Sirsa, December 20
The authorities today ordered the registration of criminal cases against a sarpanch and the Social Education and Panchayat Officer (SEPO) for gifting 100-square yard residential plots to ineligible persons. These plots were meant for rural poor under the Mahatma Gandhi Grameen Basti Yojna.

Jagdish Chander, sarpanch of Khaishergarh village, and Om Parkash, SEPO of Baragura block in which the village is located , are alleged to have executed gift deeds of 100-sq yard plots to 39 such beneficiaries, who did not qualify for the scheme.

Five panchayat members of the village, Balwant, Krishan, Dana Ram, Rajender Kumar and Jassa Ram, had given a written complaint to the authorities in this regard.

The City Magistrate and the District Development and Panchayat Officer, who conducted an inquiry, found the duo prima facie guilty . The two failed to furnish any satisfactory reply to the show-cause notice served on them.

Sameer Pal Srow, DC, today ordered the registration of a criminal case against the two.

In another case, the DC today suspended Ram Murti, sarpanch of Jamal village, for siphoning off old-age pension of those who are no more.

Ram Murti allegedly kept withdrawing and misappropriating the old age pension of about 12 villagers even after their death.

The District Social Welfare Officer, who conducted a probe, found the sarpanch guilty.

He could not offer any satisfactory answer to the show-cause notice served on him.

Ordering Ram Murti’s suspension today, Srow barred him from participating in any proceedings of the panchayat and directed him to hand over all records, funds and movable and immovable properties of the panchayat to the seniormost panchayat member. 

Chandigarh, December 20
The Punjab and Haryana High Court’s order declaring five HJC MLAs, who had “merged” their party with the Congress, as “unattached” has turned the clock back to the post October, 2009, Assembly results. The Congress had started with 40 MLAs of its own and had formed the government with the support of seven Independents and one BSP MLA as it was short of five MLAs to have a majority in the house of 90.

After the judgement, the party has again been left with 41 MLAs (one MLA of the Congress was elected from Ratia in the recent byelection), four short of the majority. But there is no threat to its government because the seven Independents and one BSP MLA continue to support it. Even the five “unattached” MLAs will have the voting right, which, they may or may not exercise in the favour of the government. However, they will no longer be bound by the Congress whip, which they were when they had become a part of the party.

Of course, the court orders have come as a morale booster for Kuldeep Bishnoi and the INLD, which has been licking its wounds after the Adampur and Ratia Assembly byelections. Bishnoi, his alliance partner BJP and the INLD have already demanded the resignation of Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on the ground that he has lost the majority support in the Assembly.

However, a Congress leader pointed out that the majority support of a government could be tested only on the floor of the House. The government, he said, had proved its majority immediately after its formation. Even now the government has the requisite support.

The HC order may set the stage for a confrontation between the judiciary and the legislature in the state because the Speaker may invoke the Article 212 of the Constitution to assert that in the affairs of the Assembly, his authority is supreme. In any case, the issue is likely to be taken to the SC either by the Speaker or the five MLAs, who have been declared by the court as “unattached”. Further, they have also been told not to hold an office of profit till the Speaker decided on the disqualification petitions against them. Their counsel, Harbhagwan Singh, said his clients would decide the next course of action only after going through the court judgement.

Political analysts believe that the court order has restored the “bargaining” position of the Independent MLAs supporting the government, which had been reduced to a large extent after the “merger” of the five HJC MLAs with the Congress.

They also believe that the threat to Hooda within the party, if there were any, would be further diminished now. Already the victory in the Ratia byelection had silenced his critics within the party. Now in view of the uncertainly caused by the court order, there is no other Congress leader other than Hooda, who can ensure the support of the Independents to the government. Under the circumstances the dissidents would like to lie low. 

Kurukshetra, December 20
Architect of the Indian Constitution Dr BR Ambedkar was not in favour of providing reservation to the Dalits and depressed classed under the provisions of the Constitution. He opposed the move in the parliamentary session when such a proposal was tabled by Rai Gobind Ram, a Congress leader.

This was revealed by Prof PD Sharma, former chairman of the Political Science Department of Kurukshetra University, while delivering a lecture in the Refresher Course in History on the issue of Depressed Classes in India being organised by the UGC-sponsored Academic Staff College and Department of History of Kurukshetra University in the Faculty Lounge here recently.

Prof Sharma, while debating on the issue of reservation for the depressed classes, said, Dr Ambedkar did not want it to be a part of the constitutional provision, so he opposed the move of Gobind Ram who wanted the government to doll out concessions to the Dalits so that this class could come up to join the mainstream of Indian society. But Dr Ambedkar wanted that the Dalits must be educated enough to stand on their feet themselves and should not be put on crutches. When there were arguments in favour of concessions through reservations in the government jobs, educational institutions and alike, Dr Ambedkar could be persuaded only to agree to reservations to the depressed classes classified as the SC/ST. — OC

Sirsa, December 20
A tug of war between elected office-bearers led by president Harjinder Singh and officials led by secretary Rishikesh Chaudhary of the Rania municipal committee in the district have been affecting development activities in the town.

The municipal chief alleges that Chaudhary and others remain absent from their duties and do not take interest in development activities. He has marked four officials of the municipal committee absent in the attendance register today and has sent a report to the higher authorities.

Harjinder Singh alleged that a government grant worth over Rs 70 lakh had been lying unutilised for the past one year, as the secretary and other officials did not take interest in development activities and were often found missing from the office.

Harjinder and his deputy, Prem Jindal, marked Chaudhary as well as three other officials absent from duty in the attendance register and they had sent a report to the SDM, Roshan Lal, in this regard.

Chaudhary on the other hand alleged that Harjinder and Jindal were targeting him because he had acted against Jindal’s kin for constructing a shop in violation of the municipal norms. He denied that he was absent from the duty and maintained that his station leave was lying in the municipal committee.

Chaudhary also denied the allegations of disinterest in the development activities and maintained that the grants could not be utilised so far due to an application under the right to information in this regard by some activist. He said the estimates of the work would be prepared soon.

Roshan Lal said he had received a verbal complaint from the municipal president and he had asked him to send it in writing. 

Chandigarh, December 20
“Drunk drivers” will be behind bars in Haryana soon with the police gearing up to enforce strictly provisions of the Motor Vehicles Act in this connection.

The drive against drunk driving is being intensified in the backdrop of hundreds of road accidents, sources said, adding that the offenders would be taken to the courts for strict punishment.

Currently, the district police in select areas like Gurgaon in the NCR were regular in challaning people and taking them to court for conviction.

In fact, the Haryana police decision to go strict with “tipsy drivers” seems to be an offshoot of the recent directions of Justice Rajiv Bhalla of the Punjab and Haryana High Court.“It appears that apart from a couple of districts in Haryana, offenders challaned for driving under the influence of liquor are being released by imposing a token fine”, Justice Bhalla had said, asking judicial officers to consider sentencing drunk drivers to imprisonment.

Saying that the Haryana Police was committed to enforcing the high court order, a senior police official said drunk driving formed an offence under Section 185 of the Motor Vehicles Act.

Anyone driving vehicle under the influence of liquor faces an imprisonment of up to six months or a fine of Rs 2,000 or both, he added.

Besides stepping up the drive against drunk driving, which led to several fatal accidents in foggy weather, more offenders would be produced before the courts for imprisonment. Currently, if the alcohol content in blood is more than 30 ml, the driver is issued a challan. If the driver is excessively drunk (100ml), he is detained and produced in the court.

Recently, the practice of making offenders under drunk driving stand in the courtrooms till the court rose for the day in Chandigarh had a sobering affect on tipsy drivers. The same experiment could be replicated in Haryana as a deterrent against drunk driving, the official added.

Gurgaon, December 20
The Town and Country Planning Department, Haryana, has made it mandatory to get the building plans approved under the self-certification system before starting construction failing which the structure will be demolished, TC Gupta, Director-General of the department, said at a meeting organised here today. After formally unveiling the new self-certification policy, Gupta replied to queries of architects, engineers, RWAs and others.

He said under the new regime, private architects had to submit building plans to the District Town Planner (DTP) concerned and if there was any deficiency therein, it would be communicated to them.

“If no reply is received from the DTP’s office within five working days, it will be deemed as approved and the owner can start the construction,” he said, but added that the architect had to ensure that the construction was carried out by the owner as per the building plan.

If there was some deviation from the plan, it should be informed to the DTP otherwise the architect would be held liable. In case the owner wanted to change the architect, he also had to inform the DTP within a week of the change. “It is the primary duty of the architect to check whether the plot for which the building plan is being prepared is located in a licensed colony.”

Gupta further stated that five standard designs of building plans would be uploaded on the department’s website from where these could be downloaded and used by any person who did not want to get the building plan prepared by any architect. The DG disclosed that if the experiment succeeded, the department could even empower architects for issuing the completion certificates as well. 

Sonepat, December 20
The All-India Farmers Welfare Association has unanimously resolved that the tubewell connections should be given to farmers free of cost and the minimum support price (MSP) of sugarcane should be on the UP pattern.

It was also resolved that after registration of land deals, a day in a week should be fixed for entering mutations in the land records of the tehsil office.

It was also resolved that there should not be a search report fee while mortgaging land for taking agriculture loans and all those water courses for which the farmers had deposited the amount should be brick-lined by March 31 next year.

The meeting, which was presided by Kartar Singh Rana, president of the state unit of the association, was attended by national president Chandra Singh Malik, vice-president Prem Singh Shokeen, general secretary Udaiveer Singh, state vice-presidents Col (retd) Sher Singh, Randeep Singh, Satbir Singh Gahlaut and Amritpal Singh, among others. 

Chandigarh, December 20
Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda has advised the newly recruited HCS officers to understand the significance of patience, passion and professionalism in public service and work hard.

Hooda was interacting with newly recruited 25 HCS officers as they called on him here after the completion of one-year training. They were accompanied by Rajni Sekhri Sibal, Director-General, Haryana Institute of Public Administration (HIPA), and OSD HIPA Ashok Vashist.

Congratulating the officers, Hooda said as they had become part of the Haryana Civil Service, their responsibility towards the state had increased. He asked them to work hard and familiarise themselves with administrative procedure.

Chief Secretary Urvashi Gulati said they had to understand that they were there to serve the people and not the other way round. Rajni Sekhri Sibal apprised the Chief Minister about their training. All these HCS officers introduced themselves to the Chief Minister. — TNS

Sirsa, December 20
A couple was killed while two others were injured when a car overturned when the driver tried to save a ‘neelgai’ near Odhan this morning .

The diseased couple, Adarsh Bajaj and Raj Bajaj, belonged to Abohar town of Punjab and the injured persons included Bajaj’s sister, Santosh, and car driver Paramjit Singh.

According to reports, the victims were on their way from Abohar to Faridabad. Owing to heavy fog, driver Paramjit Singh failed to notice a ‘neelagai’ that suddenly appeared in front of the car. The driver took a sharp turn to his left, making the car overturn.

Both Adarsh and his wife, who were sitting on the left side of the car, died on the spot, while the other two were injured.

The injured were rushed to the community health centre at Odhan, where their condition is stated to be stable.

Foggy conditions have claimed six lives in the district in three days. Four persons were killed in two accidents in the district due to fog on Sunday night. 

Chandigarh, December 20
The government has accorded sanction to open 18 new ESI dispensaries in the industrial areas of Gurgaon, Faridabad, Rewari and Yamunanagar during 2011.

A spokesman of the Labour Department said sanction had also been accorded for upgradation of the ESI dispensaries at Jawahar Colony, Faridabad, Kundli, Rai, Sonepat and Karnal, besides the creation of additional posts of different categories. Three ayurvedic wings had also been approved at ESI hospitals in Sector 8, Faridabad; Panipat and Yamunanagar during the year, he added.

He said thE construction of a 500-bed medical college over 30.6 acres was going on in full swing at the ESI hospital, Faridabad, and the first batch in the college would commence in 2013. A state-of-the-art 100-bed ESI hospital had also started functioning at Manesar, Gurgaon, during the year.

Indravati, Multipurpose Health Supervisor, posted at the ESI hospital, Panipat was awarded the Florence Nightingale award carrying Rs 50,000 in cash and a commendation certificate by the Vice-President of India for her outstanding achievements in the field of family planning during 2009-10, said the spokesman, adding that the Chief Minister had also awarded her Rs 50,000, a silver medal, shawl and a certificate acknowledging her services to mankind. 

Fatehabad, December 20
A cop who went to the Shimla Colony of Ratia town to serve a warrant issued by a local court last evening, was allegedly beaten up by the accused, Hardev Singh, and his family members.

Bihari Lal had gone to the accused’s house to serve the court’s warrant under the Negotiable Instruments Act for bouncing of a cheque. The court had ordered Hardev Singh’s production in the court today.

When the cop reached his house last evening, the accused tried to escape. When Bihari Lal caught him after chasing, the accused along with his mother and sister attacked the cop with stones and sticks. The police has booked Hardev Singh, his mother and sister under Sections 332, 353, 186, 506, 224, 225 and 34 of the IPC.

Hisar, December 20
Chief Parliamentary Secretary Dharamveer Singh today directed the administration to launch a campaign against theft of electricity and canal water.

Addressing a meeting of the grievances panel here he said criminal cases should be registered against the offenders. The theft of water and power was not simply a criminal act but it led to wastage of scarce resources. It was, therefore, imperative to book habitual offenders.

He said it had been brought to his notice that in the rural areas people stored canal water in make-shift ponds and then stole power to heat it up. This could not be allowed as it could lead to electrocution also.

The CPS said the SHO of the area where such thefts were prevalent should be responsible for detection of theft and also for registering criminal cases.

He asked the authorities to be prepared for taking up the responsibility of toning up the public distribution system in the wake of the proposed Food security Bill. He said the distribution system should be streamlined and all pilferage stopped. He demanded action against erring ration depot holders.

Ambala December 20
The police has arrested parole jumper Nirmal Singh, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in a case of a cold-blooded murder of five members of a family of Sonepat.

He was lodged in Ambala Central Jail. Granted parole in June, 2001, he had been missing since then.

Shashank Anand, DC, said Nirmal Singh had been residing in a rented accommodation under a different name, Vijay, at Gaganheri village in UP.— OC

Mullana (Ambala), December 20
As many as 2,873 graduate and postgraduate students of various streams were conferred degrees at MM University, Mullana, today. Rakesh Bakshi, “Padam Shri”, Chairman and Managing Director, RRB Energy Limited, was the chief guest on the occasion.

Six students were awarded PhD in various streams. Delivering the convocation address, Bakshi said Haryana was emerging as an education hub of the country.

He said the youth were the driving force and strength of the nation. They could do wonders by their hard work and dedication in every field, whether it is space research, science, medical & technology and industry.

Tarsem Kumar Garg, Chancellor, said the university had emerged as a leading educational centre in the region.

Reading out the annual report, SG Damle, Vice-Chancellor, said from an engineering college that started in 1995, it had become a full-fledged university, offering various courses.