Amritsar, February 27
A slack approach of the government and the district administration came to the fore as no attempt has been made to repair a portion of Bhandari Bridge that had collapsed on December 6, following a mishap.

The state government’s tall claims of providing world-class infrastructure in the holy city fell flat. Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal yesterday laid the foundation stone of the ambitious BRTS project on the broken bridge, apparently with a view to earn voters’ attention ahead of the crucial general election.

A senior citizen, Naresh Johar, said keeping in view the significance of the bridge and the high-volume traffic there, residents expected a quick response to repair it. However, passing away of nearly three months after the accident brought it in public how 'sarkari' work progresses.

Commuters are facing a tough time as the bridge often witnesses traffic snarls during the day and no government agency has bothered to repair a part of the bridge that had collapsed on December 6. On the fateful day, a truck laden with sand broke through the narrow side of the Bhandari Railway Overbridge and fell on the railway tracks and disrupted electricity supply to trains. The truck driver had driven the vehicle over the side of the bridge which was originally meant for pedestrians.

The bridge is a vital and highly used link to connect the walled city with the Civil Line areas. Bhandari Bridge, popularly known as 'Uccha Pul', was built in 1955. It was constructed after widening a small bridge of the pre-Partition era, 'Uccha Pul', in 1955. According to the RITES Company which had studied the immense load being borne by the bridge, around 1.64 lakh vehicles pass through this bridge in 24 hours. This led to frequent traffic jams. Due to this, pollution level also increases manifold in the area around the bridge.

Attempt to widen the Bhandari Bridge, as it shrunk with time as the traffic flow on the key link increased manifold following the construction of the elevated road, came to naught. A three-member technical team of the railways had visited the bridge in February 2011 to study the widening feasibility but later rejected the proposal citing that the iron angels which separated the main bridge from the pedestrian path on both sides could not be removed for it being a cantilever bridge. Instead, they had mooted the idea of construction of the new bridge by demolishing it. Since then the Amritsar Improvement Trust has been working to identify alternate site for a parallel bridge.

Deputy Commissioner Ravi Bhagat said he has written for the repair of the bridge to three agencies railways, municipal corporation and PWD. He said reply from these three departments was awaited.

Naresh Chander Goel, Divisional Railway Manager, Ferozepur division of Northern Railway, said a communiqué casting doubt over safety of bridge was received in his office. He ruled out any safety threat from the bridge and signalled that it has been functioning smoothly even about three months after the accident. He said the repair can be carried out by a state government agency after getting the NOC from railways. 

Amritsar, February 27
Panic has spread among medical students living in the hostels of the local Government Medical College (GMC) after yesterday's instance while the city police have registered a case in this connection.

Four medical students were injured when several outsiders allegedly clashed with the medical students on the college premises last evening. A couple of youths from the other group were also reported to be injured. Tension gripped Guru Nanak Dev Hospital under the GMC when the same group of outsiders entered the emergency ward of the hospital where the medical students were admitted and created a scene. They fled after the hospital management called the police. One of the students had reportedly sustained fracture in his head.

A medical teacher, preferring anonymity, said the students were ready to leave the hostel after the outsiders, who claimed to be the supporter of a top politician in the city, threatened them of dire consequences.

"The students are in panic and asking their teachers' permission to leave the hostel," said the teacher.

The faculty members of the GMC today held an emergency meeting and formed a College Security Council to review the security arrangements and take necessary action for strengthening these. "We have formed a security council and nominated members. We will hold our next meeting in a couple of days to review the present situation and strengthen security on the college premises," said Dr Sujata Sharma, who is Principal, GMC, and officiating medical superintendent of the GNDH. She insisted though that there was panic among the students earlier, but the faculty members had met them and assured them that all teachers and management of the college was with them.

A similar incident had occurred in the past due to lack of security arrangements in one of the premier health institutions in the region. Earlier, there was a ban on the entry of outsiders especially in the medical college ground as the girls' hostel is located just a few metres away from the ground. However, the order was revoked after the intervention of a local ruling party leader.

"Have you heard about allowing outsiders near girls' hostel in any institution?" questioned another teacher of the college while emphasising that the entry of outsiders should be banned without delay.

Meanwhile, Sukhjinder Singh, SHO, Majitha road, said that a case under Sections 323, 344 and 506, IPC, had been registered in this connection and further investigations were under progress. He said raids were also being conducted to arrest the alleged culprits.

Amritsar, February 27
City-based artist Bharti Malhotra has opened an art gallery and education space for art students and patrons. The initiative taken as a step to promote art and art spaces in the city, the newly opened Bharti Art Academy has also announced an eight-day long art workshop with Mural guru, renowned artist Bharat Raval.

The Pune-based artist, Raval, popular for his murals will be conducting a workshop for art students in the city on mural making and glass painting. Talking about the details, Malhotra said, 'The gallery-cum-academy will introduce city art enthusiasts to highly innovative techniques in 3D mural art by Raval, who invented the technique 30 years ago in India. The workshop is free for all and will be focusing on the art which has become quite a popular décor and an aesthetic art form.' Bharti, too, specialises in mural art form and runs her own label in the city.

Bharat Raval, who has till date trained 9000 students and held over 95 workshops on art form across India will be sharing his skill with city students. "3D mural making is for anyone who wants to learn. Its simple technique using self formulated resin clay for modeling and media like glass, wood, scrap metal has made it popular with non-artists as well. It has become a popular relief wall art,' shares Bharti. Raval educated from JJ School of Arts Mumbai and later specialised in 3D mural art in India. He will be holding the workshop till March 6, 2014.

The workshop will teach students about 3D ceramic murals, glass murals, Siporex murals and multi-layered landscape murals. 'The purpose of teaching them mixed-media murals is to create self-reliant, employment opportunities by enhancing their creative skills,' said Bharti. The workshop will commence from tomorrow.

Amritsar, February 27
Humanity at large has benefited tremendously from the latest applications of science and technology besides advancements in the field of chemistry as deadly diseases, which were difficult to diagnose, are now being treated with the help of Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR), said Prof CL Khetrapal, Centre of Biomedical Research (CBMR), Lucknow, while delivering the keynote address at the IVth national symposium on "Advances in Chemical Sciences' today at Guru Nanak Dev University (GNDU).

The two-day national symposium was organised by the Department of Chemistry of the GNDU with the collaboration of Centre of Advanced Studies under the aegis of the12th plan of the UGC.

Prof Khetarpal said the most important discoveries of the early 1970s were 2D-NMR proposed by Belgian physicist J. Jeener (1971) and NMR-Imaging proposed by Lauterbur published in Nature (1973). These two discoveries were closely related and had left most of other applications of NMR far behind and have themselves gone way ahead in biological and medical sciences

He said that MRI beats CT Scan as it was five times more sensitive than CT Scan in detecting ischemic strokes and more precise in spotting blood clots and bleeding. He said with this technology, pacemakers, stents and pregnant women could benefit at large.

Prof Khetarpal said the use of NMR as a noninvasive means of studying anatomy, structure and in vivo metabolism is seeing exponential growth since the past three decades due to continuous new developments in NMR techniques and instrumentation. However, the demand for innovative techniques for understanding the human diseases at molecular level is still at its infancy although enormous of efforts are being made in this direction. Monitoring the changes of the disorders at molecular level is more sensitive in identifying diseases in the early stages giving much room for remedial actions, he added.

He said that meditation produces health-promoting benefits like stress reduction and decreased blood pressure. He said that the MRI technique was employed to investigate neural activity of meditation. Mantra induced meditation was compared with other language-activated situations. He said that both experienced meditators and subjects with less or no training with meditation were studied. He said that the results establish a correlation between spirituality and science Red regions show gross activation of brain area during meditation Prefrontal cortex (PFC) and Parietal cortex (PC): Involved in selective and focused attention PFC plays significant role in decision making and PC plays role in focusing attention.

He said that there is, therefore, an urgent need to ?educate? medical doctors and NMR providers endless scope of research in Medical Sciences.

Host varsity Vice-Chancellor Prof A.S Brar, who presided over the inaugural session, said that though development of science and technology has given a lot to human being but due the excess use of natural resources, there would be great loss to humanity. He said that natural resources could be utilized keeping in view the forth coming generation and could be preserved accordingly.

He said that alternative source of energy should be generated like solar energy and solid waste needed to converted into energy. He said that optimum use of solar energy needed to be promoted. He said that the most worried part for the developing and under developing countries is to find out the ways for preserving and conserving natural resources. He said that if these situations if not tackled wisely, there would be economical imbalance and these would be beyond the reach of poor man.

Prof. Brar and Prof. Khetarpar jointly released a Souvenir to mark this occasion. Prof. Brar also honoured Prof. Khetarpal with memento on behalf of the University.

Prof Geeta Hundal, Coordinator of the Symposium welcomed the chief guests and detailed about the symposium. 

Amritsar, February 27
The de-addiction campaign of the Border Security Force has started yielding results, if BSF officials are to be believed. The officials claimed that their information network had expanded, which helped in thwarting arms and drug smuggling from across the border.

“Our information network has expanded after we launched the campaign in August last year. Residents are coming forward and sharing information with us, which helped in making a number of seizures in the recent past,” said MF Farooqui, DIG, BSF.

Notably, the BSF has confiscated around 92 kg of heroin in the past two months while it seized 322 kg of heroin in 2013. Besides recovering 92 kg of heroin in the past two months, the BSF also recovered counterfeit currency worth Rs 4 lakh. It also shot dead two Pakistani smugglers dead. With the success of the campaign, the confidence of the area residents in the BSF has increased manifold. Now, they are sharing information about the persons involved in drug smuggling with the BSF. “We are keeping a close eye on their movement,” said Farooqui while adding that they wanted to cut the supply line. Besides curbing the drug abuse in the border area, the campaign aims at helping people in weaning their wards away from drugs and to offer self-employment opportunities to youngsters.

The BSF has organised a number of de-addiction camps in villages and encouraged people to eradicate the menace. A number of youngsters had also approached the BSF and urged it to bring them to the mainstream.

The BSF took the help of Swami Vivekananda De-Addiction Centre associated with Government Medical College for this. 

The drive

Notably, the BSF has confiscated around 92 kg of heroin in the past two months while it seized 322 kg of heroin in 2013. Besides recovering 92 kg of heroin in the past two months, the BSF also recovered counterfeit currency worth Rs 4 lakh. It also shot dead two Pakistani smugglers

Amritsar, February 27
The Punjab State Ministerial Services Union announced to continue its protest after a meeting of the union today. The union is demanding to remove pay and promotion anomalies besides medical and educational allowances.

The general secretary of the union, Jagdish Thakur, said, "We have decided to continue the pen-down strike till March 5. We will hold a rally outside the Vidhan Sabha on February 6." Thakur said the union had decided to continue the protest till the solution to their problems was found. District President of the union Dalbir Singh Bajwa said, "The pen-down strike will affect the disbursal of salaries to government employees in all government departments." Bajwa said they knew that people would suffer because of their protest but the decision was taken as the government did not respond to their demands.

Gurinder Sodhi, finance secretary of the union, said if the government failed to take any decision on their demands, the association would intensify its agitation. "We have been submitting memorandums to the government for the last one-and-a-half-year without any result," he said. 

Amritsar, February 27
A seminar on the need to save water was organised at International Fateh Academy today. Students were apprised of the ways to prevent the wastage of water and on using it judiciously. They were also told how drip irrigation was a better method for irrigation.

Jagbir Singh, chairman of International Fateh Academy, said rainwater harvesting was significant due to erratic monsoon in the country. He said deforestation was leading to the fall in underground water table.

Chief guest Inder Singh, former Mayor, London, appreciated efforts of the academy. A cheque for Rs. 50,000 was presented by Jagbir Singh to the Social Welfare Society for organising the seminar and contributing to the save water movement.— TNS 

Amritsar, February 27
The Voluntary Health Association of India has started a programme "Samvad" to control tuberculosis. Volunteers of the association organised a one-to-one interaction with the Central Jail inmates to identify TB patients today.

Programme coordinator Axshaya Rajeev Chaudhary said, "The volunteers held a one-to-one interaction with the jail inmates and noted down symptoms of any physical problem in them." He said as the jail was a congested area and hygienic conditions were unavailable to prisoners, a TB patient in the jail had the potential to communicate the disease to hundreds of prisoners.

The team has also carried out a door-to-door survey in the slums of the city. "We have visited around 6,000 homes in various localities of the city till now," Chaudhary said, adding that a list of suspected cases has been prepared and they would send the samples for sputum tests soon. 

Amritsar, February 27
Raj Kakra, Isha Sharma and Sukhdeep Sukha were in the city to promote their upcoming film "Kaum De Heere". Based on the 1984 riots and their aftermath, the film has a new star cast.

The film came into news when it was denied clearance by the Censor Board due to its contentious content. Based on former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi's assassination by her bodyguards, the film reportedly throws light on the former PM's life and incidents leading to her assassination by her bodyguards Beant Singh and Satwant Singh.

"It is true that the film was supposed to be released on February 28 but due to some objections raised by the Censor Board, the producers submitted the movie to the revision committee of the board. The revision committee's decision will be announced soon and we hope for a favourable decision," says Ravinder Ravi, director of the film.Raj Kara, a punjabi lyricist, says, "The film is not just about the assassination of the former PM but also about the emotions of the assassins' family members. I always wanted to work in such a film." Kakra plays the role of Beant Singh in the film.

The film stars Sukhdeep Sukh and Isha Sharma in lead roles, along with Raj. The story of the movie is written by Ravinder Ravi. The film is likely to be released on March14. 

Bathinda, February 27
The death of two ‘kanwarias’ in an accident on Mahashivratri sparked off protests. A mob also burnt a truck canter near Ghunas village in Barnala. Kanwar is the annual pilgrimage of Hindu devotees who bring holy water from Haridwar and other religious places to sprinkle it in the temples of Lord Shiva.

The 'kanwarias' were walking on foot by the roadside when a speeding truck canter, rashly driven by an unidentified driver, crushed them, injuring two others seriously.

The devotees of Lord Shiva and various other religious groups also announced a bandh in view of the two mishap.

A complete bandh was witnessed today in Rampura, Bhucho and Balianwali mandis.

The accident took place at around 5.30 am. The vehicle driver fled from the spot immediately after the accident. The deceased were identified as Suresh Kumar, 33, a Rampura resident, and Gurmel Singh.

The duo along with many others was returning to Rampura after taking holy water from Haridwar on the pious occasion. The three other seriously injured were taken to the Rampura Hospital from they were two were shifted to Bathinda Civil Hospital. One of them was further referred to Ludhiana and another to the PGIMER, Chandigarh. Two of the three injured are said to be critical.

The injured were identified as Ramesh Singla and Deepak Kumar, residents of Rampura.

Son of Punjab Education Minister Sikandar Maluka and Chairman of Zila Parishad Bathinda, Gurpreet Maluka, reached Rampura to condole the death of kanwarias.

Maluka announced Rs 5 lakh for the kin of the deceased.

Meanwhile, heavy police force was deployed in and around Rampura Phul in view of the incident to maintain law and order. 

Amritsar, February 27
The four-day inter-departmental cultural competition Jashan-2014 of Guru Nanak Dev University began today. More than 600 students from various university departments are participating in the event, which would conclude on March 2. Uma Gurbaksh Singh, chairperson of the Gurbaksh Singh Nanak Singh Foundation, Preet Nagar, Amritsar, inaugurated the event.

Uma Gurbaksh Singh said any competition should be beyond the spirit of defeat or victory. She also praised the university for its achievements in academics and extra-curricular activities. Students from various department of the University will participate in 30 cultural competitions.

On the opening day, bhangra was performed. Students from the Music Department also performed on the occasion. Folk songs, skit, mimicry, collage making, rangoli and poster-making competitions will be held tomorrow.

On March 1, mime, nautanki, western dance and quiz competitions will be held. On March 2, creative dance, giddha competitions will be held. — TNS 

Amritsar, February 27
The working in the Birth and Death Certificate Department under the municipal corporation has once again come under the scanner after an MC employee was shifted back to the department within a week of his transfer in the Health Department.

Varinderjit Singh, a dispenser, was shifted to the Health Department on February 7, whereas he was relieved on February 18. Interestingly, he was transferred back on February 24, citing "administrative interests."

Ironically, the man in question is facing a number of complaints regarding "corrupt" practices in the department. He was even booked by the Vigilance Bureau for the same reason and he also faced suspension a number of times.

The order of reverting him to the Birth and Death Certificate Department has mocked tall claims of Local Bodies Minister Anil Joshi who had said that no person would stay in his seat for more than three years. The decision was taken to end large-scale corruption in the MC, he said.

According to information, Varinderjit was also accused of swindling a local resident, Charanjit Singh, of Rs 50,000 on the pretext of providing him a job in the MC. Charanjit even worked for eight months after giving a fake approval. He lodged a complaint with the MC Commissioner and investigations were under progress.

Nagrik Adhikar Parishad, a local NGO, shot a letter to Joshi in this regard seeking cancellation of his transfer in the department. The NGO alleged he managed to come back in the department as a number of officials were hand in glove with him.

The NGO alleged that Varinderjit had been facing cases of tempering with the records, issuing fake certificates, possessing illegal arms and gambling in various police stations.

D P S Kharbanda, Commissioner Municipal Corporation said that he might have been transferred in "routine". He said he would take action after looking into the matter. 

Amritsar, February 27
The Dairy Development Department organised the programme, "Women Empowerment Through Dairy Farming", at Hoshiarnagar here today.

Speaking on the occasion, Animal Husbandry and Fisheries Minister Gulzar Singh Ranike said the department had offered rural women an opportunity to supplement their family income.

He said the interested women were being given 15-day training to manage dairy farms. He added that rural women were being given 50 per cent subsidy to set up a dairy farm.

He said the department had planned to set up at least 20 more dairy farms. To avail the scheme, a woman should be 25 to 40 years of age and her family should not have more than 5 acres of land.

However, the woman's family should have the means to provide security for the loan.