555 villages in Rajkot district reeling under water scarcity
RAJKOT: About 555 of the total 868 villages in Rajkot district have been declared hit by water scarcity and the district collector will send a revised master plan to the State government about this. District collector K Shrinivaas called the district panchayat president, district development officer and water supply board officials to review the situation in the district. The work on the revised master plan may be finished on April 23 or 24. In view of the seriousness of the situation, the district water committee will meet at 5 p.m. every Monday.Savalia is new Rajkot dist BJP chief
Laljibhai Savalia was elected the Rajkot district Bharatiya Janata Party president on Monday. The State BJP sent a team to take the opinions of party workers recently. Morbi MLA Kantibhai Amrutia and Laljibhai were on the race for the post. Before becoming the president, Laljibhai was acting as the general secretary of the district BJP. The election should have been conducted some two or three months ago. Since the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections were announced at that time, election was postponed and Govindbhai Patel who was the previous president was asked to continue till a new president was elected. Savalia is a staunch RSS supporter and a law graduate.
New semi-luxury ST buses
Gujarat Road Transport Corporation's Rajkot division will introduce semi-luxury bus services in three new routes from May 23. A new bus between Rajkot and Dwarka will start from Rajkot at 5.30 a.m. and reach Dwarka at 10.30 a.m. On its return journey, the bus will start from Dwarka at 11 a.m. and will reach Rajkot at 3.45 p.m. The Rajkot-Porbandar bus will start from Rajkot at 11.30 a.m. to reach Porbandar by 3 p.m. The return bus will leave Porbandar at 4 p.m. and will reach Rajkot at 7.30 p.m. A non-stop bus from Rajkot to Ahmedabad will start at 1 a.m. to reach Ahmedabad at 5 a.m.
Pipaliya drinking water scheme
Gujarat Water Supply and Sewerage Board has sanctioned Rs 3 lakh for drinking water scheme in Pipaliya village in Jasdan taluka. A water tank having a capacity to store 30,000 litres of water, a 165 mm bore, a stand post and pipelines will be erected in the village, officials say.
Corporator on day-long fast
JAMNAGAR: Asgarali Kapasi, a young corporator of ruling BJP in Jamnagar municipal corporation on Monday resorted to a day's fast in front of municipal commissioner's office protesting against total lack of sanitation in Jamnagar city. Kapasi said that since sanitation and solid waste disposal services have utterly failed, the city was overflowing with filth and garbage creating health hazard for the citizens. He said that he had already served a notice to the municipal commissioner 15 days ago and had warned that if efforts were not taken he would go on fast but the civic authorities failed to clean up the mess. Meanwhile, Mayor Raju Sheth expressed helplessness and blamed the municipal commissioner who, he said, was supposed to enforce civic amenities.
SI in ACB trap
Arshad Aiyub Yakubkhan Sarvani, a sub-inspector of Bagodra police station in Ahmedabad district landed in an ACB trap laid on Friday while accepting Rs 10,000 as bribe from a petrol pump owner Nanubhai Popatbhai Algotar, of Bavla. According to ACB deputy director B C Bhatt, a driver who had come for filling on April 14 at Nanubhai's petrol pump near Bagodra, had filed a complaint with the police following an altercation with the pump employee Rajesh Prajapati. Sarvani allegedly came to the pump and slapped Prajapati and allegedly demanded Rs 15,000 for not booking him under PASA. He took Rs 5,000 but was caught accepting the final installment.
