Shimla, February 22
Chief Minister PK Dhumal has ordered an inquiry into the allegations of financial irregularities and mismanagement in the International Roerich Memorial Trust (IRMT) at Naggar in Kullu.

The action has been initiated on a complaint submitted to him by a former IAS officer and life trustee of the IRMT Shakti Singh Chandel here today. He has asked the principal secretary, language art and culture, to inquire the matter to ascertain the facts and take action accordingly.

In his complaint, he has pointed out that meetings of the Board of Trustees (BOT) and Executive Committee (EC) of the IRMT were not being convened regularly, leaving its working in a complete mess. No meeting of the BOT has taken place since 2006 and during the last financial year only one meeting of the Executive Committee was called as against the mandatory four meetings.

He alleged that the trust had become an arena of squabbles and no corrective action was being taken to remove the irregularities due to defiant attitude of some functionaries. No one had been held accountable for various omissions and commissions and even serious financial irregularities had been overlooked.

He had also attached copies of various file noting of the government obtained under the Right to Information and minutes of the meetings of the trust with the complaint to substantiate his charges. He said an in depth probe was required as the IRMT was a symbol of the great traditional bond of friendship between Russia and India but if its affairs were not set right, it would hurt grievously the very spirit and purpose for which the trust was formed.

Since a friendly country was involved in this sensitive matter, he was seeking his intervention to help reduce the tension in the trust, which would surely improve its intellectual, cultural and spiritual environment for which it had been created by the great Svetoslav Roerich and his wife Devika Rani.

Shimla, February 22
Holding a protest in support of their demands, activists of the Students Federation of India (SFI) today barged into the room of Naresh Kumar Mahajan, controller of Examination (CoE) of Himachal Pradesh University and manhandled him.

The CoE was taken by surprise when the students suddenly gatecrashed into his room. His personal staff came to his rescue immediately and summoned the security staff who managed to push the students out with great difficulty. The CoE was pushed and manhandled by the activists in the resultant melee in which the office was also damaged.

The Vice-Chancellor, Prof Sunil Kumar Gupta, said a complaint had been made to the police to take action against the students for damaging public property, trespassing and causing hurt to the officer.

Shimla, February 22
The collapse of the newly constructed enclosures at the Sarhan pheasantry has given another setback to the conservation-breeding programme to save the highly endangered western tragopan which hit a roadblock due to outbreak of E-coli infection during the last season.

Constructed after a delay of more than two years, the new enclosures required for parent rearing of the pheasant caved-in due to snow even before they could be put to use.

According to sources, faulty design coupled with indifferent construction led to the collapse. The enclosures did not have the requisite structural strength to bear the weight of the snow and as a result the roof collapsed, causing extensive damage to five out of the seven enclosures.

The new spacious enclosures are required for providing stress-free environment under the Rs 4.93-crore project funded by the the Central Zoo Authority (CZA) conservation breeding of the pheasant which is placed high on the Red Data Book of the International Union for Nature Conservation (IUCN) listing the highly endangered species.

In fact, its survival depends on success of the project as the Sarhan pheasantry is the only place in the world, which has the highly endangered birds in captivity. It was put on the world pheasant breeding map when the rare bird was bred in captivity for the first time in 2005.

The issue was discussed at a meeting convened by principal secretary, forests, Sudipto Roy, who directed the department to restore the enclosures after rectifying the faulty design at the earliest.

However, it will take time as structural engineer will have to be consulted to remove the deficiencies in the design before reconstructing the enclosures. Even otherwise, the chances of breeding during the coming season are bleak as the E-coli infection has left the birds vulnerable.

The bacterial infection, which caused the death of three birds last year, forced the authorities to stall the breeding process midway during the season. The bacterial infection causes extensive damage to internal organs, including the reproductive system and not much study has been conducted on this aspect so far.

The pheasantry still has 19 birds, 9 females and 10 males, and if all goes well, breeding can be resumed after a gap of a year as only seven pairs are required for the purpose.

Kullu/Keylong, February 22
An avalanche has damaged the site camp offices of a German company constructing the 8.5 km-long Rohtang tunnel at the Taling site in the Lahaul valley. A bridge on the Chandra river linking the national highway to the north portal of the Rohtang tunnel also got damaged.

According to a company official and Tailing villagers, the avalanche has buried the camp site offices under snow, causing 75 per cent damage to the sites. It blocked the Chandra river near the bridge, which has also collapsed, they told The Tribune on the phone today.

The villagers had cautioned the company that the office site was located on an age-old glacier point and was prone to avalanches. “We had offered them a safer place at Sissu village, but they instead erected fibre offices there, said Prem Lal, a resident of Sissu and Prem Singh from Tailing village, about a km away from the camp office site.

The water of the Chandra river had formed a semi-frozen lake that had damaged the bridge. The water had started overflowing from the lake downstream in the river but did not pose any danger to people living downstream at places like Udaipur because the flow in the river was lean these days, they informed.

Not only this, the avalanche had damaged a bridge across the Dimphuk nullah, about 2 km from Koksar, being built by the Border Roads Organization (BRO). BRO, which maintains the Manali-Keylong-Leh highway has confirmed the damage.

Apart from damaging the polyhouses in the valley, the heavy snowfall damaged a godown being built by the Food Corporation of India at Karga. The quality of construction is being questioned and the builder has not handed over the building to the FCI as yet, said an official from Keylong. The phone and Internet services remained disrupted for weeks together at Rohtang Pass and Sissu. The Mayar valley, Tandi and Koksar remained without electricity for over two weeks.

Confirming the damages caused by the avalanches and snow in the tribal valley, the SDO-cum-DC, Lahaul-Spiti, Varender Sharma told The Tribune that the avalanche had damaged two bridges and company sites offices. The camp site was located on the glacier point and so was the case with the Dimphuk nullah bridge, he added. Sharma said there was still over 5 feet of snow in the valley. The BRO and PWD will start restoring the roads from March 1.

Shimla, February 22
Even as more than 65,000 rare and valuable manuscripts, mostly in organic material, have been registered in the hill state, a priceless trove of these ancient documentations still remain tucked in the monasteries, temples and other institutions dotting the hill state.

The government today urged people being in possession of valuable manuscripts to get them registered so that the centuries-old vital information contained in them could be deciphered with the help of experts.

About 600 of these rare manuscripts have already been collected by various agencies like Language, Art and Culture Department, the Manuscript Conservation Centre and the Manuscript Research Centre. Efforts are on to digitise others so that they could be conserved and saved from being lost to time.

A five day workshop on “Preventive Conservation and Awareness on Illustrated Manuscripts” was inaugurated by principal secretary, Manisha Nanda here today. The workshop has been organised by National Mission for Manuscripts in collaboration with the Manuscript Conservation Centre.

Tulsi Raman, project director of the centre, said people were reluctant to part with these priceless possessions to allow their digitization. He said they should at least get the manuscripts in their possession registered so that their deciphering could be done as and when possible.

Shimla, February 22
The HP High Court today expressed serious concern over the bad condition of the 80-km-long Theog, Kotkhai, Jubbal to Rohru highway and sought explanation from the chief engineer-cum-project director, State Road Project, HP PWD, that why so much delay has been occurred on the completion of the construction of the road.

The bench comprising Chief Justice Kurian Joseph and Justice Sanjay Karol further directed the official to file his affidavit explaining the factual position of the work within four weeks and listed the matter for further hearing on March 21.

The court passed this order on a petition filed by Devinder Chauhan alleging that due to the bad condition of this road, apple growers of this area were facing transportation problem. As apple was the main fruit crop of the area, the cost of transportation was increased on account of the upgrade of the road. The road cutting done for widening purposes has led to landslide blockades and slush on the route.

The petitioner alleged: “The condition of roads is so bad that it takes over eight hours to cover 72 km from Kotkhai to Shimla instead of the normal two-and-a-half hour.

He further alleged that the bad condition of the road entailed a loss of 500 crore to apple growers, adding that wrong methodology had been adopted for the execution of the work.

He had urged the court to direct respondents to complete the work in a safe and congenial manner, keeping in view the larger public interest.

The upgrade work of the 80-km-long Theog, Kotkhai, Jubbal to Rohru highway, which is a World Bank-funded project, is being undertaken by the Himachal Pradesh Road and Other Infrastructure Development Corporation and was awarded to a Chinese firm, Longijian Roads and Bridge Limited.

The work was awarded for Rs 228 crore with the work commencement date as June 5, 2008. Now, the matter is listed for further hearing on March 21.

Solan, February 22
The Baddi police claims to have solved the February 17 shootout case, where a vegetable seller, Malkiat Singh, was injured after having been shot at in the forest area of Kharota near Baddi, by arresting Fervinder Singh from a gurdwara near Chandigarh today.

Chander Shekhar Pandit, SP, Baddi, said the police had swung into action after Malkiat revealed that Fervinder, who was a ‘tantrik’, had shot at him after taking him to a forest in the Kharota area on Thursday.

Fervinder’s arrest had, however, created a dicey situation before the police as according to the date of birth revealed by him, he was a minor and, hence, could not be arrested.

The police was now trying to ascertain his age and if he turned out to be a minor he would have to be produced before the juvenile court.

As per the disclosures made by Fervinder, alias Lalli, he was peeved with Malkiat as the latter had spread rumours that Fervinder could “entice girls” and this had led to a large number of people flocking his place for the same. This had irked Fervinder and he had wanted to settle scores with Malkiat. Fervinder confessed to the police that he had shot at Malkiat with a country made pistol after he directed him to close his eyes and chant some religious mantras in the Kharota forest area on February 17. Fervinder had also handed over the pistol used in the incident.

Malkiat, on the other hand, told the police that Fervinder had duped him off cash and jewellery on the pretext of doubling them within a certain period of time. Fervinder had, however, denied this allegation. The SP said they were now on the lookout for Fervinder’s mother who too was a party to the crime. — OC

Hamirpur, February 22
The Hamirpur police today seized a huge quantity of drugs from a vehicle transported illegally from Punjab and has detained a person in this connection.

The drugs were recovered from a Bolero jeep (HP-22 A-0277) near Kohali (Hamirpur) this morning.

The prohibited drugs include 20,016 capsules of spasmo-proxyvone, 1,600 tablets of alprazolam, 240 injections of fortbin and 380 bottles of rexcof syrup.

These drugs are prohibited in the state as these are sold illegally by some unscrupulous drug sellers to youths.

Mohinder Singh of Nohangi from Hamirpur district has been detained by the police in this connection.

Kuldeep Sharma, Hamirpur, SP, said: “The police in its drive against illicit transportation of prohibited drugs has been working to identify the people involved in this trade for quite some time and gathered information that the drugs were being brought from the neighbouring areas of Punjab for delivery to the local peddlers.”

During the investigation, the accused could not produce any valid document in support of the possession of the scheduled drugs and said he had brought them from Jalandhar and was going to deliver the same in the district.

The SP said: “Though the district police has seized the prohibited drugs, proceedings against the accused would be initiated by the drug inspector under the Drugs and Cosmetic Act 1940.”

He added that after this recovery, the police had gathered important leads about drug trafficking and would continue its drive to nab culprits.