Jalandhar, July 4
Rendered invalid due to age and ill health, three abandoned men are receiving treatment in pitiable conditions from an overburdened staff of the Male Medical Ward at the Civil Hospital.

Crying, malnourished, unclothed and one of them tied to his bed by the staff, the patients are receiving half-hearted care at the Civil Hospital even as their families and city NGOs have closed their doors to them.

When The Tribune team visited the hospital today, one of these men was sitting on a bed in the corridor, grabbing his belly and looking for someone to take him to washroom (there was no staff member available to accompany him).

After 10-15 minutes, a do-gooder took him to the washroom sometime later, even as some other patients and a nurse refused to help him.

Another (an HIV positive) patient lay on the hospital floor in the AIDS section of the male ward, lying in his own urine as neighbouring patients winced, with their kerchiefs on their noses.

A third, severely malnourished man, lay on a bed on one of ends of the Male Surgical Ward, tied awkwardly to his bed with strips of bandage. When asked why he was tied, the nurse on duty replied, “He was falling off from the bed, whenever he tried to change sides. So we tied his limbs to keep him from falling.”

While the name of the man in the corridor is Inderjit (79), the identity of the other two is not known, because they were left at the hospital either by the police or some good Samaritan, who didn’t know them.

Inderjit was wearing dirty clothes and the other two lay partly naked.

Inderjit constantly cried and said he had four children - two boys and two girls. He said, “I had been begging before I came here. My daughter left me here. I have been hungry and thirsty for the past 15 days. My son also beat me up.” Patients said no one has been coming to see him.

Talking about the HIV-positive patient, Jaswinder Singh, relative of an AIDS patient in the same ward, said, “We are having severe problems due to him. He is not able to get up to urinate, but the staff haven’t moved him, nor taken him to the bathroom. He has been urinating under the bed. The other patients cannot even breathe.”

As Jaswinder complained to the nurse on duty, he asked her to provide him with gloves.

About 10 minutes later, Jaswinder, along with another patient, moved him to a bed in the corridor since no hospital staff was available to do that. It was only after being shifted outside that he was covered with a sheet.

The third, malnourished man had been dropped at the hospital by the police. Patients said they had been watching him for the last 24 hours and he hadn’t eaten anything.

Save for a cloth that covered half his limbs, he was naked.

As the frail man with a thin belly took troubled breaths, patients said no one from his home had come to attend on him. “The staff checks on him from time to time, but his state looks really bad and regular food is very important for him,” said a patient on a bed near his.

The staff on duty had their own list of complaints - “There is just one staff nurse and two trainee nurses on duty for 35 patients. Can we afford to take patients to the bathroom?”

When asked whether these men were being fed, the nurses said members of NGO Sewa Samiti had been providing them with cereals and fruits.

Suresh Malhotra from the Sewa Samiti, when contacted, said, “It is extremely bothersome that families dump their loved ones in hospitals. What’s worse is that NGOs do not agree to accept such patients. We have talked to both Apahaj Ashram and Pingla Ghar, but they say they can’t take patients who are dependent on someone to move about or urinate.”

Malhotra claimed that the samiti had been feeding them regularly.

Jalandhar, July 4
A textile shop owner has been asked by the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum to refund the amount of a ladies suit to a customer which he had purchased for his sister and later found it to be defective. The forum has asked the owner to repay Rs 1,595 along with Rs 500 as compensation.

A resident of Mithapur Chowk here, Rahul Kumar, said he had purchased an un-stitched ladies suit from Rachna’s, a shop at Jalandhar Textile Market, vide bill No 66563 for Rs 1,595 on March 23, 2011, for his sister as a gift as there had been a family function in the house.

He said, “At the time of the purchase of the un-stitched ladies suit, it was about 6 pm and their was no power in the shop at that time. I purchased the suit under just a little bit of daylight at that time with the assurance of shop owner that the same is good for stitching.”

The complainant said the next day his sister gave the suit to a tailor for stitching and it was found that the suit had holes at many places and it was a defective one and not fit to be stitched. At this, the complainant said, he approached the shop owner, showed him the suit and requested him to replace the same or refund the amount to him, but he did not listen to his requests.

After getting a notice, the shop owner appeared before the court and filed a written reply pleading that the complainant has concocted a false story.

“There was electricity at the shop and there also is also a generator backup. As soon as the electricity goes, the power is turned on with the generator supply. The complainant duly made the choice out of various suits and completely inspected the same by asking the salesman to open the un-stitched suit. He purchased it after completely satisfying himself with the design and quality of the unstitched suit.”

He further pleaded that it is clearly mentioned on the bill that “No claim, no guarantee, no exchange, dry clean only”. At the stage of the evidence of opposite party, none appeared on its behalf and as such it was proceeded against ex-parte.

On the other hand, the complainant tendered an affidavit of one Neha, who has stated that she is doing the work of stitching of ladies clothes. The sister of Rahul Kumar, namely Priyanka, had come to her for the stitching of one ladies suit on March 24, 2011, and she had checked the suit and found the same to be defective one. The suit was perforated from many places and was not in a position to be stitched and as such it was returned to the sister of the complainant.

There was no evidence from the opposite party. Thus, the complaint got accepted.

Jalandhar, July 4
Activists of the Pendu Mazdoor Union (PMU) have rescued 30 members of four families, which were kept as bonded labourers at the Gaddowali brick-kiln. The members had been working for the kiln owners for the past eight months.

Activists of the PMU informed the Lambra police station about the workers being kept as bonded labourers. The police sprung into action after the matter was brought to the notice of the SSP (Rural) by the PMU.

General secretary of the PMU Kashmir Singh Ghugshore alleged that the labourers were kidnapped from the Gaddowali kiln and being taken to Jalalabad. He said in December, 2011, too, these labourers were freed from a Jalalabad-based kiln.

“The Jalalabad kiln owners had brought armed assailants in four vehicles on the night of July 2 (this year) and beat up some labourers,” alleged Ghugshore.

He said the labourers, who were heading to their native state UP that night, were robbed by the assailants. “The labourers were robbed of Rs 1,36,000 that they had earned as wages and the belongings they had loaded on a vehicle to be taken to UP were also taken away by the assailants,” he added.

The labourers today submitted a complaint in this regard to the SSP (Rural).

Stating that someone had also informed the police by calling 100 during the time they were being kidnapped from the Gaddowali kiln, the labourers alleged that the police, however did not take any action in the matter.

The labourers demanded that the owners of both the Jalalabad and Gaddowali kilns be arrested and their stolen money and belongings be returned to them so that they may go back to their native state.

Jalandhar, July 4
Bringing a major relief to computer and IT professionals, a city-based researcher has devised a special software that identifies various wrong sitting postures and the problems arising out of it.

The software titled as ‘Work Posture Assessment of Computer Users using CARULA’ (Computer Aided Rapid Upper Limb Assessment) has been created by Assistant Professor Lakhwinder Pal Singh from the Department of Industrial and Production Engineering of Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute of Technology (NIT), Jalandhar.

Professor Lakhwinder has devised the software keeping in mind the varied problems faced by computer professionals in daily life such as lower back pain, spinal cord problems, tightness, headaches, Computer Vision Syndrome (CVS) and psychosocial pressure.

An amazing blend of technology and human mind, the software captures web images of computer users in sitting posture and then counts the posture of the upper body parts namely- wrist position, upper arm position, lower arm position, neck position and trunk position.

The software works with Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA), which is a method to investigate work-related upper limb disorders. “A coding system is used to create an action list, which indicates the level of intervention required to reduce the risks of injury due to physical loading on the operator. RULA is divided into four exposure classes: negligible, low, medium and high. The medium and high risk actions should be urgently addressed to reduce the level of exposure of risk factors,” said Professor Lakhwinder.

He also said since computer professionals spend more than four hours daily on computers, the chances of lower back pain was high among them. “Almost all problems related to back pain, spinal disorders, tightness and headaches are due to the wrong sitting posture. The software highlights the wrong postures and shows the percentage of wrong posture and its remedies,” he added.

“Almost all such wrong sitting posture problems can only be solved with the help of physiotherapy, yoga and regular exercise sessions. If implemented this software can prove to be a big boon for the computer professionals across the globe,” he said.

Professor Lakhwinder worked on this software along with two of his co-researchers, Amanpreet Singh, an assistant professor from St Soldier Institute of Engineering and Technology, Jalandhar, and Supreet Kaur, a student.

Using this software, the researcher examined ten different sitting postures. Different computer-related postureS and muscle activities between children and adults have not been previously examined, informed the professor.

“The study found that children tend to use more spinal flexion and young children had greater spinal asymmetry while using computers. This might lead to greater risk of musculoskeletal discomfort and disorder,” Professor Lakhwinder added.

Jalandhar, July 4
The All-India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), Delhi, has approved additional 60 seats in MBA course at Apeejay Institute of Management and Technical Campus, Jalandhar.

The AICTE has approved the increase in intake for MBA seats from July onwards. The institute has applied for enhancement of 60 seats in the MBA course, following which the total number of seats has increased to 240 from the existing 180.

Director of the institute, Dr Rajesh Bagga emphasised that the seats were enhanced considering the increasing trend and the preference of students to opt for MBA and MCA courses.

He highlighted that almost all the students passing out of MBA have been bagging placements with leading MNCs and companies across the country. “In the past many years, the students of the institute have been selected by organisations and institutions like ELI Lilly, HDFC Bank, Asian Paints, Infosys, Accenture, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra, Smart Data to name a few,” he said.

Dr Bagga added that the additional seats would help many MBA aspirants to study at the institute. “MBA is emerging as one of the most sought after career option. More and more students would be able to take benefit of the campus’ highly experienced and well-qualified faculty,” he said.