Beasts caught in poisoning chain

Monkeys to dogs, animals in Tamil Nadu better watch out what they eat. It might be their last meal.

The state has had a bizarre run of poisoning deaths over the past few months, the latest being the disclosure earlier this week about a man who had killed 30 dogs in a Madurai village.

Well before Sivakumar, enraged at the death of his goat from dog bite, poisoned canines to death, nine monkeys had perished after eating toxic food in Dharmapuri around two months back.

While Sivakumar was fined Rs 20,000 by the panchayat and the sum handed out to the dog owners, little could be done in the Dharmapuri case, where 21 monkeys had to be treated at a nearby veterinary hospital. Sixteen were released into the wild later.

Wildlife officials had suspected that some villagers were behind the monkey deaths, perhaps because they saw them as a source of nuisance.

Some residents had claimed the unconscious simians were dumped by a van but few forest officials seemed to believe them.

Rush to pack off beggars

Hands folded, they begged last week — not for cash but freedom.

Around 100 beggars, including women and children, were picked up from the capital’s streets recently and produced before magistrates for being sent to welfare homes.

They were held as part of an anti-begging campaign, which was halted in March because of lack of civic officers.

“We picked the beggars from Connaught Place, Hanuman Mandir and the Janpath areas and sent them to welfare homes in Lampur and Kingsway Camp,” Delhi’s social welfare department director, S.K. Saxena, said.

As part of the crackdown, aimed at ridding the capital of beggars by the time the Commonwealth Games are staged in 2010, the mendicants were filmed asking for alms to ensure they didn’t deny the charge before judicial officers. (PTI)

Second metro link on track

Mumbai Metro’s second corridor will be built by a joint venture between a government firm and a private developer.

This link will connect Mankhurd, in the city’s south, with Kandivali’s Charkop, in the west, and cut through Bandra.

“We have decided to go ahead with the public-private partnership model for the Charkop-Bandra-Mankhurd line,” metropolitan commissioner Ratnakar Gaikwad said.

The decision comes close on the heels of the creation of the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation, on the lines of the Delhi Metro Rail Corp, for the construction of the project.

Union urban development minister Jaipal Reddy had recently announced the Centre would chip in with Rs 4,500 crore in viability gap funding — money to plug possible shortfalls in raising resources — for the Metro plan.

The first corridor, linking the eastern suburb of Ghatkopar to Versova in the west, is already under construction, being built by Mumbai Metro One Private Ltd under the public-private model.

In all, nine corridors are planned in three phases. (PTI).

Special cell

A special cell will soon be set up in the Karnataka government to promote the development of Bangalore.

Governor Rameshwar Thakur told a recent joint session of the Assembly that the cell would examine a host of matters, including ways to boost the city’s infrastructure.

According to the address, prepared by the new BJP regime, Bangalore’s municipal area has gone up from 226sqkm to 800sqkm but the growth had also generated problems.

MUMBAI: The Maharashtra Chamber of Housing Industry is organising Share Bazaar, a one-day workshop on the stock market, from 11am to 6pm. The venue is 12 K, Dubhash Marg in Fort, near the Bombay Stock Exchange. You can call 022-24442794 for more information.