New Delhi, September 3
The Delhi High Court has issued notices to the Centre, the Delhi Government and the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) on reports that most of the hospitals run by them in the Capital lack even basic water supply.

A Division Bench of Acting Chief Justice Vijender Jain and Mr Justice Kailash Ghambhir asked the three agencies to file their status reports within a week. September 20 was fixed as the next date of hearing.

The Bench issued the notices after taking suo motu cognizance of newspaper reports which highlighted the lack of basic water facilities in a majority of the hospitals putting the patients to inconvenience.

Mr O. P. Saxena, standing counsel for the MCD, who was present in the court, was asked by the court to ensure that all hospitals under the civic body had adequate water supply round the clock to avoid inconvenience to the patients.

The court took a serious view of news reports that at Swami Dayananda Hospital, Shahdara, the operation theatre had to close down due to non-supply of water.

The hospital had no water connection since the past three years. It had to depend on the water tankers of the Delhi Jal Board alone for their day-to-day requirements.

As a result of shortage of water tankers, the operation theatre at the hospital had to be closed down.

The Bench sought a detailed report on the issue. The court also asked Delhi Government counsel J. R. Midha to obtain reports from all Delhi Government hospitals like Lok Naik Jai Prakash Hospital, GB Pant Hospital and Maulana Azad Memorial College and file a status report regarding the availability of basic amenities at these places. 

Faridabad, September 3
Four members of a family, including two minor kids died under mysterious circumstances, while they were travelling in an air-conditioned car in Sector 16 here last night after it got stranded in a flooded street.

The bodies of the victims were recovered from the ill-fated vehicle this morning and sent for postmortem examination in the civil hospital here. The heavy downpour that lashed the city last evening led to flooding of several roads and residential areas for hours.

According to reports, a Santro car driven by its owner Mr Dhanesh Jindal (32), a resident of Sector-31 here, got stranded in a traffic jam that was caused by flooding on the road near Sunflag Hospital in Sector 16 here. Jindal was accompanied by his wife Ruchi, a one and a half years old daughter Kritika and a son.

It is learnt that the airconditioner of the car was on when the car came to a halt. But according to reports, the car failed to move even after the traffic got cleared and it was thought that the car had a breakdown due to water on the road.

As no one could notice about the occupants in the car due to black-tinted glasses, someone in the morning today saw something suspicious as the blood was dripping out of the vehicle.

After getting the information, the police got the centrally locked doors opened and found that four persons, the couple and two children, were found lying unconscious. All the four were declared brought dead. Maybe they had died due to suffocation. While the postmortem report was still awaited, it is suspected that the victims had died due to suffocation caused by leakage of some harmful gas after there had been breakdown in the engine of the car due to water, as the airconditioner had been on at that time.

It is believed that the couple could not open the door due to central locking after they had been affected by the poisonous gas that could have come out suddenly at the time of breakdown.

The police have started an investigation into the matter.

This is the first case of death perhaps caused indirectly by the flooding caused by rains.

The city reported around 55 mm of rainfall in the past two days. Otherwise the district had been facing a heavy shortfall of rainfall this season. 

New Delhi, September 3
In protest against the sealing of business establishments, children of traders today observed a one-day token hunger strike, asking the Union Government to take immediate cognizance of the seriousness of the issue. Sealing may be a disaster for traders. Their families should be protected from the impending disaster, they demanded from the government.

The fast was held under the aegis of the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT).

The children carried placards reading “Sealing to karoge par kya main apne mata pita ke prati kartavya nibha paoonga, kya main apna bhavishya bana paoonga” and posed several questions before the government.

The traders said that they were undergoing trauma due to the sealing drive launched by the MCD.

They asked the government to follow the principle of governance by protecting business establishments.

New Delhi, September 3
Consuming liquor during office hours and trying to molest the wife of a colleague is too grave an offence, which justifies outright dismissal of such an employee from service, the Delhi High Court has ruled. Upholding a decision of the labour tribunal which held sacking of the errant employee as “perfectly legal and justified,” Mr Justice S. N. Dhingra, quoting a Supreme Court ruling, said the scope of judicial review was limited to deficiency in the decision-making process and not the decision.

Mangal Singh, a sweeper with Punjab Bhavan here, was sacked by the management on charges of drinking during office hours and attempting to molest the wife of a colleague. It was alleged that Singh went to the house of his colleague Salig Ram in an inebriated condition and molested his wife. He took advantage of the fact that the colleague would be on duty at that time. Singh had challenged his dismissal before the tribunal which by an order on September 24, 1999, upheld the dismissal as perfectly legal and justified. Following this, the accused appealed in the High Court on the ground that the inquiry conducted against him was mala fide and vitiated by bias. This was not considered by the tribunal before upholding the punishment.

However, Mr Justice Dhingra noted the accused had given a confessional statement on June 30, 1985, and was given sufficient opportunity to examine and cross-examine the witnesses.

New Delhi, September 3
The Delhi High Court has quashed the DDA’s bid to slap an excess amount of nearly Rs 1.91 lakh on a 74-year-old widow after belatedly allotting her a flat.

Mr Justice Ravindra Bhat also ordered the DDA to pay an interest of 12 per cent on an amount of Rs 1.55 lakh belonging to the widow, which was illegally held by it for a period spreading over six years. The victim Dev Kumari’s husband, B. B. Sharma, had initially applied for the allotment of a flat at Paschim Vihar in September 1985.

At the DDA’s instance, Dev Kumari joined her husband in 1986 as a co-registrant of the flat, but Sharma expired in 1987. In April 1989, Kumari received an allotment letter indicating total disposal cost of Rs 1,63,700 for which she deposited Rs 92,832.

Though the flat was purportedly registered on August 30, 1990, yet the DDA, for inexplicable reasons, did not hand over the possession of the flat to her and subsequently cancelled it in 1993.

After Kumari made a representation, the DDA, while admitting its folly, issued a fresh allotment letter to her for a flat at Jhilmil.

However, instead of acknowledging the amount of Rs 92,832 belonging to Kumari lying with it, the DDA allotted the victim a flat in August 1995, but shocked her with a higher cost of Rs 3,30,900.

New Delhi, September 3
Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit yesterday stressed on the proper health care for children, saying that this was an important prerequisite for making a strong nation.

Inaugurating a two-day Continuing Medical Education (CME) programme on “Health and Beyond: Putting Child First” organised as part of Golden Jubilee Celebrations of the All India Institute of Medical Science, she said the theme of the CME was of paramount importance and a foremost focus area.

She said the government had included the aim of making Delhi a child-friendly city in the ninth Delhi Development Goals.

Emphasising on the need to ensure good health of mother, the Chief Minister said, “Motherly care is most important for a child up to the age of five years when the foundation of physical and mental development is laid.” She further exhorted mothers to prevent children from becoming sick.

She claimed that the Stree Shakti Camps in Delhi had helped in generating awareness about personal hygiene, sanitation and cleanliness. She called upon mothers, schoolteachers, doctors and all other stake-holders to work together to develop healthy children and healthy nation.

The CME would highlight various health issues related to children including epilepsy, asthma, the problems of poor school achievers and increasing cost of health charges.

The paediatric population form the most significant chunk of the city population and the percentage of children up to 14 years is 32.40.

New Delhi, September 3
Bharatiya Janata Party MP Vijay Kumar Malhotra today appealed to Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit to constitute a high-level committee for working out the basic problems of journalists. He said this at a function organised by the Indra Prastha Press Club.

He said the main problem of the Delhi journalists was of accommodation.

Professor Malhotra said when he was the Chief Metropolitan Councillor there was two per cent reservation for journalists in all schemes of flats launched by the DDA. A number of journalists had got flats under the scheme. Later, the scheme was quashed.

In 2003, the Congress election manifesto declared that it would provide accommodation to the journalists if they came to power. Now, it was being delayed on various pretexts. When the government could construct houses for factory workers, it could provide houses to journalists also. 

Gurgaon, September 3
The district police seem to be selective while taking action against the culprits, alleged a number of complainants who had lodged FIRs in different police stations.

Taking a bold step, a taekwondo player lodged the FIR against four youths for allegedly raping her and taking her obscene photos on August 15.

The police have not arrested even a single accused till today, the girl told ‘The Tribune’. As the culprits belong to Jhunjhunu district in Rajasthan, the local police, showing helplessness in arresting the accused, now intend to transfer the case to Jhunjhunu to benefit the accused and harass the complainant, added the girl.

The local police’s lethargy had given sufficient time to the accused to destroy the evidence against them and prepare fabricated documents to establish their innocence, the girl lamented.

District Town and Planner (Enforcement) Ms Gurmeet Kaur lodged an FIR against Anil Rao, Jitender Kataria, Pradeep, alias Meenu, and many others for assaulting and obstructing public servant in discharge of public functions (under Sections 186, 353, 506 IPC) on August 7.

Ms Kaur along with Duty Magistrate Balraj Singh (Naib Tehsildar) and other officers had gone to demolish illegal banquet hall ‘Celebration Point’ near Sheetla Mata Mandir, but the persons mentioned above created hindrance and did not allow the officer to demolish the structure.

The police have failed to arrest anyone of the accused and took the plea that the culprits had gone underground. But on the other hand, Celebration Point has organised a number of functions after the incident, informed a source.

How does the owners go underground and kept organising the functions, asked a senior official on the condition of anonymity.

In another significant FIR lodged by the Sadar police station on August 9 against the then Estate Officer Mr Pradeep

Daggar and others allegedly transferred a residential plot on fabricated documents in February 2004.

The FIR was registered by a Hisar resident under Sections 419, 420, 467, 468 of IPC against the EO, HUDA and others but till today, the police have not arrested the officer on one pretext or other, informed the complainant.

These are three incidents of the last month where the police have failed to take any action against the culprits, said the complainants, adding that there are hundreds of cases where the complainants are not getting justice. 

New Delhi, September 3
The Expenditure Finance Committee (EFC) of the Government of NCT of Delhi has sanctioned Rs. 92.86 crore for the purchase of machinery and equipment for the Institute of Biliary Science.

The EFC gave its nod to five projects; two each relating to the Department of Health and Family Welfare and the PWD and one from the Department of Environment.

The projects were sanctioned in a meeting held on Friday under the chairmanship of Delhi Finance and Planning Minister Dr A.K. Walia.

Addressing the media, Dr Walia said the EFC had sanctioned Rs. 92.86 crore for the purchase of machinery and equipment for the Institute.

The proposed material would be purchased in phased manner as per the requirement, the minister said, adding that it would be ensured that none of the equipment remained unutilised after the commissioning of the Institute.

The EFC has also given a go ahead for the purchase of Typhoid Vaccine and related items worth Rs. 1.28 crore that would help in bringing down morbidity and mortality caused by the disease in the age group of 2-5 years. This would also led to a reduction in hospital admission cases.

Dr. Walia said a project of the Environment Department for procurement of 40 acre land for setting up of the treatment, storage and disposal facility at Ghummanhera at an estimated cost of Rs 11.22 crore had also been approved.

The decision is in keeping with an order of the Supreme Court directing the Delhi Government to develop a site for treatment, storage and disposal of hazardous waste.

Two projects of the PWD have also been cleared by the EFC that would facilitate provision of escalators for foot over bridges at Ring Road near ITO and Maharani Bagh with an estimated cost of Rs. 5.27 crore and resurfacing of Ring Road from Nigam Bodh Ghat to Clock Tower and construction of service road near clock tower on city side at an estimated cost of Rs. 2.82 crore 
within a period of 12 months.

The resurfacing of this part of Ring Road would provide a safe and smooth riding surface to the road users in this stretch.

New Delhi, September 3
The West Delhi police today claimed to have recovered a two-year-old boy, Saurav, who was kidnapped from Uttam Nagar about two weeks ago. A woman, Naeem, has been arrested.

The father of the boy, Prem Singh, had reported on August 19 that his child, Saurav, who had been playing with other children in the street, was missing. He suspected that someone had kidnapped him. After an FIR was lodged, a team was set up and investigations were on. Sources were deployed in the neighbourhood of the victim. “A watch was kept on the persons visiting the house of Prem Singh,” said a senior police officer.

During investigations, it was observed Naeem, who had been residing in the neighbouhood of the victim and had left the house about six months ago, was showing undue interest in the kidnapping incident. She visited the house many times. She also inquired about the progress of the case from the mother of the child. She advised her to pay up if there was any demand for ransom for the safe release of the child.

The suspicious behaviour of the woman alerted the police. A manhunt was launched to track her. A raid was conducted at the parental house of the suspect. The kidnapped boy was recovered from her possession.

On sustained interrogation, the accused disclosed that she had a plan to demand ransom after some time. 

New Delhi, September 3
A Delhi court has sentenced a man to life imprisonment for a murder during a robbery attempt about five years ago in a South Delhi locality. Convicting Udham Singh for fatally shooting Jarnail Singh during an attempted robbery in his house, Additional Sessions Judge Vinod Kumar held that there was no ground to disbelieve the eyewitness account given by the complainant. The court also imposed a fine of Rs 10,000 on the convict.

The court, however, acquitted three others, Darshan Singh, Gurdeep Singh and his wife Mindo Bai, observing that “there is no evidence against them... the prosecution is relying only on their disclosure statements.”

According to the prosecution, on September 12, 2000, complainant Banta Singh, a resident of Faridabad, and his wife Jeet Kaur had gone to his brother-in-law Jarnail Singh’s house in the Badarpur area of South Delhi for an overnight stay. At night, all of them slept in the courtyard while Jarnail and his wife slept in the room. At about 12 o’clock Banta woke up as the air-cooler had stopped due to power cut. He saw at least four men near the entrance of the house. One of them, Udham Singh, was carrying a countrymade pistol.

Banta caught hold of the barrel of the pistol. The burglar fired a shot which woke up Jarnail who came out rushing from inside.

Udham then fired again which hit Jarnail on his chest, knocking him to the floor. 

New Delhi, September 3
A minor fire broke out yesterday afternoon in Parivahan Bhawan on Parliament Street here.

There was no loss of life or property as the fire was brought under control within minutes, according to the Fire Brigade.

“The fire had broke out due to a short circuit on the NCB Board of the office at about 12.05 pm and was put off at 12.15 pm,” a Fire Brigade official said.

New Delhi, September 3
Art lovers in general and Fida fans in particular are in a for a weeklong visual treat of 25 original paintings from a collection of 100 specially painted for the business tycoon, Guru Swarup Srivastava by the master painter, MF Husain under the heading “Our Planet Called Earth”.

Bartercard is holding a special exhibition of these paintings at the Lalit Kala Akademi here from September 7 to September 13. The exhibition is being curated by Durga Kainthola, a known name in the art circles.