TT: Kalimpong, July 8: The DGHC today announced a host of relief measures for the landslide-hit villages under Nimbong, Pabringtar and Singey gram panchayats. The landslides occurred in the villages under the Kalimpong subdivision on the intervening night of July 2 and 3, killing one person, damaging roads, destroying houses and snapping power and water supply. The measures include restoration of road links, repair of power lines and relocation of affected families. DGHC administrator B.L. Meena, who toured the affected villages today, told The Telegraph that some of the works had already begun and more would be started this week. Officials of the DGHC’s Kalimpong Engineering Division (KED), public health engineering department, irrigation department and rural electricity department were with Meena. “Four landslides occurred in Nimbong and seven at Borbat in Pabringtar. In all, 15-16 major and minor landslides took place in both the panchayats,” said Meena. He added that 12 landslides had hit villages under Singey gram panchayat. The restoration of road links is moving fast with the Nimbong-Bakrakote route being all but cleared of debris till Cfuikhim. “Only a short stretch of about 200 metres near Borbat has to be restored and that work will be over tomorrow,” said Meena. However, the forest road that begins from Cfuikhim is still in a shambles and he made no mention of that route. As a big landslide made many houses completely unsafe at Nimbong, families living there will have to be shifted elsewhere. “Seventy-eight families at Centre Gaon, Paila Line and Chhetri Jhora in Nimbong will have to be relocated. They cannot approach the road and they are almost cut off from the outside world,” said the administrator. In Nimbong and Suruk under Samtar gram panchayat, the irrigation department will carry out jhora protection work to streamline the flow of water. The estimate, Meena said, had already been prepared and the work would begin this week. Work on restoring water and power supply will also be taken up this week in all affected areas. “The villages of Longrap and Yelbong will be electrified as the people there demanded it,” said Meena. Meena also instructed the KED to prepare an estimate for constructing buildings for 11 primary schools under Pabringtar, Nimbong, Samtar and Yangmakum panchayats. Asked about the overall quantum of loss suffered, Meena said the Darjeeling district magistrate was on the job. The district magistrate, he said, had already submitted a report to the state government regarding the damage to the houses and would be preparing similar assessments of the loss of arable land and livestock.OUR CORRESPONDENT 
Nimbong village dotted with landslides that occurred on the intervening night of July 2 and 3. Telegraph picture
TT: Kurseong, July 8: The Gorkha Janmukti Morcha has called a 12-hour general strike in the Kurseong subdivision tomorrow, demanding the immediate release of its three supporters arrested for alleged assault on some GNLF workers yesterday.
The Morcha supporters have been also accused of ransacking the house of a Panighata-based GNLF leader Rajen Mukhia. The arrests were made after Mukhia filed an FIR. Posters came up in Mirik Bazar today demanding the “immediate and unconditional release” of those arrested.
Subba falls ill, in hospital
SNS: JALPAIGURI, 8 JULY: The Gorkha Liberation Organisation chief and the prime accused in the GNLF chief, Mr Subhas Ghisingh's assassination attempt in 2001, Mr Chattre Subba along with five others who were on a hunger strike in Jalpaiguri jail, fell ill and have been admitted in North Bengal Medical College and Hospital. Informing this Mr Subba's lawyer, Mr Akhil Biswas today said that Mr Subba is suffering from cardiac problem and malnutrition. “Mr Subba and the five others were on hunger strike for the past five days at Jalpaiguri jail. Mr Subba fell ill on 4 July and the jail authority shifted him to the North Bengal Medical College and Hospital. The others were shifted on 6 July,” Mr Biswas said. Pointing out that Mr Subba was in jail for the past eight years, the lawyer added: “He is over 70 and has a cardiac problem. He had been hospitalised in the past due to the ailment but this time his condition is quite serious. Moreover, he is suffering from malnutrition, which has aggravated the problem,” Mr Biswas said. Lamenting Chattre Subba's condition, his brother Mr Santosh Subba, said: “We are apprehensive about his health.” The SP Jalpaiguri, Mr Anand Kumar and the ADM (General), Mr NG Hira, both acknowledged Mr Subba's hospitalisation information. “We are monitoring the situation but can do little as it is a judicial matter,” they said.
Singhe, a lama or Buddhist priest, had been working in the Shakya Monastery in Kalimpong town.
He had visited two remote and underdeveloped villages - Hatiagola and Chepuwa - which have no roads and electricity and require five days walking from the district headquarters.
The villagers are mostly Sherpas, people of Tibetan origin, who are extremely poor and virtually illiterate.
Police said the yellow-robed Singhe had promised the villagers that their children would be educated in the Kalimpong monastery and returned home.
“There were 13 children with him,” Deputy Superintendent of Police Kosh Raj Pokhrel told IANS.
“We found the parents had little knowledge about where the children were being taken or what would happen to them. We also found Singhe did not have any document to prove his claim.”
The police official said Singhe came under suspicion due to his companion, a 17-year-old boy called Yunduk Bhote.
“Three years ago, some children were taken away from Chepuwa village and their parents were told they would receive education in the Shakya Monastery,” Pokhrel said. Yunduk was one of them.
“However, after his return three years later with Singhe, he did not show any sign of having received any education. He can speak a smattering of Hindi and English but he can’t either read or write.”
Both Singhe and the teenager have been kept under police surveillance in Sankhuwasabha.
Nepal’s Maoists allege that followers of exiled Tibetan leader Dalai Lama are luring away children from Nepal’s northern villages with the promise of educating them in India.
But they are in reality being `brainwashed’ to be the Tibetan leader’s followers, Maoist daily Janadisha said, an allegation that was rejected by the Dalai Lama’s government in exile.
The Indian’s detention comes even as a 42-year-old from India’s Darjeeling town, Biren Pradhan, is under trial in Nepal for the kidnap and brutal murder of an 18-year-old high school student.
Currently, there is mass hysteria in Nepal about child lifters.
On Wednesday, students blocked part of the Araniko highway linking Nepal with China in a violent protest after locals in Thimi town lynched four teenaged students, suspecting them to be child abductors.
Two of the students died in the assault Tuesday while two more have been seriously injured.
TT:MALDA, July 8: A mob tried to push a block development officer into the raging Fulhar in Bhaluka last night when he was negotiating for the release of an engineer who had been confined by villagers for nearly 10 hours. The engineer had come to supervise the anti-erosion work, which the villagers felt was an eyewash as strengthening of embankments should be done, not during, but before the rains. As drown-the-BDO-before-we–are-drowned rent the air and some villagers physically lifted Narboo Tshering Lepcha off his feet to be thrown into the river, some others came to his rescue. They snatched him from the clutches of the mob and smuggled him away to a house in the village from where he was whisked away by police. In the past 72 hours, the Fulhar, a branch of the Mahananda, had eaten into 600 metres of the embankment in Bhaluka in Harischandrapur II block. Cracks have also appeared in other parts of the embankment that borders the village. Yesterday morning, the villagers gheraoed the subdivisional officer and engineer of the embankment project, Salil Pal, when he went to oversee the anti-erosion work in Bhaluka, 50km from here. They kept him confined to a room from 11am to 9pm. When Lepcha, the BDO of Harishchandrapur II, heard about the gherao, he set out for Bhaluka. Lepcha’s arrival around 9.30pm made the villagers more angry. “What was my fault? Some people raised a slogan that before they drowned they would drown the BDO in the river. However, some others helped me escape,” Lepcha said. Forces from the Harishchandrapur police station then rescued the BDO and the irrigation engineer. The BDO lodged a written complaint with the police this morning. According to irrigation department sources, the Fulhar has been in spate for the past few days and the water has been passing barely a metre below the extreme danger level. The ferocity of the river has started severely affecting the left embankment. Massive erosion has been reported from Shankartola near Manikchak, 36km from here. “We have started introducing anti-erosion measures in these areas on an emergency basis,” a senior official of the Mahananda project said. Executive engineer of the irrigation department Biren Das said the local panchayat samiti had already sanctioned Rs 5 lakh to meet the immediate crisis. Sandbags are being used along the embankment. “We would soon start permanent anti-erosion work. Tenders have already been floated,” Das said. Secretary of Bhaluka Bandh Raksha Committee Suresh Chowdhury said: “We had been warning the irrigation department for more than a year, urging for early and permanent anti-erosion measures. But they did not listen to us. Instead they started work just when the monsoon arrived. ” Forward Bloc MLA from Harishchandrapur Tazmul Hussain said he had also briefed chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee on the grim situation when he had visited Malda last year. But that also did not work, he said. District magistrate Sridhar Ghosh said Rs 40 lakh had already been sanctioned to protect the Bhalukha embankment. The irrigation department has been entrusted with the job. “Throwing a BDO into the river will not solve any problem. Rather, the villagers should co-operate with the administration,” the district magistrate said.OUR CORRESPONDENT 
Villagers watch as chunks of the embankment disappear in the Fulhar in Bhaluka. Picture by Surajit Roy
GENERATING POWER FROM HAIR
Sabin Chandra Acharya, The Himalayan Times: KATHMANDU, JULY 7: Two 12th graders — Milan Karki and Harihar Adhikari — of Trinity International College in the Capital, have invented a new technique to tap solar energy.
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