Pondy CM accuses TN govt of not releasing water for farm use

PUDUCHERRY: Puducherry Chief Minister V Narayanasamy on Sunday accused the Tamil Nadu government of not releasing water from Veedur dam for farm use in the union territory. Puducherry has a share in the water from Veedur dam in Villupuram district in that state under an inter-state agreement inked in 1961, he told media here today.

Narayanasamy noted that an agreement was signed by the two governments in 1961 to share water from Veedur dam to meet the irrigation requirements of farmers in Mannadipet constituency in the union territory.

The deal ensured availability of water for Puducherry for 175 days to enable farmers here to get water for cultivation on an extent of 1400 hectares from the dam, he said.

"The release of water for Mannadipet block was stopped this year.. Our plea is that the agreement should be enforced by the Tamil Nadu authorities," he said adding a letter would be shot off to the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu seeking immediate release of water in keeping with the provisions of the agreement.

Veedur dam is situated in the catchment areas of Varaha river and Thondiaru in Villupuram district and had been a source of irrigation for farm lands in Mannadipet constituency in Puducherry.

"Besides, Tamil Nadu government was ignoring the Union Territory's share of 6 tmc feet of water released into the Cauvery basin by the Karnataka government," Narayanasamy alleged.

On AIADMK'S demand that Congress and DMK MLAS should step down from the posts of chairmen of the PSUS and Parliamentary Secretary to CM, he said "The MLAS belonging to Congress and the DMK were appointed chairmen of the PSUS or Parliamentary Secretary to Chief Minister here as per the Act adopted in the territorial Assembly in the past."

"We took utmost care before appointing the MLAS to the posts of chairmen and Parliamentary Secretary and therefore the situation in Puducherry is different from New Delhi," he claimed.

The AIADMK had yesterday said it would seek disqualification of ruling Congress and DMK legislators in Puducherry "for holding office of profit," in view of the Election Commission's decision to disqualify 20 AAP MLAS in New Delhi on similar grounds. MUMBAI: Three persons, who were arrested yesterday in connection with the fire at a pub in the Kamla Mills Compound here that claimed 14 lives, have been sent in police custody till January 25.

The N M Joshi Marg police had last evening arrested Ravi Bhandari, a partner in the Kamla Mills, station fire officer Rajendra Patil, and Utkarsh Pandey, the owner of the Nirvana Hookah, in connection with the incident.

The three were produced this afternoon before the Bhoiwada court which remanded them in police custody till January 25, senior police inspector Ahmed Pathan said.

The arrests were made last evening after Brihanmumbai Municipal Commissioner Ajoy Mehta submitted his report to the chief minister in which he mentioned factors which caused the tragedy last month.

The owners of the '1 Above' pub, Jigar Sanghvi, Kripesh Sanghvi and Abhijit Mankar, as well as owners of the adjoining 'Mojo's Bistro', Yug Pathak and Yug Tulli, are already arrested.

According to the enquiry report submitted by Mehta, the fire on December 29 started because of the flying charcoal embers from hookah which was illegally served at Mojo's Bistro. It then spread to 1 Above.

Most of the deceased were visiting 1 Above.

The owners of both the pubs were booked for 'culpable homicide not amounting to murder' and other offences under the Indian Penal Code.

The municipal commissioner's report said the owners of Kamla Mills allowed illegal alterations and usage of terrace by the two pubs.

It also said that a departmental inquiry will be conducted against some fire brigade officials for lapses in duty. MUMBAI: The Maharashtra government is all set to introduce a system to issue daily district-wise weather advisory to farmers across the state.

"The system has a capacity to generate weather alerts for every ten minutes, if required. The state is taking a step forward to explore the possibility of issuing weather advisory for farmers to minimise their crop losses due to adverse weather conditions," Agriculture Commissioner Sachindra Pratap Singh told PTI.

"Going by our current preparations and capacity to handle the data, I think we can introduce a weather advisory system," the commissioner said.

"The government is likely to announce it next week," Singh said.

The agriculture commissionerate conceived the proposal a few years back and it has completed setting up of weather stations at 2,050 sites across Maharashtra, he said.

"The weather stations have started data collection work and its uploading on central server of the state government," Singh said.

The first automatic weather station (AWS) in Maharashtra became operational on May 1 last year. The weather station helps in measuring the wind direction, wind speed, air temperature, relative humidity and records amount of rainfall, the officer said.

The Union and state governments get their weather alerts and inputs from the India Meteorological Department (IMD). LUCKNOW: In the backdrop of an attack on a class 1 student in a school here recently, the Lucknow district administration has decided to run a special campaign to verify the security parameters of schools.

Starting January 22, the administration will check if the schools which are also board examination centers have installed CCTV cameras -- as mandated by law.

"Now, whether all the schools, which are examination centres have really installed CCTV cameras is yet to be ascertained. The verification will be carried out to ascertain the ground reality," Lucknow district magistrate Kaushal Raj Sharma said.

Sharma said the administration is getting the security cameras installed in all the government schools which have been made examination centre.

"But those schools, which have not been made examination centres, there is no budget for the administration to get CCTV cameras installed," he said.

"The administration can tell the private and governmentaided schools to get CCTV cameras installed in their premises, and can even pressure them. But, owing to absence of any budget, the administration cannot put any pressure on the government schools," Sharma said.

In Lucknow, there are 1,027 government and private schools, which are made examination centres.

On January 16, a class 1 student was injured when he was allegedly attacked with a sharpedged weapon in the toilet of a private school in Lucknow, an incident similar to the killing of a Ryan school student in Gurugram.

The incident evoked the call for more measures to ensure safety of children in schools.