Chandigarh, March 31
Private universities in Haryana will not be able to provide education through study centres, off campuses and offshore campuses.

The decision has been taken against the backdrop of a judgement of the Supreme Court in Prof Yashpal versus State of Chhattisgarh. “The primary objective of the decision is to exclude the possibility of commercialisation of education,” SS Prasad, Financial Commissioner and Principal Secretary, Higher Education, told The Tribune.

In fact, this decision forms the part of the Haryana Private Universities (Amendment) Bill, 2012, which puts in place a proper monitoring mechanism over the private universities and was passed in the recent session of the Haryana Assembly.

While the faculty will have qualifications as prescribed by the University Grants Commission(UGC), the Act makes a special provision for academic audit.The
academic audit provides for the compulsory dissemination of relevant information to enable the students to make informed choice of courses. It vests powers in the state government to assess an university for standards of teaching, examination and research or any other matter and impose penalities for misinformation, maladministration and for not maintaining standards and make byelaws for these institutions.

Meanwhile, the endowment fund, which will be used by the state government in case the university is dissolved, has been raised to Rs 5 crore. It has also been made mandatory for a private university to offer minimum three faculties providing education up to the level of PhD.

On the fee structure, official sources said since the government was not transferring any land to the private educational institutions, it would not be prudent to meddle with the fee structure that should be decided by the market forces.

However, 25 per cent of the total seats are reserved for Haryana domicile students, who are also eligible for fee concession.While 20 per cent of these students will get full fee concession, 40 per cent will get 50 per cent fee concession. The remaining 40 per cent will get 25 per cent fee concessions, the sources added.

Chandigarh, March 31
The Haryana Government has made all arrangements to commence procurement of wheat from tomorrow.

While stating this today, Haryana Food and Supplies Minister, Mahendra Pratap Singh, said Haryana expects a production of 118.61 lakh metric tonnes of wheat out of which about 70 lakh metric tonnes of wheat would be procured on the MSP by the procurement agencies. The Food and Supplies Department would procure 33 per cent, HAFED would procure 30 per cent, CONFED seven per cent and Food Corporation of India (FCI), Haryana Warehousing Corporation and Haryana Agro Industries Corporation each would procure 10 per cent wheat.

He said the arrangements for purchase of wheat had been made in 371 mandis as against 367 mandis during last season. Farmers had been advised to bring their foodgrains to the market after proper cleaning and drying in accordance with the norms set by the Government of India. The minister said the state government agencies would procure wheat at the MSP of Rs 1285 per quintal. The MSP for Barley is Rs 980 per quintal, gram Rs 2,800 per quintal, Masur Rs 2,800 per quintal and mustard Rs 2,500 per quintal. He the directions had been issued to ensure that all grain markets had basic amenities like drinking water, electricity, pucca platforms, covered sheds and parking lots for farmers. Also, all procuring agencies, including the FCI, had been directed to ensure adequate stocks of gunny bags, polythene and tarpaulins for timely and proper storage of procured foodgrains.

He said the 24-hour control rooms had been set up at the state headquarters as well as district headquarters to ensure smooth procurement. 

Gurgaon, March 31
The Chief of Indian Army, Gen VK Singh, has assured the ex-servicemen that the anomalies in their pension would be removed soon.

General Singh, who was addressing a convention of the Indian Ex-Services League veterans here today, maintained that the pension anomalies had been put before the government and the Union Defence Minister, AK Antony, had promised to remove these after the Budget Session of the Parliament was over.

“The Central Government is sensitive to the needs of the former defence personnel and efforts are on to remove anomalies in their pension,” he asserted.

The Army chief pointed out that after the Sixth Pay Commission, 46 anomalies were found in the pension for ex-servicemen. He said the government authorities concerned had been apprised of the matter and it would be ensured that everyone gets his/her due.

Conceding that a “wrong message” that removing these anomalies would cost too much money had emerged, General Singh said now that the actual figures had been conveyed to the authorities concerned, he hoped that the issue would be resolved soon.

Jhajjar, March 31
The state government is serious about the issue of Bhakhra water and it will ensure that it gets its full share from the Bhakhra project so that all the areas could get their due share.

This was stated by Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda while addressing a series of public meetings at Chhara, Dighal, Beri and Dubaldhan villages after laying foundation stones and inaugurating various projects in Beri Assembly segment here today.

“The Hansi-Butana Link Canal has been completed at a cost of Rs 400 crore, but some people of the state were creating hindrances for their selfish political interests,” said the Chief Minister.

Without naming anybody, he said he had solid proof but the people should not worry. All farmers would get their due share of water. Stressing upon adopting water-saving and productive techniques in farming, he said the land holdings were getting smaller and the farmers should adopt modern agricultural technology being practised in Israel.

Hooda directed the local Deputy Commissioner to organise a study tour of farmers to the Centre for Excellence in Vegetables at Gharaunda so that the farmers could see the progress for themselves and be motivated.

“I am trying to get the Minimum Support Price (MSP) increased but the permanent solution is to fix the formula of deciding the MSP by adding 50 per cent of the production cost in the cost of production as the profit,” said he, adding that the Chief Minister’s working group headed by him has already submitted its recommendation in this regard.

Hooda called upon the farmers to generate alternative sources of income like dairy farming. 

Rohtak, March 31
The state unit of the CPM has criticised the hike in the power tariff by the Haryana Power Regulatory Authority. Reacting sharply to the imposition of a heavy burden to the tune of Rs 1,795 crore on the consumers and the HVPN, party state secretary Inderjit Singh described it as “totally unjustified” and an “unwanted”.

The state government was actually attempting to escape the onus of the result of the alleged failure and the burden of the bankruptcy created by their faulty policies regarding the operation and function of such an important public utility department. He said it was incumbent upon the government to explain the factors that had caused huge losses to the HVPN following the corporatisation of the erstwhile board despite stiff opposition of the employees’ unions and other organisations. — TNS

Chandigarh, March 31
Former Haryana Chief Secretary Urvashi Gulati was administered the oath as Information Commissioner by Governor Jagannath Pahadia at a ceremony held at Haryana Raj Bhavan here today.

Gulati, the 1975 Batch IAS Officer, was posted as Chief Secretary, Haryana, and attained superannuation today before joining the new assignment.

Those present on the occasion included Haryana Finance Minister HS Chattha, Additional
Principal Secretary to Chief Minister Dr KK Khandelwal, Deputy Principal Secretary to Chief Minister RS Doon, Chief Information Commissioner Naresh Gulati, other senior officers of the state government besides her family. 

Karnal, March 31
With arrangements for procurement of wheat during Rabi season 2012-13 from April 1 already in place, the local administration is taking steps to ensure that the procurement process is not vitiated by growers from neighbouring states like UP, selling their produce in local markets.

“The arrival of wheat from the neighbouring states has been banned and no farmer from outside the state will be allowed access to markets,” said an official.

Anticipated bumper crops, inadequate storage capacity and huge carry forward stocks were some of the factors forcing growers from the neighbouring states to sell their produce in Haryana markets and the imposition of ban was prompted by these, say experts. Old stocks and shortage of space for storage of fresh wheat was causing anxiety to procurement agencies, as godowns had not been fully vacated to accommodate fresh arrivals.

The Bhartiya Kisan Union has strongly condemned the move of the administration saying that it is not in consonance with policy of free movement of wheat for sale and may strain the relations among the states. Such arbitrary decisions can be counter-productive also as sugar mills of Haryana depend on the arrivals of sugarcane from UP and if UP imposes a similar ban on movement of sugarcane, what will be the situation like, asked Sewa Singh Arya, state president of the BKU.

However, some leaders and Subhash Chander, ex-president of the Karnal Aadhti Association, has welcomed this decision and described it as a right that would benefit local growers.

A procurement of seven million tonnes of wheat has been fixed by the state government for Rabi 2012-13 and 371 purchase centres were being opened to ensure smooth procurement.

Sonepat, March 31
Two murder accused, Pritam Singh of Rampura in Gurdaspur district and Khajan Singh of Amritsar, has been sentenced to life imprisonment. The court has also imposed a penalty of Rs 20,000 each on them.

According to the FIR, the police found two bodies from the bushes near Garhi Kalan village on the GT Road on March 5, 2010. Another body was also found on the same day near Haldana border on the GT Road. On the complaint of the sarpanch of village, Garhi Kalan, a case of murder was registered.

Later the bodies were identified as of canter driver Lakhwinder, conductor Ramesh Bahadur and Yash Pal, working in a chemical industrial unit at Gajrola in UP. The police also recovered the chemical canter from Kurukshetra three days after the incident. Lakhwinder, Ramesh Bahadur and Yash Pal left Gajrola on March 4, 2010, in the chemical-loaded canter for Dera Bassi in Punjab.

It was revealed that Pritam Singh and Khajan Singh were also in the canter on the same day. — OC

Fatehabad, March 31
Three youths lost their lives and one person sustained grievous injuries when a Mahindra Xylo vehicle hit their motorcycle near Bhuna on the Chandigarh road last night. The deceased have been identified as Preetpal, Raj Pal and Gurdass, all in their early twenties and residents of Jakhan Dadi village near Ratia.

They along with Ashok, who has been shifted to a Hisar hospital in serious condition, were returning to their village, all riding on one motorcycle after attending a wedding party. The accident was so fierce that the youths were thrown away on the road at a distance from the accident site. — TNS