Director meets Civil Surgeons on Pulse Polio campaign
Our Correspondent

Ludhiana, March 11
Dr G. L. Goel, Director, Health and Family Welfare, held a meeting with Civil Surgeons and District Immunisation Officers (DIOs) of Malwa region to review the Pulse Polio campaign. He asked the officials to involve NGOs, social organisations and volunteers to make the next round of polio immunisation, scheduled for April 4, a success.

Civil Surgeons and District Immunisation Officers of 10 districts — Ludhiana, Patiala, Sangrur, Fatehgarh Sahib, Moga, Muktsar, Ferozepore, Mansa, Bathinda and Faridkot — attended the meeting.

Dr Goel said stress should be laid to motivate the masses. He said in certain areas, it was found that health workers kept on sitting in the booths allotted to them rather than asking the passersby whether their children had been administered the polio drops or not. He stressed that more facilities were required, particularly in Ludhiana, for the storage of vaccines.

Dr Goel also discussed issues like female foeticide, Vande Mataram scheme and other family planning programmes.

The meeting was attended among others by WHO members Dr Kamaljit Singh, Dr Dinesh Dadwal, Dr G.B.Singh, Dr S.N.Tiwari, Civil Surgeon, Dr Rajinder Kaur, a former Civil Surgeon, and Dr Kuldeep Kaur, District Immunisation Officer.

Central Railway defeat Northern Railway eves
Our Sports Reporter

Ludhiana, March 11
On the penultimate day of the eighth All India Mohinder Partap Singh Grewal Memorial Women’s Hockey Tournament being played here at Deso Turf ground of Punjab Agricultural University, Central Railway, Mumbai, defeated the defending champions, Northern Railway by 2-0.

Both teams started the proceedings on a brisk pace and stormed each other’s territory without much success. The current champions, the Northern Railway earned as many as four penalty corners during the first 25 minutes of play but could not avail these scoring opportunities.

Whereas, after fumbling at the goal on a couple of occasions, the Central Railway drew the first goal in the 30th minute through their international star Kanti Baa. Northern Railway players pressed hard for the equaliser and forced four penalty corners but failed to take advantage of these chances.

After thwarting Northern Railway eve’s repeated attacks, the Central Railway consolidated the lead (2-0) through another international player Geeta B M in the 57th minute. Down by two goals, the Northern Railway went all out to reduce the margin, however, they failed to dodge past the agile defence of the Central Railway.

In another match which turned out to be a cliff hanger, the Dhanoa Academy (HMV), Jalandhar, scrambled past the SAI, Chandigarh, 4-3 after leading 2-1 at half time.

After wasting a penalty stroke in the fifth minute, the academy girls went into the lead in the 28th minute through Surjit Kaur and two minutes later Vandana made it 2-0. Few seconds before the breather, SAI eves reduced the margin (1-2) when Deepika converted a penalty corner.

In the second half, Surjit Kaur scored her second goal to increase the lead 3-1. However, their joys were shortlived as Chandigarh players struck in quick succession (51st minute by Prem and Usha in the 53rd minute) to level the score 3-all.

With two minutes before the long hooter, Arun Bala of the Dhanoa Academy scored a fine field goal to seal SAI girl’s fate and helped her team clinch the title 4-3.