Jalandhar, July 28
Ever since the last allotment of liquor vends, the local residents are quite upset as many of these have illegally come up in residential areas or as encroachments in verandahs of shopping malls.

While officials of the Excise and Taxation Department and Municipal Corporation, Jalandhar, have turned a blind eye to the issue, the residents claim that their lives had been badly affected.

A vend in a house in the Dashmesh Nagar colony has come up as an eyesore for the residents of the area. The vend came up last month and is now preparing to even construct a drinking place.

Manmohan Singh, who lives in the adjoining house, said his family was much upset at the opening of the vend. “The drunken people create hooliganism every evening. Many of the inebriated visitors do not leave till the time they go unconscious. Many a times, I have to had call police to take these people away. My wife and kids have stopped stepping out of the house in the evening for the same reason”, she pointed out.

A yet another vend has come up in the verandah of a shopping mall in New Jawahar Nagar, owned by MLA Sarabjit Makkar. While sources in the MC confirmed that it was an illegal encroachment as the space was not meant to be covered in anyways and was earmarked for parking on plan. They, however, said that they could not dare to pull down the structure in the land of the ruling party MLA.

Makkar, however, claimed that it was a temporary structure and had come up for a short while. “It is my own space which I could have covered but had deliberately left as it is”, he tried to explain.

MC Assistant Commissioner DP Bhardwaj said the two sites had to be checked by the town planning officials. “I cannot comment on them”, he said passing the buck on the excise officials.

Assistant Excise and Taxation Commissioner Virdi, when contacted, passed the baton back as he said that the Excise Department only ensured that there was no school or religious place around, the rest is for the MC to see whether the site is a residential one, commercial or some encroachment. “We just see that there are 12 sites in a designated zone”, he claimed.

“If the residents approach us demanding in writing, we can get these shifted,” he added.

Nawanshahr, July 28
The claims of bringing in administrative reforms and Right to Service Act for ensuring hassle-free, transparent and time-bound delivery of various public utility services to the common man being made by Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal as well as the distinction of being the best e.governance district in the country notwithstanding, the people here have been facing hassles just to get the delivery of their registration certificates (RCs) of their vehicles and their driving licences (DLs) for the past more than two months.

Though their applications are completely in order, but they are lying pending at the office of the Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Balachaur, for want of the signatures of the Registering & Licencing Authority-cum-Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Balachaur, in the district. A considerable number of people have been making rounds of the SDM office, Balachaur, for obtaining their documents, but they just have been getting a new delivery date as the SDM is yet to put his signatures on the forms.

Anup Kumar of Nawanshahr while narrating his tale of woes said he had submitted his application for getting the RC issued at the Suvidha Centre on June 3 and the tentative delivery date was June 17. Froml then, the delivery dates had been extended thrice, i.e. June 30, July 14 and July 30.

Vinod Sharma of Ropar, who has come at Balachaur to get the RC of his vehicle, said he had been making rounds of the SDM office for the past more than two months. “Now, I am doing job in New Delhi and have to face a lot of inconvenience at the police check posts in the absence of the RC,” rued Vinod.

Similar views were expressed by Ashok Kumar of Kulewal village and Radhe Shyam, president of the BJP Youth Morcha. “Earlier, I was given July 13 as the delivery date of the document, but later it was extended to July 26 and then to August 20,” said Radhe Shyam.

Neeraj Kumar, SDM, Balachaur, when contacted, said he had joined his duty on July 10, but had to proceed on leave due to some domestic problem. “Now, I have joined duty and the people would not face any inconvenience,” he said.

Shruti Singh, Deputy Commissioner, when contacted on phone, said she was not aware of the problem being faced by the people at Balachaur. “Earlier, the SDM was transferred and the new SDM proceeded on leave,” said Shruti, adding that she would look into the matter and the SDM, Balachaur, would be instructed to immediately clear the pending applications.

Jalandhar, July 28
Following a positive response regarding “one rank, one pension” by the Chairman of the Standing Committee on Petitions in Parliament, members of the Indian Ex-services League, Punjab and Chandigarh, said today that they would hold statewide protests from August 15 onward.

The league members said they had taken up the issues of “one rank, one pension” and anomalies in the Sixth Pay Commission during a meeting with the President of India, Union Defence Minister, Defence Secretary and the three chiefs of armed forces.

Addressing mediapersons, president of the league Col Bhag Singh said they would start their protest from Tarn Taran on August 15. “Similar protests would be held at Amritsar on August 21, at Gurdaspur on August 28, Hoshiarpur on September 4, Jalandhar on September 11, Barnala on September 25, Faridkot on October 1 and at Sangrur on October 9,” he added.

Col Bhag Singh added that the league had till date filed 300 cases in the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT), Chandigarh, and won all of them in favour of widows, Honorary Captains, Captains and Majors for removal of disparities in the grant of pensions.

Employment opportunities for ex-servicemen and the youth: It is for the first time that Indian Ex-services League, Punjab and Chandigarh, has been given a special government project of consumer indexing of Punjab State Power Corporation Limited.

The consumer indexing would be carried out in 74 towns of the state. The recruitment process will begin on August 1 at Pensioners Bhawan, near DC office, in Ludhiana.

Col Bhag Singh said the project included collection of data from electricity meters, electricity bills and the consumers across the state. The data would be filled up in printed forms for which a large number of ex-servicemen and their educated wards and youth were required to be recruited. The hard copies of the data would be sent on software by email for which computer-trained data entry operators, surveyors and supervisory staff would also be recruited.

“All ex-servicemen their wards and youth from the state should make use of this golden employment opportunity. The selection of the candidates will be carried by the league and the selected candidates will be given training by a team of officers,” he added.

Jalandhar, July 28
Activists of the Akali Dal (1920) burnt an effigy of Gurdwara Election Commissioner H.S. Brar outside District Administrative Complex (DAC) here today.

Addressing the gathering, leaders, including the district president of the Akali Dal (1920) M.P. Singh, alleged that Brar was functioning in a discriminatory manner. A large number of non-Sikhs were being enrolled as the voters for the forthcoming elections to the SGPC.

Demanding that the SGPC polls should be held in a free and fair manner, he said it was possible only if Brar was shifted from the current post.