in the area. He photographed two chicks and a female sarus sauntering in the marshy areas along the river near the Talewal industrial town last week. "This is the first time that I have spotted two chicks. Earlier, only adults (three pairs) were seen in the area," Bhatti told IANS. Bhatti, who has been monitoring sarus cranes in the area for more than six years, said the presence of chicks showed that the cranes had started breeding in the area. In India, the bird is found in areas in Gujarat, UP, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh, but their numbers have been declining for the past few years. The tallest of all 15 species of cranes in the world, the sarus is distinguished by its contrasting red head and attains a height of up to six feet, with a wingspan of eight feet. The Red Data Book of the International Union for Conservation of Nature - a compendium of species facing extinction - has put the bird in the "vulnerable" category. "Great news, indeed," K.S. Gopi Sundar, research associate (India) of the US-based International Crane Foundation, said via e-mail, reacting to the sighting of chicks. He said their population in Himachal, especially in the Pong wetlands of Kangra district, seemed to have been increasing since the late 1990s. "Ideal water levels during the breeding season, and increase in cropping activity seems to be providing sarus with good breeding habitats. In Punjab, the sightings of Sarus are becoming common largely due to more interested people. "We don't really have a good idea of how well the population there is doing, but given that the Himachal population is breeding and increasing, it's very likely that more sarus cranes will now fly to neighbouring Punjab, especially during the winter," he said. Una district, located in lower Shivaliks, adjoins Punjab. Chief wildlife warden AK Gulati said the wildlife wing would soon conduct a faunal survey of the area to know the exact status of the endangered bird. — IANS
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First calf born using embryo transfer tech in state
Solan, January 11 Incidentally, Bagthan was also the native place of the state’s first Chief Minister YS Parmar, who is referred to as the architect of Himachal Pradesh. This has been achieved by the hard work of Dr KD Ryot, animal reproduction specialist and assistant director in the department, who took it as a challenge and initiated this work on a trial basis last year. He started working on this project at Bagthan farm after getting a short-term training on ETT in Germany where he was especially chosen to be sent by the Dr BC Bist, director, animal husbandry. Terming it as a big achievement for the state, Dr Ryot said initially, 10 deep frozen cattle embryos were brought from other states and out of this, nine were transferred to recipient cows (surrogate mothers) of the farm. One of the pregnant cows from ETT delivered a healthy viable male calf weighing about 32 kg on December 28, 2010. Besides, two more cows have also conceived at the farm using ETT. “The birth of the calf with ETT technique has placed the state among the category of a few leading states in the country which have developed this technique of animal breeding. This was considered a powerful tool for rapid improvement of milch animal genetics. Besides, trials for the implantation of frozen embryos in surrogates were also conducted to produce the embryos from our own animals (donors) at Bagthan farm and Milch Livestock Improvement Society, Live Stock Farm, Kotla Barog, with encouraging results,” added Dr Ryot. Terming it as the beginning of a marathon task aimed at improving the breed of milch cattle in the state, Dr Ryot opined that it would help improve the economy of dairy farmers. The department is proposing to import high pedigree embryos under a central project for the production of elite breeding bulls for use at sperm station and donor cows to be used in ETT for production of embryos at cattle breeding farms in the state. The project is expected to give a boost to Doodh Ganga Pariyojna in the state by contributing significantly to the pool of high quality milch cattle genetics. It may further help in reducing stray cattle population by using selected classes of infertile cows as recipients in
ETT.
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Central team to visit Bilaspur today
Our Correspondent
Bilaspur, January 11 Nandita said this team would be on a visit to four districts and in the district here, this team would survey the progress of "Remove Polythene Campaign" at Namhole, Brahmpukhar, Bilaspur, Ghaghas. She said this entire area had been divided into five sectors and district officers and their departments had been directed to ensure the total cleanliness and garbage removal from all these and near about places well in time and any lapse in this matter would be viewed seriously. Gupta said people had been asked to cooperate in this effort and the assistant engineer, Pollution Control Board, here had been directed to take suitable action and even challan those shopkeepers and other people who litter garbage. The Emergency Response Centre has received 12,571 calls on the toll-free number 108 over the past two weeks out of which 543 were actual emergency calls and the remaining 1,221 turned out be enquiry calls.
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Plea to review AMASR Act
Chamba, January 11 "Chamba is an ancient town of Himachal with a number of temples and palaces which are under the purview of the Archeological Survey of India ". The amended AMASR Act, 2010, which came into force on March 30 this year throughout the country, forbids any construction, including addition or alteration, either vertically or horizontally within within a radius of 100 metres from the protected monuments without permission from a competent authority. In petition to the Prime Minister, association president RK Mahajan said the amended Act had directly or indirectly affected the people of Chamba town which needed to be reviewed forthwith. The association appealed to the Prime Minister to direct the central high-powered committee to visit Chamba to physically verify the location of such monuments and take public opinion before taking a decision in this connection.
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vignettes A young boy in his teens used to come from Ambotta in Una to Shimla after the city was declared the summer capital of India in 1864. He had a strange name 'Thunia Mal' and his visits here meant generating petty business far away from his native village where agriculture was the main profession of his family. Thunia that meant 'a jester' in Pahari language thought seriously of starting a permanent business here and he grabbed the opportunity with both hands when he got a shop on The Ridge where existed Upper Bazaar in 1872. He started a provision store in the name of Thunia Mal Ghunghar Mal (See photo), Ghunghar being his son, to share the bazaar with De Russet, a photographer; Hamilton and West, drapers; O'Connor and Peliti, confectioners, besides Hussain Baksh, Ahsanullah etc. The provision store was more of a general order supply centre catering to almost all demands of the British. In 1875 a fire broke out in the premises of Hamilton and engulfed the bazaar and nearby houses. Edward Buck writes: "The municipality wisely prohibited rebuilding, compensated proprietors for their lost sites, levelled down the crest of the road and planted the flourishing copse." The provision store was then shifted to 17, Lower Bazaar, from where it has been functioning to date. It is gratifying that despite ups and downs of the business, the branches of the same genealogical tree are running the shop; of course, the vocation has changed from the provision store to that of hardware and, since October, 2008, to medicine sale. Amar Chand inherited it from Ghunghar Mal to pass it on to Jai Lal and Bodh Raj. Bodh Raj has two sons, Kapil and Kamal - both are educated and well behaved-who are looking after the business with the help of Mukul, son of Kapil. Bodh Raj was honoured in 1999 by LK Advani for his yeoman service towards the RSS. May it be disclosed here that Kamal's son, Karthik Sood, is an upcoming photographer of India! Like father like son, Kamal is also a photographer of repute whose work has been appreciated by BN Goswami, the known art critic. Due to a sharp fall in the business, the Soods lost ownership of the shop in 1910 to Kuthialas, the known forest lessees of Shimla, but regained in 1968 when Mohan Lal was ruling the Kuthiala roost. During these about 60 years, the provision store owners ran the business from the shop itself, but as tenants. The shop at Lower Bazaar had five supporting columns with relief work done on these, so it was popular as '5 hatra'. Hatra is derived from hatti, which means shop and because the five columns were so placed in the front, the shop looked divided into five cubicles. These were removed in 1971 when the shop was given a new look. A Swedish photographer was so impressed by the columns and their antiquity that he took their photograph before removal. We Indians have little love for such things so no photograph is available at Thunia Mal Ghunghar Mal. Kapil and Kamal (KK) were delighted to inform me that they were one of the few proud shopkeepers to have the earliest installed telephone. They named only two other traders having telephones then - chemist DR Vohra and general merchant Gaindamal Hemraj on The Mall. Thunia Mal Ghunghar Mal had two specialties - they were the licence-holder for selling spirit and authorised judicial stamp paper vendors, allowed to sell stamp papers up to or below the value of `3000 . Thunia Mal Ghunghar Mal diversified their business in 1953 when they started Amrit Aerated Water Factory opposite Jama Masjid at Old Butail Building. KK said, unlike today, nobody would take cold drinks in winters so their factory used to work at the optimum level from March to August. Soda, however, was ever on demand from the rendezvous visited by the British or elite denizens. The factory was closed down in 1984 when competing with Colas became difficult. Thunia Mal Ghunghar Mal was the flag-bearer during the British regime and after. Its provisions were sold to almost all convent schools, restaurants and clubs of repute. Happy clientele to the new vocation of medicine, medical goods and toiletries!
Tailpiece
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Himachal diary The experiment of the Language, Art and Culture department to start hobby classes at Shimla's Gaiety Theatre (See photo) has been a great success. More than 125 boys and girls, mostly school and college students, are taking advantage of the training being provided in disciplines of classical dances, painting and theatre. In fact, there were many more students who were keen to undergo training but they could not be enrolled because of limitations of time and space. The authorities decided to enrol a maximum of 50 students for coaching in dance and painting and they were split into two groups of 25 each to ensure that every student got personal attention. In the case of theatre, only 25 students have been enrolled. The department is charging a token fee of `150 per month per discipline. Some students are undergoing training in more than one disciplines. Director of the department Prem Sharma said that the initiative was taken by Manisha Nanda, Principal Secretary, Language, Art and Culture, who was keen to provide an opening to students for pursuing creative activities during the long winter vacations. Besides, the huge infrastructure available at Gaiety Theatre would be put to good use during the lean winter months. The department has arranged the services of Narinder Sharma, a student of well-known dance exponent Ila Pande, National School of Drama-trained theatre artist Kedar and Kapur V Bhan of the Charu Art Foundation for conducting the classes. Initially, the classes have been planned for two months, January and February. However, these could be extended up to March 15 depending on the availability of students. Parking lots
Keen to create parking facilities for the ever-increasing number of vehicles in the state the government is working on a proposal to use the excess width available on national highways and state roads for the purpose. The state has 1967 km of national highway and unlike the plains, their width is not uniform due to curves and space is available at places for creating parking lots without obstructing traffic. The PWD has been asked to identify such stretches and mark them with a yellow line. The vehicle owners will be charged a parking fee on a daily and monthly basis for using the parking lot. The amount will go to the road development fund. The department may engage private contractors for collection of parking fee, whereever necessary. The step will help check unauthorised parking of vehicles along the roads and also help the government raise funds. To begin with, the scheme will be implemented in the state capital. As per the proposal, a parking fee of `600 per month will be charged. The PWD wants the government to make unauthorised parking a cognizable offence.
Political turncoats
Immediately after the announcement of results of the just-concluded panchayati raj institutions (PRI) and urban local bodies poll, many people have switched their loyalties and are now seen in the company of the winning candidates. These turncoats worked hard to ensure the defeat of some candidates who ultimately emerged victorious. But they had no qualms in changing their loyalties and lost no time in jumping to the bandwagon of the successful contestants. Some of them are even taking credit for the victory of the winning candidates. It is the human tendency to get closer to the rising sun and to shun the loser. Thus, aligning with the winners is not surprising. However, ignoring the preferred near ones after their defeat is a bit disturbing for those who have been involved in the poll. One candidate after losing the election complained about the behaviour of one of his staunch supporter who maintained a distanced from him after the defeat. He was promptly reminded by his friend of the old saying - "success has many fathers but failure is an orphan". (Contributed by Rakesh Lohumi and DP Gupta)
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Ambulance service gets good response
Shimla, January 11 The Emergency Response Centre has received 12,571 calls on the toll-free number 108 over the past two weeks out of which 543 were actual emergency calls and the remaining 1,221 turned out be enquiry calls. A majority patients were pregnant women. The maximum calls were received from Shimla and Sirmaur districts, followed by Hamirpur and Bilaspur. The state started the service in collaboration with the GVK Emergency Management and Research Institute (EMRI) in public-private partnership. In the first phase of the Atal Swasthya Sewa, 50 ambulances have been made available in the districts of Shimla, Kangra, Bilaspur, Hamirpur, Solan and Sirmour. By March 2011, the service will be extended in the remaining districts. Himachal Pradesh has carved a niche in a number of sectors and health is one of them. The centre from which the services will be controlled is being established at Dharampur in Solan. Till a regular centre becomes functional over the next one year, the service is being managed from a temporary centre at Rabaun on the Solan-Kumarhatti bypass. The centre has a trained staff, including doctors and police personnel who take care of everything, right from sending ambulance, providing emergency treatment on the way and admitting patients at the nearest hospital. All vehicles are equipped with GPS (Global Positioning System) which enables the centre to keep a track of all ambulances and despatch the one stationed at the nearest point. The average time for an ambulance to reach the patient is 25 minutes in the urban areas and 35 minutes in the rural areas. The emergencies include delivery cases, snakebite, accidents, cardiac and respiratory disease and other ailments, which require immediate medical care. The ambulances have on board life-saving equipment like automatic internal defibrillators, pulse oxymeter, oxygen supply, nebulisers, suction machine, glucometer, electronic blood pressure measuring apparatus, five types of stretchers and splints, extraction kit, medicines and IV fluids that can handle 42 types of emergencies. Out of the total 108 ambulances, 25 vehicles will have advanced life support equipment like multi-para monitor in addition. The driver, called pilot, is trained to handle emergencies for which he is assisted by a trained paramedical. The entire state will be covered by the end of March after which there will be an ambulance for a population of about 50,000, compared to the national average of one lakh. The recurring expenditure on the service will be Rs 14.39 crore and the capital expenditure will Rs 18 crore. In all, over 600 personnel will be deployed to run the service.
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57 girls benefit under state scheme
Chamba, January 11 The scheme launched in Himachal Pradesh has proved a boon for the helpless and poor girls for solemnising their marriages. This was stated by the Himachal Pradesh Vidhan Sabha Speaker Tulsi Ram while presiding over a meeting of district welfare committee here today. The Speaker said under the Mother Teresa yojna, 953 women had also been provided an assistance of `19.5 lakh for their nourishment and education. The Speaker said `10.55 crore which included `8.17 crore as pensions were being spent under various social security programmes in the district during the ongoing financial year. — OC
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Handloom exhibition
Nurpur, January 11 According to Samir Sharma, marketing manager of Himbunkar, pure wool traditional handloom products like Kullu and Kinnouri pashmina, angora and yak wool shawls, jackets, scarves etc are displayed. “The main objective of organising such an exhibition is to conserve the rich heritage of handicrafts and educate people about the traditional handloom products,” he asserted. Sharma informed that exhibitors had offered a special 10 per cent discount to local buyers. He claimed that such exhibitions facilitated entrepreneurs in getting adequate price of their products without paying any commission to mediators. He told that Himbunkar had enrolled 292 cooperative societies.
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Mock firefighting drill at Tanda college
Kangra, January 11 Dr Sanjeev Choudary, college spokesman, said it was on the initiative of Dr Anil Chauhan, principal of the College, that a mock drill was conducted by the PWD’s electrical wing to ensure effective handling of fire incident for ensuring the safety of human life and property. He said the principal took an initiative and requested the faculty, staff, students and other interested people on the campus to attend and learn the safety measures. In this endeavour, a brief introduction to the main causes of fire, its sources (fire initiation triangle), classes of fire, ways and means for extinction and the classification of fire extinguishers on the basis of nature of combustible material was given by the electrical wing of the PWD to students, faculty and others present on the occasion. The mock drill was concluded by giving a live demo of fire extinction followed by a practice of triggering and aiming of fire extinguishers, which were due for refilling, to different classes by faculty, staff and students. The mock drill was witnessed by patients and attendants while firefighters were seen in action. The principal also directed the electrical wing to arrange the refilling of extinguishers in a phased manner so that firefighting measures remain in order round the clock.
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A young boy in his teens used to come from Ambotta in Una to Shimla after the city was declared the summer capital of India in 1864. He had a strange name
'Thunia Mal' and his visits here meant generating petty business far away from his native village where agriculture was the main profession of his family. Thunia that meant 'a jester' in Pahari language thought seriously of starting a permanent business here and he grabbed the opportunity with both hands when he got a shop on The Ridge where existed Upper Bazaar in 1872.
The experiment of the Language, Art and Culture department to start hobby classes at Shimla's Gaiety Theatre (See photo) has been a great success. More than 125 boys and girls, mostly school and college students, are taking advantage of the training being provided in disciplines of classical dances, painting and theatre. In fact, there were many more students who were keen to undergo training but they could not be enrolled because of limitations of time and space.
The Emergency Response Service under which free ambulance service has been introduced in six districts of the state has started well.
The Emergency Response Centre has received 12,571 calls on the toll-free number 108 over the past two weeks out of which 543 were actual emergency calls and the remaining 1,221 turned out be enquiry calls.