Chandigarh, February 11
Hundreds of private schools, both affiliated with the CBSE and the Haryana School Education Board, are on collision course with the state government over 25 per cent quota for students belonging to economically weaker sections.

Kulbhushan Sharma, president of the Federation of Private Schools Welfare Associations, said the schools would not implement the government order. But the state government got into action mode. The Education Department constituted the district-level committees under the chairmanship of the Deputy Commissioners to ensure the implementation of its order.

In a communication sent to all districts, the Financial Commissioner and the Principal Secretary, Education, said under Rule 134-A of the Haryana School Education Rules, 2003, recognised private schools had to reserve 25 per cent of the seats for meritorious students of the EWS category. However, the rule had not been fully implemented by these schools and a writ petition, Satbir Singh Hooda versus Haryana, was pending before the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which was monitoring the implementation of the rule. Therefore, the district-level committees had been constituted to enforce the rule. Among others, the Superintendent of Police and the Additional Deputy Commissioner of the district concerned would also be its members.

Sharma said the 2003 rules were amended in 2007, laying down that the expenses incurred by a school on 25 per cent students of the EWS category would be recovered by it from remaining 75 per cent students. The rules were again amended to specify that the expenses to be recovered would be equal to the fee applicable in government schools.

He said the Right to Education Act was enacted in 2009. The Haryana Government notified the rules under the RTE Act on June 10, 2010. The Act provided that the expenses incurred on EWS students would be reimbursed to schools by the government. The rate of reimbursement would be equal to either the fee charged by a school from general category students or the expenses incurred by the government on each student, whichever is less.

Sharma said while the government was keen to enforce Rule 134-A, it was not coming out with a mode of reimbursement. The schools, he said, would not burden general category students as it would mean an enhancement of at least 50 per cent in the fee. He said the government must first discuss with them the mode of reimbursement with schools before they would agree to implement Rule 134-A. The reimbursement, he said, must be made every month and not after one year. Sharma said if needed school managements were ready to go on a strike. Already, schools in Rohtak district remained closed for a day last week.

Sirsa, February 11
Senior officers of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are miffed at the manner in which information of Friday’s raids at Dabwali was leaked despite their efforts to keep the action confidential.

Though the raiding parties of the FDA met with huge success and a large cache of intoxicants, including narcotics were seized from six shops and two godowns operating from houses, the recovery could have been much more had the information of the raids not been leaked.

Sources said that three chemists, notorious for sale of narcotics, were tipped about the raids in advance and they managed to shift their incriminating stock to safer places during the night before the raids.

Shops of some other chemists remained locked since morning and the FDA authorities sealed six of these.

Senior officers of the FDA have been suspecting the role of a Drug Control Officer, posted in one of the districts of the state, in the leak of information. A senior officer of the FDA admitted that the information of the raids was leaked and said the role of some insiders was being probed.

The police last night arrested two chemists Rajesh Kumar alias Deepak and Sajan Arora for violation of provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act. Police said nearly 6,000 bottles of cough syrup containing codeine, an opium derivative and nearly 35,000 tablets of intoxicants have been recovered from an illegal godown operated by the former in his house, while more than 4.5 lakh intoxicant tablets and capsules have been recovered from the illegal godown of the latter.

The two accused were produced in the court of judicial magistrate Dr Atul Marya, who remanded them to police custody for three days.

The FDA authorities, meanwhile, carried out their operation in Sirsa today. The authorities have sealed a shop near the Shiv Chowk after the owner escaped after locking it.

Another chemist near Balmiki Chowk surrendered his drug license and gave an undertaking to give up the drug business, when the raiding party went to his premises.

Hisar, February 11
Indian National Lok Dal Secretary-General Ajay Chautala today asked the Bhupinder Singh Hooda government to return land acquired from farmers forthwith or face the wrath of his party workers.

Addressing a series of meetings in villages of the Hisar Lok Sabha constituency, he said the Hooda government was functioning like a “property dealer” and acquiring farmers’ land for builders.

He said the Punjab and Haryana High Court had issued notice to the government for acquiring land near Gurgaon “for public purpose” and then handing it over to a known builder. This, he said, was the biggest proof that the Hooda government was bent upon ruining farmers to benefit builders.

Chautala also referred to the Reliance Special Economic Zone project at Gurgaon for which the government acquired thousands of acres of prime land but the project fell through. “Hooda had claimed that the SEZ would provide employment to 10 lakh youths. Where are the jobs? Instead, hundreds of farmers had been rendered landless,” he added.

He said his party would no longer tolerate this and its workers were prepared to “make any sacrifice” to ensure that farmers’ land was not acquired in the future and that the land already acquired was restored to the rightful owners.

Chautala said he would take up the issue in the Vidhan Sabha during the Budget session. He thanked the voters for supporting him in the recent byelection to the Hisar Lok Sabha seat.

“I was able to score a moral victory as your support exposed the unholy nexus between the HJC and the Congress,” he added.

He is scheduled to cover the entire constituency in the next two days.

Faridabad, February 11
Following its memorandum to the state Financial Commissioner and Principal Secretary, Urban Local Bodies, Ram Niwas yesterday demanding regularisation of ad hoc employees of municipal bodies, the Nagar Palika Karamchaari Sangh today upped the ante, saying it would soon launch an agitation to press for acceptance of its demands.

Naresh Shastri, president of the Nagar Palika Karamchaari Sangh, Haryana, said employees’ patience had been exhausted and they were determined to launch a state-wide agitation. He added, “The government will be solely responsible for it.”

The sangh charged the government with finding “flimsy excuses” to evade regularisation of the municipal employees in Haryana. A deputation of employees had met Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda under the banner of Sarv Karamchaari Sangh, Haryana, on the issue.

He said there are about 5,000 ad hoc employees in Municipal Council, Municipal Committees and Municipal Corporations in Haryana who have been working for 15-20 years.

He further said the government’s negative attitude on the issue was based on its misinterpretation of the apex court’s ruling in a case, Umma Devi versus state of Karnataka. The court observed that getting employment on an ad hoc basis was not the fault of the employees, and thus sympathised with them, he added.

The sangh has objected to the rules amended by the Haryana government last year, imposing conditions for regularisation of jobs, saying they could not be implemented ex-post facto. They include a minimum of 10 years in service by an employee and the employment must be against a regular post through a selection committee or employment exchange.

Jhajjar,February 11
To mount pressure on the state government for getting their demands met, a large number of mid-day meal workers under the aegis of the Mid-Day Meal Workers Union today hold protest in the city and submitted a memorandum addressed to Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda to a Naib Tehsildar here.

The protesters were demanding status of regular government employees besides Rs 15,000 per month as salary until their services was not regularised. Earlier, the mid-day workers gathered at the Shri Ram Park this morning. Thereafter, the protesters took out a procession headed by the union leader Darshana.

Addressing the protesters, Darshana said the state government had been adopted “indifferent” attitude towards the mid-day meal workers. The union’s demands were not being met by the government despite giving assurance in this regard several times in the past, she added.

Fatehabad: Irate workers of accredited social health activist (ASHA) functioning under the Health Department and mid-day meal workers of government schools on Saturday blocked the national highway near the Laal Batti Chowk after authorities in the Education Department failed to turn up to receive their memoranda.

Chandigarh, February 11
Haryana’s much-touted millennium city - Gurgaon is turning to be the most unsafe city in the state. After murders and auto thefts, Gurgaon has the dubious distinction of reporting the highest number of thefts in 2011- a theft every two hours.

While Haryana reported 17,285 thefts last year (two thefts every hour on an average), Gurgaon with 3,345 thefts accounted for lion’s share of the total thefts. In 2010, the state reported 16,024 thefts with Gurgaon leading with 3,107 thefts. Faridabad, which reported 1,750 thefts (up from 1,471 in 2010) was way behind Gurgaon followed by Hisar with 1,167 thefts. Hisar had reported 829 thefts in 2010, data collected by The Tribune revealed.

On the other hand, Fatehabad proved to be the safest district with just 266 thefts (241 in 2,010) followed by Kaithal with 350 thefts (304 in 2010) and Panchkula with 380 thefts (317 in 2010). While several districts registered a spurt in the thefts cases, Sonepat with 708 thefts (984 in 2010), Karnal with 813 thefts (836 in 2010), Mewat with 390 thefts (407 in 2010), Kurukshetra with 529 thefts (728 in 2010) and Jhajjar with 468 thefts (527 in 2010) registered a significant fall in the number of theft cases last year.

On the spurt in thefts in the state in general and Gurgaon in particular, a senior police official informed that it reflected the deteriorating law and order in the state where fear of law seemed to be fast vanishing. “Despite police’s best efforts, law and order situation continues to get worse with each passing day against the backdrop of large-scale urbanisation in the National Capital Region (NCR) districts bordering the National Capital,” he asserted.

Since Gurgaon has a porous border with Delhi and Rajasthan, the involvement of the inter-state gangs was mainly responsible for a large number of thefts, including petty thefts by small-time criminals and anti-social elements, the police official added.