Seminar on hospital management
Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, December 18
To stimulate the thought process of senior medical professional on key management subjects and to clarify understanding of these for better management decisions in the field of health care, a five-day seminar on hospital management began at Command Hospital, Chandi Mandir, today.

In his inaugural address, the General Officer Commanding-in-Chief, Western Command, Lieut-Gen Surjit Singh, stressed the need to accord top priority to provide better medicare in military hospitals. The issue of hospital management came up prominently in the last Army Commanders’ conference in New Delhi, and it was felt that there was enough scope for further improvement of healthcare services by the use of modern techniques of hospital management, he added.

The Army Commander said that with clientele expectations rising continually, the job of medicare service providers had become more challenging. Criticism and feedback emanating from patients must be examined to bring about improvement in the services, he added.

In his welcome address, the hospital Commandant, Major-Gen Partap Dayal, said that experts from civilian hospitals as well as officers from the Army Medical Corps would have an opportunity to exchange views for mutual benefit.

Later, in the first session on the human resource management, Col R.P. Bhatnagar, spoke on team building. Dr Girish Jaswal highlighted various aspects of motivation and organisation behaviour, while Dr Anil Kumar Gupta delved on the subject of delegation and participative management.

Other topics to be covered in the succeeding days include material management, hospital engineering services, hospital support services and hospital information system.

DAVC-10 move up in kho-kho tourney
Our Sports Reporter

Chandigarh, December 18
DAV College, Sector 10, Chandigarh moved up in the Panjab University Inter-College Kho-Kho Men's Tournament played here today at the Panjab University grounds. The DAV players won two of their matches when they defeated MR Government College, Fazilka, by one turn and 18 points and then outclassed BAM Khalsa College, Garhshankar, by one turn and 23 points. In the other matches of the day, SD College, Hoshiarpur, outwitted MR Government College, Fazilka, by one turn and 16 points.

Judo championship

Women judokas of Panjab University did their university proud when they secured the second place in the All-India Inter-Varsity Women's Judo Championships by securing 17 points. GND University clinched the first place in the meet, while MD University got the third place. The medal winners included, gold medal — Manpreet (below 78 kg); silver medals — Aarti Sharma (below 70 kg), Neelam Punia (below 70 kg), Narinder Kaur (below 44 kg) and Dipika (below 52 kg).

Skating championship

The Chandigarh Roller Skating Association will hold the Chandigarh State Skating Championships on December 25 and 26 at Bhavan Vidyalya in Sector 27. About 200 skaters are likely to take part in this two-day meet. According to Mr Jagpal Singh, secretary of the association, it will also serve as the basis of selection of the UT Skating team for the National Skating Championships to be held at Visakhapatnam (AP) from January 15 to 20, 2002. Entries for the state meet can be given to Ms Gurinder and Ms Ranjit Mehta from 3 pm to 5 pm at the above venue.

Test cricketers fail to enthuse crowds
Ravi Dhaliwal

Patiala, December 18
Cricket, a game for and of the masses, is all about people and passion. Take out the passion people bring in with them and the game will be rendered hollow.

This age-old saying seems to have been lost on the locals as was reflected from the fact that just half a dozen odd spectators made it to the Dhruv Pandove Stadium here yesterday. This notwithstanding the fact that several Test cricketers, one-day specialists and a couple of on the fringe cricketers were displaying their skills during the crucial North Zone Ranji Trophy league encounter played between star studded Delhi and Haryana. This development not only perplexed the local organisers but also stood out as an eyesore as Test cricketers, household names in a cricket mad nation and whose stature is next only to film stars and gods, found it hard to believe that they were playing to an empty stadium.

Notwithstanding the slick organising skills of the officials of the Patiala Cricket Association who left no stone unturned in their endeavour to make the match a success, the match in itself turned out to be a bad advertisement as far as spectator response was concerned. One of the reasons perhaps was that the pre-match publicity hype was missing.

The Test cricketers who played in what turned out to be an intense contest were India discards Ashish Nehra and wicketkeeper Vijay Dahiya, fast bowler Amit Bhandari who has donned the India colours in half a dozen one dayers and cricketers like Haryana skipper Ajay Ratra, Delhi batsmen Mithun Minhas and Gautam Gambhir — all of whom have a foot in the revolving door of the Indian selection committee and are all set to yank it open.

The Delhi coach,Surinder Khanna, who represented the country in the 1979 World Cup held in England under the captaincy of S.Venkatraghavan and who was declared the man of the series in the inaugural Asia cup held in Sharjah in 1984, was also present. Yet another jarring note struck was the absence of scores of starry- eyed young cricketers, who ironically train at the same stadium in the evenings. It would have been some good education for them had their coaches instructed them to be present at the ground to watch their hero’s in action and learn the finer points of the game.

VCs’ cricket tournament opens
Our Sports Reporter

Patiala, December 18
The third All-India Vice-Chancellors cricket tournament for employees of various universities was inaugurated on the university campus by the Vice-Chancellor, Dr J.S Ahluwalia, here today.

Nine teams from various universities of the Northern region are participating in the tournament. While speaking on the occasion, Dr Ahluwalia said that participants from different universities would get a chance to interact with each other. Dr Ahluwalia added that from next year, teams from universities from all over the country would be invited to take part in the tournament which was an annual feature.

Speculation rife on PUDA move
Rajmeet Singh
Tribune News Service

SAS Nagar, December 18
After lying low for over five months, the Punjab Urban Planning and Development Authority (PUDA) is learnt be to “actively” pursuing the “absorption” of at least four well-connected persons working on deputation with the authority. The final nod for the absorption of the deputationists is likely to be granted in the meeting of the authority, scheduled for December 21.

At least two of the well-connected persons were being absorbed against two recently created posts — Senior Manager ( Projects ) and Project Manager ( Computerisation and IT). It may be noted that the creation of the two posts by circumventing rules and regulations had attracted strong reaction of the PUDA employees.

Sources in the authority said that a relative of a close aide of the Punjab Chief Minister and a kin of a bureaucrat were among the deputationists whose case for absorption was being taken in the authority meeting. Taking a serious note of the move to absorb certain persons in the organisation, the PUDA Employees Association has threatened to hold a gate rally in front of the head office of PUDA, if it went ahead with the move to absorb the deputationists.

Inquires reveal that in July, the authority had created posts of Senior Manager ( Projects) and Project Manager( Computers and IT) after surrendering a vacant post of an architect and two posts of law officers. The employees lament that the work being assigned to the beneficiaries was being handled earlier by other officials. Going systematic, two employees of Punwire were taken on a contract for six months which was further extended for six months. After creating the two posts, the deputationists were to be absorbed, said the agitated employees.

In case of a stenographer, said to be a close relative of a person in the personal staff of the Chief Minister, a regular post had already been created for his absorption. An Additional Chief Administrator (ACA) working on deputation from another development authority was likely to be absorbed, said sources in the authority.

The PUDA Employees Union today held an emergency meeting to decide the future course of action against the move to absorb the deputationists. The union leaders said PUDA was taking the agenda of absorbing the deputation in the authority meeting on December 21.In the meeting, Mr Gurmail Singh, Chairman and Mr Ashok Mehra, general secretary of the union, said the matter was being taken up with the authority so that avoidable financial burden could be checked.

The union leaders said the Vice-Chairman of the authority had already disagreed to the proposal to absorb the deputationists. The December 21 meeting is being held in absence of the vice-Chairman, stated the employees.

MC wants funds released
Our Correspondent

SAS Nagar, December 18
The local Municipal Council has asked the Local Government Secretary to get funds released from PUDA for maintenance work in various sectors.

In a letter sent to the Secretary, the council president, Mr Kulwant Singh, said that after the development of new sectors the PUDA authorities handed these over to the civic body for maintenance. However, no financial help was given by PUDA for this purpose. The financial condition of the council was not strong enough to undertake such maintenance work. Besides, the government had exempted the town’s residents from the payment of house tax until 2005 and recently octroi had been scrapped. Therefore, the council at present could not generate adequate funds from any source.

The president said the council had passed a resolution on July 27 that the patterns adopted in Chandigarh and Panchkula should be followed by PUDA for ensuring that funds were available to the council. In Chandigarh, the administration had given the ownership right on some land to the Municipal Corporation and in Panchkula 75 per cent of the income from the building fee and the extension fee was given to the Municipal Council there.

MC gets Rs 1.6 cr as compensation
Tribune News Service

SAS Nagar, December 18
The Local Government today released Rs 1.6 crore to the SAS Nagar Municipal Council as compensation for the financial loss incurred by it after the abolition of octroi. The amount has been released for the month of December.

The amount has been released in accordance with the income from octroi earned in the corresponding month in 2000. For the month of December 2000, the civic body had earned Rs 1.24 crore from octroi.

Meanwhile, a sewer cleaning machine built at a cost of Rs 16 lakh was today handed over to the civic body after a demonstration in the Industrial Area.