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Amritsar civic body grapples with fund crunch
HC notice to EC, DGP
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Rejected papers were incomplete, says DC
Justice for displaced shopkeepers after 28 years
SAD-BJP has it easy in Dharamkot
Cong meeting to discuss ‘vendetta’ cases today
childhood trapped
Poultry farmers in dire straits
Gurdaspur protest fizzles out
Tainted cop appointed Rajpura SHO
HC: No sanction needed to remove corrupt babus
361 cops facing trial in Punjab, HC told
Ensure signboards, says HC
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Amritsar civic body grapples with fund crunch
Even as Amritsar, the spiritual capital of the state, having a population of over a million, is grappling with civic woes such as inadequate road network, chaotic traffic, poor sewerage system, haphazard urbanisation, and insufficient drinking water supply, the upcoming municipal corporation polls will decide whether the way city residents lead their lives will change for better in the coming five years. The Tribune correspondent G.S. Paul reports: Fiscal health The Amritsar Municipal Corporation is currently facing a cash crunch. There are multidimensional reasons for it. Besides, making compulsory expenses like electricity bills for operating tube wells, maintenance of its buildings, streetlights, employees' salaries, it was sloppiness on the part of the three main revenue earning departments of the MC — the house tax, water supply and estate wing — which could not make any additions in the AMC's kitty. The situation has become more complicated after the announcement of the implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission. The 10 per cent increase in salaries on board would be a virtual jolt to the AMC kitty by over Rs 35 crore. A whopping Rs 50 lakh has been calculated as just DA arrears and other allowances, as prescribed by the commission. Then, the AMC has the liability to bear the electricity expense to the tune of around Rs 22 crore annually for running tube wells to provide water supply. The AMC has proposed a budget of Rs 239.65 crore for 2012-2013 after introducing enhancements in the previous budget for 2011-2012, which was around Rs 180.52 crore. The AMC's per month expenditure comes to about Rs 12.5 crore per month, whereas the income stands between Rs 9-10 crore. The AMC has also raised a Rs 5-crore loan from the Improvement Trust and an equal amount has to be returned under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission) and Japan Banking Investment Corporation. Water supply and sewerage The quality life is still a distant dream for city residents. The walled city area, from where over 60 per cent of the total waste water of entire city emerges, has the same obsolete underground piped sewerage system, which had been laid during British era. Out of total population of 11,61,000 as per 2011 census, around 36 per cent residents are devoid of any sewerage facility and the water supply network still could not reach 20 per cent houses. The water supply at times gets mixed with the sewage at several places because of breakages as there is inadequate gap between both lines. There is absolutely no scientific system available to treat or check the quality of water. At present, water is treated through a system of chlorination or bleaching powder, which is added at the level of water extraction. The system of water supply is entirely based on ground water, which is extracted through tube wells and supplied to the residents through a system of OHRs. The ground water level of the district has been dipping. About 10 years ago, the level which varied between 45 and 55 feet is at present between 60 and 80 feet. Officials said the water level on an average has been declining to around 1 foot with each passing year. The wastage of water is rampant mainly because the major portion of water supply system is five decade old and maintenance is nill. Also, around 80 per cent of the city stands outside the purview of the storm water drainage network. Insanitary conditions A major issue that remained unsolved is the city's main garbage dumping yard at Bhaktanwala, located adjoining the main grain market. The plan to set up a solid waste management plan, which will rid the area of the problem, has been hanging fire for quite sometime now. Consequently, the heaps of garbage kept on mounted with each passing day and the present situation is that in the absence of making adequate arrangements for dumping the city garbage, the garbage are piled up right on the roads leading to the residents' houses, their place of work and their fields. Areas of concern Non-execution of solid waste management plant, dilapidated sewerage and drinking water system, city with old topography has a lot of illegal encroachments making narrow lanes narrower, inadequate provision for storm water disposal. Traffic snarls in the absence of adequate road infrastructure. While the inflow of visitors has risen, the facilities available within the city are limited. Looking ahead There is a requirement to introduce modern mechanism to improve the efficiency and overcome poor upkeep of the existing network. The idea of introducing low floor city buses and PRTS (personal rapid transport system) has been conceptualized to manage the traffic flow, but both projects have yet to take off. The practice of disposing of sewage should be stopped and efforts made to introduce recycle and reuse of waste water techniques. The Punjab Water Supply and Sewerage Board (PWSSB), in collaboration with Japan International Corporation Agency (JICA), has also started to rejuvenate the existing sewerage system. Illegal colonies Even as PUDA had detected around 343 illegal colonies mushroomed within the limts of AMC. Today, their status has been transformed into 'legal', post announcement by the state government just prior to recent assembly elections. Nevertheless, this decision had contradicted the Amritsar Master Plan (AMP) that was implemented about a year back. The AMP promised congestion free wide roads, separate residential and commercial areas. It stated that interior roads must be 25 feet wide and also mentioned about setting up of parks and green belt in residential colonies. But these unapproved localities have maximum 20 feet wide roads. Besides, residents have opened up shops as per their need which further resulted in congestion. Parks and green belts do not exist at all. Some of these colonises have been built on agricultural areas. Illegal colonies can be spotted on the circular road from Jandiala bypass on Amritsar-Jalandhar road, Verka bypass, Fatehgarh and many other parts of the city. Brief history n
Amritsar was declared a city on March 29, 1977, under the Punjab Municipal Corporation Act 1976 and the Municipal Corporation constituted. The first election to the corporation was held in 1991 and the city divided into 50 wards. OP Soni was elected Mayor on June 25, 1991. The corporation was dissolved on June 18, 1996. n The number of wards was increased to 60 when elections were held on May 28, 1997, and Subash Sharma (BJP) took over as Mayor. Sharma had to resign and was replaced by Brij Mohan Kapur on October 18, 2000. n To give more representation to women, at least 20 seats are reserved for women. Seats are also reserved for SCs and Backward Classes. The present House has 22 women councillors.
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‘Illegal’ rejection of nomination papers
Chandigarh, May 28 The court has set a 24-hour deadline for the respondents to answer the allegations leveled by the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC). As the case came up for hearing this morning, advocate Deepinder Singh Patwalia, on petitioner’s behalf, alleged that candidatures of Congress candidates had been rejected on frivolous and unsuitable grounds like non-attachment of a Scheduled Caste certificate or a residence certificate etc. “The said objections do not sound to be reasonable enough, but a wholesale rejection of nominations is enough to presume that the said act was a deliberate move and an eyewash and was solely meant to benefit a few from the ruling party and to destroy the right of free and fair elections. This has been the fate of the first phase of elections of municipal councils/nagar panchayats of Punjab. Learning from the past, the present petition is being filed well in time as it is again apprehended that the same shall be repeated in the second phase of elections,” reads the petition. The petitioner has also sought directions for deputing an independent observer along with a nominee of the PSEC. Directions have also been sought for videography during the scrutiny of nominations scheduled to be held on May 30. The petitioner has also sought directions for deployment of Central forces at the polling booths of each ward on June 10, the day of elections.
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Rejected papers were incomplete, says DC
Chandigarh, May 28 The Deputy Commissioner said the papers of 11 candidates were rejected due to certain shortcomings and after the candidates were given an opportunity to rectify the errors. He said the papers of Jagtar Singh and Nirmal Singh from ward Nos. 1 and 10 were rejected due to non-submission of nomination fee. The papers of Venus and Balkar Singh of ward Nos. 5 and 13 were rejected due to their failure to attach an SC certificate. In the case of Palwinder Singh of ward No. 6, his papers were rejected due to his failure to attach a BC certificate. Similarly, in the case of Harbhajan Singh of ward No. 4, the papers were rejected due to absence of his complete name in the voter list, whereas the papers of Sukhbir Singh, Malkeet Kaur, Mangat Ram, Vijay Kumar and Harpal Singh of ward Nos. 6, 12 and 9, were rejected due to their failure to attach no dues certificate issued by the MC.
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Justice for displaced shopkeepers after 28 years
Amritsar, May 28 Traders Gurjit Singh Bhola and Subhash Kapoor said the HC had ordered allotment of two plots, one measuring 3.75 acres and the other of 2 acres, near Jain Temple on the GT Road. The government will also extend them aid in constructing the shops, each of which will measure around 27 square yards. Asked whether all these traders were in a position to build their shops on the land allotted to them, they said half of them will not have much problem in constructing shops while the rest would have to arrange funds through bank loans and other means. A section of these traders are living in penury and barely manage to earn two square meals a day. Physically challenged septuagenarian Daljeet Singh, who ran a wholesale shop of ‘kara’/’kangha’ before the Army operation in 1984, now moves on a tricycle in the narrow lanes of the walled city selling undergarments to eke out a livelihood.
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SAD-BJP has it easy in Dharamkot
Dharamkot (Moga), May 28 As many as 50 candidates had filed their nomination papers for the 13 wards of the local body. The papers of 11 were rejected. Returning Officer Inder Dev Singh said except for the SAD-BJP candidates, all other candidates had withdrawn their papers. He said the declaration of results was now a mere formality. Those in the fray are Paramjit Kaur Sushil Kumar, Gurdip Singh, Sangeeta Rani, Gurmail Singh, Gurmail Singh (SC), Amritpal Kaur, Lakhwinder Singh (SC), Jagtar Singh, Bhajan Singh and Shinder Kaur, all SAD candidates; and Renu Sood and Ashok Kumar of the BJP. After the withdrawals, local MLA Tota Singh held a meeting of the SAD-BJP candidates at a gurdwara and gave them siropas. Jagdarshan Kaur, district Congress president, said: “It is a murder of democracy ”.
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Cong meeting to discuss ‘vendetta’ cases today
Abohar, May 28 Addressing meetings of party workers in a number of villages here, Jakhar said the Congress would decide tomorrow as to what course of action should be taken to check “vendetta”.
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childhood trapped
Chandigarh, May 28 Born to parents convicted and sentenced to imprisonment, they are permitted to live with them in prison. In Punjab, there are at least 120 such children. When para-legal volunteer with the Punjab Legal Services Authority Dr Misha Kumar ventured into one of the women barracks at a Central Jail in Punjab, she was told that a few women were lodged separately with their children in a crèche. There was no way Dr Misha Kumar could have guessed that the “crèche” was a windowless room, big enough to accommodate a sofa but too small to contain the energy and spirit of the young ones. She realised that the police, jail staff and NGOs working towards reformation of prisoners were hardly paying any attention to the children trapped in the box-sized room. The crèche had at least 12 children, some as young as 10 months. Others were aged up to 10 years. “You have guidelines stipulating the maximum age for a child to stay in a prison. But these are seldom adhered to, either because they allow for some flexibility under exceptional circumstances or because the children cannot be cared for outside the prison,” says Dr Misha Kumar. “In India, children as old as 15 have reportedly remained in prison with their parents, though the prescribed age is up to four years”. “There is hardly any provision for education, training and personality development. And imprisonment prevents the children from getting admission in schools,” she says. “It, as such, violates the fundamental right of children to free and compulsory education and the principles of United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child, to which India is a signatory. Dr Misha Kumar recommends an independent child-friendly set up with access to special healthcare facilities. She also recommends sports and recreational activities. “The state needs to provide a separate children’s home outside the prison premises where parents can visit their children twice a week,” she adds.
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Poultry farmers in dire straits
Chandigarh, May 28 Currently, poultry products (broilers, layers and eggs) are not exported across the border. Considering the relatively higher demand for poultry products in Pakistan and the much higher prices that these products fetch there, farmers have urged the government to add poultry products on the list of items approved for exports. Poultry farming in the state is facing one of its worst crisis. The Jammu and Kashmir government increased the toll tax on poultry products early this year, making their sale in that state unviable. In the past six years, Jammu and Kashmir has increased the toll tax on poultry products by 1,500 per cent (from 40 paisa per kg of poultry product in 2006 to Rs 6 per kg now). HS Bedi, president of the Amritsar Poultry Industry Association, said the high toll tax meant a tax of Rs 24,000 per truckload ( 4,000 kg) of poultry products entering Jammu and Kashmir. “Because of this, the sale of broilers to Jammu and Kashmir has dropped from 60,000 per day to just 15,000 now,” he said. “Jammu and Kashmir is no longer a good market for our produce. Earlier, Punjab’s poultry farmers also supplied products to Delhi and Uttar Pradesh . But with the poultry farming developing in a big way in Haryana, these markets too are closed for Punjab farmers. There is an urgent need for us to find new markets,” he said. “We will get a better price if we export poultry products to Pakistan. We will be able to export eggs at Rs 4.80- Rs 5 per piece. Broiler in Pakistan sells at Rs 300 per kg while we can sell it for Rs 130-140 per kg,” Bedi said. He said the government had allowed the export of soybean to Pakistan and Iran, leading to a huge hike in the prices of soyabean, one of the main ingredients in poultry feed. “In the past two months, the price of soyabean has gone up from Rs 16 per kg to Rs 32 per kg. Because of this high input cost and low returns, mainly because of the shrinking Jammu and Kashmir market, the poultry farmers are now forced to cut down production and small poultry farmers are forced to close business,” Bedi added.
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Gurdaspur protest fizzles out
Gurdaspur, May 28 RS Brar, SSP, remained stationed at the Nabipur bypass, 3 km from here, and kept the protesters at bay. Denied an opportunity to enter the town, hundreds of them decided to stage a dharna at the bypass. Abhinav Trikha, DC, reached the site and tried to negotiate peace with the protesters even as they raised slogans against the CM the local MLA. Jaspal Singh, an engineering student, had died in “police firing” on March 29 during a protest against the hanging of Balwant Singh Rajoana, convicted for assassinating the then CM Beant Singh. The victim’s family, backed by Sikh radicals, had given a call for today’s protest, demanding action against the “guilty” policemen. The protest was led by Lakhwinder Singh of the Damdami Taksal. The former chief of the Panthic Committee, Wassan Singh Zaffarwal, and Damdami Taksal head Harnam Singh Dhuma were convinced by the police to stay away. Zaffarwal said: “Nobody is coming forward to take the blame. The suspension of former SSP and the transfer of the then DC are a mere eyewash. The killers of the slain student are roaming freely.”
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Tainted cop appointed Rajpura SHO
Patiala, May 28 However, the posting orders come in the midst of the departmental probe ordered by Patiala DIG against the accused officer. Sources in the police department said Rajan was posted back and that too as Rajpura Sadar SHO three days ago. On May 2, Inspector Rajan and ASI Rakesh Kumar were suspended after they failed to register an FIR despite registering a Daily Diary Report pertaining to robbery of Rs 20 lakh at gunpoint from an employee of a trading company. As the complainant reached the then ASI Rakesh Kumar and SHO Rajan Parminder, instead of registering an FIR and informing their seniors, they allegedly tried to hush up the matter. On April 30, the Fatehgarh Sahib police informed the Rajpura police that they had arrested Surjit Singh, a dismissed policeman, who had confessed to having robbed a trader of Rs 20 lakh in Rajpura. Patiala IG Paramjit Singh Gill said posting of the SHO-level officers was the decision of the SSP. Patiala DIG LK Yadav, who had ordered the departmental probe, also expressed ignorance on the issue. Patiala SSP Gurpreet Singh Gill could not be contacted for comments. Rajan said he had joined three days ago as SHO Sadar, Rajpura. “My departmental probe is still pending”, he stated.
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HC: No sanction needed to remove corrupt babus
Chandigarh, May 28 It means that they can be proceeded against even without the grant of sanction for their prosecution. The significant judgment, expected to affect nothing less than 90 per cent of the corruption cases against the lower-level staff, came on a petition filed by a patwari in Punjab. He was facing criminal proceedings after being allegedly caught red handed while accepting Rs 2,000 as illegal gratification for carrying out a mutation. For reaching the conclusion, Justice Mehinder Singh Sullar referred to Section 19 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, which deals with “previous sanction necessary for prosecution”. Justice Sullar held that only those public servants of the Central or the state governments are entitled to the umbrella of protection under Article 19 of the Act, who are employed in connection with the affairs of the Union or the State and are removable by the respected governments, and not otherwise. “Meaning thereby, public servants who are liable to be removed by the lower/subordinate authority other than the government indeed are, and would, not at all be entitled to such protection”. Examining the section in depth, Justice Sullar added: “Section 19 (1) (a) of the Act regulates public servants, who are removable by the Central Government; and clause (b) deals with public servants, who are removable by the state government; whereas clause (c) is only applicable to other persons (public servants) employed with the affairs of variety of other financial institutions, banks, corporations and not public servants of the Centre or state governments. Justice Sullar added that the intention of the legislature been to extend the protection of sanction under this Section to all categories of public servants, “it ought to have mentioned that all public servants are entitled to protection of sanction and only this one line would have served the purpose". Referring to the case in hand, Justice Sullar minced no words to say: “Since the petitioner was working as a patwari at the relevant time and place, and was removable by the district collector and not by the state government, no prior sanction was required to prosecute him”. Prior to the judgment so many accused, who could be removed by subordinate authorities, would claim their case fell under clause (c). They would claim that sanction was necessary for their prosecution as well. But, the latest judgment has paved way for their trial. The Punjab and Haryana High Court today issued notice to the State of Punjab and 21 Chief Parliamentary Secretaries on a PIL seeking quashing of their power to go through files and disburse discretionary grants. Acting Chief Justice MM Kumar and Justice Alok Singh issued the notice on a PIL filed by advocate HC Arora. He was seeking the quashing of Rule 6 of the notification dated May 4, 2006, issued under the orders of the Punjab Governor, directing that the Chief Parliamentary Secretaries shall function as intermediary channel between the administrative secretaries and the ministers concerned.
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361 cops facing trial in Punjab, HC told
Chandigarh, May 28 As a PIL filed by Resurgence India on tainted police officials came up for hearing, Punjab AIGP, Welfare and Litigation, MS Chhina submitted an affidavit stating that 55 cases were untraced, 146 cases have been closed on account of cancellation reports, 23 cases were under investigation, FIRs were quashed in 23 other cases and 57 police officials were declared innocent. He added that another 11 have been convicted by the courts, 756 have been acquitted, 184 police officials have been dismissed from service due to conviction, 57 police officials were either dead or retired, two police officials were declared proclaimed offenders (POs) and 24 police officials have been given major punishments. In seven cases, trials have been stayed by courts. Advocate HC Arora, allowed to intervene in the PIL submitted in Haryana also at least 234 police officials were facing criminal cases. In a related case, the High Court took serious view of reinstatement of a head constable convicted for rape. During the hearing of a PIL filed by HC Arora against convicted police officials, the petitioner in-person submitted that Head Constable Angrej Singh, from Patiala, after being convicted for rape in police custody, was removed from service by SSP on May 30 1998. The appeal filed by him against the dismissal order was rejected by DIG Patiala vide order dated March 9 2001. But the IG police of Zonal-I, Punjab, Patiala, has vide order dated May 12, 2011, reinstated Angrej Singh, and directed him to be posted as constable at the starting stage of pay scale. Taking a very serious view of the matter, the Bench issued notice to the State of Punjab, which was accepted by Rita Kohli, Additional Advocate-General, Punjab, for seeking appropriate directions from the government.
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Justice Rajive Bhalla directed both the states and the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) to ensure that adequate signboards were installed along the national highway, indicating to the travellers, among other things, the lanes for buses and cars. Justice Bhalla observed in the open court that the national highway was nearing completion and it was necessary to implement the provisions of the Motor Vehicle Act, including the marking of lanes “so that all vehicles drive in the designated lanes”. The Bench had recently expressed displeasure at the delay in the six-laning of the Panipat-Jalandhar project. It had said that larger public interest was involved in the matter and it should not be delayed. — TNS
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Chandigarh, May 28