The government has sanctioned a new university at Padshahithaur and a degree college for Dhauldhar area of Tehri district, Upadhyay said. It will also upgrade four other colleges, he said adding the government has also decided to utilise Rs 250 crore, which was sanctioned by the Centre, for the purpose of development of the Tehri reservoir as a major tourist attraction. The people have also asked the government to provide passage from Tehri Dam for the residents of Pratapnagar and other nearby areas after the submergence of bridges and roads in the Tehri reservoir. “A deadlock still persists on the passage from Tehri dam,” Upadhyay said. He said the government has also agreed to sanction 22 kms of new roads for better connectivity in Tehri region.

News Source: IBNLive

Earlier, the foundation stone was to be laid on November 5, but as the AICC president will not be able to reach Gochar on the said date because of earlier commitments, the date was postponed. Gochar, incidentally, has the largest flat tract in the region, and is also used for the landing of choppers during emergency.

Meanwhile, there is a lot of excitement in the state over the laying of the foundation stone, for railway lines just touch the peripheries of this infant state. The railway stations, which are at the entry of the state include Dehradun, Kotdwara and Rishikesh, which hardly serve even a miniscule percentage of the hill population.

Cutting across party lines, political leaders of various hues admitted that November 9 would be a red letter day in the history of the state, when the foundation stone for the railway line is laid. Incidentally, this day also happens to be the statehood day.

Meanwhile sources in the Railways said that new technique would be used in laying the railway line, which would pass through low and middle Himalayas and not actually traverse the higher reaches. Some of the technology that has been used in the Beijing-Lhasa railway line is likely to be incorporated in this railway line, they added.

They said that the railway line would be laid by the Railway Development Corporation Ltd and would also generate employment at the local level for the unemployed youth of the region.

News Source: Hilly News

Chief Minister B.C. Khanduri tabled the “Uttarakhand Lokayukta Bill, 2011” in the Assembly as the session resumed after a month-long recess.

Soon after taking over as the Chief Minister on September 11 this year, Mr. Khanduri had announced to bring a stronger and an effective Lokayukta Bill within two months.

Lower judiciary will be covered under the Lokayukta while judges of the Uttarakhand High Court will not come under its purview.

Former Chief Ministers, former ministers and retired officers will also be under purview of the Lokayukta.

The Bill envisages that for any act of corruption, the punishment shall not be less than six months of rigorous imprisonment and may extend up to imprisonment of ten years.

In the rarest of rare cases, the punishment may be extended up to life imprisonment.

The Lokayukta will consist of a chairperson and five members with a scope of increasing the number to seven as per the need and requirement.

Khanduri asserted that BJP would win assembly polls which are scheduled in less than six months time.

“There is less time left and I am hopeful that BJP will win polls” he said after taking over as CM at Rangers Ground in capital.

Interestingly Khanduri repeated all eleven faces of Nishank cabinet including Diwakar Bhatt from Uttarakhand Kranti Dal and Rajendra Bhandari an independent.

Earlier Khanduri was unopposed elected as the leader of BJP legislative party in a ‘tense’ meeting that lasted for 45 minutes at Bijapur Guest House. Outgoing chief minister Nishank proposed name of Khanduri as the leader which was seconded by cabinet minister Matbar Singh Kandari amid the presence of central observer Ravi Shankar Prasad.

Nishank who tendered his resignation to governor before coming to meeting said that he would readily accept any responsibility.

“I have given my time to party and I look forward to serve in any capacity” said Nishank.

Meanwhile the BJP election in charge for Uttarakhand Rajnath Singh maintained that Nishank was not removed owing to graft charges.

“The change has been made as a part of BJP poll strategy” Singh clarified.

News Source: Hindustan Times

Police personnel would get the best training from the college and serve the state in a better way, Nishank said. He also announced a grant of Rs7.2 crore for various works to be undertaken in the college.

For the last ten years, the personnel used to undergo training in other states like Punjab and Uttar Pradesh.

DGP Jyoti Swaroop Pande lauded Nishank’s role in the welfare of police personnel and thanked him for creating 4,000 new posts in the force.

In the first batch, a total of 120 police constables will start training from today and complete the course in nine months, Pande said.

“We have prepared a new curriculum which is tailor-made for the requirements of the state like heavy tourist inflow,” he said. The DGP hoped that these requirements would now be met with the functioning of the college.

A criminal complaint has been lodged with the court of Chief Judicial Magistrate Kunwar Amanedra Singh here against Nishank and two others on account of alleged misappropriation of funds to the tune of crores of rupees during the mela where the central grant was nearly Rs 565 crore. The other two persons incriminated are mela minister Madan Kaushik and the then mela adhikari Anand Vardhan.

The complaint has been filed under IPC sections 120 B(criminal conspiracy)and section 409 (breach of trust by a public servant) by J D Jain in the court which has posted the hearing for May 2. The case has also taken the cognisance of a Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report which highlighted the widespread irregularities during the kumbh mela.

Interestingly, the case came at a time when only few months are left for the Assembly elections in the state. The case has given a fresh lease of life to the campaign of former Chief Ministers B C Khanduri and Bhagat Singh Koshiyari, who are openly supporting Anna Hazare’s movement against corruption. Both the two leaders have already met the central leadership of the BJP complaining on the issue of a series of alleged scams rocking the hill state.

However, a BJP spokesman dismissed the allegations saying the charges against Nishank were politically motivated. “The government has earned a lot of goodwill during the kumbh mela,” said the spokesperson.

The recent CAG report has put the government in a tight spot by highlighting wasteful, avoidable and unauthorised expenditures of nearly Rs 43 crore in the Kumbh Mela which was organised last year from January 1 to April 30, with a total action plan of Rs 590 crore with the centre contributing Rs 565 crore.

The report also stated that 54 works with approved cost of Rs 180.07 crore remained incomplete.

News Source: Business Standard

The clearance was transferred to the Alakananda Hydro-Power Corporation in 1999, when the project design was changed to increase the height to 90 meters and capacity to 330 MW. The company claimed that in the transfer letter the ministry gave approval to the enhanced capacity, but the letter did not mention any change in scope of the project.

The court, however, struck down the contention claiming that the ministry’s transfer letter did not mention clearance for additional capacity and citied an order of the Central Empowered Committee (CEC) of the Supreme Court.

The CEC had said asked the ministry to consider, whether in the case of the Srinagar power project, revised clearance was required or not, because of change in scope of the project. The ministry had, however, taken no action resulting in the high court order. It had also taken months to file an affidavit in the court on whether it approved the project up to 90 meters.

Srinagar hydro-project is on the river Alakananda, which joins the Bhagirathi at Devprayag to form the Ganga. Although the central government, under stewardship of environment minister Jairam Ramesh, had cancelled hydro projects on the river Bhagirathi, it had refused to take cognizance of similar projects on the Alakananda river.

“They (environment ministry) are not even discussing it,” said Bharat Jhununwala, who has been fighting to save the ecology on river Alakananda because of hydro projects.

The Srinagar project was conceived in 1981 and the construction started only in 2007. Part of the dam constructed is above 63 meters and rest is below the environment clearance limit.

While the Uttarakhand high court refused to grant stay on construction of the dam up to 63 meters, it asked the project proponents to stop the work for construction above 63 meters.

Following the court’s order, the ministry may have to conduct an environment clearance process, as increasing the height of the dam will have a greater impact on the ecology than considered, when approval for 63 meters was given.

The ministry’s own order of 2004 says that fresh clearance will have to be taken if scope of the project is changed, which has been the case in Srinagar project.

News Source: HindustanTimes

News Source: CNN IBN

Priorities were given to making more money by way of allotment at the growth centre, said the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India.

The scheme to set up the growth centre was introduced by the government to encourage industrialisation in backward areas. Under this scheme, a growth centre was sanctioned in December 2003. A total of 100 acres of land was acquired by SIDCUL for the growth centre, out of which 60.9 acres were developed for allotment to the entrepreneurs.

Records of SIDCUL, which is the nodal agency for industrial development, showed that only 32.9 acres of land had been allotted to 37 industrial units and the remaining 27.9 acres were lying unused till August 2010, the report said.

Out of the above allotments, 29.4 acres of land was allotted by SIDUCL to 31 units during the year 2005-07 at a fixed price of Rs 450 per sq metre and only 3.5 acres of land was allotted to six units during the last three financial years, it said.

The audit observed the slow rate of allotment was mainly due to the “faulty” policy of bidding by SIDCUL from the year 2007-08, which stipulates the industrial plots will be allotted only to the highest bidder and to those bidders, who will quote their rate within the range of 30 per cent from highest bidder.

By adoption of this policy, only two allotments (at the rate Rs 2,800 per sq metre and Rs 2,200 per sq metre) were finalised through the bidding process comprising 27 applicants as there were huge variations between the rates quoted by the bidders.

Subsequently, the state government in July 2008 also issued an order that further allotment of plots would be made at the rate of 125 per cent of the last allotment of industrial estates, according to which, plots for only four units were allotted at the rate of Rs 3,500 per sq metre up to August 2010, the report said.

Thus, the priorities were given to making more money by way of allotment at higher rates instead of encouragement of industrialisation in backward area as per policy of the government, which resulted in 45.9 percent of industrial land remaining vacant in the growth centre, the report said.

News Source: Business Standard