New Delhi, October 3
At a meeting held today, the Delhi Cabinet decided to intensify the anti-dengue drive in the Capital, including issuing instructions to schools and asking every minister to ensure that the disease does not spread in their respective areas. The meeting was chaired by the Chief Minister, Ms Sheila Dikshit.

Meanwhile, Delhi Health Minister, Dr Yoganand Shastri, also directed the MCD and NDMC today to be vigilant and monitor the cases of water borne diseases carefully and take all necessary measures to control dengue.

At a high-level meeting chaired by the Health Minister, it was decided that the district health officers would be held responsible if the disease was not brought under control and action would be taken against them if there were any lapse on their part in tackling the situation.

Mr Shastri said that the awareness campaign on preventing the spread of the disease would also be intensified. In view of the increase in the cases of dengue in the Capital, a review meeting would be held twice in a week, he added.

The Minister said that there was, however, no need to panic, claiming that fewer dengue cases were being reported compared to last few days.

He said that a total of 51,706 houses were found to be breeding mosquitoes. Nearly 36,159 legal notices had been issued and 19,758 prosecutions had been launched by the MCD till now against a total number of 85 lakh houses visited to check breeding of mosquitoes.

It was also decided in the meeting that the children of all Delhi schools would be asked to wear full sleeve shirts. The necessary instructions were being issued to the principals.

It was decided that school principals and medical superintendents would be held responsible in case mosquito breeding grounds were found in the schools or hospitals respectively.

Special attention should be given to prevent the breeding of mosquitoes in houses as well as government and non-government offices, educational and technical institutes, the Minister said, adding that the MCD and the NDMC should make adequate arrangements to control breeding in offices and public places.

It was also decided that the public would be asked to immediately remove coolers from their homes or offices. If the coolers are not removable, they should be regularly cleaned and their front side should be blocked.

Dr Shastri appealed to all citizens of Delhi to keep their surroundings clean and dispose wastes immediately. 

Gurgaon, October 3
As many as 11 dengue cases have been detected from Gurgaon city while the health department is stumped at the shift in the area of occurrence of dengue cases compared to the affected areas last year.

According to the chief of the department and Chief Medical Officer, Civil Hospital, Gurgaon, Dr D.V. Saharan, last year there were about 105 dengue cases in the district and the majority of them were from villages spanning from Catarpur to Ghata—all bordering Delhi.

This year so far 11 cases have been detected and the patients are from Gurgaon city. The cases have been found in posh Sector 4 (2), Sector 30, Rajiv Nagar, Hans Enclave, City Plaza, Wazirabad, Sanjay Colony and Mata Colony.

According to Dr Saharan, there are 60 suspected cases and the blood and platelet samples have been sent to NICT for confirmation.

With the scourge in the bordering state of Delhi and cases showing up in Gurgaon, the authorities are reportedly doing their best to check the menace. Eight medical teams have been formed to fog the city. So far the fogging of the municipal limits of the city has been completed and the exercise in other pockets of the city like the HUDA sectors and private colonies in new Gurgaon city has also begun.

Besides, a separate dengue ward has been created in Civil Hospital and all the beds have been fitted with mosquito nets. A separate control room has been created in the hospital too along with round-the-clock blood investigation centre. Two doctors have been asked to deal exclusively with the suspected patients.

In a flurry of activities today, the Deputy Commissioner, Gurgaon, held a meeting with the officials of departments concerned.

The Adminisrator, HUDA, Gurgaon Circle, also convened an emergency meeting with the Residents Welfare Associations of HUDA sectors. The district administration and HUDA have set up nodal officers in their areas to deal with any contingency and spread awareness on the dos and don’ts relating to the disease.

With the disease showing up in Faridabad district, the Commissioner, Gurgaon Divison, held an emergency meeting of the officials of the four districts of Gurgaon, Faridabad, Mewat, Rewari and Mahendragarh districts.

Chief Medical Officer Dr D.V. Saharan said that the health departments in Gurgaon and Faridbad exchange notes with regard to the disease and its pattern.

According to him, all the schools are being contacted with an advisory for the teachers and the principals on the precautionary measures. He, however, asserted that the health department has enough stock of medicines and expertise to deal with any emergency in Gurgaon.

Noida, October 3
Eight people, including an inspector of police and two ASIs, have allegedly died of dengue here while about 30 patients were admitted to various hospitals, 12 of them in the last two days.

Considering the seriousness of the situation, the Meerut Divisional Commissioner convened a meeting of district officials from Ghaziabad, Bulandshahr and G.B. Nagar and instructed them to take suitable measures against the menace of dengue. District magistrates were told to monitor the situation personally.

While the Noida DM appealed to people to take precautions, the special dengue cell set up in the district hospital has only one room with hardly any facilities. Two dengue patients admitted there on the first day had, in fact, gone away from the hospital the same evening and sought admission to Delhi hospitals. Even facilities for preliminary dengue test were not available in the special dengue cell, not to speak of facilities for transfusion of platelets, etc.

Over 30 dengue patients are being treated in various hospitals here, and the number is only likely to increase in the next few days due to failure of the district administration to take effective measures against the breeding of mosquitoes which spread dengue.

New Delhi, October 3
If there is no legal binding, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi may ban the use of coolers in residences and public places, as most of the mosquito breeding takes place in coolers.

The Mayor, Mr Farhad Suri, said that he had directed the Municipal Commissioner, Mr A. K. Nigam, to find out the legal points for banning coolers under Section 376 of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi Act. “If there is no legal binding, the use of coolers should be banned as 95 per cent of the mosquito breeding takes place in coolers”, he said.

The citizens should spread kerosene oil in coolers to prevent the breeding, but they do not do this. Now the corporation is making efforts to bring “Temphos granule”, a medicine to be used to kill mosquito breedings in coolers and in other water containers, to the markets. The medicine is likely to be made available in markets by the next week. This will be more effective, the government officials claim.

Besides, the corporation will also use fire brigade vehicles for spreading anti-dengue and malaria medicines. In the beginning, four vehicles of the department will be hired. The corporation has 12 mounted vehicles. Two additional vehicles will be hired from private agencies to spread medicines.

Meanwhile, the Health Department of the MCD has issued challans against 13 hospitals, including ESI Hospital Okhla, St. Stephens, Ganga Ram, DDU and Chanan Devi hospitals. One junior engineer (electricals), house-keeper, contractor, store officer and a few others have been prosecuted for mosquito breeding detected in G. B. Pant and Lok Nayak hospitals.

At present, 3,000 employees of the health department are being engaged in anti-mosquito breeding drive launched by the MCD to prevent the spread of dengue in the city, Standing Committee Chairman, Mr Jaikishan Sharma, said. Leaves of the staff had also been cancelled, he added.

The Municipal Health Officer, Dr N. K. Yadav, said that the latest figure of the dengue cases was 497. Of these, 280 cases are from Delhi and the remaining from the neighbouring states. No dengue death was reported today. However, on an average, as many as 10 fresh cases were reported in Delhi everyday, he said.

Gurgaon, October 3
The Haryana unit of the BJP has flayed the state Cabinet’s decision to disband the Cash Credit Cooperative Samitis and the Market Societies.

Submitting a memorandum addressed to the Governor at the office of the Deputy Commissioner, the party’s Cooperative Cell, headed by Mr Om Prakash Maan, demanded that the samitis and societies be re-activated forthwith.

There are 2433 Cash Credit Cooperative Samitis and 70 Market Societies and about 10,000 persons are employed with them, according to the BJP leaders.

The state government has, however, decided to set up 480 Agriculture Service Societies and employ about 2,500 persons who would lose their job on account of the Cabinet’s decision. The government has also assured that it would employ the remaining workers.

The BJP demanded from the government to specify where the other persons who would lose their jobs would be rehabilitated.

Talking to news persons, Mr Maan and the unit’s general secretary, Mr Veer Kumar Yadav, said that the poor would be adversely affected by this ‘anti-farmer’ decision of the Haryana government.

New Delhi, October 3
Criticising the Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister, Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad, for appealing for a pardon to the prime accused in the Parliament attack case, Md Afzal Guru, who has been awarded a death sentence, the BJP Delhi Pradesh president, Dr Harsh Vardhan, today said that Mr Azad should not continue at his post.

“Mr Azad, who is advocating indirectly for the dreaded terrorist, is supporting terrorism in India. This is an act of sedition,” Dr Harsh Vardhan alleged. He also said that if a pardon was granted to Afzal, the BJP would protest against it.

In a statement issued here today, Dr Harsh Vardhan said that even while the Minister of Foreign Affairs had pointed out that Pakistani terrorist groups were behind the Mumbai train blasts, Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad was appealing to the Prime Minister to pardon a convicted terrorist.

He said that the Foreign Secretary and Mumbai Police Commissioner had claimed that the mastermind behind the Mumbai blasts was ISI. Pakistan had also been held responsible for other terrorist attacks on Akhshardham Temple in Gujarat, Raghunath Temple in Jammu, Sankat Mochan Temple in Varanasi, Ram Janam Bhoomi in Ayoadhya etc, he contended.

However, he said, the Prime Minister announced in Havana that Pakistan is also suffering from terrorism.

“Due to this, the morale of nationalists is being eroded. The terrorists are being encouraged. If the main accused person in the Parliament attack case will be pardoned, then how can the country be saved?” the statement said. 

New Delhi, October 3
In a major step towards modernising the public transport system in the national Capital, the Chief Minister, Ms Sheila Dikshit, will lay the foundation stone for the much-awaited first dedicated corridor for the hi-tech High Capacity Bus System (HCBS) tomorrow.

Talking to reporters today about the project that had been facing uncertainties over the last few years, the Transport Minister, Mr Haroon Yusuf, said the 19 km-stretch from Ambedkar Nagar to Delhi Gate, to be constructed at a cost of Rs 140 crore, would be completed within the next 18 months under a strict deadline.

He said that for the convenience of commuters, the track would be integrated with the Metro at Tilak Bridge station so that the passengers can change their mode of commuting as per their requirements.

Talking about five other corridors identified by the Delhi Government, the minister said that RITES was conducting feasibility study of the project and would submit a report soon.

“Once the report is finalised, we will issue global tenders for the task. All the corridors will be ready by 2009, before the upcoming Commonwealth Game 2010,” Mr Yusuf said.

Regarding the setting up of monorail, the minister said technical bids had been opened and RITES was studying the report to be submitted to the government within the next ten days.

The HCBS project that was gathering dust for the last few years received a momentum following the Supreme Court direction to implement the entire infrastructure and make it operational by 2009.

New Delhi, October 3
Santa Claus, the world’s most famous face for children, would pay a special visit to India in November to be with some of the underprivileged children as part of Finland’s efforts to improve its tourism ties with the country.

The Santa Claus living in Lapland in Rovaniemi, who is also recognised as the official Santa Claus of the world, would come down to India for three days and during the period he would travel around the country and meet underprivileged children, offering them gifts.

This, the Finnish officials here say, would officially also kick off their efforts to increase tourism between the two countries. The Nordic circle country is eyeing the fast-growing breed of outbound Indian traveller to promote tourism of their country, especially in the summers.

While Finnair, the official airline of Finland, is all set to start its three times a week service from Delhi to Helsinki, just after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh pays a visit there for the Indo-EU summit, the Finnish Tourist Board is offering a lot of incentives to the Indian traveller.

Finnair has also tied up with the Mumbai-based Ambassador Group for in-flight catering and would only be offering the choicest of Indian dishes to travellers on its flights as part of the effort to promote India to Europe and Finland to Indians.

With a population of just five million, Finland is looking at attracting the Indian traveller especially during the summer time to offer them the cool locales. With the Indian outbound travellers rising by almost one million every year, Finland is wanting to promote summer tourism, as during winter it remains a favourite place for travellers from rest of the world, especially during Christmas with the attraction of the Santa Claus in Lapland.

Finland could be a beautiful place for a holiday in summers for India, officials say. The country would be the right place to get away from the sweltering heat of India, said Rauno Posio while talking to ‘The Tribune’.

New Delhi, October 3
The India International Centre is all set to launch ‘The IIC Experience-2006’, an annual art and cultural festival, from October 6.

During this week-long celebration, various programmes, including dance performances, theatre, poetry-reading, films, and exhibitions, would be staged.

The festival will be inaugurated by Mr Soli Sorabjee, the centre’s president.

Mr P S Arumugam and his troupe will play traditional ‘Nagaswaram’ and ‘Thavil’ to ceremonially welcome guests at the Gandhi-King Plaza on the inaugural day of the festival.

Amongst the dance performances, a choreographic composition ‘Adhbhuta - Vision of Wonder’ will be presented in Bharatanatyam style by the well-known danseuse Malavika Sarukkai and directed by Mrs Saroja Kamakshi.

Also, there will be a-first-ever all-women music concert called ‘Vadya Sammelanam: Carnatic Classical Music’ on October 8 at 9.30 am. Dr Suma Sudhindra on Veena will lead this choir. Lalgudi Vijayalkshmi and others will also present some of the enchanting morning ragas from carnatic classical music.

The third dance performance would be on October 12 at 6.30 pm.

Bulandshahr, October 3
Two armed criminals in a daring attack shot at a trader who was walking along with his wife in the morning near Bulandshahr SSP’s residence yesterday. After the crime, the assailants fled on foot towards the DM’s colony.

The victim, Niranjan Lal Gupta, was rushed to the district hospital by the police, which arrived at the scene immediately. However, he was referred to a Ghaziabad hospital by the doctors in the government hospital.

The trader succumbed to his injuries in the Ghaziabad hospital later in the afternoon.

Traders in Bulandshahr town observed a bandh to protest against the murder.

Gupta was a retailer in weights and measures. As he along with his wife reached the SSP’s residence after buying milk from a dairy in DM’s colony, two youths with revolvers in their hands walked up to them.

One of the assailants shot at the trader who slumped in a pool of blood. The assailants had fled on foot, according to the eyewitnesses. The police said it appeared to be a revenge killing.

Anil Desh Bakt, general secretary of the UP Traders Security Forum, threatened to launch an agitation in case the killers were not apprehended soon. He claimed that crime had increased in Bulandshahr lately. 

New Delhi, October 3
In an ongoing drive against the illegal storage of firecrackers, the police claimed to have seized more than 26 tons of firecrackers worth about Rs 50 lakh from various parts of the Capital in the last two days.

Around 1,035 kgs of firecrackers worth approximately Rs 10 lakh were seized from a godown in Nand Nagari area of Shahdra, whose owner Manish Goel (25) was arrested in this connection.

A case under Explosives Act has been registered against him.

In another incident, one Preet Pal (25) was arrested today with 16,301 kg of firecrackers worth Rs 25 lakh in Rajouri Garden area.

New Delhi, October 3
The police claimed to have arrested five persons, including four women, on charges of being involved in the production of illicit liquor in three different cases in the Capital today. A huge quantity of illicit liquor has also allegedly been seized by the police.

Following a tip off, one Veena (30), a resident of Najafgarh area, was arrested and illicit liquor in large quantity allegedly was seized from her residence.

In another case, one Trolok Shahu (48) was arrested from his residence in Vasant Kunj area. Both the accused were allegedly guilty of violating Excise Act many times

In yet another case, the North–East district police today arrested three women on the same charges and seized illegal liquor from their possession, a press release claimed.

The department claimed that it was extra vigilant with regard to production and distribution of illicit liquor.

New Delhi, October 3
An auto-rickshaw driver was crushed to death by a speeding car near ITO today while he was repairing his vehicle.

He was taken to a nearby hospital where he was declared ‘brought dead’.

The driver of the car also received severe injuries in the accident. He has been admitted to a nearby hospital. His condition is stated to be critical.

In another incident, four persons were injured when an RTV overturned near Malviya Nagar flyover.

The injured have been admitted to a nearby hospital, where their condition was stated to be out of danger.

Preliminary investigations indicated that the accident occurred due to a break failure, the police claimed.