Panchkula, February 21
Haryana Janhit Congress (HJC) chief Kuldeep Bishnoi today started his “tractor yatra” from Kalka to “expose the wrongdoings” of the Congress government in the state as well as at the Centre.

Addressing a gathering on the occasion, Bishnoi said every section of society in the state was bearing the brunt of an “ineffective and insensitive” Congress government.

Reiterating his commitment to the overall development of Haryana, Bishnoi said his party would take up the cause of the common man.

He said Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda had failed to resolve the contentious issue of the SYL Canal with Punjab as a result of which the state had failed to get its share of water for irrigation purposes.

Bishnoi urged people to “reciprocate” the contribution of former Chief Minister Bhajan Lal by supporting the HJC in its struggle against corruption. He alleged that the government, in order to benefit big industrialists and realtors, was acquiring land of poor farmers at throwaway prices. Lashing out at the Chief Minister for “ignoring” some districts in the matter of development, the HJC leader said his party favoured equitable development. He said his party would continue to fight for the “ouster” of Hooda. He said his party would try to establish contact with as many people as possible during this yatra, which would culminate in Delhi on March 9 after passing through various parts of the state.

Policemen had a tough time managing traffic on the Kalka-Panchkula national highway as more than150 tractors participated in the “yatra”. 

Chandigarh, February 21
Bacchus lovers in Haryana will now have to shell out more with the government announcing a marginal increase in the excise and import duty and introducing a franchisee fee under the new excise policy. The policy was approved by the Cabinet which met under Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda.

While the minimum ceiling price of country-made liquor has been raised from Rs 75 to Rs 80, beer, against a flat rate of Rs 45, will now cost Rs 50 (mild) and Rs 55 (strong). The prices of Indian-made foreign liquor (IMLF) have also gone up, varying between Rs 10 to Rs 20. Antiquity Blue costing Rs 480 will now be available for Rs 500 while Peter Scott, Blender’s Pride, Smirnoff and Bacardi will cost Rs 380 (up by Rs 20).

The minimum price for scotch has been hiked by Rs 50, implying that a bottle costing Rs 1,200 will now be available for Rs 1,250. However, the rates of a number of brands whose minimum price has been hiked are already being sold for more in the market.

Introducing the pub culture, the policy provides for licences for opening pubs instead of restricting the department to offering licences for bars.

An important clause is that it has completely done away with “political discretion” in the allotment of wholesale licences for country-made liquor. According to the new provisions, the wholesale licences for country-made liquor will be given to the first eight revenue-netters among the retails. This will completely eliminate arbitrariness in the allotment of wholesale licences while making the system more transparent.

At a press conference later, Hooda, accompanied by Excise and Taxation Minister Kiran Choudhry, announced that there would be no increase in the quota for country liquor and IMFL.

“The allotment of vends will be done by inviting sealed tenders for all the vends, individually and separately. The good news for prospective licensees is that there would be no increase in the ex-distillery issue price (EDP) of country liquor,” Hooda said.

Further, the mandatory quota of country liquor distributed equally amongst the distilleries of the state has been reduced from 50 per cent to 45 per cent.

To improve transparency, CCTV cameras will be installed in all the distilleries and breweries. It has been decided to introduce holograms on IMFL bottles too.

Further, Rs 3, Rs 5, Rs 2 per bottle of country liquor, IMFL and beer, respectively, shall be devolved to the municipal committees and Panchayati Raj institutions to augment their resources.

“Since the bottling of IMFL was being carried out in Haryana, the distilleries were circumventing the franchisee fee. We have introduced a franchisee fee of Rs 8 per proof litre. We hope to earn an additional Rs 250 crore though this,” Choudhry said.

Hisar, February 21
Former minister and Congress legislator Sampat Singh today demanded “broadening of the scope” of the ongoing probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation into the charges of corruption against former Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala.

Talking to mediapersons here, Sampat Singh said currently the CBI was probing certain specific allegations against Chautala. These did not reflect even a fraction of the scams that were perpetrated during the time Chautala was the Chief Minister.

He said the Chautalas owned prime properties in every conceivable town in Haryana, especially those located along the highways. These properties were acquired by illegal means and were formally owned by a trust named after former Deputy Prime Minister Devi Lal. The trust, he alleged, was only a front for the Chautala family.

Criticising Chautala for levelling graft charges against Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, he said the latter never chaired meetings of the high-powered purchase committee of the government whereas Chautala, during his regime, never missed a meeting for obvious reasons.

Sampat Singh said in Chautala’s regime, only two liquor cartels ran the liquor trade in the state every alternate year with just a 2 per cent increase in the licence money. There were huge kickbacks involved in this. The present Congress government had issued L1 licences to all those who wished to trade in liquor.

The former Finance Minister alleged that during the INLD rule even village-level tenders were allotted on direct orders of the then Chief Minister and his sons. No outsider was ever allotted a tender.

The reasons for eliminating competitive bidding were obvious and the CBI should include this in its probe.

Sampat Singh, who was a close confidant of Chautala before he joined the Congress in 2009, said Chautala while levelling charges of involvement in land scams against Hooda was conveniently ignoring the fact that most of the land for SEZs and industrial or commercial use was acquired during his own rule.

He said he had personal knowledge that Chautala even directed officers to forcefully oppose petitions by farmers in the high court for enhancement of land acquisition rates.

He demanded that the CBI probe all the land deals made by Chautala from 1999 to 2005.

Sampat Singh also alleged that the Chautalas “looked forward to holding political rallies as keenly as Diwali because these rallies were a money spinner for them. Targets were handed out to all party legislators and workers to collect purses presented to Chautala at these rallies”.

He said the Congress had brought out total transparency in the functioning of the government. 

Gurgaon, February 21
Workers of the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), the major Opposition party in Haryana, staged a protest demonstration against the alleged involvement of the Bhupinder Singh Hooda-led Congress regime in “shady” land deals in and around Gurgaon.

The protesters, led by INLD state president Ashok Arora, national vice-president Anant Ram Tanwar, Pataudi MLA Ganga Ram and district unit president Gopi Chand Gehlot, also submitted a memorandum addressed to the Haryana Governor through the local Deputy Commissioner.

In the memorandum, the INLD members have alleged that certain builders and realtors had been usurping huge chunks of fertile agricultural land in connivance with the state government, which had pushed the farmers to the brink of ruin. “The Haryana Government has changed the master plan of Gurgaon and released land from acquisition proceedings even after issuing notices to the farmers to benefit its near and dear ones to the tune of thousands of crores of rupees,” the memorandum maintains.

Citing specific instances in which the government agencies had acquired farmers’ fertile land and/or gave land to certain private companies on rates much lower than the prevailing market price, the INLD has urged the Governor to institute an inquiry into such land “scams” by a Supreme Court Judge.

KAITHAL: A large number of workers of the INLD, led by party secretary-general Ajay Chautala today took out a procession and held a demonstration here on Monday to press for their demand for a high-level inquiry into the land scams during the Hooda regime. The protesters walked from Pehowa Chowk to the mini-secretariat and later handed over a memorandum to the DC.

Fatehabad, February 21
Farmers, who have been sitting on dharna against the Gorakhpur Atomic Power Project for the past 190 days, today rejected an offer for a visit to the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) plant at Narora in Uttar Pradesh.

Hans Raj Siwach, president of the Kisan Sangharsh Samiti, which is spearheading the farmers’ agitation, said they had already rejected such offers twice in the past and added that there was no question of visiting any atomic power project now or in the future. “We have been fighting to save our fertile land from acquisition, because we have no other source of livelihood and this fact will not change by visiting Narora,” Siwach said in response to the latest offer from the NPCIL authorities.

Sanjay Gumasta, Chief Engineer and project manager of the Gorakhpur Atomic Power Project, had yesterday said that the NPCIL had given an offer to the farmers as well as other local people to visit their nearest nuclear power project at Narora near Bulandshahr in Uttar Pradesh to allay misgivings, if any, regarding atomic power plants.

The offer had been given through the district authorities, Gumasta had said.

Siwach said similar offers had come to them at least twice in the past and last time they were given this offer when the district authorities arranged their meeting with the Managing Director of the Haryana Power Generation Corporation Limited (HPGCL) at Panchkula.

“We made it clear to the HPGCL authorities at Panchkula that we are not interested in visiting any atomic power plant and nor are we giving our land for the proposed plant at Gorakhpur,” he said.

He said they had been agitating to save their fertile land for more than six months and two farmers had died during this agitation. Siwach said on the one hand the state government had been claiming that no fertile land was being acquired for industries, while on the other hand they were being forced to part with their productive land. 

Panipat, February 21
Two units of 210 MW each at the Panipat Thermal Power Plant were shut down today due to coal shortage.

The coal stocks at the plant were in the super critical category for the past several days and despite several communiqué to the authorities concerned, the coal supply remained meagre.

Sources said two days back, power generation at Unit 7 had also been hit due to the coal scarcity. Unit 2 of the thermal plant is under maintenance.

On Friday, the coal stock was recorded at 56,000 MT which was sufficient for only three days, if the plant was run at full-load capacity. A report posted on the website of the Central Electricity Authority said all the three thermal plants in the state were facing coal shortage as the HPGCL had failed to import coal at the appropriate time.

As of today, the total power generation in the state was recorded at 1,970 MW against a generating capacity of 3,230 MW. The HPGCL had on January 17 placed an order with Indonesia for the import of 1.45 million tonnes of coal.

The thermal plants in Haryana get ‘F’ grade coal that has high ash content due to which some generation units in the three power plants are unable to achieve full-load capacity, the sources added.

Sonepat, February 21
Train services on the Delhi-Ambala section remained disrupted for at least two hours this morning after a coach of the Swaraj Express derailed near Panipat.

Agitated commuters at the Narela railway station squatted on the rail tracks and threw stones at the Mahila Special train, which was delayed for about an hour. Thousands of commuters were stranded at various railway stations between Sonepat and Delhi. HNK and KDM passenger trains were delayed for 90 minutes and the Jhelum Express, Jan Shatabdi and Bhatinda Express for more than an hour.

When Mahila Special reached Narela, male commuters started boarding the train. The Narela police and RPF personnel had to pull them out. In protest, they sat on the rail track, not allowing the train to move.

An announcement was made that the track be cleared for a non-stop goods train. As soon as this was done, the Mahila Special was given the green signal.

Angry at being tricked, the protesters started throwing stones at the train. The police and RPF again swung into action and got the track cleared for the train’s departure

Panipat: The last coach of Swaraj Express that connects Bandra-Delhi with Jammu was derailed near the Panipat junction a few metres from the Panipat junction under the Asandh flyover bridge at 6. 45 am on Monday.

Though none was injured, the up line track was damaged, affecting traffic on the Delhi-Ambala section.

A senior official of the Railways said the train’s last coach jumped off the tracks as it shifted to the loop line. It took more than an hour for the Railways staff to detach the coach from the train. The passengers of the derailed coach were accomodated in other compartments.

With the track damaged, the authorities had to run all other trains on a single track, which resulted in delay in services. A team of the technical staff from Delhi repaired the track late in the evening. — TNS

Sirsa, February 21
A man and a woman, who were living together outside wedlock, allegedly committed suicide today by consuming poison at Khuian Malkana village in this district shortly before they were to leave for the police station at Dabwali where they were summoned regarding a complaint lodged in this connection. Mohinder Singh (50) and Santosh (40) were living together in Sirsa for sometime and the man’s wife, Palo Devi, had lodged a complaint with the police in this regard.

The woman’s daughter has alleged a foul play.The SHO of the Sadar Police Station in Dabwali said he had called a panchayat of prominent persons of the village along with relatives of both sides to resolve the issue today.

However, the two allegedly went inside a religious place set up in Mohinder Singh’s house in Khuian Malkana before leaving for Dabwali, and consumed poison. When Mohinder’s relatives, who were waiting to accompany them to the police station, broke open the door, they found them in an unconscious state.They were rushed to hospital where they died.

Gurgaon, February 21
The Central Ground Water Authority, New Delhi, has directed that all registered and permitted tube wells in the notified area of Gurgaon be fitted with water meters and a record of the withdrawal of groundwater from the tube wells be maintained.

Gurgaon DC PC Meena said here today that as per the CGWA order dated February 8, 2011, it had been made mandatory for all registered as well as permitted tube well owners in the notified area of Gurgaon to install water meters on their tube wells within 60 days of the date of issuance of the order.

Hence, the tube well owners in the district have to get water meters installed on their tube wells by April 9 so that an audit of groundwater extraction can be done.

Meena said the tube wells of those violating this order would be sealed and strict action taken against the violator(s) under the Environment Protection Act, 1986.

The HC had ordered on December 24, 2010, that the water of bore wells be used only for domestic purposes.

Faridabad, February 21
Residents of Dabua Colony kept the body of an accident victim on the FCI road for two hours today, holding the authorities responsible for the death.

Geetika Sehgal of Dabua Colony was knocked down on a stretch of road that is in bad shape.

The blockade was lifted when officials of the Municipal Corporation visited the site and assured the residents that the road would be repaired.

Sirsa, February 21
The efforts of the police and the child marriage prohibition officer, Sadhna Mittal, prevented the wedding of a minor at Bajekan village near here. When the police intervened, the bridegroom had already come with his baraat from Aboobshahar near Dabwali, and marriage ceremony had already begun.

A police spokesperson said Jitender Singh, SHO of the Sadar police station had received a complaint that the parents of a 16-year-old girl were getting her marriage solemnised at Bajekan. Mittal said initially, the family members of both sides resisted the action of the authorities, but later, they agreed to stop the marriage.