Shimla, July 8
A Rs 250-crore passenger aerial ropeway connecting the Inter-State Bus Terminus Tutikandi and the Mall will be built in the state capital to help reduce traffic and facilitate easy movement both for locals as well as tourists.

Stating this here today, Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh said a ropeway connecting ISBT-the Mall-Rani Jhansi Park would be set up under the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) mode to reduce heavy traffic in Shimla.

He was presiding over a high-level meeting of the HP Infrastructure Development Board (HPIDB) here today.

He said the total length of the ropeway would be around 3 km and it would be supported on 18 pillars and the boarding stations would be built at Tutikandi and the Lift with a parking facility for 500 vehicles each. The carrying capacity of this ropeway would be around 1,500 to 2,000 persons per hour each way.

He said the total project cost would be about Rs 250 crore and the travel time would be about 10 minutes each way. Both the terminals at Tutikandi and the Lift would have a restaurant, a waiting hall and other amenities such as toilet and drinking water.

Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh also gave the nod to build another ropeway at Himani Chamunda in Kangra district. He said this ropeway would help pilgrims to visit the famous shrine which was not connected by road.

He said this ropeway would be constructed at a cost of Rs 200 crore and would be of 6-km length with a carrying capacity of about 1,000-1,200 persons per hour each way. He said the total travel time would be around 20 minutes.

A presentation on the Material Ropeway Project from Kotgarh, Baggi, Kotkhai, Theog, Gumma, Yashwant Nagar, Sinj till Parwanoo was also given by consultants, Usha Breco, appointed by the HP Infrastructure Development Board for undertaking the feasibility study to transport the agriculture and horticulture produce from Shimla district to Parwanoo.

The Chief Minister said Himachal was known for quality apples throughout the country and Shimla district produced the maximum apples apart from other vegetables.

“The traffic in Shimla has reached a saturation point and there is need to think of an alternative, but prior to this, provision will have to be made for storing, marketing yard and adequate parking facilities at Parwanoo," he said.

He said it would help in the reduction of ground transport and traffic and would take off 64,000 truck trips at 40 per cent capacity utilisation.

The features Ropeway will be around 3 km It will be supported on 18 pillars and boarding stations built at Tutikandi and Lift with a parking facility for 500 vehicles Carrying capacity of the ropeway will be around 1,500 to 2,000

Palampur, July 8
The local administration has failed to remember two martyrs of the town. Both officers sacrificed their life fighting Pakistani intruders in the Kargil War in 1999.

Capt Vikram Batra and Capt Saurabh Kalia were killed by the Pakistani army during the war. Captain Kalia was killed on June 9, 1999.

Captain Batra sacrificed his life on July 7, 1999. He was honoured with the Param Vir Chakra posthumously for his extraordinary courage shown in the Kargil War. The state government had also installed his statue in the Pragati Maidan here.

July 7 is observed as the sacrifice day every year. The martyr's parents garlanded the statue of their son yesterday. However, the local administration failed to remember the heroes of the nation and no government official turned up.

Girdhari Lal Batra, father of Captain Batra, said he was hurt at the indifferent attitude of the state government. Despite the fact that everyone was aware of the sacrifice day, no one bothered to spare even a few minutes for garlanding the statues or saying prayers.

He said he had lost his young son in the Kargil War. The state government had made tall promises to take care of the families, but today the situation was such that government officials had no time to even pay homage to the heroes of the nation.

This is not a lone incident. On June 9 this year, Captain Kalia’s parents were alone to garland the statue of their son installed at Saurabh Van Vihar. Dr NK Kalia was also unhappy with the state government.

Shimla, July 8
With a hike in the prices of petrol and diesel, the apple growers will have to pay almost 15 per cent higher freight rates for the transportation of their produce to the markets.

This was stated by Deputy Commissioner Dinesh Malhotra here today while presiding over a meeting with apple growers, transporters and officials. The meeting was held to review the arrangements for the transportation of apples from interior parts of the districts to the markets.

Malhotra said keeping in view the inflation rate and an increase in the diesel and petrol prices during the preceding months, it was proposed to hike freight rates of heavy vehicles up to 15 per cent corresponding to the rates of the last year.

The apple growers raised the issue of digging of roads at several places for the laying of telecom cables. Malhotra directed the Public Works Department (PWD) and telecom authorities to immediately stop this work for a month till the conclusion of the apple season.

He also asked PWD officers to ensure repair and maintenance of the roads during the season.

“The position and condition of the roads should be monitored on a day-to-day basis by the officers concerned to ensure the smooth flow of traffic,” he stressed. 

Shimla, July 8
Sujan Singh Pathania and Prakash Chaudhary, ministers in the Virbhadra government, today denounced former Chief Minister PK Dhumal's statement on the issue of political interference in the transfers of government employees.

In a statement here today, they alleged that Dhumal's statement reflected his feeble and frustrated mental state after the humiliating defeat of the BJP in the Mandi byelection. “He is a confused man and if he feels so strongly about the issue of transfers, why didn’t he show the boldness of putting a complete ban on transfers when he himself was in power,” they remarked.

They said while in power his government had ordered the transfer of thousands of employees who were victimised on political considerations. They said only a few transfers in the state were being done on administrative grounds and in public interest. They reminded the BJP leaders that there were large-scale transfers during their regime and many posts were kept vacant in the field and difficult places.

“The transfers have been necessitated to strike a balance and gear up the functioning in the field as some places are overstaffed while in remote and rural areas there are too many vacancies,” they justified. They said the government had tried to provide succour to employees who had been victimised by the previous BJP government.

They said the state Cabinet had recently approved the new transfer policy for the government employees, which spoke of the concern and commitment of the government towards its employees. They said the Congress government had taken a major decision to revive the State Administrative Tribunal with Circuit Benches in Dharamsala and Mandi as it would go a long way in providing relief to the employees.

Solan, July 8
The grant of prosecution sanction in a case registered against BJP MLA and former minister Rajiv Bindal by the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau has triggered a protest from local BJP leaders.

The leaders comprising Lokeshwar Sharma, Pawan Gupta, Virender Sood, Ravinder Parihar, Inder Singh, Kamla Sharma, Soma Thakur and others, condemning the move, said here today that the ruling Congress government was settling political scores. The step had been taken against the advice of the prosecution department.

They accused the government of pursuing a vendetta against him.

The leaders said the Speaker of the state Vidhan Sabha had in 2004 rejected the case pertaining to grant of prosecution sanction during the Congress regime and it was also rejected by Speaker Tulsi Ram during the tenure of the former BJP government and even the Urban Development Department had not given its sanction for this case.

It was, therefore, surprising as to why the state government had suddenly taken this decision. The BJP leaders of the Solan mandal said they would agitate against this move.

The case against Bindal pertains to appointments in the local Municipal Council when he was the chairman and the bureau had registered a case on December 1, 2006, under Sections 420, 468, 471 and 120-B of the IPC and Section 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act against him.

The Home Department had kept the case pending during the former BJP regime despite the Vigilance Bureau having sought the sanction.

Bindal had to resign before the completion of his term.

Though the case was registered by the former Congress regime, it had failed to reach its logical conclusion then.

Nurpur, July 8
Following the complaint of Kamaljeet Kaur of nearby Harnora Ghat, the police has registered a case against her husband Raman Kumar for allegedly trying to commit suicide by consuming a pesticide today.

In her complaint, Kamaljeet stated that her husband returned home last night in an inebriated condition and had an altercation with her. In anger her husband took a bottle of pesticide kept in a cowshed and drank it. But she immediately snatched the half-consumed pesticide bottle from him and got him rushed to the Civil Hospital in 108 ambulance. DSP Rajiv Atre said a case had been registered against him.

Nurpur, July 8
The local police claimed to have solved a murder case last evening when accused Deepak Kumar of Kotpalhari village confessed that he had killed his mother Srishta Devi.

The police had arrested Deepak on July 3.

The accused in his statement to the police confessed that he had attacked his mother with a sharp-edged sickle in a fit of rage.

Srishta Devi, along with her son, had gone to a forest to collect wooden sticks on July 2. Deepak returned home, but his mother did not come back. Later, her husband found her headless body on a path to the forest.

Reports say the accused was a drug addict and had a strained relationship with his mother.

Meanwhile, the police today produced him in a court, which remanded him in 14-day judicial custody.

Kangra, July 8
A two-day free ENT camp organised by the local branch of the Vivekananda Kendra at the Zonal Hospital, Dharamsala, turned out to be a boon for seven-year-old Srishti, who successfully underwent a cochlear implant surgery at the camp.

The surgery done by Dr Sanjay Sachdeva, Director, ENT, Head and Neck Surgery, Max Group of Hospitals, is considered as the first cochlear implant surgery in the region.

Srishti, a resident of Boda village, was suffering from congenital hearing impairment. Her parents sought financial help from the state government through the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan programme, but to no avail.

Srishti’s father Sandeep Kumar said he also sought help from the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) through the BMO, Bhawarna, but it was a futile exercise. At last, he borrowed Rs 5.3 lakh form relatives and friends for the cochlear implant, but the surgery was conducted free of cost at the camp.

Dr Sachdeva said children born with congenital hearing loss faced difficulties in communication and learning speech. Such children could be helped by surgically implanting a cochlear implant.

He said a few states in the country had started funding these cochlear implant for the children affected.

He said deafness was prevalent among 7 to 10 per cent of the population of above 50 years in the state. These persons did not include those who suffered of deafness because of ear discharge and other reasons.

He said there were certain factors responsible for this prevalence and needed to be evaluated with urgency. The nerve-related deafness was more prevalent among men than in women.

He suggested that a mass awareness programme should be launched to create awareness about the nerve-related deafness and its prevention among people.

Bilaspur, July 8
Members of the BJP Kisan Morcha have expressed resentment as their maize crop has been infected with a disease despite sowing the seeds bought from the recognised state Agriculture Department.

After attending the meeting of the unit here today, morcha president Sita Ram Thakur said the disease had been destroying maize crop from the beginning of the crop cycle and farmers were unable to understand how to check it. The disease had damaged 50 per cent of the total crop in the district.

Morcha president said farmers had purchased these seeds (hybrid) from the government department at a cost ranging between Rs 150 and Rs 180 per bag of 5 kg and it was expected that these seeds would be of good quality.

The members at the meeting urged the government to order an inquiry into the issue.

They said areas sown with maize in Malyor, Harlog, Harnoda, Berry, Chandpur, Jabbli and other gram panchayats had been afflicted with the disease.

Meanwhile, Agriculture Technological Management Agency (ATMA) Director LR Dhiman said in a press statement that the disease, black beetle, had been damaging maize crop in some areas of the district and farmers should use Siper Matherine 10-EC or Profanophos pesticide to save their crop.

He said the disease had also been spreading in Chandpur, Rajpura, Barthin and several other villages of the district.

Kangra, July 8
Strengthening the Routine Immunisation (RI) is crucial to achieve polio-free status and every year full immunisation prevents approximately 0.4 million under-five deaths from vaccine preventable diseases in India.

Dr RK Sood, Epidemiologist-cum-Programme Officer, said the strategy for Special Immunisation Week included micro-planning with the identification of the session site and attached high-risk areas, beneficiary estimate of under-two children and pregnant women.

He said many children missed the benefits of vaccinations every year. He said a majority of those missing the opportunity were from among under-served and marginalised populations. Being unvaccinated kept them at the highest risk of catching life-threatening childhood diseases, Dr Sood added.

He said to create awareness on the urgency to vaccinate every child and intensify efforts to improve the RI coverage, the Government of India had launched the Special Immunisation Week. Special Immunisation Weeks were being conducted to improve coverage, especially in low-coverage pockets, mobile and under-served population, urban slums and high-risk population.

He said Kangra Deputy Commissioner C Paul Rasu, while presiding over a special inter-sectoral meeting for a review of health programmes complimented health staff for improvement in the coverage in special rounds, which had increased from 48 sessions in the first round in April to 130 sessions in the second round in June this year in the district.

Preparations were in full swing for the current round which started today.

Chamba, July 8
Anil Kumar died on the spot when his car veered off the road and rolled down 200 metre from a hillock, near Hamalgala village of the district, a report said here today.

The deceased belonged to Bhadram village of a nearby area. The body had been handed over to his kin after an autopsy. The police had registered a case in this connection and was trying to ascertain the cause of the accident, the report said.