Chakrata Road shopkeepers promised more land
Dehradun August 13
Vice-chairman of the Mussoorie Dehradun Development Authority (MDDA) RM Sundaram at a meeting held here today assured shopkeepers of Chakrata Road that they would be allotted extra land. The shopkeepers had been complaining of receiving less land in lieu of portions of their shops which were demolished during the widening of the road.

Haridwar, August 13
With the arrest of yog guru Swami Ramdev in New Delhi, while marching towards Parliament today, local people and Bharat Swabhiman Trust and Patanjali Yog Peeth activists, expecting his return to his hometown, have planned a grand welcome for the flag-bearer of the movement against black money.

In view of this development, the district administration has geared itself up to handle the situation in the wake of the arrival of Swami Ramdev’s troupe in Patanjali Yogpeeth ashram. District Magistrate Sachin Kurwe said that the administration was following the developments and would take steps to ensure that law and order was not disturbed.

Hectic activity was witnessed today at the twin Patanjali Yogpeeth ashrams. Employees at units of Patanjali Yogpeeth, Divya Pharmacy, Patanjali Food Park and Yog Gram were quite excited to see the overwhelming response to Ramdev’s anti-black money/corruption agitation at Ramlila Maidan in the national Capital.

The city witnessed many demonstrations in the past few days with students and women coming out in open support of Ramdev’s movement.

Patanjali Yogpeeth insiders, on the condition of anonymity, informed TNS that they were in constant touch with Bharat Swabhiman Trust executive members, who had been managing and chalking out strategies of the agitation at Ramlila ground for the past five days.

In June last year Swami Ramdev had to escape in women's attire from Ramlila ground following Delhi police crackdown. This time, as Ramdev has the upper hand, his supporters want to give him a grand welcome to erase the bitter memories of last year.

Meanwhile, in view of Swami Ramdev calling on all major political party leaders, including Bharatiya Janata Party’s national chief Nitin Gadkari, at the Ramlila ground dais, the Congress district unit has decided to oppose Swami Ramdev’s entry into Haridwar.

The Congress district unit also condemned Swami Ramdev’s step of giving his "so-called non-political movement a saffron touch."

Veteran Congress leader and former State Women Commission chairperson Santosh Chauhan termed Gadkari’s coming up with Ramdev as unveiling of a political mask that the yog guru has been donning since last year’s agitation.

Coming heavily on the anti-black money agitation, Chauhan first demanded that Ramdev should come out clean from cases levelled against him of amassing assets disproportionate to his known sources of income.

“Ramdev has not revealed much about the multi-billion rupee industrial empire that he has set up in just less than two decades. Even his close aide Acharya Balkrishan, who is Managing Director of Patanjali Trust, is in prison for forging documents to obtain a passport. So how come he is seeking bringing back black money from foreign shores, while he is hiding his own sources of wealth," said Chauhan.

The BJP, on the other hand, termed Ramdev as a crusader against corruption and black money, who, after making yoga popular worldwide, is now trying to clean the corrupt system of the country.

District BJP unit chief Sushil Chauhan remarked that Swami Ramdev had given a boost to the anti- corruption drive which was started by Anna Hazare.

"We are not trying to take any political mileage from Ramdev’s movement. It is the cause for which we are extending support. Ramdev is raising the voice of people who are perturbed with corruption and

there is weight in his statement that if black money is declared a national asset, there will be no poor people, and India will automatically become a developed nation," said Chauhan, while holding a meeting of party workers over the ongoing developments at the party office.

Dehradun August 13
Vice-chairman of the Mussoorie Dehradun Development Authority (MDDA) RM Sundaram at a meeting held here today assured shopkeepers of Chakrata Road that they would be allotted extra land. The shopkeepers had been complaining of receiving less land in lieu of portions of their shops which were demolished during the widening of the road.

Sundaram said the portions of shops or houses, which were demolished to widen Chakrata Road, would be compared with the land allotted to the shopkeepers at the new shopping complex, near Clock Tower, and flats near the ISBT. In case it was found that they had been allotted less land, they would be given more land.

The MDDA has begun the exercise and is receiving documents from the shopkeepers with regard to the demolished portions of their shops. It is planning to give a few surplus shops at the new shopping complex to those whose claims have been found to be justified.

It is presumed that one shop will be given to three or four shopkeepers and one party can buy the rest of the land from others.

With regard to construction of a six-storey shopping complex on both sides of Chakrata Road on the public-private-partnership mode, Sundaram said the shopkeepers would be called to attend three sessions with consultants of the project to understand the entire concept.

Meanwhile, the traders are confused about the project. While some of them are keen on the project, others are opposing it.

They blame MDDA officials for keeping them in the dark about the project.

Mussoorie, August 13
The India Independence Day events celebrations began at Woodstock School, Mussoorie, with scintillating inaugural performance by kathak maestro Shovana Narayan. She enthralled the audience with her graceful movements, intricate footwork and nimble movements of arms today.

Shovana Narayan, an exponent of traditional kathak, was accompanied by Shakeel Ahmed Khan on the sitar and Madho Prasad on the tabla, while Vijay Sharma was the vocalist. The dancer captivated the audience with her fluid steps, which captured the imagination of young members of the audience.

She also interacted with the young students from around 25 countries enrolled in the school and satisfied them with her prompt answers.

The jugalbandi between the tabla player and her footwork was much appreciated by the audience. Her display of Krishna Raaslila, depicted with finesse and aplomb, left the audience spellbound.

Shovana, in her career spanning several decades, has been conferred with numerous awards, outstanding among which are the Padma shree Award for excellence and outstanding contribution to dance by the President of India in 1992, and yet again the Sangeet Natak Akademi award by the President of India in 1999-2000.

Some of the other awards won by her include Delhi government's Parishad Samman, Rajiv Gandhi Puraskar, Bihar Gaurav Puraskar, Indira Priyadarshini Samman, Kelvinator's GR 8 Award, Rotary International Award and Japan's Oisca Award.

Shovana is a guru of standing whose disciples are adorning the world of classical dance. She has also worked in collaboration with nationally and internationally-known Indian and western dancers and musicians. Shovana has also taken part in films and operas as well as research works on the development of dance in general and kathak in particular. Among the films is 'Dance of the Temples' based on Khajuraho.

According to Woodstock festival committee members, other programmes scheduled under the Independence are puppet show in Parker Hall by Dadi Pudumjee for all students in junior school and Woodstock staff members on August 14. The celebrations will end with a flag raising ceremony and an item on Indian food court on August 15. Spicmacay has provided the logistic support to the events being organised here.

Dehradun, August 13
Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna and his wife Sudha Bahuguna yesterday called upon Governor Aziz Qureshi at Raj Bhawan here. They inquired about Governor's health, who had undergone a knee operation few days ago.

The Governor was also briefed about the state government’s efforts in meeting the natural disaster at Uttarkashi.

Dehradun, August 13
The willingness of the USAID, New Delhi, to collaborate with the Indian Council of Forestry Research and Education (ICFRE) on climate change and biodiversity has come as a major success for the ICFRE.

A delegation of the USAID, New Delhi, after a recent visit to the ICFRE, has shown interest in discussing a collaborative programme with the council on forest, climate change and biodiversity.

Vegeesh Paul of the USAID said, “We have developed a forest plus programme for India where main thrust will be to strengthen India's capacity in reducing emissions and in the areas of silviculture management, carbon sequestration, multiple value of forest ecosystems, strengthening forest carbon ecosystem and involvement of communities in these programmes.”

Director General, ICFRE, Dr VK Bahuguna, said the ICFRE had developed an All-India Coordinated Programme of Climate Change which was directly linking with the masses. He said the ICFRE had initiated reducing emissions from the Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries (REDD) plus project in the state with the financial support from the Uttarakhand Forest Department and further planning to start the REDD plus projects in Gujarat and Sikkim.

Bahuguna said collaboration with the USAID would be of mutual interest and would benefit both the organisations.

Pithoragarh, August 13
The death of two leopards has came to light in the Kumaon region. Forest officials have attributed it to their struggle for prey.“Villagers of Siyu village of Kandarakhua Patti of Ranikhet subdivision of Almora district informed me about a dead leopard. As we reached the spot, we found wounds on the body of the animal which reflects its fight with another animal for a prey as a dead cow was lying nearby,” said Diwani Ram, range officer of the Almora forest division.

“The two-year-old leopard was later creamed after post-mortem by veterinary surgeon Dr RP Singh of Dwarahat veterinary hospital," said the range officer

In another incident, which took place a few days ago, a male leopard was found dead in Kilpara village of Kapkot subdivision of Bageswar district when it fell into a deep gorge in a bid to escape after a group of villagers reportedly chased the animal as it had attacked a woman.

“According to the post-mortem report, the death of the animal took place due to head injuries," said RC Sharma, DFO of Bageswar forest division.

According to the range officer of Kapkot, the leopard was later burnt after the post-mortem.