Posts Tagged ‘Shimla’
Written by admin on 01 May 2012
Shimla, May 1 (IANS) The apple of Himachal Pradesh’s eye is turning sour. Attacked by hailstorms, the state’s apple crop, worth more than Rs.200 crore, is lying unattended in the fields.
Horticulture department officials say hailstorms damaged crops in Shimla, Mandi and Kullu districts, but the continuous spell of snow in the higher reaches has rung alarm bells for growers in Kinnaur district too, the area known for producing delicious apples.
“There are reports of widespread hailstorms in Jubbal, Kotkhai, Rohru, Theog and Narkanda areas (in Shimla district). But the damage to the crop is comparatively less in Kullu and Mandi districts,” an official said.
“Field surveys across the state estimate that the loss to the apple crop till date due to recent hailstorms is over Rs.200 crore,” Horticulture Minister Narender Bragta told IANS.
He said the loss would be further compounded as the region is still in the grip of weather vagaries.
“The variation in temperature at this point of time is not good for fruit setting and the stormy weather also slows down insect activity, essential for proper pollination,” S.P. Bhardwaj, former joint director at the Solan-based Y.S. Parmar University of Horticulture and Forestry, told IANS.
He said frequent changes in climatic conditions would impact the overall production. Other fruit crops like cherry are also badly hit in the region.
Hemant Chauhan, an apple grower in Narkanda, said this time the fruit setting is quite good in the area compared to the last crop but frequent hailstorms are severely hitting the crop.
“It’s a matter of concern,” he added.
Last year, the overall apple production was just 30 percent of the bumper production of 4.46 crore boxes in 2010. In that year, the reduced output was owing to adverse weather – extended winter and the fury of hailstorms when the crop was maturing.
Bragta said the Rs.374 crore anti-hail gun project has been submitted to the central government for funding to install 300 guns in the state to protect the crop from the hails.
He said a high-level expert committee headed by Gorakh Singh, horticulture commissioner with the government of India, had toured the apple-growing areas in the state in this regard.
On a pilot basis, the state in 2010 installed three anti-hail guns in Deorighat, Kathasu and Braionghat in Shimla district.
“The state government this year increased the farm subsidy on anti-hail nets from Rs.25,000 to Rs.50,000,” Bragta said, adding “the state government has been demanding the central government to include hailstorms as a national calamity so that fruit growers are compensated”.
According to horticulture department estimates, hailstorms damage 20-30 percent of vegetable and fruit crops in the state every year.
Himachal Pradesh’s economy is highly dependent on horticulture, apart from hydroelectric power and tourism, with the annual apple industry worth about Rs.2,000 crore.
The total fruit production in the state during April-December 2011 was 328,000 tonnes, of which apples accounted for 275,000 tonnes.
According to the economic survey report of 2011-12, the area under apple cultivation has increased from 400 hectares in 1950-51 to 101,485 hectares in 2010-11.
(Vishal Gulati can be contacted at vishal.g@ians.in)
Tags: Himachal Pradesh, Shimla
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Written by admin on 30 April 2012
Shimla, April 30 (IANS) Sudripto Roy, a 1978-batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, will be the new chief secretary of Himachal Pradesh, replacing Harinder Hira, who retired Monday.
Hira was appointed chief secretary April 1 this year on the superannuation of Rajwant Sandhu.
Roy was earlier additional chief secretary (forests, environment and science and technology).
Roy also served as secretary general of the International Jute Study Group based in Dhaka in Bangladesh for three years from 2007.
Tags: Himachal Pradesh, Shimla
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Written by admin on 30 April 2012
Shimla, April 30 (IANS) To check frequent sale and purchase of a piece of commercial land in Himachal Pradesh, the government should impose a moratorium for 10 years, says a commission appointed by the state government.
“Every third day we read in the newspapers that the land mafia is active…During the perusal of cases from 2003 to 2011, the commission has observed that there are certain persons who have purchased land in bulk and sold to industrialists within a period of six months to three years,” said Justice D.P. Sood, former judge of the Himachal Pradesh High Court who headed the commission.
The state government had constituted the one-man commission to probe ‘benami’ (illegal) land transactions in the state from 2003 to 2011 and look into violations of statutory provisions and administrative procedures.
In his report submitted to the government this month, Justice Sood shortlisted 22 people who were involved in frequent land purchases and its sale.
“They purchased land in bulk, either in their own name or obtained GPAs (general power of attorneys) in Baddi, Barotiwala, Nalagarh, Kala Amb etc., in advance and sold it to the different industrialists,” says the report.
Baddi, Barotiwala and Nalagarh in Solan district and Kala Amb in Sirmaur district are the prominent industrial belts in the state.
The commission observes that such people purchase the land with the sole objective of speculation. “They purchase the land in bulk at cheaper rates and then sell it at higher rates to the industrialists. In this process, the poor farmers and the rich industrialists are the losers.”
“Industrialists get the land at higher prices and the farmers’ land is purchased at cheaper rates. This huge profit goes into the pockets of these middlemen.”
To curb this practice, Justice Sood recommends that where any new township or industrial town is to be developed, the land purchaser and the (new) owner should not be allowed to sell the land further for at least 10 years.
“The transfer of land on the basis of GPAs may be banned,” says the report.
Representatives of real estate say if the recommendation of the commission is accepted, there would be a drastic check on speculation and inflated property rates.
Under Himachal Pradesh laws, only permanent residents can buy land in the state. Others who want to purchase the land for non-agricultural purposes have to seek permission from the government under provisions of the Himachal Pradesh Tenancy and Land Reforms Act.
Tags: Himachal Pradesh, Shimla
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Written by admin on 28 April 2012
Shimla, April 28 (IANS) An over one-and-half-month old controversy over wearing of full-sized turban by Sikh students ended Saturday with a prominent boys’ school here allowing them to wear the headgear, an official said.
“The principal has given the assurance that now students can wear the full turban,” Additional District Magistrate (ADM) Naresh Kumar Lath said.
Gurleen Singh, a Sikh student of Class 12 was verbally told by the principal to wear only ‘patka’ (under-turban) in St. Edward’s school, which barred the students from wearing the full-sized turban.
“The principal gave us in writing that the students will be allowed to wear the full-sized turbans from Monday,” Jaspal Singh told IANS.
Parents of some Sikh students approached the local administration Thursday on the issue after the school refused to withdraw its March 2 order. They said the students had been wearing ‘patka’ in the school since then.
Shimla Deputy Commissioner Onkar Sharma had directed school principal John Bosco to settle the issue on priority.
St Edward’s School has been a prominent boys’ school in Shimla since March 9, 1925, in the Milsington Estate. Brother J.C. Doheny was its founder principal.
The school boasts of alumni like Vice President M. Hamid Ansari, former cricketer Kapil Dev, former Punjab Police chief K.P.S. Gill and union minister and former chief minister Virbhadra Singh.
Tags: Himachal Pradesh, Shimla
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Written by admin on 28 April 2012
Shimla, April 28 (IANS) Shimla’s last few sprawling green belts are in peril. A political decision to allow construction in the green zones — the only surviving lungs in the concrete jungle — by lifting a 12-year-old ban will render the hills more barren, an official here said.
Town and Country Planning Minister Mohinder Singh told IANS Saturday that the government is making amendments in the building construction rules in the green areas of Shimla in order to facilitate the land owners.
The government’s move is worrying the environmentalists. They say the government should preserve the green belts rather than destroying something that is of ecological value.
The ban on both commercial and private construction was imposed in 2000 in 17 green belts spread across the town. Since then, the residents have been demanding limited construction or paying of compensation for keeping the plot vacant.
“When the government has allowed Jagson Ropeways Company for carrying out construction of the ropeway tower in the green zone, why is it then not allowing the individual plot owners,” asked an affected resident. There are nearly 70 residents who are affected by the ban on constructions.
Citing a Supreme Court judgment relating to right to property, the residents say in case the plot owners were denied sanction or deprived of possessing their property, the government or local civic body should pay compensation for keeping the plot vacant for preservation of greenery.
Shimla Municipal Corporation commissioner M.P. Sood said it was not possible for the civic body to pay compensation to each plot holder. “The total compensation works out to be more than Rs.150 crore,” he said.
Rajesh Mehta, former director of the state’s town and country planning department and a resident, said: “The government should allow only those plot owners who have purchased the land before the ban came into force (in 2000) and there should be need-based construction only.”
According to Mohinder Singh, a development plan for Shimla has been prepared to ensure systematic development of the town and adjoining areas.
“A plan to develop satellite towns in Vaknaghat, Ghandal and Fagu (in the suburbs of Shimla) has been prepared,” he said.
Planned for a maximum population of 16,000, the town now supports 236,000, as per provisional census figures for 2011.
Officials of the Town and Country Planning Department said Shimla’s northern slope of the historic Ridge, an open space just above the Mall extending to Grand Hotel in the west and the Lakkar Bazaar in the east, is sinking.
At present, Shimla, the erstwhile summer capital of the British India, has 187 buildings with more than five floors, including a 12-storey commercial building being constructed by Jagson International Ltd, an eight-storey building of Oberoi group’s five-star hotel Cecil and a 10-storey building of the Himachal Pradesh High Court.
Tags: Himachal Pradesh, Shimla
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Written by admin on 28 April 2012
Shimla, April 28 (IANS) As Himachal Pradesh goes to the polls for its 68 assembly seats later this year, the faction-ridden opposition Congress has begun an exercise to put its house in order with the hope of ousting the Prem Kumar Dhumal-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government.
Senior party functionaries, including union ministers Anand Sharma and Virbhadra Singh, are meeting here in a daylong brainstorming session May 1 to initially sink their differences and then prepare a roadmap for the elections.
“The meeting has been planned on the advice of our party chief (Sonia Gandhi)…it’s just to jointly work out a strategy to bring the party back to power,” Congress Legislative Party leader Vidya Stokes told IANS.
Gandhi called the senior party leaders in Delhi April 24 and told them in clear terms to work in unison and adhere to the party norms.
“Himachal is an important state and we want results there,” Gandhi told the leaders.
She asked Birender Singh, in charge of the party’s state affairs, to sit along with the leaders and discuss the challenges ahead of polls and chalk out an election strategy.
Besides Virbhadra Singh and Sharma, state party president Kaul Singh and his state unit functionaries, former state party chief Viplove Thakur and Stokes have been invited to the meeting.
Five-time chief minister Virbhadra Singh, 76, popularly known as Raja Saab, is fighting a ‘survival battle’ this time, while state party chief Kaul Singh’s prestige is at stake to bring the Congress back to power under his leadership.
Political observers feel Virbhadra Singh has to re-establish his credentials as a charismatic leader in the elections as the party faced a humiliating defeat in the 2007 assembly elections at his helm. After losing power, he was almost marginalised in state politics.
“Now Raja Saab wants that the elections should again be conducted under his leadership, or at least he should have a say in the allocation of tickets (to candidates),” a senior party functionary said.
To make his presence felt, he has already become active in state politics and held a series of rallies across the state.
At the rallies, where he got an overwhelming response, he has been critical of his own party leaders. He has been saying the state leaders have failed to take the Dhumal government head on. He even accused them of playing a “friendly match” with the BJP.
“Even Gandhi has taken a serious note of Virbhadra Singh’s independent rallies without taking the state party chief into confidence. She asked all the leaders to stop holding parallel rallies,” a source said.
Interestingly, Stokes and Virbhadra Singh, who were believed to be archrivals, have of late joined hands and been seen at political rallies together.
A segment of young legislators are not happy with the performance of Kaul Singh. They are demanding change of leadership in the state.
“The party can go for restructuring the state leadership but at the moment the issue of bringing the seniors together is top priority,” said a Congress leader.
Stokes said besides assembly elections the forthcoming meeting would also take a call on the party’s strategy for the Shimla Municipal Corporation elections due May 27.
The party is yet to make public candidates for the post of mayor and deputy mayor. Elections to both the posts will be held directly for the first time.
The Congress has been maintaining its control over the civic body for the past three decades, but the state ruling BJP is hoping to win at least the post of mayor even if it does not get a majority in a 25-member house.
(Vishal Gulati can be contacted at vishal.g@ians.in)
Tags: Himachal Pradesh, Shimla
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