Jalandhar, December 14
Wholesale sugar and karyana merchants observed a strike by keeping their shops closed at Gur Mandi on the second day of the resumed agitation by city traders against the rates of property tax for commercial buildings.

Hundreds of shopkeepers, led by the president of the Gur Mandi Shopkeepers Association Pritam Singh Arora, its senior vice-president Krishan Lal Arora, Karyana Dealers Association chief Naresh Gupta, Rope Dealers Association chief Kuldeep Singh Narula and Pipe Fitting Association president Bajar Nauhariya president Dev Raj Gupta observed a half-day strike in support of their demand of rationalising and simplifying the property tax on commercial buildings.

The shopkeepers of Gur Mandi and nearby markets kept their shops closed from 9 am to 12 noon, staged a one-hour dharna from 11 am and held a protest rally in support of their demand of simplifying the property tax on commercial buildings.

Addressing the rally, members of the Industrial and Traders Joint Action Committee (JAC) Gursharan Singh (also president of the Industrial and Traders Association), Ravindra Dhir (also state chief of the Vayapar Sena), Raj Kumar Sharma (also chief of the Jalandhar Traders and Manufacturers Association) flayed the Parkash Singh Badal led Akali-BJP government for impsosing a high property tax on commercial buildings.

Meanwhile, JAC members said the wholesale tyre merchants at Shashtri Chowk would observe a bandh on Monday and auto-shop owners would keep their establishments closed on Tuesday in support of their demand of reducing the property tax on commercial buildings from the current 3 per cent to 1.5 per cent, charging property tax according to the measurement of the land and rationalising collector rates where thee were higher than the market rates.

Jalandhar, December 14
The indefinite strike by the doctor faculty today forced the management of the Punjab Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) to postpone the term examination of the MBBS students to be conducted from Monday.

The PIMS management reportedly took the decision as the entire teaching faculty was on strike for the fourth consecutive day here today.

The doctors' strike that left the hospital working virtually parsalysed has also started hitting the functioning of medical college.

PIMS has two batches of 300 students pursuing their MBBS degree and their term examinations were scheduled to start from Monday, a striking senior teaching faculty member said.

The PIMS director-cum-principal, Dr Kulbir Kaur, however, was not available for comments till late this evening.

The protesting doctors, however, said that there was neither any assurance nor any remedial measures taken by the management to pay their salaries due for the past over five months.

Firm regarding their decision, the irate doctors have decided to continue the protest till their demands were met.

As PIMS is being run on a private public partnership (PPP) basis by the Punjab Government, the protesting doctors have also appealed to the government to intervene in the matter so that the problem could be resolved without any loss to students' studies and public convenience.

Jalandhar, December 14
A day after the decision of industrialists and traders to hold a protest march against “anti-businessmen policies” adopted by the Badal government on next Saturday, several BJP leaders have reportedly tried to persuade them not to hold an agitation on December 21 when the BJP PM candidate, Narendra Modi, is scheduled to address a rally in Jagraon.

Confirming this, state president of Vayapar Sena Ravindra Dhir, who is an erstwhile BJP leader, said they had been contacted by BJP leaders indirectly to persuade them to withdraw their agitation on the next Saturday but they would carry out the car rally on that day.

The businessmen will carry out the car rally from Jalandhar, which will culminate at Modi’s rally site in Jagraon after passing through Phagwara, Goraya, Phillaur, Ludhiana on December 21.

The industrialists and traders had decided to hold a protest rally in an emergent meeting of the Joint Action Committee (JAC) of Industrialists and Traders in Jalandhar on Friday.

Talking to The Tribune, an active member of the JAC, Ravindra Dhir, said “We have deliberately chosen December 21 to hold protest rally so that Modi should know how the business community of the state is suffering due to levying new taxes every other day.”

Dhir said, “Industrialists and traders have been suffering a lot due to delayed VAT refund, introduction of E-trip system, imposing high property tax on commercial buildings, introduction of advance tax and levying huge charges for regularising illegal colonies.”

“Farmers have been given free power worth Rs 6,000 crore per annum, whereas new taxes are imposed on urbanities on every other day and we are not even properly heard by the representatives of the government,” he added.

He said, “We are not opposing Modi’s rally in Punjab but we have chosen the rally day for our protest so that he should be aware of our sufferings.”

Prominent JAC members, Gursharan Singh, Raj Kumar Sharma, Colonel JS Paul (retired), RK Gandhi, Sooba Singh, Vijay Dhir, Sukhwinder Singh Bagga, DL Sabharwal, Rakesh Behl and Ashwani Malhotra, were present in the meeting.

Jalandhar, December 14
Virender Kataria, Lieutenant Governor, Puducherry, today paid a visit at the residence of his predecessor Iqbal Singh on the Mall Road here today.

Being associated with the Punjab Congress for several decades, he said they knew each other since 1992 and it was a sheer chance that they both got the same constitutional post in the UT in immediate succession.

A former MP, hailing from Abohar, Kataria, recalled his stay in Jalandhar as a BA student of DAV College from 1949 to 1952. “In those days, there was no college near my hometown. Even in Jalandhar, there was just one college Kanya Maha Vidyalaya. I stayed in a hostel at DAV and I can still recall the time I spent with my friends, most of whom became politicians later. I was a very active student leader then,” said the octogenarian.

He recalled the tenure of former principals of his college Lala Gyan Chand and Suraj Bhan, who later became the Vice-Chancellors of Panjab University. In the evening, he attended an Old Boys’ Meet at the college where he was felicitated.

Jalandhar, December 14
Members of the Government School Headmasters’ Union today warned that if the government will play with the quota promotions from post of headmaster to principals, then headmasters across the state will hold protest.

Speaking at a press conference here today, headmasters said, “To stop the process of promotions, the government is now talking about verification of certificates after seven years of their jobs.”

They said, “They have written to Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal to look into the matter of checking of certificates, which is a ploy to stop their promotions.”

They said while on one hand people were being promoted to key official posts in the Education Department straight from the posts of lecturers, on the other hand, teachers having spent seven years on the post of headmasters were required to get their certificates checked.

They said as per civil writ petition 19400-2012, these promotions were ordered to be conducted by January 31, 2014, as per the orders of the Punjab and Haryana High Court issued on 23 July 2013.

They said if the government does not promote them as per their experience and requisite quota, they will not be afraid of knocking the doors of the court again.

State president of the union Brijmohan Singh Bedi, Ishwar Chander, Anita Arora and Madan Gopal Singh were present on the occasion. 

Jalandhar, December 14
There has been a spate of shootout incidents in the city for the past two weeks.

A head constable deputed in the escort vehicle of IG Zonal, Balbir Singh Bawa, was injured from his own rifle yesterday morning. On Thursday night, there was a shootout at Aneja Restaurant, Mehatpur, in which the owner’s son Johny Aneja got injured. The gunshots were fired by a car-borne masked man from Jagraon road. The victim got two shots in his wrist and abdomen.

The bullets also pierced the fridge, glass door and walls of the restaurant. DSP Nakodar Harminder Pal Singh said he was inching close to the investigation and hoped to arrest the accused by tomorrow. A case under Section 307 of the IPC and the Arms Act has been registered.

Another firing incident took place at a house of a businessman, Ashok Sikka, Shakti Nagar, on Wednesday night. The city police have not made any arrest so far. Sources said that a car with beacon, son of an SDM and youths from business families were involved in the incident. A CCTV footage from the adjoining house of the businessman has been taken by the police. Naresh Dogra, ADCP-1, however, ruled out the possibility saying that anyone’s car could have passed away at that time.

The police have, however, succeeded in arresting six persons in a shootout that took place at the Urban Estate Phase II market on November 20, wherein a railway contractor’s son had a miraculous escape. 

Jalandhar, December 14
The Rural police today arrested Lachhman Das of Phagwara, at Shankar village of Nakodar, and seized nine stolen vehicles from him.

The police have recovered six mobikes, a Santro car, Bolera and a scooter. Three cases had already been registered against the accused while two cases were registered against him pertain to smuggling of poppy husk in Nakodar Sadar Police Station and one at Phagwara Sadar Police Station. 

Jalandhar, December 14
The Rural Police have arrested seven persons in seven cases under the NDPS Act and recovered a total amount of 1.355 kg of heroin, intoxicating powders and a pistol.

The police arrested Amritpal Singh of Gurdaspur with 1.1 kg of heroin from Sarai Khas village at a naka yesterday. He had remained behind bars in an abduction and murder case registered against him at the Division Number 4 police station and had got released about three years ago. He also has cases of theft against him in Pathankot. His brother Baljit Singh is still in jail in the same case.

SSP (Rural) Jaspreet Singh Sidhu said since Amritpal had been making supplies with the use of cellphone, it had been recovered and buyers and suppliers in his network, too, would be followed and arrested. A case has been registered against him at the Maqsudan police station.

Five separate cases under the NDPS Act have been registered at the Bhogpur police station. Vivek S Soni, assistant superintendent of police, Adampur, said they had formed a whole chain of drug traffickers, who were arrested one after the other.

Sucha Singh and Kuljit Singh of Kishanpur were the first ones to be arrested with 320 gm of drug powder and 10 gm of smack yesterday. The next in the same chain was Balehar of Kala Bakra village, who was apprehended with 17 gm of smack and 255 gm of drug powder. Next to fall was Baldev Raj of Lamma Pind from whom 110 gm of intoxicating powder was recovered. Sarabjit Singh of Kala Bakra village, too, was arrested in the same link with 17 gm of smack and 255 gm of drug powder. Bikramjeet Singh of Kapurthala was arrested today on further interrogation from those arrested yesterday. Drug powder weighing 255 gm was recovered from him.

The SSP said Baldev Raj was a PO in a case of Arms Act in Division Number 8 Police Station, while Bikramjeet Singh already had a case registered against him in Kapurthala.