Shimla, August 19
Marred by a fungal attack, all production estimates of apple by the Horticulture Department may go haywire this year as the state has marketed about 46 lakh apple cartons.The season has almost ended in the lower apple belt and the demand for the middle belt apple has picked up.

The outbreak of the twin fungal diseases of “marsonina blotch and alternaria”, both afflict leaves and trigger premature leaf fall, in several pockets of Shimla, Mandi and Kullu have reduced the fruit size. This has put all production targets almost 20 per cent on the lower side this year, said Sanjeev Bragta and Deepak Banchta, orchardists.

The fungi have attacked orchards in Nehra, Kufar, Badaon in Kotkhai, several pockets in Jubbal, Chopal, Rampur and Rohru belts, said farmers.

The present spell of rain has created a humid condition which is conducive for the outbreak of fungal attacks in the orchards as the vegetative growth and green grass act as facilitators, said Dr Vijay Thakur, Vice-Chancellor, Dr YS Parmar University of Horticulture.

“The premature leaf fall hit the size. Farmers should remain strict to the spray schedule to control the fungal attacks in time”, he added.

As many as 2.07 lakh apple cartons are being transported from three main barriers — Parwanoo, Kuddu and Swarghat — daily to markets.

The crop appeared to be 25 to 35 per cent less as compared to last year’s production of 3.69 crore apple cartons, said Gurdev Singh, Director, Horticulture. “The production can be on a lower side this year as the fruit size has been reduced. As many as 125 procurement centres have been started since August 16,” he added.

Deputy Commissioner, Shimla, Dinesh Malhotra said farmers had been provided enough trucks to facilitate transportation of fruit to the markets. The CCTV cameras had been installed to keep a check on the movement of trucks and facilitate the transportation, he added. 

Shimla, August 19
Ex-servicemen slammed the Modi government today for announcing a meager Rs 1,000 crore for 22 lakh ex-servicemen in the country and delaying the implementation of “one rank, one pension” (OROP).

They also demanded the opening of a CSD depot in the state.

Retired soldiers, while talking to The Tribune here, said the state and the Central governments had been playing to the galleries as far as the welfare of the ex-servicemen was concerned.

Capt Jagdish Verma, president of the Honorary Commissioned Officers’ Welfare Association of Himachal Pradesh, said it was regrettable that the Modi government, which talked much about the welfare of serving and ex-servicemen during 
elections, had allocated just Rs 1,000 crore to be disbursed among 22 lakh ex-servicemen.

The Central Government was delaying the implementation of the OROP in the country in letter and spirit, Verma said. The NDA government should allot more funds to implement the OROP.

Even the health facility under the ECHS scheme was inadequate in the state. Also, there was no CSD depot, in the jurisdiction of Himachal Pradesh, the ex-servicemen said.

Referring to the letters sent to the 7th Central Pay Commission’s Chairman, the ex-servicemen said the government had not settled the ongoing court cases of the honorary commissioned officers.

The government had not implemented the reservation scheme for providing government jobs to former defence personnel, said Captain Verma.

Even the arrears for the disabled ex-servicemen had not been released and so was the case with the disability pension, even after the directions issued by Armed Forces Tribunals and courts, the ex-servicemen added.

The condition of the Sainik rest houses in the state was miserable. The political parties talked about ex-servicemen during the elections to win their votes and forgot about later, they said. 

Una, August 19
M Venkaiah Naidu, Union Urban Development and Parliamentary Affairs Minister, in a letter to Anurag Thakur, MP, has announced funds for the purchase of 215 buses. These buses will provide services in Hamirpur and Shimla.

BJP media co-in charge Hari Om Bhanot, in a press statement today, said Rs 14.75 crore had been released to the state government as the first instalment.

Bhanot said 130 buses would ply on the Una-Amb-Santoshgarh and Hamirpur-Jwalamukhi routes, while 50 would ply on the Bilaspur-Ghumarwin-Sundernagar route in Hamirpur segment. 

Shimla, August 19
Suresh Bharadwaj, former Himachal BJP president and sitting MLA from Shimla, today lashed out at the Himachal Lokhit Party (HLP) and the CPM for blaming the BJP for the impasse in the House. He urged the Speaker to reconvene the House and dubbed these parties as “dirty tricks departments” of the Congress.

He asserted that it was not the BJP but a section of the Congress which did not want the House to run smoothly.

Both the HLP and the CPM had appealed to the Speaker to reconvene the House, but the House had been prorogued and the Governor alone could recall the session, he added.

Bhardwaj further said though the onus to run the House smoothly was on the ruling party, there were no sincere efforts to coordinate with the BJP.

Bhardwaj further reiterated that the HLP and the CPM also did not mention that the adjournment motion of the Vidhan Sabha was brought up by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Mukesh Agnihotri at a time when two very important issues, the havoc created by floods and discussion on RUSA, were listed for discussion.

Shimla, August 19
Himachal Pradesh Tourism Development Board Vice-Chairman Vijay Singh Mankotia will represent the state during the Tourism Ministers’ conference. The event is being organised by the Ministry of Tourism, Government of India (GoI), in New Delhi on August 21.

Major Mankotia will be accompanied by Director, Tourism and Civil Aviation, Mohan Chauhan. Important issues related to air connectivity, sanction of projects under tourist destination and circuit schemes of the GoI will be raised, besides including Himachal in the Incredible India campaign.

Shimla, August 19
Heavy rain has claimed the lives of 31 persons and 633 cattle, besides damage to property. Roads and drinking water schemes are the worst hit and the government has provided funds for undertaking restoration works, said Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, presiding over a meeting of the state-level Disaster Management here today.

Stressing on restoration of roads in far-flung tribal and rural areas before the apple season, the Chief Minister, who directed the officials to open all roads by August 22, said out of 336 roads blocked, 187 had been opened while 132 roads were likely to be opened today.

He said apart from the departmental machinery which included 342 excavators-cum-loaders, machinery worth Rs 280 crore had been hired for PWD zones for Shimla, Kangra, Mandi and Hamirpur districts and the total loss of the damaged roads and bridges was assessed around Rs 412 crore.

The CM also gave instructions for restoring the bridge on National Highway-88 over the Kunah rivulet, Seer Khad bridge at Jahu in Hamirpur district and Baghi Khad bridge on Prashar Road in Mandi district on priority.

Reviewing the damage caused to the Irrigation and Public Health, he said 1,869 rural water schemes damaged fully or partially had been restored, besides 14 urban drinking water schemes.

The IPH Department had been made an interim allocation of Rs 4 crore while Rs 22.36 crore had been allocated to the PWD for immediate restoration of roads. It was also agreed to provide Rs 2 crore to the HPSEB for restoration work, he added.

Referring to the losses due to disaster in the last financial year, the CM said he had met and written to the Centre for releasing the remaining amount (Rs 157 crore) out of the total sanctioned amount (Rs 252 crore) as the state government has received Rs 95 crore.

Discussing the bottleneck on the Shimla-Kinnaur highway, he asserted to find a permanent solution to the landslide zone near Urni. He said the practice of sprinkler and Kuhl irrigation should be discouraged as this was a major reason for the landslips besides the blasting undertaken by Jaypee to construct tunnels which had further shakened the fragile hills of Kinnaur.

Reacting to allegations of the Opposition, he stated that government functionaries had reached every affected area and it was wrong to allege that the government was sleeping and nothing had been done. The Deputy Commissioners, in the worst-hit districts, had been visiting the affected areas and providing financial and other assistance, he added.

Shimla, August 19
The fate of the Rs 2,000-crore Himalayan Ski Village, touted as one of the biggest foreign direct investment projects, will finally be decided by the Cabinet as the plea of promoters to be allowed to scale down the project with certain modifications will be placed before the Council of Ministers.

The Department of Tourism and Civil Aviation had referred the plea of the promoters on the modification of the project before the Himachal Pradesh Infrastructure Board (HPIDB). The HPIDB has suggested that the matter should be referred to the Cabinet for a final decision which will now take the final call.

Senior officials too said since the promoters wanted certain modifications in the project which was likely to be taken up in a phased manner with private, public and community participation, it would only be appropriate for the Cabinet to have the final say so that nobody can raise finger.

“As per the laid down norms in case of any modification in the earlier project, fresh bidding has to be undertaken, so let the Cabinet air its view whether their plea can be accepted or fresh bids may be invited,” said an official.

The jinxed project, which faced many a roadblock ever since it was conceived in 2004 during the Congress regime, initially appeared to be a dream project with the backing of Ford. However, despite the signing of an MoU with the HP Government on December 9, 2005, the project never took off. There was stiff resistance by the local communities for fear of vitiating their culture and century-old traditions.

It was in September 2013 that John Sims, Managing Director of the Ski Village, had requested the government to allow the project with certain modifications. Though the main plea of the promoters was that certain changes would be made to ensure greater community involvement so that there were direct opportunities for the locals, it was felt that considering the grim economic scenario, the promoters were left with no other option but to scale down the project.

Seeking government cooperation for the project, the promoters had also made it clear that not only was the budget of the project likely to be halved, but even in terms of the land, the requirement would also be reduced to half. Initially the total land requirement for the project was 93.1 hectares which included 16.3 hectares
government land.

In fact, villagers in Kullu-Manali had come out openly in protest against the project and even the public hearing held at Kothi near Manali in the presence of senior government functionaries had turned violent. 

Dharamsala, August 19
Narrow bridges on the Pathankot-Mandi national highway (NH), that transverses through Kangra district, remain a major bottleneck for traffic. The bridges, including the Kotla bridge, Manji river bridge near Matour and Gajj river bridge near Gaggal, have outlived their life and been declared unsafe. Despite the fact that Army uses the road for ferrying material to Leh via Manali, no urgency has been shown by the Union Government to replace the bridges.

The construction work of the Kotla bridge has been hanging fire since 2009. The national highways wing of the Public Works Department (PWD) had tendered the job at Rs 7.48 crore in 2009. However, the contractor left the work in between.

It took the PWD about five years to retender the work.

Satya Varat Sharma, Senior Engineer, PWD, National Highways, said the construction work of the Kotla bridge had been retendered and allotted to a new contractor. The revised estimate for the construction was Rs 10.54 crore. The work would start just after the monsoons, he said.

The department plans to replace the bridges in a phased manner. A detailed project report (DPR) for replacing the Gajj river bridge has been submitted to the Union Ministry for Surface Transport. For other bridges, a proposal has been sent to the ministry. After the proposal is cleared, the DPR would be sent, he added.

The Kotla bridge is over 100 years old. It supports one-way traffic and is a major bottleneck on the national highway.

The Manji river bridge near Matour is also very old and cannot support heavy traffic. It is the main connecting link between Kangra and Dharamsala. Generally, there is heavy traffic over the bridge. Since the bridge cannot support two-way traffic, it leads to jams on the national highway.

The Gajj river bridge is at the entry to Dharamsala from Gaggal Airport. It also supports one-way traffic and needs replacement. The sources here said the bridge had also been declared unsafe.

Due to these narrow bridges, heavy vehicles cannot reach the Kangra valley. Most of the car agencies have to use the longer and hilly Una-Kangra road to bring in cars to the valley. Even on that road, heavy vehicles carrying cars are stopped at a narrow tunnel near Kangra. From there, the vehicles are driven to the agencies.

Shimla, August 19
Ponywalas of Shimla, Kufri, Solang Nullah, Rohtang Pass and Khajjiar are a harried lot as the Department of Tourism and local municipal bodies have no proper policy for them.

The atmosphere around the historic Ridge maidan and the tourist spot of Kufri in this erstwhile summer capital of the former Raj pervades with stench of horses’ dung and urine.

The Municipal Corporation and the Special Area Development Authority, Shimla, which oversees Kufri, have failed to provide a shelter and poo-bags to them.

Caretakers offer pony rides to tourists as well as local residents on The Ridge as well as in Kufri to make their ends meet. But neither the MC, SADA or the Tourism Department has framed a proper policy keeping both hygiene and upkeep of horses in mind.

“There was a time when we used to operate from Daulat Singh Park and the printing press below The Ridge, but the corporation has uprooted us and allotted a little space on The Ridge, which has no shelter,” said Prakash Chand, president of the Bharat Mazdoor Sangh Union of Ghora Chaalak.

The number of ponywalas, who have got a licence from the corporation, has dwindled to 16 from 250 today, he said.

While the ponywalas on The Ridge hail from Hamirpur, Mandi and Bilaspur, those in Kufri are labourers from Bihar or Nepal, who have been employed by local residentss from Fagu and Kufri. NGOs and tourists have also raised issues such as health and hygiene as more than 300 horses create a mess near the Chini Bangla every day and on the trek to the Mahasu peak.

AK Mehta, a camp operator at Kufri, said: “The area reeks of horse dung and urine as there is no proper policy for pony operators.”

Tourists say they face the same problem at the Rohtang Pass and the Solang Nullah, where more than 500 ghorewalas operate. There are no well-laid tracks for horses, they rued.

Municipal Commissioner Amarjeet Singh said: “The corporation cannot provide shelter to ghorewalas as The Ridge falls in the core-heritage zone. We are planning poo-bags to the ghore walas to maintain health and hygiene.”

Director, Tourism, Mohan Chauhan said: “The local area authorities control the operation of pony operators and fix the rates. We will take up the matter with them.”

Shimla, August 19
To resolve the legal disputes, efforts should be made to settle these by adopting the techniques of Alternative Disputes Resolution Mechanisms, such as arbitration, conciliation, mediation, Lok Adalats and judicial settlement.

This was stated by Chief Justice Mansoor Ahmad Mir while inaugurating a three-day course on “ADR Mechanism, Effective Court & Case Management and Procedural Issues of Trial in Civil Cases.”

The course is being organised by the H P Judicial Academy from August 19 to 21, for the district judges, additional district judges and civil judges (junior division) of the state. As many as 17 judicial officers are participating in the course.

The Chief Justice stressed that Section 89 and other provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure should be effectively used to provide speedy and economic justice to the general litigant public. He also enlightened the judicial officers on various provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, to effectively deal with the procedural issues of trial in civil cases and also advised them to act impartially and uphold the spirit of the Constitution of India, so that the faith of the people in the judicial system was strengthened.

Rakesh Kainthla, Director of Judicial Academy, welcomed the Chief Justice, the dignitaries and participant-officers on the occasion. CB Barowalia, Registrar General, and Anuja Sood, Deputy Director of the Judicial Academy, were also present.

Shimla, August 19
More than 60 renowned artistes of the Shri Ram Bhartiya Kala Kendra, New Delhi, will perform at a two-day ballet “Krishna”. It is being organised on August 23 and 24 at the Gaiety Theatre and all preparations have been made.

This was stated by Upma Chaudhary, Additional Chief Secretary, Art, Language and Culture, here today.

She said Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh would inaugurate the ballet on the opening day and Urban Development Minister Sudhir Sharma would preside over it on the concluding day.

Upma said 12 internal management committees had been constituted to make the show successful. This would be a great opportunity to people of the state to witness top-class artistes of the country perform at their doorstep, she added.

Kangra, August 19
Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) Limited will start drilling at Surani village, 10 km from Jwalamukhi, in the first week of September to explore the possibilities of the presence of gas and oil.

Kallol Bhattacharya, Frontier Basin Drilling Head, told The Tribune today that scientists of the ONGC had identified one point at Surani, on the Jwalamukhi-Palampur road, and the equipment of drilling was in the process of shifting to the site.

He said there were many places identified and this point had kindled the hopes of scientists of the ONGC. Bhattacharya added that some drilling equipment had already arrived at Surani and the remaining was on way from Damooh town of Madhya Pradesh.

“The world’s chief dependence for energy resources during the coming decades will be on oil and natural gas supplies and the world’s energy demand is projected to grow 60 per cent till 2020,” he said.

In the national scenario, the maximum thrust is placed on frontier basin exploration and the recent advances in the geoscientific understanding of these basins, while non-conventional petroleum systems and development of the frontier technologies were playing a critical role in identifying new petroleum provinces.

He said when the drilling would start, it would depend upon the situation as to which depth the well was to be drilled. It was learnt that in the first phase, drilling up to 3,500 metre would be done and when the possibility of the presence of gas and oil were further strengthened, further drilling would continue.

Scientists had concentrated in different parts of Himachal Pradesh in search of natural gas and oil, but the ONGC abandoned the work at different sites near Jawalamukhi after exerting for more than three and a half decades.

The current decision of starting drilling at Surani has kindled hopes of the people of the state and the scientists. 

Shimla, August 19
The scrapping of the Private Educational Institutions Regulatory Commission by the Himachal Pradesh High Court in October 2013 and its subsequent revival by the Supreme Court in June 2014 has dent the regulatory framework of the commission, resulting in delay in the imposition of penalty on erring institutions.

“We have sought information about the admissions made in violation of norms after August 15, 2013, and suspect that the number of violations is more than the figure of 352, given in the High Court. We are also ascertaining that whether private institutions made any admissions after the regulatory commission was scrapped”, sources in the commission said.

The commission has sought the information from private universities regarding the total admissions made last year and also the admissions made in violation of norms.

The commission will send a notice under Section 11 of the Regulatory Commission Act to the universities seeking their explanation. The universities will be given opportunity for one or two personal hearings before deciding the quantum of penalty.

“It is quasi-judicial process as prescribed under the Act and may take three to four months and reach the stage of imposing fine,” sources added.

Five universities in October last year had admitted students in violation of norms, but more universities may be in the net and number of admissions made in violation of norms may be higher.

The government had given one-time relaxation in marks in qualifying examination to private institutions for admissions last year and made it clear that regulatory bodies would be free to impose penalty on these institutions subject to the outcome of writ petitions filed by the Private Universities and Unaided Technical Institutions Welfare Association.

Since both petitions have been dismissed by the High Court last month, the regulatory commission and Himachal Technical University are free to impose penalty as per set guidelines.

Dharamsala, August 19
The Bar Association of Dharamsala has proceeded on an indefinite strike demanding a circuit bench of the Himachal Pradesh High Court. The association said initially they would strike for a week. However, if no action was taken on their demand, they would chalk out a further course of action.

Tek Chand Rana, president of the association, alleged that work in local courts had been hit due to the establishment of circuit courts at the district level. Earlier, all the cases of the District and Sessions Courts were heard at the district headquarters in Dharamsala. However, the circuit court of the District and Sessions Judge is held in different parts of the district. This had hit the livelihood of advocates in Dharamsala.

The Bar Association has demanded that either the circuit bench of the HP High Court be established at Dharamsala or the practice of holding a circuit court be abandoned.

The establishment of a circuit bench of the High Court at Dharamsala is a long-pending demand of the association. Political parties, including the BJP, had included this demand in its manifesto. However, till date, no progress has been made over the matter.

Besides striking their own work, the Bar has put a binding on the working of notaries and oath commissioners. This is likely to hit the common people as they need attestations from notaries and oath commissioners for regular administrative work.

Una, August 19
As revenue officers of the rank of naib tehsildars and tehsildars sat on a one-day pen-down strike today, people who came to the various tehsil and sub-tehsil offices in the district were left harried. The strike has been called by the State Association of Revenue Officers to press for their demands.

Raj Kumar Thakur, Una Tehsildar, said the government had not fulfilled their long-pending demands, including the provision of 35 per cent quota to their cadre for promotion into the Himachal Pradesh Administrative Services (HAS), besides others. He said in lieu of today, the revenue officers would work on the coming Sunday in candle light.

Meanwhile, pressing for their demands, the Joint Patwar-Kanungo Sangh has already implemented work to rule, under which no patwari or kanungo will work beyond the official working hours from 10 am to 5 pm. Ashok Sharma, district president of the Patwar-Kanungo Sangh, said out of the total 192 sanctioned posts of patwari in the district, 39 were lying vacant.

This meant that 39 patwaris were given an additional charge of the vacant circles. The keys of these 39 patwar circle buildings, of which their cadre was given an additional charge, have also been handed over to the respective naib-tehsildars, he added.

Sharma said their main demands include the creation of a kanungo circle for every four patwar circles, provision of salary and perks at par with those of regular patwaris to those working on a contract basis, filling up vacant posts of their cadre and de-notification of all stamping rules, which were notified on July 5, 2014.

Shimla, August 19
The state committee of the Students’ Federation of India (SFI) today demanded the announcement of the dates of the elections of the Students Central Association (SCA) of Himachal Pradesh University (HPU) as per the Lyngdoh Committee recommendations.

State secretary of the SFI Manish Sharma said the results of BA II and the semester system started under RUSA were yet to be declared.

He said the SFI would contest the elections on the issues of implementation of Rashtriya Uchchtar Shiksha Abhiyan in haste, lack of basic facilities in the university, financial crunch faced by HPU and vacant posts of teaching and non-teaching employees.

Chamba, August 19
Over one lakh pilgrims have so far visited Manimahesh since the commencement of the pilgrimage on August 15 in Bharmour here.

This was stated by official sources today. They also had a bath in the sacred waters of the Manimahesh lake.

Around 2,000 pilgrims, including men, women and children hailing from Khundi Mural and Gulu-Ki-Mandi in the Bhaderwah area of Jammu and Kashmir from across the Chamba border had a holy dip in the lake and paid obeisance to Mount Kailash on Janmashtami, the sources said.

The sources said pilgrims hailing from different parts of Himachal and neighbouring states had visited the shrine by around 8,000 light vehicles and 6,000 two-wheelers, besides heavy luxury vehicles.

As many as 500 police personnel had been deployed for traffic regulation and the parking of vehicles along the stretch between the Bharmour-Hadsar highway and link roads, the sources said. Police personnel had been directed to help pilgrims by providing information about the itinerary of the pilgrimage.

Nurpur, August 19
Pradeep Kumar (42) of Chakk Bhatiyan near Pathankot died when his scooty (PB-35 M -8367) was hit by a speeding pick-up jeep (PB-35 Q-7490) coming from the opposite side near Chakki on the Pathankot-Jalandhar highway on Sunday evening. Pradeep was going from the Damtal temple to Pathankot.

The Indora police registered a case under Sections 279 and 304-A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), against the jeep driver and handed over the body to the family after a postmortem today.