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Katwal tapes issue set to
rock BJP demands CM’s resignation Government seeks liberal fiscal aid The Himachal Pradesh Government has urged the 12th Financial Commission to recommend adequate devolution of funds for the state not only to cover its projected cumulative non-Plan revenue deficit of Rs 31,552.85 crore over the 2005-10 period but also to leave a certain minimum revenue surplus to help sustain the pace of development. 200 cr compensation for ban on forest fellings sought The Himachal state unit of the BJP has urged the 12th Finance Commission to compensate the state for the ban imposed on green fellings by recommending additional devolution of at least Rs 200 crore per annum. |
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Finance panel for reliable transport system Govt withdraws Pawar as HPU Registrar Mr R.D. Panwar, Registrar of Himachal Pradesh University, has been withdrawn from the university. Mr Panwar’s appointment had been quashed by the Himachal Pradesh High Court on the ground that he did not fulfil the requisite qualification for the post of Registrar. Poor rainfall delays sowing
of wheat Two persons were killed in two accidents in the district today. Devi Ram of Doghra village fell from a bus at Aut Bazar and was seriously injured. He was taken to Hospital where he succumbed to his injuries.
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Katwal tapes issue set to
rock Vidhan Sabha Shimla, December 13 In fact, both parties have started working on their respective strategies much earlier to confront each other in the House. Armed with the voluminous “deleted data” retrieved from the hard disk of the computers of former Chief Minister’s office regarding recommendations for appointments made during the BJP regime, the Virbhadra government has granted sanction to prosecute Mr S.M. Katwal, former Chairperson of the controversial state subordinate services selection board, to ensure that a challan against him was presented in the court the very day the session gets under way. The objective is to embarrass the BJP, which has been claiming that the Vigilance and Enforcement Departments have failed to “unearth” any scam in the recruitments made by the board despite eight months of intensive investigations. The BJP, on the other hand, is banking on the Katwal cassettes, tactically leaked on the eve of the session, to put the Congress on the back foot. The cassette, which allegedly contains evidence of Congress leaders making recommendations to Mr Katwal for selection of their favoured candidates, will come in handy for the BJP to counter the hard disk data missiles of the Congress. There are reports that some more Katwal case settes will be released during the session to expose the “double standards “of the Congress. The brief session will be full of fireworks. The developments in Himachal Pradesh University, particularly the Arvind Kaul Committee report which has been dubbed as a “political document” by the BJP, are also likely to be debated in the house. The report had indicted Dr S.D. Sharma, Vice-Chancellor, who was subsequently forced to resign, and recommended annulment of all irregular appointments made during the BJP rule. However, the BJP plans to highlight the alleged fallacies in the report and shift the focus to the irregular appointments made during the Congress rule from 1993 to 1998. It has already submitted a memorandum to the Chancellor regarding the factual errors in the Kaul committee report. The legislative groups of both the Congress and the BJP will meet tomorrow to work out their respective game plans for the session. |
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BJP demands CM’s resignation Shimla, December 13 Addressing a press conference here, he said the audio cassette which contained the conversation of various Congress leaders with Mr
S.M. Katwal had added a new dimension to the ongoing inquiry into the alleged irregularities in recruitments by the board. |
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Government seeks liberal fiscal aid Shimla, December 13 The official memorandum presented to the commission here yesterday, while seeking liberal financial assistance, stressed that the consideration of efficiency should apply to Central and state governments. It pointed out that the total revenue transfers as a percentage of gross revenue receipts of the Centre had declined from 39.34 per cent in 1979-80 to 36.71 per cent in 1999-2000. There was a need to reverse this trend. To impose a hard budget constraint on the Central Government, the commission must recommend devolution out of gross tax collections and not net proceeds of taxes, it said. As an alternative, the commission could consider restoration of the pre-1989-90 practice of providing Central budgetary support as part of plan funding not only to cover the Plan resource gap but also to cover the non-Plan gap. Instead of linking reforms with revenue deficit grants, the commission could create a separate incentive corpus. Since a penalty has already been built in the projections of the commission, withholding a further 15 per cent of recommended devolution amounted to “double jeopardy” and only exacerbated the financial woes of fiscally disadvantaged states. Moreover, the scheme, as it was designed, extended Article 275 grants to certain states even though these were not in need of the grants. Mr C. Rangarajan, Chairman of the commission, appreciated the performance of the state in the social sector, especially literacy and poverty alleviation, but expressed concern over the increasing revenue deficit which was estimated to reach a level of 9.2 per cent Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) in 2002-03, while the fiscal deficit was expected to go up to 14.6 per cent. He said the state government needed to pay attention to reducing the fiscal deficit by augmenting tax revenues as well as by expenditure compression and containing the debt within sustainable limits. The state government could also consider appropriate legislative measures for containing debt. Mr Rangarajan noted that the revenue expenditure of the state had increased at a faster annual rate of 13.8 per cent during 1997-2003 as compared to the growth of revenue receipts at 11.0 per cent. Of particular concern was the combined burden of interest, pension and salary expenditure, which as a percentage of revenue receipts increased from 70.3 per cent in 1997-98 to 115.7 per cent in 2003-04. Apart from evolving a general scheme of fiscal transfers, the commission will also take into account the state’s specific concerns and problems, he observed. Earlier, Mr Virbhadra Singh, Chief Minister, said the state’s financial woes had multiplied because of the shortfall in the projected Central tax share and 15 per cent deductions of reform-linked revenue deficit grants, which together cost the state about Rs 1,000 crore over the five-year period of the 11th Finance Commission. |
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200 cr compensation for ban on forest fellings sought Shimla, December 13 In a memorandum to the commission it pointed out that forests were major resource but the state was not exploiting it for the sake of environment in the ecology fragile of the Himalayan belt important for the entire country. It was because of the ban on fellings that no major forests based unit had come up in the state. |
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Finance panel for reliable transport system Shimla, December 13 Interacting with officers of the state government Mr Sompal, along with Dr G.C. Srivastava, member-secretary of the commission, stated this inspecting the site for Sanjauli bypass at Dhalli near here today. He said that planning of the bypass should be for meeting future transportation needs of the town. He also visited the site of Lift Water Supply scheme from Ashwini Khud underlined the need to have a sustainable source to meet water requirements of the town. He was informed that three tubewells had been sunk on the bank of Ashwini Khud for the augmentation of the existing scheme and eight lakh gallons of water per day was available from these tubewells. Earlier, Mr Sompal also inspected the site at Bhatta Kufar near, Dhalli where a bus stand is proposed for upper Shimla area. Mr S.S. Parmar, Principal Secretary, Finance, Mr Subhash Negi, Principal Secretary, PWD and other senior officers were also present during the visit of members of the Finance Commission to various places. |
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Govt withdraws Pawar as HPU Registrar Shimla, December 13 Mr Panwar’s appointment had been quashed by the Himachal Pradesh High Court on the ground that he did not fulfil the requisite qualification for the post of Registrar. The High Court, in its order dated September 15, held him ineligible for the post of Registrar as per the university statutes. But to continue Mr Panwar as Registrar, the state government amended the Himachal Pradesh University Act. Meanwhile, the Controller of Examination, Mr K.P. Dogar, has been given the additional charge of Registrar. — OC |
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Poor rainfall delays sowing
of wheat Kumarhatti, December 13 Generally, the sowing of wheat is done in November but in most areas, the process has not been completed on time this year. The farmers have failed to sow the MS 240, VL 616 and HPW 89 varieties of the crop. |
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Two killed in accidents Mandi, December 13 Devi Ram of Doghra village fell from a bus at Aut Bazar and was seriously injured. He was taken to Hospital where he succumbed to his injuries. In another accident, Sher Singh of Kasbara village under Sadar police station was crushed under a private bus at Salethar when the driver lost control over the bus. Both the bodies were handed over to the relatives after postmortem. Cases have been registered. |
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300 bus
routes for unemployed youth Dharamsala, December 13 Disclosing this here today, the state Transport Minister, Mr G.S. Bali, said the corporation had identified 300 loss-making bus routes in the state which could be ideal for minibuses. He said under the new scheme, to be introduced next year, unemployed youth would be encouraged to have their own buses under a finance scheme in which HRTC would stand guarantee.
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Man murdered
after scuffle Kumarhatti, December 13 Rajinder Singh Raju, the deceased from a nearby village, was allegedly involved in various criminal cases. It is learnt that he was drinking liquor along with Geeta Ram and Ramesh. A scuffle ensued between them on some issue. |
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Musafir calls on
Kokje Shimla, December 13 |
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