Chandigarh, April 29, 2013: Members of Desh Sewak Employees Union, Chandigarh staged a protest dharma outside the main entrance of the organisation here on Monday, alleging wrong policies of the management and also in support of their certain demands.

Protestors shouted slogans.

Addressing the gathering, the union president Ashok Kumar regretted that the management was not acceding to their demands. He recalled that they had staged the protest in the recent past too. He regretted that the management was adamant in not listening to their voice. He said the employees observed their future dark due to the wrong policies.

Adding, Ashok Kumar said they would allow the management to fulfill their aspirations. He categorically said they were ready to give any kind of sacrifice for their cause. He regretted that the organisation’s management claimed to be pro-employees but the fact was something else. He alleged the employees were being harassed unnecessarily. As a result, the employees were completely fed up.

Among others, the union general secretary Rohit Singh also addressed the protestors. He said the employees were under pressure of workload due to shortage of staff. He also said the employees were unable to un financial affairs of their families because of insufficient salaries.

The Union leaders announced to burn an effigy of the Desh Sewak Management on April 30 as a mark of protest. They warned to intensify the ongoing struggle if their demands were not met.

Among other things, they demanded the implementation of the Majithia Wage Board, hike in the annual salary and filling of vacant posts in the departments.

New Delhi / Jalandhar, April 30 2013: The members of the State Information and Public Relations Officers Association (SIPRA), New Delhi today unanimously elected Ashok Sharma, Joint Director (Public Relations), Haryana as the new president of the body at a general meeting held at Haryana Bhawan at New Delhi.

The outgoing president G.L. Mahajan, Deputy Director Information, Himachal Bhawan proposed the name of Sharma who was supported by G.N. Bhatt, Joint Director of Rajasthan and other members with a united voice as the new head of SIPRA. Sharma has been serving as JDPR for Haryana Government in New Delhi for over a decade.

After elected as President, Shri Sharma said that he will work to strengthen the Association by taking along everybody in the same manner that everyone has unanimously entrusted him with the responsibility.

The Office bearers who were elected for other executive posts of SIPRA include Mohan Rathod (Maharashtra) as Senior Vice President, P. Muthiah (Tamil Nadu) as Vice President, Neha Bhatnagar (Gujarat) as General Secretary, Sunandita Dasgupta (West Bengal) as Joint Secretary, T.P. Tripathi (Chhattisgarh) as Treasurer, Amarjyot Arora (Maharashtra) as Press Secretary, G.L. Mahajan (Himachal Pradesh)Coordinator, Girish LP  (Karnataka) Coordinator and Tasneem Majid selected as Patron of the Association.

Chandigarh, May 1, 2013: Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today expressed profound grief and sorrow over the sad demise of Tek Chand, father of Jalandhar based Correspondent of Amar Ujala Surinder Pal, who passed away at Jalandhar today evening after cardiac arrest.  

He was 69 and is survived by wife and three sons.

Sharing his heartfelt sympathies with the members of the bereaved family Badal prayed to the Almighty to give them strength and courage to bear this irreparable loss and grant peace to the departed soul.

We are pleased to announce the launching of www.ludhianatribune.com (A News Portal), which is a new venture of City Air News (www.cityairnews.com).

This newly launched News Portal www.ludhianatribune.com will carry news related to Ludhiana only.

www.ludhianatribune.com is a multi-lingual News Portal. It carries news stories in English, Hindi and Punjabi.

Readers of www.ludhianatribune.com will be able to read stories about Ludhiana, generated from different sources.

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Chandigarh, May 4, 2013: Partap Singh Bajwa, President, Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC) today mourned the demise of Ruldu Ram Khanna, father of Chandigarh-based journalist Salil Khanna.

Bajwa said that loss of parents is always big tragedy in someone’s life. The birth and death are not in hands of human beings. He prayed for peace to the departed soul and said Salil Khanna must take forward the legacy of his father who was a kind soul, always ready to help the members of society.

Chandigarh, May 16, 2013: The Punjab Government has appointed Vineet Joshi as the Assistant Media Advisor to the Government of Punjab, with immediate effect.

This was disclosed by an official spokesperson of the Punjab Government. He said that detailed terms and conditions of his appointment would be issued separately.

Faridabad (Haryana) / Jalandhar May, 20, 2013: Haryana Chief Minister,  Bhupinder Singh Hooda has assured of full cooperation of the State Government to Faridabad industrialists for the all round development of Faridabad. IMT coming up in Faridabad will be better than IMT Manesar, he said.

Hooda was speaking at a function in New Delhi last evening, organised for the release of Coffee Table Book on Faridabad industrialists, which was brought out by Jagran Publication Ltd.  Hooda said that Faridabad was established by first Prime Minister Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru. It is not only one of the leading industrial towns of the country, but is also a town of International fame.

The CM  said that with IMT, Metro, Badarpur flyover for connectivity with Delhi, YMCA University, Medical College and other facilities, Faridabad is developing at faster pace. Faridabad will see more development than Gurgaon.

He said that during last eight years, development projects have been started in all parts of the State. During next 5-7 years, Haryana will become education hub, not only of National level, but International level, he said. Big institutes like National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT), National Institute of Design (NID), Defense University, four new Medical Colleges, Rajiv Gandhi Education City, NIFTEM, CIPET, IIM Rohtak and new universities are coming up in the State.  In sports also, Haryana is emerging as Sport Power.

Hooda said that for assessing the progress of any State, there are four parameters – per capita income, per capita investment, resource mobilisation and per capita Plan expenditure. Haryana is ahead of other states in all these four parameters. The emphasis of the State Government is on inclusive development, so that benefit of progress reaches everyone.   Hooda asked the entrepreneurs to continue working without any worry. Government will extend full support. He also appreciated the activities of Jagran Group and said that the descriptions about 14 business icons included in the Coffee Table Book will inspire other entrepreneurs, particularly new entrepreneurs.

He asked the Jagran Group to bring out a Coffee Table Book like this on the freedom fighters of Haryana also. People will not only come to know about the history of our freedom struggle, but youth will also get inspiration.

The Chief Minister felicitated the 14 industrialists mentioned in the Coffee Table Book by giving them mementos. Their names are –K.C. Lakhani (Lakhani Armaan Group), Dr Om Prakash Bhalla (Manav Rachna International University), Dr Anil Jindal (SRS Group),  Vijay Aggarwal (Action Construction Equipment), Chandra Bhan Rawal (Rawal Group), Jai Prakash Gupta (Crown Group), Dr Prakash Gupta (Sarvodaya Hospital), Arvind Kumar Batra (The Perfect Bread Group of Companies),  Sajan Kumar Jain (Indo-Autotech Limited),  Satinder Singh Banga (Victora Tool Engineering Pvt. Ltd.),  Pratap Singh (Akash Group),  Ajay Gautam (Gautam Gautam Associates),  Navdeep Chawla (Psychotropics India Ltd.) and  Sukhbir Singh Maan ( Maan Ventures).      

The Industrialists thanked Haryana Government and particularly the Chief Minister Hooda and said that the State Government has provided a peaceful environment and very good infrastructure. “We are grateful to the Government for providing support. We will work hard, so that Haryana progresses further”, they said.

Those present on this occasion included Sirsa MP Dr Ashok Tanwar, Political Advisor to CM Prof. Virender and Media Advisor to CM  Shiv Bhattia, Additional Media Advisor to CM  Sunil Parati, MD of HSIIDC Mr Tarun Bajaj, besides CEO and Editor in Chief of Jagran Publications and others

Ferozepur, June 5, 2013: A joint meeting of journalists of Ferozepur attached with print, electronic and online portals, who attended in good numbers, was held at local Saragarhi Gurudwara, to discuss for  permanent solution to the  problems being faced by the journalists

After sharing the problems being faced with logics and suggestions, it was unanimously decided to constitute Press Club.  It is pertinent to mention that since long, efforts were being made for the formation of Press Club and the credit for giving it a practical shape goes to Gurnam Sidhu and Gurdarshan Arifke and managed to bring all the journalists on one platform.

In the meeting, it was unanimously decided to elect Joginder Singh Kumar as Chairman and Parminder Singh Thind as President of Press Club, Ferozepur.  Besides this, to run the day today affairs more effectively, seven member core committee was also constituted headed by Rajinder Malhotra with Parmajit Kaur Sodhi, Surinder Goyal, Gaurav Bhaskar, Prem Nath Sharma, Harish Monga an Anil Kumar as Associate Members.

In the meeting, Parminder Singh Thind was authorised to nominate the remaining members of the Press Club.

After the formation of the Press Club and unanimous nomination of its members, all the present members paid obeisance at Gurdwara Saragarhi for the welfare of the club and pledged to work with sole motive to work jointly by keeping aside the self-interests and revengeful attitude.

Chandigarh, June 9, 2013: Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal today pledged all support and cooperation to the Chandigarh administration for the overall development and progress of Chandigarh, the capital of Punjab & Haryana as one of the country’s best planned city well equipped with ultra modern facilities and civic amenities for its inhabitants.

Sharing his vision to develop Chandigarh on modern lines as an integral part of tri-city during an event ‘Chandigarh back to future’ to chart city’s future organised by Times of India on its commemoration of 175th anniversary here at JW Marriot, the Chief Minister assured the Punjab Governor and Administrator Union Territory of Chandigarh Shivraj V Patil to extend all possible assistance and cooperation  for the expansion of PGIMER, early completion of the metro rail project and international airport on the top priority. He said the PGIMER was the pioneer medical and research institute committed to provide the best health care facilities not only to the patient of tri-city at affordable rates but also to the people coming from far flung areas of Rajasthan, Jammu & Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh.

The Chief Minister offered land for the expansion of PGIMER so as to enable it to function in a far more meaningful and result oriented manner. He also urged Patil to lead a delegation including him and his Haryana counterpart  to impress upon the Centre to take up the issues of expansion of PGIMER and early completion of Chandigarh Metro Rail project and an international airport without any further delay as these were of paramount importance for the over development of the tri-city.

He thanked the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare GoI for opening an extension center of PGIMER at Sangrur to provide better health facilities to the people in the Malwa belt. He also asked the U.T. Administrator to use his good offices in prevailing upon the GoI to further extend the metro rail project which was originally upto Zirakpur in one direction and Mullanpur on the other Kharar, Kurali and Ropar on one side and Banur, Rajpura and Patiala on the other so that the people of these towns could be immensely benefitted due to this comfortable transport facility as a viable alternate to the road journey.

Highlighting the initiatives taken by his government to ensure planned development growth in the region adjoining to Chandigarh, the Chief Minister said the GMADA had already finalise a master plan of Mullanpur, Kurali, Kharar, Zirakpur, Derabassi, Banur to ensure urban development in a holistic manner with the focus on the best road network infrastructure coupled with latest housing facilities and civic amenities of lighting, sewerage and drinking water.

Justifying the recent decision of the state government to rename Mullanpur as new Chandigarh, Badal said Chandigarh was the brand name of planned development in the tri-city and what was the harm in giving a name “New Chandigarh” to Mullanpur, which was coming up in a big way with a focus on the latest health and educational facilities. He said Edu-city and Medi-city were being developed in New Chandigarh to attract the World class players in the field of medical and health to set up their state-of-the-art hospitals to provide the best healthcare and diagnostic facilities to the people besides schools, colleges and universities to enable our youth to compete globally.

Highly appreciating the acumen and unmatched administrative capacities and capabilities of Patil, the Punjab CM said that he had no doubts at all that the tri-city especially the Chandigarh would make progress by leaps and bounds under his able stewardship and guidance.  He also welcomed the suggestion put forth by Patil for the expansion of Panjab University, Chandigarh which was one of the premier institutes of higher learning in the country. He also conceded the proposal of Patil to popularise the concept of solar energy in the upcoming urban development projects as the energy saved from other sources such as hydro and thermal equated to energy generated. 

Earlier, the Governor of Punjab and UT Administrator lauded the path breaking initiative taken by Badal for giving 30% subsidy on solar pumps to the farmers in addition to the subsidy provided by GoI. He urged Badal and the Chief Minister Haryana Bhupinder Singh Hooda, as major stake holders to ensure urban development under their states’ jurisdiction especially in Mohali and Punchkula to ensure synergy in the integrated and planned development of tri-city.

Patil said that the master plan of Chandigarh was being finalised in the light of emerging needs and requirements of the citizens in the changed scenario, which would be published soon and suggestions thereof from the public invited. Adding he said meaningful and positive suggestions would incorporated in the master plan while the insignificant ones would be rejected. 

Meanwhile, the Resident Editor of Times of India Raja Bose conducted the proceedings of the event on Chandigarh back to future.

The Chief Minister was accompanied by his Advisor on National Affairs and Media Harcharn Bains and Principal Secretary to Chief Minister S.K. Sandhu.

Dharamsala, June 12, 2013: “France 24 reporter Cyril Payen has been harassed and threatened by Chinese diplomatic personnel’s for his documentary ‘Seven Days in Tibet’, which was broadcast by France 24 on 30 May and was followed by a live debate, “said Lobsang, official of Central Tibetan administration in Dharamsala on Wednesday.

CTA said that Cyril Payen got a rare access to enter Tibet in May with a seven day visa. He secretly filmed and interviewed Tibetans in the capital Lhasa, which he says is currently under an Orwellian veil of surveillance, like a city under occupation. “What he saw lends weight to the complaints of the Dalai Lama and human rights organisations, who say Tibetan culture is being erased,” France 24 said.

“As Payen was leaving Paris for Bangkok on 3 June, the Chinese embassy in Paris contacted France 24 and asked to meet with him. As he had by then already left, two embassy officials went to France 24 to talk to its CEO, Marc Saikali. For two hours, they accused the station of broadcasting a mendacious report that was “riddled with errors” and demanded its removal from the website. The station refused,” Reporters Without Border said.

On his arrival in Bangkok on 4 June, Payen received threatening calls and text messages from the officials in Chinese embassy there. “The embassy then stepped up its harassment of Payen, who received several anonymous calls and many texts. A message left yesterday by a female member of the embassy’s staff was openly threatening. She gave him an ultimatum to attend a meeting at the embassy by today at the latest to explain why he had “cheated” in order to obtain a Chinese visa. She urged him to stop postponing the meeting and to comply with the embassy request, or else “take the responsibility” of his refusal,” it said.

Reporters without Borders sharply criticised the Chinese government’s irresponsible behaviour, stating that “such unacceptable behaviour might be expected from the mafia but not from senior diplomats.”

Ferozepur, July 23, 2013: The third phase of the “Ajit Hariyawal Lehar” campaign started in August 2011, under the guidance of Chief Editor, Ajit Publications, founder of Punjab, Punjabi and Punjabiat, to save the Punjab from becoming a desert land in view of shortage of trees, was inaugurated at Ferozepur today at Guru Harkrishan Public School campus, on the eve of Gurpurab of Sri Guru Harkrishan Sahib Ji, by planting the trees.

The tree plantation ceremony was performed by Kamal Sharma, President, Punjab BJP, Sher Singh Ghubaya, MP, Parminder Singh Pinki, MLA, Ferozpeur City, Manjit Singh Narang, Deputy Commissioner, Ferozepur, Varinderpal Singh, SSP, Ferozepur, Sanjiv Tiward, Divisional Forest Officer, Gurcharan Singh Sandhu, DTO, Rana Gurmit Singh Sodhi, MLA Guruahrahai, Anumeet Heera Sodhi, Delegate Punjab Congress, Master Gurnam Singh, Member General Council SAD, Satinderjit Singh, President, Sri Guru Harkrishan Public School Management Committee, along with representatives of various political, NGOs  and district administration, by planting the trees jointly, by appreciating and honouring the dream of Dr. Barjinder Singh Hamdard, Chief Editor, Ajit Publications, invited all Punjabis to  pledge to participate actively in the “Ajit Hariyawal Lehar” for providing pollution-free environment.

On this occasion, the religious sermons were recited from Sri Sukhmani Sahib followed by Shabad Kirtan by the jatha of Sri Sukhmani Sahib Sewa Society and Khalsa Gurudawara, Feozepur.

“The distinguished services of Barjinder Singh Hamdard for the nation and state, with dedication and devotion are appreciable, as he has always been on the fore front to deal with the natural calamities and for the help of the victims”, said Kamal Sharma, Punjab BJP President on the inauguration of third phase of Ajit Hariyawal Lehar while addressing mammoth gathering.

He further said, “The circumstances of Punjab are known to everyone as out of 137 blocks of Punjab, 102 blocks are such which are having low-level and polluted water, which is a dangerous signal to the Punjabis.  He also said, no doubt we are filling up the food basket by using the chemical and insecticides but we have definitely invited the pollution for which we have to pay a big price.  The main cause of these natural calamities is due to cutting of trees and moving against the natural resources for which we have recently seen in the devastating Tsunami like attack in Uttarakhand”.

Kamal Sharma also said, “By planting the trees, we not only save ourselves but can also provide the pollution-free environment for the coming generations”.

All other dignitaries also addressed on this occasion and appreciated the initiative taken by the Ajit Publications for Ajit Hariyawal Lehar by expressing concern over the cutting of trees.

They said, there was a time when the environment was so cool that there was no need of air-conditions and now with the cutting of trees, the whole environment is heated and giving a birth to chronic diseases like Cancer.  In case this practice continue for another sometime, the average age of the human being will come down to 50 years. An appeal was also made to all the Panchayats to plant atleast 50 plants in each village apart from taking care of them till they are grown up like our own children, which is our moral responsibility.

DFO said, about 12 lakh trees have been planted in the district and more plants will be planted under the Ajit Hariyawal Lehra.