YEH MERA INDIA

Worship mosquito & say 'no' to dengue !

Bokaro: The ward off dengue and malaria fever, people in Jharkhand’s Bokaro district are offering prayers to the ‘mosquito god’ to seek a shield against the life-threatening mosquito-borne diseases.

A big mosquito statue was installed at Chas a day earlier and a procession organised by devotees who beat drums and chanted mantras to appease the winged god. A priest recited mantras in the presence of hundreds of people and the statue was also garlanded and worshipped before the holy fire.

“Hundreds of suspected dengue cases have been reported in the district. The health department is yet to wake up. We have sought a shield from the ‘mosquito god’ and tried to appease it by installing a statute and worshipping it,” Rajendra Mahto, a district resident, told media.

Four people have died of suspected dengue in the district which has reported around 130 cases of high fever this season. The blood samples of the patients have been sent to Ranchi and the district administration was yet to confirm the dengue cases.

“There is no facility in the district to detect dengue. The government has failed to act in time to curb the menace,” said Poonam Sinha, another devotee of the ‘mosquito god’. 

Lapses in PF a/cs: wrong move by EPFO

New Delhi : Initiating an inquiry against employers for lapses in maintaining EPFO accounts would become difficult, with the retirement fund organisation imposing a time bar of seven years for such probes.

The norms, which were issued by Central Provident Fund Commissioner (CPFC) R C Mishra on his last day in office (November 30), seek to modify the provisions that often result in harassment of employers and establishments.

However, unhappy over the circular, the Trade Unions have decided to to press the government for its withdrawal. EPFO has over 50 million subscribers and manages a corpus of over Rs 3.5 lakh crore.

But, in a worker friendly move, the circular also sought to redefine the meaning of “basic wages” for the purpose of provident fund deductions.

It said: “All such allowances which are ordinarily, necessarily and uniformly paid to the employees are to be treated as the basic wages”. It did not, however, specify the allowances which should be included in ‘basic wages’.

According to the circular, the inquiry against employers can only be initiated after, “actionable and verifiable information,” is placed for consideration before the compliance officers.

The EPFO would also not take action against employers who fail to deposit dues of unidentified workers into the PF accounts.

“There shall be no assessment without identifying individual members in whose account the fund is to be credited,” the circular said. The employer, it said, would be required to make available online the complete history of the establishment for the benefit of compliance officers. The information to be provided should include the amount remitted and the number of employees engaged by the establishment.

Opposing the circular, trade union leaders have decided to press the government for withdrawal.

“This circular which has time-barred such inquiries is anti-worker and we would Lodge our protest with the Labour Secretary,” a EPFO trustee and Secretary Hind Mazoor Sabha A D Nagpal told media.

Doctor stops misleading ad 

New Delhi: A misleading television advertisement on a vaccine to protect children from severe gastrointestinal diseases has been withdrawn after a Delhi based doctor approached the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), complaining against the advertisement that was on air in July in two channels.

The ASCI agreed with the  complaint of Delhi-based community medicine professional Nalini Abraham and asked the vaccine’s manufacturer GlaxoSmithKlime (GSK) to withdraw the commercial after its consumer complaints council found merit in Abraham’s petition. In her complaint, Abraham said vaccines were prescription drugs which were not advertised in India. Moreover, the advertisement had misleading claims that vaccine was the only way to treat rota virus infections and reduced infections. Nearly 150,000 children die every year due to such infections.

The ASCI asked GSK to withdraw the spot after it was found that the company’s claim that the company’s claim that “vaccine is the only way to treat rota virus” was misleading. GSK assured the advertisement council that the TV commercial had been discontinued and will be modified appropriately later.  

The vaccine advertisement appeared at a time when GSK and its rival Merck were pushing their expensive rota virus vaccines in the Indian market, hoping for its inclusion in the universal immunization programme. While the cost-about Rs 1,000 for a two dose vaccine– remains an issue, an indigenous vaccine in the pipeline too. Independent doctors, however, questioned the government for permitting sale of these two vaccines without adequate trials. 

“It is surprising that these two vaccines have been approved for marketing in India by the regulators despite insufficient immunogenicity and absent efficacy data in Indian children,” Rakesh Lodha of AIIMS and Dheeraj Shah of the Guru Teg Bahadur Hospital reported in the journal of the Indian Paediatric Association. 

Jamiat-e-Ulema says 'NO' to Abu Jundal!

Mumbai: A Muslim NGO, the Jamiat-e-Ulema, Maharashtra which provides free legal aid to Muslim youths arrested in various cases on charge of terrorism across the country has refused to provide legal aid to Zabiuddin Ansari alias Abu Jundal, an accused in the Aurangabad arms haul case of 2006.

 Gulzar Azmi, secretary, legal cell of the Jamiat said that Ansari’s mother Rehana and maternal uncle had approached the organisation to provide legal aid to defend Ansari in the Aurangabad arms haul case 16/06 in the designated MCOCA court.

 ”We have rejected the application and will not be defending him. As a policy we do not provide assistance to any person with a criminal background. We offered legal aid to Faheem Ansari and Sabauddin in the 26/11 trial as we felt that they were innocent. The court acquitted them and even the Supreme Court upheld the decision. But in the case of Ansari, our legal team is not convinced of his innocence. Therefore, we have decided to reject his appeal,” said Azmi.

It is pertinent to note that, in the same case remaining 21 accused already benefited by Jamiat-e-Ulema, Maharashtra.

However, advocate Ezaz Naqvi is willing to represent Abu Jundal in the court.

Jundal, a native of Beed district of Maharashtra,  was taken into custody by Mumbai police after he was brought from Delhi where he had been arrested following his deportation from Saudi Arabia in June this year. He is an accused in the 26/11 case and Aurangabad arms haul case.

During 26/11, he had allegedly issued instructions to two terrorists holed up inside Nariman House, a Jewish outreach centre, during the attack from a control room set up in Karachi and his voice had been intercepted by the intelligence agencies.