Chandigarh, March 1
“As you read you will become more & more familiar With words and setence patterns you already know understanding them better and better as you meet them in more & more contexts, some of which may differ only slightly from others.”

Shockingly, the above mentioned passage, which is a part of one of the reading comprehensions in this year’s Class XI English question paper of the UT Education Department, is enough to give jitters to lovers of the Queen’s English.

Still, if you consider giving the benefit of doubt to the Chandigarh Education Department, then sample another: “We cannot learn to speak a language better with The help of book to believe this to believe that the spoken language and the written language are quite different things”.

In the exam held yesterday, several sentences did not make any sense. The full stops, commas, and question marks were either missing or had been inserted in the wrong places, thereby, changing the meaning of the whole sentence.

Many ordinary words were also misspelt. Words like ‘ditcionary’ (dictionary), passge (passage), sentance (sentence), betwene (between), vorabulary (vocabulary), hte (the), agressive (aggressive), sysmptoms (symptoms), survivial (survival), chemothrpahy (chemotherapy), detertion (desertion) have flawed almost each page of the question paper.

Nearly 50 mistakes, with approximately 10 on each page, were found on scanning the question paper. “There is no justification for such serious blunders in the question paper of the final exam,” said a government teacher, adding there was total chaos for three hours as students were frequently disturbing the class with their queries during the exam yesterday.

“It has probably happened for the first time that there are so many grammatical and factual errors in the English paper, said a school head, adding there was a passage in the question paper on how one could improve the usage of English and here the students were provided with a question paper, loaded with silly mistakes.

Errors are plenty. For instance, in the first passage, a line “Chemothrpahy in breast cancer has undergone a Sea change” is full of mistakes. Another line of the same passage, “This result in most patients turning up at the hospitals only when at stage 2 and beyond” is unclear.

Another line, “In learning the pattern and vorabulary of the written form we are learning to a considerable extent those of spoken from too” does not make any sense.

The question 3 of Section B starts with a phrase, “Due to severe fog and extreme Sold”.

Even a simple line like, “It is considering cenorship of all the cigarette Smoking Scenes in Indian cinemas” is full of mistakes.

A student requesting anonymity said that she was baffled and so were her classmates, while attempting the question paper. A lot of time was wasted in understanding the paper. “What does the Education Department expect from the students when the teachers themselves have such a non-serious approach towards their work, she said.

The annual exams of classes VIII, IX, XI started last week in government schools here. Sources said that the whole exercise of setting up of the question papers was done in a haste.

“Earlier, the department was planning to ask schools to set their own question papers for different classes, but at the last moment, it decided to follow the centralised pattern of setting and distributing papers. The whole exercise was a waste and the result is now in front of everyone,” said a senior official of the department. 

Chandigarh, March 1
“The grant of green card membership to 150 persons was in violation of the bylaws of the Chandigarh Golf Club……It has come on record that some persons, who were above the age of 21 and not even playing golf regularly were given green card membership.” These were the observations made by SS Sahni, Additional District and Sessions Judge, while dismissing the appeal filed by the Chandigarh Golf Club over the green card membership issue. Though the order was passed on February 14, the detailed order was made available only today.

Chandigarh, March 1
The Punjab government has sent the panel of three IAS officers for the post of Managing Director of the Chandigarh Industrial and Tourism Corporation (CITCO). This is the third panel of officers sent by the Punjab government.

The state government canceled the first panel, while the second panel was rejected by the Union Ministry of Home Affairs. The latest panel includes Kumar Rahul, a 2000-batch IAS officer, Daleep Kumar, a 1995-batch IAS officer, and Kavita Mohan Singh, a 2004-batch IAS officer.

The panel, which was rejected by the MHA was consisting of Bhupinder Singh Nanda, Balvinder Singh Multani and Arunjeet Singh Miglani. Sources said the UT Administration had recommended Miglani’s name for the post. After the rejected, the administration had sought a fresh panel from the Punjab government.

In August 2011, six months before the expiry of the term of the present CITCO MD, DK Tiwari, the Punjab Government had sent a panel of three officers: AK Sinha, SK Sharma and MR Aggarwal. Later, however, the state government cancelled the panel and sent a fresh one.

Chandigarh, March 1
Dev Samaj College for Women, Sector 45, Chandigarh, organised a one-day national seminar on "Challenges to inclusive growth: The way forward".

The seminar was sponsored by ICSSR-NWRC, Chandigarh, and organised by business administration department of the college.

Dr Meera Modi, principal of the college, welcomed all the delegates and dignitaries from various parts of the country. She emphasised on the need for inclusive growth for sustainable development of our country.

Dr AK Vashisht (chairman of the UBS, Punjab University, Chandigarh) was the keynote speaker during the inaugural session.He apprised the audience with the dire need of inclusive growth in all spheres- education, health, employment and ecology. He condemned child labour and stressed that it was major hindrance for inclusive growth.

He emphasised on the need of primary education and quality education. "Education is the panacea for all evils. Consistent health services at the grass root level and development of human resources is needed for the future development of India," he said.

Chandigarh, March 1
KK Sharma, Advisor to Administrator, today gave away census medals and commendation certificates to census functionaries at an award ceremony organised by the Census Operations, Chandigarh (UT), at CRRID.

The awards are given in recognition to the outstanding work done by the Census functionaries in Census-2011.

TN Bindhyeswari, Director of Census Operations, said the grand success of the Census operation in Chandigarh is a result of the untiring efforts put in by a dedicated team of as many as 3,000 Census functionaries and the constant support extended by the Chandigarh Administration and the Registrar General of India.

She congratulated the entire Census team for completing the field work within the give time frame. Bindhyeswari thanked the residents of Chandigarh for their cooperation.

She said Indian Census has a rich tradition since 1972. Census 2011 was the 15th in the unbroken series and the 7th after the independence.

"Census is one of the biggest and most complex administrative exercises in the world. It is a comprehensive source of data on the socio-economic and democratic characteristic for planning welfare schemes and electoral process," she said.—TNS

Chandigarh, March 1
A record 1.40 lakh Indians, including students and visitors, were issued visas to Canada. Among the beneficiaries, 1.30 lakh were visitors and 13,000 students. Never before have so many Canadian visas been granted in a year.

Canadian Minister of State for Small Business and Tourism Maxime Bernier said this trend was a result of the increasingly close relationship the two countries enjoyed.

It is a 58 per cent increase in the number of visas granted and a 530 per cent increase in the number of student permits issued since 2004, which reaffirms the fact that Canada continues to be a destination of choice for Indian travellers and students. It seems to be a part of Conservative government’s strategy to win over the strong Indo-Canadian community on its side. This is also highlighted by the fact that several Canadian ministers and delegations have been visiting India of late.

Maxime Bernier is currently on a tourism mission to India. “Many Indians visit Canada. Our government is working with the industry to capitalise on this growth and welcome even more Indian travellers. We want to create jobs in Canada while strengthening our relationship with our Indian visitors,” the minister said.

The Indian middle class represents one of the fastest-growing outbound travel markets in the world. Additionally, significant improvements to the Canada-India bilateral air transport agreement were made in June 2011 and July 2012, specifically in terms of the number of flights permitted, access to additional cities and greater pricing flexibility for airlines. “Attracting an increasing number of visitors to Canada, including the best and brightest young minds, is part of our plan to grow the economy and create jobs,” said Minister for Citizenship and Immigration Jason Kenney.

“We strive to issue visas and permits as quickly as possible to facilitate travel for visitors and students and to benefit from the economic spin-off they bring to Canada,” Kenney said. In November 2012, Prime Minister Harper announced plans to open a new consulate in Bangalore.

The Harper Government has also made significant improvements to the visa application process. The period for which multiple-entry visas are valid was extended from 5 years to 10 years, which allows visitors to enter and exit Canada for up to 6 months at a time over 10 years.

Additionally, parents and grandparents of Canadian citizens and permanent residents are now eligible to apply for the new Super Visa, which is valid for up to 10 years and allows parents and grandparents to remain in Canada for up to 24 months at a time. These measures are complemented by the fact that Indian travellers to Canada receive faster visa approvals than travellers from any other part of the world.

Chandigarh, March 1
In a stringent order, the Police Complaints Authority (PCA) has requested the Inspector General of Police (IGP) to issue a general direction to all police officers manning police stations to behave in a decent manner and avoid using derogatory language.

The complainant, Bharat Bhushan Sharma, had stated that he had submitted a complaint against a builder addressed to the SSP alleging that he has been cheated.

Inspector Diwan Singh, SHO of the Sector 34 Police Station, had then called him to the police station where he was made to sit for over three hours as the SHO was not available at that time.

On reaching the station, the SHO had allegedly retorted that he was not his servant and insulted him.

Inspector Diwan Singh denied the allegation.

The PCA stated in the order that it was definitely objectionable to use insulting and derogatory language. “The SHO being the head of the police at the thana level is expected to set an example for his subordinates by treating the visitors in a decent way,” the order stated.

The complaint was filed through advocate Arvind Thakur.

Mohali, March 1
After three postmortems in two days, doctors have not been able to trace any bullet from the body of Amarpreet Singh, a lawyer who died on Wednesday following a firing incident the same day. “The cause of Amarpreet’s death is shock and hemorrhage due to firearm injury,” said the latest post-mortem report of the board of doctors at the Civil Hospital.

Several acquaintances of the victim expressed surprise at the report and said in case no bullet was found on Amanpreet's body, it would benefit the culprits in the case.

The doctors, on the other hand, said there could be several reasons of not finding the bullet. “There were two wounds on the body. Might be the bullet had pierced through the body. It could have burst or have broken into several pieces after entering into the body,” said a senior doctor of the hospital.

“As the cause of death has been mentioned due to firearm injury, finding the bullet is important,” said a doctor, adding skin samples being taken from the wounds had been sent to a forensic laboratory for further tests.

“It seems that government functionaries, whether the police or health authorities, are under pressure. Yesterday, some doctors had claimed that the bullet was found lying in the pelvis of the body. Today again they said it was untraceable. The police, too, failed to make any arrest in the case. One can easily guess what’s going on,” said a relative of the victim.

DSP of the area Rajinder Singh Sohal said these reports would not affect the ongoing investigation. “The case depends on circumstantial evidence and when the cause of death is mentioned as caused by firearm injury, it is sufficient,” said the DSP.

No further arrest in the case

Even after 48 hours since the incident, the police has failed to make any arrest in the murder case. “Teams have been sent to various locations in and out of the state. We have got some vital clues. Miscreants will be arrested soon,” said DSP Sohal. Two of the accused, Sunbir Singh and his uncle Onkar Singh, have been arrested so far in this connection. As many as nine accused, including a son of the SGPC member, have been booked for murdering the lawyer over a trivial issue of car parking on February 27.

Mohali, March 1
As the work remained suspended for the second day in Mohali district courts, several litigants faced a difficult time.

Dilwara Singh and Ram Partap Singh, who came from Patto village near Chunni (Fatehgarh Sahib) in connection with their land cases, had to return empty-handed.

“I had a hearing in a land case today. After coming here, I came to know about the development. It’s really harassing,” said Dilwara Singh.

Ram Partap Singh, who has a case against his son for grabbing his land fraudulently, too, expressed the same sentiments. “Now, I have to come here again. My today’s visit went in vain,” said Ram Partap Singh.

Like them, several other litigants, who came from distance places, were also seen waiting in the court complex in the hope of resumption of work.

Chandigarh, March 1
Air Officer Commanding-in-Chief of the western command Air Marshal Arup Raha visited the station High Grounds here today. He was accompanied by his wife Lily Raha, president of the Air Force Wives Welfare Association (regional).

They were received by Group Captain Sanjeev Dargar, Station Commander of the High Grounds, and Manisha Dargar, president of the Air Force Wives Welfare Association (local).

Air Marshal Raha was presented a guard of honour. Later, he visited various training complexes and reviewed the quantum of work put up by the station personnel in training of air warriors. He also visited the X-ray model aircraft and interacted with station personnel.

Meanwhile, Lily Raha inaugurated a shopping plaza established under the aegis of the Air Force Wives Welfare Association and visited Disha Play School and Air Force School located in the station.

Chandigarh, March 1
City-based 1971-War hero and Maha Vir Chakra awardee Brig Kuldip Singh Chandpuri has been conferred with the Lifetime Achievement Award at a function in New Delhi. The function was organised by a prominent national TV news channel to honour the brave heroes of the nation.

Brig Kuldip Singh Chandpuri was decorated with the Maha Vir Chakra, the second highest gallantry award, for his role in the Battle of Laungewala during the 1971 Indo-Pak War. The epic battle, fought by the 23 Punjab in the deserts of Rajasthan, has been immortalised by Bollywood film “Border”. The Lifetime Achievement Award included a sum of Rs 1 lakh.

Talking to The Tribune here today, Brig Chandpuri said he had donated the entire award money to the unit to be distributed among the widows of soldiers who had lost their lives in the battle.

Besides Brig Chandpuri, five Army war widows were also felicitated on the occasion. The other brave hearts who were honoured at the function included Major Anup Joseph Manjali and Subedar Pradeep Beck, Lt Commander FD Mogal and leading Seaman Umakant Panigrahi from the Indian Navy and martyrs constables Shiv Prasad and Bhoop Singh from the Indo-Tibetan Border Police Force.

Union Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, leader of the Opposition LK Advani, Lalu Prasad Yadav, Kapil Sibal, Sharad Yadav, Narayan Sami, Rajeev Shukla, Salman Khurshid and Harish Rawat were among the dignitaries present on the occasion. 

Chandigarh, March 1
The Haryana Culture Department today began its seven-day cultural festival, Saang, at the Tagore Theatre.

The festival began with the performance "Satyavan Savitiri" directed by artiste Suraj Bedi. The one-hour-long performance brought the perfect assimilation of music and folk tale. It narrated the story of a king's daughter Savitiri who fell in love with a young man Satyavan.

A senior theatre artiste, Dr SK Punia, was the chief guest on the first day of the festival.

Chandigarh, March 1
The CBSE adopted "easy to complex" formula for the board exams, which began today in the tricity. While the class XII board exams began with the English paper, the class X boards started with the painting exam.

There were as many as 39 centres in the tricity for the board exams. More than 17,000 students appeared for class XII board examination and over 11,000 students appeared in the class X exams.

CBSE counsellor and principal of DAV School, Sector 15, Rakesh Sachdeva, said: "Starting the board examinations with a light subject was a thought by the board. It will help the students to build their confidence for the difficult core subjects lined up."

A class XII student said the English exam was easy and has boosted his confidence for the next paper.

Many students came out of their examination centres before the scheduled time. Another student, Reema Gupta, said her real board examinations would begin with the next paper.

For the arts stream, History is the next paper on March 4. The paper for Physics is on March 5 followed by Business Studies on March 6. The papers for several vocational subjects are scheduled for March 5.

As far as class X is concerned, the students must be tensed as the paper for mathematics is scheduled for tomorrow. "I have prepared well. I hope the exam goes well," said Rachit, a class X student.

Counsellors meanwhile have advised the students to maintain a balanced diet during the exams. A city based counselor, Sunil Bedi, said they should plan their schedule smartly. Small breaks are important within the study hours. According to him, they should avoid every possible distraction and need to maintain a focused approach.

Chandigarh, March 1
The creative society of the PG Government College for Girls, Sector 11, Chandigarh, Kala-Srijan, organised an annual art exhibition today.

The exhibition showcased more than 150 artworks of BA I, BA II, BA III students. The art works included creative composition, life study, portrait study, still life, posters, advertisements, landscapes and crafts items.

Dr Anita Kaushal, dean of the college, inaugurated the art exhibition. She appreciated the creativity and imagination of the students and also applauded the efforts made by the society for conducting such an exhibition.

Dr Guneeta Chadha, head of department, Department of Fine Arts, explained the relevance of holding an art exhibition in the academic life of an art student. Dr OP Parameswaran gave the vote of thanks.