Chandigarh, February 3
The release of land from the acquisition process in favour of East India Hotels Limited in Gurgaon and the subsequent execution of sale deed in favour of Chandra Jyoti Developers Pvt Limited and DLF Limited has failed to find favour with the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

The development is significant as the government had given its approval for setting up a special economic zone by Chandra Jyoti developers Pvt Limited and DLF Limited after the sale of land.

A Division Bench of Justice Jasbir Singh and Justice RK Garg, has held the action to be illegal. The Bench has also ordered the revival of the acquisition proceedings while directing the demolition of any construction raised on the land. The directions came on a petition filed by Harkishan of Mohammadpur Jharsa in Gurgaon and other petitioners against the Union of India and other respondents.

The petitioners had contended that the state had initially acquired a big chunk of land, which included the land in question, by invoking the provisions of the Land Acquisition Act for developing residential and commercial area in Sector 30, Gurgaon.

The state then proceeded to release it in favour of East India Hotels under the garb of providing a 300-bed hospital and other medical-cum-educational facilities.

It was submitted that after the sale of land in favour of Chandra Jyoti developers Pvt Limited and DLF Limited, the government “gave approval of all kinds”, including the approval for setting up a special economic zone by Chandra Jyoti developers Pvt Limited and DLF Limited.

The Bench allowed the petition with a cost of Rs 2 lakh to be borne by the state and the three companies.

It held: “The impugned action of the state cannot be upheld…. The writ petition is allowed and the notifications releasing the land in favour of East India Hotels Limited are set aside and it is further held that permission of sale, which was granted on April 28, 2006, in favour of East India Hotels Limited and execution of sale deeds in favour of Chandra Jyoti developers Pvt limited and DLF Limited was illegal.” The bench added: “We hold and direct that the proceedings of acquisition of land in question and further notification under Sections 4 and 6 of the Act issued on January 31, 1989, and January 25, 1990, shall be revived and the respondent authorities shall complete the acquisition proceedings from that stage.

“The respondents shall pass an award acquiring the land in dispute. After completing the acquisition proceedings, the land be put to use by the respondent state for the same public purpose for which it was released for acquisition in favour of East India Hotels Limited.

“The construction, if any, raised by the respondents on the land in dispute shall be removed by the respondents within a reasonable time, say within six months... ”

Chandigarh, February 3
When Haryana’s new Public Health and Excise and Taxation Minister Kiran Choudhry walked down the corridor on the eighth floor of the Haryana Secretariat today, several heads turned and eyes followed her right up to her room.

The charismatic Choudhry settled into her new role with ease. Interacting with officials of the Excise and Taxation Department, she minced no words while issuing instructions to the staff. Choudhry was known for her plain-speaking as Minister of State in the earlier Hooda Cabinet (she had then vociferously waved the “lop-sided” development flag). This time, her fight is even bigger — to meet the water challenge in the state.

“Coming from Tosham in Bhiwani, I know how precious water is. I plan to take up the issue of taking water to the tail-end of the canals with the Irrigation Minister once I’m done with the departmental briefings,” she says while acknowledging greetings from the public and officials alike.

Choudhry’s first couple of decisions on taking charge have been regarding public health. As MLA, she had raised the issue of banning PVC pipes, claiming that these were a hazard to public health.

“The very first thing that I have done is to stall the laying of such pipes. I’ve asked the officials to stop the on-going replacement of old PVC pipes with new ones immediately,” she says. In another major decision, e-tendering has been introduced for awarding contracts worth Rs 5 lakh and above. “My agenda is to check corruption and bring in transparency. Everybody is familiar with my style of working and will come around with time,” she remarks.

Her other department, Excise and Taxation, is as demanding with the onus of earning for the government now on her shoulders. “We need revenue to flow in and I will work on generating more funds. We will involve all our stakeholders in ideating on policies before coming out with a blueprint. Transparency will be my hallmark,” she insists. Ask her how she ended up with two very important departments and she breaks into a smile. “Perhaps, the government thinks I’m very capable,” she remarks. In a plain room without so much as good lighting, she seems a little out of place given her style statement. “Late entrants have to do with what they get. I will turn this around too,” she quips.Late entrant into the Cabinet she may be, but Choudhry is not one to lie low. “I’m here to bring about a change and it will happen, sooner than anybody can imagine,” she concludes as she readies for yet another presentation. 

Karnal, February 3
A doctor and his mother were arrested late last night in connection with the abortion performed on an inmate of the local Nari Niketan who is a minor and suffers from a hearing impairment. The two were remanded to police custody by a local court today.

The principal of Mata Prakash Kaur Vani Viklang Kendra, an attendant and the kendra chowkidar, the main accused in the case, were remanded to judicial custody for two weeks. Their services were terminated by the Chairman of the Haryana Welfare Society for the hearing and speech impaired, Mahinder Kumar, yesterday. The 17-year-old girl was allegedly raped by the chowkidar of Viklang Kendra. She was sent to the Nari Nikaten here from Bahadurgarh in 2006. and was shifted to the government-run Viklang Kendra in 2007.

Chandigarh, February 3
The Punjab and Haryana High Court today turned down the plea for regular bail by Rajinder Singh, one of the accused in the Mirchpur arson case. Rajinder Singh was seeking regular bail in FIR no. 166, dated April 21, 2010, registered at the Narnaund police station in Hisar district.

Justice Alok Singh refused to give the petitioner bail after the counsel for the State of Haryana said the trial was pending before a Delhi court pursuant to the transfer order passed by the Supreme Court. 

Panipat, February 3
A lineman of the power utility, who has been facing a vigilance probe in a case related to missing meters and seals, allegedly committed suicide by consuming some poisonous substance here today.

A team of the vigilance department of the power utility had yesterday raided the house of Chaman Lal, a resident of Bhatia Colony, to conduct a probe into allegations that he had stored meters and seals in his house in violation of the rules.

The family members of the deceased alleged that the vigilance team humiliated Chaman Lal even as he continued to plead innocence.

Not able to bear the humiliation, he consumed sulphas tablets today morning.

He was rushed to a private hospital from where he was referred to Delhi. However, he died on the way to the National Capital.

Later, kin of the deceased blocked the NH-1 outside the local Civil Hospital demanding action against the top three officials of the power utility, who visited their house yesterday.

The traffic movement was disrupted for half an hour till senior officials of the district administration reached the spot and persuaded the agitators to lift the blockade.

The body of the deceased was handed over to the family after a postmortem. None of the officials of the power utilities was available for comment. 

Fatehabad, February 3
Boswal village with a population of over 1,700 persons has become the first village in the district to have adopted compact fluorescent lamps (CFL) for lighting their homes.

The village is inhabited by families displaced from Bilaspur district of Himachal Pradesh at the time of construction of Bhakra Dam.

Additional Deputy Commissioner Ashok Meena, whose efforts helped the village attain its present status, was in the village today to felicitate the villagers.

Sarpanch Prem Dass, Kamla Devi, a member of the Zila Parishad, and Bhawani Singh Thakur, district president of the Kisan Cell of the Youth Congress were present on the occasion.

Meena said it took the authorities as well as members of the village panchayat less than two months to motivate the villagers for switching over to the CFLs to save energy and money and to protect the environment.

The ADC said Sirdhan, a village under the Bhattu Kalan block of the district, would soon become the second village of the district to become a 100 per cent CFL village.

Meena said the CFLs generated lesser heat and consumed much lesser energy than the normal yellow incandescent bulbs.

He also called upon villagers to use sources of renewable energy for their daily household chores and distributed solar cookers and lights among villagers on the occasion. The government, he said, had been giving subsidy on solar geysers, solar cookers, solar lights and solar power plants.

Chandigarh: The Centre has revised the minimum daily wage under its flagship programme of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) for all states.

Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said as per the decision, the MGNREGA workers in the state would now get daily wage at the rate of Rs 179 with effect from January 1, 2011. The revised wage rate of Haryana State was highest in the country as compared to other states.

During the year, 1.50 lakh rural households had taken up MGNREGA work in the villages and these households would be benefitted on account of the revision in the wage rate, he added. — TNS

Fatehabad, February 3
The police has booked an assistant manager of the Union Bank of India for duping unsuspecting customers of the bank by siphoning off money from their accounts through fictitious accounts opened by him.

The accused identified as Kumar Kaushal Kaushik has suspended and transferred to the bank’s regional office in Chandigarh and the money allegedly swindled by him has been recovered by the bank.

Inder Pal Yadav, chief manager of the local branch of the bank, lodged the FIR today on the directions from the head office.

He alleged that the bank came to know of the fraudulent transaction when a person came to the bank on January 5 and informed that money had been withdrawn from the two fixed deposit accounts.

The FDRs valued at Rs 91,235 each were issued to minors Sarita and Tony on the orders of a local court in a case decided in their favour by Motor Accident Claims Tribunal as compensation for a death in a road accident and the bank was under direction to allow encashment only after the minors attain an age of majority.

Upon inquiry by the bank, it was found that the accused had opened an account in the name of one Ashok Kumar on September 19, 2008, on the introduction of a person who did not have any account in the bank and transferred the funds of the two FDRs in that account on the same day.

The money was withdrawn through an ATM two days later, as per the bank records. On November 22, 2008, the accused again transferred the funds from the accounts of Amit Narang and Sumit Narang to the account of Ashok Kumar after first transferring the money to some other accounts and siphoned off Rs 52,166 and Rs 52,101, respectively, from the two accounts.

The accused, according to the FIR, transferred Rs 98,119 from the account of one Pokhar Ram Godara on April 17, 2009, and then transferred Rs 4,50,000 from the account of Mohammad Rafiq, a dormant account in the Srinagar (J&K) branch of the bank, to the account of Ashok Kumar.

The accused bank official allegedly transferred Rs 5,06,047 from the account of Halima Bano again from the Srinagar branch of the bank and transferred it to an account in the name of Ramesh Kumar, another fictitious account opened by him without any identity proof. Some other fraudulent entries by the accused have also come to the notice of the bank.

SP Vivek Sharma said a case under Sections 420, 409, 467, 468 and 471 of the IPC had been registered against the accused. 

Karnal, February 3
The body of Deepak Gautam, who went missing along with his wife Seema after they left their house at Amargarh Gaamri village, 20 km from Kaithal district, on January 27, was recovered from the Narwana-Bhakra-Karnal link canal, near Chamarkhera, 5 km from here, today.

The body, which bore no injury marks, was handed over to the relatives after a postmortem and it appeared to be a case of accident, SHO Satish Kumar said.

The body was identified by Deepak’s father Suresh Gautam and his brother, but there was no trace of his wife Seema, who was travelling in the same car with him. The car in which the newly married couple had gone for outing was also recovered with the help of the divers from the Bhakra canal near Mirzapour village on the Kaithal- Kurukshetra road on Monday.

Deepak’s father had expressed suspicion over the death after the car was recovered but the police did not suspect any foul play after the recovery of the body.

The rear windowpane of the car was found broken and only one of Seema’s sandals was found lying inside the car.

Bhiwani: The body of a youth, who has been missing for the past two days from Kheri Bura village, was found hanging from a tree in fields near the Dadri bypass road here today.

The deceased has been identified as Sanjay. The relatives suspect that Sanjay was murdered. Sanjay had lent lakhs to a resident of Mankawas village, who was seen with Sanjay two days ago. 

Rohtak, February 3
There is no effective vaccine against HIV, which is one of the most dreadful retroviral disease infecting 30 million persons worldwide.

Due to highly variable nature of AIDS virus, the development of an effective DNA vaccine against HIV remains a challenge. This was stated by Dr Vainav Patel of the National Institute of Health, USA, while delivering a lecture on “DNA Vaccines against HIV” here at the PGIMS today.

According to Dr Patel, the progressive immuno-deficiency leads to death if a patient is not treated timely. The available treatment as of today is “HAART” (highly active antiretroviral therapy) treatment, but this often results in emergence of drug resistance and has harmful side effects.

The DNA vaccine, he said, was the most advanced and third generation vaccine. He said the DNA vaccine had several advantages above previously used conventional vaccines as these were safer, efficacious and more stable providing long-term immogenicity.

Moreover, refrigeration and cold chain storage was not required for DNA vaccine. However, due to highly variable nature of AIDS virus, the development of an effective DNA vaccine against HIV remained a challenge, as there were limited clinical trails of these vaccines with approximately 30 per cent efficacy.

Dr Patel said his research group was in the process of developing HIV-DNA vaccine with clinical tests on the Indian Rhesus macaques.

The vaccines developed by his group so far had shown good results as immune response can be boosted even after two years, said Dr Patel.

The PGIMS is observing its 50th year of existence and DNA vaccine lecture today was the first of the golden jubilee lecture series, which was inaugurated by Dr SS Sangwan, Vice-Chancellor of Pt BD Sharma University of Health Sciences.