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Punjab students perform dismally in AIEEE
Jalandhar, August 13
It is an issue that needs serious rethinking by the state’s academicians. The performance of Punjab students in the All-India Engineering Entrance Examination (AIEEE) conducted by the CBSE has been dismal this year.

Raksha Bandhan brings joy to jail inmates
Jalandhar, August 13
The festival of Raksha Bandhan brought joy for the inmates of the Jalandhar Central Jail today. As the sisters of various inmates visited the jail to tie rakhis on their brothers’ wrists, some cried, not wanting to let go of their sisters and kin, while others were happy.

Nayyar’s Indo-Pak peace formula: Common currency in South Asia
Amritsar, August 13
If Indian and Pakistan governments failed to resolve differences, countries like America and China would take advantage of the situation, observed intellectuals and political leaders of both the nations during a seminar organised by the Hind-Pak Dosti Manch in collaboration with Punjab Jagriti Manch, Jalandhar, and Folklore Research Academy as part of Independence Day celebrations (of India and Pakistan) here today.

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Punjab students perform dismally in AIEEE
Deepkamal Kaur/TNS

Jalandhar, August 13
It is an issue that needs serious rethinking by the state’s academicians. The performance of Punjab students in the All-India Engineering Entrance Examination (AIEEE) conducted by the CBSE has been dismal this year.

While the number of candidates who appeared in the examination this year was quite close to the number that appeared last year, the number of top rankers has come down steeply.

The number of state candidates with up to 25,000 all-India rank was just 712 this year as compared to 2,406 last year, going down by less than one-third of the last year’s figure. Again, the candidates with up to 50,000 rank was just 1,364 this year against the figure of 3,139 last year. Those with a rank of up to 1 lakh was 2,675 this year and 4,540 last year.

Out of the total 29,538 candidates who appeared from the state vying to get admission in the country’s topmost engineering colleges, a major chunk of 27,864 candidates have got a rank in the slot of above 2 lakh rank. Those with ranks of above 5 lakh this year was 14,689, up by 2,561 from last year’s number in this slot.

Handing out the data collated by the National Informatics Centre, PTU Vice-Chancellor Dr Rajneesh Arora says that he too is surprised at the sudden downfall in the performance of state students. The VC seems to have in fact taken an excuse of low performance of state students for low admission in university-affiliated engineering colleges.

Rashmi Vij, Principal, Police DAV Public School, opines, “The bright students from Punjab move out to Chandigarh or Kota after completing matriculation for getting the best coaching for cracking entrance examination. Parents of such students ask us to give their wards dummy admission, which we refuse. Ultimately, these students fall in Chandigarh or Kota category. The trend has been on an increase and we somehow encourage our own students to follow the step owing to chances of getting better results. Being Chandigarh students, they also get an advantage in institutes like PEC which has reservation policy for UT representatives.”

Raksha Bandhan brings joy to jail inmates

Jalandhar, August 13
The festival of Raksha Bandhan brought joy for the inmates of the Jalandhar Central Jail today.

As the sisters of various inmates visited the jail to tie rakhis on their brothers’ wrists, some cried, not wanting to let go of their sisters and kin, while others were happy. This is also the last time the festival would be celebrated in the Jalandhar jail since it is slated to shift to Kapurthala soon. The timings for visitors were increased by three hours. Some female inmates (83 in all) of the prison were also paid a visit by their brothers.— TNS

Nayyar’s Indo-Pak peace formula: Common currency in South Asia
Tribune News Service

Amritsar, August 13
If Indian and Pakistan governments failed to resolve differences, countries like America and China would take advantage of the situation, observed intellectuals and political leaders of both the nations during a seminar organised by the Hind-Pak Dosti Manch in collaboration with Punjab Jagriti Manch, Jalandhar, and Folklore Research Academy as part of Independence Day celebrations (of India and Pakistan) here today.

They also stressed that political leaders of both the countries should try to evolve new ways to strengthen their bilateral ties.

Columnist Kuldip Nayyar Nayyar said in order to establish peace in the region it was need of the hour to make South Asia a common market having single visa facility and common currency.

He said he was trying to set up a common news agency 'South Asia News Service' so that people to people contact should be maintained through their news.

Noted Pakistan's advocate Aitzaz Ahsan said the initiative took by Hind-Pak Dosti Manch had become a mass movement with more and more people joining hands. Imtiaz Ahmad, Member of Commerce, Gujarat (Pakistan), said there was a need of open trade through Attari-Wagah joint checkpost.