Haridwar, June 1
As the mercury soaring, fried items shops, fruit salad stalls and juice corners are mushrooming here. Pilgrims throng the city to have a holy bath in the Ganga so it's a boon for open food joint owners. But doctors say most of the food items that is being sold may have serious impact on one's health.

Dr Anil Verma says most of the food items that is sold in open should be consumed within one or two hour otherwise bacteria production begins at a rapid rate.

Though he adds that one should be cautious as many open joints operators refry some food items as due to this procedure foul smell is not easily detected.

Dr Verma adds that due to a large number of flies and insects, one can be prone to various types of diseases.

Taking this into consideration, the district administration has started a special drive on roadside eateries, dhabas and restaurants carrying out raids at these stalls.

A Health Department team is taking samples of food items at railway station, bus stand, Har-ki-Pauri, Upper Road, Shiv Moorti Chowk, Devpura and other places.

Food and Supplies Inspector Yogendra Pandey told TNS that adulterated food items were being destroyed at the moment while samples were being taken of the suspected items.

Mussoorie, June 1
Considered as the most prestigious school of Northern Railways in the hills of Mussoorie, Oak Grove School, celebrated its 124th Founder’s Day with fervour in Mussoorie today.

The chief guest on the occasion, chief personal officer (administration), Northern Railway, Anand Singh Khati, inaugurated the function by hoisting the school flag. NCC cadets and scouts from the school presented a guard of honour in honour of the chief guest here.

The principal of the school, Sandeep Trivedi, read out the annual report in which he highlighted the achievements of the school in the field of academics and sports.

The students from junior, senior boys' and girls' school enthralled the audience with a display of pyramid formation, ballad dance, yoga dance etc on the occasion.

The chief guest distributed citations and awards to the students excelling in academics and sports for the calendar year in the evening. He also inaugurated an art, science and craft exhibition of the school. Shivaji House in boys' section and Mirabai House in girls' section were declared as best houses and presented the prestigious Cock House Trophy by the chief guest.

Alankrita received Manav Sankriti Samman for the most creative girl. Yogita was adjudged as the most sporting girl, and the most enterprising girl's award went to Shruti Sudha. Udhyotna Kumar received the award for the best student of the school. Best all-round student award went to Sachin and Bipin Kumar.

In academics Prashant Kumar, who stood third in the state in class XII board exams for the current year, received the award, citation and cash prize for bringing laurels to the school. Arushi Kathpal from girls' section was also felicated for excelling in class XII board exams. The other students to recive the awards and citations were Mrinal Mandal, Manish Sharma, Aman Pandey, Vishnu Shankar, Vinayak Mandal, Vaibhav Priya, Chinmaya Anand, Ankit Kumar, Shobit Sinha, Myank and Prateek Kumar.

The science exhibition in which the ways to check adulterated milk at home were shown by the students from class IXh Prateek Kumar and Sangam Shekhar was much appreciated by the invited guests. Harsil Pradhan and Mridul Kumar, through their presentation, displayed the medicinal value of spices used in the household through their exhibition.

The renovated computer lab was also inaugurated by the chief guest along with a relief mural titled "Kal, Aaj aur Kal” depicting the 124 years journey of the school that was much appreciated by all present.The new website of the school was also launched on the occasion.

More than 40 old students also were part of the celebrations and were extremely glad with the progress of the school. Supreme Court Advocate Arvind Kumar Sharma, Dr Hanspal, Brijesh Bhutani, PVR Verma, Alok Sharma and Ajit Kumar Asthana said that it was an emotional moment to revisit the school and relive the fond memories of the stay in the school.

Arvind Kumar Sharma said that the old Oakgrovian association was planning a grand reunion on the completion of 125 years of the school in which the ex-students from India and abroad will be invited later in the year.

Speaking on the issue of granting heritage status to the school, Arvind Kumar Sharma said that he was hopeful that the school will figure in the heritage list soon, provided the basic infrastructure of the school is not tampered with.

Later, a cultural programme was organised on the occasion where the students of the boys’ and girls' sections presented various folk dances and plays, much to the delight of the parents and the invited guests.

Dehradun , June 1
Uttarakhand Governor Aziz Qureshi inaugurated the 10th Governor’s Golf Tournament by teeing-off at the Raj Bhavan Golf Course at Nainital today.

Admiring the natural splendour of the Lake City, the Governor said that organising the annual golf tournament would promote tourism in Nainital and in the entire state.Throwing light on the objectives of the tournament, he said that promoting Nainital as a special tourist destination was one of the major goals of the event.

He said that Uttarakhand had a vast potential as far as tourism was concerned but there was a great need to improve the basic amenities for tourists.

The Governor said that keeping in mind the growing popularity of golf at the national and international levels, holding other golf events like Invitation Cup, Gold Cup, Women ‘s Golf Tournament and Amateur Cup could also be considered.

One hundred and thirtyseven golfers entered the tournament this year, out of which 8 are women . Till 10 a.m. today, 60 golfers had entered their names for playing the first 9 holes. Like earlier years, the participants have been divided into two categories - under 18 and above 18. All participants will have to play 18 holes on the first day.

On June 3, the Governor will award the winners. Folk artistes of Uttarakhand will present a cultural programme at Raj Bhavan today to familiarise the participants with the state’s unique culture.

In the inaugural session today, present, along with the participants, were Raj Bhavan Golf Club vice president and Principal Secretary to the Governor, Ashok Pai, Commissioner, Kumoan, Hemlata Dhaundiyal, DIG Deepak Jyoti Ghildiyal, District Magistrate Nidhimani Tripathi and Nainital Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Sadanand Date.

Dehradun, June 1
Mukhya Nagar Adhikari, Dehradun Municipal Corporation (DMC), and Mayor Vinod Chamoli held a meeting with other officials of DMC to discuss the house tax issue. It was decided to fix the new house tax policy in the next board meeting.

It was also decided to incorporate slum colonies in the ambit of house tax and also to decrease the house tax rates as fixed earlier on the demand of Congress councillors.

Dehradun , June 1
Dr RS Tolia, Former Chief Secretary, Government of Uttarakhand, has said the hill states require special focus so as to meet the challenges of environment and to achieve their development aspirations. He stated this at the inaugural address at the CII’s UCOST Environment Summit held here yesterday.

He suggested that industry and science should collaborate to work out a formula for arriving at green bonus, which should be given to hill states in lieu of the environmental services that they offer to the nation.

The annual summit, 4th in the series, was held with the theme ‘Sustainable technologies for inclusive growth’. The daylong deliberations dwelled upon green technologies for manufacturing, green urban infrastructure and panel discussion on green energy.

Addressing the inaugural session, Dr Rajendra Dobhal, Director General, UCOST, emphasised the importance of green buildings and said the upcoming Science Bhawan in the state would be incorporating all features of green buildings, including rainwater harvesting and use of solar energy. He also laid emphasises on the importance of collaboration among science, industry and civil society.

Rakesh Aggarwal, Chairman, CII, Uttarakhand State Council, said the effect of the current resource intensive development process on environment was being felt across the globe. However, its potential to impact ecologically sensitive zones like the state was much higher. Setting the context for the theme of the summit, Aggarwal urged the industry to adopt greener technologies.

Chairing the session on green urban infrastructure, IK Pande, Special Advisor, State Planning Commission, Uttarakhand, emphasised the immediate need for focusing on urban planning. Quoting various reports, Pande said the urban infrastructure in the country today was woefully inadequate. “Only 6 per cent of the towns and cities in the country have sewerage systems. Therefore, huge investments are required in this sector. Given this scenario, elaborating the economic sustainability of green infrastructure becomes important,” he added.

Concluding the inaugural session, Rajiv Berry, former Chairman, CII, Uttarakhand State Council, gave the vote of thanks. The summit was attended by more than 100 delegates from industry, institutions, academia, NGOs and experts in the area of environment and addressed by more than 15 experts.

On the occasion, an exhibition on environmental concerns by Aloke Lal was also organised.

Dehradun, June 1
Members of the ONGC Employees Union laid siege to the office of Regional Labour Commissioner (RLC) MK Prasad here today demanding the reinstatement of the monthly monetary benefit of Rs 840.

Prasad, who had extended the date of hearing on this matter on June 22, advanced it to June 7 on the demand of the union. The members also warned that if their demands were not met till June, 7 then they would lock the office of the ONGC as well as that of the RLC.

Joint Secretary of the union Ramesh Nautiyal said the allowance of Rs 840 was started by the company on its own besides the rest of the wage structure for each employees from May 2008 but stalled it after seven months.

The company then under an agreement consented to give Rs 400 from April 2010 which was again stopped in May this year. He said the employees were now not ready on resumption of allowance of Rs 400 but of original amount Rs 840.

Dehradun, June 1
A group of constables who are among those 300 dismissed for filing application forms from two different places for Uttarakhand constables' recruitment exams for the year 2010-11, held out a procession from Gandhi Park to Clock Tower yesterday, while begging symbolically to passersby to send out a message with regard to their poor financial status after the expulsion.

Praveen Kumar questioned that when 876 candidates out of total 1450 were found guilty for depositing double application forms, then why only 300 of them were dismissed and the rest had been allowed to continue.

He said it was not a new phenomenon to file double forms as the procedure had been followed openly from 2005 onwards. It was only during these exams that the enquiry was set up at the behest of former DGP, JS Pandey, in this respect and selective candidates were expelled.

Sanjiv Kumar said it was unjustified to expel them after they had already completed the training tenure of nine months and five months of joining period, during which they also gave duties during Assembly elections in the state. The candidates, however, saw a new ray of hope in the assurance given by Vijay Bahuguna. Robin Sharma said; "The former CM got us thrashed on our demand for justice. On the contrary, the present CM has assured to look into the matter.."

Dehradun, June 1
The students of Raja Ram Mohan Roy Academy, who scored more than 90 per cent marks in the class X ICSE and class XII ISC board examinations were felicitated at a function held at the school Wednesday.

A total of 12 students of class X and nine students of class XII were honoured on the occasion.

Geeta Nautiyal, District Education Officer, Dehradun, who was the chief guest, honoured the meritorious students.

She congratulated the students on their success and exhorted them to keep working hard to achieve higher goals in their lives.

The school manager, Dr SK Mukherjee, presided over the programme.

Principal of the school Alok Virmani congratulated the students and their teachers for putting in hard work.

He called upon the students and staff members to make further efforts to improve the results next year.

The following students were awarded badges by Nautiyal-

Class X: Lakshya Singh 95 per cent, Vaishali Bansal 93.8 per cent, Parkshal Jain 93.2 per cent, Samiksha Goel 92.8 per cent, Himani Lohani 92 per cent, Nedhi Kumari 91 per cent, Medha Singh 90.8 per cent, Shahida Khatoon 90.6 per cent, Ankit Negi 90.4 per cent, Akakansha Rawat 90 per cent, Saumya Chhetri 92.6 per cent and Sneha Singh 91.2 per cent.

Class XII: Swati Joshi 96.2 per cent, Ayush Sharma 94.5 per cent, Sanjay Rawat 92 per cent, Aanchal Sharma 92 per cent, Shreya Singh 91.5 per cent, Akshay Sharma 91.25 per cent, Ayush Goyal 90.5 per cent, Anchal Bansal 90 and Boney Shikha 94 per cent.

Dehradun, June 1
The Internal Audit Report (2010-2011) of the state tabled during the ongoing budget session of Uttarakhand Assembly has detected financial irregularities to the tune of Rs 46.63 crore while auditing the accounts of Nagar Palika Parishads, Nagar Panchayats, the Krishi Utpadan Mandi Samiti, an engineering college, universities and the Uttarakhand Van Nigam.

In the accounts of the Nagar Palika Parishad of Kichha, irregularities to the tune of Rs 18.31 lakh were detected, Jaspur Rs 5 lakh, Rudrapur 74.32 lakh, Roorkee and Haridwar Rs 12 lakh, Pithoragarh Rs 5.7 lakh, New Tehri Rs 30.82 lakh, Kotdwar Rs 11.69 lakh, Srinagar Rs 15.17 lakh and Pauri Rs 10.13 lakh.

The report says most of the financial irregularities were committed while giving contracts for parking, the appointment of contractual workers, failing to charge sanitation tax, etc by Nagar Palikas and Nagar Panchayats.

KL Polytechnic, Roorkee, failed to disburse Rs 17 lakh as scholarship for members of ST communities without receiving sanction from the Social Welfare Department.

Kumaon University also incurred losses to the tune of Rs 96 lakh as it failed to recover the amount in the sale of group B and C certificate examinations.