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Snow disrupts life in Kullu valley
BJP to make five new organisational districts |
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State pins hope on Centre for special financial package
State to start cage culture in reservoirs to boost fish production
Child injured by leopard dies at PGI
Night bus travel gets costly
Power supply restored in Kasauli
Super-speciality services at Vivekananda Medical College soon: Speaker
Sukhwinder to constitute sub-panel
Govt efforts on industrial package hailed
HP to re-open 149 schools closed by Dhumal
govt: MLA
IOC opens cooking gas agency in Nurpur village
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Snow disrupts life in Kullu valley
Manali, February 6 Life remained affected in the entire upper Manali areas as power remained disrupted for the third consecutive day. Vehicular traffic, power and telephones were also disrupted in various parts of the upper Kullu valley. Local buses also remained suspended on the Manali-Naggar road. Himachal Pradesh Transport Corporation sources said all long route and local buses suspended their journey near Patlikulh on the Manali-Kullu national highway today. Only light vehicles were plying on the roads. The entire higher reaches in the Kullu valley, including the 13,050-ft-high Rohtang Pass, also received heavy snowfall. Shimla has highest precipitation
Shimla: The city recorded 76mm of precipitation over the past 24 hours, which is a record for the month of February. According to the local Met office, the previous highest precipitation of 63.5 mm in Shimla in a single day was recorded on February 2 in 1908. The total precipitation in the state from February 4 to 6 has been 91.1mm, which is 951 per cent more than the normal. All the districts received an excess precipitation with Sirmaur receiving the highest rainfall of 136.4 mm, 1,998 per cent more than the normal precipitation, followed by Shimla (104.6mm, 1,703 per cent), Solan (116mm, 1,511 per cent), Kullu (124mm, 1436 per cent), Kinnaur (113.5mm, 887 per cent) and Chamba (105.2mm, 616 per cent). The lowest precipitation of 27.4 mm was recorded in Una district, which is 552 per cent more than
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BJP to make five new organisational districts
Kasauli, February 6 Addressing mediapersons here today after conclusion of a two-day “chintan baithak”, state president of the BJP Satpal Satti said the extended core committee had decided in principle to chalk out five new districts. According to the outline drawn for carving out new organisational districts, Mandi would be bifurcated into Mandi and Sundernagar districts, Kangra into Palampur, Nurpur, Dehra and Kangra and Shimla into Shimla and Mahasu organisational districts. Apart from this, the Mandi Parliamentary by-election is the key focus of the party now and its candidate is likely to be announced soon. While terming lack of coordination among various levels like booth, mandals, district, etc, as a major cause of loss in the Vidhan Sabha poll, he said efforts would be made to strengthen the organisation and training camps would be held to overcome new challenges. The BJP president, while attacking the Congress government for ‘dumping’ 3.5 lakh jute bags bearing pictures of BJP leaders and instead replacing them with new bags bearing pictures of Congress leaders for distributing rations, said this was a wastage of public funds as Rs 45 lakh had been incurred on them. He also criticised the Congress for changing the name of ‘108 Atal Swasthya Yojna’ and said a Prime Minister represented the entire nation and his name should be beyond party politics. He criticised the decision of the Congress to stop work on a sabzi mandi at Prala in Shimla district which had been inaugurated by former Chief Minister PK Dhumal and said such decisions were ‘politically motivated’ and served ‘no public cause’. Senior leaders, including national vice-president Shanta Kumar, national general secretary JP Nadda, state in charge Kalraj Mishra and co-in charge Shyam Jaju were conspicuous by their absence. Satti, however, attributed their absence to their official engagements elsewhere and said Virender Kashyap, MP, Shimla, who is also the All-India general secretary of the SC ST Cell, and Anurag Thakur, who is the national president of the Bhartiya Janta Yuva Morcha, were among the national leaders who marked their presence at the meeting. Those who were present at the meeting included former Chief Minster PK Dhumal, state general secretary Dr Rajiv Bindal, MP Virender Kashyap, MLA and former MLAs Randhir Sharma, Dr Rajiv Sehzal, Suresh Bhardwaj, Suresh Chandel, Kripal Parmar, Sukh Ram and Chander Mohan.
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State pins hope on Centre for special financial package
Shimla, February 6 However, managing empty coffers, which it has inherited from the previous BJP regime, is a huge challenge for the Congress government and with a little scope for resource mobilisation, it is looking towards the Centre for liberal financial assistance. It has adopted a multi-pronged approach and knocking at several doors to secure an enhanced Central funding. Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh has already met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Power Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia and Railway Minister Pawan Bansal to pursue the cause of the state for a financial assistance. Besides seeking a special financial package of Rs 7,565 crore to undo the impact of ‘faulty’ recommendations of the 13th Finance Commission, it is seeking an immediate settlement of the BBMB arrears of Rs 4,259.50 crore in accordance with the Supreme Court verdict and uniform funding under Central schemes in the ratio 10:90 for special category states. At present, the state has to contribute anything from 10 to 50 per cent under various schemes and if the Centre agrees to the uniform funding pattern, the state will have to contribute about Rs 150 crore less annually. The government is hopeful of an early settlement of BBMB arrears as Union Power Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia has assured that the matter would be expedited and the committee set up for working out the arrears would be asked to complete the job within 10 days. Once the final amount is worked out, the matter will be put up before the apex court for passing a decree. If the issue is settled over the next few months, it will give a big respite to the fund-starved state. The state maintains that the 13th Finance Commission has under assessed the committed liabilities of the state on account of salaries, pension and interest liability as a result of which the uncovered gap was increasing progressively. It swelled to Rs 3,522 crore in 2012-13 and further increased to Rs 4,043 crore during 2013-14. It was the main reason for the financial crisis and the Centre must grant a package of Rs 7,565 crore to bail out the state. In the absence of a requisite financial support from the Centre, the present government will be in dire straits as the wage bill will swell by about Rs 900 crore next year due to benefits announced by the outgoing regime on the poll eve. With committed liabilities accounting for almost 89 per cent of the budget, hardly any funds are available for development. With general election due in 2014, it has to secure the maximum funds. |
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State to start cage culture in reservoirs to boost fish production
Shimla, February 6 Stating this while speaking at the national seminar on fisheries development in New Delhi today, Forest and Fisheries Minister Thakur Singh Bharmauri said initially the scheme would be introduced in one of the water bodies on pilot basis and later extended to other reservoirs. He said to increase fish production, the Central Fisheries Technical Institute, Cochin, would also be involved for research to successfully implement the scheme. Hatcheries, fingerling nurseries, rearing areas and feed mills would be developed in the state through the integrated aqua-culture development approach, besides creating the required infrastructure for marketing. Bharmauri said fish production in the Gobind Sagar reservoir was 90 kg per hectare, which was 33 per cent more than the national average. He said a record 909.35 tonne fish was produced from the reservoir till January 15, 2013, which was 471.54 tonne more than the previous year. He said new units would be set up in public and private sectors alongwith feed mills to implement the cold chain scheme to boost production of trout fish. He urged the Centre to provide Rs 4 crore under the 12th Five-Year Plan for the implementation of the scheme. He also sought Rs 5 crore for the development infrastructure for fish production in reservoirs and Rs 13.36 crore under the National Agriculture Development for 370 trout units. He said as many as 4,000 families were earning their livelihood from fisheries. |
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Child injured by leopard dies at PGI
Bilaspur, February 6 Shagun was taken away by the leopard and found abandoned some distance away in a very critical condition. She was rushed to the Regional Hospital and then to the PGI where she remained admitted for six weeks. She was released by doctors after they said “the lower part down to her neck was totally crippled as the carnivore had severely damaged some very sensitive nerves of her little tender neck”. Her father Suresh Kumar said she seemed to be “recovering” at home, but when she fainted she had to be again taken to the PGI where she died after four days. This was the fourth child killed till now by leopards during the last four months. Two leopards had been declared man-eaters and killed by sharp shooters and local hunters, while the third “man-eater” leopard still had not been found. Suresh is totally heart-broken. He says he has been paid Rs 25,000 by the local Forest Officer, but nobody from the department ever bothered for his daughter. Thereafter, he spent more than Rs 2 lakh on her treatment after taking loans from relatives and friends. Meanwhile, Chief Parliamentary Secretary (Forests) Rajesh Dharmani said everything possible would be done for the bereaved family. |
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Night bus travel gets costly
Hamirpur, February 6 The state government has reintroduced night charges in HRTC buses. Passengers travelling between 8 pm and 6 am will have to shell out Rs 20 extra for the journey. The night charges, which were withdrawn by the state government about a decade ago, have again been levied making travelling costlier. The levying of night charges will put the HRTC buses at a disadvantage in comparison to other roadways buses as none of them is charging night charges. However, passengers undertaking journey for less than 50 km during night time will not be charged this extra money. Onkar Sharma, Managing Director, HRTC, said Rs 20 would be charged as night charges in HRTC buses with immediate effect and the money collected from the night charges would be spent for the welfare of drivers and conductors deployed in night buses. |
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Power supply restored in Kasauli
Solan, February 6 Executive Engineer JS Rana said various reasons led to the breakdown of the lines which included the uprooting of trees on the National Highway No-22 and Mandodhar on the Dharampur-Kasauli road. Power could not be restored till late last evening and it was by this morning that the supply was restored. Kasauli, Garkhal, Dagshai, Dharampur and its surrounding areas had remained without power. The disruption of power with the onset of a windy weather has become a routine phenomenon in the Kasauli area. Not only have incidents of trees uprooted become a common occurrence, but power cuts extending for hours have also become the bane of this area. A major reason attributed to the uprooting of trees is the reckless construction going on at every nook and corner of Kasauli. With little support, these trees get uprooted whenever winds strike. The maintenance of electricity lines is therefore becoming a daily headache for HP State Electricity Board Ltd employees. |
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Super-speciality services at Vivekananda Medical College soon: Speaker
Palampur, February 6 He said since this was an institution being set up by a private trust, the government had no say in the matter. However, he would personally request the executing agency, Jay Pee Group, to fulfill its commitment made to people of the state. He regretted that despite public pressure, the BJP government had initiated no efforts for the completion of the VMRT in the past five years. The state government as well as the trustees had failed to persuade Jay Pee to fulfil its commitment made to residents of this region. Meanwhile, several social bodies of the Palampur region urged the Himachal Pradesh Government to take over the VMRT which was under construction since 1991. These bodies told Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh that in the past 20 years, the trust had been reconstituted several times, but to no avail. Over Rs 20 crore donated by residents of the area were of no use as the health institution had not become functional till date. They also demanded probe into the transfer of the trust property to Jay Pee. |
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Sukhwinder to constitute sub-panel
Shimla, February 6 He said he would soon visit districts to review the functioning of the organisation right down to the block level and take action to activate inactive units. In case the units still failed to perform, stringent action would be taken, he said, adding that the block presidents would be responsible for implementing directions of the PCC. He told all the ministers, chief parliamentary secretaries and chairpersons of boards and corporations to send intimation to the party unit whenever they go on tour so that party workers could attend their programmes and also interact with them. |
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Govt efforts on industrial package hailed
Solan, February 6 In a press note here today, general secretary of the association YS Guleria said the efforts made by Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh and Industry Minister Mukesh Agnihotri would go a long way in helping industry by way of upgrading the infrastructure and liberal support from Central schemes. The proposals worth Rs 1,500 crore include projects for improvement of roads in industrial areas and strengthening of power distribution network. Efforts to enhance Central investment subsidy from the present limit of Rs 30 lakh to Rs 75 lakh would give a major boost to the industry, the association said.
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HP to re-open 149 schools closed by Dhumal govt: MLA
Nurpur, February 6 Bharti, who is CPS with the Education Department, was presiding over the annual prize distribution functions at Government Senior Secondary School, Bharmar, yesterday and Government High School, Tallian, in Jawali subdivision today. He announced the allocation of funds for the construction of a science block and an additional school building of three rooms each at Bharmar and Tallian schools. |
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IOC opens cooking gas agency in Nurpur village
Nurpur, February 6 While opening the new agency at Baduee, near here, Area Manager, IOC, Dharamsala, Sunil Thakur said the IOC had planned to open 15 gas agencies in rural areas of Kangra district during 2010-2014. While opening the gas agency, he delivered the first gas connection to Ram Lal of the village. |
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