Ludhiana, November 7
At least eight samples of “khoya” and sweets made from purportedly poor quality or synthetic raw material have failed the laboratory test.

Stating this here today, civil surgeon Dr Sat Pal Sharma said five samples taken from a consignment of seven quintal of “khoya”, which had arrived from Uttar Pradesh in different trains and intercepted on November 1 at delivery points in different parts of the city, had been found adulterated and unfit for human consumption in the Government Laboratory.

The sweet makers from whom these samples have been taken will face proceedings under the provisions of the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act.

The “khoya” samples that have failed the test were taken from Piara Sweets in Sunder Nagar, Kamal Sweets on Shingar Cinema Road, Bengali Sweets in Aggar Nagar, Lakshmi Sweets in Industrial Area and Janta Sweets in Dholewal Chowk.

The entire consignment of “khoya”, suspected to be made from synthetic milk, had been seized and produced in the court of judicial magistrate. The court had issued summons for appearance to the owners of the sweet shops concerned for November 8.

The civil surgeon added that three other samples of “khoya” taken from sweet shops by the field staff of the health department had also failed the chemical analysis test.

These samples were taken on October 31 from Chawla Sweets, Field Ganj Road, Naresh Sweets, Sufian Chowk and Dayal Sweets, Gill Road.

Proceedings against the defaulting halwais under the PFA Act are being initiated, he added.

Mandi Ahmdedgarh: A team led by Dr K.C. Goel, district health officer, Sangrur, inspected sweetmeat shops and dairies at Malerkotla, Dhuri, and Kup besides local town and sealed samples for further examination.

Owners of almost all dairies at the local town and surrounding villages have restricted preparation of milk products, including cheese and “khoya”. The trend followed widespread action by health department against the manufacturers of synthetic “khoya” and subsequent alleged harassment of suppliers of genuine products. 

Ludhiana, November 7
Dhanteras is usually marked with traditional purchases of gold and silver ornaments, besides utensils. But now the purchases are being made as per the horoscope or as suggested by family astrologers.

A survey to some of the markets in the city revealed that most customers demanded things other than the regular items.

Savita, a homemaker, said she was looking for an idol of either Lord Ganesha or Goddess Saraswati. Asked what was the reason, she said she had been told by her astrologer to keep one of these idols in the north-west side of the house throughout the year.

“It will bring good luck and prosperity to the family,” she said while paying Rs 510 for a silver Ganesha idol.

Several shopkeepers had displayed crystal turtles and pyramids this time and people made a beeline to purchase such items.

Ajay Mehra, a shopkeeper at Ghumar Mandi, said people were making purchases according to vaastu this time. “They say they want these two items as one of the channels had told about the benefits of pyramids and turtles a few days ago. It is all in their mind. We do not know the reason but we have to keep the customers’ choice in mind,” he said.

Residents bought things worth lakhs of rupees today. The maximum items that were sold included silver coins of Goddess Lakshmi and Lord Ganesha, gold guineas and steel utensils.

Nita Sharma, a customer, said, “I always bought steel utensils earlier, but now vaastu experts say that steel and plastic should be avoided this year, so I am buying silver coins.”

Ludhiana, November 7
Reports that certain police personnel were siphoning off money recovered from gamblers got credence today with the suspension of a sub-inspector and an assistant sub-inspector on charges of pocketing the gambling money and letting of an accused.

The SSP, R.K. Jaiswal, told The Tribune that SI Tehal Singh and ASI Amarjit Singh, posted with the CIA wing-I, had been suspended for allegedly cheating the police department by showing less recovery amount that was seized from five gamblers during a raid on Model Town two days ago.

The SSP said it was also brought to his notice that the police officials had nabbed six persons, but named only five in the FIR.

Mandi Ahmedgarh, November 7
The body of Mintoo (15), a migrant boy who had left his house on a bicycle to pay Rs 3,000 to a grocer on Monday evening and who was missing since, was spotted by some passersby in a drain near Sarinh village today.

A complaint had been lodged by Dev Narayan, a resident Alamgir, that his son Mintoo had been killed by some persons for an amount of Rs 3,000 and the bicycle.

R.K. Jaiswal, SSP, Ludhiana, said the SHO, Sadar, had been directed to corroborate the information.

As the body did not bore external injury marks, it could not be deduced what kind of weapon was used in the crime.

Khanna, November 7
The aided schools progressive front of Punjab has alleged that the state government was issuing false statements regarding the release of grants for the payment of salaries of more than 8000 teachers working in various aided schools across the state.

In a joint statement president of the organisation Upjit Singh Brar, chairman KK Sharma, press secretary Gurdish Singh, vice president Dharminder Singh and Jaswinder Singh Randhawa, president of the Patiala unit, said the DPI(s) had issued statements that the grants for aided school teachers had been released, which had not been the case.

Challenging the claims made by the DPI(s), the front leaders said in case the department had released any grants for the salary of the teachers since April 1, 2007, then the DPI(s) should produce the grant copies before the media. The leaders of the front said the ground reality remained that not even a single school in the state has received any grant copies nor any salaries till October 31.

These leaders said it was the duty of the DPI and the DEO’s to submit the claims of grants in time. The leaders said though the previous government had issued instructions for introducing a new system of online salaries, but the department till date has not implemented it. They said the front was planning to invoke the right to information act to find out about the grants that the government was claiming have been released for the aided school teachers in the state.

Ludhiana, November 7
The District and Sessions Judge G K Rai said a state level lok-adalat would be held at district courts complex on November 17. The lok-adalat would be presided over by the chairman of the state legal services authority, Justice Mehtab Singh Gill, Punjab and Haryana High Court.

He said in order to settle maximum number of cases; judicial officers have started doing spade work. They have started organising pre-lok adalats for persuading the litigants to resolve their disputes through lok-adalats.

He appealed to masses to resolve their disputes by way of amicable settlement, as it puts an end to their dispute forever and helps in reducing bitterness among the parties.

He further apprised that different benches would be constituted to settle different nature of cases. Each bench would be headed by a judicial officer and assisted by one lawyer and social worker.

Cases involving matrimonial disputes, civil disputes, workmen compensation cases, civil appeals, cheque bounce cases, traffic challans etc. would be taken up in the adalat.

Meanwhile, a pre-lok adalat was organised, which was headed by Additional District and Sessions Judge A K Mehta. The cases pertaining to the motor accident claims, involving New India Assurance Company, were taken up. 

Mandi Ahmedgarh, November 7
Feeling humiliated by the alleged offensive attitude of health authorities, manufacturers of genuine milk products are hesitant to supply their product to sweetmeat makers of big cities.

However, to maintain their relations with the buyers, they have agreed to supply milk and prepare “khoya” and cheese on their doorstep.

While cheese is in great demand for preparing certain sweetmeats and domestic consumption, a minimum quantity of “khoya” is required for decoration of already prepared stuff.

Observations by Ludhiana Tribune revealed that a majority of suppliers of “khoya” and paneer had restricted their supplies to other cities.

In spite of their claims about genuineness of their product, they wanted to avoid humiliation and harassment due to complexity of procedure of getting their stocks after their quality was approved by the laboratories.

“Now when we know that anybody can humiliate us on the pretext of checking for synthetic ‘khoya’ why should we put ourselves in trouble. But keeping in view problems of our valuable customers we have offered to supply milk and get ‘khoya’ and paneer prepared by our workers at their places,” said Deepak owner of a dairy.

Do’s

• Use fireworks in open spaces
• Buy fireworks of authorised make
• Light one cracker at a time
• Keep fireworks at a safe place
• Organise community display of fireworks
• Use long candle/sparkler for igniting crackers
• Keep two buckets of water handy

Don’ts

• Ignite fireworks while holding in hand
• Bend over while igniting cracker
• Light crackers in a container
• Approach immediately to misfired cracker
• Tamper with misfired fireworks
• Attempt to make fireworks at home
• Allow children to handle fireworks
• Throw or point fireworks at others
• Store firecrackers near source of fire
• Wear synthetic clothing
• Wear loosely-hanging clothes

Ludhiana, November 7
Spare a thought before you burst firecrackers this Diwali for the data collected over the years by the Punjab Pollution Control Board suggests that the ambient air has been the biggest casualty during the festival every year.

On October 21 (Diwali) last year, the suspended particulate matter (SPM) measured by the board in commercial area was between 572 and 1167 microgram (mcg), residential area between 478 and 802 mcg and sensitive area between 375 and 612 mcg.

The levels of SPM were alarming as its permissible limits in industrial, domestic and sensitive areas were 500, 200 and 100 mcg, respectively.

It was four times the permissible limit in the domestic area and six times in sensitive areas like hospitals.

The air quality was the worst hit as the Ludhianvis burst crackers till wee hours in the morning last Diwali.

Similarly, the concentration of SO2 on that day was 35 to 51, 32 to 59 and 30 to 58 in commercial, residential and sensitive areas, respectively.

The concentration of NOX was between 54 and 58, 50 and 80 and 44 and 66 on that day. The city was once again declared “most polluted” by the board compared to other cities like Amritsar, Jalandhar, Patiala, Mandi Gobindgarh and others.

As all this goes unabated, the number of residents visiting doctors with respiratory disorders has seen a rise.

Asthma cases are on the rise as even young children have been complaining of the problem.

The aftereffects of these festivals can be felt till many days after, as the SPM level remains quite high for many days.

Ludhiana, November 7
When it comes to busting den of gamblers with perfection, even raiding policemen cannot escape scrutiny.

In one such raid, a posse of Kotwali police aided by force from other police stations had to surrender their mobile phones, wallets and empty their pockets at the Kotwali police station before raiding the Bhadaur house market late last evening.

Police sources said the aim was to remove the popular perception that policemen pocketed most of the money recovered from gamblers.

In order to achieve this, the raiding team members, over 50 in number, were not told till the last minute the purpose of the raid.

They were asked to deposit their mobile phones, wallets and directed to return with empty pockets.

Not content with this, team leader SHO Sandeep Wadhera videotaped the raid. The alleged gamblers caught in the raid were told to sit in a queue, place the money in a handkerchief and write the amount on a piece of paper.

Sources said it was common for the accused gamblers to claim later that the police had pocketed large chunk of the recovered money and showed far less amount in the records.

In the raid, 13 persons were nabbed with over Rs 1.03 lakh recovered from them.

Those arrested were Mukesh, Sanjay Kesar, Sanjay Kumar, Rajesh Kumar, Naveen Dahwan, Naresh Kumar, Ravi Nand, Mukesh Kumar, Rajesh Kumar, Anoop Kumar, Vikram Kumar, Sunil Kumar and Sunil Kumar.

Doraha, November 7
Actor, director and producer Mangal Dhillon screened his documentary film "Sarvnash" in the college library of the Mata Ganga Khalsa College for Girls, Kottan, today.

The film is based on the menace of drugs and the destruction it causes to the family and society where it spreads.

Dhillon exhorted the students to shun the ever-growing menace of drugs, which he said is eating into the very vitals of our entire social set up. He said the youth energies instead of being channelised toward individual and national reconstruction, are being and wasted in fruitless endeavour and directed toward destructive ends.

Harmit Kaur, principal, Ramgarhia Girls College, Ludhiana too asked the students to become god-fearing and develop their moral and intellectual capabilities.

Principal Manjinder Kaur congratulated and lauded the efforts of Mangal Dhillon in the field of social film-making and requested the entire Sikh community to walk on the noble path of righteousness shown by the ten gurus.

Last week, all the city newspapers yelled out loud the shocking news of seizure of adulterated milk products being blatantly prepared by the city halwais who have no qualms about putting the common man’s life at risk by using synthetic khoya. It speaks volumes about the food situation in Ludhiana in particular and India in general. These days, right from rehdiwallas to restaurants serving ‘hormone fortified’ milk and pesticide-laden foodstuff, everyone is minting money by selling adulterated, unhygienic low quality foodstuffs. So if we fall sick after consuming those tempting sweets of Diwali, the only rescue are the Indian medicines.

Gagan Sohal, Ludhiana

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Mandi Ahhmedgarh, November 7
Investigations into an incident of an alleged attack by the students and members of bhangra team of GHG Khalsa College, Sudhar, on the official judges during zonal youth festival at GNG Khalsa College, Narangwal, a week ago might expose malpractice of hiring professional artists.

The Dehlon police and the authorities at Punjab University, Chandigarh, have to initiate examination of facts and sequence of events leading to registration of a case against the suspects for allegedly damaging property of GNG Khalsa College and assaulting and threatening the judges.

Principal and management committee of the GHG Khalsa College, Sudhar, the parent institute of the suspects had however called upon the authorities to take view of the fault of the students whose carrier was at stake now.

Accusing the students and members of the bhangra team of Sudhar College Hardil Jit Singh Gosal, principal,said it was not possible for him to withdraw the complaint lodged with the police and the university authorities.

Gosal further alleged that in charge of the said team had also misguided the organisers by making hired artistes on behalf of the institute.

S M Kant director, youth welfare, PU, said the authorities were yet to initiate probe into the matter.

Reiterating appeal of leniency for the erring students Surinder Pal Kaur, principal, admitted that they (students) had lost their nerves as the teachers sent by the college were busy in handling other teams. Refuting allegations of hiring artiste for the team Surinder Pal Kaur claimed that a committee comprising senior lecturers had been constituted to look into the matter at college level and decide.

Members of bhangra team of Sudhar College had allegedly attacked Sukhdev Singh Randhawa, Ajit Singh and Jagbir Singh (judges for bhangra competition) on October 31. The principal of the host college had lodged complaints with the Dehlon police and the university authorities. Though an FIR had been registered and evidence about the sequence of events had reached the university authorities, they were yet to initiate the process in this connection. Interestingly it was yet to be established if the booked persons were all students of the college or not.