Patiala, July 2
Fearing legal implications, the Punjab Drainage Department has stopped the work to clean the 16.5-km stretch of the Ghaggar from Makrod to Karail, a step that was initiated to ensure that the river didn’t overflow. The move comes a few days after Irrigation Minister Janmeja Singh Sekhon visited the site.

Confirming the development, Chief Engineer Vinod Chaudhary said: “We have stopped the work to clean the Makrod-Karail stretch. After deliberate legal consultation, considering all the aspects and review of the entire matter by the Irrigation Minister, it was decided to stop the work to clean this particular stretch of the Ghaggar.”

Regarding how much length of the project had been cleaned, he replied: “Negligible.”

Though the Drainage Department officials were tightlipped, sources said as the Ghaggar Standing Committee did not allow Punjab to execute the second phase of the channelisation project, there was an apprehension that in case the state went ahead with the cleaning work, the Haryana Government may “misrepresent facts before the panel”.

Under the channelisation project, the 16.5-km stretch from Makrod to Karail was to be widened in order to check overflow in the Ghaggar. However, a senior official of the Drainage Department stated that there was a possibility that Haryana may have accused Punjab of initiating the second phase of the channelisation project notwithstanding the fact that the state had only started the cleaning work. “Hence, it was decided that it is better not to initiate even the cleaning work,” he added.

Meanwhile, with the discontinuation of the cleaning work, the residents of villages situated alongside the river stretch were worried a lot, fearing that floods were imminent now.

Patiala Deputy Commissioner Dipinder Singh today sent a team of officials to assess the situation in the villages that have been flooded due to the overflowing Mirpur seasonal rivulet.

Ferozepur, July 2
There appears to be no end to the dispute surrounding the wall that Haryana is constructing alongside the Hansi-Butana canal. And in it, politicians seem to have got an issue to target each other.

Today, Punjab Irrigation Minister Janmeja Singh Sekhon chose to attack Capt Amarinder Singh by saying that the PPCC chief had been “misguiding” the state by issuing “misleading” statements on the wall dispute.

“The silence of the state Congress leadership and misleading statements by its head Capt Amarinder Singh on the issue, which has been favouring Haryana, have been adding insult to injury,” he claimed.

This issue would dominate the proceedings during the next assembly session, he pointed out, claiming Haryana Government officials were allegedly indulging in blackmail tactics by asking the Punjab Irrigation Department to allow them to run Hansi-Butana canal if the Punjab Government wanted to complete its Ghaggar Channelisation Project.

Seeking Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s intervention, Sekhon claimed that Haryana was “scripting doom” for Punjab in the form of the toe wall. The wall would result in large-scale floods which, it turn, would displace lakhs of Punjab people.

For protecting the future of the people, particularly those living in Patiala and Sangrur districts, the state Congress leadership should join hands with the SAD-BJP government and seek Union Government’s directions to Haryana to stop the construction work.

Apart from other problems, claimed he, this may create a “serious law and order problem for both the states, for which both the Centre and Haryana Government would be responsible”.

Another “injustice” being done to Punjab by the Centre, claimed he, was that the Union Ministry of Water Resources had allegedly forced the state to stop work on the second phase of the Ghaggar channelisation project, which was cleared by the SAD-BJP government during its rule from 1997 to 2002.

Also, Sekhon claimed that Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda had allegedly been lying that his Punjab counterpart Parkash Singh Badal had not written any letter to him for stopping the construction of the toe wall. “The letter written to Hooda is part of the documents submitted by Haryana Government in the Supreme Court in response to the petition moved by Punjab Government on the issue,” he added.

Naushera-Pattan (Hoshiarpur), July 2
A raging Beas, following heavy downpour in this part of the region especially in the Shivalik Range, has left a trail of destruction, damaging crops over 100 acres along its banks in Hoshiarpur, Gurdaspur and Kapurthala districts.

This is just the beginning of the monsoon that the river has started playing havoc with the crops and property in scores of villages located on its banks. The farmers are a worried lot and are apprehending that the monsoon may cause more destruction in the coming days.

Standing crops and green fodder over 25-km stretch starting from Mirthal to Terkiana in Dasuya were destroyed by the floods. The heavy rain in the catchment area of the Shivalik Hills had raised the water level in the Beas and damaged portions of a number of embankments and kutcha bundhs constructed over the years all along the river.

“We have to face the fury of the river every year as the government has failed to take up any concrete step to tame the Beas. The river has continuously been changing its course and washing away the fragile land besides damaging the crops,” said the farmers of the area.

A visit by The Tribune team to Mehtabpur, Kolian, Harsa-Kalota, Naushera-Pattan, Chhanta, Kale-Bagh, Mehatabpur, Dhanoa and Terkiana villages revealed that the river has washed away 100 acres of the land on either sides of the river.

Amarjit Singh, a farmer from Naushera-Pattan village, complained that the government has failed to construct any pucca spur in place of a ‘kutcha’ one that was washed away by the swelling Beas almost 10 years ago. “The government claims to have been spending huge amount on flood-control measures every year, but the situation remains the same,” he added.

Nirmal Singh of Chhanta village lamented that the river washed away over two acres of the agricultural land and destroyed sugarcane crop after leaving a thick mud-layer over it. Another farmer Sanjeev Kumar lamented that the flooded river had washed away a major part of his agricultural land.

Sub-Divisional Engineer of the Drainage Department VK Gupta said, “A team from NABARD conducted a survey of the area and the adequate flood-control measures will be taken shortly. The department has already started constructing a bundh in Tahli village to prevent the floods.”

Chandigarh, July 2
Finally, Congress president Sonia Gandhi has given her approval to the expansion of the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC). However, the names of those who would be included in the expanded team of party's state Capt Amarinder Singh were yet to be made public.

According to sources, Congress general secretary and Punjab affairs in charge Gulchain Singh Charak, PPCC president Capt Amarinder Singh and Congress legislature party leader Rajinder Kaur Bhatttal had two rounds of meetings today and finalised a new list of leaders who were to be appointed as party office-bearers.

This list, which goes beyond the 17-member list submitted by Capt Amarinder to the high command earlier, will be submitted to the Congress president for her final approval. Amarinder had earlier appealed to the party president to relax the limit for PPCC appointments for Punjab as it was going in for elections. As per present norms, there can only be 41 office-bearers in the PPCC.

Speaking to The Tribune, Charak said that besides the list of new inclusions in the PPCC, the meeting today also decided to nominate persons to new committees being proposed by the party — the flagship programme monitoring committee and the publicity committee. Sources said these committees would serve to adjust leaders who were not likely to make it to the expanded PPCC list.

Party sources said those up for inclusion in the new list included former ministers Avtar Singh Brar, Avtar Henry, Amarjit Singh Samra, Tej Prakash Singh, Darshan Singh Brar, Jagmohan Singh Kang, Malkiat Singh Birmi, Tript Rajinder Singh Bajwa and Sunil Jakhar. Abohar legislator Jakhar, who is in the PPCC executive committee at present, is slotted for an important assignment.

Amarinder, as per sources, was keen for the inclusion of Tej Prakash to accommodate the Beant Singh family, none of whose members had made it to the PPCC. Besides, the PPCC president is keen on giving more representation to the Doaba region, which the party feels could revert back to the Congress in the forthcoming assembly elections. The BJP had swept the belt in the last elections.

Amarinder said he had gone by seniority while making the recommendations today. He said there was a feeling that the first list had a number of junior people and this had caused heartburn amongst the senior leadership. He said the state unit was trying to convince the Congress president that it was impossible to include everyone in a 41-member list as stipulated by the party constitution and that the high command needed to expand it. The earlier PPCC had 130 office-bearers and 1,500 secretaries.

Hoshiarpur, July 2
The Centre is intentionally delaying the SGPC elections fearing that in case the SAD, which has always won it in the past, will again capture it and this will benefit the latter in the elections of Punjab state assembly due in February next year.

This was alleged by Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal while talking to mediapersons after holding a Sangat Darshan programme at Tanda town, 32 km from here today.

He said he had already met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in this regard and had requested him to hold the SGPC elections which were overdue now. Though the PM had issued necessary instructions to the officials concerned in this connection, but the file relating to it was lying pending in the Union Home Ministry office and was yet to be cleared.

He strongly refuted the allegation of some of the Congress leaders regarding misutilisation of the Central grants by the state government. He said the Centre was not releasing grants to state from its own funds and was allotting funds from the money being given to it by the state governments through various taxes.

Earlier, the CM, while addressing the Sangat Darshan, said Rs 800 crore were being spent for the development of basic infrastructure of the rural areas of the state. He also distributed cheques of Rs 7.34 crore to 113 panchayats of this constituency. 

Nawanshahr, July 2
Notwithstanding the apathy of the government, various social, religious, youth organisations including the Indian Ex-Servicemen Movement, Punjab, All-India Defence Brotherhood, Punjab, Kalgidhar Sewa Jatha, Kahma, and Kalgidhar Mission Charitable Trust have been observing the birth centenary of Lt-General Bikram Singh by organising shobha yatra, seminars and various competitions to highlight the heroic deeds of the “Forgotten Hero".

Lt-General Bikram Singh had put up a brave front despite many handicaps while defending Ladakh during the Chinese aggresion in 1962. He was killed in helicopter crash on November 22, 1963, close to the Line of Control in the Poonch sector.

A son of Risaldar Maj Narain Singh, ADC to King Edward VIII, during 1932-35, Gen Bikram Singh was born on July 4, 1911, at Kahma village in this district.

A seminar to commemorate the birth centenary of Lt General Bikram Singh was organised at a government school in Kahma on Saturday.

Brig Kuldip Singh Kahlon, convenor, Indian Servicemen Movement, Punjab, and president, All-India Defence Brotherhood, Punjab, presided over the function.

Jalandhar, July 2
PTU’s online counselling took off on a poor note with just 17 per cent of the available BTech seats getting filled in engineering colleges of Punjab in the first round.

While as many as 26,663 BTech seats had been offered in the counselling, 12,162 candidates had been allotted seats of whom only 4,500 have deposited the fee. This leaves more than 22,000 seats to be filled in the second and third rounds.

For this, the authorities of PTU-affiliated colleges blame the university for not conducting the common entrance test (CET) this time.

“Many rural students were not aware that there will be no CET this time. They did not appear for AIEEE either. The good rankers of AIEEE are trying to take admission in colleges outside the state for which the process is on simultaneously. The ones in the middle rung are trying for management quota seats in good colleges,” they claimed.

University officials have another viewpoint. “The fact that many students have not reported in colleges is directly related to our flexible counselling system. While National Institutes of Technology (NITs) do not allow an aspirant to participate in the next round, if he has not reported in the allotted college in the previous round. They even do not allow a change in choices till the fourth round. Our procedure is entirely different,” they said.

PTU VC Dr Rajneesh Arora has rather appreciated the candidates’ wisdom of not going to colleges they did not want to opt for. “They still have a wide choice in the second round. Moreover, they have saved themselves from the refund of fee from the first college. They have even saved the Rs 1,000 that would have been deducted in the first round. This is an indication that the candidates are not in panic mode,” he claimed.

Meanwhile, the university authorities have got a change in modalities notified from the Punjab Government. According to the previous rules, students from outside Punjab had a 15 per cent quota.

But now in the second round the registration for which started today, the students from outside Punjab will be able to take admission in the Punjab general category pool as well. The third round will be open for all categories.

The university has also outlined plans to help colleges fill more seats in these rounds by undertaking aggressive marketing in states like Jammu and Kashmir and Uttarakhand from where they feel there is a good scope of getting candidates for BTech. The VC has also plans to use social networking sites including Facebook, Google and Yahoo to send messages to a large section of aspirants.

Jalandhar, July 2
While other procurement agencies have disbursed bonus to farmers, the FCI is yet to do so. In April this year, the Centre had announced Rs 50 per quintal as bonus on the wheat procured for the central pool.

A senior official said the FCI had disbursed about 35 per cent of the total bonus amount. He said though the FCI had been issuing cheques in the name of the farmers concerned, these were being sent through commission agents.

Meanwhile, the Punjab Arhtiyas Association has urged the state government not allocate any grain market to the FCI for paddy procurement. Ravinder Singh Cheema, president of the association, said a delegation would meet the Chief Minister on this regard.

Cheema alleged the FCI had delayed the disbursement of bonus to farmers without any valid reason. “Often, the FCI delays the lifting of procured foodgrains. This often leads to disputes with commission agents,” he explained.

Nangal, July 2
Panic gripped those working at the National Fertilisers Limited (NFL) plant here today when four employees got injured while doing repair work at the plant.

According to information, four people, including the plant manager Kanda Swami, were doing some repair work at the plant. A gasket inside the nitric acid pipe burst due to over-screwing of a bolt. The acid leaked in the plant and plant employees Pyar Chand and Kanda Swami and two workers of a contractor Kuldip and Arjun Singh received injuries. They were rushed to the NFL hospital, from where they were referred to an eye specialist and were later discharged.

The senior NFL officials visited the spot and took stock of the situation. The injured employees said the incident took place due to an over-tight screw of a pipe, which compacted the gasket and the employees came in contact with the acid.

“Precautionary measures were taken before doing the repair work and all the injured employees are fine now. The incident happened due to some technical trouble and it is a minor incident,” said the official spokesperson of the NFL.

Patiala, July 2
The city police has arrested a thief and recovered seven cars that were stolen recently by the accused.

According to the preliminary investigations, the accused used to steal the vehicles and leave them with a nearby car accessory shop in lieu of small amounts of money, ranging from a few hundreds to a few thousands. “He would then never turn up to claim the vehicle,” they said.

Senior officers said the 22-year-old Bhupinder Singh Soni, a Hoshiarpur resident, was caught allegedly for stealing cars from near the religious shrines of the city and nearby districts.

Tripri SHO Harpal Singh said the accused was earlier lodged in the Amritsar jail on the charges of car theft and was released on June 18. “In a week, he stole seven more vehicles from the city,” he added.

During interrogation, the accused told the cops that he was living alone and used to sleep in a gurdwara or a temple in Patiala and Fatehgarh Sahib and these were the places from where he usually identified his prey and then steal his vehicle. Soni's family is based abroad. “We are investigating the case,” said the police.

Meanwhile, the police held a meeting with the Gurdwara Dukhniwaran Sahib management here today and decided to install 12 close circuit cameras in the vicinity of the gurdwara.