Hefty fee for serving liquor at parties prevents organisers from applying for licence
Amritsar, July 2
While a modest banquet hall in the city could be hired for a day for anything between Rs 6,000 to 10,000, the party organisers are required to pay Rs 20,000 as licence fee for serving liquor. The hefty fee charged by the Excise Department is forcing people to look for ways, which could be termed as illegal, to serve the liquor to their guests. Hence, most of the people try to save the money by not applying for the licence.

Three of family booked for duping residents of Rs 19 lakh
Amritsar, July 2
The police has registered a case against three members of a family for duping residents of lakhs of rupees by making false promises of sending them abroad. The accused have been identified as Gourav Mahindru, his wife Aman Mahindru and his mother Pooja, all residents of Sandhu Colony, Batala Road, Amritsar.

Amritsar, July 2
Amritsar Central Jail staff has got booked a man for attempting to hand over intoxicant powder to his brother, an undertrial lodged in the jail. The undertrial has also been booked for the offence.

According to information, Ranjit Singh had come to meet his brother Manjinder Singh, alias Saba, during the visiting hours last evening. In the meantime, he handed over a packet to Manjinder Singh, which was later discovered to be containing 4.5 gm of intoxicant powder.

Even as Ranjit Singh went back, but the vigilant jail staff searched his brother Manjinder Singh before he could get back in the jail enclosure and recovered the drugs from his possession.

A case was registered against both of them at the Cantonment police station. Deputy Superintendent of Police RK Sharma said a case under Sections 22, 61 and 85 of the NDPS Act and Section 42 of the Prisoner Act was registered against them. 

Amritsar, July 2
Deputy Commissioner-cum-District Election Officer Rajat Aggarwal has stated that 6,700 employees have been deployed to conduct Panchayat elections tomorrow. The voting will be carried out from 8 am to 4 pm.

In all 10,522 candidates, including 1,931 for sarpanches (heads of panchayats) and 8,591 for panches (members of panchayat), are in fray in the district. Of these, 131 sarpanches and 706 panches have been elected unanimously. Besides, 14 sarpanchs and 811 panches have been announced winners without contest.

It is anticipated that a little over 8.50 lakh voters would exercise their franchise tomorrow.

The Amritsar (Rural) police has about 816 polling stations under its jurisdiction. Out of these, 84 have been declared extremely sensitive and 221 sensitive polling stations. On the other hand, 22 polling stations fall in the Amritsar Police Commissionerate.

With a view to hold peaceful elections,1,566 constables and 43 patrolling parties, which are being headed by 200 Inspectors, 8 DSPs, two SP-level officials besides SSP (Rural), have been deployed.

Amritsar, July 2
While a modest banquet hall in the city could be hired for a day for anything between Rs 6,000 to 10,000, the party organisers are required to pay Rs 20,000 as licence fee for serving liquor.

The hefty fee charged by the Excise Department is forcing people to look for ways, which could be termed as illegal, to serve the liquor to their guests. Hence, most of the people try to save the money by not applying for the licence.

A city resident, who had organised a family function recently, said, "For a gathering of 100 guests, including women and children, one would only find around 25 drinkers and they would at the most consume 12 bottles. Paying Rs 20,000 for serving 12 bottles cannot be justified on any grounds. Perhaps the Excise Department can earn more money if the fee is less as nobody takes a risk for a nominal price," he said.

While the city has bigger and costlier banquets halls, which charge around Rs 60,000 to Rs 1,20,000 for a function and organisers here do not mind paying the hefty fees.

But for a man with modest means, the fee certainly is too high, said Ranjit Singh, a local resident. "The department should devise a system as per which lesser fee can be charged from party organisers with fewer guests invited," he said.

Presently people can be seen having drinks in their cars outside modest banquet halls. "This is because organisers do not serve drinks inside the hall as the do not take permission to avoid paying hefty fee. They keep the bottles in the cars and whosoever wants to drink can have it from there," said another resident Amanpreet Singh.

During the previous financial year, the licence fee for serving liquor at parties was around Rs 5,000. But it was increased to Rs 20,000 from the current session to generate more revenue.

Meanwhile, excise officials, though admitted that the fee is exorbitant for small party organisers, but said the excise policy was decided by the state government and they were just implementing it.

Amritsar, July 2
The police has registered a case against three members of a family for duping residents of lakhs of rupees by making false promises of sending them abroad. The accused have been identified as Gourav Mahindru, his wife Aman Mahindru and his mother Pooja, all residents of Sandhu Colony, Batala Road, Amritsar.

According to one of their victims Pawan Kumar, the trio took Rs 8 lakh from him to send his son Saurav to Canada. Not only this, they took Rs 3.5 lakh from Parminder Kumar for sending him to Australia, another Rs 7.5 lakh from Rakesh Kumar for sending his son Danish to New Zealand. They neither sent anyone of them abroad, nor returned the money.

Investigating officer ASI Jatinder Singh of the Sadar police station said a case under Sections 420, 467, 468, 471 and 120-B of the IPC was registered against the trio and the accused were absconding. “It has been alleged that the accused neither fulfilled their promise of sending their clients abroad, nor returned the money. We are raiding their possible hideouts,” he said.

Amritsar, July 2
Condemning the functioning of ruling party leaders and Municipal Corporation, various Congress leaders have termed the present administrative set up as “unproductive and visionless”.

Among those who have launched a frontal attack on the civic body authorities are Congress leader Raj Kanwal Preet Pal Singh Lucky, Youth Congress leader Vikas Soni and District Congress Committee (U), Amritsar, president Jugal Kishore Sharma.

Citing the examples of various projects having passed their deadlines, a dilapidated infrastructure and other civic problems, they said despite ample support from the Centre, it was the inefficiency and incompetence of the SAD-BJP alliance which failed to utilise it.

Raj Kanwal Lucky said except for criticising the Congress party on frivolous grounds, the ruling alliance never spared a thought for establishing an ideal system which could at least provide citizens a quality life.

“No major project has brought respite to the residents of the city. Except for gaining political mileage by announcing or laying the foundation stones of various projects, no effort has been made to execute them on time. The city is grappling with the issue of garbage lifting for the past many years. No concrete planning was ever initiated to dispose of garbage. It is shameful that even the passage which leads to the Golden Temple and is visited by over 1 lakh tourists from all over the globe, could not be kept clean,” he said.

Lucky also raised the issues of having not started the city bus service, Rasoolpura Housing project for people belonging to the economically weaker section (EWS), JAICA sewerage project besides a dismal situation at Bhandari Bridge and Kitchlew Chowk.

“The matters remained on the discussion table for six years despite the fact that the Centre has already released its preliminary share which is still lying unutilised with the MC,” Lucky said.

Soni and Jugal Kishore raised the issue of displacement of shopkeepers due to the road widening project leading to the Golden Temple near Jallianwala Bagh. They demanded that the displaced shopkeepers should be rehabilitated before bulldozing their shops which they have been running for the past four decades.

Former chairman of Amritsar Improvement Trust Jugal Kishore said a similar operation was to be conducted at Jain Dharmshala in Mochi bazaar during his tenure.

“I had allotted flats to the displaced persons before demolishing the dharamshala. The authorities have not spared thought for rehabilitating them,” he said.

They also criticised the shifting of MC office from its present location from the 140-year-old Town Hall building to Ranjit Avenue. The foundation stone of MC’s new premises, spread in around two acres was inaugurated by Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal a couple of days ago.

Terming it as anti-people, they said it would not only cause inconvenience to the general public but would also burden the state exchequer by raising a loan of around Rs 24 crore from Asian Development Bank for constructing new structure at Ranjit Avenue. 

Amritsar, July 2
NGO Mission Aagaaz has started its ‘Monsoon Plantation Drive’ by planting a tree sapling and installed a tree guard outside the office of CPI at Chheharta in the memory of late Communist leader Satpal Dang.

The association members said under the plantation drive, 100 saplings of amaltas, sukhchain, neem, karipata would be planted and maintained on a stretch along the GT Road from GNDU to India Gate.

The NGO will further plant 500 saplings in adjoining villages and the local residents would be motivated to ensure their upkeep. The tree guards around the trees would also be installed, said Gurbhej Singh Sandhu, general secretary of the NGO. 

Amritsar, July 2
Students of BBK DAV College for Women have secured top positions in BBA-final year result. Neha Chopra bagged the third position in the Guru Nanak Dev University by scoring 1,637 marks while Sahiba Arora scored 1,604 marks and stood fourth in university.

College principal Dr Neelam Kamra felicitated the students for bringing laurels to the institution. She motivated the students and teachers to work with greater dedication and sincerity in future as well.

Deepali Kochar and Manpreet Kaur of of DAV College, Amritsar, notched up the third and fourteenth positions in BCA-final year examination conducted by Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar.

Deepali and Manpreet scored 1,922 marks and 1,877 marks respectively out of 2,500 marks. Principal Dr KN Kaul wished the meritorious students a grand success in life. 

Amritsar, July 2
The police has registered a case against a Baba Bakala resident for marrying a city-based girl in a fraudulent way. The accused, who allegedly had concealed his real name, have been identified as Gurpreet Singh, alias Bachitter Singh, who got married to Nishu Navneet, a resident of Ranjit Avenue, Amritsar, by projecting himself as a UK citizen.

A case has been registered under Sections 420, 498-A and 506 of the IPC at the Civil Lines police station, but no arrest has been made so far.

In the complaint submitted to the police, the victim alleged that her parents had given a huge dowry at the time of her marriage, which included a house in a posh area of the city. She alleged that her husband had also sold a plot in the vicinity of Suncity and had bought an SCF in Ranjit Avenue.

Investigating officer ASI Nishan Singh of the Ranjit Avenue police post said the victim alleged that her husband used to beat her up and demand more dowry from her parents. "She alleged that her husband pretended that he possessed a British passport, which was later found to be false. The authenticity of the accused's Indian passport, too, is being investigated as it has been alleged that he had changed his name often. When she insisted to take her to the UK, he beat her up and compelled her to get cash from her parents. We have received a complaint from her, on the basis of which her husband was booked. Further action would be initiated after a thorough probe in the matter," he said.

Amritsar, July 2
The seventh annual Punjabi Theatre Festival opened in the city with Shakespeare's famous tragedy Othello. The four-day festival will bring together different theatre groups and techniques weaved with storylines that will entertain and educate the audience.

Organised by Manch Rangmanch at Virsa Vihar, the theatre festival is an attempt by noted theatre person kewal Dhaliwal to present innovative techniques of storytelling on stage. "This festival will have five stage productions being presented in four days by young theatre artists from the region. The plays have different styles of production from physical theatre to musicals and are based on classic adaptations," said Kewal.

Amritsar, July 2
In the wake of the panchayat elections in the state, the teaching and non-teaching departments of Guru Nanak Dev University (GNDU) will remain closed tomorrow.

GNDU Registrar Dr Inderjit Singh said the announcement was made after the closing declaration by the Punjab government due to panchayat elections. However, the ongoing admission counselling and entrance tests of various classes will be held as per the announced schedule, he added.

Varsity results announced

The results of B.Ed examination held by Guru Nanak Dev University in March/April this year have been declared.

Dr RK Mahajan, Professor In-charge (Exams), said the results would also be available on the university website www.gndu.ac.in for the students’ convenience.

B.Tech counselling on July 5

The counselling for admission to B.Tech (Urban and Regional Planning) will be held on July 5 at 9.30 am at Guru Ramdas School of Planning and Bhai Gurdas Library of Guru Nanak Dev University.

Dr Balvinder Singh, head, Guru Ramdas School of Planning, said those students seeking admission to this course should bring their original documents at the time of counselling and must be present in time.

Randhawa to lead Indian contingent in Russia

Dr HS Randhawa, Deputy Director Sports of Guru Nanak Dev University would lead the Indian contingent at the 27th World University Sports to be held at Kazan (Russia) from July 6 to 17.

Dr Randhawa said more than 13,000 sportspersons from 160 countries would participate in these games. He said there would be 50 sportspersons and officials in the Indian contingent and their expenses would be borne by the Union Ministry of Sports and Youth Affairs.

He said the expenses for the sportspersons, including Maninder Singh in athletics, Aman Ghai in swimming, Akshay Jain in shooting and coach Rajwinder Kaur, would be borne by the University.

A trial-cum-coaching in camp rifle and pistol shooting of selected 10 men and women sportspersons was organised by Guru Nanak Dev University. 

Amritsar, July 2
Priyanka Lehri of Hindu College bagged the first position in BCA final year in Guru Nanak Dev University (GNDU).  She scored 1,940 out of 2,500 marks.

College Administrator Hem Raj Gupta said Kanupriya Dubey stood eighth, Raghuraja ninth and Priya Mehra stood 20th in the university. —TNS