Dehradun, March 17
President Pranab Mukherjee has said that for India’s political and economic stability, it is important to have a truly ‘inclusive’ growth- growth that benefits each and every citizen of the country, especially those who are on the margins of society and at the base of the socio-economic pyramid.

He was addressing the first convocation of the newly formed IIM, Kashipur, today.

The President called upon the faculty and students of the IIM, Kashipur, to focus on the problems of the bottom of the pyramid and develop innovative solutions to address their concerns.

Addressing the students, the President said as they stepped into the professional world, they must remember that the potential for learning was never exhausted. “Education is a life-long process. I hope your studies will inspire you to seek knowledge at every stage of your career,” he said.

He reminded the faculty and students that according to an international ranking of universities, no Indian university figured among the top 200 universities of the world. “Our efforts must be aimed at taking Indian universities to the top. Innovation is also an important driver for growth. Unfortunately, we also lag behind our major competitors in this aspect. The number of patent applications filed in India in 2011 was about 42,000, which is far below the 5 lakh plus applications in both China and the USA. A culture of innovation must be encouraged in our country and for that we must create more opportunities for collaborative research, set up industry incubation parks in educational institutions and provide more research fellowships,” he said.

President Mukherjee said the unique geography of the location of the Kashipur institute in an industrial belt, surrounded by a predominantly rural area, provided an opportunity to develop extensive education courses. “Students should be encouraged to contribute to positive social development by helping people of the region learn better ways of running their farms, small businesses and other community ventures. This will instill in them a sense of obligation, which they will carry with them throughout their professional lives,” he advised.

He further said India today stood at the cusp of greatness. “While there are many challenges ahead, there are also boundless opportunities. We are passing through a phase of unprecedented demographic change, which is likely to contribute to a substantially increased labour force. The bulk of this increase is likely to take place in the relatively younger age group of 20-35 years, which would make India one of the youngest nations in the world. In 2020, the average Indian will be only 29 years old as compared to an average age of 37 for China and the USA, 45 for West Europe and 48 for Japan. It is clear that youths of the country, who are the leaders of tomorrow, shall aspire for higher standards of living, better service delivery and increased transparency and accountability,” he said.

The President said there was a need for a strategy to make the Indian industry compete with the best in the world. “Skilled manpower has to play a key role in this strategy. A healthy growth of Indian business will be greatly facilitated by the availability of a competent cadre of management professionals,” he said.

“The pool of such professionals in our country is unfortunately not enough to meet the needs of our industry. The annual enrolment in commerce and management streams has increased from around 23 lakh in 2006-07 to around 34 lakh in 2011-12. The need for graduates and postgraduates from these streams will be much higher in the future and we must be ready to meet the demand,” he said.

Expressing happiness at the proposal of the IIM, Kashipur, to set up two centres of excellence on sustainable development and on competitiveness, he hoped that these centres would stimulate new thinking, research and practise in their focus area.

The President gave away degrees to 37 postgraduate students of the IIM. Governor Aziz Qureshi, Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna, Chairman of Governing body of Indian Institute of Management Dhruv Sahni and Union Minister of state for Human Resources Jitin Prasad were also present at the convocation.

Dehradun, March 17
The drug menace which has spread its tentacles in Dehradun as well as Haridwar claimed the life of a youth here today. In a fierce fight over smack among five boys, one was injured seriously and another was killed at Jwalpa Enclave here this afternoon.

The accused have been identified as Aditya Negi, Rohit Chauhan and Prateep Tiwari, all residents of Dalanwala while the deceased, Saurabh Joshi, lived in Nehru Colony and Vijay Vir Singh alias Ashu was the resident of Doiwala. Mayank Sudi, who was the middleman, runs an electronic shop at Jogiwala.

According to the police, the accused tried to snatch the drug from the victims. Rohit who was also carrying a knife stabbed Saurabh and he died on the spot. The police arrested all accused except Sudi by afternoon.

Rohit denied of killing Saurabh. He said, “We all, Aditya , Prateek and me had gone on a call given by Mayank to expose Saurabh and Ashu. None of us knew these two boys. They began fighting with Mayank, because of which we also began helping him. It was Saurabh who attacked me first with his knife which broke my sunglass. I then snatched the knife and attacked him but that only injured him slightly in the face.” He could not clarify as to who and how Saurabh was killed. The accused also denied of having anything to do with drugs as such.

However, the police said they were involved in taking drugs.

Aditya Negi, who studied in BA II at IMS college, was the son of Ravipal who works as Class I officer in an ordnance factory at Raipur. Rohit Chauhan is the son of Jitender Chauhan, retired inspector with the CRPF. Prateek Tiwari is son of a head clerk at DBS college.

Ashu worked as property dealer. The police has begun investigation into the matter which might unravel more layers of the drug transactions in the city. 

Mussoorie, March 17
The parents of convent school students have alleged that an insurance company was trying to sell its insurance policy forcibly to students.

According to the parents of a convent school student, Bajaj Capital Insurance Broking Company from Moradabad held an arts competition for the schoolchildren and collected data which included financial status and telephone numbers of the parents a few days back.

Following that, officials of the company invited the parents in a hotel to collect the certificates issued to the student for participating in the art competition yesterday. When the parents reached the hotel, insurance agents started convincing the parents to buy insurance plan for their children. The parents also alleged that the insurance agents also threatened them if they did not buy the plans worth Rs 8000, 10,000, 15,000.

The insurance agents also issued receipts after collecting the amount and also sought cheques bearing their name on it.

The enraged parents, after knowing the facts, began questioning the way in which the insurance plans were being sold to them. Sensing foul play, they summoned the police to the hotel and even filed a written complaint against the insurance company’s officials.

The police then brought the officials of the insurance company to the police station for further questioning late last night.

The police station in charge BS Rawat after conducting an investigation found that a marketing team of the company had arrived on March 8 and organised an art competition where the necessary data was collected from the students. The insurance company also distributed prizes to the three winning candidates. On March 14, another team invited the parents in the name of distributing arts competition certificates in a hotel and began selling insurance plans to them showing the fear of the school.

BS Rawat, speaking to media, said the police found that a sister concern of Bajaj Capital known as Bajaj Capital Insurance Broking Company was involved in the whole act without any permission from either the police or the local administration.

The parents, who had no knowledge about the company, thought that some persons were trying to dupe them in connivance with the school in the name of insurance resulting in mistrust among the parents. The police after intense verification let them go with a stern warning today.

The school administration said they had only consented for an arts competition and nothing else in the school and were not aware of any business activity which was being organised in the name of the completion here. Lucknow head of Bajaj Capital Insurance Broking Company Pankaj Kanojia said a team from their company was sent to Mussoorie to pitch in for the insurance plan. He refuted the claims of forcing the parents to buy the insurance plans.

Meanwhile, the parents were angry by the modus operandi of the insurance company, saying that it should have come to them directly and not in the name of art competition.

Dehradun, March 17
Ordnance Factory Dehradun (OFD) are the eyes of India defence forces. It is the only manufacturing facility for day and night vision devices for small arms, artillery and armoured vehicles like tanks.

Interacting with mediapersons on the eve of the 212nd Ordnance Factories Day that falls tomorrow, Ordnance Factory Dehradun (OFD) general manager R Rajashekaran said, OFD would be celebrating the 212nd Ordnance Factories Day tomorrow by hosting a number of programmes. He disclosed that the first Ordnance Factory was established in March 18, 1801, in Cossipore, Kolkata, and since then March 18 is being celebrated as Ordnance Factories Day.

Referring to Ordnance Factory Dehradun, he said OFD too had come a long way since it was set up subsequently in 1943. He said the factory was today manufacturing various day and night vision devices for small arms like INSAS Rifle and LMG, artillery and armoured vehicles like tanks, T-72, T-90 and Main Battle Tank Arjun.

He said the factory has all facilities like high vacuum coating plants, testing equipment, including environmental test chambers, dark and low-light tunnel for measurement of resolution and range evaluation of night vision devices besides high precision machines for manufacturing mechanical and optical components.

He said the factory was also planning to venture into promoting holographic sight and uncooled thermal imagers.

He said as part of the 212nd Ordnance Factories Day celebrations, OFD would host a number of programmes on the day. "An ordnance run will be organised for the employees during early morning hours followed by flag hoisting and the Ordnance Factories Day pledge", General manager R Rajashekaran said.

He said an exhibition about OFD products would also be organised during afternoon hours and a cultural programme be held during evening hours to mark the occasion.

He said the OFD apart from generating employment for the residents of Dehradun was also providing first-aid facilities to the residents of the nearby Raipur area in emergency. He said the factory was also contributing to environment protection by undertaking tree plantation from time to time.

Haridwar, March 17
The folk culture of Uttarakhand was at display at the annual function of KL DAV Postgraduate College at the college auditorium here yesterday.

Colourful Kumaoni and Garhwali presentations based on the folk culture of the hill state impressed the audience. Clad in traditional attire, students with their precision-like choreography and act enthralled everyone present. The students also sang folk songs of veteran singers Narendra Singh Negi, Kalpana Rana, Sangeeta Dhaundiyal, Anil Bisht and other artistes.

Earlier, Suresh Garg from the College Management Committee inaugurated the function. He said success in any field required hard work, discipline and dedication.

College principal Dr Yashodha Mittal told the students to inculcate moral values as these would benefit them throughout their lives while temptations attract only for some time.

A dance skit based on the December 16 South Delhi gang-rape brought out the life and struggle of the deceased girl.

Shikha Saini, a student, said though the Union government had sanctioned Rs 1,000 crore for the Nirbhaya Fund made in the memory of the Delhi gang-rape victim, unless the devil that resides in us was not curbed such instances would continue to shock society.

Babita Rawat was adjudged the best performer in the girls’ category while Anikit was awarded the trophy in the boys’ section.

NCC cadet Shubham Saini was adjudged the best cadet of the college for his overall performance during the academic year. 

Dehradun, March 17
Two Sulabh toilets were opened each in Rajiv Colony and Gobind Garh by MLA Harbans Kapoor and Mayor Vinod Chamoli here today. Besides, a drain near KC School on Kanwali Road was also covered with an iron mesh.

They also launched a project of extending the length and depth of the Choti Bindal river at Shanti Vihar which will take approximately four months to complete. Counsellor of Indira Nagar Colony Surender Kukreja was also present there.

The project of toilets cost around Rs 10 lakh while that of iron mesh Rs 15 lakh.

The Choti Bindal project is expected to incur Rs 40 lakh, for which the sum of Rs 10 lakh was released in the first phase.

MLA Harbans Kapoor said slum dwellers of Rajiv Colony and Gobind Garh had no facility of toilets, which was why they were defecating in open. The women faced major problems due to this. With the construction of these two projects, this would be maintained by the Sulabh

International company, he said there would be no problems in keeping these toilets clean.

Over the matter of installing iron mesh around nullah from KC School to Kanwali Road, he said the residents of the surrounding area and private garbage collectors, who would dump garbage from their carts/mini trolleys into the nullah, would no longer be able to do so. The repulsive view of the dirty nullah choked with garbage would also be concealed with the mesh.

When Kapoor was questioned about the logic of putting up iron mesh while drawing his attention toward those places where people continued to throw polythene bags garbage above the iron mesh, he said, “It has been seen that the propensity of throwing garbage into the drain by public decreased by 90 percentage with the iron mesh in place, at least the private garbage collectors find it extremely difficult to do so. As far as the cleanliness is concerned, it is difficult to clean the drain regularly.”

The project of extending the Choti Bindal river from 40 m to 62m would protect the residents of Rajiv Colony, Teachers Colony and Shanti Vihar from getting flooded in the rainy season.

Vinod Chamoli said, “People of these areas come to us each monsoon and complain about water logging into their houses and colonies as a whole. The problem of overflowing of water from the rivers into the residential areas would now be solved with the extension of the Choti Bindal river crossing through this area.”

Dehradun, March 17
Demanding better pay and perks, the dharna started by Uttarakhand Class Four Employees Federation members in Dehradun entered the fourteenth day.

Led by KK Shukla, district general secretary, Uttarakhand Class Four Employees Federation, the dharnites accused the state government of neglecting the class four employees in the state. The protesters also appealed to the class four employees to ensure their presence in the March 18 protest rally against the state government in Dehradun.

Pramod Kumar Rathore, Phool Chandra Verma and Purshottam Gupta were prominent who participated in the dharna. 

Dehradun, March 17
As part of the anti-polythene campaign after the deadline of March 15, City Magistrate Harak Singh Rawat yesterday conducted a raid and seized five quintals of plastic glasses and polythene bags from wholesalers and recovered Rs 11,500 as fine from 14 shopkeepers at Hanuman Chowk here yesterday.

Three vegetable sellers were also fined Rs 500 each for using polythene bags. —TNS

Dehradun, March 17
A glaucoma camp was held at the Shri Guru Ram Rai Institute of Medical and Health Sciences in which 161 patients were examined and medicines were given to patients free of cost.

During the camp, operations were also conducted on eight patients for glaucoma.

The camps were held under the supervision of Dr Sanjeev Mittal, head of the eye department, Shri Guru Ram Rai Institute of Medical and Health Sciences.