Shimla, June 12
Having exhausted all channels of criminal arbitration unsuccessfully to get back the George Cross awarded to her husband Naik Kirpa Ram of the 8th Battalion of the 13th Frontier Force Rifles in 1946, Brahmi Devi, the octogenarian widow of the martyr, is now gearing up to wage a civil battle with the London Metropolitan Police (LMP) finally rejecting her claim.

The latest communication received from the Directorate of Legal Services of the LMP two days ago has virtually dismissed the claim of the widow. While rejecting Brahmi Devi’s claim of being the rightful owner of the medal, the letter clearly states that no criminal liability can be made out against Ashok Nath, as he is the bona fide purchaser, who is in possession of all documents.

London-based Ashok Nath had managed to take the George Cross out of the country and put it up for auction at Dix Noonan Webb in London in December 2009. However, it was due to the efforts of the state CID that the auction, which was to take place on December 2, 2009, was stalled and the precious medal saved from going under the hammer. A case was subsequently registered by the Bilapsur police against Ashok Nath, SL Jain and Kripal Singh of Moga.

The latest letter shot off by the Antiquity Unit of the LMP, both to the Himachal police and Brahmi Devi’s lawyers has literally given a clean chit to Ashok Nath, making the return of the medal to India seem even more difficult than before. “The LMP has recommended that since no criminal proceedings can be made out in the case, the matter can be pursued by Brahmi Devi’s lawyers only in a civil court,” said ID Bhandari, Director-General of Police (CID). The police had tried to get the medal back by approaching the LMP through the Interpol with the assistance of the Ministry of External Affairs.

SS Thakur, a lawyer and distant relative of Brahmi Devi, says he will step up the fight in the civil court. “I am in the process of preparing the reply to the letter from the LMP as Brahmi Devi is its rightful owner and the status of the George Cross being a ‘stolen property’ cannot be changed,” he said.

He said one could not put a price to the medal and, moreover, it was not acquired for personal collection but to make big bucks by putting it up for auction.

The latest letter received from the LMP may have dashed the hopes of getting back the George Cross from London for the police, but Brahmi Devi, who leads a lonely existence at Bhapral village of Ghumarwin in Bilaspur district has still not given up the fight.

Dharamsala, June 12
Rohit (10), who has lost both his arms, is not the only victim of negligence on the part of the Himachal Pradesh State Electricity Board. Data collected by The Tribune reveals that in the Chowari area of Chamba district, low-hanging or damaged electrical wires have claimed the lives and limbs of many other victims also.

From the same area, assistant lineman Mokoru Ram lost both his arms while trying to repair a damaged power line. According to local Congress MLA Kuldeep Singh Pathania, Mokoru Ram now sits at home in a destitute condition. He has not been paid any compensation by the power board for the grave injury caused to him due to the negligence of some other power board official.

Gandhi Ram, another employee of the board, got both legs fractured and is now bed-ridden. Mohinder, another employee, lost his fingers, the MLA alleged.

He alleged that in remote and rural areas of the state, especially in high hills, there were about 100 people who had received grave injuries due to the alleged negligence of the power board.

Pathania alleged that he had taken up the matter in the Himachal Assembly. At present, the state government had no policy to provide compensation to victims of accidents, caused due to the alleged negligence of the HPSEB. The victims had to fight long legal battles in court to seek compensation for the handicap caused to them due to the negligence of power board officials and the government contested their compensation claims to add agony to the pain of the affected people.

Sources told The Tribune that in the Chowari area of Chamba district, 111 electricity poles needed immediate replacement. These poles were highly damaged and posed threat to the life of people living in the surrounding areas. Another 50 poles were required to shorten the span at places where electricity wires were hanging at heights where these could pose a threat to the life of people. The shortening of spans between poles lifted the electricity wires to a height where these were beyond the approach of the people.

Overall in the entire state, 2,000 electricity poles required immediate replacement as per date procured from the HPSEB, Pathania said.

Meanwhile, Vikramaditya, son of Virbhadra Singh, Union Minister for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, today said on the phone that he would urge the Union Government to provide compensation to Rohit, whose entire life had been destroyed due to the tragic incident. The government should come forward to help the poor child, he said.

Shimla, June 12
With banks restricting advances to power distribution companies on the direction of the RBI, the financial crisis plaguing the state electricity board has further aggravated and it is struggling to pay for the power purchased from various generating companies.

The outstanding amount has crossed the Rs 500-crore mark, which includes Rs 250 crore on account of the power made available to it by the state government to meet the winter shortfall. If the board fails to arrange funds, the generating companies may refuse to supply power to it and the ultimate sufferer will be the consumers. How grim the financial has become can be guaged from the fact that the short-term loans of the board alone have crossed the Rs 2,300-crore mark and the long term loans are touching the 2,000-crore mark.

As the board has been using the short-term loans to meet the revenue gap, the State Electricity Regulatory Commission does not allow the interest on such advances in the annual revenue requirement. Thus the board is being denied an amount of over Rs 220 crore annually and the total impact comes to about Rs 240 crore due to additional borrowing.

The exorbitantly high employee cost coupled with the rising power purchase cost are mainly responsible for the increasing revenue gap, which comes to a whopping of Rs 700 crore annually. In fact, the entire revenue from the sale of power comes to around Rs 3,300 crore, just enough to meet the employees’ cost (over Rs 1,000 crore) and the power purchase cost (Rs 2,500 crore). Indiscriminate permissions granted by the government to power-intensive arc furnace-based steel plants has led to a sharp increase in the demand, forcing the board to purchase costly power. The demand has been increasing sharply, from 5,837 million units (MU) in 2008-09 to 6,388 MU in 2009-10, and further to 7,375 MU, an increase of 15.5 per cent, in the following year. The projected figure for 2012-13 is 8,973 MU. The employees’ cost will go up further as and when the arrears of the pay revision are cleared.

The board is making do by holding back about Rs 420 crore collected by it on behalf of the government as electricity duty and Rs 250 crore it owes on account of power supplied to it to meet the winter shortfall. The financial crunch will affect the purchase of power and the board will be forced to impose more power cuts if no solution is found to ease the tight situation.

The move of the Centre to work out a comprehensive bailout package for power distribution companies, which were reeling under heavy debts aggregating over Rs 1.20 lakh crore, has provided some hope for the board. However, it will take some time and the state will also have to share a part of the burden.

Hamirpur, June 12
Fourteen persons were injured today when two groups of villagers clashed over the construction of a link road near Aasla village, about 15 km from Sujanpur, under the Sujanpur police station.

The dispute over the construction of the Aasla-Khaneu-Kangari road was going on for quite sometime as Ramesh Chand, Ratan Chand and Sita Ram of Aasla had obtained a stay from a court as the road was to pass through their private land.

Last night, these persons had blocked the road at Aasla by putting up barricades of bamboos and bushes.

This morning, when school students coming from Chhonti, Saud and Khaneu tried to remove the barricades to cross the road, one of the students was allegedly beaten up by Ratan Chand and other villagers.

On getting this information, Chandu Ram, Prem Singh, Kiran and Anu from Chhonti, Saud and Khanue villages reached Aasla village and tried to remove the barricades put up by Ratan Chand and the others.

Later, a large number of villagers from both sides, carrying sticks, stones and rods, attacked each other, leading to injuries.

Ramesh Chand, Ratan Chand, Sulochana, Sarla Devi, Sarasvati, Daljeet, Pawan, Khayalo Devi, Kamla Devi, Santosh, Virender and Kamal, who were seriously injured, have been admitted to the Community Health Centre, Sujanpur.

Later, the villagers also blocked the road for some time, which was cleared after the intervention of the police and the district administration. Hamirpur SDM Kumud Singh reached the spot to control the situation. The SHO, Sujanpur, said, “The police has registered cross FIRs against both parties.

Palampur, June 12
Despite the specific order of the state high court and subsequently notification from the state government to remove encroachments from highways, the local administration, the PWD and the National Highways Authorities of India (NHAI) were yet to initiate steps in this regard.

Only in a few cases action has been taken. There are over 100 encroachments across the town and 80 per cent are on PWD roads.

The increasing encroachment on government land, particularly on state and national highways, has become a matter of concern.

The state highways like the Dharamsala-Palampur road connecting the town and Pathankot and the Mandi national highway passing through the town are becoming narrower day by day because of encroachments, making it difficult to drive vehicles.

Though the HP Roadside Land Control Act prohibits any construction within five metres of state highways and national highways on both sides, it seems that PWD officials were ignorant about the norms.

In the Ram chowk and other parts of the town, the width of the road had reduced to three metres as number of shops on both sides of the road had come in gross violation of rules in the past few years.

The PWD had served simple notices on encroachers a number of times but no follow up action was taken.

On the Mandi-Pathankot national highway, which is one of the busiest roads of the town, over 50 fruit vendors and vegetable sellers have encroached the road. Fruit vendors have occupied the one fourth portion of the highway and due to this traffic jams are a routine affair here.

Shimla, June 12
The CPM today sought the immediate transfer of Shimla SP Chander Shekhar for his “unethical and ruffian way and behaving like a BJP agent”. Secretary of the Shimla committee of the CPM Vijender Mehra urged the Director-General of Police (DGP) to shift the Shimla SP as he was behaving in a partisan manner and targeting CPM activists. “He should be removed immediately as his continuation could further aggravate the situation,” he urged.

Mehra accused the SP of not carrying out his constitutional responsibilities and behaving as an appendage to the ruling BJP regime. “For the past four days, organisations patronised by the ruling BJP have been creating hooliganism in the city, including damaging public property, but so far no arrests have been made,” he said.

Mehra alleged that when CPM activists wanted to place their viewpoint before the SP, he used force and falsely accused them of manhandling him. “The past four days’ incidents have been reported in the media along with the unbecoming behaviour of the SP in handling the situation,” he said.

Nurpur, June 12
The Zila Banao Sangharsh Samiti, which has been hoding a protest in support of its demand for granting the district status to Nurpur, today organised a public meeting which was attended by people from all four Assembly segments of lower Kangra - Nurpur, Jawali, Fatehpur and Indora.

The samiti, led by its president Mastan Singh, served one month’s ultimatum on the state government to fulfil its demand.

Addressing the gathering, local MLA Rakesh Pathania, who has been spearheading this agitation, announced that the samiti would further intensify the stir if Nurpur was not accorded the district status within one month and he would sit on an indefinite fast.

Later, the samiti, led by Pathania, submitted a memorandum to Chief Minister PK Dhumal through the local SDM.

The samiti launched a special awareness campaign in support of its demand by taking out a procession of around 200 vehicles carrying samiti members through the four Assembly segments of lower Kangra, which got a rousing reception from people.