Forest cover depleted: report
SHIMLA, March 21 — Large-scale felling of trees and encroachments have depleted the forest cover in the Jubbal and Kotkhai areas by an alarming 25 per cent over the past 30 years.

Plea to reduce quota for direct recruitment
SHIMLA, March 21 — The Himachal Pradesh State Allied Services Confederation has urged the government to reduce the quota for direct recruitment to state administrative service from 50 to 25 per cent to provide more promotional avenues to allied services.

Remarks of Cong MLAs decried
SHIMLA, March 21 — Mr Mohan Lal, Minister of State for Ayurveda, has criticised Congress legislators who had issued a statement that the Scheduled Castes community was not given representation in the Himachal Public Service Commission and the Subordinate Services Selection Board.

Forest cover depleted: report
Tribune News Service

SHIMLA, March 21 — Large-scale felling of trees and encroachments have depleted the forest cover in the Jubbal and Kotkhai areas by an alarming 25 per cent over the past 30 years.

This has been revealed in a preliminary report prepared by the remote sensing cell of the state government which studied changes in forest cover in the catchment of Pabbar river using satellite data. The study covering the catchments of Biskalti Nullah and Gauni Khad, the two tributaries of the river, detected depletion of forest area from 41.98 sq km in 1964-65 to 31.28 sq km in 1997, a reduction of 10.692 sq km.

The Forest Department, however has been claiming that the deforestation and encroachments took place decades ago and that there had been no further depletion of green cover over the past decade or so.

The satellite images on the other hand, clearly indicate that the trend has been continuing and the depleted forest area has increased from 9.757 sq km in 1990 to 10.692 sq km in 1997.

A perusal of the satellite images, the report says, shows that agricultural land boundaries have invariably transgressed the forest boundaries and in certain cases to a considerable distance. There are several patches devoid of vegetation, identified as depleted forests and might be the result of deforestation.

Besides, certain contiguous areas shown as forests on the topographical map, when seen on satellite images appear to have lost all characteristics of forests and no vegetative cover could be seen in such pockets.

Although the Forest Department has been receiving reports of large scale encroachments by influential fruit growers and illicit felling of trees, for long, it is for the first time that a study, has been carried out to quantify the reduction in green cover. It is common knowledge that during the apple boom vast stretches of forests were transformed into orchards in connivance with the local forest officials. The inaccessibility of the area has also been to the advantage of the encroachers, as senior officers seldom visit the interior areas.

The report has suggested that a more indepth study be conducted after acquiring comparable satellite data from 1975 to 1990. In case accurate forest working plans depicting the forest expanse are available, it would be appropriate to digitise them for compression with the satellite data.

A special campaign can also be mounted with the help of space applications centre for Kulu and Shimla, the two districts where such changes are suspected to have occurred on a large scale, the report observed.

Plea to reduce quota for direct recruitment
Tribune News Service

SHIMLA, March 21 — The Himachal Pradesh State Allied Services Confederation has urged the government to reduce the quota for direct recruitment to state administrative service from 50 to 25 per cent to provide more promotional avenues to allied services.

Mr K.S. Daulta and Mr Manoj Tomar, President and General Secretary of the association, respectively, said here today that the existing promotion of Tehsildar and non-tehsildar categories, also required a review. While the Tehsildars had been allotted 22 per cent quota on the cadre strength of 104, the 28 per cent quota of non-tehsildar categories was being shared by 13 allied services with a cadre strength of 364.

The promotional avenues of non-tehsildar categories had been squeezing due to increase in the cadre strength. The situation became worse as the government wrongly included "certain categories" like General Managers of district industries centres, in the category. Consequently, the members of allied services had to wait for promotion for more than 15 years.

They urged the government to rationalise the quota and ensure that no category, except those recruited through the State Administrative Services Examination, was considered for inclusion in the feeder cadre.

The association has submitted a representation to Mr P.K. Dhumal, Chief Minister, and urged him to take immediate steps to end stagnation in the allied services.

Solang being developed
From Our Correspondent

MANDI, March 21 — Mr Maheshwar Singh, MP, said here today that the large network multi-assessed rural radios (MARR) in the Mandi parliamentary constituency would be repaired on a war-footing.

The Union Communications Minister had issued the necessary directions in this regard, he added.

He said Tatapani in Mandi district would also be linked with group dialling before March 31. The capacity of the Sundernagar exchange would be enhanced from 2800 lines to 4000 lines and that of Rampur from 1200 lines to 2000 lines before the end of the month, he said.

He said the Prashar Lake in the district was being linked with a metalled road through a new alignment from Tihri to Prashar. The funds for this would be managed from the Centre. A Rs 2.10 crore project was likely to be approved, he said.

He said Solang near Manali was also being developed under a central scheme for winter sports.

Mr Maheshwar Singh disclosed that the snow-bound tribal areas of Himachal Pradesh were being linked with the wireless local loop (WLL) with a view to maintaining uninterrupted telecommunications.

Remarks of Cong MLAs decried
Tribune News Service

SHIMLA, March 21 — Mr Mohan Lal, Minister of State for Ayurveda, has criticised Congress legislators who had issued a statement that the Scheduled Castes community was not given representation in the Himachal Public Service Commission and the Subordinate Services Selection Board (SSSB).

The Minister pointed out that Mr Vidya Nath, who was recently appointed member of the SSSB belonged to the Scheduled Castes.

He alleged that the Congressmen were making false allegations against the government.

Support prices to be fixed soon
From Our Correspondent

KANGRA, March 21 — The Himachal Pradesh government was actively considering fixing the support prices for potato and onion on the pattern of apple and mango.

This was disclosed by the Agriculture Minister, Mr Vidya Sagar, while addressing the farmers at the Kisan rally in the oil seed research station here yesterday. He said the government was providing subsidies to the tune of Rs 15 crore to the farmers on fertilisers, seeds, tools and insecticides annually. An amount of Rs 12 crore was spent by the government on the distribution of the 90,000 tonnes of the chemical fertilisers among the farmers of the state.

Sixty thousand quintals of seeds were distributed among the farmers and Rs 53 lakh were spent on the production of the oilseeds in the state this year.

He advised the agriculture scientists to increase the production of oilseeds, which was 7,000 tonnes this year. About 22000 hectares of land was utilised for the production of oilseeds in the state.