Amritsar, January 18
Two candidates, Jasbir Singh Dimpa (Congress) and Inderbir Singh Bolaria (SAD), both contesting the Assembly elections from the Amritsar (West) constituency, were booked for violating the election code of conduct today.

Cases were registered against them at the C-Division police station as poll-related hoardings and posters pertaining to them did not have on them the mandatory details of the printer and publisher.

It is mandatory to have the mention of the name and address of the printer and publisher along with the number of copies on any poll-related advertisement material as per the directions of the Chief Election Commissioner.

Confirming it, Returning Officer of the constituency Pardeep Sabharwal said separate cases under Section 127A (1) of the Representation of the People Act, 1951, had been registered against them. “I had received reports that both the candidates were not abiding the election code of conduct, despite the fact that the political party representatives as well as printers and publishers were repeatedly warned not to violate the norm. That’s why a case has been registered against both the candidates.”

In a separate move, Dimpa and another candidate of the PPP Jasbir Singh Shyam have been issued separate notices by the Returning Officer of Amritsar (West) for not seeking permission of the Media Certification and Monitoring Committee before releasing their poll-related advertisements in newspapers.

Meanwhile, Additional Deputy Commissioner Baljit Singh today conducted meetings with the local printers and publishers to apprise them of the election code of conduct.

“It is mandatory on the part of the printers and publishers to submit the sample of any poll-related hoading/poster/flex advertisement with the office of the District Election Office. The printers and publishers have been directed to get the approval from the District Election Office before publishing any advertisement, so that there should be no room for error,” he said.

Amritsar, January 18
Residents awoke to dense fog, which engulfed the city giving tough time to the commuters. Consequently, the arrival of six trains and three flights, including two international, was delayed.

The Katihar Express (15707) was behind the schedule by 3.40 hours, Kolkotta Super (12357) by 1.30 hours, Dadar Express (11057) by an hour, and both Shan-E-Punjab (12497) and Sach Khand (12715) were running 30-minute late.

The flights of international airlines of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan landed behind the schedule while Jet Airways’ Delhi-Amritsar flight arrived nearly four hours late.

Anxious passengers and their relatives could be seen waiting at the Amritsar international airport and railway station.

Intense cold wave, coupled with dense fog, forced commuters to drive slowly on roads.

An employee of a bank, Sarbjit Singh, said the arrival of customers was less than normal due to dense fog. He said the employees enjoyed the free time sipping piping hot cups of tea and coffee.

Fog cleared for a brief period at noon, but appeared again soon.

Amritsar, January 18
The Punjab Chemist Association is up in arms against the alleged harassment at the hands of the drug inspectors.

Following the instructions of the Elections Commission (EC) to check the misuse of habit-forming drugs, especially during elections, the Health Department has asked the drug inspectors to conduct regular raids on various drug stores in the city. However, this has not gone down well with the chemists, who under the banner of the Punjab Chemist Association have declared to keep their establishments closed till the elections are over. The retail shopkeepers dealing in medicines are also likely to join them. Declaring this, Surinder Duggal, general secretary of the Punjab Chemist Association, said he had detailed talks with president of the association Surjit Mehta in this regard.

“We have decided to close our medical stores, including wholesalers in Katra Sher Singh here, in protest against the harassment being meted out to the chemists in the name of checking till polling, scheduled to be held on January 30, is over,” said Duggal.

It is pertinent to mention here that the Health Department had yesterday claimed to have seized banned drug worth over Rs 2 lakh from a wholesaler in the Katra Sher Singh area in the walled city.

Refuting the charges, Duggal said the raiding team had recovered medicine worth Rs 20,000 from the shop, while the shopkeeper had shown the requisite documents to them.

“It would be the responsibility of the Health Department and Election Commission if any shortage of medicine in the market arises,” he pointed out. Rajkumar, president of the Amritsar Chemist Association, said the trade was already suffering due to the limitations in carrying cash imposed by the Election Commission in view of the elections. “Our payments are stuck in the villages and townships, thus badly affecting our business,” he said. The Punjab Chemist Association urged the Elections Commission to withdraw its orders regarding conducting of regular raids on chemist shops.

Amritsar, January 18
To comply with the directions of the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), District Food and Civil Supplies Controller Dr Rakesh Singla has issued directions to the petrol pump owners to maintain record of those customers who are purchasing over 15 litres of diesel in containers. However, there would be no questioning over filling up the vehicle tank exceeding this limit.

It has been learnt that the Election Commission has received a number of complaints that diesel is being procured by supporters of political parties, obviously to be used for poll campaigning in vehicles, the expenses for which go as unaccountable.

There is already a ban on the sale of petrol in containers as per the directions of the Ministry of Petroleum, but this bar was not applicable on diesel, because it is used to run generator sets or other industrial machineries.

Confirming the development, Dr Singla said these directions were issued to curb the misuse of diesel in poll campaigning by candidates.

“It would be the duty of the petrol pump owner from now onwards to note down the name and address of the person who purchases more than 15 litres of diesel in any sort of container and the purpose for which it was purchased. This information would have to be submitted to the office of the District Electoral Officer. The defaulter would be liable to face action,” he said.

A meeting regarding this has already been conducted with officials of Hindustan Petroleum, Indian Oil Corporation and Bharat Petroleum, who are responsible to supplying fuel to the petrol pumps.

Amritsar, January 18
With the Election Commission (EC) being extra vigilant on poll expenses of candidates contesting Assembly elections, with the limit of maximum of Rs 16 lakh, the candidates here have started adopting “unusual” ways to limit their campaign expenses following the prescribed “rate chart” provided by the District Election Officer (DEO).

Even as the EC’s strictness is a welcome step, which helped curbing the excessive use of money in the election process, yet the voters would miss the customary election colours, in the absence of poll-related activities like loud demonstrations or rallies on the streets, the public address systems atop the vehicles of leaders laden with party flags and banners, hoardings and posters in their vicinity or other publicity material.

The reason is that there are at least 14 trained observers to assess the election expenditure and do video recording of the poll campaign of candidates from the day they have filed their nominations.

To avoid their wrath, the first and the foremost “funda” adopted by almost all the candidates here is to organise “nukkad” meetings. It has been observed that instead of taking cavalcade of vehicles, the leaders prefer to make minimum use of vehicles. Even if the leader is being followed by his or her supporters, they have been told to avoid affixing posters, banners, party symbol stickers or flags, apparently to escape the attention of poll observers.

These “nukkad” meetings are being conducted by getting the residents of the area assembled at a designated spot in their vicinity. The candidates would address public meetings, listen to the voters’ grievances and make them aware of their poll plank.

Another amazing fact noticed was that there would hardly be any arrangement for tea or snacks for the gathering during these public meetings, apparently to avoid the expenditure being included in the candidate’s expense list.

For the door-to door campaigning, the candidates preferred to go on foot and making least use of their vehicles.

Another miss is the 24X7 “langar” at the candidates’ office or their residences, which was a must on their agenda earlier. It has been learnt that the poll observers have kept an eye on this aspect too.

The EC’s sternness could well be gauged from the fact that no candidate was ready to talk on record on the issue. Though visibly wary of this strictness , they end up the conversation by just saying, “We have no objections. It’s a good decision of the EC to have released the expense list for poll expenditure and they have chalked out their campaigning programmes accordingly.”

Earlier, the candidates used to present vouchers of their “whatever” expenditure on poll to the returning officers and in the absence of any parameters, it was all acceptable. But this time, “rate chart” would help observers to accurately account the cost and rental fee of gadgets and material used by individual candidates and their agents for campaigning.

Amritsar, January 18
The Majitha police has destroyed a running illegal distillery and seized a huge quantity of illicit liquor during a raid on Bhangwa village, near here, late last night.

Jasbir Singh, in whose premises the liquor was seized, however managed to escape. The police has registered a case under the Excise Act.

According to information, the Majitha police received a tip-off that Jasbir Singh was involved in the manufacturing of illicit liquor. A police team immediately rushed to spot and recovered of about 1,200 kg of lahan from there.

The police destroyed the illegal distillery. The police also recovered 18,750 ml of liquor from there.

Kanwalpreet Singh, SHO, Majitha police station, said the liquor was stored in plastic drums with each having capacity of 300 kg each, besides an iron drum in which liquor was being distilled.

He said Jasbir Singh was a habitual offender.

Meanwhile, the Amritsar (Rural) police booked Sukhwinder Singh of Sathiala village, Gulzar Singh of Bhinder village and Balwinder Singh of Shehzada village and recovered 7,500 ml, 7,500ml and 15,000 ml illicit liquor, respectively, from them. While Gulzar and Balwinder managed to escape from the spot, Sukhwinder Singh was arrested, but released on bail.

Amritsar, January 18
City-based industrialists and economists seek blue print for growth and development of the holy city and an economic think-tank at the state level.

Former President Indian Economic Association Dr RS Bawa said proceeding without plan was akin to roaming aimlessly. He said valid issue had not been raised by any political party. Guided development would help revenue generating industries to realise their optimum level, he said.

Before development of the industries, the holy city requires quality infrastructure and basic civic amenities. He said the blue print must address issues like public transport system that should cover outer ring road of the city connecting railway station, bus stand and the Golden temple.

He said the blue print must stress on preservation of existing revenue generating industries like tourism, hospitality, shawl manufacturing and dry fruit industries. He said it must advocate introduction of new foot loose industries which do not require very heavy raw material. He suggested that these industries could be chemical, electronics or Information Technology. He said all these industries had never been introduced in the city.

Dr Varinder Bhatia from economic department of DAV College said the all political parties must work for development of business, industrial sector.

He said announcements made for the economic development of this city had never been realised. “Educated youth of Amritsar aspired that it should be transformed into an industry hub keeping in view its proximity to Pakistan and gateway to Central Asia,” he said.

Dr Bhatia, who was a member of District Planning Board, feels the elected representatives have been diverting the discretionary funds towards economically non-productive and non-employment generating projects. He said at state-level the present SAD-BJP coalition government did not have any economic think-tank to chalk out plan for development.

The Amritsar Hotel and Restaurant Association General Secretary APS Chatha said that hospitality industry was economic backbone of the city yet the government failed to lend any constructive support to it. He said the government gave industry status to the tourism but power tariff was being charged on commercial rate. He said the industry was battered with state and central taxes.

Shawl Club of India President PL Seth said combined share of shawl, stole and blanket industry of the city in domestic and international market is nearly Rs 1,000 crore per year. He felt the economic blue print of the holy city would help the industry not only to prosper but also to check competition from Ludhiana and Panipat. He said blue print would ensure development of Amritsar as a multi-functional centre, commercial and trade capital of the state. “A master plan for the holistic growth of the city, including tourism, aviation and hospitality, should be developed,” he added.

District Congress Committee (Urban) President Jugal Kishore Sharma said it was not possible to issue blue print for economic development at city level since the Congress was a national political outfit. He said as per the established rules manifesto was only issued at state level in the assembly elections. He said his party had sought inputs before the formation of election manifesto. He said certainly the district Congress office could take up the issues of local industry after winning the elections.

District BJP President Anand Sharma said his party manifesto took care of demands of local industry.

Amritsar, January 18
Historic building conservationist from Britain Bill Kataky has asked the SGPC and other authorities concerned to consult conservation architects before heading to repair the Golden Temple complex.

He was here today to hold consultation with Balvinder Singh, conservation planner and head of Guru Ramdas School of Planning, Guru Nanak Dev University.

Kataky said conservation was akin to reviving and preserving architecture built centuries ago. “It is literally inheriting and maintaining legacy of once ancestors,” he said.

Citing the example of two world famous sites in India, Amritsar’s holy Sikh shrine and Agra’s Taj Mahal, he said both were in deplorable condition. He added that expert guidance was required to maintain the old charm with help of new technologies.

He said there was a necessity to tighten laws in order to preserve heritage buildings otherwise private institutions would cause harm to these old structures. He also advised conservationists not to be overzealous in their approach.

Balvinder Singh said following the directions of the GNDU Vice Chancellor AS Brar, Kataky was working to ink memorandum of understanding (MoU) between Guru Ramdas School of Planning and School of Architecture and Britain’s Planning and Landscape of New Castle University.

Balvinder said the MoU would facilitate exchange programme for faculty and students. He said the British University was known for expertise in architecture and landscape planning. He said the exchange programme would help students here to gain a global outlook.

Amritsar, January 18
Pargat Singh, a resident of Tangra, lost his life when he was hit by an unidentified vehicle late last evening. The accused driver managed to flee from spot.

Buta Singh, an uncle of the deceased, said Pargat Singh was going alongside the GT Road when an unidentified vehicle hit him. He was rushed to hospital where he succumbed to his injuries.

The Tarsikka police under Amritsar rural police district have registered a case under Section 304-A and other relevant Sections of Indian Penal Code in this connection.