Bathinda, September 8
The integrated municipal solid waste management facility on Mansa Road has been given the final nod. The State Environmental Impact Assessment Authority (SEIAA) gave the green signal making it the first ever project in the state to get the approval.

Confirming this, Municipal Commissioner Uma Shankar Gupta said the approval has been granted. "The company has been directed to complete the plant by August 31 next year," he said.

The integrated plant, located on 20 acres of land, at Mansa road, as well as the engineered sanitary landfill facility, located on 36.8 acres of land, at village Mandi Khurd, too has been given the approval. The plant will be operated for 330 days in a year and will have a life span of 25 years.

The approval has been granted after the Voyants Solutions Pvt. Ltd, the environmental consultant firm of the Municipal Corporation Bathinda, presented its environmental impact assessment report. The consultancy team conducted a study during the months of February, March and April, 2011.

The present structure of the plant would be constructed as per the population projection for the year 2017 and provision has been kept for future expansion.

The integrated project will have components of door-to-door collection of MSW, secondary storage and transportation, processing facility and transportation of rejects or inerts to the landfill facility at Mandi Khurd.

The expected cost of the project is Rs 66.46 crore. It would require 45 KLD of water daily and 600 KW power to run the facility. The Municipal Corporation will install a 250 KVA genset as an alternate arrangement in times of need.

The SEIAA has laid out detailed guidelines to be followed when the plant is under construction and when the plant has been made operational.

Residents of the areas around the plant had been apprehending a heavy volume of traffic on Mansa road as the plant will cover 18 urban bodies including Bathinda. Addressing the concern, the SEIAA has directed that traffic congestion near the entry and exit points from the roads adjoining the proposed project site must be avoided. The Municipal Corporation has been asked to ensure that the parking is fully internalized and no public space is utilized for parking vehicles that visit the facility.

During the construction phase, the Municipal Corporation has been directed to ensure that the construction material like the earth excavated from the site and construction spoils, are handled with care. None of these should find their way outside the plant site and steps should be taken to ascertain that they do not leach or pollute the groundwater because of its serious ramifications on the health of the people.

Bathinda, September 8
Days after a snatcher was nabbed by a crowd that decided to teach him a lesson in full public view, it was the turn of an eve-teaser to face the people's wrath today.

The eve-teaser was beaten up for passing lewd comments and holding the hand of a girl working in a shop today in the evening. The girl retaliated by slapping the youth. The bystanders too joined in and thrashed the eve-teaser injuring him seriously. He was later brought to the police station after the intervention of the Civil Lines police lead by its SHO Gurdev Bhalla.

Bhalla said both the parties reached the police station and a case under section 354 of the IPC would be registered against the youth if the two parties fail to reach a compromise.

The SHO said the incident took place at Bhatti road when the girl was returning home. The youth, the owner of a cement shop, intervened and blocked the path of the girl and started teasing her. Both the boy and the girl are in the age-group of 18 to 22 years.

It may be mentioned that residents had caught hold of two youths who had snatched the gold chain of a woman near Namdev Marg a few days ago.

Bathinda, September 8
Two days after the gangster Gurshaheed Singh Shera was shot dead by the police just outside the residence of ASP City-II Kuldeep Chahal, his uncle has demanded a CBI inquiry or judicial probe into the incident.

Terming the shooting of Shera as murder, his uncle Darshan Singh said his nephew could have been arrested had the police not acted in haste. Admitting to the possibility of his nephew's involvement in crime, Darshan Singh said the police should have arrested his nephew and lodged him in jail instead.

Police killed the 25-year-old Shera in the busy Kamla Nehru Colony and a white Toyota Fortuner Car and a pistol worth Rs 9 lakhs was recovered by the police and a girl sitting in the car was arrested by the police. Police had declared Shera a wanted criminal in numerous cases of robberies, carjacking, murder and kidnapping registered in Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Chandigarh. Darshan said Shera's body bore a bullet injury in his stomach. He said the last time that he met Shera was around six months ago. — TNS

Bathinda, September 8
A seriously injured man with his hands tied was found floating in water channel near Sangat Mandi and was rescued by the volunteers of the NGO, Sangat Sahara. The injured was taken to the Community Health Centre (CHC) at Sangat where the volunteers of the NGO accused the doctors of not attending to the patient. Consequently, he was shifted to the Bathinda Civil Hospital.

The man, 27-year-old Jatinder Singh of Ruldu Singh Wali Bangi, was thrown into the water channel after being seriously injured. Jatinder was working near Bikaner in Rajasthan and a woman called him to Bathinda where his cash and other belongings were looted near Fauji Chowk.

A volunteer of the NGO Sangat Sahara, Pali Mashana, said despite his chopped fingers and grievous head injuries, Jatinder managed to come out of the water channel and reached a nearby dhaba. The workers at the dhaba informed the NGO and the man was taken to the healthcare centre.

"The attitude in dealing with such a serious case was not right. There was hardly any doctor available at the Community Health Centre at Sangat. The staff at the hospital asked us to take the unidentified patient to the Bathinda Civil Hospital," said Pali. He said it took them a while to brief the doctors at the Bathinda Civil Hospital after which the patient was admitted.

"The authorities demanded the referral card from the Sangat CHC as the man was found injured in Sangat," Pali said.

He alleged that the medical services becomes out of reach for the people at night as the doctors deployed at the Sangat CHC reside in Bathinda.

Dr Seema, who has the additional charge of Senior Medical Officer (SMO) at the CHC, Sangat, while refuting the allegations, said all the doctors deployed at the CHC reach the hospital within 10 to 20 minutes. "

Since the admission rate of patients is less than five a day in the 30-bed hospital, the doctors do not stay at the hospital. However, the staff has been deployed there for assistance round-the-clock," Dr Seema said.

She said the man admitted with the serious injuries had to be shifted to the Bathinda Civil Hospital even otherwise. "He was given first aid and only then was he shifted to Bathinda," the doctor said.

Head constable Hoshiar Singh at the Sangat police station said since the crime took place under the Civil Lines police station, the case has been handed over to them for investigations.

Bathinda, September 8
The Health Department has exempted medical specialists from performing VIP duties and emergency duties. In a communiqué issued to all civil surgeons, the Director, Health and Family Welfare, has stated that gynaecologists, paediatricians, radiologists and anaesthetista working at the district and sub-division hospitals should be exempted.

These doctors should be deputed on VIP duties only when required. Also, these doctors would be appointed on emergency duties only when doctors from other specialities are not present.

Bathinda, September 8
The office of Director General of School Education (DGSE) Kahan Singh Pannu has warned people against falling victim to two companies using names that sound as the Sarv Shiksha Abhiyaan (SSA) and the Rashtriya Madhyamik Shiksha Abhiyaan (RMSA) and misleading people.

The two companies, namely the Rashtriya Sarv Shiksha Abhiyaan (RSSA) with office address of Phase-V Mohali and the Sarv Saksharta Computer Education Abhiyaan (SSCEA) with its office at Sector 14 in Panchkula, are projecting themselves as government-run agencies.

Since the names of these organisations resemble the two national schemes, people get carried away and join them thinking that these were government organisations.

Earlier, the DGSE office had issued similar warnings on August 11, 2010, and June 19, 2011, specifying that these companies do not have any government component or support.

These organisations are promising jobs and education to people.

It has been categorically mentioned that anyone dealing with these two organisations will do so on his or her own risk and that the government will not be responsible for the same.

A visit to the website of the RSSA revealed that it is an NGO with its head office located on the Bakhtawarpur - Burari Road, Hiranki, Delhi.

The NGO claims to be dealing mainly in computer education.

At the same time, the SSCEA had recently advertised a number of posts in Punjab for its various centres. An ISO certified company, the SSCEA claims to offer computer courses, short-term courses, vocational courses and English speaking courses.

Bathinda, September 8
Continuing its tirade against people involved in constructing unapproved colonies in Bathinda, the BDA (Bathinda Development Authority) today got two more cases registered at the Rama police station.

The police has booked Anand Kumar, Kewal Krishan and Harnek Singh of Rama and Tarsem Chand and Ved Parkash in two separate cases under Sections 36 of the Punjab Apartment of Property Act.

No arrests have been made so far.