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Journalism of Courage
Jharkhand too cleans up
With the country caught up in the Anna Hazare agitation,Chief Minister Arjun Munda did his own little bit of cleaning up in the state. Apart from prevailing upon the 81-member state Assembly where four former ministers and one ex-chief minister Madhu Koda are in jail facing various allegations to adopt a unanimous resolution backing Hazares agitation,he dismissed 40 engineers of the state road construction department. Appointed on an ad hoc basis by the Lalu Prasad Yadav-Rabri Devi governments while Jharkhand was a part of Bihar,they had been facing allegations of corruption. While many of them are set to move court over the action against them,the Munda government is reportedly ready to fight them all the way to the Supreme Court.
Medicines worth Rs 30 lakh bought for players for the National Games held in Jharkhand last year continue to lie unused,in another case of government apathy. A large chunk of them,including 150 vials of anti-tentanus Tetglob,20 vials of Streptokinase for heart ailment and nearly 20,000 tablets of paracetamol,were found dumped in a store during a recent inspection. Waking up to the wastage,the Sports Department cleared a file recently advising that the expiry dates on the medicines be checked,and that if the stocks were found to be still fit for consumption,these should be used for poor patients at government-run RIMS Hospital. However,last checked,the medicines were yet to reach the patients concerned.
Felled by malaria
Deployed in the state to carry out anti-Maoist operations,the CRPF is battling an old disease malaria. While Constable Birendra Kumar Saini of 206 Battalion died of the disease on August 21,70 CRPF personnel who were part of a month-long anti-Maoist operation in the Saranda forest in West Singhbhum district are admitted in different hospitals with symptoms of the disease. Senior officers have now decided to sanction a special fund for the affected jawans. As part of preventive measures,they have also decided to organise lectures exhorting forces to use mosquito repellents and nets made available to them. Said DIG Lakshman Prasad: We have been using a BSF helicopter to evacuate sick jawans and take them to hospitals.
Coal blow to BCCL
Bharat Coking Coal Ltd,a Dhanbad-based subsidiary of Coal India Ltd,has long been a company in the red. Now,its production is set to fall an estimated 40,000 tonnes of coal every day following an order from the Jharkhand State Pollution Control Board to close 22 of its 103 mines. The board found that the company had not upgraded its technology to contain pollution,as had been prescribed by the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests norms. BCCL has sought clearance from the Ministry,saying it has already taken corrective measures. Said Director D C Jha: We have asked the Ministry to provide us the clearance as we have already initiated the process to acquire the needed technology.
