Jalandhar, August 25
Illegal meat shops have been mushrooming under the nose of the Municipal Corporation here, but no action is being taken against these. It seems the only reason officials are allowing shopkeepers to sell unhygienic meat is they are hand in glove with shopkeepers.

Interestingly, even MC officials admit that only a countable numbers of meat sellers have taken licence to run meat shops. A majority of them are running meat houses in residential localities, causing a big nuisance to residents. Due to inaction by the MC, Health Department and the police, no concrete action is being taken against the meat shops.

As per a rough estimate, there are over 300 meat shops or butcheries dealing in mutton in urban areas of Jalandhar alone, about 40 to 50 butcheries selling pork and over 1,000 chicken shops/butcheries across the district. Thousands of outlets across the district procure/cull or sell various animals, flouting various Acts such as Punjab Municipal Corporation Act, 1976; Punjab Animals Slaughter Control Act 1963; Punjab prohibition of Cow Slaughter Act, 1955; Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Slaughter House) Rules, 2001.

These butcher institutes, apart from posing health hazards to the consumers, have also made the lives of common man hell, as animal wastes, blood and refuse is mostly disposed of on the streets or in dumps around these butcheries. The concentration of these units in the district is mainly near the bus stand, Garha Road, Gurunankpura, Maqsudan, Transport Nagar, Focal Point, Buta Pind, Bashirpura, Wadala Chowk, Bhur Mandi, among other areas.

Sources said due to less checks by officials, the meat of diseased, infected, injured and unhygienic animals are also being sold at many shops and in the absence of checks, people are consuming such meat by loads.

Jalandhar, August 25
Twelve B.Tech passouts of the Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute of Technology (NIT), who are yet to receive the grant of their eighth semester fee from the Centre as per the SC Post Matric Scholarship Scheme of the government, are facing trouble.

The authorities have denied them provisional degrees, a copy of which they have to deposit with their companies with whom they are set to join.

Being SC students with an annual family income of less than Rs 2.5 lakh, they are entitled to the scheme and the institute authorities have asked them to either deposit an amount of nearly Rs 24,000 from their own side or wait till the time the government deposits the amount in their accounts. The students said that in the event of college not issuing them the degree, they had not been able to join the companies.

The students have even met Deputy Commissioner Kamal Kishor Yadav, District Welfare Officer Rajinder Singh and Chairman Punjab State Commission for SCs Rajesh Bagha, but the college authorities have failed to budge.

The names of the students are Jatinder, Harmanpreet Singh and Inderjit Singh of Industrial and Production Engineering, Malkeet Singh and Malkeet of Textile Engineering, Rahul, Shinder Kumar and Neeraj of Civil Engineering, Amanpreet Kaur of Computer Science Engineering, Jaswant Rai of Electronics and Communication Engineering, and Gurvinder Singh and Bishnu Mahesh of Mechanical Engineering.

The institute authorities have been resorting to this measure against the students despite the fact that there have been orders of Secretary, Welfare Department, Seema Jain, dated June 12, 2014, to Dr Roshan Sunkaria, Principal Secretary, Higher Education, saying the colleges should not be allowed to withhold any certificate or document of any SC student even on any delay in the reimbursement of fee.

Jalandhar, August 25
The issue of the installation of entrance gates in various colonies here is getting murkier, with residents on collision course on the matter.

There are groups within same colonies who are for and against the installation and have been fighting it amongst themselves. Residents of Garden Colony, who have installed an entrance gate, have been supporting their issue, claiming it to be a law and order problem, while those opposing it have said that they and their guests have been suffering inconvenience on this account.

Gurpreet Singh, president, and OP Gambhir, vice-president of Garden Colony, have said that the decision of installing the gate had been taken after a general body meeting of their welfare society. They have said that since there were security guards who opened and closed the gates to facilitate entry and exit, no one was facing any inconvenience.

“Personal IDs only of visitors are checked who do not reside inside the colony. Since the administration and the police are unable to provide security to general public, the arrangement of gate has been made to secure the women and residents from any incident of snatching,” they said. The residents have further pointed out that they had even got stickers printed and pasted on vehicles so that they are not stopped for checking at the gates.

Gates have already been installed in various colonies, including Rajinder Nagar, Guru Teg Bahadur Nagar, Green Model Town, New Green Model Town, Green Park and Seth Hukum Chand Colony and guards have been deputed to check people’s entry. Recently, residents of New Jawahar Nagar and Mota Singh Nagar had also installed gates.

However, as per the law book, restricting entry to a public road by installing gates is a violation under Section 246 (i) of the Punjab MC Act. As per the Act, “No person shall, except with the permission of the Commissioner granted in this behalf, erect or set up any wall, fence, rail, post, step, booth or other structure whether fixed or movable or whether of a permanent or temporary nature, or any fixture in or upon any street or upon or over any open channel, drain well or tank in any street so as to form an obstruction to, or an encroachment upon, or projection over, or to occupy any portion of such street, channel, drain, well or tank.”

Commissioner MC Manpreet Singh Chattwal said installing gates was unlawful, but he had been receiving representations from both sides on the matter. “We plan to counsel the residents on the matter and discourage them from putting up gates,” he said. 

Jalandhar, August 25
With more than 1,200 applicants for high security registration plates (HSRPs) turning up at the District Transport Office each day, an additional counter for the levy of fee for the purpose was started to provide relief to the public.

However, there has been no respite for hundreds of visitors to the Punjab Roadways workshop on Garha Road, where the applicants have to stand in scorching heat the day through to wait for their turn to get the plates fitted.

With just a provision of a small shed, tarpaulin and a tree and no fan, most applicants are forced to brave the scorching heat till the time their work is done. Many applicants say that they have had to stand for as long as five hours to get their turn. There also is no provision for drinking water and the public is forced to keep buying water from outside till the time they are at the spot.

Ramit Ahuja, a businessman, said he wasted his two full days in getting the job done. “One entire day went in paying up the fee and jostling for turn at the DTO counter. The second day went at the workshop, where I had to purchase as many as three water bottles to quench my thirst. If the department makes arrangements a little better, hundreds of people will be relieved of the daily turmoil,” he fumed, adding that some seating arrangement, a shed, a fan and drinking water were the minimal requirements that the department should have made, especially when it is charging over Rs 500 from over a thousand people each day.

Not just the applicants, it is difficult even for the mechanics who keep working throughout the day. “We do not just bear the heat but also the foul remarks of visitors, all of whom want their work to be done on a priority basis,” they said. Queuing in scorching heat

There has been no respite for hundreds of visitors to the Punjab Roadways workshop on Garha Road, where the applicants have to stand in scorching heat through the day to wait for their turn to get the plates fitted. With just a provision of a small shed, tarpaulin and a tree and no fan, most applicants are forced to brave the scorching heat till the time their work is donex

Jalandhar, August 25
With no move or programme to tackle the begging menace in the city, the residents seem to have been exasperated. Residents feel that stern laws and their proper enforcement is the need of the hour. They say the lack of a rehabilitation programme plays a major role in encouring begging.

Jalandhar, August 25
Five days have passed but the police are yet to trace Amandeep, an NIT BTech third-year student.

However, the police said that the efforts were being made to trace him.

The student had disappeared after he failed to convince a girl for friendship. The sources said the police have recovered a diary of Amandeep in which it had clearly been stated that he was in one-sided love affair.

“In his diary, Amandeep has stated that he loves a girl, but she is not accepting his proposal. Due to this, he is in tension,” said a police official.

It has also come to the fore that a day before the boy had gone missing from the hostel of the institute on August 20, he had organised a birthday party and also invited the girl. But the latter did not turn up. Since that day, Amandeep reportedly went into depression. On the very next day, he disappeared from his hostel room, leaving his mobile phones, laptop and other belongings.

Parents of Amandeep have been visiting several places across the state to trace him but to no avail.

The police is also digging up the call details of the boy, to inquire if he was in contact with any person before disappearing from the hostel.

The police said that the boy has even deleted his Facebook account to prevent hide his whereabouts.

Jalandhar, August 25
Students from 232 government and aided schools demonstrated their creativity and in-depth knowledge of subjects as they participated in the six-day District-Level Inspire Award Exhibition being organised by the National Council for Science, Technology and Communication that began at Sain Dass AS Senior Secondary School here on Monday.

A three-day elementary-level exhibition began today, while that of secondary-level is slated to begin on August 28.

Akhilesh, a student of Government Middle School, Gohar Nangal, had come up with a new ‘anti-malaria device’, which, he said , could help check the breeding of mosquitoes in village ponds at a one-time cost of Rs 500. Operated with the help of a battery, the device creates bubbles and ripples in the pond as it moves about on the surface of the water.

“Since it does not allow the water to stand still, the mosquitoes are not able to breed. If a village panchayat invests a minimal amount of Rs 1,500 on three such gadgets, it can get rid of the menace.” said Akhilesh. He gave the credit of his work to his guide Sandeep Sagar.

A student of Government Middle School Lambri, Karanvir, had come up with a project on devising a car with clutch control in right hand. He said that he got the idea from his science teacher Upinder Kumar, who being polio-afflicted had problem in using his left leg.

For the exhibition, he had purchased a frontal portion of an old Maruti car including dash board, steering including hand and foot control set up. He had got the sides and the hind portion of the car cut from it.

“The project cost me Rs 3,500 and anyone having one leg disability could drive a car spending the same amount,” said Karanvir.

Another model in the exhibition was by Rahul of Government Middle School Avtar Nagar. The model titled ‘Aao Brahm Mandal di sair kariye’ was actually a mini-planetarium. The visitor had to enter a dome shaped tent which was kept inflated with the help of a fan pushing in air via a tunnel. A revolving lamp was kept underside a reverse perforated basket. The perforations in the basket had been made to represent planets on the basis of different shapes, sizes and distance from the Sun.

Rahul said he had taken the idea from exhibits at Science City and his teacher Sumit Gupta helped him in its designing.

The students have put up various projects including those on generating hydro-electricity, water filtration, Pythagoras theorem, finding square roots through alternative methods at the exhibition

ADC (D) Kumar Amit inaugurated the exhibition. DEO (secondary) Harinder Pal Singh and District Science Supervisor Baljinder Singh coordinated for the event. They said the projects would be judged on the third day.

“From the fourth day an exhibition by secondary-level students will begin, in which students of Class IX and X will participate. The prize distribution will be held on August 30,” said Baljinder. 

Jalandhar, August 25
Leaders and activists of the District Congress Committee (Urban) staged a protest against the hike in the power tariff by the state government here on Monday.

Led by the DCC (Urban) president Rajinder Beri, party leaders gathered outside Power Corporation office Shakti Sadan and burnt the effigy of the Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal. The protesters also raised slogans against the SAD-BJP alliance.

Beri said, already, the public in general, had been suffering from the price rise and the hike in the power tariff to the tune of 2.74 per cent would further make things difficult.

“Eversince, the SAD-BJP alliance has come into power, there has been an exorbitant increase in the power tariff for the consumers belonging to all categories. The industry as well as domestic users in the state are feeling the pinch of the rise in power rates.”, added Beri.

Congress leaders also pointed out that the electricity supply during the tenure of the Congress government from 2002 to 2007 in the state was much better than the present government.

“Congress purchased power from outside at higher rates, but made sure that no financial burden should be passed on to the consumers, ” said the leaders. — TNS

Jalandhar, August 25
Guru Gobind Stadium hosted a grand opening of 28th JCT Punjab State Super Football League here today.

Inder Singh, Arjuna awardee graced the occasion and kick started the league.

Last year’s runners-up Punjab Police started its Super League Campaign in fashion by a solitary goal win over arch rivals BSF in an opening match. The players of the BSF were looking so desperate to score in the first 20 minutes and showed its supreme tactics game.

In the 61st minute of the game Punjab Police created a chance to score, when Harpreet left winger created a move which BSF defender Vishal could not clear ball and alert Jaswinder Singh made no mistake making the ball past BSF goalkeeper.

In the fag end of the game, the BSF made attempts in search of an equaliser, but it was too slate to beat the Punjab Police. The match ended with 1-0 win for Punjab Police. 

Phagwara, August 25
A daylight burglary took place in Adarsh Nagar locality here today.

The incident took place when Hardev Singh Virdi, owner of the house, was away along with his wife.

Sources said the burglars entered the house after breaking the locks open and decamped with Rs 40,000, two gold bangles, three diamond rings, one gold ring, and foreign currency notes.

The police said an estimated loss of worth Rs 4 lakh had taken place. A case has been registered. — OC