Thursday, April 29, 1999
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N E W S Thursday, April 29, 1999 |
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Parking lots auction nets Rs
11.64 lakh CHANDIGARH, April 28 — The Municipal Corporation of Chandigarh (MCC) netted Rs 11.64 lakh through the auction of four parking lots in the city today. At the auction held at Tagore Theatre, the highest amount of Rs 7.53 lakh was netted through the auction of the parking lot in front of the Lake Club. The reserve price for this parking lot was Rs 4.80 lakh. The parking lot at the Terraced Garden in Sector 33 was auctioned for the minimum sum of Rs 26,300 as against the reserve price of Rs 25,000. Similarly, the parking lot adjoining the District Courts in Sector 17 was auctioned for Rs 3.25 lakh as against the reserve price of Rs 2.20 lakh Against the reserve price of Rs 50,000, the parking lot at Shantikunj in Sector 16 was auctioned for Rs 60,100. The parking lot adjoining Dhillon cinema in Mani Majra could not put to auction due to a poor response, corporation sources said. These parking lots had been auctioned for a period of one year from the dates the contractors were issued allotment letters, the sources added. It may be recalled that the corporation had fixed a fee of Rs 5 for parking a car at a parking lot for the whole day and Rs 2 for a period of four hours. The monthly pass would be issued for Rs 50. For a scooter\motor cycle, the charges would be Rs 2 for the whole day and Re 1 for up to four hours. The monthly pass for these vehicles would be available at Rs 25. In the case of bicycle
Re 1 would be charged for a full day with the monthly
pass costing Rs 10. |
City
chosen for pilot police project CHANDIGARH, April 28 — The city has been selected for a pilot project to computerise police stations in the country and interlink these for easy access of records about crimes and criminals. A team of the National Crime Record Bureau (NCRB) is expected to visit the city next week to finalise the modalities of creating a local area network (LAN). The Chandigarh police will procure the computer hardware. Under the project, Rs 70,000 have been sanctioned for each of the 11 police stations in the city. Computerisation of the police posts will be carried out in the second phase. Each police station will have a computer and a modem linked to telephone lines. Linking police stations through telephones lines would not be a problem as the police also had its own telephone exchange, said the Superintendent of Police (SP) of Police Headquarters, Mr Ajay Kashyap. Another plan is to link the stations through wireless But this is yet to be tried out on a large scale so telephone lines are being used at present. The NCRB has a computer link with district and state headquarters. But interlinking police stations would be first such experiment, the SP said. The NCRB team was to arrive here last week but the visit was put off. The database will have profiles of criminals and records of crimes committed by them. This will enable immediate verification of a criminal or suspect. For this, the police intends to train the Station House Officers (SHOs) and Sub-Inspectors, at various police stations. A training facility will be opened at the police lines for the staff and their children. This project was in the pipeline, Mr Kashyap said. The project was first
conceived a couple of years ago but things never moved in
the right direction, while money for it had been
sanctioned. |
5-hr snap
in ‘65’ level phones CHANDIGARH, April 28 — Close to 8,000 telephones working in Sectors 27,28,29 and 30 and the Industrial Area went dead this evening following a technical snag. The phones that went dead around 6 pm could not be set right till late in the night. All the phones were connected to level `65' of the FETEX --150 exchange. Around 10 pm, another 6,000 numbers of level `64' connected to the E--10--B-- exchange and functional in a wider area in the city also went dead. Both the exchanges are in a common building of Industrial Area, Phase II . According to sources in the department, a group of pulse code modulators (PCMs) connecting the main telephone exchange in Sector 34 with the Industrial area exchange had gone bad. Due to the fault, communication link was totally snapped while businessmen and STD PCO calls owners suffered a loss. All incoming and outgoing calls from The Tribune that is also connected to the Industrial Area exchange were cut. This happened when there is peak flow of information for news and other matters. Last night also, the exchange had developed problems. No STD calls could be made from 6 pm to 11 pm. STD lines are routed through special cards that have a facility called "reversal" . These cards had been corrupted , according to a source. Just two days ago,
around 30,000 phones in Panchkula and Mani Majra had
remained dead for more than six hours. |
Notice to
PU on exam postponement CHANDIGARH, April 28 — Taking suo motu notice of a news item published in the Chandigarh Tribune and another daily on April 17, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has asked Panjab University to apprise the court as to what were "those compelling reasons which impelled the postponement of the various examinations indefinitely". Mr Justice R.S. Mongia and Mr Justice Iqbal Singh, who treated the news items as a writ petition in public interest, also issued notice of motion for May 3 to Panjab University through its Registrar and also to the Punjab Government through the Education Secretary on what steps they were being taken to hold examinations, which had been postponed indefinitely. The Judges, who handed down this order yesterday, observed: "We consider that the careers of various students are at stake inasmuch as if the examinations are not held and are postponed indefinitely, their funds for taking admission to higher classes and getting jobs would definitely be jeopardised". In its two-page order the Bench said: "On our asking Mr Cheema accepts the notice on behalf of the state government, and Mr Anupam Gupta, who is on the panel of lawyers for Panjab University, accepts the notice on behalf of the university. "Photostat copies of the news items as also a copy of this order arrested by Special Secretary of this court have been given to Mr Cheema and Mr Gupta. "Mr I.S. Balhara, advocate of this court, is requested to assist the court in the matter as amicus curiae. Copies of the news item as well as copy of this order have also been given to him", the order said. Bail refused to convict The High Court today turned down the bail plea of Sarabjit Singh, sentenced in a murder case to undergo imprisonment for 20 years by the Hoshiarpur Sessions Judge on the ground that he was suffering from AIDS. Mr Justice V.K. Bali and Mr Justice A.S. Garg, before whom his application for bail had come up for hearing, held: "All said and done, still the situation is that the state of health of the applicant is the same as it was when he had allegedly committed the murder of Raghbir Singh and Gurdip Singh along with his co-accused". His being let off on bail, the Bench held, "would be more serious as it would be hazardous to members of the victims' family as well as the public at large than his confinement to prison and to undergo the sentence inflicted upon him. He can be treated through jail authorities absolutely to the convenience and medical requirement of the petitioner as advised by the medical men. In jail he can also be kept in a suitable manner as an experienced Superintendent can arrange to keep such a person at a proper place (not in solitary confinement) and get him treated". "As per arguments of counsel for the complainant, the members of the family of victims are afraid of the designs of the petitioner, if allowed bail. So it appears to us that it is really immaterial that he remained on bail during the trial and did not misuse the concession of bail", the Bench observed. "Hence after
considering the pros and cons of the matter, we decline
bail. However, the petitioner can move (an application)
again for bail, if need be or if situation so
arises", the Bench held. |
Villages
connected to main exchange CHANDIGARH, April 28 — Telephone exchanges of Morinda, Kurali, Kharar, Sohana, Landran, Batta, Manauli and Mullanpur have been connected to the main exchange in SAS Nagar. Subscribers living in these places, can now call each other without dialling codes. Subscribers of Chandigarh, SAS Nagar and Panchkula, will have to dial 918 or 92-1888 before desired numbers in these towns. They will have to prefix 911 or 92-172 before the desired numbers in Chandigarh, SAS Nagar and Panchkula. According to the Telecom
Department, this will be convenient for rural
subscribers. |
UT
employees stage dharna CHANDIGARH, April 28— To press for their demands the members of the Chandigarh UT Subordinate Services Federation staged a dharna near the Sector 17 Estate Office here today. The employees were demanding release of bonus for the year 1997-98, release of dearness allowance on the central pattern and amendment in rules so as to make the UT employees alone eligible for government accommodation. Those who addressed the rally included Mr Ramesh Kumar, Mr P.S. Sandhu and Mr P. S. Chawla, all federation leaders. Mr P. S. Lamba, the
general secretary of the federation said,the
administration should settle all demands of the employees
without any further delay, otherwise the employees would
be forced to intensify their agitation, he warned.
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Police
remand for taking bribe KHARAR, April 28 — Mrs Neelam Arora, Sub-Divisional Judicial Magistrate, Kharar, today sentenced Surjit Singh, an employee of the Health Department, Punjab, who was arrested by the Punjab Vigilance Department while allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 2,000 from the editor of a newspaper yesterday, to police remand till April 29. Mr Harjap Singh, DSP, Vigilance, and Mr K.S. Brar, Assistant Public Prosecutor, who appeared on behalf of the State, informed the court that the accused was arrested when he accepted the bribe for making the payment of advertisement published in the newspaper. They pleaded that more
papers were to be recovered from the accused and
information about his property was to be gathered. |
Tragedy
waiting to happen ZIRAKPUR, April 28 — It is a tragedy waiting to happen in Bartana village nearby. High tension electricity transmission wires pass precariously close to a row of houses. The wires carrying power transmission are only a couple of feet away from the roof of houses. The village forms part of the newly formed Notified Area Committee (NAC). Technically, engineers says, no construction activity can take place immediately under the wires but since these constructions came up several months ago no action was taken. Besides the Electricity
Department has no power to take action against such
construction activity. Interestingly, in this area plots
are being sold where a tower carrying high tension wires
located amongst the plots. Due to high voltage such wires
have a wide magnetic field around them. |
Meat shops
inspected in Kharar KHARAR, April 28 — Mr Amarjit Singh Dhindsa, Sub-Divisional Magistrate, Kharar, today made a surprise check of various meat shops here and in Kurali. He found that most of them being run without valid licences and were working under unhygienic conditions. Mr Dhindsa said that he had issued directions that these shops should not be allowed to operate without proper licences and improvement in conditions. He said that he had asked senior veterinary doctors to examine all animals before and after killing these and stamp these. He had issued directions that the doctors would visit the meat shops and see that only the meat of those animals was being sold which had been stamped by them. He said that there was no slaughter house either at Kharar or at Kurali. He had asked the executive officers of both the municipal committees to select places where the slaughter houses were to be constructed. These should be constructed after getting the necessary permission from the Punjab government. He said that he had
asked these officers to make arrangements for regular
supply of clean drinking water to the residents of both
these towns. He also inspected some offices in Kharar and
found their working satisfactory. |
Imparting
education to growing child CHANDIGARH, April 28 — A meeting of policy makers and educationists on the subject of adolescent education was held under the chairmanship of Mr Brahmjit Kalia, District Education Officer, at the State Institute of Education, Sector 32 today. The objective of the meeting was to device ways to impart education to the growing children between the age of 12 to 18 years and to make them aware of certain adolescent phenomena and variations in human behaviour. Dr Swaran Lata, co-ordinator of the Population and Development Project, revealed that adolescence began with a period of rapid physical and sexual development called puberty. The rapidness which these changes occurred generated a number of problems which the adolescents found it difficult to understand. She said that the programme was being experimented in five selected schools where 10 teachers had been trained to provide counselling to the children. This programme would be extended in the colonies with the help of nongovernment organisations and the UT Health Department. The representatives of
these organisations were of the view that there was need
to make children aware about scientific knowledge of the
process of growing up, behaviour and orientation, drug
addiction, bad affects of population explosion and
quality of life. It was also decided to convene a meeting
of the heads of schools to enlist their help in making
this programme a success. |
9 booked
in dowry cases SAS NAGAR, April 28—The local police has booked nine persons under the Anti-Dowry Act in two separate incidents. According to the police, Harjit Kaur Walia, a resident of Phase XI had alleged in a complaint that her husband, Arun Kumar and his parents had been torturing her for past many months for not bringing adequate dowry. Acting on her complaint, Arun Kumar, his father Balbir Singh, his mother Santosh Kumari, sister Amrita Walia, and brother Amit Kumar have been booked under Sections 498 and 406 of the IPC. In another case, acting
on a complaint by Timardeep Kaur, a resident of Phase
III-B-I, her husband Gursharan Singh, Joginder Singh,
father-in-law, Daljit Kaur, mother-in-law, Parwinder
Singh, brother-in-law and Jaswinder Kaur, all residents
of Sector 22, Chandigarh, have been booked under Sections
498 and 406 of the IPC. She had also alleged that she was
being tortured by her husband and his relatives, who had
been forcing her to bring more dowry. |
B.Com I
exams from May 5 CHANDIGARH, April 28 — While the B. Com I and II Exams will commence on May 5 and 4, respectibely, the B Com III exams will commence on May 10. However, the examinations for all three years will end on May 24. Releasing the revised date sheet today, the PU Controller of Examinations, Dr Sodhi Ram, said that no exam would be held between May 21 and 23 to facilitate the conduct of the PU Combined Entrance Test (CET). The examinations will be held between 2 pm to 5 pm. According to the date sheet, the B. Com I and II examinations will commence with English papers, the B Com III year exam will begin with business law-I, history and culture of Punjab and languages. The honours examination for B. Com II and III year will be held on May 24. The last paper of B. Com I will be quantative techniques and business economics. Meanwhile, Dr Sodhi Ram
said that preparations were complete for conducting the
undergraduate classes of BA and BSc. Of the total 180
examination centres, 45 had been set up in government
colleges, while 135 were in private colleges. A total of
180 superintendents, 200 deputy superintendents, 1450
supervisors, 720 non-teaching employees had been put on
duty at these centres. He said that adequate arrangements
had been made to check cheating at various centres.
Flying squads had been deputed to assist the
superintendents at various centres for the smooth conduct
of examinations. |
Two
booked under Wildlife Act PANCHKULA, April 28 — Two persons have been booked by the local police in connection with keeping a Monitor Lizard, a protected specie under Schedule I of the Wild Life Protection Act. Paramjeet, a contractor, and Rajesh, a labourer,have been further booked for obstructing a government official from performing his duty. According to the information available, a peon with the State Wild Life Department, Mast Ram, informed a Sub-Inspector of the department, Sahid Khan, on April 23 that a labourer was illegally keeping the monitor lizard at his house in Sector 6 here. Rajesh was brought to the head office of the department in Sector 6 here. Soon Paramjeet, who had employed the labourer at the HSIDC building coming up in the sector, came with his brother. They contacted somebody on a cellular telephone and soon three persons arrived at the wild life office, one posing as a DSP of Punjab Police. They threatened the officials of dire consequences if the labourer was not released. As senior officials of the department were not present on the scene, the persons accompanying the labourer got him released from the custody of the lower-rung staff. After that, the monitor lizard was allegedly released by the labourer,said the officials. The police has registered a case against Paramjeet and Rajesh under Sections 186 and 353 of the IPC and under Section 51 of the Wild Life Act, 1972, on the basis of a complaint lodged by the Wild Life Department. Meanwhile, a challan
against the erring persons would soon be put up in the
Environment Court at Hisar. |
Damaged
power meters not to be repaired PANCHKULA, April 28 — The electricity consumers in Haryana will now have to pay for meters installed in place of partly damaged ones. Instructions in this regard have been issued to the field staff by the Haryana Vidyut Prasaran Nigam (HVPN). Earlier, the practise was to send the defective meters to the M and T laboratories for repair. No charges were taken from consumers till the cost of repair was not intimated by the laboratory concerned. Now, the partly damaged meters will not be repaired. These instructions have been issued in continuation of an earlier order regarding disposal of defective and damaged meters. According to the new procedure, if a meter is found damaged it will not be repaired and the SDO (operation) concerned will debit the cost of the new meter from the consumer's account. Only those metres which
are to be tested, will be sent to laboratories and no
cost will be debited from consumers' accounts. However,
the procedure in case of burnt or damaged meters will
remain as such. |
Revision
in notification of posts CHANDIGARH, April 28 — Keeping in view the administrative problems being faced by various employers regarding recruitment in government offices, departments, boards and corporations, the Chandigarh Administration has revised the procedure for inviting applications. Under the new procedure, in case the number of vacancies is less than five, these besides notifying in the local Employment Exchange, would be published in one local newspaper instead of the Employment News. But in case the number of such vacancies is more than five, the recruitment notice for the relevant categories would be published in the Employment News. Earlier, bulk applications were received even for a single vacancy in such offices which resulted in an inordinate delay in filling the vacancy. The decision will not
apply to such cases where the recruitment process has
already been started or recruitment notice published in
the Employment News. |
13 AIDS
camps organised CHANDIGARH, April 28 — On the first three days of the observance of the family health awareness week 13 camps were organised till today to cover 22 villages and colonies in the Union Territory. A total of 124 Anganwari workers provided information on AIDS prevention by visiting approximately 90,000 people in these villages in the age group of 15-49 years and informed them about the camps for diagnosis and treatment of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and reproductory tract infection (RTIs) besides provision of free medicines. Approximately, 5500 people have so far attended these 13 camps being organised by the State AIDS Control Society in collaboration with non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Till today 1800 people were treated for STDs and RTIs and 427 blood samples were collected for diagnosis. Counselling was also provided along with AIDS awareness information in these camps. The officials of the health department visited the camps organised at Bapu Dham Colony, Kishangarh, Gursagar Colony, Khudda Ali Sher and Indira Colony. These camps were organised by the Baptist Association, Rotary Club (Central), Harinder Welfare Society, Servants of the People Society and Citizens Awareness Group, respectively. As many as 129 patients were examined during an AIDS awareness camp, organised by the Servants of the People Society in Khudda Ali Sher today. The people of the village and surrounding areas attended the camp voluntarily. Free laboratory tests and medicines were also provided to the patients during the camp. Dr R.S. Sandhu, Director, Health Services, Chandigarh, along with Dr N M Sharma, Secretary, AIDS Control Society, Chandigarh and Ms Amrita Ahluwalia also visited the camp. Mr Balwinder Sipray, President, Youth Club, Khudda Ali Sher, thanked the State AIDS Control Society for organising the camp in the village. Similar camps on
awareness and diagnosis/treatment of RTIs and STDs will
be organised in Daria, Ram Darbar, Colony No. 4 and
Colony No 5 tomorrow. |
SNIPPETS Passport applications till Jan 29 processed CHANDIGARH, April 28 (TNS) — The local Regional Passport Office (RPO) has processed all applications which were submitted till January 29 and were found complete in all respects. This information was given by the RPO here today in its weekly report on the status of passport applications for the week ending April 16. CHANDIGARH, April 28 (TNS) — The Chandigarh Administration has appointed Ms Vineeta Rai, Adviser to the UT Administrator, Chairperson of the Chandigarh Housing Board, in addition to her duties from the date she takes charge, an official spokesman said here today. CHANDIGARH, April 28 (TNS) — The local unit of the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) has staked its claim to the local Lok Sabha seat. The President of SAD, Mr Gurpartap Singh Riar, said here today that since SAD had left the local seat for the BJP twice now it was the turn of SAD to contest the seat. He said that under no circumstances would the party support Mr Satya Pal Jain, if he was fielded by the BJP again. CHANDIGARH, April 28 (FOC) — To press for their pending demands, the Punjab Pensioners Association (PPA), Chandigarh , held a meeting in Arya Samaj Mandir, Sector-22, here today. The association has been demanding the release of dearness relief (DR) instalment due on January 1, merger of 97 per cent DR in basic pension, grant of travel concession to family pensioners, grant of fixed medical allowance of Rs 500 per month and concession in bus fares. Mr K.L. Issar, Chairman, and Mr Kewal Ram Sharma, President of PPA, threatened a peaceful agitation in case the Punjab Government failed to accept their demands. The association decided
to join the protest rally at Dera Bassi on the call of
the Punjab State Pensioners Confederation on May 5. |
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