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Kalimpong, May 30: The district consumer disputes redressal forum has directed the Kalimpong branch of the State Bank of India (SBI) to compensate the widow of a government servant for the loss of her cheque amounting to Rs 2,89,685.

In an order passed yesterday, the forum directed that Doma Lhamu Bhutia, a resident of Chest Clinic Compound here, will receive an interest at the rate of 9 per cent per annum till the date of credit of the cheque to her account. Besides, the bank has also been asked to pay Rs 500 for allied costs she had to go through. The forum comprises members G.P. Chakraborty and Jharna Mazumdar (Datta) and Dilip Kumar Basu, the president.

The forum delivered the verdict following a complaint lodged by Bhutia on September 4 last year, demanding more compensation from the bank for causing undue harassment and mental torture for 18 months, the period the bank took to pay her against the cheque that she had deposited with it. She had also said she was not satisfied with the interest rate of 5.2 per cent and had demanded that it should be 18 per cent. (more…)

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Kalimpong, May 28: Dr Graham’s Homes here is sailing into uncharted waters by opening a BPO academy on its school premises.

To function from a renovated cottage on the sprawling Homes campus, the academy will provide both theoretical and practical training in business processing. Top companies, like HSBC, Acclaris and Databazaar have agreed to send resource persons for the courses.

According to David Foning, the bursar of the school, it has always been the dream of the institute to start higher institutes of learning. “We believe the hills have a tremendous scope for growth in service sector industries like IT, IT enabled services, retail and hospital. This is our attempt to tap the potential,” he said.

To begin with, about 60 trainees — each to be charged a course fee of Rs 15,000 — will be selected for a three-month training programme, which will start from August. The process of selection has already started. “The applicants should have at least passed Class XII and have a good command over English,” said Foning.

On completion of the course, the students will be awarded internationally recognised certificates. “All successful trainees will be offered jobs by the participating companies at a monthly salary of Rs 10,000 to 12,000 on condition that they will work there for at least 18 months,” the bursar said.

During the training, the trainees will be provided with personal computers with multi-media software. A special language course will also be held.

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Gurung in uniform

Kalimpong, May 27: Army jawan Narendra Gurung, who hailed from Mangbol bustee near Alainchikhop here, was killed in a gunbattle with terrorists in Kashmir yesterday.

The 27-year-old rifleman was part of the 2/8 Gorkha Rifles currently posted in the Poonch sector.

The death, however, was what Gurung had always wanted. As an emotional uncle B.H. Subba recalled: “Narendra used to say that when he died he would ensure that his body came draped in the Tricolour.”

Besides Subba, who brought him up, Gurung is survived by his newly-wed wife Anita and his father H.N. Gurung. The couple was married last February and he was here for the last time in April.

“When he last called us up on May 14, Narendra said he was trying to get leave sanctioned so that he could pay us a short visit, but that was not to be,” said Subba.

A former soldier in the British army himself, Subba, however, said the mounting casualties in Kashmir do not augur well for the government. “How many more will die before the Kashmir problem is resolved?”

The news of Gurung’s death was conveyed to the family a little after 4 pm yesterday. The army station could not provide details of the circumstances leading to his death.

“His body will arrive by flight tomorrow. The junior commissioned officer accompanying the body will be able to fill in the details,” said an army officer.

Gurung’s family members said his body will be kept at Mangbol bustee overnight and the funeral will probably take place on Tuesday.

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The clock strikes 11 on Thursday morning. Picture by Chinlop Fudong Lepcha

Kalimpong, May 24: At the stroke of 11 this morning, the clock atop the Raja Dorjay tower at Kumudini Homes here began chiming again, breaking a 25-year silence.

A number of people, including former students and teachers of the school, were at hand to witness the formal inauguration of the newly repaired clock. The unveiling also coincided with the annual school day celebrations of Kumudini.

The initiative to repair the clock was taken by the Kumudini Pariwar, the school’s alumni association, following reports in the media in the middle of last year about its deafening silence. The association had launched a fund-raising drive in the Kalimpong subdivision as well as in Sikkim and the neighbouring countries of Nepal and Bhutan.

The clock was eventually repaired by two Chennai-based companies — India Clock and Sion, and Tools and Engineering Company — at a cost of about Rs 2 lakh in one-and-a-half months. The clock was originally installed at the tower by another Chennai (then Madras) firm, Ghani and Sons, in the mid 1950s.

“The restoration of the clock, though a long time coming, is a boon for the people of Kalimpong,” said local MLA and an alumnus of the school, Gaulan Lepcha, who played a leading role in the fund-raising drive. T. Lachungpa, an ex-student of Kumudini Homes and former minister of Sikkim, called it “a big achievement for the school” and promised to help in all such future endeavours that the school plans to take up.

With the Kumudini clock now alive and ticking, the focus could now shift to the 100-year-old clock atop Georgina McDermot memorial tower at Dr Graham’s Homes, which has been silent ever since it was damaged in an earthquake in 1968.

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Kalimpong, May 23: The news of the death of mountaineer Pemba Doma Sherpa has shocked her close acquaintances and in-laws here.

The 36-year-old climber died in an accident while climbing down from Mt Lhotse (8,516m) in Nepal on Monday. She had summitted the peak — the fourth highest in the world — earlier in the day. The accident happened above the 8,000m mark.

The two-time Everester was the “daughter-in-law of the hill town”, having married local boy Rajen Thapa. While Thapa is a resident of Atisha Road, near 8th Mile here, Sherpa hailed from Namche in the Solukhumbu district of Nepal. (more…)

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Kalimpong, May 21: World Vision, an NGO, here has decided to add some music to the life of poor children in villages bordering the hill town.

Today, the NGO took the first step towards realising its goal by donating musical instruments worth around Rs 70,000 to residents of Taren, around 5km from here, and its surrounding areas. Overjoyed with the gift of nine violins, three guitars, a synthesiser, a bass guitar, a congo and a drum set, the children are ready to start their lesson in Western classical music in June.

At a small programme held to mark the official launch of the Music Learning Centre, local MLA Gaulan Lepcha said: “When I was a child, I had always dreamt of going to such a school. This is a dream come true for me.” Lepcha is a keen guitarist and can be seen strumming the instrument once in a while.

To begin with, the music centre will function from a small room of the local primary school, where the programme was held today. “We eventually want to have a building of our own. Some villagers have already offered to provide land for the music centre,” said Uttam Kartak, the coordinator of World Vision. (more…)

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Kalimpong, May 14: The flora and fauna of the Kalimpong hills will soon be captured on film.

From tomorrow, the wildlife division II of the forest department will start the visual documentation of the Neora Valley National Park, spread over 88 sqkm in the upper reaches of the Kalimpong subdivision, an exercise to be conducted for the first time.

The national park is situated over one of the oldest reserve forests in the country, with its northern boundary running contiguous to the forests of Sikkim and Bhutan.

The documentation team, headed by Tapas Das, the divisional forest officer (DFO), wildlife division II, includes a group of photographers from Calcutta. “Given the difficult terrain, the exercise will take us around seven days. This, of course, will be the first phase. We will again conduct a similar activity in winter,” Das told The Telegraph. (more…)

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Kalimpong, May 9: Milk producers in the hills, under the banner of Himalayan Farmers’ Front, have urged Darjeeling MP Dawa Narbula not to accompany a delegation of Himul workers to a meeting with chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee.

The delegation comprising members of the Intuc-affiliated Himul Employees’ Association (HEA) is expected to discuss with Bhattacharjee the various ways and means to revive Himalayan Milk Producers’ Union Limited (Himul).

The Hill Employees’ Union, another body of Himul workers (not producers) affiliated to the GNLF, has refused to be a part of the team. (more…)

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Kalimpong, May 8: The Sisters of St Joseph of Cluny, Province of North India and Nepal, will celebrate the bi-centenary of the congregation at St Joseph’s Convent here on May 11 and 12.

Representatives from various parts of the province are expected to attend the two-day event. Archbishop of Calcutta Lucas Sircar will be present on the first day, which will see Eucharistic celebrations, a Festival of Faith and Taize prayer.

On the second day, an inter-faith prayer meeting and other events will be organised in memory of the Blessed Anne-Marie Javouhey, the founder of the order. “May 12 marks the foundation day of our congregation,” said Sister Teresa, the provincial of Cluny Sisters, North India and Nepal.

Blessed Anne-Marie Javouhey and eight others founded the Institute of Saint Joseph of Cluny at Cabillon in France in 1805, though it was eventually recognised in 1807. The Cluny Sisters first set foot in India at Pondicherry in 1827.

Apart from running institutions like St Joseph’s Convent and St Philomena School in town, the order has also adopted eight villages in the interiors of the subdivision, providing education and healthcare.

As part of the bi-centenary celebrations, the Cluny Sisters took up two major programmes in the last few months, one involving people with HIV/AIDS and another catering to victims of child labour.

“We also plan to provide education to at least 200 needy children in each of our institutions across the province over the next few years in consonance with President A.P.J Abdul Kalam’s call to make India literate by 2010,” said Sister Teresa.

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Kalimpong, May 7: The Congress MP from Darjeeling, Dawa Narbula, has raised the problems faced by workers in tea gardens and cinchona plantations in the Parliament.

Narbula has demanded stringent measures against managements found violating the Plantation Labour Act, Factories Act, Payment of Bonus Act, Industrial Disputes Act, Gratuity Act and Employees’ Provident Fund Act.

A recent workshop on exploring alternatives in closed and abandoned tea gardens held in Siliguri also suggested changes in the legal and institutional instruments governing the brew industry.

Narbula had blamed the Bengal government for the plight of the workers at the cinchona plantations in the Darjeeling hills.

“There is a huge demand for cinchona and other medicinal plants, but the government is doing nothing to tap the market,” The Congress MP told The Telegraph over phone from New Delhi.