Cong corporators issued whip for mayoral polls Wednesday, October 24, 2001
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
AHMEDABAD: Congress corporators on Monday were reportedly issued a whip to vote in favour of incumbent mayor and deputy mayor prior to AMC general board meeting called on Tuesday for election to the posts.
Sources in the party said the Congress corporators were asked to favour the re-election of Mayor Himmatsinh Patel and Deputy Mayor Khemchand Solanki. "Corporators have decided to have the present mayor and deputy mayor for another term," a senior councillor told TNN, adding that the decision for re-constitution of committees would be decided in the next general board meeting.
Earlier, the administrative wing postponed the farewell ceremony of the outgoing Municipal Commissioner K Kailashnathan due to meeting of the ruling Congress party corporators being convened at the last moment. The fresh date would be announced soon after the re-election of the top functionaries, sources said.
The corporators meeting assumes significance due to bumpy ride the party has had during its one-year rule since assuming power, as also the fact that voices of dissension are growing among a group of Congress corporators venting their ire against the mayor and standing committee chairman Badruddin Sheikh.
News Source : The Times of India [India's best Newspaper]
1 more arrested in fake currency scam Wednesday, October 24, 2001
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
VADODARA: Organised crime branch of the city police have arrested one more person in connection with the counterfeit currency scam. Police disclosed the identity of the arrested person as one Dipu Bhailal Patel hailing from Rampur village of Dholka. Police said Patel was arrested on Tuesday.
Patel is the third accused arrested in the scam so far, besides Hasan alias Lala Sindhi of Vadodara and Hanif Vohra of Surat. All the three are learnt to be carriers in the fake currency scam which has been linked with the ISI.
Police said Patel had showed fake notes of Rs 50,000 to a city builder and offered him to sell it to him on his next visit. Patel had asked the builder for Rs 1.10 lakh in exchange of the counterfeit notes, OCB police inspector B Jadeja said.
Jadeja avoided disclosing the name of the city builder. Incidentally this is the third occasion when reference has been made to a city builder in the scam who is believed to be a resident of Karelibaug area.
Anthrax claimed lives of 16 animals in Sept Wednesday, October 24, 2001
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
GANDHINAGAR: At least 16 animals, mostly sheep and goat, died following an anthrax outbreak in Chanchapar and Paddhari areas of Rajkot district last month and teams of veterinary doctors of the state animal husbandry department controlled the spread of the disease through effective vaccination.
State animal husbandry minister Devanand Solanki, who reviewed the precautionary measures being taken by the government with officials led by director S K Pandya, said no cases have been reported so far this month.
While speaking to 'The Times of India', Solanki said animal husbandry staff have been asked to either burn the animal carrying bacteria infection or bury them if they were tested positive. District collectors have been asked to maintain vigil in rural areas. The officials have been asked to convene gram sabhas and educate shepherds against the possible outbreak of the disease.
The animals fall prey to the infection while grazing when they consumed roots carrying the germs.
Pandya said every year, anthrax claims at least 30 to 40 sheep. In all 100 such deaths were reported in the last three years. He claimed that the vaccination campaign had warded off the possibility of the animals infecting humans.
Experts examine packets
Biological experts of Jamnagar Medical College have checked two packets received by Reliance Petroleum from the United States and found nothing harmful in them.
Health minister Ashok Bhatt said the company, on receiving the packets, informed the police who handed over the packets to the medical college. The team led by Dr Minaxi Oza examined the packets. One had five books and the other, chocolates.
News Source : The Times of India [India's best Newspaper]
Anthrax claimed lives of 16 animals in Sept Wednesday, October 24, 2001
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
GANDHINAGAR: At least 16 animals, mostly sheep and goat, died following an anthrax outbreak in Chanchapar and Paddhari areas of Rajkot district last month and teams of veterinary doctors of the state animal husbandry department controlled the spread of the disease through effective vaccination.
State animal husbandry minister Devanand Solanki, who reviewed the precautionary measures being taken by the government with officials led by director S K Pandya, said no cases have been reported so far this month.
While speaking to 'The Times of India', Solanki said animal husbandry staff have been asked to either burn the animal carrying bacteria infection or bury them if they were tested positive. District collectors have been asked to maintain vigil in rural areas. The officials have been asked to convene gram sabhas and educate shepherds against the possible outbreak of the disease.
The animals fall prey to the infection while grazing when they consumed roots carrying the germs.
Pandya said every year, anthrax claims at least 30 to 40 sheep. In all 100 such deaths were reported in the last three years. He claimed that the vaccination campaign had warded off the possibility of the animals infecting humans.
Experts examine packets
Biological experts of Jamnagar Medical College have checked two packets received by Reliance Petroleum from the United States and found nothing harmful in them.
Health minister Ashok Bhatt said the company, on receiving the packets, informed the police who handed over the packets to the medical college. The team led by Dr Minaxi Oza examined the packets. One had five books and the other, chocolates.
News Source : The Times of India [India's best Newspaper]
Gram Sabha is real, 'Samras' is a ploy! Wednesday, October 24, 2001
TIMES NEWS NETWORK
Our new CM NaMo has again thrown two dices -- one is his finger pointing at Gram Sabha as the basic institution that he wants to be revived, and the other could apparently be a political ploy -- his announcement to launch a drive to declare more and more villages as election-free 'Samras'!
That means a Samras village will be the one that will not elect its sarpanch but will choose him/her by a consensus! It is highly doubtful whether it would be a practical way to create a feeling of unity through such a so-called consensus in the presence of some taluka officials and BJP activists. Meanwhile, NaMo has not once uttered a word about his predecessor Keshubhai's favourite Gokulgram. Perhaps, does he see those already 'gokulled' 3,649 villages as "gone with the wind", as they are not likely to vote for the BJP?
I had written in this column sometime back, in the context of rural problems in Saurashtra, that the best way to settle the accumulated mess was to revive the Gram Sabha (general body meeting of all the village voters) as the supreme body, stipulated in panchayat law but never realised. I have been a witness to many villages in Saurashtra where voters have no knowledge about their panchayat's activities.
By law, every decision of the elected panchayat was to be endorsed by the Gram Sabha. It was bigger and more powerful than those usurpers like taluka development officers or district development officers or those directors of district development agencies -- all put together.
Actually, NaMo perhaps does not know that this bunch of village 'developers' have succeeded in killing this vital institution of Gram Sabha. Moreover, the Gokulgram scheme spent millions of rupees in cosmetics but it never talked of reviving the Gram Sabha.
What, instead, we see in the villages today are faction-ridden panchayats, autocratic or powerless sarpanches (normally the largest caste representatives), corrupt and absentee secretary or talathi and totally non-functional members in the face of the most despicable condition of infrastructure and backwardness. Most of the collectors and TDOs/DDOs work in a remote-control format without any live touch with the rural mass.
Sensitivity to people's needs is no more a cherished value for the administrators from down to top.
NaMo could get full marks, as no other CM has got before, if at all he succeeded in restoring some sensible orientation to the 'babudom's' deep-rooted culture of 'saheb & gulam'. Now NaMo wants those same 'babus' to go to the village Gram Sabhas and activate them. This would be like culprits in charge of a treasury. What is most essential is first to train those 'babus' and teach them how to understand villagers' psyche and how to identify with them.
Another major problem for gram panchayats was the lack of financial recourses. Neither Samras nor Gram Sabhas could fill up this huge gap. The only way to solve this problem was to make every village a self-reliant unit by handing over or building at least one small or medium industrial unit with all its profits going to that village. Preferably such a unit could make export-only goods. China has adopted this practice and my recent talk with a village chief over there convinced me that such a method was worth trying in our country too. Such a scheme could prevent the village unemployed peoples' migration to urban areas too.
So far as NaMo's idea of Samras was concerned, BJP may use this scheme to avoid the panchayat elections for fear of losing them -- which have already been postponed three times in the past. 10,000 village panchayat and taluka-district panchayat elections should be declared absolutely a non-party affair and should be freely held instead of trying to 'choose' the village heads by consensus. It can be clearly seen that 'consensus' choices would fall on those elements that support only the ruling party. More grants to such Samras villages could provide an incentive to keep the mouth of all other villagers shut.
It is not known, by the way, what happened to those 2,445 villages that were supposed to be adopted by various NGOs and industrial companies, as announced in July 1999 by Keshubhai Patel? In fact, even according to the rural development sources, only 3,649 villages out of 18,000 were so far declared as Gokulgram, where whatever rickety village gates or bus stops were built have already fallen flat or dilapidated.
One further step earmarked for Gokulgram villages was to survey those living below the poverty line. Such a survey earlier done by an NGO had found out that most names on the list belonged to the well-to-do class instead of the real poor. This was because the sarpanch or talathi-mantri would 'co-opt' names of their choice for the purpose of taking benefits of fans, bicycles or roof-repairing grants for their own kith and kin instead of for the rural poor. Nothing short of a complete overhaul of past system could salvage our villages.
(Batuk Vora)
News Source : The Times of India [India's best Newspaper]
