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Speaker’s SLP in SC on Disqualification Petitions
Disabled man petitions Prez for job or nod to commit suicide
Encroachments removed, but govt yet to reclaim Samalkha grain market land
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Cold claims yet another life in Sirsa
Schools closed for 3 days
Gurgaon enters New Year with resolve for traffic safety, no honking
Plan to install CCTV cameras in govt offices
Noise pollution to invite action in Sirsa
Youths indulge in arson at GJU hostel
Eve’s molestation on New Year eve raises concern
Police station to check water, power theft
Six booked for youth’s murder
Baba Pritam Singh dead
Man booked for abetment to suicide
2 booked on rape charge
Student found dead
Criminal held at naka
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Speaker’s SLP in SC on Disqualification Petitions
Chandigarh, January 2 Sharma’s special leave petition (SLP) has been filed after he consulted Attorney-General Goolam E. Vahanvati yesterday. Vahanvati will also represent Sharma in the apex court. If the Supreme Court agrees to hear the case, many grey areas in the anti-defection law are likely to be cleared when the apex court pronounces its verdict. There is a multiplicity of court judgements, which, as Sharma says, leave a presiding officer in a state of confusion regarding his powers under the anti-defection law. It is broadly held that the courts should not interfere when the disqualification petitions are pending before the Speaker. The question of judicial review arises only after the final verdict of the Speaker. Similarly, many legal experts feel that under the existing law, no court can direct a Speaker to decide the disqualification petitions within a given time frame. But in the present case the high court not only intervened during the pendency of the disqualification petitions before the Speaker, but also directed him to decide the petitions before April 30, 2012. The high court also declared the five MLAs, against whom the disqualification petitions have been filed, as “unattached” and directed the Speaker to allot them seats separate from those of the Congress as well as the HJC. Can a court direct the Speaker what to do or not to do inside the House? This question may also be answered by the Supreme Court. The apex court may also lay down a procedure to be followed by the Speaker to determine if a political party has merged with another or not. Then the Supreme Court may be called by contending parties to decide if a time frame can be fixed for the Speaker to decide a petition under the anti-defection law, known as the 10th Schedule of the Constitution. So far a Speaker is expected to decide a petition “as expeditiously as possible” or “within a reasonable time”. But nothing is defined. What Speaker found objectionable in HC order Some of the comments in the high court judgement Speaker Sharma has found objectionable are:
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Disabled man petitions Prez for job or nod to commit suicide
Jhajjar, January 2 He has threatened the authorities that he and members of his family will not hesitate to end their lives on January 26 if the problem of their unemployment is not sorted out till January 25. The agitated man also stated that he and his kin would stage an indefinite dharna from January 6 if the district authorities failed to give him any satisfactory reply in this regard. Manphool Singh while talking to mediapersons here today said that he had also sought permission for ending his life voluntarily from the President of India in case the authorities concerned failed to do justice to him. “I have run from pillar to post for getting justice during the past 13 years but no administrative officer has so far come forward to help me. I have no other option but to end my life as I am unable to earn a livelihood for my family owing to my disability,” said he. Manphool Singh said he was appointed as a Hindi teacher on daily wages in 1997 for 89 days under the government policy. “I was relieved in 1998 following regular recruitment of teachers in the state but many of his colleagues were not removed from service by the government. When I raised an objection against this, the government misguided me several times,” said the protesting man, adding that he had written a missive to the President of India on September 20 last year to seek permission to end
his life voluntarily on January 26 if the authorities concerned failed to do justice to him. In response to the letter, the President had sought a reply from the district authorities, but the authorities were deliberately delaying sending the report to the President, Manphool Singh added. Jhajjar Deputy Commissioner Ajit Balaji Joshi while speaking to The Tribune said the issue had been sorted out as Manphool Singh had dicontinued his agitation last evening after an interaction with the district officials on the issue. “Manphool Singh should not have launched such an agitation as the court has already refused to give
any relief to him in this regard. Despite this, I had offered him a private job but he declined the offer,” said the Deputy Commissioner, adding that there was no rationale for
carrying out an agitation in this condition. |
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Encroachments removed, but govt yet to reclaim Samalkha grain market land
Samalkha, January 2 Sources in the board said after officials razed the illegal structures in the grain market, XEN Marketing Board was supposed to either erect fences or convert the land into green belts so that it could never be encroached upon again. PP Kapoor, RTI activist, who had spearheaded a campaign against the encroachers using the RTI Act as an effective tool to force the government bring down the illegal structures, said that given the political connections of the commission agents, the possibility of re-encroachments on the same land could not be ruled out. Meanwhile, the sources said after the illegal structures were removed, the state government had tried to transfer the whole team, which was involved in the action, a move, which was prevented after the matter was highlighted by The Tribune. They said fearing the ramifications involved of taking any further action against the encroachers, the officials were now reluctant to proceed any further. The officials are also apprehensive of filing the recovery suits against the encroachers, who were to deposit Rs 73.61 lakh as a rent for using the government land. A senior official of the marketing board said they had not received any communication in this regard so far. The chief administrator of the HSAMB had in August informed the state Lokayukta that directions had been issued to file a recovery suite against the encroachers for using the government land. "No such notice has so far been served on the commission agents," said a senior official. These officials maintain that until the government support was extended to them in a true spirit, any further action against the encroachers could put them in trouble. The HSAMB had brought down 90 illegal structures, which had encroached over 4,905.61 square metres of government land meant for roads and sewerage, which was worth several crores. The encroachments had existed here for 17 years as the commission agents enjoyed a political clout. Seven attempts made by the board officials earlier had failed to get the government land vacated, but in September the board had finally razed the illegal structures. |
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Drive to enrol voters from Jan 5
Chandigarh, January 2 Misra said that all eligible electors could submit their applications in Form-6 to the respective booth-level officer, electoral registration officer or the District Election Office, along with two photographs, proof of date of birth and residence. Form No. 6 could be downloaded from the Chief Electoral Officer, Haryana’s website: ceoharyana.nic.in <http://ceoharyana.nic.in/> as well as the Election Commission of India’s website: eci.nic.in <http://eci.nic.in/>. She has made a special appeal to the youth and eligible women electors to come forward to
register themselves in the electoral rolls. Misra said that the photo electoral rolls of all the 90 Assembly Constituencies of the State had been revised and published with the qualifying date as January 1, 2012. Misra has asked all political parties to peruse the published electoral rolls and bring discrepancies, if any, to the notice of the election office or the Electoral registration officer concerned for rectification. All EPICs cards would be distributed soon after their publication on January 25, 2012, at the respective polling stations. |
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Cold claims yet another life in Sirsa
Sirsa, January 2 It is the sixth instance of roofless people dying of cold in the district in the past fortnight. Three persons-- two at Sirsa and one at Dabwali -- were found dead on December 26. While a sadhu died of cold at Balmiki Chowk on the night of December 24, another person was found dead in the mela ground on the morning of December 21. Ironically, a night shelter set up by the district authorities to provide refuge to the roofless during chilly nights is awaiting its inauguration. SK Goyal, Executive Officer of the Sirsa Municipal Council, said they were waiting for Deputy Commissioner Sameer Pal Srow to resume duty before the night shelter was dedicated to the public. The authorities recently claimed that pursuant to the directions of the Supreme Court, they had been running three night shelters in the town. The authorities claimed having found only 11 homeless persons in the town, who did not live permanently in Sirsa, but kept moving and slept on the railway platform, whenever they came here.
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Good Samaritan comes to injured children’s rescue
Ambala, January 2 Kulwant said he saw that several schoolchildren were lying unconscious in a pool of blood while others were crying, having suffered serious injuries. He said around 30 students were crammed in the Tata Magic, whereas it could seat hardly 12 persons. He said the driver of the van was already dead and there was nobody to help him in taking out the injured schoolchildren from the van. He waved to the drivers of several cars passing by to stop these but none came forward. In the mean time, a few villagers passing by on their bicycles came forward to rescue the kids. “I informed the police on 100. It reached there with an ambulance within a few minutes,” he said. He said most of the schoolchildren were hardly eight to 10 years old. One of the children, who had sustained minor injuries, gave him the mobile phone of his father and asked him to inform his parents. Arjun Public School, which is located just 1,000 metres away from the accident site, has one bus and a van for ferrying students. The school has on its rolls about 300 students. As soon as the Principal and staff of the school came to know about the accident, they rushed to Ambala Cantonment where most of the injured and the bodies were taken. One of the teachers of the school said that most of the students travelling in the van belonged to Langar Channi, Dinarpur, Sabka and Passiala villages. Some of the nearby schools declared a holiday when they heard about the incident. |
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Gurgaon enters New Year with resolve for traffic safety, no honking
Gurgaon, January 2 DCP (South Gurgaon) Hamid Akhtar flagged off the runs the participants of which bore traffic safety slogans on their chests. Sonu, who emerged the winner, is just seven years old while his cousin, Rohit, finished second. They had come from Manesar by Sonu’s father’s auto-rickshaw. Both Sonu and Rohit have been training for track-and-field events. Three-and-a-half year-old Ananya Natrajan was the youngest participant and ran with her father, Srikant, “We were delighted to see so many people running for the cause and so many spectators cheering them. We certainly had fun as we ran with all other participants,” said Rahul Verghese, founder of Running and Living Infotainment. Meanwhile, the Earth Saviours Foundation observed the day as a no-honking day during which volunteers of the NGO exhorted the drivers not to blow horns unnecessarily to check noise pollution. Apart from distributing “Do Not Honk” stickers and educative pamphlets among the passers-by, the NGO volunteers also put up a number of boards, banners and placards to raise awareness about the increasing noise pollution on the city roads. A couple of dogs were also put on display along with interesting messages like “Even a dog does not bark unnecessarily” to drive home the point. Ravi Kalra, president of the NGO, said the Earth Saviours Foundation would file a PIL for effective implementation of the rules to ban the blowing of pressure horns in no-honking zones. |
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Plan to install CCTV cameras in govt offices
The decision was taken at a meeting of the governing body of the District IT Society here recently. While it was decided that measures were required to be taken to improve computer literacy at all levels, the meeting resolved that the CCTV cameras must be installed at all government offices to ensure transparency and security at such spots especially public dealing offices in order to streamline the work related to the interest of the common man. It is learnt that though such a facility does exist at certain places, its coverage so far has been limited and it was required to be expanded to all offices of the district administration. To monitor and control the CCTV network, a control room will be set up at the district headquarters and the recording will be supervised by the officials concerned at regular intervals. It will not only help to keep a tab on the work at all offices, but it will come in handy in dealing with any threat or movement of suspects at any time of the year. The state government had announced recently to deliver as many as 36 services of public utility in stipulated time. The authorities concerned have been asked to ensure not only the delivery of services on time, but also put on display the status of various applications. Complaints and allegations regarding the non-delivery of various services have been common especially the applications regarding to driving licence, ration cards, arms licence, old-age pension and services, including domicile certification and related work. The state government had recently directed the authorities to implement effectively the citizens’ charter of completion and delivery of various services in the given time frame and provide a special queue for senior citizens in the district offices with immediate effect. |
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Noise pollution to invite action in Sirsa
Sirsa, January 2 Noise pollution is normally caused by unauthorised use of mikes and loudspeakers in religious functions and social gatherings. Use of pressure horns by vehicles and musical horns by young bikers is also adding to the decibel level. According to Noise Pollution (Regulation and Control) Rules, 2010, the area within 100 metres of hospitals, educational institutions, courts and religious places is taken as a silence zone. An official spokesperson said the Environment Department had determined separate decibel levels of sound for day and night to curb the menace of noise pollution in the state. In the industrial area, 75 decibels had been determined during the daytime and 70 decibels during the night. In commercial areas, it will be 65 decibels during the daytime and 55 decibels during the night. Similarly, it would be 55 decibels during the daytime and 45 decibels during the night. In the silence zone, the decibel level will be 50 during daytime and 40 during the night. The spokesperson said the authorities could allow the use of speakers and mikes from 10 pm to 12 pm for 15 days in a calendar year during cultural and religious festivals. Permission for the use of speakers or mike systems could be sought from the SDM concerned in residential areas and from the regional officer of the Haryana State Pollution Control Board for religious places and in industrial areas. In the case of automobiles, such permission was granted by the SP, he said. |
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Youths indulge in arson at GJU hostel
Hisar, January 2 They first broke windowpanes and then smashed washbasins in the toilets. Later, they burnt down furniture and computers lying in the warden’s office. There were reports that many of them tried to scale the walls of a girls’
hostel also. Before the arson some outsiders were reportedly playing songs in high volume in the hostel. Some students complained to the authorities. The chief warden and
the warden reached there and asked them to leave. The outsiders reportedly misbehaved with them. Later in the night the arson took place. It is learnt that the contract of the security agency which provided security guards to the university expired at midnight. All guards had left the campus before the arson took place. The new agency’s guards were posted on Sunday morning. Ram Pratap Singh, chief security officer of the
university, was later sacked for his failure to prevent arson. The decision was taken at a meeting held under the chairmanship of Vice-Chancellor ML Ranga. The VC also appointed a committee to probe the
incident. Headed by chief warden SC Kundu, the committee will give its report in 15 days. A case has been registered against unidentified persons and the authorities were trying to identify the culprits. The VC also appointed a panel of teachers to make surprise checks in the hostels to find if any outsiders were staying there. The new security agency has been asked to deploy more guards at boys’ hostels. A special supervisor for the guards at the hostels has also been appointed. |
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Eve’s molestation on New Year eve raises concern
Gurgaon, January 2 Residents feel that the primary concern relates to controlling the crowds especially unruly youths on such occasions. Given the exceptionally high number of offices and other workplaces in Gurgaon, there is a sizable floating as well as settled population of young people. These coupled with semi-literate youths from high-end villages around the city pose a tough challenge to the law-enforcing agencies. Occasions like this make the situation even more uncontrollable. Then, the conduct of the policemen and other security personnel also leaves much to be desired. Most security men guarding the malls, pubs, bars and hotels simply tend to look the other way even if something unruly takes place in front of their premises. The police personnel, too, function in a callous and unprofessional manner. In the eve-molestation incident which took place near the MG Road Metro Station in the heart of the city, the policemen first remained mute spectators and then brutally cane-charged the hooligans. Some innocent passers-by and onlookers also sustained injuries in the police lathi-charge. However, an officer of the traffic police plainly denied any lathi charge by the police personnel a little while after the incident. Both lathi charge and the officer's contradictory version were shown by news channels. |
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Police station to check water, power theft
Gurgaon, January 2 These police stations will deal exclusively with offences relating to all cases pertaining to the theft of canal water and electricity under the provisions of the Indian Electricity Act and Sections 379, 430 and 431 of the Indian Penal Code
(IPC) among others. The state’s first irrigation and power police station commenced its operations on the first day of the calendar year 2012 here yesterday. The Director, Vigilance
(Haryana), Parminder Rai, said today that the police station set up at Gurgaon would cover Gurgaon and Mewat districts. Similar police stations would be set up at
Ambala, Karnal, Rohtak, Jind, Rewari and Faridabad in due course, he said. The Haryana Government has already issued notifications to set up the police stations at these places, he said and added that these would cover
Ambala, Panchkula, Yamunanagar, Kurukshetra, Karnal, Panipat, Rohtak,
Jhajjar, Sonepat, Jind, Kaithal, Rewari, Mahendergarh, Bhiwani, Faridabad and Palwal
districts. Rai further revealed that the state government would also notify the setting up of another police station at
Hisar. |
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Kaithal residents resent construction of nullahs
Kaithal, January 2 The claims of the PWD and the
elected representatives that their decision will provide a relief to them
is a “cruel joke on us”, they say. Though for now the construction of the nullahs has started on the Ambala road, work on other roads is also likely to begin soon. The PWD authorities, however, assert that the new nullahs and the raised level of roads will neither cause any damage to any building nor put the residents to any inconvenience but this will result in proper drainage of rainwater. |
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Six booked for youth’s murder
Karnal, January 2 The police said Rajesh sustained serious injuries on his leg which proved fatal for him during a quarrel with the accused outside Karnal Haveli A B.Com student at a local college, Rajesh had gone out with his friends to celebrate the New Year at Karnal Haveli. The police is yet to ascertain as to who left Rajesh’s body outside his house. |
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Baba Pritam Singh dead
Sirsa, January 2 Baba Pritam Singh was unwell for the past some time and was undergoing treatment in a Ludhiana hospital, where he died early this morning. His body has been kept in the Gurdwara Chilla Sahib in Sirsa, where he lived and hundreds of people have been visiting the gurdwara to have his ‘darshans’. Abhey Singh Chautala, MLA from Ellenabad, Gobind Kanda, an HPCC executive member, Parkash Singh Sahuwala, president of the Dasham Patshahi Gurdwara and several other social and political persons have mourned his death. |
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Man booked for abetment to suicide
Faridabad, January 2 The case was registered against Khosla on the
basis of a suicide note found with the body of Suman. According to the police, the businessman allegedly obtained Satish Kapur’s signature on “forged papers”
and “fraudulently” became the owner of latter’s 14 trucks. This led Satish Kapur and his wife to extreme poverty. Kapur allegedly committed suicide by jumping from a running train near Palwal on Tuesday. Satish Kapur’s wife consumed poison on the same day her husband left home to commit suicide. |
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2 booked on rape charge
Sirsa, January 2 The girl, a receptionist at a local hospital, alleged that Vicky, who worked as a dispenser in the same hospital, and another youth approached her yesterday when she was coming back after attending tuitions and told her that the doctor had called her. She said she boarded Vicky’s car but instead of taking her to the hospital, he diverted the car towards Malaut road. When she tried to raise an alarm, she was gagged. The victim said the duo took her to a room in the agricultural fields and forced her to consume liquor before she was raped. The youths later dropped the girl outside her house. She was shifted to the Community Health Centre,Dabwali, where she recorded her statement in the presence of a woman advocate today. |
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Student found dead
Hisar, January 2 Earlier in the day, the head of the coaching centre had lodged a complaint with the police that Hritik had gone with some boys to the market and had not returned. A few hours later, his body was found in a bedding in one of the hostel rooms. The police is investigating the case. |
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Criminal held at naka
Rewari, January 2 While Harish Meo had committed 50 cases of loot and robbery in Gurgaon, Jhajjar, Mewat and Rohtak districts. He carried a reward of Rs 1 lakh on his head . The police seized a country-made pistol and impounded the vehicle.He was produced in the court of the Duty Magistrate here from where the Taoru police of Gurgaon district secured him on production warrants.
— OC
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Jind, January 2