Ludhiana, June 19
Murderous attack on Tehsildar-cum-Sub Registrar, Maj GS Benipal, who was assaulted and stripped today, brought true the worst fears of revenue officials, who were anticipating a similar attack in the recent past.

They had even written to Deputy Commissioner Vikas Garg for providing security in their respective offices. Their demand was, however, declined by Garg, who could not gauge the situation that turned uglier today. Seeing no help from district administration the revenue officials had started bringing their private security guards to save themselves from any such situation.

Even after regular complaints the administration remained a mute spectator to the atrocities on these officials as it was helpless in taking action against politicians due to latter’s proximity with the ruling Akali leaders. It looks as if the administration was waiting for today’s incident to happen.

Only Major Benipal, who happens to be a retired Army officer, was not bringing his security. He was the one who became the victim today.

Recently, Major Benipal had complained of misbehaviour by councillor Kamaljit Singh Karwal and had even complained to the Deputy Commissioner about it. No case was, however, registered against Karwal and the tehsildars, who were snubbed and asked to return to the work. Benipal was even ready to submit his resignation over the issue, as the deputy commissioner was not taking any action against the politician.

Even before that on several occasions Akali councillor Simarjit Singh Bains and Karwal were accused of misbehaving with Major Benipal. On the very first day when Sub-Registrar (Central) office was set up, these councillors had a problem, as they wanted to inaugurate the office formally.

Later, there were at least five incidents of misbehaviour against Major Benipal alone. On June 10, Sub-Registrar (East), Jagsir Singh, was attacked by a lawyer in his office. Then also the revenue officials had protested and demanded security. In this case, however, the lawyer was booked after some days.

Ludhiana, June 19
The municipal corporation has once again decided to waste public money by constructing a bridge over Ganda Nallah near Shingar Cinema. The new one would be one-foot higher than the old one.

The work on this under construction lintel was stopped by Congress councillors today. They alleged that there was no fun in spending Rs 73 lakh on the work if the height has to be raised by only one-foot.

"There was no fun in demolishing the older one if the upcoming bridge had to be raised by this height as the real purpose for which it was being constructed fails," said Congress councillors Sanjay Talwar and Rakesh Parashar, who have questioned embezzlement in the construction process.

The real problem with the pulley is that the flow of Ganda Nallah has increased and during the monsoon it spreads out by striking less height bridge causing a lot of inconvenience to the people living in the area and the commuters. They added that even during its construction about two years ago the sand bags put up below the bridge were not removed which are still choking the nallah.

They said, "Due to less height mechanical cleaning below the 100-foot wide bridge is not possible and manual operation too are hampered since even humans cannot go below. We called upon zonal commissioner Vinod Sharda along with the SDO to review the height." Besides, we also want that the potable water that is going above the nullah should be diverted as water is being supplied to around 15 wards through that line.

According to information, the tenders of construction of Rs 73-lakh bridge were invited in January and were allotted to contractor Inder Mohan. The work was inaugurated by Deputy Speaker Satpal Gosain, who is working as a crusader along with MLA HR Dhanda to clean Ganda Nallah.

Ludhiana, June 19
MBBS doctors in Punjab are up in arms against the Punjab Public Service Commission (PPSC) following declaration of result of interviews for 100 posts of PCMS doctor.

Accusing the commission of having declared the result “in haste”, a group of doctors said the result was declared on June 12 so as to avoid controversy caused by the revelation of the “unprofessional approach” adopted during the interviews, which was highlighted in The Tribune on June 11.

The doctors made another attempt to seek the details of “selection criteria” from the PPSC, which had earlier refused to give information on the pretext of confidentiality.

Dr Vikas put up an application under the RTI Act asking the information officer of the PPSC to give the details of the selection process, marks of the candidates selected and profession of their parents.

Another doctor, while pointing to the list of selected candidates, alleged that it was clear from it that “merit” had been ignored in interviews as was evident from the names of relatives of politicians, bureaucrats and highly-placed officials in the list.

Dr Jagpreet Singh had filed a PIL against the PPSC for “lack of transparency” in interviews in Punjab and Haryana High Court, which Dr Sonia (one of the candidates) said would be further pursued in the Supreme Court if the outcome was not in favour of doctors and public at large.

The doctors also referred to “absurd” questions asked by the commission members from qualified doctors during interviews.

Dr Hirdaypal Singh Chahal claimed that he was asked to tell the number of teeth a frog had and the smallest breed of dog in the world.

Also, a woman doctor claimed that she was asked about her mode of travel to Russia for her postgraduation. On replying that she had gone “by air”, she was asked to name the airplane models and flight numbers.

The questions were in stark contrast to the selection criteria mentioned by the PPSC to the election commission during the elections (to take permission to continue interviews) wherein it was categorically mentioned that 50 per cent marks would be given for the interviews and 50 per cent for the basic qualification.

Ludhiana, June 19
PCMS doctors in a statement issued here today demanded total pay parity with doctors under the Centre.

The doctors also demanded non-functional “Dynamic ACP“ (assured carrier progression) of SAG (senior administrative grade) for PCMS doctors having 20 years of regular services, on a par with doctors under the Centre.

Dr Hardeep Singh, state president, and Dr Balwinder Kumar, district secretary of the PCMS Association, expressed resentment over the Fifth Punjab Pay Commission that had failed to keep its promise to remove disparity in the pay package of PCMS doctors vis-à-vis central doctors.

Though the Punjab pay commission stressed on parity with central doctors as the guiding principle to retain PCMS doctors in government service, it had now adopted a mysterious silence on matters, including disparity in ACP, different pay package for specialists, different functional pay scales for seniors PCMS hierarchy from SMO to senior-most officials.

Dr Hardeep Singh said the PCMS cadre was infested with stagnation following anomalies in promotions and pay packages.

Also, Dr Balwinder Kumar pointed towards the delay in notification of allowances and demanded early gazette notification of all recommended allowances like non-practicing allowance (NPA) conveyance to all doctors, rural area allowance, postgraduate increments to all specialist doctors, mobile allowance, children education allowance and minimum qualifying service of 20 years for full pension.

Ludhiana, June 19
Pensioners of different government departments observed 7th foundation day of Pensioners’ Bhawan under the aegis of Pensioners’ Information Centre Management Committee at mini secretariat here today.

BR Kaushal, chairman of the committee, in his welcome address, said the bhawan was a unique project in this part of the country. It was a non-state funded project, built and equipped with required infrastructure at a cost of Rs 22 lakh on a piece of land provided by the state government within the district administrative complex.

Chief guest Pawan Bajaj, zonal manager, Bank of India, remarked that the bank, one of the eight public sector banks engaged in disbursement of pension on behalf of the state and central government, had great regard for the government pensioners, who had spent a major portion of their lives in public service.

He outlined several facilities like increased rate of interest on deposits, need-based loan against pension, reverse mortgage and ATM, which were being offered to pensioners and other senior citizens.

Other speakers urged the state government to implement recommendations of the 5th pay commission after removal of anomalies as the delay caused on this account was brewing resentment among government pensioners.

Among others, BD Sharma, Vishnu Datt Sharma, OP Bhardwaj, Kuldeep Jaiswal, HS Kahlon, Kalyan Singh Panchhi, Gurmel Singh, Dr Lakhbir Singh, HK Sood, RS Behal, VK Khanna, GL Bajaj, Hardwari Lal Sharma, Darshan Singh Ladla, Vishwa Mittar Bhandari, Jarnail Singh Dhillon, Prem Sagar Sharma, AK Singh, Charanjit Singh, MS Kainth, Amarjit Singh, HS Neelon, Bhag Singh Tihara and Harbhajan Singh were present.

Ludhiana, June 19
The Punjab State Electricity Board seems to be grappling with acute shortage of power with no solution in sight for the time being with a result that duration of power cut in different parts of the city went up from 4-5 hours to nearly 7 hours today.

The PSEB had imposed a 4-hour daily power cut in all towns and cities of the state from June 10 when the decision to provide 8-hour power supply to the agriculture sector was implemented for the paddy sowing operations. But with increasing gap between availability and demand for power during the last week or so, the duration of power cut had to be increased, say the PSEB officials.

In the localities falling in City I group, the power remained cut off from 8.45 am to 11.15 am, 12 pm to 3 pm and again from 5.30 pm to 6.30 pm. In City II and City III groups also, the power cut ranged from five and a half hours to seven hours during the day, giving a tough time to the people who had to go without power and water in the sweltering hot weather conditions.

Sources at the PSEB headquarters at Patiala revealed that the gap between total availability and demand of power was hovering between 300 to 350 lakh units, which could be tackled with a maximum power cut of four hours during the day.

The main reason for sudden increase in the duration of power cut was alarmingly low frequency of the northern power grid, which led to load shedding to save the entire system from collapse. The reason attributed to low frequency of the grid was poor generation in almost the entire country and things could improve only if the states could improve their power generation.

With timing and duration of power cut going haywire, the water supply provided by the Municipal Corporation had also been badly affected with most of the city localities going without water supply from 8.30 am till 7 pm. All tubewells and submersible pumps put into service for water supply by the civic body could operate only when power was available and any disruption directly affects the water supply as well.

Scores of city residents rued that with power cut having been imposed at 8.30 am, they were denied water supply which is normally available till 9.30 am and again they had to go without the afternoon water supply from 12 pm to 2 pm.

There is a strong feeling among the affected people that the PSEB and the Municipal Corporation ought to have close coordination so that even if the duration of the power cut remains the same, the timing could be so regulated that water supply could be maintained for some period during the day.

Ludhiana, June 19
An expert team from Punjab Engineering College (PEC) was invited by municipal corporation today to collect samples from Gill Road. However, the in-charge of building and roads, zonal commissioner Vinod Sharda, had no idea about it.

When the TNS asked Sharda about the sampling done by the PEC team, the official expressed ignorance on the matter.

According to sources, the samples had been taken so that the corporation could inspect its work on its own. However, the head of the department was caught unawares.

Earlier, too, the PEC team had taken samples of various roads on recommendations of the vigilance department of the local bodies and all of them had failed.

Even the state-level technical committee formed under Lt Gen BS Dhaliwal had rejected the work on various roads undertaken by the municipal corporation in various areas.

Meanwhile, Congress councillor Gurpreet Bassi said: “The work on roads in my ward was given to Ganpat Construction Company around six months ago. The contractor has been issued three legal notices but to no avail.” He added that the building and roads department officials were also adopting pick-and-choose policy.

He also met with Municipal Commissioner today and urged him to blacklist the contractor who had stopped work in his area allegedly at the behest of some officials of the B&R department.

Ludhiana, June 19
The Punjab government has appointed Kamaljeet Soi as member of the executive committee of transport department’s road safety council along with other senior bureaucrats.

Soi has expertise in road safety and transportation management.

He specialises in the field and has delivered lectures and implemented programnes around the world to prevent accidents and reduce fatality rate.

He has done research work in the field of transport management and road safety from Punjabi University, Patiala, for his doctorate degree.

Soi is on board of various international organisations like Institute of Transport Engineers, USA, Australian College of Road Safety, Institution of Highways and Transportation, UK, International Road Federation, etc.

The committee is headed by Punjab transport minister with many senior bureaucrats as its members.

Ludhiana, June 19
As the results of class XII, BCom, BCA and BBA are out, city colleges are gearing up for admissions for the new session.

While colleges are on admission spree, students coming out of schools are keenly vying for a berth in colleges of their choice.

Heavy rush of students for admission to the colleges is evident from the sale of prospectuses by various colleges.

Kamla Lohtia College principal Deepak Kaushal said BBA, BCA and BCom courses were eliciting maximum response.

Arya College principal Dr SM Sharma said the trend towards humanities was on the wane. Only those students who were unable to secure admission in commerce stream or BCA opted for Arts.

Arts, science and PG courses had virtually been wiped out. Arts was a traditional stream for the new generation as there were fewer job opportunities, while students of science stream preferred to join BTech affiliated with Punjab Technical University.

After graduating, students opted for BEd so that could get jobs in schools, as after doing postgraduation they had to clear UGC-NET to become a lecturer in the college.

Gurpreet Kaur, head of department of commerce, Government College for Women, said there were no jobs in the Punjab government, leaving just the private sector open for them.

Students preferred BCom as it had more practical and vocational value. If students with science background joined MBA, they had to learn the basics of commerce first.

Ludhiana, June 19
The district health authorities have failed to check even a single canteen in any of the local school or college in the last one year, thereby giving a green signal to the contractors to carry on selling stale, unhygienic food to the students.

The authorities, when contacted, expressed helplessness to conduct checks on the pretext of interference of the bureaucrats and politicians.

Food inspector Dr Harjot said, “We tried to check a canteen of a leading city school following a complaint, but the authorities approached the district administration, alleging the health department of adopting pick and choose policy.”

So much so that the school authorities also levelled the allegations of harassment to the minority community, disclosed the food inspector.

Maintaining anonymity, a department official said the managements of the educational institutes are politically well connected and also have good links with the high officials in district administration who go out of the way to oblige the management members as their respective wards are studying in one institution or the other.

The missing check on these canteens has given a free hand to the contractors to violate the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act and the students are forced to have the unhealthy food available in canteens.

Many a times people approached us with complaints, including sale of uncovered food items with flies sitting on them, but when we tried to check the same a telephone call at the office abstained us from doing so, added the official.

Interestingly, the department is constantly on the job of collecting samples of eatables and beverages from different outlets, including restaurants, grocery shops, milk booths, but canteens in schools/colleges are excluded.

The paradox in the situation being that people interfering in the matter are ignorant about the health hazards caused by consumption of adulterated and unhygienic food and drinks.

Ludhiana, June 19
PAU conducted the entrance test for admission to four-year programmes such as BSc agriculture (Hons), BSc biotechnology and BTech food technology, today. Giving details, controller of examinations Dr VK Dilawari said an overwhelming response was received for the courses, which have 90, 50 and 30 seats, respectively.

He added that a total of 1,474 candidates applied for these courses out of which 1,202 candidates appeared in the test. Traditionally, agriculture field is considered as domain of male students, however, 50 per cent of those who took the test were girls, he informed. PAU Vice-Chancellor Manjit Singh Kang, registrar RK Mahey, dean, College of Agriculture, Milkha Singh Aulakh took the round of the examination centres to see the arrangements made for the smooth conduct of test. Dr SS Mahal, professor of agronomy, was the coordinator of the test.

NEW COURSES: Various new courses offered by PAU this year have attracted a large number of applicants indicating their popularity among students. Vice-Chancellor MS Kang has introduced several new courses keeping in view their demand in the market. Giving details of the applications received for various courses, PAU registrar RK Mahey said MSc biotechnology programme had just 10 seats, but it received 177 applications.

Similarly, for MCA course with 30 seats, the university received 125 applications. Dr Mahey said for BSc agriculture, BSc biotechnology and BTech food technology, there were a total of 90 seats where as the number of applications received were 1,480. Similarly, the new programme of BSc agriculture, 6-year programme after Class X, has attracted 762 applicants.

Various masters’ programmes of the university have also been popular. For MSc in agriculture, 211 applications have been received while for basic sciences, 244 candidates were seeking admission.

HAILED: The PAU Teachers’ Association (PAUTA) in its meeting welcomed the decision of the Punjab government to clear the UGC scales for the university teachers in the Cabinet meeting held yesterday. PAUTA vice-president Harmeet Singh Kingra urged the government to notify the Cabinet’s decision at the earliest so that the scales are implemented without any further delay. He further extended special thanks to the government for implementing the scales from January 1, 2006 and also urged the government to give the other benefits from the same date (such as CAS and allowances). Dr KS Sangha, secretary, PAUTA, specially thanked the Chief Secretary, Punjab, for ensuring that the scales were also implemented in PAU at the same time, along with other universities of Punjab, and stressed that the Cabinet decision should be communicated to PAU for early implementation by the university authorities.

Ludhiana, June 19
Rajneesh Arora, Vice-Chancellor, PTU, met foreign students studying in Punjab during a farewell party to 10 passing out students from batches from 2006-09 held at Lodhi Club, Ludhiana. Sarojini Gautam Sharda, registrar, PTU, and Sarabjit Singh, deputy dean (international affairs), PTU, were present on the occasion.

KNS Kang, director general, PCTE and other senior officers of PCTE were present.

On this occasion, Kang presented all foreign students of the PCTE to Arora and other officials from the university. Kang said the PCTE had more than 40 students from seven different countries of Africa namely Tanzania, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Uganda and Mozambique and Cameroon studying in various courses. These 10 passing out students belonged to Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Mozambique and Ghana, who were returning to their native countries after completing their BBA and BCA degrees.

Ludhiana, June 19
The District Youth Congress today organised a free medical check-up camp to celebrate the 39th birthday of Rahul Gandhi, general secretary All India Congress Committee, here today.

A team of specialists examined patients in ward No. 23 and distributed medicines free of cost.

Unit president Dimple Rana, Rajesh Arora, Lal Singh Lali, Harish Dua and various others were.

Mandi Ahmedgarh: Activists of the Youth Congress organised blood donation and free medical camps in their respective areas here today.

Hundreds of activists led by Gurkirat Singh Kotli and Ravneet Singh Bittu organised medical camps at Jagera, Sihar, Jhammat, Dhaul, Bilaspur, Karamsar and Tharike villages in Ludhiana district.

Former minister Malkit Singh Dakha said there was no better way of celebrating the occasion than helping ailing humanity by organising free medical camps.

He said besides the government, all sections of society should come forward to help members of lower strata.

Besides Dakha, Tej Parkash Singh Kotli, Raghunandan Sharma Jatinder Laddi presided over concluding functions at various camps.

Ludhiana, June 19
On a call given by the All-India State Bank of Indore Officers’ Co-ordination Committee and All-India State Bank of Indore Employees’ Co-ordination Committee, employees and officers of the State Bank of Indore will observe a strike on June 22 against the merger move of the bank with State Bank of India.

The Punjab Bank Employees’ Federation, Ludhiana, has also decided to extend support to the agitation. Under the banner of the State Sector Bank Employees Association, the All-India State Bank of Patiala Employees’ Federation will hold a dharna in front of the State Bank of Patiala head office on June 30.

On July 3, employees and officers in all associate banks will observe a full-day strike against the merger move of the associate banks with the State Bank of India.

Khanna, June 19
The police has booked three persons, including a woman, for beating up a resident of Kishanpura village. In his complaint to the police, Jagdev Singh alleged that Surjit Singh, Rajpal Singh and Amarjeet Kaur, wife of Sher Singh, all residents of his village, had beaten him up over poll rivalry.

He said they had beaten him with sticks and swords in the village. He was rushed to the local Civil Hospital where he was being treated with head injuries and various other minor injuries inflicted upon his arms, legs and other body parts. The police has registered a case in this connection.