Haryana asks private universities to to implement statutory provisions

CHANDIGARH, MAY 15

 The Haryana Government has directed all the Private Universities in the State to implement various statutory provisions under the Haryana Private Universities Act, 2006.

          While stating this here today, a spokesman of Higher Education Department said that as per a letter addressed to all the Vice-Chancellors of Private Universities in the State, every university established under this Act would publish a prospectus.

          This prospectus would have each component of the fee, deposits and other charges payable by the students for pursuing a course or programme of study, and the other terms and conditions of such payment. It would also have the percentage of tuition fee and other charges refundable to a student, the number of seats approved by the statutory authority in respect of each course or programme of study for the academic year and the conditions of eligibility for admission in a particular course or programme of study.

          He said that all relevant instructions with regard to maintenance of discipline by students within or outside the campus, prohibition of ragging and consequences thereof for violating the provisions of any regulations in this regard made under the University Grants Commission Act, 1956 (Central Act 3 of 1956) or any other law for the time being in force would also be incorporated.

          The university would publish information on its website, and the attention of prospective students and the general public would be drawn to such publication on the website through advertisements displayed prominently in the different newspapers and through other media. Every university would fix the price of each printed copy of the prospectus, not more than the reasonable cost of its publication, distribution or sale and its copy would be sent to the Government for information.

          He said that admission in the university would be made strictly on the basis of merit. Merit for admission in the university may be determined either on the basis of marks or grade obtained in the qualifying examination and achievements in co-curricular and extra-curricular activities or on the basis of marks or grade obtained in the entrance test conducted at the state level. Admission in professional and technical courses would be made only through entrance test.

          He said that a minimum of 25 per cent seats for admissions in the university would be reserved for students of Haryana, out of which 10 per cent seats would be reserved for students belonging to Scheduled Castes of the State.

          He said that the university may, from time to time, prepare fee structure and would send it for information to the Government, at least 30 days before the commencement of the academic session. The fee structure for the 25 per cent of the students who are domicile of Haryana would be based on merit-cum-means which included one-fifth of the 25 per cent would be granted full fee concession; two-fifth of the 25 per cent would be granted 50 per cent fee concession and the balance two-fifth of the 25 per cent would be granted 25 per cent fee concession.

          He said that admissions in the technical and professional courses would be made only through entrance test conducted by agency of State or Association of Universities. The entrance test for the courses which are not professional and technical in nature, cannot be conducted by individual private university. However, if an association of the universities at the state level for conducting entrance test for these non technical and non professional courses is formed, it is permissible. Moreover, if the private universities grant admissions in non-professional and non-technical courses on the basis of marks or grades obtained in the qualifying examinations and achievements in co-curricular and extra-curricular activities, they are allowed to grant admission on their own.

----balbirsingh227@gmail.com

Abhimanyu seeks Centre's assistance for disaster management

CHANDIGARH, MAY 15

Haryana Revenue and Disaster Management Minister, Capt. Abhimanyu, today urged the Central Government to provide financial support in planning and implementation of disaster management programmes, particularly in view of Gurugram falling within the ambit of seismic zone IV, one of the regions highly prone to earthquakes. 
          The Minister, who was speaking at 2nd meeting of National Platform for Disaster Risk Reduction in New Delhi, said that social media application should also be developed to interconnect institutions and States.
          The meeting saw the whole range of India’s disaster risk community coming together to share experiences, views and ideas, and explore opportunities for mutual cooperation in the field of Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), to prepare a roadmap for the formulation of future national action plans on DRR.

          Expressing consonance with the approaches promoted globally by the United Nations, Capt. Abhimanyu said that Haryana Government had established an institutional framework for DRR from state to grassroots levels. “We are following strictly the 10-point agenda laid by Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi, during the Asian Ministerial Conference for Disaster Risk Reduction held in November, 2016, and have already worked on some aspects of the agenda,” he added.
          He said that the State Disaster Management Plan for Haryana and District Disaster Management Plans for all districts were being implemented. About 3,710 government school safety plans, with hazard, risk, vulnerability and capacity analysis have been prepared, and training on disaster management and preparation of different teams of schoolchildren and teachers as first responders has been carried out. Apart from this, 70 college disaster management plans and 650 village disaster management plans have been prepared. Disaster management plans for district headquarters, bus stands and railway stations have also been prepared for all the districts. Disaster management plans have also been prepared for Mini Secretariats, Judicial Complexes and Civil Hospitals, Emergency Response teams are being formed by designation and training of the teams on specific subjects is being carried out, he added.
He said that in collaboration with the Department of Sports and Youth Affairs, youth of Haryana, especially sportspersons, NSS and NCC scouts and NYK volunteers at divisional level were being trained in first aid, search and rescue, evacuation, fire safety and camp management to make them capable as first responders. These include those who live around vulnerable areas such as bus stands, railway stations, flood-prone areas and industrial areas. Training is also being provided to women volunteers, Anganwadi workers, ASHAs and Self Help Groups to meet the special needs of women affected by disasters. 
The Minister said that the Disaster Management Initiative for Legal Services had been conducted to spread awareness about the legal aspects of the Disaster Management Act and its implementation. “We have laid emphasis on legal services due to lack of awareness of laws for compensation of disaster relief, so that local people are aware about the processes and application through public prosecutors. We have also prepared the case studies of past disaster events such as Samjhauta Express fire tragedy, Dabwali fire and Charkhi Dadri air crash. We are making more case studies of recent disasters,” he added.
Highlighting the steps taken by the State Government for risk coverage, he said that Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Suraksha Yojana had been launched in Haryana to provide financial assistance in case of damage to crops due to natural calamities such as heavy or low rainfall, hailstorm, waterlogging and landslides.

          Referring to proactive steps taken by the Haryana Government for mitigating loss of life and property in natural calamities, Capt. Abhimanyu said that the Government had collaborated with different organisations and institutions such as AIIMS and used social media applications to monitor rainfall and flow of water of the rivers. This group includes all stakeholders, including Chief Minister, Mr. Manohar Lal, the Revenue and Disaster Management Minister, Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare Minister, Mr. O.P. Dhankar, Irrigation Minister, Chief Secretary, Administrative Secretaries, Divisional Commissioners, Deputy Commissioners, field-level functionaries, NGOs, Central Government institutions such as Central Water Commission, Indian Meteorological Department and National Disaster Management Authority, and officials of surrounding states and Union Territories such as Delhi, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand. Due to timely warnings and active flood management measures, the Yamunanagar District Administration was able to protect precious human lives and properties in the flood-prone villages during cloudburst-like situation last year, when around 365mm rainfall occurred in the short span of five hours in the district, by releasing advance warnings and carrying out evacuation. As many as eight people stranded on Yamuna island were airlifted due to faster communication through social media applications.
He said that the Haryana Government was establishing Emergency Operation Centres (EOC) at state and district levels. “Since Haryana is vulnerable to earthquakes, we intend to conduct seismic micro-zonation of vulnerable areas such as Gurugram, Faridabad, and other important cities. The Town and Country Planning Department and Haryana Urban Development Authority will ensure the implementation of National Building Code to come up with disaster resilient structures. Asset mapping of disaster response resource inventories in GIS-enabled environment in the State has become one of our priorities,” he added.

---balbirsingh227@gmail.com

Advisory to prevent ransomware attacks

CHANDIGARH, MAY 15

 In view of the aggressive spread of WannaCry/WannaCrypt Ransomware, which spreads across networks and holds files to ransom, the National Informatics Centre, Haryana has issued an advisory listing best practices to prevent ransomware attacks.
The advisory also states that individuals or organisations should not pay the ransom, as this does not guarantee that files would be released. Such instances of fraud should be reported to Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) and law enforcement agencies.
While stating this here today, an official spokesman said that WannaCry encrypts the files on infected Windows systems. This ransomware spreads by using a vulnerability in implementation of Server Message Block (SMB) in Windows systems. This exploit is named as ETERNALBLUE.
In order to prevent infection, users and organisations should apply patches to Windows systems as mentioned in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS17-010 (https://technet.microsoft.com/library/security/MS17-010). They could also obtain further details on the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team website at http://cert-in.org.in/s2cMainServlet?pageid=PUBADV01&CACODE=CICA-2017-2509.
          He said that to prevent ransomware attacks, people should maintain updated antivirus software on all systems. They should check regularly the integrity of the information stored in the databases and also check the contents of backup files of databases for any unauthorised encrypted contents of data records or external elements, such as backdoors or malicious scripts.

          He said that people should keep the operating system third-party applications such as MS Office, browsers and browser plugins up-to-date with the latest patches. They should also carry out application whitelisting and strict implementation of Software Restriction Policies (SRP) to block binaries running from %APPDATA% and %TEMP% paths as ransomware sample drops and executes generally from these locations.
          They should also perform regular backups of all critical information to limit the impact of data or system loss and to help expedite the recovery process. Ideally, this data should be kept on a separate device, and backups should be stored offline.
          The advisory cautions against opening attachments in unsolicited e-mails, even if they come from people in their contact list. “People should never click on a URL contained in an unsolicited e-mail, even if the link seems benign. In cases of genuine URLs, close the e-mail and go to the organisation’s website directly through browser,” the spokesman added.

People should follow safe practices when browsing the web and ensure that the web browsers are secured with appropriate content controls. They should also disable ActiveX content in Microsoft Office applications such as Word and Excel, disable remote desktop connections and employ least-privileged accounts. They should consider disabling PowerShell and windows script hosting if not required.
They should also restrict users' abilities (permissions) to install and run unwanted software applications, and should enable personal firewalls on workstations. Strict External Device (USB drive) usage policy should be implemented and Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit or similar host-level anti-exploitation tools should be installed.
He said that attachments of file types .exe, .pif, .tmp, url, .vb, .vbe, .scr, .reg, .cer, .pst, .cmd, .com, .bat, .dll, .dat, .hlp, .hta, .js and .wsf should be blocked and Vulnerability Assessment and Penetration Testing (VAPT) and information security audit of critical networks and systems should be carried out regularly.

----balbirsingh227@gmail.com

Another chance of personal hearing for students involved in UMC

CHANDIGARH, MAY 5
Haryana Board of School Education, Bhiwani has decided to give another chance of personal hearing to the students involved in the Unfair Means Cases (UMC) during the Secondary and Senior Secondary (Academic and Open School) Examinations held in March 2017.
          While stating this today, a spokesman of the Board said that such students could present their case before the committee constituted for this purpose at Board’s office on May 9, 2017 at 9:30 a.m.
          He said that district wise students were called at the Board’s headquarter on different dates from April 29, 2017 to May 5, 2017 for personal hearing before the committee. But due to some reasons, few candidates failed to appear. Therefore, while taking a lenient view, it has been decided to give another chance of hearing to these students.
===balbirsingh227@gmail.com

Haryana to purchase sunflower at MSP price

CHANDIGARH, MAY 5
The Haryana Government would procure seeds of sunflower at Minimum Support Price (MSP) of Rs 3,950 per quintal during the current procument season.
        This was disclosed in a meeting held under the chairmanship of Chief Secretary, Mr. D.S. Dhesi regarding procurement of sunflower in 2017-18, here today.
        It was informed in the meeting that sunflower crop is grown mainly in districts Kurukshetra, Ambala, Panchkula and Yamunanagar. The Central Goverment had decided the MSP of Rs 3,950 per quintal for 2017-18, and had made National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India (NAFED) the central nodal agency for procurement of sunflower. The Haryana Government has authorised Haryana State Co-operative Supply and Marketing Federation Limited (HAFED) for procurement of sunflower.
        It was also informed that HAFED has been carrying out procurement of sunflower for the last two years. In 2014-15, the produce was 32,100 tonnes, in 2015-16 it was 14,800 tonnes and in 2016-17 it was 12,500 tonnes. The Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare Department had notified the harvesting period of sunflower from June 1 to 15 and HAFED would continue its procurement till July 31. The guidelines for the procurement of oilseeds and pulses under the Price Support Scheme were issued by the Union Ministry of Agriculture.
        Others present in the meeting included Additional Chief Secretary, Finance Department, Mr. P. Raghavendra Rao, Additional Chief Secretary, Cooperation Department, Mrs. Dheera Khandelwal, Principal Secretary, Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare Department, Dr. Abhilaksh Likhi, Managing Director, HAFED, Mrs. Sukriti Likhi and other senior officers.
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Haryana Government promotes 10 Section Officers

CHANDIGARH, MAY 5
The Haryana Government has promoted 10 Section Officers to the post of Accounts Officers and also issued their posting orders.
        Simant Mangla, posted in office of District Education Officer, Faridabad has been posted to office of Director/Principal, Saheed Hassan Khan Mewati Medical College, Nalhar, against vacancy.
        Tulsi Dass, posted in office of Director General, Treasuries and Accounts has been posted to office of State Information Commission, vice Mrs. Reena Verma, Acounts Officers, proceed on long leave.
        Sunil Kumar, posted in office of Director General, ITI, Chandigarh has been posted to office of District Project Coordinator, SSA, Kaithal, against vacancy.
        Sunita Mangla, posted in office of Director General, Technical Education has been posted to office of Managing Director, HPGCL, Panchkula, against vacancy.
        Sunil Kumar, posted in office of District Primary Education Officer, Sonepat has been posted to office of District Project Coordinator, SSA, Panipat, against vacancy.
        Vishal Kharab, posted in office of Director General, Animal Husbandry, Panchkula has been posted to office of Principal Chief Conservator, Forest, Panchkula, against vacancy.
        Sunil Kumar, posted in office of Senior Town Planner, Rohtak has been posted to office of Chief Executive Officer, DRDA, Rohtak, against vacancy.
        Sudhir Shankar, posted in office of Transport Commissioner, Haryana, Chandigarh has been posted to officer of Secretary, Haryana Staff Selection Commission, Panchkula against vacancy.
        Dilbag Singh, posted in office of Xen, Panchayati Raj, Rohtak has been posted to office of Deputy Commissioner, Jhajjar, against vacancy.
        Sanjeev Kumar Jain, posted in office of Director General, Higher Education, Panchkula has been posted to office of Principal Chief Conservator, Forest, Panchkula, against vacancy.
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Haryana for amendment in Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966

CHANDIGARH, MAY 4
Haryana Vidhan Sabha today passed a resolution to request the Parliament to effect an appropriate amendment in the Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966 to provide for the creation of a separate High Court for Haryana within the capital city Chandigarh. 
          The resolution presented by Parliamentary Affairs Minister, Mr. Ram Bilas Sharma, was passed unanimously in the special session of the Vidhan Sabha.
          According to the resolution, while Haryana has completed 50 years of its existence as a separate State, a separate High Court has still not been provided for the State. During this period, the people of Haryana have suffered in manifold ways, including through delays in the disposal of their cases due to heavy workload in the common High Court. Presently, there are only 18 Judges from Haryana against a total sanctioned strength of 85. There are 13 Judges from Haryana under direct quota drawn from Advocates of the High Court, against a sanctioned strength of 23, leading to under-representation of the Advocates from Haryana.
          The Haryana Vidhan Sabha had adopted resolutions recommending the bifurcation of Punjab and Haryana High Court and setting up of a separate High Court for Haryana on March 14, 2002 and December 15, 2005.
          On April 22, 2017, Chief Minister, Mr. Manohar Lal, had urged Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi, to accord top priority to setting up of a separate High Court for Haryana during the ongoing Swaran Jayanti Year of the State.
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