Dial-a-cycle-rickshaws launched in Chandigarh

Chandigarh, 25 June - City residents need not walk across the streets to spot a cycle-rickshaw. They just have to dial the operators’ number and the rickshaw will be at their doorsteps within minutes.

In perhaps first of its kind initiative in the city, a group of volunteers have come up with a facility that enables the residents to call up rickshaw operators on their cellphones.

The phone numbers of rickshaw operators (sector wise), for ‘Dial-a-rikshaw’ service are available on the website http://www.chandigarh.ecocabs.org.

And if you are satisfied with the service, you can recommend the rickshaw operator’s name to other residents by uploading his name and phone number online. A separate link on the website enables residents to recommend the name of rickshaw operators.

The website has a database of 110 rickshaw operators who are spread across 12 sectors. The service is available in Sectors 9, 11, 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 22, 23, 40, 41, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47 and 56.

Sample this: If a resident of Sector 44 hires a rickshaw, he can take the details of the operator and upload the same on the sub-section of Sector 44 on the website.

A team of 12 volunteers from different walks of life joined hands to form a non-profit association and developed the concept of ‘Dial-a-rickshaw ecocabs’. The service was launched today in collaboration with the UT Administration, Municipal Corporation and the New Kranti Cycle Rickshaw Union.

“In case of any complaint against the rickshaw operator, the residents can access the contact number of the sector mentor from the website,” said one of the volunteers, Navdeep Asija, the founder of ‘Dial-a-rickshaw ecocabs’.

Chandigarh Municipal Corporation is all set to impose house tax

Patil gives the go-ahead to MC proposal; Tax to be collected from July

Chandigarh, June 17 - Chandigarh Municipal Corporation (MC) will start collecting house tax at the rate of Re 1 per sq yard per year from July.

With the imposition of house tax, the MC will get around Rs 2.50 crore annually. The owner of a five-marla house in the city will have to shell out only Rs 125 per year, followed by Rs 187.5, Rs 250 and Rs 375 per year for owners of 7.5, 10 and 15-marla houses.

The owner of a one-kanal house (500 sq yards) will have to shell out Rs 500 per year, followed by Rs 1,000 per year for owners of two, three, four, five and six-kanal houses. No house tax will be levied on houses less than 125 sq yards. EWS and LIG houses have been exempted. In the case of apartments, a category-wise lumpsum amount will be charged proportionately.

Rates to be revised after three months

According to UT officials, initially they will impose house tax at the rates proposed by the MC. However, after three months, they will review the rates and there are chances that the Administration will increase the rates because Re 1 per sq yard will not make much of a difference to the financial health of the MC and the Administration.

Number of houses to be affected

There are 20,265 houses (five marla and above as well as kanal houses), 7,979 houses in co-operative societies, 5,597 MIG houses, 10,675 HIG houses, 15,053 houses under the Administration and 22,040 under the Central Government, which will have to pay house tax.

BJP opposed the decision

Former Union Minister and senior BJP leader Harmohan Dhawan opposed the decision of the UT Administration, saying that the UT was a fund-surplus state.

Lawyers’ Chambers Issue

HC issues notice of motion to UT
Chandigarh, December 6

A day after a section of the UT District Bar Association sought a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation into the ‘criminal’ wastage of money in the construction of the lawyers’ chambers building in Sector 43, the Punjab and Haryana High Court today issued notice of motion to the UT and others.

The petition has been filed by the construction committee constituted by the investor-members of the District Bar Association for the allotment of chambers in the Sector 43 district courts complex. It has been filed through its members, including HS Awasthi, Vinod Choda, RS Walia and Amar Singh Chahal. The chambers are being built on self-finance basis.

The petition says the CBI may be directed to register a case on the basis of a complaint dated November 6 sent by the member-investors of the chambers building. Directions have been also sought to “undertake investigation of the same for the purpose of prosecution of persons responsible for the offences so committed by them, as stated in the complaint”.

The petitioners said their grudge was that amount “running into crorers, collected from some members of the District Bar Association had been wasted on the basis of forged bills, use of substandard material, procurement of forged documents and showing purchase of material on false documents”.

Elaborating, the petitioners said the total contract money was Rs 13.30 crore, while the amount paid to date to the contractor was Rs 14.60 crore. As such, an excess payment of Rs 1.30 crore was made, while 40 per cent work was yet to be completed. “The estimated money wasted could well be more than Rs 5 crore,” the petitioners alleged.

Chandigarh doctor gets prestigious award

CHANDIGARH: Dr. Dharam Vir , faculty speech and hearing, department of ENT, PGIMER, Chandigarh has been awarded talented scientist award for his contribution to alternative medicine on the occasion of XXVI National Medicos Congress at Hoshiarpur. The award was given for contributing a tool to assess the prevalence of articulation errors/defects in the Panjabi speaking children and adult population.

'Speech' is the auditory-vocal form of expressing and comprehending languages. A person with an articulation problem is the one whose production of speech sound varies too widely from the average values. This variation interferes with communication.

Around the globe, Punjabi is spoken by more than 80 million people. Need was felt to develop a specific tool to assess the prevalence of articulation errors/defects in the Panjabi speaking children and adult population. The tool thus developed is known as Punjabi Articulation Test (PAT). No such test was available for Punjabi Language prior to it.

The study made to develop the test examined the articulation errors of consonants on normal pediatrics population of Punjabi speaking children between the age ranges of 8 and 10 years. The present study examined the Punjabi Consonant Errors of Punjabi speaking children of rural (130) and urban (70) population of the Punjab State of India.

This Punjabi Articulation Test (PAT) will be very useful for the North Indian Punjabi speaking population as well as for the Punjabi speaking folks living in Pakistan and elsewhere. This test can be administered on different types of speech and language disorders of Punjabi speaking population.

Crackdown on encroachments in Sector 17

Chandigarh, November 21
As the UT estate office has stepped up its drive against banks and other offices which have encroached upon corridors of upper floors of buildings in sector 17, the estate office has ignored similar violations by shopkeepers near the central piazza of the commercial sectors.

On Wednesday, teams of the estate office started removing the glazing in the rear balconies of the buildings housing banks.

Apart from the violation, the glazing is a major fire hazard as has been witnessed during recent incidents of fire in the buildings located in the Bank Square.

Sources said notices to around 70 violators have already been issued. The chief architect has sought to maintain the heritage status of Sector-17. The heritage status does not allow glazing in the corridors. The architect department has pointed out that the defacement of buildings was also against the heritage plan.

Most of the owners and occupants of the buildings in the sector have covered their corridors with glazing, plywood or other material to convert the open area into rooms.

The violators also included the UT Excise and Taxation Office and 30-bays building, which housed several government offices of UT.

Students from Paris on tour to study city’s architecture

 Chandigarh, November 18

Eighteen students from the Architectural School of Paris-Malaquais are in the city on a fifteen-day tour to understand how the local planners accommodated the radical vision of the original master plan of the city.

Students of Architectural School of Paris-Malaquais visit an old house in Sector 22, Chandigarh, on Sunday. Tribune photo: Pradeep Tewari

The group is surveying, photographing, sketching and describing the modern architecture of the city. The goal is to see how the modern city of Chandigarh could absorb the current and continuous growth of population.

These students belong to various countries including Spain, France, Hungary and Portugal. They are being accompanied by their teachers Thierry Mandoul and Clement Blanche.

The students will help in developing urban and architectural proposals which will integrate themes like preservation and sustainability.

This project, being done in collaboration with the Chandigarh College of Architecture, will be finalised in the summer of 2013.

37,000 sit for CTET in tricity

Chandigarh, November 18

About 37,000 students appeared for the Central Teachers Eligibility Test (CTET) held at 67 centres around the tricity.

Started by the CBSE in 2011, CTET is mandatory for any teacher who wants to join a government-aided CBSE school, and schools run by the Centre such as Kendriya Vidyalayas and Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas, and those managed by the union territories.

As far as passing percentage is concerned, CTET has seen poor results so far. In the second edition, more than 92 per cent teachers failed to pass the exam, where as the maiden exam in 2011 saw more than 85 per cent teachers failing to clear the exam. More than 7 lakh candidates appeared for this year’s exam across India.