J A L A N D H A R    E D I T I O N

Inmates can contest poll, but can’t vote
Kapurthala, January 6
Thousands of inmates languishing in various jails of the state would not be able to cast their franchise on January 30 even though those convicted under particular sections can contest the forthcoming assembly poll.

A file picture of inmates coming out of the Jalandhar central jail.

BSP connection dominates Adampur seat
Jalandhar, January 6
Whatever be the outcome of the elections in the reserved Adampur seat, it will be a win-win situation for the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) as even the candidates fielded by the Congress and the SAD are “originally” of the BSP.

Dense fog engulfs Amritsar on Friday. Photo: Sameer Sehgal

SC slaps Rs 50,000 on Punjab for fighting case for 25 years
New Delhi, January 6
The Supreme Court today slapped a cost of Rs 50,000 on the Punjab government for fighting a legal battle for 25 years against an officer in the Public Relations Department despite demoting him illegally.

3 councillors expelled from BJP
Hoshiarpur: On the report of its state disciplinary committee, the district BJP expelled its three councillors of Hoshiarpur Municipal Council from the party for their alleged anti-party activities. Party sources said councillor Gopi Chand Kapoor has been expelled from the party for 6 years, Sanjiv Dua for three years and Perveen Saini for a year.

Residents block traffic after woman dies in accident
Pathankot, January 6
A large number of residents yesterday blocked the traffic on the main road for one and half hours in protest against the death of a 70-year-old woman Karmi Devi, resident of Rampura locality, after she was run over and by a private bus of the A&M Institutes of Management and Technology.

Expenditure observers deputed
Hoshiarpur, January 6
The Election Commission of India has deputed Amish Kumar Gupta, a revenue officer, as expenditure observer for the 39 Mukerian and the 40 Dasuya segment. IB Khandel has been deputed expenditure observer for the 41 Urmur, 42 Shamchaurasi and 43 Hoshiarpur segments. Girdhar G Pai has been deputed for the 44 Chabbewal and 45 Garhshankar segments.

• 15 companies of BSF sought

Inmates can contest poll, but can’t vote
Dharmendra Joshi
Tribune News Service

Kapurthala, January 6
Thousands of inmates languishing in various jails of the state would not be able to cast their franchise on January 30 even though those convicted under particular sections can contest the forthcoming assembly poll.

Such are the provisions of Section 62 (5) Representatives of the Public Act (RPA), 1951, that mention that no imprisoned person can vote. However, Section 8 of the RPA Act states that convicted persons with sentence less than two years can contest.

Additional Chief Electoral Officer Raj Kamal Chaudhary said the Punjab election office received instructions from the Election Commission of India a few days ago that no inmate be allowed to vote. However, he stated, if a person was convicted for some particular offences that entail less than two years of imprisonment, then he could contest the elections.

The offence includes crime under FERA, Corruption Act, Protection of Civil Rights Act, Sections 153 A of the IPC and various Sections of the IPC related with electoral malpractices, Customs Act, NDPS and TADA.

AIG (Jails) DK Sidhu said there were over 10,000 undertrials lodged in 23 jails of the state who would not be allowed to votes. These undertrials are lodges in eight central jails located at Kapurthala, Faridkot, Ferozepur, Patiala, Bathinda, Ludhiana, Amritsar and Gurdaspur (with capacity from 700 to 2800), six district jails at Ropar, Kapurthala, Hoshiarpur, Nabha, Sangrur and Mansa (with capacity below 500), eight sub jails at Dasuya, Pathankot, Phagwara, Patti, Malerkotla, Moga, Fazilka and Muktsar (with capacity from 25 to 250), Borstal jail at Ludhiana (capacity 500 prisoners from 18 to 21 years of age) and women jail at Ludhiana.

Taking strong exception to these provisions of the RPA Act, a human rights activist, advocate Rajinder Bhatia, has urged the Union Government to amend Section 62 (5) of the Act that prohibits the undertrials from voting.

BSP connection dominates Adampur seat
Deepkamal Kaur
Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, January 6
Whatever be the outcome of the elections in the reserved Adampur seat, it will be a win-win situation for the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) as even the candidates fielded by the Congress and the SAD are “originally” of the BSP.

The Congress today fielded Satnam Singh Kainth, who had been a BSP MLA in 1992. The SAD nominee Pawan Tinu was also with the BSP till about four years back. The BSP itself has also fielded its one of the most promising candidates Sukhwinder Kotli from the constituency.

Of all the three, 50-year old Kainth has had the best political graph having remained an MLA, MP and Leader of the Opposition in Vidhan Sabha. He had also emergent triumphant as an Independent from the Phillaur parliamentary seat in 1998. Later, he had formed the Democratic Bahujan Samaj Morcha as a breakaway from the BSP, but merged with the Congress in the last parliamentary polls in 2009 to make a comeback. A resident of Sotran village in Nawanshahr, the Dalit leader had canvassed for Ravneet Bitu for the Anandpur Sahib seat.

The SAD nominee, Pawan Tinu, too, had been with the BSP since 1989. He remained as the state general secretary of the party and contested in 2002 Assembly polls. In 2004 parliamentary polls, he had emerged third from the Phillaur seat getting 1,57,637 votes from the BSP ticket. He had been dropped by his own party, but was taken into the SAD fold in May, 2008.

As an advantage to the other candidates, there has been much opposition against his candidature by the SAD leaders. The rural and urban SAD presidents from Adampur have been holding much protest against the party decision to field him citing reason that he had evoked communal tension between Dalits and Jats during the Talhan episode.

Hailing from Kotli Than Singh village, falling in Adampur, Sukhwinder Kotli has been sarpanch from the area thrice. Even as he has managed to create a good base in the area, he has not had a taste of Assembly polls earlier. He, however, has been the state general secretary of the party since the past six years.

SC slaps Rs 50,000 on Punjab for fighting case for 25 years
R Sedhuraman

New Delhi, January 6
The Supreme Court today slapped a cost of Rs 50,000 on the Punjab government for fighting a legal battle for 25 years against an officer in the Public Relations Department despite demoting him illegally.

A Bench comprising Justices GS Singhvi and SJ Mukhopadhaya passed the order, reprimanding the PR department for coming all the way to the SC to settle the dispute over the promotion of Sukhdev Singh Randhawa as an Assistant Public Relations Officer (APRO) in 1986.

The APRO, who was demoted within a year citing some procedural mistake in the promotion, has been forced to litigate for the past 25 years and spend most of his income on lawyers because of the "ex-facie illegal action taken by the officers" of the Information and Public Relations Department, the Bench noted in the order.

The judiciary was getting clogged with mounting number of pending cases mainly because of such reckless attitude of the government authorities, the Bench observed during the arguments.

"In the garb of considering the case of one Narendra Singh, in the light of the trial court order, the department undertook an exercise for reverting Randhawa and other similarly situated employees and ultimately reverted them," the Bench observed.

3 councillors expelled from BJP

Hoshiarpur: On the report of its state disciplinary committee, the district BJP expelled its three councillors of Hoshiarpur Municipal Council from the party for their alleged anti-party activities. Party sources said councillor Gopi Chand Kapoor has been expelled from the party for 6 years, Sanjiv Dua for three years and Perveen Saini for a year.

Sanjiv Dua criticised the district leadership of the party for expelling him from the party without giving any show-cause notice. He said he was a loyal soldier of the BJP and would remain its sincere worker forever.

Residents block traffic after woman dies in accident
Our Correspondent

Pathankot, January 6
A large number of residents yesterday blocked the traffic on the main road for one and half hours in protest against the death of a 70-year-old woman Karmi Devi, resident of Rampura locality, after she was run over and by a private bus of the A&M Institutes of Management and Technology.

The incident occurred at 4 pm near Arya School on the main road while Karmi Devi was crossing the road. After the accident, residents and family members of the deceased gathered on the spot and kept the body of the deceased in the middle of the road and broke the windowpanes of the bus. The protesters raised slogans against the police demanding immediate arrest of the erring driver of the bus, who fled from the scene after leaving the vehicle behind.

The police reached the spot, pacified the protesters, removed the body from the road and sent it to the Civil Hospital for postmortem. The SSP, SK Kalia, said action would be initiated against the bus driver.

Expenditure observers deputed
Our Correspondents

Hoshiarpur, January 6
The Election Commission of India has deputed Amish Kumar Gupta, a revenue officer, as expenditure observer for the 39 Mukerian and the 40 Dasuya segment. IB Khandel has been deputed expenditure observer for the 41 Urmur, 42 Shamchaurasi and 43 Hoshiarpur segments. Girdhar G Pai has been deputed for the 44 Chabbewal and 45 Garhshankar segments.

Nawanshahr: Pawan Kumar, IRS, who has been deputed as Expenditure Observer for the three Assembly segments of Nawanshahr, Anga and Balachaur, falling in the district, by the Election Commission of India, today reached here.

He held a meeting with district officials.

15 companies of BSF sought

Hoshiarpur: The police has sought 15 companies of the BSF for Assembly elections in 7 segments in the district. SSP Balkar Singh Sidhu said four companies of the BSF arrived at Hoshiarpur today. He said the remaining companies would arrive on January 8. — OC