Jalandhar, January 28
Even though it has been nearly a year since Jindal Urban Waste Management Limited purchased vehicles and equipment for lifting waste from the city as per a contract with the Municipal Corporation (MC), the infrastructure is lying unused as the authorities have failed to give a green light to the project.

Fourteen garbage tippers, 14 carts and 150 community bins that have been bought by the company have been kept at a site at Issa Nagar, but these are not being put to use owing to pressure from safai karamcharis to first resolve their issues before going ahead with the project.

The recent 10-day strike by the safai karamcharis during which the entire city got filled with heaps of garbage has further put the project on hold. The strike has had such a serious impact that even four days after it was called off, the dumping sites have still not got cleared. Garbage heaps, stretching to over 500m, can be seen outside PIMS on Garha Road, in front of Doordarshan Kendra and near Adarsh Nagar.

The daily collection of waste which is lifted in MC trucks weighs 450 metric tonnes on an average. In 10 days, it would have surely got up by 10 times, which the MC sanitation wing is now finding difficult to lift.

The company officials said they had even hired 75 persons in July last and kept them on rolls till October. When there was no clarity as to when the project would finally get started, it retained 20 of them, keeping the remaining on hold. The company is currently getting a survey done on the number of families in various areas and the average discharge from various pockets.

Des Raj Jassal, ward 1 Congress councillor, said there was no point in getting all such equipment and then keeping it unused. The authorities must either get the project started or get all such infrastructure packed up. "There is no point stretching the matte for so long. The issues of the employees must be quickly resolved for the betterment of the city," he said.

SE (O&M) PS Jaggi said the government was in the process of settling the demands of the unionists with regard to the project. They have been seeking that they should be allowed to do door-to-door collection for which some middle-line approach was likely to be adopted in consent with the Jindal group. I hope that the matter would be sorted out at the earliest, he said.

Jalandhar, January 28
The Jalandhar Improvement Trust (JIT) is in the process of expediting the process of clearing its nearly 1 acre encroached land, falling on 120 feet road in Guru Teg Bahadur Nagar adjoining Latifpura here, following the Supreme Court orders in the matter.

The land, falling in the 110 acre GTB Nagar scheme, had been encroached upon by nearly 27 persons. The court had decided the matter in favour of the JIT on August 16, 2012, which it failed to get cleared. However, a contempt petition was filed in the matter against the JIT Chairman in which the court, on September 2 last, had asked the JIT to expedite the matter and issue notices to the encroachers.

It had also told the encroachers/petitioners to file their reply to the notices within four weeks. The Trust officials, had on November 5, passed a resolution to give public notices to the encroachers and give them a hearing on November 18. The JIT officials heard the objections, which were filed by 18 encroachers, a number of times till January 9. Subsequently, the JIT Executive Officer DC Garg and Superintending Engineer Mukul Soni submitted their report on the matter on December 2.

The report reads, "A survey was conducted to identify the encroachers in 1999-2000. The 18 petitioners, through an advocate, had submitted that their land had not been acquired. They also produced copies of the electricity bill, telephone connection, Aadhaar card, voter ID card, water supply bill to show adverse possession. The president of the Mohalla Society Kulwant Singh had submitted that nine petitioners had already passed away and hence there was no representation from their side. But such documents do not prove ownership."

While the petitioners claimed that their land had not been acquired, the JIT officials searched old plans and found that the mentioned "khasras" were part of the Guru Teg Bahadur scheme for which the award had been announced by the Land Acquisition Collector on August 3, 1976. The possession of the land had been given to the Trust on January 30, 1980.

An objection had also been raised that the JIT could no longer act upon the matter as the scheme had been transferred to the MC, at which the officials reported, "As per Section 55 of the Punjab Town Improvement Act, when a scheme is developed, the services like water supply, sewage, roads and streetlights are transferred to the MC for maintenance but not the land rights."

One petitioner had produced six title deeds for 71 marla land in his possession, but the officials found that none of these had khasra number mentioned and dates of deeds were much later than the award and possession reports. The officials have reported, "No one has the right to buy or sell the land after acquisition."

The JIT team had gone for demolition at the site on May 12, 2012. The JCB machines had barely touched the frontal part of walls of a shop and a house when the residents began a massive protest. Congress leader and councillor Aruna Arora's husband Manoj Arora had fallen unconscious at the site while showing solidarity with the residents there just a month ahead of the MC polls. 

Jalandhar, January 28
Despite the claims of strict supervision made by the Forest Department in the Kandi area in Hoshiarpur, illegal hunting is going on unabated.

This fact came to light with the arrest of four persons who were nabbed red handed by the police while they were hunting for wild boars in Lalwan village near Chabewal in Hoshiarpur.

The police recovered a rifle, several used and live cartridges and a binocular from them.

The accused were identified as Shingara Singh of Wadala village, near here, Sukhwinder Singh of Link Colony, Simranjit Singh of Tower Enclave and Anmol of Tilak Nagar.

The police said it had received secret information on Saturday that four Jalandhar-based persons carrying a .306 bore rifle were hunting for wild boar in Lalwan village in the Chabewal area.

The police then raided the spot and nabbed them red handed.

The police said the accused had fired several shots to hunt down wild boars, but they missed all shots.

During interrogation, the nabbed persons admitted before the police that they were hunting for wild boars in the forest area near Hoshiarpur.

The police also launched a thorough search operation in the forest cover to recover dead wild boar, if any, gunned down by the accused, but no recovery was made.

A case under Section 336 of the Indian Penal Code and 51 of the Wild Life Protection Act was registered against them, a police official said, adding that all persons were also granted bail later as all sections were bailable.

District Forest Officer Hoshiarpur Satnam Singh couldn’t be contacted on his phone despite repeated attempts.

Jalandhar, January 28
The Jalandhar Cantonment, for the first time, is facing a threat from trees within its area, some of which more than 100 years old.

The trees can be seen tilting over the major roads of the cantonment for the past few months and could fall on anybody passing through these roads. Many of these have already fallen and can be seen lying in the compounds by breaking into the boundary walls of various houses. Some of these are so dangerously placed that most of their roots have completely come out of the ground and are just standing with little support. Also, those that have already fallen are lying on the sides of major roads, causing a lot of hindrance in the smooth movement of the traffic.

“As most of them do not have any commercial value, nobody turned up for the auction which we tried many times. Now, we will be removing the trees within two to three days, as they are very dangerously tilted over the busy roads of the cantonment,” said Vibha Sharma, CEO, Cantonment Board, Jalandhar.

Also, the confusion over the jurisdiction of the trees falling under the Cantonment Board and the Defence Estate are hampering the speedy disposal of trees inside the cantonment. While the Defence Estate seems to be clear about the trees falling under its jurisdiction which has trees inside the military establishment including barracks, unit formations and bungalows, the cantonment board seems to be confused about the trees on the boundary walls of the military houses. Both the establishments seem to be fighting over the jurisdiction of these trees. Unfortunately, it is these trees only that are uprooted and tilted on the major cantonment roads like Jindan Road, Bhagat Chowk, road going towards the Defence Colony and the Rama Mandi Chowk and some area near the Bhim Road and Haqiqat Road.

However, sources at the Defence Estate office also allege corrupt practices regarding the auctioning of trees by the Cantonment Board for long. They have alleged that the auctions held to dispose of these trees by the Board were only an eyewash and would soon be sold through unfair means by showing them as discarded ones with no commercial value. “This is an annual practice. They intentionally leave the uprooted trees lying dead for months, citing no commercial value and later dispose these of through unfair means,” said a source from the Defence Estate. They have also confirmed the illegal auctioning of two "sheesham" trees by the Cantonment Board recently that had actually fallen under the jurisdiction of the Defence Estate. However, Vibha Sharma, while denying the allegation, confirmed that both trees were the property of the cantonment board only. “Both trees got uprooted in a storm. They were sold in a proper auction conducted by the board,” confirmed Sharma. Defence Estate Officer Kailash Chander Gupta showed ignorance in the case, but promised to investigate the matter soon.

Kapurthala, January 28
An undertrial, lodged in Kapurthala Central Jail, died under mysterious circumstances today.

The deceased was identified as Bunty Kumar (28), a resident of Shekhey village, near here.

Bunty suffered acute pain in the jail in the morning and was rushed to the Civil Hospital, Jalandhar.

Two hours after he was brought to the hospital, he died.The victim's family members alleged that Bunty died due to the negligence of the jail staff. They also demanded a probe into the death.The body was kept at the mortuary in the Civil Hospital. A board of doctors would conduct his post-mortem tomorrow to ascertain the cause of the death. — TNS

Jalandhar, January 28
While the Municipal Corporation has shown its helplessness in this case due to shortage of space, the residents who have been living in the city for more than a decade have given useful tips which can help commuters who waste around 15 to 20 minutes looking for a spot to park their vehicles.

While accusing the Municipal Corporation of not matching the pace of development work vis-à-vis the increase in the number of vehicles, some of them have also held the people in the city responsible for causing traffic congestions and blocking roads due to lack of civic sense. Some of them have even proposed special parking for the differently-abled people.

"Like many cities in India, it is high time that the corporation introduced special parking areas for the differently-abled people. Although there is a huge shortage of space for general parking, but some areas could be marked as free parking zones for these people. So many times, they can be seen whisking away their tricycle or scooter to some corner of the market and requesting the shopkeepers to give them some space in front of their shops. I think that this should be done on priority basis by the MC," said Amarjeet Singh Anand, a social activist

"At present, Rainak Bazaar, Jyoti Chowk, Sabzi Mandi, PNB Chowk and Namdev Chowk face traffic congestion and illegal parking on both sides of the road. This is happening because most of the commercial activities take place in these areas only. Most of the commercial vehicles which have their origin or destination in the city could be seen parked on the roads. There should be a time restrictions for such vehicles to enter and exit the congested areas of the city," said Sushma, a cosmetologist.

"The government should discourage the use of private transport by strengthening the public transport system. It should promote services like shuttle buses, bicycle lanes, car pools, employer transit subsidies or support programmes and footpaths for the smooth pedestrian movement. The making of new parks and side-walk ways will definitely make people move away from the use of personal vehicles. They should also shift market activities towards the periphery of the town and develop truck terminal/warehouses on the periphery of the town," said Gian Singh.

"As the existing space is already exhausted, there is need to develop a new road network to improve the existing ones. As there is no place for parking, there is a need to promote operational efficiency of the city 's traffic engineering by making more ROBs, flyovers, elevated roads, ring roads, underpasses and subways," said Madhu Rachna, an advocate.

"The biggest problem is that although the Municipal Corporation has specified Rs 10 per entry in the authorised car parking areas, all of them are charging more than that and also according to time. The PUDA market near Jyoti Chowk is not authorised and cannot charge for vehicles. Still, some goons there charge Rs 20 per hour and there is no check on them. Due to such high rates, people often avoid parking their cars in the authorised areas and instead park them on the already congested narrow roads of the city. There should be a check on such goons by the traffic police," said Vikram Showrey, an entrepreneur.

Jalandhar, January 28
Team Dakash of the Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute of Technology will represent India in the Shell Eco-Marathon Asia 2014 competition, which will take place in Manila, the Philippines, from February 6 to 9. Shell Eco-marathon is an annual competition that challenges students from around the world to design, build and drive energy-efficient vehicles. The event aims to inspire young engineers to push the boundaries of fuel efficiency and technical innovation.

Arpit Madaan, one of the six team members, who have developed a light weight diesel prototype car with 250 kmpl average, said it was their own initiative to participate in the competition. Afterwards, the university helped them with the project, which was sponsored by the Speedways Electrical.

''As per the conditions of the competition, we cannot participate if the project weight is exceeding 140 kg. Therefore, we developed a car that has a total weight of 72 kg. We have used aluminum chassis, which has less weight, adjustable steering and plastic body."

A third-year student of industrial production and engineering, Arpit said, "140 teams from all over the world will be participating in the competition."

Jalandhar, January 28
In an effort to promote tourism, the state government has opened a tourist information centre by roping in the Lovely Professional University (LPU), near here.

With the opening of the tourist information centre at the university, Jalandhar is now the 10th city, besides Chandigarh, Amritsar, Patiala in the state, to have such a centre.

The tourist information centre will not only help the students from different countries studying in the university but also the people visiting the city.

The university has provided space for the centre at its main entrance on the GT Road for an easy access to the visitors. 

Jalandhar, January 28
Bharat Vikas Parishad, a charitable trust, along with the National Small Industrial Corporation Ltd, today distributed hearing aids, tricycles, crutches, wheelchairs, and artificial limbs to 53 differently-abled persons.

Rajkumar Chaudhary from Bharat Vikas Parishad said they would help such people in the future as well.

Jalandhar January 28
A Jammu-based person has been missing for the last one week. The victim's brother apprehended some miscreants might have been taken him to Jalandhar.

Ajay Gupta, brother of the missing person, Sanjay Gupta, alleged that his brother had left his house for his business establishment at Narwal in Jammu after opening his shop and didn't return thereafter. He said his car was found parked in the parking lot of Government Medical College in Jammu. "Since his last call detail was traced near Chotti Baradari in Jalandhar, so we suspected that he might have been kidnapped by some Jalandhar-based miscreants," he alleged. — TNS
Ajay Gupta shows a picture of his brother Sanjay Gupta who has been missing for the last one week. A Tribune Photo

Jalandhar, January 28
The police today nabbed a person with 400 grams of smack.

The drug peddler has been identified as Harvinder Singh Swami, a resident of Pucca Bagh locality. Station House Officer Dr Richa Agnihotri said the police had received a tip-off following which a raid was conducted and the accused was nabbed.

During the search operations, the police recovered 400 grams of smack.

The police have also rounded up Swami's wife for investigations. The police said after seeking remand of the accused, his drug connections would be explored to nab the other accomplices.

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