Photo for representational purpose only. iStock

Beijing, March 6

Tibet’s second largest terminal began operations on Monday, officials said. The new terminal, the sixth to open in Tibet, is located at Nyingchi Mainling Airport, close to the India border. It covers an area of 10,300 square metres and will be able to handle 750,000 passengers and 3,000 tonnes of cargo throughput annually by 2020, Xinhua news agency reported.The airport is located close to the disputed Arunachal Pradesh border.China’s extensive development road, rail and air infrastructure in Tibet has sparked concerns in India because of possible military advantage.India has also initiated border infrastructure development in recent years.The Nyingchi airport will open new air routes to Xi’an, capital of northwest China’s Shaanxi province, resume routes to Beijing and increase more round trip flights to Lhasa, Guangzhou, Kunming, Chongqing and Shenzhen after the new terminal comes into service, said Liu Wei, deputy director of Civil Aviation Administration of China in Tibet.The airport has seen year-on-year increases in passenger flow since it was put into service in 2006. Passenger volume hit 390,000 in 2016, bringing the total passenger numbers to two million in the past years, Liu said, adding that the new terminal will effectively alleviate pressure brought by the growing number of passengers.Nyingchi is located in southeast Tibet at an average elevation of 2,950 meters above sea level. The city has attracted more visitors in the recent years due to tourist attractions such as its peach blossom festival, the report said. — PTI/ IANS

We want clarity about his death. I know he couldn’t commit suicide. We want a through probe. SAROJ, Roshan Singh A soldier hailing from Kal Banjara village near Lehragaga in Punjab’s Sangrur allegedly committed suicide by shooting himself with his service weapon in Lower Krishna Ghati sector of Poonch district on Sunday morning.

The deceased has been identified as Sepoy Roshan Singh, 35, of the 68 Engineering Regiment, who was posted with 39 Rashtriya Rifles in Poonch. The army has ordered a court of inquiry into the incident.

Roshan joined the army 14 years ago. Army and police authorities informed the family about his death on Sunday. The body will reach his native village on Monday where his last rites will be performed.

Roshan is survived by his wife Saroj and three children. The family lives in a one-room accommodation. Roshan’s parents are living with his brother.

Not able to come to terms with the tragedy, Saroj said the authorities informed the family that he sacrificed his life in line of duty. “I don’t know what happened with him,” she said.

“We want clarity about his death. I know he couldn’t commit suicide. We want a through probe,” Saroj added.

Vishav Bharti

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 29

The last five years of the SAD-BJP government saw public debt increase by almost Rs10,000 crore every year. This was the time when then Deputy Chief Minister Sukhbir Singh Badal made claims about ‘Progressive Punjab’.The outcome of the financial mess is that Punjab is now under debt of more than Rs1 lakh crore. A bigger worry is that around 60 per cent of the loans have to be paid in seven years.The Comptroller Auditor General (CAG) of India, in its report released today, called it an alarming situation.The report on the state’s finances said the total debt on Punjab was around Rs64,000 crore in 2011-12 and it swelled to Rs1.03 lakh crore in 2015-16. This means that in five years, debt shot up by Rs10,000 crore every year. During 2015-16, public debt increased by Rs16,377 crore.Another worry for the state government is nearing of loan deadlines. As per CAG, the state has to repay 58.51 per cent of its debt (more than Rs60,000 crore) in next seven years. The state government has to repay 18 per cent (Rs18,500 crore) of its debt in three years, 18 per cent (Rs18,500 crore) between three and five years, and 23 per cent (Rs23,367 crore) between five and seven years.“This is an alarming position and the state is heading towards a serious debt repayment position, especially when its major irrigation projects had accumulated losses of Rs1,600 crore during 2011-16 and the application of debt raised by the state government towards creation of new assets remained below 6 per cent of total expenditure during 2011-16.“The state needs to formulate a well-thought-out debt management strategy and step up resource mobilisation to ensure debt stability. Unless such efforts are made, the state would face serious debt servicing challenges, which could lead to a situation of debt trap,” the CAG observed.On reasons behind the financial mess, the CAG found that the state’s revenue expenditure increased more than revenue receipts in the past five years. As per the report, revenue receipts increased from Rs26,234 crore in 2011-12 to Rs41,523 crore in 2015-16 at an average annual growth rate of 8.86 per cent. But at the same time, revenue expenditure grew at an average annual growth rate of 8.95 per cent. The revenue expenditure includes salaries, pensions and interest repayment.“The revenue expenditure continued to constitute a dominant proportion (85 per cent to 95 per cent) of the total expenditure during 2011-16,” the CAG said.Jagbans Singh, Principal Accountant General (Audit), Punjab, said: “Earlier, Haryana was considered a much smaller economy than Punjab. But recent Budget figures of Haryana suggest that it is almost one-and-a-half times bigger than Punjab.”The capital expenditure decreased by Rs59 crore (1.89 per cent) over the previous year. “The capital expenditure incurred during 2015-16 was 62.98 per cent of budget estimates which indicates that asset creation was not given as much priority as intended in the budget estimates,” the CAG report observed.

Manpreet blames it on SAD ‘misgovernance’

Ruchika M Khanna

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 29

“Dekhte hi dekhte kafila lut ta chala gaya;Hai sad afsos lutne walon ko bhi khabar nahi hui.”This poetic rendition was given by Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal as he described the poor fiscal health of the state while presenting the vote-on-account. He sought the permission of the House to okay the supplementary grants of Rs25,199 crore, the money spent over and above the Budget estimates for this fiscal.Calling the fiscal mess left behind by the previous Akali-BJP government as sheer misgovernance, he said he was appalled at how the government could be so off the mark in presenting its Budget estimates that Rs25,000 crore was spent over and above that. “Meri zubaan katti jave….but these people (pointing towards the Opposition benches where the Akalis were seated) have left generations of Akalis in chains of slavery,” he said, adding that future earnings of the next five years of the Punjab Infrastructure Development Board (PIDB), Punjab Mandi Board and several other government undertakings, had been hypothecated by the previous government with various banks.Though former Finance Minister Parminder Singh Dhindsa and Bikram Singh Majithia did try and defend his party’s government by saying that there was no illegality in spending funds, he was silenced by Local Bodies minister Navjot Singh Sidhu, who said, “Tu na idhar udhar ki baat kar, bata karwan kyun luta.”He also accused the Akalis of doing “chori te seena zori”, when the Akali MLAs tried to scream against the tirade launched against them.Manpreet’s tirade against the previous government continued through most part of the session, who said: “Angrezan ne vi Punjab nu ihni buri tarhan nahin lutteya jiven pichli sarkar ne luttya hai (even the British did not plunder the state as was done by the previous government).”Manpreet said they were working to bring austere governance in Punjab. “No one will be spared… I have no choice,” he said, reiterating his government’s commitment to fix responsibility for the fiscal mess and to conduct a third-party audit of the PSPCL and the PIDB.For a change, if only for a brief while, Leader of Opposition HS Phoolka too supported the Finance Minister’s decision to bring a White Paper. He, however, insisted that the White Paper should cover the fiscal mess which had been created under different governments during the past 20 years.Sukhpal Khaira, too, supported him, saying the custodians of the treasury were the ones who looted it, and urged the Congress against making political appointments that would be a drain on the state exchequer.Congress MLA Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa demanded that the government punished all, including the bureaucrats, who helped the previous government in cheer haran of Punjab.Manpreet, who presented the vote-on-account for Rs29,389 crore for the first three months of the next fiscal, beginning April 1, said that the White Paper on the state of economy was being prepared and it would be presented in the House during the Budget session. He sought the permission of Punjab Vidhan Sabha to consider and pass Rs29,389 crore.Other than this, the Vidhan Sabha passed the supplementary grants worth Rs25,199 crore (of which Rs6061.38 crore is on the revenue account), which is the amount that was spent over and above the budgetary estimates.

Bill on engaging law officers passed

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 29

The Vidhan Sabha today passed The Punjab Law Officers (Engagement) Bill 2017, which paves the way for engagement of law officers in a transparent and fair manner.Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh presented the Bill. Advocate General Atul Nanda was present in the House at that time. The Bill paves the way for appointing senior Additional Advocate General, Additional Advocate General, senior Deputy Advocate General, Deputy Advocate General, Assistant Advocate General and advocates on record.The bill says the number of law officers to be engaged under each category may be notified from time to time based on the assessment made by the government. This assessment will to be based on the number of courts, the number of cases and the number of officers already engaged.Of the total posts, 5 per cent have been reserved for district attorneys. Law officers on the remaining posts will be appointed after inviting advertisements. For this purpose, the government will form a scrutiny committee, which will forward applications to the selection committee headed by the Advocate General. The AG has been given the right to engage seven law officers on his own.The Bill also mandates that an advocate whose professional annual income for the past three years is up to Rs20 lakh can be engaged as a senior Additional Advocate General (he has to have 20 years of standing). The income criterion is Rs15 lakh for Additional Advocate General (designate senior having 16 years of standing); Rs10 lakh for senior Deputy Advocate General (14 years of standing); Rs7 lakh for Deputy Advocate General (10 years of standing); Rs3.5 lakh for Assistant Advocate General (three years of standing).

Sidhu tosses drug barb at Akalis

Chandigarh: Left without the leader of their party, Sukhbir Singh Badal, and SAD patriarch Parkash Singh Badal, Akali MLAs were forced to face the barbs directed at them from both the treasury benches and the Opposition benches occupied by AAP and its ally Lok Insaaf Party. The 16 MLAs of the SAD and the BJP (barring the Badals) were trounced by the other two parties over the financial condition of the state and the drug menace. It all began when Akali MLA NK Sharma began the debate, seeking CM’s clarification on a news report appeared in The Tribune on Wednesday regarding farmers being issued recovery notices by banks. “I want to know that if you have decided to get their debt waived, why farmers are being issued notices,” he said. Though CM Capt Amarinder Singh assured the House of expediting the matter, the MLAs on the treasury benches reacted sharply. Local Bodies Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu said: “For 10 years you were sleeping like kumbhkaran, you have no right to speak against us as our Cabinet does not sell chitta like you did.”  tns

Out on debt recovery, bankers held hostage

Two bank officials (sitting on chairs) detained by BKU activists at Raonta village in Moga on Wednesday. Tribune Photo

Kulwinder Sandhu

Tribune News Service

Moga, March 29

Two bank employees, including a manager, were today taken hostage for a few hours by activists of the BKU (Ekta) when they went to the house of farmers Gurjeet Singh and Gurpreet Singh, both brothers, at Raonta village here to recover a loan of Rs 10 lakh from their father, Tek Singh.Tek Singh told mediapersons that the bank officers threatened to arrest him, besides insisting on attaching his property even as their total credit limit was Rs 50 lakh.“We suffered financial losses in the last couple of seasons due to which we could not repay the loan,” Gurjeet Singh said. As the bank officials were sitting in their house, neighbours informed the local BKU activists, who reached the spot and detained the officials. They also raised slogans against them.The farm activists claimed that the government had asked the bank employees not to conduct raids on the houses of farmers for forcibly recovering the loan amount.Later, the bank officials assured the gathering that they would not visit any farmers’ house to recover loan, following which they were released. Bank official Chandan Kumar said both brothers had credit limit of Rs 25 lakh each and the total interest had accumulated to Rs 10 lakh in the past couple of years. “We issued several notices to them but they did not even visit the bank in the past two years,” he claimed.The bank is likely to declare them defaulters on March 31 and they went to their house to inform about it and request them to at least pay the interest amount

Improvement Trusts’ heads, trustees removed

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 29

To revamp a “collapsed structure” of local bodies, Local Government Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu removed chairmen and trustees of all 28 Improvement Trusts in the state.Now, administrators (DCs or SDMs) would head the trusts appointed by the government till further orders, he said.Sidhu said, “The work in local bodies was not specified. The deadlines were never met. There was no verification of the quality of work. A case in point is a Rs 6 crore work in Hoshiarpur that was sublet through illegal tenders.”The Improvement Trusts in the state are at Abohar, Amritsar, Barnala, Bathinda, Batala, Faridkot, Fazilka, Gurdaspur, Hoshiarpur, Jalandhar, Kapurthala, Kartarpur, Khanna, Kotkapura, Ludhiana, Malerkotla, Moga, Nabha, Nangal, Nawanshahr, Pathankot, Patiala, Phagwara, Rajpura, Ropar, Samana, Sangrur and Tarn Taran.The minister said, “An agency from outside Punjab will audit the quality of works of the Local Government Department. Display boards will be installed outside the project sites, mentioning the name of the contractor, job specification, total cost of the project and the deadline.” This week, Sidhu said, the department would divulge action on the loopholes in the current system. “Preliminary findings have brought out that bills were made in the back date because projects were not completed on time. The department’s engineering wing will conduct surprise inspections and report.”

Power corp CMD resigns

Aman Sood

Tribune News Service

Patiala, March 29

Chairman and Managing Director (CMD) of Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) KD Chaudhri today resigned from the post, a day after the state government amended rules “to ensure that a technocrat is replaced with a bureaucrat” to head the Rs 26,000-crore company.The government is yet to appoint a replacement but the new CMD will face a daunting task to run the company which is under a heavy financial burden.Sources say that Chaudhri sent his resignation, through Secretary, Power, A Venu Prasad and vacated his office here today, following which the government asked Prasad to look after the functioning of the company.During Chaudhri’s tenure as the head of the company, the power sector in the state took drastic steps as “from a power-hungry state, Punjab turned to be a power-surplus state”. With the previous SAD-BJP government giving extension after extension to Chaudhri, the PSPCL ensured round-the-clock supply to all sectors from the past two years.Chaudhri was first appointed in June 2010 for a period of one year. Thereafter, he kept getting extensions. The PSEB Engineers Association, a faction of engineers within the PSPCL, was against these extensions. However, the state government continued to back Chaudhri.The Rs 26,000-crore company, as is claimed by the government, faces a debt of over Rs 25,922 crore and is managing its affairs based on loans.

Crackdown on stone crushers in Pathankot

Despite crackdown, iIlegal mining going on in Abaadgarh village (Pathankot). tribune photo

Ravi Dhaliwal

Tribune News Service

Pathankot, March 29

The Pathankot administration, after identifying crushing units operating illegally, has ordered a crackdown.The noose has been tightened particularly against 42 stone crushers operating without the mandatory clearance of the Punjab Pollution Control Board and the PSPCL. To compound matters, these units are operating in river beds, violating the Punjab and Haryana High Court orders.“Owners of these units did not have pollution and electricity clearances yet they were operating because they were hand in glove with lower-level officials. They were the ones who had disturbed the already fragile ecological balance of the region,” said an official.People who have mining licences are elated. With the crackdown on unauthorised crushing units showing results and people no longer getting material from these, a heavy rush can be seen at the legal mining points which include Chak Ram Sahai (Gurdaspur) and Shan points (Madhopur). The owner of Guru Nanak Mines at the Shan point said the drive was paying dividends.However, despite the clean-up operation, some units are still operational like crushers in Abaadgarh village of Mirthal. “Crusher owners knew how to play cat and mouse with the administration and the police. The mining being done in Abaadgarh is a case in point,” said a police officer.“We supply material between Rs 135 to Rs 160 per tonne which are the rates decided by the government. However, crusher owners used to supply at a much higher price. Now, this is slowly coming to an end with the administration acting tough against unauthorised mining,” said a businessman who has mining rights.Pathankot Deputy Commissioner (DC) Neelima said action had been initiated against 15 out of 42 crushers. “We are taking action against others too after verifying the details,” she said.Balwinder Singh, Mining Officer, Pathankot, said 10 committees had been formed which had raided illegal points and stopped mining at Beria, Keeria and Narot (both on the Ravi river), Harial and Mirthal (on the Chakki river) and Anear (on the Beas).

Drugs case: Seven jailed for 15 years

Our Legal Correspondent

Ludhiana, March 29

The Court of Additional Sessions Judge Rajiv K Berry has convicted seven persons in a case of recovery of 1,43,28,400 intoxicant capsules, tablets and cough syrups without any permit or licence.They were also facing accusations of indulging in drug smuggling activities worth crores of rupees in Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Himachal. They have been given 15 years of rigorous imprisonment each. They were also ordered to pay a fine of Rs 1 lakh each. Those convicted are Pardeep Choudhary, and Prithi Choudhary of Karnal (Haryana); Sukhraj Singh, Pawan Kumar Goyal and Parveen Kumar of Moga; and Pawan Kumar Malhotra and Sadhu Singh of Ludhiana.However, the court acquitted Puneet Kumar of Sangrur, Deepak Soni, Salem and Sukhdev Singh of Ludhiana finding no convincing evidence against them.Initially, an FIR was registered against three persons on September 19, 2013. During investigation, the police booked other accused. The police claimed to have recovered Parvon Spas capsules (8,65,000), Rexcof cough syrup bottles (1,400), Phenotil tablets (83,50,000), Microtel tablets (9 lakh), Avil injections (12,000) etc.

One teacher each in 1,170 schools

Vishav Bharti

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 29

The Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) funds were released short by Rs1,362 crore during 2011-16, according to the CAG report tabled in the Assembly here today.The SSA is the primary vehicle for implementing the Right To Education (RTE) Act, 2009, and to provide useful and relevant education to all children in the age group of 6-14 years.Besides, 1,170 primary schools in the state are running with single teacher and 572 upper primary schools with less than three teachers, the report said.It also observed that inadequate planning and implementation was evidenced by lack of mapping of neighbourhood schools and data relating to children belonging to weaker sections and disadvantaged groups.The CAG found that only one set of uniform was provided against the required two sets during 2011-16.Besides, excess expenditure of Rs6.76 crore was incurred on purchase of books against the norms fixed by the Ministry of Human Resources and Development.Deployment of resource teachers was not related to the number of children with special needs and the nature of their disability. No norms were fixed by the state for deployment of resource teachers. No resource teacher was appointed in the state in cases of multiple disabilities, cerebral palsy, learning disability and autism spectrum disabilities resulting in deprival of resource support to 18,214 children suffering from these disabilities.The CAG observed that a performance audit of the implementation of the SSA for 2011-16 brought out lack of planning and deficiencies in both financial management and execution of the programme.

Capt Sukhjit Hara, MLA Vaid meet Amarinder

Capt Sukhjit Singh Hara (left) and Gill MLA Kuldeep Singh Vaid (right) with Chief Minister Amarinder Singh during a meeting in Chandigarh. A Tribune photo

Our Correspondent

Sahnewal, March 29

Captain Sukhjit Singh Hara, a close associate of Chief Minister Captain Amarinder Singh, along with Gill constituency MLA, Kuldeep Singh Vaid, met the Chief Minister at his Chandigarh residence recently.They apprised the Chief Minister of various problems of Gill and Sahnewal. The focus of the discussion was Sahnewal airport which has almost been abandoned due to a meager number of flights.“I shared with Captain Amarinder Singh that Ludhiana based industrialists and business tycoons were facing a lot of problems. Foreign delegates reach Delhi but avoid visiting to Ludhiana for business meetings due to no flight connectivity. To finalise deals businessmen from Ludhiana have to go to Delhi, which is a major problem,” said Sukhjit Hara.While accusing the SAD-BJP led government he said “Akali government just believed in showing off. The last government spent a huge amount of money for the aerodrome but it was all futile,” he added.Kuldeep Singh Vaid also stated problems of drugs in his constituency. He made the Chief Minister aware about the number of ‘bastis’ in his constituency where drug menace was expected to be on higher side.Vaid told that if he is given assistance by the Chief Minister as well as proper coordination was maintained with the police and public, he would be able to do solve the problem of drug addiction. Hara said that the Chief Minister assured that he would take personal interest in solving the problems.

Illustration: Sandeep Joshi

On Wednesday evening, a ‘terrorist,’ armed with a knife, managed to break into the outer periphery of the Palace of Westminster, the seat of the British Parliament. He was shot dead, promptly and efficiently. But what was remarkable about the whole terrible incident was that there was no reckless rush among the British media to identify the deadly intruder. The nearest attempt was to suggest that the intruder was perhaps a person of “Asian origin.” It was only after two days of diligent investigation that the London police was able to declare that the dead man was born Adrain Russell Ajao but now used another name, Khalid Masood. There was a professional touch to this reticence.A similar professional calm was on display in Washington when the FBI Director, James Comey, was asked to testify before the House Intelligence Committee on the nature of the Russian involvement in the Trump campaign. Despite provocation from the Congressmen, the FBI Director did not say a word more or a world less, than needed to be said. He, instead, preached to the Congressmen that “the FBI is very careful in how we handle information about our cases and about the people we are investigating.” Cool as a cucumber, as they say. Such calm and professional styles stand in sharp contrast to how we do business in India. Within hours of an “incident”, our agencies whisper in the ears of this or that favourite newsperson the precise name of the Islamist organisation involved. Sometimes, even the seniormost politicos rush out to add to the clamour. It is not just agencies dealing with security matters that leak like a sieve but even the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate are forever telling the media about “incriminating documents” discovered after every “raid.”Often the objective is not to find the culprit but to use an incident to create a political narrative. The leadership in our agencies is obliged to understand the political masters’ requirements and fashion their investigation accordingly.Yesterday, a reader wrote to recall how the British police reacted in April-May, 1980, when some armed gunmen had stormed the Iranian Embassy in London and taken a number of hostages. The situation was brought under control after five days of siege. Our reader recalls that all that BBC reported was that the SAS men “disappeared into the thin air” after performing their rescue act.Our agencies have not appreciated the professional need to remain faceless, nameless; instead, we seek medals and media space. The Western media culture understands the need for secrecy. On the other hand, we have no qualms in besmirching people’s reputations and destroying hapless citizens’ lives.All this has not served our cause. The NIA, our premier agency, has heaped professional shame upon itself by changing its investigation goals after a change of government in New Delhi. Its professional reputation is in the mud. No neutral international observer is willing to accept our agencies’ presumed foolproof evidence against Hafiz Saeed. 

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IT was reported the other day that the Punjab and Haryana High Court disposed of a case of culpable homicide after 34 years and the accused, the dead man’s wife, walked free. Thirty-four years. What a shabby reflection on our presumed premier investigation agency. And, what a sad comment on our criminal justice system. Worse then Charles Dickens’ Bleak House. It also occurs to me that Chandigarh seems to be having a particular taste for murder. This week, we had this horrible case of Ekam Dhillon murder. What I find particularly abhorring is the deceased’s wife, mother-in-law, brother-in-law and friends calming cutting up the body and nonchalantly going about disposing of the pieces. And, then earlier, we had the Saketri village murder, on the outskirts of Chandigarh. Young men murderously settling scores over an alleged insult.Something seems to be going terribly wrong in our society. Too much anger, too much money, too much greed, too much prideful aggression, too little respect for law and its deterrence. No wonder we rank so low on the global happiness index. Maybe because all the social ‘reformers’ have become entrepreneurs, promoting dubious brands’ doubtful politicians; and, the so-called ‘cultural organisations’ are busy providing foot-soldiers for the never-ending electoral battles. The social order is becoming precarious and fragile. 

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ALL of us know a doctor — or rather have to know a doctor. At least, one if not more doctors. Because someone or the other we love — a daughter, a son, a grandchild, wife, husband, parents, in-laws, friends — falls ill or gets injured and needs medical attention and care. A doctor becomes ‘god’ in that moment of intense personal vulnerability. In India, as in any other society, all of us have strong views about doctors and hospitals. Each one of us can tell a long story — a tale of anger, frustration, satisfaction, exasperation — about an encounter with this or that doctor. Each one of us feels fleeced and short-changed after every visit to a hospital; sometimes we feel blessed having been healed by the magical touch of a surgeon or a perfect diagnosis. Rarely do we get to know or feel the need to understand as to what goes on in the doctor’s complicated universe — the imperfections in medical knowledge and care. That is where we must meet Atul Gawande, a US-based surgeon, public health activist, and writer. Over the years, he has produced a number of best-selling books. I find him fascinating not only because he is an engagingly brilliant writer but also because he opens the door and lets us in the mysterious world where a doctor often stands between life and death. He gives us a glimpse of the inherent nobility of the medical profession — the god-like gift and opportunity to save a human life. “Our decisions and omissions are moral in nature,” he writes in the introduction to his first book, Better.Gawande tells us that after all the advances in science and technology, the knowledge, the experience, the tools and the environment often prove inadequate: “The knowledge to be mastered is both vast and incomplete. Yet we are expected to act with swiftness and consistency, even when the task requires marshaling hundreds of people — from laboratory technicians to the nurses on each change of shifts to the engineers who keep the oxygen supply system working — or the care of a single person.”He is simply an excellent storyteller about his craft. Take for instance the chapter, entitled “Naked.” He talks about what the surgeon and the patient should wear at the time of examination. Practices and protocols differ from the United States to Ukraine to Venezuela, he tells us. Then, there is the ticklish question: should a nurse or chaperone be present when a male doctor examines a female patient? I recommend him to all my younger journalist colleagues. He displays to a perfection the writer’s basic skill: power of observation, to observe the details, to see patterns and then make the most technical topics into a very, very readable and accessible language. He forces us to understand the critical importance of such mundane chores as “on washing hands” or on “the Mop-up” after an operation.Or, the importance of making a checklist of things that need to be done by a doctor. “There are a thousand ways the things can go wrong when you have got a stab wound,” he writes about an emergency room experience, when the doctors had forgotten to ask the patient for the nature of the weapon. There is a larger, simple message in Gawade stories: irrespective of the field of activity, we need to understand: “what does it take to be good at something in which failure is so easy, so effortless.”

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OUR new rulers in Punjab seem to be determined to want to squander away their goodwill even before the honeymoon period is over. Drunk with power, perhaps. I do not know what they are drinking, but whatever it is, it certainly can’t be coffee.

kaffeeklatsch@tribuneindia.com

Several parts of Jagatjit Palace were closed after being ‘declared unsafe’

The ceiling of the drawing room of Jagatjit Palace in a dilapidated condition due to paucity of funds. Tribune Photo: Malkiat Singh

Rachna Khaira

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, March 28

While Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh recently proposed to set up two new Sainik School in the state, the one established in Kapurthala is on the brink of collapse due to paucity of funds.A majority of the Jagatjit Palace that houses the school were closed in the last one year after they were ‘declared unsafe’.Perturbed over the sad plight of the royal Jagatjit Palace, which was bought by the state government for Rs 16 lakh in 1961, the school authorities have now written to Capt Amarinder to come to their rescue.Though the state government in a Governors’ meet held in 1997 at New Delhi had agreed to sign a Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the Centre, it did not do so till date.School Principal Group Captain Shakti Sharma said as per the agreement, the Ministry of Defence was to frame rules and regulations of the school along with the admission policy and management, the state government was to provide a building and to release Rs 1.5 crore along with other constructional and infrastructural development funds.“The school was the third in the line of five Sainik Schools established in 1961 across the country. As the state government did not sign the MOA, we did not receive any dedicated annual grant. It was only last year that we received a grant of Rs 1 crore after 2012-13 but that too went away in clearing maintenance dues of the school accumulated all these years,” said Sharma.She said the only library established in Durbar hall of the school was closed on August 13 last year after its ceiling started collapsing.“As the school is established in a palace, it requires an enormous amount to maintain it. With no dedicated financial support from the state or the Central Government, we could not get the library repaired,” said Sharma.At present, around 618 students are studying in the school. The 12 hostels commissioned in 1963 are also on the brink of collapse and a majority of them have been declared unsafe.Cabinet Minister and Kapurthala MLA Rana Gurjit slammed the SAD-BJP combine for the dilapidated condition of the heritage building and alleged that the Badal family wanted to grab the 200 acres sprawling palace to use it for commercial purposes. “They wanted to close the school and utilise the palace for hotel purpose,” alleged Rana Gurjit.He, however, said he would soon take up the matter with the Chief Minister and the Ministry of Art and Culture to get a national heritage status for Jagatjit Palace.

Construction of the canal without determining the total quantum of water that is available for distribution and its current usage through a fair process would be tantamount to putting the cart before the horse.

FLOW INTERRUPTED: Since the first Supreme Court order for the construction of the SYL canal, a lot has happened that renders implementation impracticable. Tribune photo

The Sutlej-Yamuna link canal, or SYL as it is popularly known, is a proposed 214 km long channel to connect the two rivers. The canal is required to carry surplus Ravi-Beas waters that have been allocated to Haryana under various agreements.The dispute regarding the sharing of river waters arose after Punjab was reorganised in 1966. Haryana demanded 4.8 MAF (million acre feet) share of water out of Punjab’s total 7.2 MAF share of water from the rivers, while Punjab claimed the entire quantity belonged to it. As no agreement could be reached, Haryana requested the Union government to intervene in the matter. In 1976, when the country was under an internal Emergency, an executive order was issued by the Union government, which allocated 3.5 MAF of water to each of the two states and the remaining 0.2 MAF to Delhi. The decision was met with opposition from various groups, including the All-India Sikh Students Federation, Damdami Taksal, Babbar Khalsa International and the Khalistan Liberation Force. In 1979, the Government of Punjab filed a suit in the Supreme Court challenging the 1976 executive order regarding sharing of waters between Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan, and also vires of Section 78 of the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966.Haryana also filed a civil suit in the Supreme Court seeking directions for construction of the SYL canal. In 1976 Haryana unilaterally submitted a project report for construction of SYL Canal to the Govt. of India, and also provided a sum of Rs. 1.0 crore to Punjab for the purpose. An agreement was reached on 31st December, 1981 between Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan under which Punjab’s share was increased to 4.22 MAF and that of Rajasthan to 8.6 MAF, while the share of Haryana from the revised availability of 17.17 MAF, remained the same. A provision for the construction of SYL Canal was also made. All states withdrew their suits following signing of the agreement and the construction of the canal was formally launched on the 8th April, 1982. In 1985, the Punjab Legislative Assembly repudiated the 1981 agreement. Following the Rajiv-Longowal accord, Eradi Tribunal was constituted on 2 April, 1986. On 30th January, 1987, the tribunal upheld the legality of agreements of 1955, 1976 and 1981 and also increased the shares of Punjab and Haryana, allocating them 5 and 3.83 MAF, respectively. The construction of the canal had to be abandoned in 1990 due to the gunning down of 30 labourers on the site of the canal in 1988 and the murder of a Chief Engineer and a Superintending Engineer in 1990 by the militants. Since then, the construction of the canal has been embroiled in disputes, in and outside of courts, between the warring states, culminating into the enactment of the Punjab Termination of Agreements Act, 2004, which abrogated all the previous river water agreements with the neighbouring non-riparian states, and the President of India making a reference to the Supreme Court of India under Article 143(1) of the Constitution of India, seeking its advisory opinion on the legality of the Punjab Termination of Agreements Act, 2004 and the honourable apex court, has returned the Presidential reference with its opinion. However, on 30-11-2016, the Honourable court directed status quo regarding land and property of SYL Canal. Haryana has now moved an application for execution of decree to construct SYL canal. The matter is now fixed for hearing before the apex court on the March 28.The introduction to the dispute is necessitated to put the issue in perspective and to trace its chequered and bloody past. Pursuing construction of the canal without first determining the total quantum of water that is available for distribution amongst various states, its current usage, and quantification of surplus water, if any, for allocation to Haryana through a process of fair and judicious adjudication under the relevant laws would only be tantamount to putting the cart before the horse. It is also to examine the myth that construction of the canal is a win-win and cost-free venture for both the stakeholders. That it is quite to the contrary is evident from the following:Firstly, the so-called agreements for sharing the river waters between different states are unilateral, arbitrary and a product of political expediency, rather than an outcome of a fair and judicious process of adjudication. When Punjab’s request for constituting a new tribunal was not acceded to and the Supreme Court decreed the Haryana suit for construction of the SYL canal, the state government was left with no alternative but to enact a law abrogating all such agreements to safeguard the interests of the farmers of the state. Even while doing so, the government took care to safeguard the current use of water by different states by a specific provision in Section 5 of the Termination of Agreements Act, 2004. It shows that the state’s intention is not to deny any state its fair share of waters.Secondly, even though the Presidential reference under Article 143(1) of the Constitution has been returned by the honourable apex court with its opinion, it is advisory in nature and the President is yet to take a view on this. As such, a window of opportunity still exists for the Union government to find a fair and just solution to this vexed issue by consulting all stakeholders. This must be seized to avoid miscarriage of justice that is bound to result from the single-minded pursuit of the construction of the canal.Thirdly, the award of the Eradi Tribunal, holding various agreements in the matter as legally tenable, cannot be enforced, as it is yet to be finally notified after publication and hearing objections of the stakeholders, as required under the provisions of the Inter-State River Water Disputes Act, 1956. In the meanwhile, the Eradi Tribunal has become defunct due to the death of its Chairman. Therefore, a fair solution would be to make a reference to a new Tribunal under the new law in the making, with new terms of reference having regard to ground realities.Fourthly, contrary to the popular belief that there is enough surplus water, which the State of Punjab is letting go down to Pakistan, rather than sharing it with its needy neighbours, there is just no surplus water. Therefore, any additional water to be given to Haryana over and above its current usage through the Bhakra Main Line (BML) system, consequent upon the completion of the SYL canal, will be through diversion and at the cost of its current users in Punjab. This will render large tracts of land in the south western Punjab a desert and will cause untold misery to lakhs of its farmers. It is also going to cost the nation dearly if apart from the cost of construction of the canal, costs arising out of loss of income and livelihood to Punjabi farmers, loss of water through leakage, seepage and evaporation over such long carrying system and the cost of lifting the water from the Western Yamuna Canal for use by Haryana farmers are also reckoned. If we add to it the incalculable cost of violence which the construction of the canal is likely to lead to, it sounds rather Tughlakesque.Fifthly, after a long flux of time of over 40 years since the issuance of the first order of allocation of waters in 1976, the order of the Supreme Court for the construction of the SYL canal has been rendered impracticable for implementation. Radical changes in agronomy, hydrology and ecology have taken place since. The most important of such changes is the change in the availability of water for allocation to different states, which is evident from the following table:Flow series Available water (in maf)

1921-1960 17.17

1981-2002 14.37

1981-2013 13.38

It would be observed from the data that the water availability has reduced from 17.17 MAF based on the 1921-1960 flow series to 13.38 MAF based on 1981-2013 series. Therefore, contrary to the common belief, there is no surplus water, Punjab is not misutilising even a cusec of water and the water flows to Pakistan occur mostly during the monsoon, because of inability to store.Sixthly, the waters of the Yamuna also formed an asset of erstwhile Punjab at the time of its reorganisation on November 1, 1966. As much as 2.64 MAF of Yamuna waters were being utilised in Haryana areas at that time. As per the agreement of 1994 amongst the states of UP, Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal and Delhi, Haryana was allocated 4.65 MAF of Yamuna waters, an increase of 2.01 MAF over and above their utilisation at the time of reorganisation of Punjab. In the absence of construction of storage dams on the Yamuna, full utilisation of Yamuna waters is not being made and part of it is at present going waste.It may, therefore, be fair to conclude that the construction of the SYL canal is likely to be a zero-sum game, resulting in no net benefit to the nation. It will only result in a diversion of about 2 MAF of water from the current usage by farmers of Punjab to an inefficient future usage by farmers of Haryana and leave in its wake a tale of misery and violence. Such a misadventure is better avoided in the larger national interest, for which the Union government must intercede with the apex court and the legitimate water needs of Haryana be met by alternative innovative means.The writer is former Chief Secretary, Punjab. The views are personal

Why Punjab can’t share more

• Water-sharing agreements engineered unilaterally and a product of political expediency, rather than judicious adjudication.
• Presidential reference only Supreme Court’s advise to the President, who is yet to take a view. Thus, window for the Union government to find a just solution.
• The award of the Eradi Tribunal not notified after hearing stakeholders. Also, has become defunct due Chairman’s death.
• Punjab has no surplus water. Any more for Haryana will be at the cost of farmers in south Punjab. Water flows to Pakistan only in monsoon.
• 40 years after Supreme Court’s first order, water availability has reduced from 17.17 MAF to 13.38 MAF, leaving little for Punjab to spare.
• As per the agreement of 1994 amongst the various states (excluding Punjab), Haryana was allocated 4.65 MAF of Yamuna waters, an increase of 2.01 MAF over their utilisation at the time of Reorganisation

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh arriving for a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Parliament House in New Delhi on Wednesday. PTI photo

Tribune News service

Chandigarh, March 23

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on Thursday indicated that his first Cabinet expansion would be before the Budget Session in June.Amarinder said in a statement that Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi had given him the freedom to choose his council of ministers and he saw seniority, experience and regional parity as key parameters for selection. Professionalism and experience would be given high priority for appointments to other government positions such as bureaucrats.  He said that his Cabinet would ensure all regions of the state were represented.The chief minister also justified his decision to continue with DGP Suresh Arora because he was a “professional man” while the chief secretary was changed because of his proximity to the previous regime.The chief minister has called a Cabinet meeting on March 27 to approve a vote-on-account that it will table in the first session of the new assembly that begins on Friday.

Ruchika M Khanna

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 21

Having inherited a debt of Rs1.78 lakh crore from the previous Akali-BJP government, CM Capt Amarinder Singh, his Chief Principal Secretary Suresh Kumar and Finance Minister Manpreet Singh Badal will be meeting the Prime Minister Narendra Modi tomorrow, requesting him for restructuring its debt burden.The state will seek the intervention of the PMO for swapping 28 per cent of the state’s debt (Rs35,000 crore) with a low- cost option and urge him to reconsider the settlement of the legacy of food credit loan of Rs31,000 crore.Sources say the government wants the Centre to reconsider its approval, granted earlier this month for giving post facto assent to Punjab to avail a term loan of Rs30,000 crore to settle the food credit account.This loan had been taken by the state in November 2016, and the first instalment of interest, worth Rs810 crore was paid by Punjab in January this year, while the second instalment is due in April.The principal amount on this count is just Rs12,500 crore, but the interest on delay in settlement of loan has gone up to Rs18,500 crore. It is to settle this account that the state had to take a term loan of Rs30,000 crore. The repayment of this loan is to be made by floating bonds worth Rs31,000 crore.