Chandigarh, January 18
Haryana Governor Jagannath Pahadia today administered the oath of office to Justice Pritam Pal as the Lokayukta of Haryana at a function organised at Haryana Raj Bhawan. Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda was present on the occasion. A former Judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, Justice Pritam Pal, was serving as the president of the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Chandigarh, since June 3, 2009, after his retirement.

In response to a query after the oath-taking ceremony, the Chief Minister said there was no opposition within the party.

Others present at the function included Speaker HS Chatha, president of the HPCC Phool Chand Mullana, Tourism Minister OP Jain, Education Minister Geeta Bhukkal, Chief Secretary Urvashi Gulati and members of Justice Pritam Pal’s family. He has taken over the office of the Lokayukta from Justice NK Sood, who retired on January 15 this year.

Karnal, January 18
Varinder, alias Billu, a convict on parole, who threatened constable Seema, sister of Manoj (murdered along with his bride Babli by the latter’s kin), was promised land and a huge sum of money for eliminating her by Babli’s uncle Rajinder and four others lodged with him in the same jail.

Rajinder and four other relatives of Babli were sentenced to death by Additional Sessions Judge Vani Gopal Sharma in the infamous Manoj-Babli honour killing case on March 30, 2010. Varinder, on four days’ police remand after he was nabbed in Delhi on Sunday by a CIA team, confessed during interrogation that he had entered the Madhuban Police Academy with the intention of eliminating Seema posted there.

The SP of Karnal, Rakesh Arya, has asked the Ambala Jail Superintendent to keep all hardcore criminals in isolation. Arya said the police would oppose the petition of the convicts in the High Court as their conduct inside the jail was reprehensible and did not deserve any mercy. Varinder, on a two-week parole in December last, had barged into the Madhuban Police Academy and threatened Seema. A case under Section 506 of the IPC was registered against him after Seema met the SP.

Despite the court awarding capital punishment to five persons for killing Manoj and Babli, it has had no deterrent effect on the perpetrators of the crime.

Jind, January 18
Despite the state government’s assurance to hold a fresh CBI probe into the Mirchpur violence, the Sarvajatiya Sarvakhap Mahapanchayat announced late this evening that its agitation would go on till the CBI started working afresh on the case.

The district authorities held several round of talks with the protesters today. The Mahapanchayat has threatened to block one of the main highways in the district tomorrow.

The atmosphere at the dharna site in the noon turned positive following reports that the government had sent a fax message, accepting the demand for a fresh CBI probe. A copy of the message was shown to the leaders of the agitation.

They were reportedly told that the state government was ready to accept their demand for which the CBI would have to seek the permission of the court at Delhi.

Rajbir Dhanda, president of the Mahapanchayat, said the 12- member core committee was not sure whether or not the CBI would be able to begin the probe. He said the protest would be called off only after the CBI started working afresh on the case. When contacted, the DC said he had been in constant touch with the protesters, trying to convince them to end the blockade.

But the secretary of the Mahapanchayat, Suresh Koth, charged the authorities with trying to create confusion and divert their attention from the ‘real’ issue.

While president of the Mahapanchayat Dhanda told The Tribune that there was no proposal to block road traffic tomorrow, Koth insisted there was, indeed, one. He said the mahapanchayat committee would hold talks only at the dharna site.Meanwhile, rail traffic continued to remain disrupted for the fourth day in a row today. 

Chandigarh January 18
State Finance Minister Capt Ajay Singh Yadav yesterday said he would urge Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee to raise the limit of compensation for per acre loss caused due to floods and increase the subsidy for the storage of foodgrains in the cold stores in rural areas and reduce the rate of interest up to 4 per cent for the farm sector and 7 per cent for the non-agriculture sector.

Capt Yadav said this while presiding over a meeting of the officers of Finance and other departments concerned here yesterday to prepare a vision paper to be presented in the Finance Ministers’ meeting scheduled to be held tomorrow in New Delhi under the chairmanship of Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

Capt Yadav said special thrust would be given to the agriculture and allied sectors in the Finance Ministers’ meeting. He said as the land holdings were already decreasing in the state, it was necessary to take up agriculture-related schemes to get maximum fund from the Government of India.

He was of the view that the compensation norms fixed by the government to give relief in case of floods should also be revised. 

Chandigarh, January 18
The one-man commission of inquiry constituted to look into the Mirchpur violence, which led to the death of two Dalits, has failed to get any response to its public notices urging witnesses to come forward and depose in the case.

The commission is headed by Justice Iqbal Singh, a former Judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

Now, the commission has prepared another list of witnesses and other people and officials to get to the bottom of what transpired on that fateful day of April 21 last year when members of the dominant community went about torching houses of Dalits.

Sources said while the commission had sent notices to witnesses who could shed light on the matter, the statement of the then Deputy Commissioner, OP Sheoran, had been recorded.

Victim Tara Chand’s son has already named 20-odd persons in his statement regarding the incident.

The commission, it is learnt, will visit Mirchpur again on January 20 to record the statements of 15 more witnesses it has zeroed in on by studying police case files and the list of the injured.

It will also record the statements of officers, including the Home Secretary, and also of top officials of the Police Department, besides officers posted in Hisar at the time of the incident. The commission has already visited Mirchpur twice.

Sirsa, January 18
Hundreds of applicants have been waiting for long due to an inordinate delay in the entrance test for PhD by Chaudhary Devi Lal University. The university had postponed the test, scheduled to be held in August last year, till further orders. However, no fresh dates have been announced so far.

As per the UGC regulations issued in 2009, applicants have to clear an entrance test for taking admission into the PhD programme. After getting admission, the candidates have to undertake a pre-PhD course work before they could actually get registered for the PhD.

However, the UGC guidelines said no such entrance test would be required for candidates with MPhil degree, but with a rider. The UGC has put a condition that where the admission to the MPhil course has been through an entrance examination and course work has been prescribed at the MPhil level, such candidates shall not be required to undertake the entrance examination or pre-PhD course work.

Kurukshetra University as well as the Guru Jambheshwar University for Science and Technology have implemented the guidelines of the UGC and have organised entrance tests twice each since the guidelines were issued in 2009.

The academic council of the CDLU approved its PhD ordinance on April 8, 2010, at a meeting held under Commissioner, Hisar division, Balbir Singh Malik, who held the charge of the Vice-Chancellor of the university at that time.

The university decided the follow the guidelines of the UGC in toto in this regard and invited applications for the PhD course.

However, when candidates reached the university campus for appearing in the entrance test on August 20 last year, they were informed that the test had been postponed for administrative reasons. They were told that fresh dates would be announced later.

Jind, January 18
The district authorities have decided to involve schools in a campaign to create awareness among voters regarding their rights and responsibility of exercising their franchise during elections. The authorities have announced to observe January 25 as National Voters Day.

According to the Deputy Commisioner, who held a meeting with officials in this connection, functions will be organised in 39 schools in the district as part of the drive to spread the message of importance of voting among people.

He said efforts would be made to involve as many persons as possible in these functions so that they could be made more aware of their rights and responsibilities as voters.

He said necessary directions in this regard had been issued to the Education Department. He said the department had also started the work of revising the voters’ list in various subdivisions.

The villages where awareness programmes will be organised include Rajpura, Ramrai, Ramrai Khera, Dhimana, Ramkali, Shamlo Kalan, Bibipur, Dhigana, Malvi, Muwana, Didwara, Dadrath, Pillukhera, Kalwan, Dalamwal, Khokri, Chhatar, Pega, Dumarkhakalan, Danori, Ujjana, Kalwan, Danodakalan, Nagura and Baroda, besides Safidon and Narwana towns. At least 20 villages and several colonies in Jind town will also be covered under the drive.

New voters will be given their voter ID cards at these functions. They will also be administered an oath to exercise their right to franchise whenever elections are held. A large number of students have already shown interest in the drive, claimed an official.

Panipat, January 18
Continuing with their resistance against the move to hand over distribution systems in Gurgaon and Panipat to private players, power engineers have requested the state government to reconsider its decision.

Daljit Singh, general secretary of the association, said both Gurgaon and Panipat were low loss and high revenue generating circles. He said the collection efficiency in Gurgaon was 100 per cent and in Panipat also it was quite high. He said it was unreasonable to hand over the distribution systems of these two circles to private players, who would be able to bag profits without having to invest even a single penny on infrastructure.

He said the association held a meeting with the management of the Discoms, where the rationale behind the decision was questioned. Following this, the managements assured them that no further decision in this regard would be taken without consulting the power engineers.

Last year, the state government had decided to outsource the distribution system of the power utilities in Gurgaon and Panipat to private companies with an aim to bring down the losses and increase revenues. However, the power engineers contended why the distribution systems of the two high-revenue generating circles were being given to private companies. The engineers had also expressed apprehension that the move might ultimately lead to complete privatisation of the power sector in the state.The association said the financial condition of the two Discoms in the state had deteriorated after unbundling. The accumulated loss of Dakshin Haryana Discoms was Rs 1,900 crore and the outstanding loan had increased to over Rs 3,800 crore.

Sonepat, January 18
The police has claimed to have recovered an amount of Rs 4 lakh from the possession of Sanjay Verma of Hamirpur in Himachal Pradesh, who has been arrested for allegedly cheating Azad Singh, a farmer of Chirasmi village in the district, of Rs 66 lakh in lieu of giving him a “Naagmani” in 2009.

He reportedly confessed that so far he had cheated four persons. He said his accomplices Sanjay, Sanjiv Pandit, Prakash and Rajinder used to assist him in cheating people.

The police has registered a case against them and a manhunt has been launched in Hamirpur area to nab these accused who had gone underground after the arrest of Sanjay Verma.

Sub-Inspector Inder Singh said Verma had been staying in a posh hotel in New Delhi.

He had obtained a mechanical engineering degree from Bengaluru in 2005, he said, adding that Punit Khurana of Delhi was also suspected to be involved in certifying that the “Naagmani” was real and pure.

Azad Singh sold his two acres of land to purchase the “Naagmani” from Verma and paid for Rs 66 lakh for it in 2009.