Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 7: Chief Judicial Magistrate Samba Ajay Kumar Gupta has rejected bail application of Tersam Lal and Ajay Kumar, who were allegedly involved in attempt to murder case.
After hearing APP Anil Saini for the UT, the CJM observed, “the police report clearly indicates that the accused are involved in a serious and heinous offence, thus in such cases court should be more careful while granting or rejecting the bail”, adding “from the perusal of CD file, it has been prima facie established that the accused persons along with another accused, Anil Kumar had stopped the way of the victim and hit him with the Lathi on his head due to which the victim sustained serious injuries”.
“The offence committed by the accused persons is serious and heinous in nature, the statement of the victim is still to be recorded, who is struggling for his life and the offence committed by the accused persons also carries punishment up to life imprisonment”, the court said, adding “there is every apprehension that the accused persons will tamper the evidence if released on bail”.
Bail denied in attempt to murder case
Committee constituted to re-assess Ground Water Resources in J&K
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 7: Government today accorded sanction to the constitution of Union Territory level committee for re-assessment of Ground Water Resources in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir for the year 2019-20.
According to the order, Administrative Secretary Jal Shakti Department will be chairman of the committee while Chief Engineer Jal Shakti (PHE) Department Jammu/Kashmir, Chief Engineer Jal Shakti (I&FC) Department Jammu/Kashmir, Director Rural Sanitation J&K, Director Agriculture Jammu/Kashmir, Director Industries Jammu/Kashmir and General Manager, NABARD Jammu shall be members of the committee.
Regional Director, Central Ground Water Board, Jammu will be member secretary of the committee whereas any other officer to be co-opted by the chairman of the committee, if required, will be special invitee. The committee shall be serviced by Jal Shakti Department.
The committee will re-assess annual water recharge of the UT in accordance with Ground Water Resources Estimation Methodology 2015 and also estimate the status of utilization of the annual extractable ground water resources.
Fortofino launches Forevermark at its store in Ambala
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 18: Fortofino, the jewellery brand known for their exquisite designs and expert craftsmanship have partnered with Forevermark, the diamond brand from the De Beers Group by launching the brand at their jewellery store in Ambala.
Forevermark diamonds are the world’s most carefully selected diamonds, while Fortofino enjoys the customer’s trust to offer some of the best designs in finest quality. The synergies of these two brands has brought about an ideal association to offer elegant diamond jewellery pieces that come with a unique inscription number assuring you that they are the most beautiful, rare and responsibly sourced diamonds.
The store houses exquisite Forevermark Collections that include the Millemoi Collection, the Cornerstone collection, the Twogether Collection, the Capricci Collection, Bridal Rings, the Traditional Setting Collection and the latest stackable rings Tribute Collection.
Highlighting the partnership, Vijay Saraf, Chaiman, Fortofino said, “We have been associated with Forevermark for 2 years now and as we are launching our first store in Ambala, we choose to strengthen our association by providing some of the world’s best diamonds to our new customers in the city. Each Forevermark diamond is uniquely inscribed and comes with a guarantee that every diamond is genuine and natural, this provides an additional assurance to our customers.”
Speaking on the occasion, Sachin Jain, president, Forevermark India said, “We have been associated with Fortofino at their store in Jammu as well as with an exclusive boutique in Chandigarh and we feel extremely privileged to work with such a trusted retailer. We hope that the discerning customers in Ambala enjoy the wide range of exclusive Forevermark designs available at the store.”
Forevermark diamonds are the world’s most carefully selected diamonds. Each Forevermark diamond undergoes a journey of rigorous selection and bears a unique inscription at its heart, which is an assurance that every Forevermark diamond is beautiful, rare and responsibly sourced. Known for combining superior quality and exclusive designs to produce elegant masterpieces, Fortofino will carry forward the promise of Forevermark.
Thousands participate in BSF, CISF recruitment drive
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 18: Around 30,000 candidates on Sunday participated in the written examination for recruitment in the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) in the Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, a BSF spokesperson said.
The written test of the candidates, hailing from 20 districts of Jammu and Kashmir and two districts of Ladakh, was conducted smoothly at various centres amid strict adherence of COVID-19 protocols issued by the Centre and the two UT Governments, he said.
The spokesperson said a total of about 34,000 candidates, who have been declared qualified in Physical Endurance Test and Physical Standard Test and documentation were called for the written examination for the recruitment to the post of male and female constable (General Duty) in the BSF and the CISF.
Click here to watch video
“There was huge enthusiasm among the candidates in not only Jammu but also in Kashmir and Ladakh regions. The percentage of absentees was very low,” he said.
He said the written examination was conducted at BSF Camps at Paloura in Jammu, Painthee in Samba, Subsidiary Training Centre (STC) Udhampur, sector headquarters Rajouri under responsibility of frontier headquarter BSF Jammu and STC BSF Srinagar, Sighpura-Baramulla, Bandipora, Kupwara and Tangdhar in Kashmir.
In Ladakh, the examination was conducted in Sub division Nubra Valley, ITBP Camp Leh, BSF Campus Neeru and Police line Kargil, the spokesperson said, adding that the special recruitment rally was held under the overall responsibility of Frontier Headquarter BSF Kashmir.
Advisor Baseer Khan tees off Golf Tourney, flags off adventure rally
2 day Pahalgam Autumn Festival concludes
Excelsior Sports Correspondent
PAHALGAM (ANANTNAG), Oct 18: On the concluding day of the two day Autumn Festival organized by the Directorate of Tourism, Kashmir, Advisor to Governor, Baseer Ahmad Khan teed off Golf Tournament at the picturesque Lidder Valley Golf Course here today.
Around 80 golfers from J&K and outside participated in the tournament.
While teeing off the tournament, Advisor interacted with the golfers and sought their feedback.
Baseer Khan also flagged off a Mountain Bike Rally which was attended by 30 mountain bikers. The rally started from Lidder Valley Golf Course and passed through Biasaren and Aru Valley. Also 10 trekkers undertook journey of new trekking trails. With this the two day Autumn festival has come to close.
Secretary, Tourism, Sarmad Hafeez, Director, Tourism, Kashmir, Nisar Ahmad Wani, CEO, PDA, Mushtaq Ahmad Simnani and other senior officers were present on the occasion.
Later, the Secretary, Tourism distributed prizes among the winning players.
Yesterday, on the first day of festival, an exhibition of village crafts, cottage craft and handicrafts, cuisine, fruits and other components of village economy was held at Pahalgam Club.
The festival was organised by the Department in collaboration with J&K Golf Association, Pahalgam Hoteliers and Restaurants Association, JKTDC, PDA and District administration.
The Autumn festival is part of the promotional campaign launched by the Department recently after the COVID-19 restrictions were withdrawn and SOPs were relaxed. Recently a team of officers of the Department visited Kolkata as part of promotional activities to revive the tourism sector, which has been hit by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Webinars were also organised by the Department with Tour Operators of Gujarat and Maharashtra.
NC, PDP befooling people: Kavinder
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 18: Former Deputy Chief Minister and senior BJP leader, Kavinder Gupta said that the Kashmiri mainstream political parties have deprived and deceived Jammu and Ladakh regions for the last 70 years and looted the Government resources for their own good will.
In a statement issued here today, the senior BJP leader said that the mainstream political parties of Valley have come up with a new version of ‘Gupkar Alliance’ just to befool people of Kashmir with their cheap and misleading tactics. He said people have also understood their minds who had exploited and looted Jammu and Kashmir over the past 70 years. Both NC and PDP did nothing on the ground rather than ruling the J&K, he said.
The former Deputy Chief Minister said that during the past more than 15 months, Valley people have ignored them and no one was bothered to come out on roads to seek their release.
“Both NC and PDP leaders are staging drama and expressing fake sympathies for the people by forming such ‘People’s Alliance’ and termed it as anti-national. They exploited J&K resources on the name of Article 370 and now are trying the same formula but people are aware of such tactics,” he added.
“They have lost their credibility and nor the will people trust them anymore over their fake promises and now they should accept the reality and stop acting like chameleons,” Kavinder said, adding that the dynastic politics has ended with the abrogation of Article 370.
“Abdullahs and Muftis have become hungry for power and looted J&K from the past 70 years to impose their family politics and agenda,” he asserted.
The former Deputy Chief Minister asserted that the Bharatiya Janata Party is committed to restore statehood to Jammu and Kashmir as and when the situation becomes conducive and the same has also been assured by the Union Home Minister, Amit Shah.
Kavinder said that the Union Home Minister has assured that the Party is duty bound to restore statehood to J&K and it will be restored shortly.
“People have realised that due to Article 370, the personal prosperity of the Kashmiri leaders only increased, but the public did not benefit,” he said.
Meanwhile, Kavinder Gupta along with district president, Vinay Gupta and Corporator Ward 22, Jaideep inaugurated Ayushman Bharat-Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana camp at Ward 21 Gandhi Nagar.
The camp was organized by Indu Bhushan Sharma, BJP State co-convener Industries and Traders Cell.
Mukherjee recalled fond memories of Sheikh Mujib in his article penned days before his death
NEW DELHI, Oct 18: In an article penned days before his death, former president Pranab Mukherjee had fondly remembered Bangladesh founder Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and recalled how in 1972 the then Pakistan President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had tried in vain to pressure him into issuing a joint statement to show that Pakistan remained undivided.
Mukherjee, in his article that is published in the book ‘Voice of Millions’ to mark the centenary of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, also reminisced how he, as a young Rajya Sabha MP, had called in Parliament for granting recognition to the then Bangladesh government in exile, as part of a political solution.
The former president quoted from Sheikh Mujib’s book ‘Unfinished Memoirs’, published by his daughter 29 years after his death, to note how the Bangladeshi leader was not even aware of the independence of his country and was in exile in the Mianwali Jail near Rawalpindi at that time.
He was thereafter taken to London on a special flight on the night of January 8, 1972, after Bhutto failed in his attempts to woo him.
“Bhutto informed Mujib that he was the president and needed Mujib’s help. During the few days between 1st and 8th January, Bhutto spoke to him at various times and pressured Mujib to sign a joint statement. He showed Mujib many drafts…,” Mukherjee wrote.
“Meanwhile, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto made repeated appeals to Mujib to establish a relationship between Pakistan and Bangladesh. A relationship that would keep Pakistan undivided.
“Mujib simply informed Bhutto that he would not be able to say anything to him without first conferring with the people of his country.
“In the end, a frustrated Bhutto decided to send Mujib to Britain. In the middle of the night on 8th January 1972, a special Pak Airlines plane flew Mujib, its sole passenger, to London’s Heathrow airport. When he landed at Heathrow, the local time was 6:30 am,” he said, noting from his book.
Mukherjee also recollected in his article how his mind was filled with memories of the events of 1971. He was 36 years old and an MP when the people of Bangladesh were engaged in their liberation struggle.
“I recall that, on June 15, 1971, I had the privilege to initiate a discussion on the floor of Rajya Sabha, the upper house of the Indian Parliament, when I suggested that India should accord diplomatic recognition to the Government of Bangladesh in exile in Mujibnagar. My words are on the record in the proceedings of Rajya Sabha.
“When a Member sought my suggestion on how to tackle the problem, I responded by saying: ‘I am talking of a political solution which means categorically recognising the sovereign democratic Government of Bangladesh.
“Political solution means giving material help to the democratic, sovereign Government of Bangladesh…. I reminded the House of the many instances in world history when intervention on similar grounds had taken place in the past,” Mukherjee wrote in the article which, his close associates said, was his last.
He also wrote about how Mujib worked hard for creation of Pakistan, but intense disagreements arose between him and the Muslim League leadership as he began to oppose various policies and their applications.
“Because of this, he was imprisoned shortly after liberation for criticizing and opposing government policies at different times. If the 9 months in 1971 are included, then Mujib’s total period of imprisonment comes to 3,053 days, he said.
Describing the ‘Father of Bangladesh’ as “a tireless statesman”, Mukherjee said the legacy of ‘Bangabandhu’ and Bangladesh are intertwined together.
“There are very few individuals in history who have a profound impact in the creation of Nations, indeed a subcontinent’s identity.
“Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujbir Rahman stands tall amongst those few. His unbound love for his people and his struggle for them is a testament to his legacy.
“As the sub-continent observes his birth centenary, we not only remember a statesman but a man who lived and died for his great nation, in the process reaffirming the culturally ingrained values of freedom and liberty, composite secularism and inclusive development,” he said in his article.
He wrote about the days of Sheikh Mujib’s schooling, to becoming the leader of Bangladesh.
The former President, who is the only one from outside Bangladesh to have written in the book, said his dream of a ‘Sonar Bangla’ lives on.
He also talked about how Sheikh Mujib made the ‘Chhatra League’ a mass movement that also helped in achieving the dream of Bangladesh’s independence.
Mukherjee said he was in Kolkata when Sheikh Mujib was assassinated.
“Of the brutal annihilation of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman with his entire family (except his two daughters Sheikh Hasina and Sheikh Rehana) at the dawn of 14th /15th August 1975, the most vivid memory I have is of unbelievable shock and anger,” he also said.
Mukherjee died on August 31 at the age of 84. (PTI)
IIM Sirmaur organizes workshop on Big Data Analytics
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 18: The Management Development Program (MDP) office of IIM Sirmaur today organized a one-day live workshop on topic titled “Big Data Analytics for Everyone”.
Nearly 70 participants from India and abroad attended the workshop. The objective of the workshop was to promote big data skills among faculty and PhD students of all disciplines.
Prof (Dr) Neelu Rohmetra, Director IIM Sirmaur motivated the participants of the workshop. She said that online platforms have opened a window of opportunity for the education institutions to impart skills across the globe. She also said that IIM Sirmaur shall offer more workshops on the trending data science skill in the future.
Earlier, the inaugural session was addressed by Prof Vikas Kumar (Chair of MDP office at IIM Sirmaur). He highlighted the objective of MDP office at IIM Sirmaur and stressed on the importance of knowledge transfer of IIM faculty to everyone with the help of such initiative.
The basic motto of this workshop was to give the firsthand experience of big data analytics to the participants. The workshop consisted of four sessions. First two sessions were dedicated to the working in python software in anaconda distribution. The last two sessions were more focused in the twitter data analytics. Twitter data analytics consisted of collection of data, cleaning of data, processing of data, and extracting the meaningful insights from it.
The workshop is expected to assist the participants in enhancing their capacity to understand the social media data and use it for their research purposes. All the participants actively participated in the workshop and could resolve their difficulty with the help of instructor. Instructor gave various live examples of how the social media data is rich source of information and ways in which this information can be extracted and analyzed for meaningful insights. The workshop was conducted by Prof Shashi Kant Srivastava, faculty of IT and Systems at IIM Sirmaur.
Residential house damaged in fire
Excelsior Correspondent
BHADERWAH, Oct 18: A double storey residential house was damaged in fire in village Atalgarh, here today.
As per reports, fire broke out in double storey residential house owned by Ehsan Ahmd, son of Ali Mohammad at village Atalgarh probably due to short circuit.
On getting information, police team rushed to the spot and informed the Department of Fire and Emergency Services.
Fire Tenders led by Incharge Fire Station Bhaderwah Mohammad Farooq Parrey rushed to the spot and controlled the fire from spreading to adjoining houses.
No injury or casualty has been reported in the incident, while the exact loss could not be ascertained yet.
Police has taken cognizance in this regard.
JTC, SKF take out procession, stage protest at NH
Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Oct 18: The Jagti Tenement Committee (JTC) and Soan Kashmir Front (SKF) J&K on the 17th day of protest and hunger strike today staged a huge rally from the site of sit- in to National Highway. The rally was stopped by S. H.O Police Station, Nagrota on National Highway. Protesters then staged one – hour protest near the National Highway and demanding enhancement of monthly cash relief from Rs13,000 to Rs 25,000 per month per family and Jobs to those families where there is no Government employee.
Addressing the protestors, Shadi Lal Pandita president JTC, Soan Kashmir Front J&K said that today is the 17th day of agitation which was started October 2 and it will continue till Government meets our demands. .The Government should solve the demands of KPs as soon as possible, he added.
Pandita said that the package of 20,000 Jobs should be given for unemployed KP youth and out of them 5,000 Class VI posts should be given to the unemployed youth of those families who could not send their children for higher education after matriculation due to poverty and exile. He said that the Government should provide free ration to pensioners whose pensions are very low and meet other genuine demands.
He demanded building of three Satellite Townships in three districts of Kashmir Valley near Baramulla ,Srinagar and Anantnag. Each and every land lord should be compensated for over 30 years property loss. Migrant youth of camps and non camps should be given Jobs in Police Department and be recruited on the spot. Free loans and compensation be given to over aged youth, release of balance ex-gratia of the burnt houses. Besides 2 BHK sets should be built for package employees in every district of Valley. Other leaders who sitting on protest are Raj Kumar Tickoo , Sunil Koul, Rakesh Ambardar, Kashi Nath Bhat, Inder Ji Labroo, Charanjeet Singh , Gurmeet Singh ,Vikey Hakoo ,P K Sadhu , Ravinder Koul ,M L Razdan,C L Koul , Shuban Krishan Raina, , O N Raina, S L Kar, Vijay Bakshi, Ramesh Suri, Babloo Ji ,Satish Pandita and others.