Jalandhar, May 17
The Municipal Corporation (MC) is in the process of initiating a new voluntary disclosure scheme as per which all those residents who will themselves come forward to accept that they have an illegal water supply connection will have to pay just 25 per cent of the penal charges.

While the MC has already started a door-to-door survey under the GIS scheme to collate data from the residents on civic facilities, which is also helping it zero in onto those having illegal connection, it is being believed that the scheme would make the work a bit easier, especially in cases where the residents do not cooperate.

As per the scheme, anyone found having illegal connection will have to pay three years’ water bills to the tune of nearly Rs 3,000, but the one who will himself come over will have to shell out just Rs 750.

Though the scheme is said to have got cleared from the MC House sometime back, an approval from the government is still awaited. The SE (O&M), B.S. Dhaliwal, said the scheme had been planned on the Nagpur pattern, wherein it had got a very good response with lot many residents availing themselves of the opportunity.

About four months back, officials had conducted a pilot survey of the GIS project in a slum area of Abadpura and posh Model Town colony, where the employees of the company working under the project found several illegal connections. They even came across cases where the owners of houses which had got split into two or three residential units were not paying the charges claiming that the area of the compound they were putting up in was less than 5 marla.

Since residents having accommodation of less than 5 marla are exempted from water charges, the MC officials are also deliberating on how to levy the amount in cases where the properties stand divided.

Dhaliwal said the survey was going at a slow pace in the Guru Teg Bahadur Nagar area, but now he had asked the contractor to speed it up by hiring students from local colleges for data collection.

Jalandhar, May 17
A curator is nothing short of a blessing in a city where most of the artists have to rely on day jobs to make both ends meet and to keep up the flow of funds to pursue their art.

While those in the know admit that the city is decades behind metropolitans like New Delhi and Mumbai as far as the understanding and promotion of contemporary art is concerned, people like Vibha Ahuja have been a ray of hope in the monotonous, kitsch and poster-art-ruled scenario of the city.

A Lajpat Nagar-based curator, Vibha’s little one-room gallery-shop Venus Art Gallery lies crowded with paintings she picked up from local artists as well as those across the country.

Madhubani paintings from Madhya Pradesh, Chennai-based artist Sujata’s religious Tanjore paintings in gold, intricate brass tiles and other stuff that she gets from New Delhi - Connaught Place, Karol Bagh, cottage emporiums and the art school creations from the National Gallery of Art - adorn the walls of her gallery.

Her gallery has everything from tribal art to ethnic relief works and posters for Indian and European classics (people buying them mostly don’t even know they are classics).

City-based contributors include artists Basudeb Biswas, Sukhwinder, Rosy and Ashwani.

Vibha is respected by artists for the reasonable prices at which she gets art work sold and for her fair timing too.

She is also a hard task master when it comes to packaging. She critically surveys every frame and package that paintings arrive in and reworks on the look until she feels it is pleasing enough for the client.

Golden, silver, wooden carved or plain, her hefty frames are elegant and compliment the beautiful works that she curates.

Even the little ethnic trays and boxes on her office table are creations of her own workshop.

There’s another side to the story also. Demand is mostly restricted to satisfying home decor needs, while its rare to see works being picked up for the artists they were made by.

“Once I got water colours from a talented Delhi painter. They ate dust until I convinced some of the clients to try something new. But it was difficult getting them through,” she says.

She admits that it is still going to be sometime before Jalandhar begins seeing art critically. For the time being, she holds her hopes high and does the little art service she can with her little surprise-package of a gallery.

Jalandhar, May 17
Jalandhar’s fascination with theatre seems to be thriving these days and so does an inclination towards theatre that talks about the rights of the common man.

The latest offering was Rajdeep’s directorial venture “Sabse Udaas Kavita”, written by Swadesh Deepak.

The story talked about a village, where a woman journalist, along with some local pro-people outlaws mastermind the murder of a police official to avenge the death of 60 villagers killed by the village’s feudal lord, a massacre that the police chose to remain indifferent about.

The issue of dispossession and denial of the rights of the farmers/tribesmen was picked up yet again.

Rajdeep’s effort was sincere and the play was staged without glitches. The dialogues were well-rehearsed and the performances smooth. But the problem was with Rajdeep’s treatment to the story.

A serious story like the one he told involves a lot of conflict and anxiety. The play confirmed to cliches. Though they were going through horrific times, the characters were all sure-footed and melodramatically heroic. There was not a trace of fear on their faces although they were supposed to be fighting the callous feudal lords and the police.

To begin with, the journalist, Apoorva, was too sure for a woman who dealt with death and deceit at every step.

Apoorva got away with planning the murder of the son of the village overlord, masterminded the murder of the village police official, managed a romance with a village doctor in between and was eventually sentenced (to death) but didn’t flinch once.

Her character did not reflect the chaos and confusion such a woman might go through and thus was difficult to believe. The police officers, in turn, seemed more interested in mouthing monologues than crushing revolutions and punishing outlaws. They came across as gentlemen while ideally they should have been sending chills down the spine of the audience.

The overlord’s goon was one of the rare, believable characters. His costume, expressions and intense performance did convey the anxiety to some extent. If the same effort had been devoid of melodrama and tackled the subject minus the false drama, the play would have struck a chord and sent a more meaningful message.

Jalandhar, May 17
Dr Raman Chawla and his team of cardiologists, Dr Aman Salwan and Dr Manan Anand, in association with gynaecologist Dr Jyoti Baweja performed a surgery to preserve uterus of a young patient, who was suffering from uncontrolled vaginal bleeding due to tumour in the uterus.

Addressing mediapersons, Dr Chawla said during the procedure uterine artery supplying blood to the tumour in uterus was closed using catheters.

“The tumour had been causing severe uncontrolled vaginal bleeding. In this non-surgical procedure we close the uterine artery in order to stop the blood supply to the tumour,” he added.

Dr Jyoti Baweja added that considering young age of the patient, psychological trauma of uterus removal and no chances of pregnancy after uterus removal, the alternative technique was the only possible way out to preserve the tumour-affected uterus. 

Jalandhar, May 17
iProf Learning Solutions, an e-learning superstore for the competitive exams like GRE, GMAT, IIT, CAT, PMT and other high-stakes tests, would provide study material on tablet computers.

The iProf platform in association with international education and career services provider Kaplan Venture’s content will make it possible for a student who cannot attend a classroom course to prepare for these admissions exams and pursue his or her dreams.

This would enable students from far and wide to access study material irrespective of the fact that whether they have a personal computer or a broadband connection.

Mohit Soni, Vice-President, Sales and Marketing, iProf, said
they would soon be starting their centres at Jalandhar, Amritsar and Chandigarh.

Jalandhar, May 17
Students at the Inter-National Institute of Fashion Design (INIFD) here went hi-tech on Saturday.

It was a good day for design enthusiasts at the INIFD as the institute launched INIFD design pads for its students.

Femina Miss India finalist Jyotpriya Sud was invited for the special occasion.

Customised pads, which were made to order and designed with the colours, graphic and logo of the brand INIFD in mind, were launched for the students of the institute, owing to the ever-changing needs and growing virtual-world dependency of the students.

The pads’ contents have also been designed keeping in view the specific curriculum needs and development applications to suit the specific needs of the students of design.