|
|
|
|
|
UPA regime most corrupt: Sushma
Kharkhoda to be made subdivision
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
CPM hits out at state govt, Centre
CM: Rs 21 lakh for Ambedkar Bhawan
Inside Babudom
Jhinda wants Rs 100 crore relief for Rewari riot victims
Chetan exhorts youth to inculcate good values
LAND ACQUISITION POLICY
To allay their fears, NPCIL invites farmers to Narora
Water in parts of Sirsa unsafe for drinking
Principal, teacher arrested for obscenity
CIA arrests 2 gangsters
Police busts gang of cheats
|
|
UPA regime most corrupt: Sushma
Rohtak, February 20 The present government has turned out to be the most corrupt government in the history of the nation,” said Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj while addressing a state-level rally of the BJP here today. Urging the people to join hands to uproot the UPA government at the Centre, the senior BJP leader alleged that scams and corruption were the gifts given by the government to the people in return for the faith reposed by the voters in it in the last elections. Having a dig at the Manmohan Singh Government over the alleged scams during his tenure, Swaraj said it was strange that the Prime Minister was claiming that he was not responsible for all “that has been going on”. She said the Congress had become like congress grass and needed to be weeded out. She said the BJP and the NDA would not backtrack on their demand for a JPC probe into major scams, including the 2-G and the Commonwealth Games scams. NDA convener Sharad Yadav described the Prime Minister as a “shadow” in the present coalition government and claimed that the country was forced to have a Prime Minister who was “helpless and powerless”. He alleged that the government at the Centre was a complete failure and had brought a bad name to the country at the international level. Vasundhara Raje Scindia, general secretary of the BJP and former Chief Minister of Rajasthan, criticised the land acquisition policy of the state government. Charging the government with acting as a property dealer, she alleged that officials who had been opposing or exposing scams were being victimised. She alleged that a scam worth Rs 27 crore had been unearthed in the implementation of the MNREGA scheme in Ambala district. At the national level, this scam could run into around Rs 15,000 crore, she claimed. Party national secretary Kirit Somayya, Capt Abhimanyu and state BJP chief Krishan Pal Gurjar also addressed the gathering. |
|
Kharkhoda to be made subdivision
Sonepat, February 20 Referring to other demands of the people of the Kharkhoda assembly constituency represented by Chief Parliamentary Secretary Jaibir Balmiki, he said a government college for boys would be opened there, provided the municipality or a gram panchayat made land available for the same. The Chief Minister accepted the demand for an ITI in Farmana village and approved a fire station, a stadium and a community centre at Kharkhoda. He announced a Rs 20 crore grant for villages of the constituency and promised Rs 4 crore for works in Kharkhoda town. Taking credit for implementing a farmer-friendly land acquisition policy, Hooda said the CM of Punjab in Pakistan had contacted him for details of the policy. “However, if anyone has any objection, I am willing to listen,” the Chief Minister said. He said a committee of Chief Ministers headed by him had submitted its report to the Prime Minister with various suggestions on farmers’ welfare. In order to open new job avenues for the youth, Hooda said the government was working towards making the state an industrial and educational hub. He said his rivals were levelling baseless allegations against him.HPCC president Phool Chand Mulana, MPs Jitender Singh Malik and Deepender Singh Hooda, HPCC working president and MLA Kuldeep Sharma and MLAs Jagbir Singh Malik, Jaitirth and Sri Krishan Hooda also addressed the rally. Earlier, the Chief Minister laid the foundation stone of renovation projects on the Gohana-Sisana, Kharkhoda-Delhi and Kharkhoda- Bahadurgarh roads. |
|
CPM hits out at state govt, Centre
Rohtak, February 20 Rampant corruption is the order of the day due to the ‘anti-people policies’ adopted by both these governments. They have now no moral right to remain in power.” These views were expressed by the state committee of the CPM at a meeting which concluded here on Friday night. In a resolution adopted at the meeting, the state committee has accused the Congress government in Haryana and the UPA government at the Centre of embarking on a disastrous path by following anti- people policies, leading to a rise in problems on all fronts. During the two-day state committee meeting, the party reviewed the present situation in the state and blamed the Haryana government for allegedly turning authoritarian and being callous towards the problems raised by various sections of people. The party said the state government was continuing with acquisition of fertile land in spite of resistance by farmers, shielding the corrupt and transferring valuable state assets to a favoured few under the garb of public-private partnership. The CPM has decided to plan a long-drawn struggle and to create mass awareness in this regard. |
|
CM: Rs 21 lakh for Ambedkar Bhawan
Yamunanagar, February 20 The Chief Minister was speaking at a function organised by Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar Dharmath Samiti to mark the 634th birth anniversary of Guru Ravidas. He said the 14th century saint had tried to reform society on the basis of “bhakti aandolan”. The Chief Minister said the state government was implementing a number of schemes for the welfare of weaker sections. As many as 18 lakh children belonging to weaker sections were being given scholarship and 3.32 lakh poor families had been given residential plots free of cost. As many as 97,000 poor families had been benefited under the Indira Gandhi Priyadarshani Vivah Shagun Yojana and 36,000 students awarded under Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar Scholarship Scheme. Those present on the occasion included Deputy Speaker Akram Khan, working president of Haryana Pradesh Congress Committee Kuldeep Sharma, media adviser to the Chief Minister Sunder Pal and MLA Rajpal. |
|
Inside Babudom
Chandigarh, February 20 Nanda, Haryana cadre IAS officer of the 1976 batch, hit the headlines in 2009 for his doctorate on “US Disengagement in Vietnam 1968-76” from Jawaharlal Nehru University on a UGC fellowship. He is back in news for his well-researched book “War Negotiation and Peace” released last week in the Capital by Union Minister for Parliamentary Affairs, Science and Technology, Pawan Bansal. Nanda belongs to Orissa. His daughter holds a doctorate in genetics from Cambridge while his son is a graduate from the London School of Economics. His wife is a Haryana cadre IAS officer. Among those who attended the book release ceremony were former bureaucrat KC Sivaramkrishnan (chairman, Centre for Policy Research), Dr Ash Narain Roy (Associate director, Instituite of Social Scineces), DR Yogesh K Tyagi (Dean, School of International Studies, JNU) and Dr GVC Naidu (Professor, Southeast Asian Studies). Also present were several defence and security specialists, including Dr KN Kabra, Dr BS Baviskar, Lieut-Gen Ravi Kapur (retd), Maj-Gen Sheru Thapliyal (retd) and PK Mohapatra, Principal Resident Commissioner of Haryana in Delhi. Comparing American failure in Vietnam to the battle of Mahabharat, he says Vietnam has been the mother of all freedom movements. “Vietnam is unforgettable. In the womb of vietnam history, one finds the replica of all burning issues, problems and incidents,” remarks Nanda, who retired from the civil service last year and is now settled in Delhi. |
|
Jhinda wants Rs 100 crore relief for Rewari riot victims
Kurukshetra, February 20 Addressing a press conference here, Jhinda claimed that houses of Sikhs were set ablaze and a large number of Sikhs were burnt alive by a violent mob of 500 people on November 2, 1984, and many families had no survivor. An FIR was registered by the police on Novemebr 3, 1984, mentioning the death of 20 persons, but neither was any effort made to identify the bodies of the victims nor was anyone booked. It was one of the most heinous crimes in which Sikhs were set ablaze and charred to death but neither the families of the victims got justice nor the perpetrators of the crime were punished. Jhinda said the HSGPC would submit a memorandum to the President, the Prime Minister, the Union Home Minister, the Governor and the Chief Minister seeking a compensation of Rs 100 crore for the families of the victims and a judicial probe into the incident. Action would also be demanded against those who abetted the crime and were instrumental in hushing up the case. He said all 22 members of the families of Kartar Singh, Gulab Singh and Hardyal Singh were burnt to death and there was no one even to lodge a report or persue action against the culprits. Now that evidence of the torching of houses of Sikhs had surfaced, the HSGPC had decided not to rest till the culprits were punished and the victims compensated, he added. An 11-member committee of the HSGPC, headed by Jhinda, would visit the village tomorrow to gather more information about the November 2, 1984, incident and submit its report to the government for action. The HSGPC would also demand that a gurdwara be built in the village as a befitting memorial to the slain Sikhs and in case the SGPC did not construct the gurdwara, the All-India Sikh Gurdwara Committee and the HSGPC would accomplish this task, Jhinda said. Castigating the SGPC for not taking up the cause of the victims of the anti-Sikh riots for 26 years, Jhinda said it had exposed the hollow claims of the SGPC that it was a benefactor of Haryana Sikhs. The president of the rival group of the HSGPC, Didar Singh Nalvi, also demanded a high-level judicial probe into the incident and said the culprits must be brought to justice. AISSF president Karnail Singh Peermohammad, who visited the village for collecting evidence, had said that the village, inhabited by more than 35 Sikh families, was “wiped out along with its Sikh population and a gurdwara on November 2, 1984”. |
|
Chetan exhorts youth to inculcate good values
The celebrated author-cum-movie inspirer was in the city to give away awards to selected service-provider professionals at a ceremony organised by BIG Brands Research, a market research company, here today. He asserted that instead of running after jobs and frequently changing jobs on monetary considerations, the youth should focus on realising, developing and exploiting their true potential. Bhagat, a graduate from IIT, Delhi and MBA from IIM, Ahmedabad, quit his career in international investment banking to devote ample time to writing. And, he has been amply rewarded by the thumping succeses of his novels “Five Point Someone - What not to do at IIT!”, “One Night @ the Call Centre”, “The 3 Mistakes of My Life” and “2 States: The story of My Marriage”, all bestsellers. He also wrote the script of “Hello”, a Hindi movie based on “One Night @ the Call Centre” and inspired Bollywood blockbuster “3 Idiots”. Also a motivational speaker now, Chetan advised the youth to adopt the five-point success formula of inculcating the values of excellence, determination, strategic planning, compassion and satisfaction of the target group. He asked the youth to strive for the best and not to be discouraged by failures to ensure that they get what they really want in life. Citing his own example, Chetan pointed out that “Hello”, the script of which was written by him, fell flat at the box office. “But I refused to give up and continued to do my best…the ultimate outcome is there for you to see,” he said. |
|
LAND ACQUISITION POLICY Cabinet meeting
today The Cabinet, which meets tomorrow, is likely to approve the new excise policy for the new financial year. Sources maintain that while it is expected to lay down more stringent rules in the allotment of liquor vender, the policy will also address the problem of smuggling of liquor pointed out by licencees at various meetings held by the Department of Excise and Taxation.
Chandigarh, February 20 The ministers have suggested that land acquisition be carried out in the public-private partnership (PPP) mode and the government should offer collaboration to the farmers whose land is being acquired. Sources said the ministers raised the issue at a meeting of the Infrastructure Development Committee meeting. Their suggestions got a positive response from Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda. Praising the land acquisition policies of Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh, the two leaders had suggested that the government must rework the policy to make it more farmer-friendly. They had also opposed the acquisition of fertile land to set up industry. The two ministers, toning down their rhetoric, maintained at the meeting that though Haryana’s acquisition policy was among the best, yet there was scope for improvement. Capt Yadav and Mahender Pratap were of the view that the farmers should have a 25 per cent share in the developed area not being acquired for public projects. The latter wanted the affected farmers to also be paid an additional amount as compensation for the period required to develop the land. Maintaining that the farmer should have the option of choosing between taking a lumpsum and opting for collaboration, the two ministers said this could be limited to land acquired for industrial or residential purposes. Capt Yadav, who has subsequently written a letter to the CM, said at the meeting that the farmer should get a share in the land that has been developed while Mahender Pratap is learnt to have favoured that industry be set up in smaller cities. |
|
To allay their fears, NPCIL invites farmers to Narora
Fatehabad, February 20 The NPCIL authorities have asked the district authorities to arrange for a group of people, including farmers willing to give their land as also those have reservations about the project. Sanjay Gumasta, Chief Engineer and Project Manager of the Gorakhpur Atomic Power Project, said the NPCIL had expected that the land would be handed over to it in October-November 2010.Construction work was to start by March 2012. The first twin unit of 700 MW each were to be commissioned by 2017 and the second twin unit of 700 MW from the 4X700 MW Gorakhpur Atomic Power Project by 2020. “Even if we are provided land today, we can make up for the time lost, ” he claimed. Gumasta, along with XEN VK Sharma has been camping here. He said the project would result in prosperity for the people of the area with 5,000 to 8,000 skilled and unskilled workers employed by the plant for construction activities for at least eight years beginning 2012. Once commissioned, the plant would employee over 400 engineers and a large number of other workers. Gumasta said several farmers from Gorakhpur visited his office at Hisar daily to know when they would be paid for their land acquired for the project. |
|
|
Two women panches clear ‘literacy’ test
Kohand (Karnal), February 20 Their worries were compounded with the government ordering that all members of panchayats had to be literate to be able to fight panchayat elections. It seemed the end of the road for Kiran and Kamlesh when they learnt about TARA Akshar, a literacy programme, being run in their village. They joined the programme and cleared the exams on February 17. Now they are able to read, write, and calculate and are better equipped to discharge their functions as members of the Kohand Gram Panchayat. The ICT-based TARA Akshar is an initiative of the Union Ministry of Human Resource Development under the Saakshar Bharat Mission: 2012. It aims to teach rural women to read and write Hindi in just 45 days. The programme in Kohand was conducted under the aegis of the State Resource Centre and the exams were conducted under the supervision of Ashok Mittal, Vice-Chairman, District Panchayat, and Virender Kumar, a vetenarian. TARA Akshar is based on the latest memory techniques, memory hooks and the trial and error method.The programme has already made more than 60,000 women literate in the states of Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Delhi and Haryana in the past three years. |
|
|
Water in parts of Sirsa unsafe for drinking
Sirsa, February 20 Out of the 55 samples of drinking water tested by the health authorities last month, 29 have been found unfit for consumption. All the samples contained considerably high quantities
of coliform bacteria rendering them unfit for consumption. The presence of these bacteria indicated contamination of the drinking water with human excreta in the pipelines or lack of disinfection of the same through chlorination and other means. Out of the total 16 samples of drinking water taken from Sirsa town, eight have tested unfit for consumption. Experts say that drinking water containing coliform bacteria from zero to 4 per 100 millilitre is considered safe for human consumption. But if the presence of the bacteria exceeds this limit, water becomes unfit for consumption. The samples of drinking water taken from Indira Colony, Multani Colony, JJ Colony and Chhatargarh Patti were found highly contaminated with 16, 17, 16 and 17 coliform bacteria per 100 ml of water, respectively. The samples taken from Baba Ramdev Gali in Dabwali town near Monga Nath Mandir in Kharia village, Abootgarh in Rania and Darba Kalan village, contained as much as 16 coliform bacteria per 100 millilitre each. Even the sample taken from an anganwadi centre at Kanganpur, where little kids quench their thirst, was also found highly
contaminated with coliform bacteria. “Out of the total number of patients coming to government hospitals in Haryana, nearly 12 per cent suffer from diseases caused by contaminated water. A majority of these patients are children,” said Dr Rajeshwari, an associate professor in the Geography Department of the Kurukshetra University, who has done a study-- “Epidemiological Transition in Haryana” recently. Dr GK Somani, deputy civil surgeon (health) said the health authorities had intimated this fact to the Public Health Department with copies of the reports. He admitted that contamination of water to this extent could lead to the outbreak of water-borne diseases such as jaundice, diarrhoea, dysentery, typhoid and gastro-enteritis. Angad Bishnoi, Superintending Engineer of the Public Health Department said remedial measures had been taken in cases where the samples of drinking water had failed to meet the parameters. He, however, said the samples could have test ed positive for coliform bacteria due to several other factors such as taking the sample in a contaminated container. |
|
|
Boy kidnapped, killed in Sirsa
The police has registered a case under Section 364-A, 302, 201 and 120-B of the IPC. Balbir Singh, in his complaint to the police said he sent his son to a market near their house at about 8 pm. When he did not return even after an hour, he called him on his cell phone. The call was received by Jeetu, who told him that his son had been kidnapped and demanded Rs 3 lakh for his release. Balbir Singh informed the police at once and set out in search of Deepu and Jeetu. Each time he called on the mobile, Jeetu allegedly hiked the ransom demand and finally summoned him to a spot near Jat Dharamshala with Rs 7
lakh in cash. Balbir Singh and his family members were able to nab Jeetu past midnight. However, he refused to give any information on the missing child whose body was found this morning on Khajakhera Road, the head smashed by a heavy object. It was lying in bushes, mauled by stray animals. The accused was handed over to the police. Krishna Yadav, SHO, said the police was interrogating the accused. |
|
Principal, teacher arrested for obscenity
Jind, February 20 The police had registered a case against Sandeep, a teacher, and Rajesh Kumar, principal of the school, after a complaint regarding the obscene behaviour was lodged by a resident of Kuchrana Kalan village yesterday. In his complaint, he had accused the teacher of behaving in an obscene manner with his daughter, a student of Class IV of the school, on February 14. He alleged that the accused had threatened his daughter that she would be failed if she reported the matter to her parents. When the matter was brought to the notice of the principal of the school, Rajesh Kumar, instead of taking action against the accused, he allegedly tried to hush up the matter. Both the accused were arrested and produced in a local court today, which remanded them in judicial custody. |
|
CIA arrests 2 gangsters
Sonepat, February 20 Two police constables Hanif and Dharambir sustained minor injuries when the gangsters fired at them. The police also seized three pistols, eight cartridges and a motorcycle from their possession, and a case under the Arms Act and the various sections of the IPC was registered against them in Gannaur police station. Atender, carrying a reward of Rs 5,000, was wanted by the police for robbing a bank and in a murder case.
— OC |
|
Police busts gang of cheats
Sirsa, February 20 The gang would also rob people by posing as cops. A police party from Odhan police station raided a house in the local Kirti Nagar area last night, where the cops recovered Rs 97,100 in cash and plain paper.bundles of currency notes.
— TNS |
|
| HOME PAGE | |
Punjab | Haryana | Jammu & Kashmir |
Himachal Pradesh | Regional Briefs |
Nation | Opinions | | Business | Sports | World | Letters | Chandigarh | Ludhiana | Delhi | | Calendar | Weather | Archive | Subscribe | Suggestion | E-mail | |
Gurgaon, February 20
Sirsa, February 20