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TOI : PUNE: The Pune Zilla Parishad (ZP) will soon go high-tech with the launch of their website. The website will be the first ever dynamic and data-driven website in any ZP in the country. The website, which is about 90 per cent complete, will be launched at a grand function later this month.

Shyam Wardhane, chief executive officer, Pune ZP, said, “The website will be more useful to the villagers who can now view their applications on-line, know the status of their applications, besides, downloading the forms straight from the website. This will save a lot of their time, because presently they have been coming all the way to the Zilla Parishad office in Pune for all these procedures”.

The website will be updated on the new initiatives, schemes etc of the ZP on a daily basis unlike rest of the websites of various ZPs in the country which are static and provide basic information. It will also have the necessary data, contact details and e-mail ids of all the 75 elected members of the ZP as well as non-officials.

This will be listed according to the talukas and panchayat samitis. Moreover, the geographical description as well as the map of all the talukas in Pune district will also be made available.

“We have included minute details like the infrastructural facilities in every village, hospitals and their contact numbers, nearest highway, water supply and so on. The population of each village will also be listed along with details such as families below poverty line to men-women ratio in each village,” Wardhane informed.

Suhas Chatane, an official who is working on the website said, “A special link to the self help groups run by village women and anganwadis will be provided. There are about 15,000 to 20,000 self help groups and information such as the amount of…More

TOI : PUNE: Fast-track court judge S.T. Mahajan recently granted anticipatory bail to advocate Vishal Vijayrao Kale, son of a leading civil lawyer, in an alleged extortion case.

Kale was released on a personal bond of Rs 15,000. Kale had moved the district and sessions court here to get bail, after one Rajesh Shashikant Nanavati registered a complaint against him and others with the Deccan Gymkhana police station on January 24.

Opposing the plea, the prosecution alleged Kale and the others had held Nanavati and his friend Sachin Kokane captive at gunpoint in a hotel and had obtained their signatures on a cancellation deed which was executed between Nanavati and one Laxman Gange on Jan 21. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: Pakistan-sponsored Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) agent Syed Ahmed Desai was subjected to the narco analysis test at the forensic science laboratory (FSL), in Mumbai on Monday.

Inspector Bhanupratap Barge of the special operations wing, Pune, told TOI over telephone that Desai’s test will continue on Tuesday.

Barge said Desai will be kept in a police station near the FSL. Police had obtained permission from the court for subjecting the ISI agent to scientific tests because he had refused to co-operate with the them in conducting investigations in the alleged spying case.

Desai had given vague and misleading replies to the police during interrogation and he had refused to divulge details of ISI agents operating in India. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: The city police on Monday arrested Chandan Mohan Lalwani (20), first year commerce student of D.Y. Patil College for his alleged complicity in the first year B.Com paper leak.

A police team led by sub-inspector Shaukatali Sayyed of the Chatushrungi police station picked up Lalwani who originally hails from Nanded from his hideout in the city, following a tip-off.

Lalwani had gone missing after the police had arrested his six associates, all students of various colleges, after the paper leak was unearthed by the crime branch, Pune.

Police had maintained vigil at the college as Lalwani was supposed to appear for the first year exam ever since his involvement had surfaced, but he did not turn up fearing arrest.

The six suspects, during interrogation, had told the police that Lalwani had provided them with copies of the
question paper.

The suspects have charged Lalwani for alleged leaking of other papers of first year B.Com.
Lalwani is the 11th suspect arrested in the paper leak case.

Police have so far arrested five students of DY Patil college including one from the same ayurvedic college, two students from the Indira college and four others including a principal and three exam officials of the Genba Sopanrao Moze Trust’s Arts, Science and Commerce College at Wadhmukhwadi, Bhosari.

Police have invoked section 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code against the suspects.

Meanwhile, the police have claimed that internal supervisor Rajendra Balaji Shinde had admitted his involvement in breaking the seal of the paper for helping the students on the grounds that they were known to him.

Shinde has further admitted that he had thrown the paper packet containing the final exam of first year B.com optional papers of Maths and Statistics and Computer Concepts and Programming which was…More

TOI : PUNE: Puneites may need candles and emergency lamps from April 5, as the Maharashtra Electricity Regulatory Commission (Merc) on Monday declined to give any interim order to avoid load shedding in the city till such time as additional power was sourced and contracted to tide over the demand supply gap.

However, whether the city will face load shedding or not will become clear only after the next 48 hours. In case load shedding starts from April 5, it will be done in two shifts of one-and-a-half-hour each during the morning (9 am to noon ) and evening (6 pm to 10 pm) peak hours everyday.

A detailed time-table of load shedding will be published by the Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company Ltd (MSEDCL) later. A statement released by MSEDCL late in the evening said that, as the additional power could not be arranged by March 31, the MSEDCL had no option but to start load shedding in Pune from April 5 if breakthrough was not achieved in the interim period.

“The MSEDCL will fully co-operate with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Mahratta Chamber of Commerce Industries and Agriculture, Prayas and the Sajag Nagrik Manch in working out a solution to avoid load shedding,” the statement said.

Merc made it clear that if the CII, which had initiated the Pune model involving use of captive power to prevent load shedding in Pune from June 2006, and the MSEDCL can find an interim or permanent franchisee and additional power required in the next 48 hours, load shedding could be prevented. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: The principal of Genba Sopanrao Moze Trust’s (GSMT) Arts, Science and Commerce College at Wadmukhwadi, Bhosari, and three other exam officials, including an external supervisor assigned by the University of Pune (UoP), were detained by the city police on Sunday for their alleged complicity in the first-year B.Com paper leak.

On Saturday, the UoP had to put off (till April 10) the final exam of first-year B.Com optional papers of Maths and Statistics and Computer Concepts and Programming — after the city police on Friday night cracked a racket involved in leaking these papers. Six students were arrested from Model Colony and Sant Tukaramnagar locations and a hunt was launched for Chandan, the key suspect.

Apart from detaining the principal and three others, the police also recovered the ‘missing’ bunch of question papers, which was part of the 10 sealed bunches given by the UoP to the GSMT college on the eve of the exam that was to be held on Saturday. An intense day-long search at the college premises, in the presence of the UoP confidential section officials, resulted in the recovery.

Vice chancellor of UoP Narendra Jadhav said that the seal of the recovered bunch was found to tampered with. He said, the college had initially denied before university officials that it received 10 sealed bunches from the UoP and kept insisting that it got only nine.

However, the UoP had an acknowledgement signed by the college officials, about the receipt of 10 bunches. “The recovery of the missing bunch established beyond doubt the source of leak considering that the all bunches at other centres and at the UoP were accounted for,” Jadhav said.

The V-C emphasised that the entire paper leak episode happened from the college and not from the UoP campus. “The university, in fact, played a proactive role in…More

TOI : PUNE: Ten persons were killed and five others injured when the jeep in which they were travelling plunged into a deep gorge at Varandha ghat in Bhor taluka, about 70 kms from Pune, early on Sunday.

Some of the victims were from Shirgaon in Bhor taluka of Pune district while the rest were from Pune city.

According to the Raigad police, the packed Mahindra jeep had left Wagholi village in Mahad taluka of Raigad district around 5 am where the victims had gone to attend a cultural programme. The police said the driver was still sleepy and lost control around 6.30 am, plunging the vehicle into the 75 feet deep gorge.

The police got a crane to remove the jeep from the gorge and took the help of villagers to bring up the bodies. The injured were taken to different private hospitals in Mahad and Mumbai while one of them has been admitted to the Sassoon hospital here.

The deceased were identified as jeep-driver Shashikant Dhumal (45), Vishal Dhumal, Chander Umatkar (35), Dhondiba Umatkar (32), Ganpat Pol (28), Ankush Sanas (45), Sunil Pol (34), Chander Pol (45) — all from Shirgaon, and Swapnil Desle (45) and Swapnil Dhondi, both from Pune.

The injured were identified as Hanuman Kondhalkar (40), Ashok Bhalerao (40), Pradeep Sitaram Pol (14), Namdeo Pol (40), Pradeep Jodhe (40) and Krishna Vinchure (35).

Assistant police inspector Vikas Gawade is investigating. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) on Saturday announced a provision of Rs 25 lakh to help improve the water supply in the Khadki cantonment board (KCB) area.

Talking to reporters, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader in the PMC Anil Bhosale and corporator Shrikant Patil said there had been repeated complains from residents of this area about the supply of contaminated water.

“Drinking water pipelines have not been replaced for the past 20 years. We have decided to replace all the water pipelines here, work for which will start immediately,” said Bhosale.

He alleged that the Congress, which had held power at the PMC for fifteen years, had completely neglected the cantonment area. “We have even had discussions with the KCB officials and asked them to provide an alternate place for the water tank in Khadki,” said Bhosale. He also alleged that the Congress had ruined the city’s image, and now the NCP was trying to rebuild it.

Corporator Shrikant Patil said that people in Khadki were unhappy with the situation. “The replacement of pipelines is a project has been overdue for long,” he said. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: The Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) will be widening the road in Nehrunagar area of Pimpri on March 31.

PCMC plans to widen the 12-metre-wide and 150-metre-long Development Plan road near Jyoti English school in ward no 28, Swapnanagari. It will be widened from Dosti bakery to Pimpri-Bhosari main road. The PCMC has appealed the residents, who will be affected in the widening process, to shift their belongings to a safer place. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More

TOI : PUNE: Nurses working at government hospitals have deferred their 72-hour-long ‘no work’ strike as chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh assured them that all their demands would be fulfilled in phases.

The strike was to start on March 31 in which some 22,000 nurses, from across the state, would have participated.

“A delegation of nurses met the chief minister on March 27. He promised us that all our demands would be fulfilled in phases and asked us to withdraw the strike,” said Anuradha Athavale, president of Maharashtra Government Nurses Federation (MGNF).

However, Athavale meaningfully added, “We have not withdrawn the strike but just postponed it till our demands are fulfilled.”

“Our attempt was to sensitise the state government and draw their attention to our demands. We have succeeded in that attempt. But now it is to be seen whether they really keep their promise or not,” Athavale added.

“We also had a meeting with the chief secretaries of medical education department and health service department. Both of them took cognisance of our demands, which include adequate clinical paraphernalia at the workplace; unreasonable transfer of the nurses; upgrading nursing education in the state; security at the workplace etc,” she said. The MGNF has called a meeting on April 12 in which the district representatives would take part and decide on the future course of action. Print Save EMail Write to Editor Get personalised news s…More