NEIGHBOURHOOD

Two trucks impounded for illegal mining
Our Correspondent

The police sources revealed that during the night patrolling the trucks were impounded from the Tipra village near the bypass for over loading and illegal mining. The police has also impounded an another truck without documents. The mining department has also been informed by the police, which would take appropriate action against the trucks. Notably, despite the ban on the mining by the court, the illegal mining is carried out during the night hours in the Kalka, Pinjore area.

Petrol pump owners assaulted

Some unknown assailants assaulted an owner of a petrol pump at Nanakpur village on Thursday night.

In a complaint to the police, Prem, owner of the petrol pump alleged that he along with his son were injured, when their car was stopped by an another car near Khera wali village, adjacent to Nanakpur village on the Pinjore-Nalagarh road and the five to six persons attacked them with sticks and rods. The windowpanes of his car were also damaged during the attack. The police has registered a case against six unknown assaulters, who managed to flee after the incident.

Dera Bassi, APRIL 6
Two youths from Bihar were killed in a road accident near Dera Bassi, today morning. The deceased had been identified as Manager Yadav and Manjay who were living at Dera Bassi.

Sources said that the youths were involved in the labour work for industries here. The accident occurred when the victims were going to Mubarkpur on their motorcycle through service road near national highway railway over bridge when suddenly an unidentified truck hit them. Both of them died on the spot. The police has registered a case against unidentified truck driver under Section 279 and 304 A.

The bodies of the victims were handed over to their relatives after conducting the postmortem examination in the Civil Hospital, Dera Bassi.

Patiala, April 6
A large number of university teachers under the auspices of Punjabi University Teachers’ Coordination Committee (PUTCC) met Dr Jaspal Singh, the Vice-Chancellor of Punjabi University, Patiala, regarding the fulfillment of their long-pending demands. Three demands of the university teachers were discussed, including the release of arrears and holding PUTA elections.

The Vice-Chancellor assured the delegation that he would personally take up the issue of release of the salary arrears of teachers at the highest level of government. It is important to note that salary arrears of university teachers for the 43 months (from 01-01-2006 to 31-07-2009) are still pending.

It is mentioned that Guru Nanak Dev University has recently released 40 per cent of the pay arrears to its employees from its own sources. Further, the state government has released the 40 per cent of the pay arrears to her employees during 2011. And, in the current budget session has further announced that the next installment of 30 per cent would be released in the month of June 2012. But, the release of arrears to the university teachers in no way put additional burden on the state government as 80 per cent of the arrears would be provided by the centre government in the form of reimbursed money to the state government.

Fatehgarh Sahib, April 6
To implement the Right To Service (RTS) Act in letter and in spirit, new software "State Tracking System" in Suvidha and Saanjh Kendras all over the State will be installed. The provision, which will help in keeping a close watch on the working of offices at district-level and every type of information, will be available online.

The new software will show the receipt of applications at district-level, number of disposal and pendency, said SC Aggarwal, Chief Commissioner, the RTS Commission, while talking to the media persons here today. He said that he had started the tour of all the districts from historical district Fatehgarh Sahib to know the reality regarding implementation of the RTS Act, which was brain child of Sukhbir Badal, Deputy Chief Minister and enacted by the State Government to avoid unnecessary harassment of the people in government offices for getting their work.

He said that at present government has listed 67 services related to health, transport, revenue, local government rural water supply, social security, food and civil supply, police departments etc under the RTS Act and all the other services would be brought under this Act with in two years. He called upon the people to get the benefit of these services.

Latter, while addressing meeting of district heads of the various departments, he directed them to put up signboards in their offices and at public places depicting the nature of work and the stipulated period for its disposal, so that people may know, when their work would be done. He reminded them that it was their duty to redress the grievances and clear the applications of public at the earliest. He warned that all those officers and employees harassing the people unnecessarily would not be spared. He added that all sort of information regarding the RTS would be presented in the Assembly, so the officers must understand its importance and implement it. He directed the revenue officials to complete the demarcation and mutation work with in stipulated time. He also sought suggestions from the officials.

Dera Bassi, April 6
Many passengers were harassed when a drunk driver who stopped a bus near Dera Bassi on the Chandigarh-Ambala national highway. The driver stopped the bus after crossing the Dera Bassi city. The air-conditioned Haryana Roadways bus was going from Chandigarh to Delhi.

Around 11 pm, the bus stopped and the national highway witnessed traffic jam. After receiving the informationm, the police, immediately, reached the spot. The bus driver fled from the spot before the police reached.The passengers were shifted in another bus with the help of the bus conductor. The driver could not be traced till the filing of this news. 

Mohali, April 6
Even as the Indian Premier League matches here are around the corner, firefighting arrangements at the Punjab Cricket Association (PCA) Stadium were found inadequate during a check yesterday.

Talking to the Chandigarh Tribune, municipal council (MC) Administrator JC Sabharwal said the firefighting system was not up to the mark.

“We have found that some nozzles of water pipes were not working properly. Several sensitive points did not have fire extinguishers. We told the PCA authorities to meet the shortcomings to get the NOC,” he said.

The MC team would visit the stadium again in a day or two to check things, he added. PCA joint secretary GS Walia said he asked the staff to do the needful.

“Some shortcomings were pointed out. We started the work to put things in place. We will do away with the shortcomings by tomorrow and apply for the NOC,” he said.

Mohali, April 6
About 31 umpires from various districts of Punjab participated in the three-day umpire’s seminar for PCA panel umpires conducted by the Punjab Cricket Association (PCA) that concluded at the PCA Cricket Stadium here today.

The participants had a thorough discussion on how to maintain the spirit of the game while supervising the matches. Apart from practical demonstration, audio-visual aids were used to educate the umpires. The participants were also informed about the ways to deal with the situations arising out of adverse weather conditions and to control the situation firmly. Tips to improve match management and communication skills were also given to the participating umpires, which would enable them to improve their on-field performance. The faculty was headed by former international umpires, Jasbir Singh and Dr MS Mahal and current Ranji Trophy umpires, Navdeep Singh and Bharti Vij.

PCA spokesperson Sushil Kapoor said the seminar had been conducted as a part of the association’s policy to update the umpires about the latest laws of the game and also to make them match ready before the start of the domestic season.

He said the association had also conducted seminars for other officials like match referees, coaches, trainers and scorers, so that the supervision and conduct of Punjab’s domestic matches to be held from April 20 for all age groups are hassle free. The contents of the three-day seminar included discussions on MCC laws, BCCI playing conditions and PCA playing conditions.

Chandigarh, April 6
Tejas Nagpal with four-and-a-half points and Arunima Goyal with three points emerged as champions in their respective categories in the Chandigarh Under-17 (Open and Girls) Chess Championship that concluded at St Xavier’s Senior Secondary School, Sector 44.

The championship was organised by the Chandigarh Chess Association and a total of 46 boys and girls participated in the championship.

Tejas of St Kabir and Jaskeerat Singh of DPS, Chandigarh, in the boys’ category and Arunima of Sacred Heart and Inayat have been selected to represent Chandigarh in the forthcoming National Under-17 Open Chess Championship 2012 to be held in UP from July 16.

In the under-7 category, Vyom Khanna and Krisha of DPS, Chandigarh, have been selected to represent Chandigarh in the forthcoming National Under-7 Open and Girls Chess Championship 2012 to be held at Puducherry from July 16.

Results (boys):

4½ points: Tejas Nagpal.

4 points: Jaskeerat, Tarini Goyal, Prateek Wadhwa, Abhinav Bansal.

3½ points: Yash Mishra, Sachleen.

3 points: Anubhav Tuknayat, Aditya Bedi, Amartya Bhatacharya, Manish Mandal, Lakshay Bhatia, Gurfateh Singh Doabia, Utkarsh Sidhart, Shishir Lamba, Jashanpreet.

2½ points: Akshit, Arsh Mahajan, Anhat, Archit, Maurya Mahajan.

2 points: Aryan Oswal, Soham Modi, Ishpuneet, Brahmjot Singh, Kashish Arora, Manveer, Kashish Jain, Prankush.

1 point: Jashan Khurana, Sachin Kumar, Sidharth Mahajan, Shivom, Archit Gupta.

Girls (U-17): 3 points: Arunima Goyal.

2 points: Inayat, Kritika, Arshjot.

1 point: Monash, Mahira, Avni.

Chandigarh, April 6
She got tiny eyes with big dreams, a dream to make it big, achieve new heights and to prove her mettle, Ishika Mahajan, a ball badminton player, wants to make her family proud one day.

The 13-year-old ball badminton player, who hails from a middle-class family, hogged the limelight after winning the best player award during the recently held School National Games held in Hyderabad. She won the top honours in the sub-junior category.

“I am happy and will continue to play for the state. These days I am undergoing my tuitions, as my exams are approaching and after that I will again start practicing under my coach Inderjeet Singh,” said Ishika.

A student of class VIII of Shishu Niketan School, Sector 22, she has already marked her presence in the world of sports after representing the city in three different national games. “Playing the game is my passion and I cannot afford to leave it. I will achieve my aim after giving my best and try hard to win all laurels and make my parents proud,” said Ishika.

On the other hand, her proud father stated, “One fine day, she just asked for a racket and then began her achievements in the game. She went to play three nationals, out of which she bagged the title in one competition. I hope she will continue to win and make me proud. She will get all possible support from the family,” said Ishika’s father.

Chandigarh, April 6
“I want to see Panjab University (PU) lift the Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad (MAKA) Trophy this year, again, which the camp had won six years ago,” said Dr Gurmeet Singh has taken the additional charge of Panjab University Director Sports.

Talking about his plans, Dr Gurmeet (41) who is also chairman of the physical education department and warden of PU Hostel number 6, said that for achieving this cup, he would be closely working with his sub-ordinates, Dr Dolly Dahiya and Dr Vishav Mohini (both are deputy director sports), to uplift the sports infrastructure at Panjab University.

Dr Gurmeet said that his main priorities would be to provide better facilities to the sports persons, completion of hockey turf, spruce-up the ground, get hi-tech gymnasiums, work on building-up of all weather swimming pool and also conduct summer camps.

“My role as the director sports would be quite challenging. The way the Vice-Chancellor has shown confidence in me, I would strive to perform to the best of my abilities,” he added.

Notably, Dr Gurmeet is Joint Secretary/Technical Advisor of Veterans Athletic Association of India besides being the secretary of Veterans Athletic Association of Chandigarh. He joined the physical education department at PU in 1998.