Moga, July 4
Public road transport system in the rural areas of the Moga district has crumpled in the past couple of years. The Punjab Roadways, Punbus and Pepsu had surrendered all the routes plying in the rural areas.

Out of the 350 villages in the district, the Punjab Roadways ply only on the Gholia Charik route thrice a day while the rest of the villages have been neglected by the state government. Some villages, located on the main roads and national/state highways, have been linked to long distance buses.

As a result, students, teachers and other employees are suffering a lot and often miss their scheduled time of reaching their destinations. The only comfort for the daily commuters on the local routes in the rural areas are mini buses and three-wheelers commonly called as ‘bhoonds’ that operate as per their own wish.

At present, there are 11 buses of the Punjab Roadways under the kilometre scheme, 32 directly operated by the Punjab Roadways and 45 operated by the Punbus, a subsidiary of the state government.

The local depot has recently surrendered all the routes of government buses plying to Barnala, Sangrur and a few other district headquarters paving the way for the monopoly of private bus operators.

Avtar Singh Tari, president, Punjab Government Workers’ Transport Union, while talking to The Tribune, revealed that the sanctioned strength of buses in the Moga depot is 127 against which only 88 are operating these days. The number of private buses operating from the district headquarters of Moga is almost double the strength of the government buses. The Pepsu runs only a few buses from here.

Though the private bus operators provide services to the people but it has been observed that most of their employees often indulge in clashes. There have been reports that the students studying in various institutes have clashed with the drivers/conductors of private buses on more than ten occasions in the last few years that resulted in police cases.

Further, the union of the private bus operators has formed an ‘illegal’ flying squad of youth with muscle power often stopping the private buses in the name of checking tickets. The local administration sometimes also attaches security personnel with them.

“We do sometimes send police personnel with them to avoid clashes and maintain law and order in view of the past experiences of clashes with students,” said Sneh Deep Sharma, SSP. However, he denied that any permanent security has been provided.

Narottam Puri, president of the private bus operators union of Moga district, said, “We do not harass the passengers by stopping private buses in the name of checking and try our best not to halt the buses for more than two minutes.

“In the past, we have had bad experiences of attacks on drivers and conductors by some students and drug addicts due to which we go in groups with police protection to check the buses.” 

Barnala, July 4
Principal secretary to the Chief Minister Darbara Singh Guru asked the officials to ensure proper supply of canal water to the fields during the paddy season. The instruction was issued at a joint meeting of the panchayats and district administration in Barnala, today.

The meeting was organised to review the development works sanctioned by the CM Parkash Singh Badal during the Sangat Darshan last January. Guru also instructed the irrigation and police departments to take concrete steps to check the theft of canal water.

During his two-day visit to review the development works in the district, Guru directed the SSP (Barnala) to constitute police teams in the district, to regularly monitor the main canals, minors and sub-minors, in coordination with the state irrigation department. 

Bathinda, July 4
The Punjab bandh call given by the SAD-BJP alliance for today to protest against the recent hike in the fuel prices evoked a partial response in the city as shops in most of the areas remained open. However, the buses plied on all the routes during the bandh hours.

The impact of the bandh was mainly restricted to only those markets where the SAD-BJP leaders organised a gathering and visited the shopkeepers.

Leaders belonging to the SAD and the BJP and the traders gathered at the Sadbhawna Chowk. The shops in its neighbouring areas, including the Hospital Bazaar, Dhobi Bazaar, Sirki Bazaar and Post Office Bazaar, remained closed during the bandh.

The political and trader leaders addressed the gathering and criticised the Central Government for hiking the prices of diesel, LPG, petrol and kerosene time and again after short intervals.

Among those who were present or addressed the gathering included area in-charge of the SAD for Bathinda Assembly constituency (Urban) Sarup Chand Singla, chairman of Improvement Trust Ashok Bharti and trader leaders Rajinder Kumar Raju Bhathewala and Raman Watts.

Meanwhile, local Congress MLA Harminder Singh Jassi termed the bandh organised by the SAD-BJP as a flop show. He said the Badal Government had organised the bandh just to hide its failures. Besides, the Badal Government was doing nothing to reduce the VAT on diesel, petrol and LPG, which was more as compared to some other states, he added.

Abohar, July 4
The three-hour bandh call not only failed to evoke any response but also exposed factionalism that haunted the saffron party.

Most of the mini-markets in residential areas were found open at 7 in the morning as traders preferred to sell fresh arrivals of bread, butter, milk, curd well before they were requested to observe the bandh. However, none turned up to ask for it.

District BJP president Arun Narang, Municipal Council president Shiv Raj Goyal, most of the councillors and presidents of the BJP outfits did not join the small procession that began from the Geeta Mandir. The commercial establishments owned by some senior BJP functionaries too were open.

The Beopar Mandal had refused to support the alliance call for bandh lamenting that the alliance government in the state had played a cruel joke with the consumers by offering a relief worth 25 paisa on diesel and keeping the VAT at the highest level.

The Consumer Movement and Akhil Bhartiya Grahak Panchayat had also lambasted the SAD-BJP alliance government for charging VAT, market fee and entry fee higher than the neighbouring states. — OC

Moga, July 4
The call of Punjab bandh given by the ruling SAD-BJP party against the recent hike in petrol and diesel prices by the Union Government hardly had any impact in the Moga and Faridkot districts.

The business and commercial activities remained opened throughout the day. The traffic on the roads was also normal. The attendance in the educational institutes that had re-opened after summer vacations was also as usual.

There was no untoward incident reported from any part of the Moga and Faridkot districts, claimed the SSPs of these districts.

Bathinda, July 4
Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal took the administration by surprise today when he suddenly landed here and visited the under-construction civil airport and other development projects in and around the town.

Sukhbir landed here in the afternoon and first of all took stock of the work at the civil airport that is being constructed at Bhisiana. He asked the authorities to complete construction of the apron, passenger lounge and parking area within the targeted time.

The civil airport is expected to be made operational by the end of the year. The centre has approved using of the runway of the IAF station for civil flights, but a separate apron and passenger lounge are also being made.

Thereafter, Sukhbir drove to the thermal lakes that are being developed as a recreational place for the locals and tourists. He also took stock of the lake where pedal boats would be floated within the next couple of days. Shikaras on the pattern of the Srinagar’s Dal Lake would also be made available to the people, he said.

He also took stock of work at the two stadiums in the town—one near the Hanuman Chowk and the other in the Rajendra College. He asked the authorities to expedite the work as he was planning to organise international events in these stadiums.

Sukhbir said that his visit was in continuation of his exercise to review progress of the development works.

He said that he has started holding fortnightly review meetings to accelerate work of the development projects throughout the state.

Sriganganagar, July 4
The situation in the sub-divisional jail at Suratgarh became tense on Monday as 20 inmates continued their hunger strike for the second day.

Jail authorities refused permission to Rajni Modi, a member of the jail consultative committee, to enter the premises. Modi was told that the situation was not congenial.

More than 50 undertrials and convicts have been lodged in the sub-divisional jail. Most of the inmates are murder convicts. Information gathered from different sources indicated that the inmates started the hunger strike on Sunday evening levelling a series of allegations against jailer Shailendra Singh. They have alleged that the jailer provides the facilities they are entitled to, only after he is bribed. The jailer, however, refuted the allegations and blamed some of the inmates for the trouble. 

Bathinda, July 4
A team of the Vigilance Bureau, Bathinda, led by DSP Jagdish Singh Janjua, today arrested Sham Lal, patwari of the revenue circle Mehma Bhagwana, and his private helper Bhupinder Singh while allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 10,000 from one Inderdeep Singh (Dabwali).

The VB team arrested them under Sections 7, 13 (2) 88 of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

In a press note issued here, the VB said Sham Lal had demanded Rs 20,000 from Inderdeep Singh in connection with sanctioning and making entry of the mutation of the land purchased by Inderdeep’s wife. However, the deal struck at Rs 10,000. Later, Inderdeep approached the VB as he was not in favour of paying bribe to the patwari for a genuine work.

The VB said the accused was caught red-handed.