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  • 95% exam attendance in J&K ‘surgical strike’ against terror: Javadekar

    NEW DELHI: Students from Jammu and Kashmir have given a befitting reply to militants as 95 per cent of them appeared for their class 12 board examination in the state, which is in itself is a powerful “surgical strike”, Education Minister Prakash Javadekar said today.
    “In Kashmir Valley, for the past several months, schools were shut, over 30 had been burnt. But students from Jammu and Kashmir, Leh and Ladakh have given a befitting reply to militants with a presence of 95 per cent in the board exam held yesterday,” he said.
    Emphasising that this was “India’s reply”, Javadekar said the country believed in education and progress and the message was that no design to break the country would succeed.
    “I’m proud of those children and their parents who are the strength of India. Education is the way to progress. They have understood and given this befitting reply. We have seen the surgical strike of the army, but this reply given by students is also a powerful surgical strike,” he said.
    Javadekar, who was speaking at an event ‘Kala Utsav’, said all should get a basic level of education that supports them in life but added that unique talents should be brought to the fore as well.
    Later speaking on the sidelines of the event, he made it clear that compulsory class 10 board examinations will be introduced for CBSE students from the next academic session 2017-18.
    “There is no confusion, today more than 23 million students appear for tenth board examination over the country through state boards. For CBSE also half the students appear for the exam, while half don’t appear because there was an option available,” Javadekar said.
    Now those 2 million who chose the option will also have to take the exam, he said.
    The measure, however, he emphasised will be implemented from the next academic year, saying goalposts or rules should not be shifted mid-course. The move will bring about parity with state boards, he said.

  • No proper testing of Chicken in JK

    ‘Experts warn major health risks if not checked’

    Srinagar: As the Kashmir imports approximately 5.5 crore chickens from Haryana and Punjab and around 36 lakh are produced locally, it has been observed that there is no process of testing these fowls, entailing a significant health risk to consumers.
    Sources told KNS that there is as such no mechanism from government which could ensure that the chicken available in the markets is infection free.
    Experts warned that most of chicken sold at the markets of the state are infected with deadly diseases and once they are consumed by humans, diseases of various kind are imminent. “The unhygienic chicks which are contaminated with infections like Campylobacter, Salmonella and E.coli are dangerous for human life” one of the Doctors of Animal husbandry Kashmir insisted not to be named told KNS.
    He said that the prevalence rate is higher within the premises of the poultry farms where chicks are bred. “Unfortunately, in our state we don’t have many health officers who can take a regular inspection of the market as well as of the farms,”
    Poultry farming has come up in a big way in Jammu, Srinagar, Baramullah, Kathua , Udhampur, Pulwama and Budgam districts, with large number of educated unemployed youth taking up poultry farming as a sustainable means of earning their livelihood.
    According to rough assessment Kashmir imports around 5.5 crore chickens from neighboring Haryana and Punjab. 36 lakh chickens are produced locally.
    The doctor maintained that there is as such no mechanism which could ensure that the chicken available in the market is infection free. “There are over 60 listed diseases associated with the poultry and they are common sources for the pathogens: Salmonella, Clostridium perfringens and Campylobacter. Some of these pathogens are often identified during processing but the exact source can come from several sources, including the poultry house environment, hatchery and through vectors such as equipment and personnel” he maintained.
    Some serious illnesses that infected chicken can lead to include disease called ‘Gullian-Barre Syndrome’ which kills nearly 2 lakh people around the world every year.
    Vector borne and other forms of disease are not the only problems the experts say but they said that chicken are also laced with antibiotics which can lead to resistance to anti-biotics in humans.
    “The Poultry birds are heavily dosed with antibiotics. Without knowing their ill effects on human health these chickens are directly consumed by the humans and thus making us resistant to various antibiotics,” another veterinarian doctor posted in Srinagar said.
    He said that those spurious antibiotics are readily available in the market and the farm owners feed their chicken with the same increasing the health hazard manifold.
    He added that chicken raised for their flesh are often packed by the thousands into massive sheds and fed large amounts of antibiotics and drugs to keep them alive in conditions that would otherwise kill them.
    “Only seven weeks after they are born, chicken are crowded onto trucks that transport them to the slaughterhouse. Every year, tens of millions of chickens have their wings and legs broken in the process. They are trucked through all weather extremes, sometimes over hundreds of miles, without any food or water. At slaughter, chickens are hung upside down and have their throats slit, and they’re often scalded to death in defeathering tanks,” the experts said.
    They said that most chicken spend their entire lives in filthy sheds with tens of thousands of other birds, each getting less space than a sheet of paper, where intense crowding and confinement lead to outbreaks of disease. “Adult chickens can have trouble breathing and standing upright and will even topple forward because they’ve been bred to have abnormally large breasts.
    More than 99 percent of broiler chicken carcasses sold in stores had detectable levels of E. coli, indicating fecal contamination,” the experts maintained.
    As per the laboratory report testing released by Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), antibiotics are routinely pumped into chickens during their short life span of 30-45 days to promote growth so that they look bigger and also to treat or prevent infection.
    The experts say that the government should immediately take measures in this regard and advised farm owner to follow a stringent 3-pronged protocol, Management, Bio-security and Vaccination are the three protocols a farm owner must follow. (KNS)

  • Marketing, crop insurance key to restore farmers’ confidence: Mehbooba Mufti

    Directs full support, says Kissan Board forum to seek farmers’ feedback

    Jammu: Flagging crop insurance and marketing support to the produce as key to restore the confidence of farming community in the agriculture sector, Chief Minister, Mehbooba Mufti today directed the administration to see how these two facilities are ensured to agriculturists even as she suggested use of CDF funds to give a push to rural economy.
    Chairing a meeting of J&K Board for the Development of Kissans here today, the Chief Minister said over the decades farmers have started losing interest in the trade due to poor or unstable marketing facilities or fear of crop loss in the event of any natural calamity like drought, hailstorm, floods etc. She asked the administration to plug the loopholes in this regard and see how various schemes and programmes meant for marketing agricultural produce and insurance of the crops are effectively and extensively executed on the ground. Likewise, she said, transportation also plays a role in the timely dispatch of the agriculture produce to mandies and directed augmentation of the same.
    Deputy Chief Minister, Dr. Nirmal Singh, Minister for R&B and Parliamentary Affairs, A. R. Veeri, Minister for Agriculture, Ghulam Nabi Lone, Minister for Finance, Dr. Haseeb A. Drabu, Minister for PHE, Irrigation and Flood Control, Sham Choudhary, Minister for Animal & Sheep Husbandry, Abdul Ghani Kohli, Minister for Cooperatives, T. Dorjey, Minister for FCS&CA, CH. Zulfkar Ali, Minister for Rural Development, Abdul Haq, Minister of State for Tourism, Floriculture, Priya Sethi, Minister of State for Fisheries and Forests, Mir Zahoor, Minister of State for Transport, Sunil Sharma, vice chairman, J&K Board for the Development of Kissans, Daljeet Singh Chib were present in the meeting.
    The Chief Minister, who is also chairperson of the board, said rural economy needs to be given a push as other economies have either reached a saturation stage or are not so rewarding. She said agriculture and allied sectors still hold a good scope of employability in rural and semi-urban areas. She said if concerted efforts are made agriculture would see a turnaround in the coming four to five years.
    Mehbooba Mufti expressed happiness that procurement mandies are being set up in many areas of the State which would enable farmers in stabilization of selling price of their produce. She said also more and more soil testing labs are being set up to advise farmers which land is suitable for which cultivation. She suggested commercial exploitation of wild foods, herbs and mentioned specifically Anar Dana to be promoted for commercial cultivation.
    The Chief Minister mentioned the demand of flowers in our daily life and asked the Floriculture Department to promote flower cultivation in a big way. She suggested that the Market Intervention Scheme should not be restricted to fruits only but be extended to flowers and other produce. She said funds won’t be a problem in this regard.
    Mehbooba Mufti suggested that funds under Constituency Development Fund may be used to undertake economic activities in poultry, fisheries, apiculture and other areas of rural economy. She also suggested creating constituency-wise model villages for poultry, milk, fisheries, vegetables, basmati, mushkbudji, sheep etc. where these rural economy sectors would be developed exclusively and extensively. She said Animal & Sheep husbandry sector has a huge potential in strengthening rural economy.
    During the meeting, the Chief Minister sought details of waiving off of Kissan credit loans and directed removal of all bottlenecks to make the process speedy. She also sought details of the steps being taken for development of vegetable mandi at Assar Doda and also steps being taken for promotion of Sunflower cultivation in the State.
    Mehbooba Mufti stressed on exhibiting and displaying of all schemes and facilities for the farming community. She said many of the irrigation canals damaged in the floods of 2014 are being restored.
    The Chief Minister said Kissan Board is a forum to seek feedback directly from the farmers. She asked the members to promote farming as a full time occupation with good monetary returns. She said the board should advise the Government on policy issues and measures to be taken for the growth of agriculture sector. She assured full support to the board in the conduct of its activities.
    Making his intervention, Deputy Chief Minister, Dr. Nirmal Singh complimented the board for its activation and sought increase in the frequency of its meetings. He said the cooperative movement needs to be revived in the State and sought to undertake a data assessment of impact level in the agriculture sector in the State. He said the Agenda of Alliance of the present Government has vowed the growth and development of agriculture in the State.
    Earlier, Ministers for R&B, Finance, Cooperatives, Agriculture, Rural Development, Food Civil Supplies & Consumer Affairs and Grdens & Floriculture also made their interventions and suggestions for the development of agriculture sector and to make the functioning of the board more vibrant.
    Vice Chairman, Kissan Board thanked the Chief Minister for closely monitoring the activities of and taking interest in the activities of the board. He said the Chief Minister has restored the trust of kissans and today’s meeting in which she listened to the suggestions of individual farmers keenly is a pointer in this direction. He demanded setting up of permanent mandies for procurement of paddy.
    Chief Secretary, B. R. Sharma, Chairman, J&K Bank, Parvez Ahmad, Financial Commissioner, Agriculture Production, Pramod Jain, administrative secretaries of several Departments and members of the board were also present in the meeting. 

  • Autonomy remains only constitutional remedy to Kashmir issue: Dr Farooq

    Reiterates that Kashmir acceded to a Secular India, not RSS’s ‘Hindu Rashtra’

    Srinagar: National Conference President Dr Farooq Abdullah Tuesday stated Jammu & Kashmir had acceded to secular India and not a ‘Hindu Rashtra’ while reiterating that Autonomy was the only workable solution to the Kashmir issue.
    According to KNS correspondent, while chairing the working committee meeting of district Ganderbal at party head quarters NC President said that GoI was bound to make provisions to grant Autonomy to Jammu & Kashmir and this was a guarantee that had time and again been clarified with the representatives from the government of India. He said that Autonomy remains the only constitutional remedy to Kashmir issue and there was nothing ‘unconstitutional’ about it.
    Denigrating the comments made by RSS Chief Mohan Bhagwat in Jammu recently, Dr Farooq Abdullah said that Kashmir’s accession was to secular India not an India that calls itself a Hindu Rashtra. He lambasted the comments of Bhagwat and said, “The very basis of our relationship with India is based on secular nature of the country.”
    Dr Farooq Abdullah called his staunch belief in Autonomy as an achievable goal a ‘dream that will see light of the day’. “For the love I have for the people of this state, I will never show them a dream that cannot be fulfilled,” he said. He restated that Autonomy for the state of J&K was the political statement of his party and that the party would never barter it for anything else.
    “Dialogue is the only way forward and Autonomy is the only real solution,” he said.
    He expressed angst against violence on both sides and retorted that force of any kind was not going to help either India or Pakistan. “Whose writ is this force going to establish?” Dr Farooq asked. He pleaded that both nations need to pull people out of the misery that the violence had pushed them into.
    While dismissing the ‘false propaganda’ spread by parties that he said were ready to ‘sell their soul for power’, Dr Farooq Abdullah said that history was a witness to the fact that Kashmir’s accession to India was conditional. “Karan Singh has been bold enough to clarify for all those spreading misgivings about our accession to India. He has said time and again said that his father acceded to India on the basis of three conditions.”
    He called upon the ‘people of Kashmir’ to be wary of people whose aim is to use divisive strategies to divide people. “We need to look inside at our conscience and reject the ideas of the conspirators. We need to rise to the occasion and expose the falsehood that is being spread against the party,” he said. He expressed confidence that people will help NC as ‘they have always done’. “This is the only party that has taken its birth from the blood of the martyrs, our own martyrs who laid their life down to fight oppression in Kashmir,” he said.
    Among others who were present in the meeting include party General Secretary Ali Mohammad Sagar, Provincial President Nasir Aslam Wani, MLA Kangan Mian Altaf, Central Zone President and MLC Ali Mohammad Dar, MLA and District President Ganderbal Sheikh Ishfaq Jabbar, Sr Vice President Province Mohd Syed Akhoon, Provincial Secretary Showkat Mir and other provincial office bearers.
    Speaking on the occasion GS and MLA Khanyar Ali Mohammad Sagar reiterated party’s resolve of working for the people of the state against all the divisive forces. He asked the party cadre to maintain close contact with people on the ground.
    Castigating the present dispensation of PDP-BJP government of implementing the largest and ruthless crackdown ever in the history of Kashmir, MLA Kangan Mian Altaf said, “The amount of repression is such that PDP halqa president have taken over the role of DCs now and are forcing innocent Kashmiris to report to police stations on daily basis.”
    Provincial President Nasir Aslam Wani while addressing the gathering said that such interactions will make the party stronger in respective areas and asked the party cadre to replicate such interactions at district level as well.
    Dr Farooq Abdullah patiently listened to suggestions put forward by the working committee members who highlighted many issues concerning the party. Dr Farooq Abdullah assured them all possible help in making the party more vibrant at grass root levels. (KNS)
     

     

  • 99% attendance recorded in class 10 exams

    Srinagar: Day after 95 per cent students appeared in class 12 exams, barely one per cent students failed to sit in class 10 exams that commenced on Tuesday in the Valley.

    Notably, adequate security was made in and around the exam centres to ensure smooth conduct of examination today.
    Official data in possession of Kashmir News Service (KNS) revealed that nearly one per cent of students remained absent from the examinations today.
    “Out of total 56277 students, 55500 students appeared in the exams in 558 centres that were allotted by the authorities across the Valley,” data reveals.
    It said that at least 98.61 per cent class 10 students across the Valley appeared in the exams today.
    Official data said that 777 students didn’t appear in the examinations.
    “Out of total 8425 students in Anantnag district, 123 students remained absent. In Bandipora district out of total 3421 students, 60 remained absent while in Baramulla district out of total 9020 students, 121 remained absent from the examinations, data reveals.
    The data available with KNS further revealed that in Budgam district out of 6069 students, 90 remained absent today while in Ganderbal district 30 students out of 2380 remained absent.
    “In Kulgam out of 3286 students, 57 remained absent while in Kupwara, Pulwama, Shopian and Srinagar, out of total 7742, 4656, 2693 and 8585 students, 94, 43, 62 and 97 respectively remained absent from the examination today,”
    Pertinently, the start of exams marked the first major educational activity in the Valley, where schools remained closed due to the uprising that triggered following the killing of Hizb commander, Burhan Wani in Bumdoora village of Kokernag in South Kashmir’s Anantnag district on July 8 this year.
    Notably, class 12th examinations in the Valley started from Monday in which around 95 per cent students appeared in the exams.
    Director General Police (Law & Order) Dr S.P Vaid told KNS that the examination conducted today went incident free. “There was no untoward incident in any part of the Valley today,” he said.
    However, reports informed that Police arrested many youth after there were reports of stone pelting yesterday.
    They said huge contingent of forces were deployed in and around the exam centres to ensure smooth conduct of class 10 exams. “At many places in South Kashmir, the security was more strengthened after yesterday’s stone pelting incident near the exam centres,” witnesses said.
    Meanwhile, the students complained of inadequate transport facilities.
    “We faced tremendous hardships to reach out to our exam centres due to the shortage of transport facilities. Some among the students reached late to their exam centres,” students said.
    The students also praised Board of School Education for announcing reduction in their syllabuses and said that it provide them a lot of assistance in writing their papers today. “We hadn’t completed out syllabus and keeping in view of this, BOSE announced relaxation in syllabus thereby helped us a lot in writing the papers,” they said.
    Pertinently, the students were taking to streets against the government decision of holding examination in this year and were demanding deferment of exams.
    Besides, students the mainstream opposition parties were also demanding deferment of exams till the students won’t complete their syllabus. (KNS)

  • Parrikar is mentally bankrupt, his claims on stone pelters bizarre: Er Rashid

    Narendra Modi is becoming another Mohammad Tagaluq of India 

    Srinagar: AIP Supremo and MLA Langate Er Rashid while commenting on Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar’s remarks that demonetisation has stopped stone pelting in Kashmir, today said that such bizarre remarks speak of his intellectual bankruptcy.

    While interacting with people at various places in Lolab, Er Rashid said Parikar by passing such pity remarks has tried to mislead the masses in India who have been facing a lot of inconvenience by Modi’s style of functioning by Mohammad Tagaluq’s way.

    “Whatsoever is happening at the streets of Kashmir is Indigenous and an outcome of history of long broken promises, Govt. of India has made with people of J&K from time to time. Parikar should know that no one would risk his life for a five hundred rupee note and raise slogans everyday at the streets of Kashmir. In fact the current turmoil has become extension of already existing industry for police and other security agencies to grab money from innocents by booking them in fake FIR’s and forcing poor people to sell properties to pay huge bribes to police to get their innocents released,” he said.

    He said if Kashmiris were pelting stones against getting five hundred rupee notes, may Parikar answer why All Party Delegation begged at the door steps of resistance leaders and Ram Madhav promised moons and stars to Kashmiris if they come forward for talks.

    Er. Rashid added that cancellation of currency notes in itself speaks about the fact that to what extent Indian economy stands destabilized by its own white elephants.

    “By connecting Mass apprising in Kashmir with cancellation of currency notes, Parikar or someone else cannot divert attention from the real issues India is facing, nor can defame the resistance movement in Jammu & Kashmir,” he added. (PTK)

  • Kashmir University to hold exams in Feb-Mar 2017

    Srinagar: Unlike JK Board of School Education which went ahead with conducting of exams on planned dates, Kashmir University (KU) has decided to postpone its undergraduate and post-graduate level exams till February next year in a bid to give ‘enough’ preparation time to the students. (PTK)

  • With shutdown losing intensity, Hurriyat goes hard on Govt employees

    People occupying chairs have their minds and souls sold out: Hurriyat (G)

    Srinagar: Condemning the killing of 21-year old Rizwan of Noorbagh firing and shelling on the funeral procession, injuring scores of mourners, Hurriyat Conference (G) said that blood thirst of Indian forces is not quenched by killing by bullets & pellets and they run over youth in road traffic accidents as well.

    Commenting over the “calendars from resistance camp not affecting government functioning’’, the Hurriyat said that when people occupying the chairs have their minds and souls sold out, when the bloodbath of innocents doesn’t even slightly shake them, when students and their career is used for their petty and mean political gains, when every ethical and moral value is rejected by their arrogance, when highly educated and “intellectuals” wishfully and proudly act as turncoats, when the uprising against the brutality is humiliatingly termed as a “joke”, when people from 14 to 80 years are caged and tortured in police stations and interrogation centers, when even those whose hands are drenched in the blood of innocents claim to be the loudest voices of human rights— then even a loud thunder, a sorrowful cry and peaceful protests can no longer shake the conscience of these “beasts in human skin”.

    The Hurriyat said that it is bizarre that forces use every method and occasion for the bloodshed of innocents and using force against the mourners by the rude forces and barbaric police has become the routine and in the arrogance and might of their power they molest their own legal and ethical norms and are recognized as the beasts and rogues in uniform.

    “This may be the only place where people are carrying the coffins of their loved ones and those parroting the peace rhetoric, despite the bloodshed everywhere, act willingly as blinds to the real and basic issue,” the amalgam said.

    It added that Kashmiris are peace loving people and their peace has been disturbed and tarnished none other than these stooges and their forces.

    The Hurriyat said that forcing students to appear in exams in army garrisons and these celebrating their victory is nothing but a shameful defeat of these faceless henchmen. (PTK)

  • Now do video calling on WhatsApp

    New Delhi: Catering to the requests of its over a billion users, instant messaging app WhatsApp launched its video calling feature which will be rolled out from Tuesday.

    The feature will be available on all platforms — Android, iOS and Windows.
     
    WhatsApp has 160 million users in India.
     
    “Video calling is one of the most requested features from people in India. We’re proud to have the opportunity to launch this feature in India, where we now have 160 million users, and we look forward to seeing people use WhatsApp to talk to their friends and loved ones face to face,” said Jan Koum, CEO and Co-Founder, WhatsApp.
     
    WhatsApp started with messaging and Group Chat. Then it added voice calling. 
     
    “And we did it in a way that works across thousands of device and platform combinations all over the world,” the Facebook-owned WhatsApp said. 
     
    The global launch event was addressed by Neeraj Arora, Head of Business, WhatsApp and Manpreet Singh, Product Lead, WhatsApp.

  • Demonetisation Ended Stone-pelting in Kashmir: Manohar Parrikar

    Mumbai: Since the demonetisation of high currency notes terror funding has come down to zero and there hasn’t been stone-pelting on forces, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar said here today.

    He thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the “daring” move, which, he said, will also help clamp down on the narcotic drugs.

    “Earlier, there were rates: Rs 500 for stone pelting (on forces in Kashmir) and Rs 1,000 for doing something else. PM has brought terror funding to zero,” Parrikar claimed.

    “In the last few days after PM’s daring move there hasn’t been stone pelting on forces. I congratulate PM for it,” he said, speaking at an event here organised by the BJP MLA Atul Bhatkhalkar.

    Talking to reporters later, Parrikar said those who sponsor terror will be affected by the demonetisation. PTI